The Last time I sat enraptured of, for me, one of the top two musical stories gaining Ecstatic Reverence, I sat directly under the falling chandelier! I've traveled to Canada three times to see The Phantom of the Opera! Quite exhilarating to be enthralled with what my eyes were watching, perhaps, the Masquerade scene on stage... but slowly a sound draws my eyes directly over my head... (BTW, Jesus Christ Superstar is my other lifetime favorite... both versions for separate reasons)
Ok, I have never used so many words of joy and happiness for one piece of music as brought to me through The Phantom of the Opera by Andrew Lloyd Webber...on stage. The movie was great, but you really cannot grasp the inclusion of being in an audience where mist is rising before you...and you feel as if you are in front of the stream where a small canoe comes out of that mist...
And so it was a thrill as I started reading Echoes of a Song by A. L. Butcher... For, you see, I had not yet made the connection when I was notified that I had won an audible copy of this book... So, I immediately downloaded the ebook as well. But, could it elicit my earlier joy...?
I've referenced the genre Fan Fantasy Fiction, which I have seen used by some writers to show that it is fiction based upon the characters of a fictional story. In case any of you enjoy reading this type of writing. If so, then I suggest that this one is a must-read for all Phantom Fans! Let me tell you more...
Perhaps for many of you who read this book, without knowing anything about the historical fictional background, you will instantly be pulled into a family drama like no other... A mystery of, perhaps, murder, betrayal, or, perhaps, just madness? Or of secrets known but never spoken about? Or, perhaps, like it was for me, a feeling of satisfaction? A closing of an ending to a story that was not what you wanted for the original story? I'm sure you could guess my preferred ending... Butcher did not disappointed! I loved this book!
But, more, for me, since I KNEW this story, even as I read... So, I was also invested in considering which of the original scenes had brought forth this, or that, particular twist of the overall plot... I found myself studying, reading, then having flashbacks to the Phantom... Who was singing this song and in what scene that would have brought forth these haunting words I was now reading. It was a truly fascinating occasion that the author had brought me into!
Echoes of a Song claims Raoul as its main character. Readers enter into his later life ... He has been married and now has three children. Charles, Meg, and Kristina...
Most of Raoul's life, after marriage, has been full of flashbacks... not of events... but of the music--the words--he had once heard and which now plays over and over and over in his head... It is the song, Angel of Music... And others...of his wife singing... But... I began to wonder, was it really just in his head?
His beloved wife, Christine has died in childbirth...
And...it...begins...
Christine! How could he not remember her?! She had sang to him, saying, "Think of Me..." Now, with her gone, how could he still continue to hear her, saying the words, but, never, ever to be sung by her sweet lips. Those lips, those words--Christine's beauty which he had loved from the first second his eyes touched her. Now, never to be able to touch, to kiss, to hold her in his arms... Raoul's loss of his wife was devastating...
But, his desolation was not just his alone. But his children found no warmth and comfort from the only parent they now had. Even, as Charles, the oldest child cried out, Raoul was listening...to...the...music...
Raoul, Comte de Chagny thought back to those years which now seemed so distant. He recalled the night he had asked Christine to marry him. On the roof of the opera house, she had seemed so happy and yet so afraid. He remembered her fears; he thought she was being foolish, believing the superstitions of old man Daae. He remembered the voice he had heard that night and the music he had heard in the graveyard – a voice which had captured his very soul, yet in his youth and jealousy knew it not. At least not then. He had followed Christine, afraid for her safety and envious of this mysterious patron who had her in his thrall. No one on earth could play like that, should be able to play music of such terrible, haunting beauty. She had stood, enchanted, her angel’s voice rising in song and matched by another, equally marvellous. A duet the like of which he had never heard. Raoul had thought to approach her but found he could not. He had nearly frozen to death as the snow fell, but Christine had barely noticed. Then he had seen him... this man Erik, this creature she loved, and he swore to save her from the monster he was. Christine and Raoul played at being engaged; at least she saw it as a game, he with his heart bursting. It was but an innocent game of young love that had become so dark, so cursed by the death that had surrounded them all. He believed that this monster had murdered his brother, and had nearly killed Raoul himself, had he not been saved by Christine’s compassion. Her compassion: to spend her life with a monster, a murderer, merely to save him. This man, this freak of nature who haunted the deep realms of the theatre — Once, so Raoul had learned this man, this creature, had been caged but even then he could feel no pity. The distorted face which lay beneath the white mask, the horror of which he had seen in Christine’s eyes, still haunted Raoul. Erik, this phantom, was a mad genius of music, of magic and illusion, and the dark seducer of an innocent girl. A girl like Christine – naive and simple – had fallen deep beneath his thrall.
It was a woman's sharp voice that pulled Raoul from his memories...but drifted away again, only half listening...
Raoul provided for his family but could not help but feel that Charles was indifferent to his presence. The boy’s face would visibly light up whenever he saw his mother; he would never smile at his father, although until his mother’s death he would crave his approval, perhaps far more than he should.
After Meg was born, Christine seemed at times also indifferent to Raoul’s company. He no longer saw love in those ocean blue eyes; fondness, perhaps, and even an element of pity . . . but not love. He was “dear, sweet Raoul.” She had loved him with her body and, for a while, her heart. But soon he became aware that she did not love him with her mind, or her soul. Those he knew belonged in the past, and to another. Raoul adored Christine and believed he had forgiven her for her ‘foolish infatuation’. He loved her for her voice, her kindly spirit, and for their children, but sometimes knew that he was alone in his love. She became ill shortly after Meg’s first birthday, a slow progression of weakness; the doctors were unsure of any cause. Raoul himself believed she needed rest and sun. She would be stronger by the summer and so he took them away, to places of warmth and joy, but the melancholy and the creeping sickness refused to abate. She would often sit alone, or with her son, in the gardens, singing quietly to herself and Charles, or reading the tiny, gilt-edged book that she loved so much. Soon after Charles’ fifth birthday, various items began to go missing. At first, they were mainly small, attractive items such as jewellery. Later, clocks and a music box carefully dismantled had appeared in Charles’ room. He was fascinated with mirrors and would remove the backs of them to ‘see where the face lived.’ It had become an obsession, and forbidding it simply made the boy more cunning, more deceitful in his game. Raoul had first dismissed it as a childhood whim. Christine had said nothing, just smiled sadly at her boy and at Raoul. And so, it continued, unspoken, another topic not discussed between them. As the months and years passed Christine became ever more distracted and ever more distant. The silence grew ever larger between them. ***
In the dim light of Charles’ room, Raoul saw his son curled up on his bed, arms around his sister. Both fast asleep. Charles had a book clutched in his delicate little hands, and his dark hair lay across his pale face in the darkness. Silver moonlight crept in, highlighting their faces with a strange glow and the shadows left them with mask-like faces. Raoul started, he’d seen such an aetherial countenance before. “Trick of the light,” he told himself. Raoul stared at the sleeping children. He could see none of himself in the boy. Meg was his; she had his eyes, his round face, and his smile. Kristina resembled her mother more each day; it tore his heart apart to look at her. But even she had the de Chagny nose.
And finally hearing his son's terrible words...
Charles turned those haunting, haunted eyes to his father. “Papa, why has God taken her? Why does he hate us so? Is there never to be any happiness in this house now she is gone?"
But happiness and joy slowly faded... The youngest Kristina was the next to die... Was their truly a curse on this family...?
I have tasted new words, but I yearn to know more... Will the curse ever be lifted. Is death the final time when the Angel's music is silenced? I am imploring the author... Please continue this series...
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