Cinegraphic.net, an avant-garde film/video blog, has the first chapter of their upcoming book Two Women and a Nightengale available for free download. Cinegraphic. net says:

Part fantasy, part word-play, the fragementary narrative comes alive when read aloud.

This collage novel follows the classic format: images culled from nineteenth century sources, painstakingly rearranged and reassembed into entirely new, seamless tableaux.

This is the first chapter from the novel, complete with Betancourt’s artwork and story. It is a riff on Ernst’s 1926 painting “Two children are menaced by a nightengale,” taking up the story years later from were Ernst left it.

The story chronicles the adventure of Rose, her sister Marcella, the insane landscapes they travel through (including a sea where mothers drown their naughty sons), and the eponymous Nightengale on their way to the Moon.

The sheer lunacy of the tale is accentuated by the strangeness of the images.

The tale features magical mops, flying fish, and mocking sea turtles. And plenty of mind-bending imagery, like the image at left. And yes, that’s a wolf’s head on that little girl’s body, trying to force her way through an elaborate gate (with fire?). Delicious!