The Shadow Glass follows Jack Corman, the son of a film director who is famous (but like cult movie famous) for a 1986 all-puppet fantasy film. A hero and visionary to the film’s fans, Jack’s childhood growing up with his father Bob, was way less magical than anything that happened in the movie. But now his estranged father is dead, and Jack sees a way to get himself out of debt (or start to) by utilizing his access to his father’s collection of film memorabilia, by selling pieces of the collection. Except he has to return to his childhood home and collect said memorabilia- easy right?
Well, no. Plans go awry when upon returning to his childhood home, Jack quickly finds things have started to get magical. Full-on magical, as in puppets from the movie have come alive magical. But it is not just the heroes from his father’s film that have come to life, the villains have as well. Now Jack has got to team up with some uberfans of the movie, his estranged cousin, and characters from the movie to save Iri (the land where the action in the movie took place) and also save Earth. All the while grappling with his history with his father. No biggie.
An all-puppet fantasy movie from the 1980s seems to me to scream that it has been inspired by the Dark Crystal, and maybe it is. Confession: I am an 80s kid, but I never saw that movie all the way through. I got scared and made my dad turn the movie off. I did get some Labyrinth vibes, mostly because there is a Labyrinth quote at the start of the book and because when it comes to 1980s movies that were mostly inhabited by puppet movies, that one made more of a mark on me.
I enjoyed the obvious care and attention to detail that went into the world-building and made The Shadow Glass seem like an actual movie. Each chapter has an excerpt from some in-universe media—be it transcripts of YouTube videos of convention appearances by one of the characters, movie reviews of The Shadow Glass DVD release, or entries from fictional movie guides about the movie. It all helped to flesh the world out, flesh out the backstory, and make the fictional movie seem real.
I also enjoyed the concept behind this—I am here for movies coming to life! I am here for epic quests to save the world, and I enjoyed that the main puppet but now alive protagonists are creatures called Kettu, which are anthropomorphic foxes. As the aforementioned 80s kid growing up, one of my prized possessions was a VHS with Disney’s Robin Hood tapped from TV. So envisioning Robin and Marion from that come to life? Great!
But (you knew there was a but coming right) it just didn’t quite click for me. The book does raise the stakes, and there are very real consequences for the characters who join Jack for his quest, but I was just not invested in the characters. I found the supporting characters to be kind of drawn in very broad strokes, and I didn’t care much for our hero/protagonist, Jack. While there are some creepy villains, and they do present a very valid threat, I just found myself not invested in seeing the characters attempt to throat their evil plan.
Honestly, I found myself racing through chapters so I could get to the “extras”. I wanted to read more about the history of this fake movie and read the excerpts from the script. In the end, I wish I could have seen the movie The Shadow Glass or at least read a novelization of it. I think it speaks to that feeling, that as far as the main narrative went I was more interested in seeing characters interact with The Shaodw Glass fandom and fans. That, along with those extra bits gave me the most enjoyment.
