The Ghosts of Heaven by Marcus Sedgwick

A bold, genre-bending epic that chronicles madness, obsession, and creation, from the Paleolithic era through the Witch Hunts and into the space-bound future.

Four linked stories boldly chronicle madness, obsession, and creation through the ages. Beginning with the cave-drawings of a young girl on the brink of creating the earliest form of writing, Sedgwick traverses history, plunging into the seventeenth century witch hunts and a 1920s insane asylum where a mad poet's obsession with spirals seems to be about to unhinge the world of the doctor trying to save him. Sedgwick moves beyond the boundaries of historical fiction and into the future in the book's final section, set upon a spaceship voyaging to settle another world for the first time. Merging Sedgwick's gift for suspense with science- and historical-fiction, Ghosts of Heaven is a tale is worthy of intense obsession. @goodreads

MY REVIEW:

https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/1333199427

Ok, that was one strange book. I'm not even sure what I want to rate it. I thought two of the four stories were ok. My favorite being the lunatic asylum and the astronaut. I finally saw how all of the stories weave together, but I'm still not sure how the spirals bring them together.

Anyway, this was just a strange little journey that I did enjoy even though there were some bad things happen in each of them. And the lunatic asylum sounds so familiar, it's like I read it before, which is strange. Oh no! Maybe that is my spiral... I digress.

I think everyone should just read this book on their own and make the decision to whether they like it. It's one of those that you can't just reach a conclusion in my opinion. Maybe I'm just not smart enough to see it with the spirals. You will see connections to the stories though, that much I did see. And if you just look at them as stories and not trying to figure out this spiral thing, then I think you will enjoy it more.

I must say the lunatic asylum had me very disturbed at the way they treated people. I mean, we all know how bad it was back in the day by reading about it, but it's still hard when you read them in stories knowing these things actually happen.

All-in-all I enjoyed this little read and I think everyone that wants to read it should just read it because you really need to make up your own mind on this one!

Fin!   3 Stars