The Shadow Glass

By: Josh Winning

Narrated by: Colin Mace

Josh Winning’s debut horror-fantasy, The Shadow Glass is Dark Crystal meets About a Boy in London, a race against the clock to stop bloodthirsty puppets from taking over the world.

Jack Corman is failing at life. Jobless, jaded, and on the “wrong” side of 30, he’s facing the threat of eviction from his London flat while reeling from the sudden death of his father, onetime film director Bob Corman. Back in the '80s, Bob poured his heart and soul into the creation of his 1986 puppet fantasy The Shadow Glass, a film Jack loved as a child, idolizing its fox-like hero Dune. But The Shadow Glass flopped on release, deemed too scary for kids and too weird for adults, and Bob became a laughing stock, losing himself to booze and self-pity. Now, the film represents everything Jack hated about his father, and he lives with the fear that he’ll end up a failure just like him.

In the wake of Bob’s death, Jack returns to his decaying home, a place creaking with movie memorabilia and painful memories. Then, during a freak thunderstorm, the puppets in the attic start talking. Tipped into a desperate real-world quest to save London from the more nefarious of his father’s creations, Jack teams up with excitable fanboy Toby and spiky studio executive Amelia to navigate the labyrinth of his father’s legacy while conjuring the hero within - and igniting a Shadow Glass resurgence that could, finally, do his father proud.

In The Shadow Glass, Josh has created a genre-bending adventure infused with the nostalgia and horror of Stranger Things that will appeal to the '80s kid in everyone. Both subverting fantasy tropes and paying homage to them, Jack answers the question, what happens when Bastian from The Never Ending Story grows up? Probably a lot of therapy. At once laugh-out-loud funny and taking a candid look at the complex nature of grief, the listener will root for Jack to defeat his demons, both literally and figuratively.

©2022 Josh Winning (P)2022 Recorded Books

Thoroughly Fantastic

This book was made specifically for us 80’s babies who remember the wild magic of films like The Neverending Story, The Dark Crystal, and Labyrinth.

The narration was gripping, emotive, and conveyed the action and suspense as required for the scene. The story overall was surprisingly touching and heartfelt too.

This was very much well worth the experience, i couldn’t recommend The Shadowglass enough!

Narrator makes this great

I was entertained from the first sentence
some things were drawn out and overly cheesy but the basic story was a fun fantasy and ultimately the ending not predictable
Jack and his gang were likable.
Jack is an anti-hero who is frustrating and cowardly for the first half of the book and slowly gains maturity.

80’s Fantasy Movie Homage

Absolutely perfect. Great homage to films like The Dark Crystal, the Labyrinth, and The Neverending Story. Absolutely loved it.

Interesting premise with a confusing start

I had to listen to the first chapter twice. The audiobook is so well done that I initially thought this was about a real movie from the 80s!

I enjoyed the plethora of 80s references as the story progressed. The story was a bit formulaic at times (of course the thing the MC sold is the key to everything), but still was an enjoyable listen.

It had a bit too much "ugh my life is tragic" from the MC for my tastes.

gremlins meets the dark crystal

So, I started this because it was described as a horror fantasy novel. If you consider Gremlins to be horror, then sure. Except that Gremlins is more of a comedy with darker elements, and this is basically the same. Nothing really feels menacing at all, and the main character is a 30 something idiot stuck in his teenage angst years, mad at daddy.