The tale is brilliant! It is full of weird imagination, marvelous writing, horror, beauty, and it may well be called the most "visual" book ever written for the world of fantasy. It is a grand book with a grand cast of characters. Visualize, if you are able, a monstrous head that cries tears of gold, locked deep in a cavern out of time forgotten. Consider also the incredible, Snake Mother, who is both human and reptilian, and her battle with the thing called the Lord of Evil.