Erik and Wonderland

By Lara Biyuts

“Erik and Wonderland,” by Lara Biyuts, is about a boy, who wanted to go to Wonderland, and he came there. But Wonderland of his strange adventures differs from that in other books. During his wonderful quest, he meets a lot of queer entities, and finally his stay in Wonderland influences, in some extraordinary way, the world where he lives in reality. The author pays homage to all the fairy-tales heard in childhood, with the author’s profound respect mingled with love and devotion to the book Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Lara Biyuts
• Release date: Nov 2, 2020
• ISBN: 9780463827635

Lara Biyuts

Lara Biyuts (aka Lara Biuts) author of 14 books of fiction, writer of the RevueBlanche.blogspot, collage maker for her bookcovers, translator, who signs her translations as Larisa Biyuts. Her novella A Handful of Blossoms is 2012 Rainbow Awards Honorable Mention. Her works are accepted for anthologies: Cat’s Cradle Time Yarns (Time Yarns Anthologies), Authors off the Shelf (Lazy Beagle Entertainment), Of Words and Water 2014 (Words and Water group supporting WaterAid), Hope Springs a Turtle, The Black Rose of Winter, and Greek Fire (Lost Tower Publications). Her old tale and poems are featured on TheHolidayCafe.com (2013). Her poetry is on the monthly eJournal The Criterion (April, 2014). She is a Goodreads librarian.Her novel La Lune Blanche is the first of the series. "The novel is the world where pleasures of life and pleasures of art are just norms." (Turner Maxwell Books)“The author produces a setting which is detailed and believable, and also characters which the reader gets to know well. Also the plot moves along nicely through-out the story.” (April O., facebook.com)“Lara Biyuts’ writing is deep and multi layered.” (Maggie Mack Books, maggiemackbooks.com)“Lara Biyuts comes to us from the great tradition of Nabokov and Conrad, enriching our literature in English with the rich cosmopolitain perspecitve of the East European tradition leading back to Tolstoy and Dostoyevsky. Like those great masters she takes us also into the shadow world of sexuality with its hidden psychology, possession and sensual revelations.” (Robert Sheppard, Author of the novel Spiritus Mundi, linkedin.com)“The secret of Lara Biyuts is her tales. The secret of her tales is their charm. The secret of the charm is Lara Biyuts.” (Les Hudson, goodreads.com)Favorite quotes:“Follow me, reader! Who told you that there is no true, faithful, eternal love in this world! May the liar's vile tongue be cut out! Follow me, my reader, and me alone, and I will show you such a love!” (Mikhail Bulgakov)“Cowardice is the most terrible of vices.” (Mikhail Bulgakov)for emails: larisabeeATyahooDOTcom

Book preview

Erik and Wonderland

by

Lara Biyuts

SMASHWORDS EDITION

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PUBLISHED BY:

Lara Biyuts on Smashwords

Erik and Wonderland

Copyright 2015 by Lara Biyuts

Smashwords Edition, License Notes

This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to Smashwords.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

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Erik and Wonderland

The dusky hour, favourable to conjurations…

(William Beckford. "Dreams,

Waking Thoughts, and Incidents")

A deer with a cherry tree on the head. Blazonry.

(Lara Biyuts)

Chapter 1

Lonely Larch

Once upon a time there was a boy who read the book Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland. The book was recently released, and many children of Britain read it. The boy lived outside Britain and yet he read the book too, as many children on the Continent.

Nothing special about the boy, not really; unless he had heard a lot of tales from his nanny. The tales were as old as the nanny herself, or older, and the book about Alice was recently written by the contemporary writer, therefore, there was a vague hope of a possibility that Alice was a real girl, as old as the boy, and the boy loved to think that the brave girl had been in the unearthly place where life was full of surprises at every turn; it was pure entertainment, a perpetual fun, or a series of riddles and games as the boy’s father said talking of the keynote of the book. Knowing a lot of stories of brownies, the boy’s nanny was about to tell tales of Dreamland and what happened at hours when humans slept, but the boy didn’t want the tales; the boy wanted to know more about Wonderland; the boy wanted to go there, to return and to tell about all he saw there.

It’s a pity that Wonderland is somewhere near the centre of the earth! he said to his nanny one day when they were alone in the nursery.

Why to go through the earth to see Wonderland? Some people reach it when going on foot, Nanny said.

On foot? Not in one’s sleep? Where there is Wonderland? How far way?

Ever so much far away. One can reach Wonderland, but the way is too long.

How many days?

Years, not days. Many humans went there, but nobody returned.

Why?

Died on the way, maybe. Nanny sighed and proceeded with her knitting.

The boy thought that he was right, believing that there was something else about Wonderland which the author never told. I wish you, Nanny, to go along with me!

I cannot reach it, for I am too old. You cannot reach it, for you are too young.

I bet I’ll reach it!

Nanny shook her head, Your mother won’t let you go there.

I can go without her knowledge. I am young, I have time to reach Wonderland and return.

You can return as an old man.

Which direction to go?

To the sunset. Sometimes, right after sunset, one can see Wonderland. A piece of a view of Wonderland. They say that somewhere overseas there is a highest mountain with a bird’s-eye view of Wonderland, possible once a year.

Once a year!

Alas. Listen to my tale, boy. Nobody loved Amanita the Mushroom, many shunned him, and insects attacked him, though his smell was not strong and he looked beautiful in his red cap strew with white spots. Amanita the Mushroom thought that the point was his exterior and he decided to change it. He went to the Fairy of the Forest, told about his problem and asked her to remove the white spots from his cap. The Fairy was kind and conscious, and she did what he asked. Now, with no white spots, Amanita the Mushroom looked much like a common red-capped scaber stalk. He loved his new look much, but it was autumn and very soon Amanita the Mushroom was found, placed in a basket and took out of the Forest. A human ate up it and fell ill, and Amanita the Mushroom himself ended his days much sooner than it was to be by his nature. Nanny paused and then she added, The best is oftentimes the enemy of the good.

The boy said again, Once a year…

Far in the day, the boy went to the garden, took a ladder and placed it to the tallest tree of the garden, the centuries-old larch-tree of the name of Lonely Larch. He was good at climbing trees, yet the old tree was so tall. Now, from the old tree, one could see much, far around the house in the vicinity of the Village Horse Bog, the land where the boy’s family came down for the summer.

Green stripes of fields, water-meadows, the silvery serpent of the Ezorva River, yellow fields, the dark woodland in the blue distance, and the windmill on the right. The windmill turned sails looking like a bird. A green dell was between the woodland and the windmill, going far away, where a blue mist conjoined the dell with the blue sky and the sun went down below the horizon.

Not long till sunset. The sun seemed enlarging, reddening and pulsing. A moment more and a half of the reddish disc remained seen; the smoky-blue mist in the dell turned pink; the windmill’s sails shone against the dark blue sky; then, the sunshine disappeared, only a soft glow lingered upon the verge of the landscape. Settling on the bough tightly, the boy watched the soft, even glow at the point of the sun’s disappearance.

Wonderland was said to be there. Holding on the tree, the boy sought to be unwinking, and there, something unusual started. The glow began pulsing, and a vision of a long deep purple lake appeared in its midst.

A white sailboat; pearl-white heights with golden peaks; a white tower mirroring in the lake; a dark forest behind the heights; the forest went far into grey and dark blue clouds… All the objects became now clearer, now vague again, creating some subtle waves