The Pharos Gate / Felines of New York
Issue No. 125
THE PHAROS GATE: GRIFFIN & SABINE’S LOST CORRESPONDENCE
The Pharos Gate: Griffin & Sabine’s Lost Correspondence
by Nick Bantock
Chronicle Books
2016, 60 pages, 8.2 x 8.2 x 0.8 inches
The lovelorn nostalgia and mystical voyeurism of an extraordinary correspondence return in the latest edition of the Griffin & Sabine saga, The Pharos Gate. This is the seventh book in the bestselling series by Nick Bantock and it brings several questions about the unusual love story to a satisfying end. As you might recall, Griffin and Sabine share a peculiar connection through their mail and art that seems to allow them to transcend space and time. As they fall deeper in love, danger looms and they are forced to dodge and hedge around the globe in an attempt to unite. Bantock disappointed some fans by leaving the fate of the lovers somewhat ambiguous at the conclusion of the third book and then launching a new storyline in the fourth book surrounding another unlikely pair of sweethearts. The ultimate fate of Griffin and Sabine remained tantalizingly mysterious until last month with the release of The Pharos Gate. Readers will finally find the answers scrawled in between the lines of the missing letters as Bantock revisits correspondence that has eluded us for more than a decade.
Perhaps in answer to the frustration of fans, this latest edition pays particular attention to recreating the feel of the first books. Fascinatingly strange, juxtaposed images of Egyptian gods and sketches of animals mingle and crowd the pages. Quaint envelopes stuffed with carefully lined type or flowing script anchor the story in art that seems to come alive in your hands, with pages that contain crossed out words and ink blots. You’ll catch clues in the images that align the story with the previous editions and provide new context for the puzzling mystery that the correspondence seems to allude to but never openly discusses. Each page is fashioned with a careful, adept hand that seeks to draw the character’s souls through the marriage of art and words, weaving them together across the continents and oceans. By the time Griffin and Sabine reach The Pharos Gate, you’ll be right there alongside them, clutching their love letters in your hands and gazing open mouthed at the beauty of a conclusion that has always been as inevitable as their unlikely love story. – Kaz Weida
HUMANS, MAKE ROOM FOR FELINES OF NEW YORK!
Felines of New York: A Glimpse into the Lives of New York’s Feline Inhabitants
by Jim Tews
Simon & Schuster
2015, 240 pages, 7.4 x 9.1 x 0.7 inches (softcover)
A beautiful book with glossy pages, the photographs of the myriad cats in Felines of New York are as diverse as the cats themselves: single portraits that occupy a single page, several that spread across two, working cats, attentive cats, cats ignoring the photographer – all are portrayed. Lolo, a silver tabby in Park Slope, is quoted as saying, “For me, showing love is more about what I won’t do than what I will do. For example, if I love you, I won’t shit outside your bedroom door.” Jeddy, a cat from the Lower East Side, tells us, “My grandparents immigrated here from New Jersey with nothing, and now I have this box. I wish they could see me. They’d be like ‘How the f— did you get that box? We never had a box.’ But I don’t know, the box kind of showed up and so I sat in it.”
Author and photographer Jim Tews takes snapshots of the cats he encounters in New York – both feral and community cats, as well as those that live with human owners. From the purebred to those with dubious origins, the photographs are beautiful portraits of cats in their habitats, and short interviews provide insight to their lives. So curl up with your cat and enjoy this book! – Carolyn Koh
Books That Belong On Paper first appeared on the web as Wink Books and was edited by Carla Sinclair. Sign up here to get the issues a week early in your inbox.
07/7/26
