William Mayne has devised a kind of dialogue in which the character speaks principally to himself, to clarify some facet of his personality for his own benefit. His children are surprisingly articulate but leave much unsaid. The possibilities for ambiguity, for private interpretation, are endless here, but the device is used also to project unequivocal feelings and uncertainties…. In Earthfasts … the author's concern with psychological effect is everywhere apparent: he has got inside the characters who are confronted with a variety of phenomena, in order to express more explicitly their efforts to extend conventional definitions to accommodate their experiences of the supernatural…. The author's explanations are entirely convincing; his reordering of "natural" events has in it a matter-of-fact quality and controlled tension which combine authoritatively. Everything is worked into this book; legend, superstition, a "scientific approach", psychological detail, a surface interest, a powerful evocation of scene; and everything...