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Katherine Rundell is a very talented writer, with a lyrical sensibility and the ability to find new and surprising ways of describing both the worlds she creates and the characters that inhabit them. That’s a rare gift. So I was excited to hear of a new fantasy series from her. However, I can’t say that Impossible Creatures has completely won me over. It feels a bit made to order. Ursula Le Guin’s geography; C S Lewis’s talking animals and mythical beasts; Philip Pullman’s combination of magic and technology, as well as his erudite literary references � it’s all there, combined with an ecological message. It makes for a rich mix, but perhaps a little over-rich for me. There are so many characters and so much description that I found it hard to entirely lose myself in the story. Intense and ornate but not entirely compelling.