I am a fan of Alan Garner.
I read Boneland when it was published in 2012. I remember it well thirteen years later, or at least all the elements of Ursula le Guin's review.
In Treacle Walker Garner builds on a theme from the Owl Sevice; the main protagonists are players in a repeating pattern, though perhaps this story promises a progression or even breaking out of the cycle.
Garner goes further than Boneland in his lack of explanation, and linguistic challenge. All of the characters have their own individual dialects, and are only just mutually intelligible.
The dialect portrayed is not known to me so the language of the main protagonist is a hard to grasp as that of the mythic characters.
I find the book memorable, thought provoking, but ultimately annoying; I don 't read to be stirred up but to learn, I am not sure that Alan is trying to teach.
