Book Review: Dance of the Dwarfs

  

Book Review: 'Dance of the Dwarfs' by Geoffrey Household

 

 

4 / 5 Stars

‘Dance of the Dwarfs’ first was published in the UK in 1968; this Penguin Books paperback edition (257 pp.) was issued in August, 1979. It was one of more than 20 novels written by the UK author Geoffrey Household (1900 – 1988). Most of Household's fiction was in the suspense and spy thriller genres, but a few titles ventured into science fiction and horror. 

According to IMDB, a low-budget 1983 film, shot in the Philippines, titled Jungle Heat, starring Peter Fonda and Deborah Raffin, loosely was based on Household's book. The reviews of the film are not complimentary (".....this puddle of cinematic up-chuck.....").

'Dwarfs' is set in Colombia in 1966. It opens with a Preface regarding the death of Dr Owen Dawnay, a British agronomist who ran an experiment station in a remote region of the country. While his death reportedly occurred at the hands of Marxist guerillas of the Colombian National Liberation Army, his diary has been recovered from the ruins of his home, and this diary sheds a different light on his demise. The novel then launches as a first-person narrative derived from Dawnay’s diary entries.

Dawnay is revealed in his unfolding entries to be something of an eccentric ‘Mad Dogs and Englishmen’ character, with a keen interest in the ecology and fauna of the great South American tropics that lie within a day’s ride of his estancia. It is on one of his excursions into the jungle that Dawnay spies something very intriguing: bobbing up and down among the foliage are what appear to be ‘dwarfs.’

The area cattlemen, and Dawnay's Colombian mistress, are adamant that venturing into the jungle, even in the daytime, is taboo:

 

Now that we understand each other, promise me you will never go to the trees !

 

And when it comes to the 'dwarfs,' or duende,

 

It is forbidden to speak of them.

 

Despite these warnings, Dawnay is fixated with determining what sort of entity the ‘dwarfs’ are, and in so doing, puts himself into great danger. 

I won't disclose any spoilers, but I will say that ‘Dwarfs’ is an interesting mix of adventure and horror story. I found the novel to be slowly paced at its outset, but as you get further into the narrative, the plot gets more and more engrossing. Author Household does a capable job of positioning the reader as an over-the-shoulder companion to Dawnay's forays into the strange and unsettling immensity of the Colombian landscape, a landscape that is as much a character in the novel as the human participants.

 

(I do caution those who might be interested in reading 'Dwarfs' to be wary of other online reviews, as these give the plot away.)