Klett-Cotta's Press Material for Die Zitadelle des Goldenen Bären, translated by Hans J. Schütz:

Once you have read this novel, you’ll see your house cats with different eyes

There are few authors who have created a fantasy world that is fully without precedent. Tolkien is one of them, Mervyn Peake is another. And Tom La Farge.

 The white citadel towers over a mighty port city, the exchange point for wares, the gathering place for honest folk and riffraff. Beyond the curved port, the desert begins. There the barbarian race of Thoog live – stately lizards with plump tails who keep birds as mounts. No one from the city gets mixed up with them. Except in times like these, when the riches of the city have attracted enemies. A bandicoot has observed that on the edge of the wilderness, bears are gathering. Unlike the honored citizens of the city, they are not brown or black bears, and unlike the patriarchs of the citadel they are not golden; rather, these bears are the color of blood. And they are enormous.

Into this situation of great danger burst Edgar and Alice, who want to visit their uncle Claudio – a prudent, soft-brown-colored bear who is mayor here. Their lust for adventure leads them deep into the labyrinth of the thousand-towered city, into the quarter of the insect-people, who toil as load-bearers, to the Clowncats and the traveling pandas, who play music and dance for a small fee. That is, until the two adventurers fall into a trap, and come to understand the diabolical plan of the crimson bears.

Tom Lafarge has written a novel for all the senses: the symphony of smells and sounds; unseen colors; the pandemonium of harsh, tender, mumbled, chirped, purred, meowed speech; the multitude of inhabitants (bandicoots, porcupine-butlers, cynical cats, furry salamanders); and the splendor of the bears’ salons. The overwhelmed reader finds him- or herself in a swirl of impressions and would do good to let go and enjoy the ride – an exciting adventure awaits.

Reviews of Tom La Farge’s “Die Zitadelle des Goldenen Bären”

"This highly unconventional fantasy story plays out in the delirious atmosphere of a labyrinthine nightmare city. Interspersed with defamiliarized human ur-problems like the upper-class vs. the underdogs, the eradication of unworthy lives, and so on – and with distinctive characters and sensuous, ornate dialogues, including exquisite verse epics – it is a world of its own, in which one plunges as into another Iliad. Very vivid and thrilling."

-- Buchmarkt M1997

"...Something remarkable about the author’s storytelling is his architectural imagination. The descriptions of the labyrinthine buildings of Bargeton are almost endless. One moves through houses of exuberant mannerism, a mixture of Piranesi and Hundertwasser above and beneath the earth. A subtle, tender humor is expressed in the depiction of Antony, a grumpy porcupine-butler in the pay of the bears, and in the description of the Clowncats.

"These Clowncats, who have fallen so far as to become good-for-nothings, live in the ruins of their once magnificent quarter. The arts they had once mastered have been long forgotten.

"Unlike conventional fantasy epics, there is no real happy ending here. Certainly, the war comes to an end in Bargeton, and reconstruction can begin. But it’s clear to Edgar that the former opponents will continue to maintain their animosities. One can also read this novel as a parable of the downfall of cultures. This is no ideal fantasy world, but rather intelligent fancy, as is cultivated in the Anglo-American world."

-- I. Sperl, Culture-Parable (Der Standard, Vienna, 10.17.97)

(translated by Joshua Wilkerson)