Imajica was my first Barker book and one of his most complex.
As for his works, I'll treat them superficially.
Overview:
The Books of Blood Volumes 1-6 - an excellent starting point; six small books of short stories. Most of them metaphorical and ultimately grim.
The Damnation Game - a Faustian novel about a man who sells his soul and hires a bodyguard to save him when the the other half of the contract comes to collect
Cabal - filmed as
Nightbreed it involves a man frames for murder who dies and looks for the city of Midian; the city of monsters.
The Hellbound Heart - a wonderful novella which was filmed as
Hellraiser which explores Faustian pacts.
Weaveworld - another world, stitched into a carpet, is unravelled across the English city, Liverpool.
The Great & Secret Show -
The First Book of the Art, a war across America by the forces of Good and Evil as they seek to control a second world linked to Earth via dreams
Everville -
The Second Book of the Art, a continuation on
The Great & Secret Show - it's more fun read its predecessor first to get an idea of what this one is about.
Imajica - where Earth is just one broken link between four other worlds and the time for a possible reunification is almost upon us. It has religious tones and memorable characters.
The Thief of Always - childrens' book where a boy visits a summerhouse where the four seasons occur every day.
Sacrament - his most biographical work, I believe, in that it features a homosexual in a coma, dreaming of his childhood, and coming to terms with all the things that have made him who he is. One of my favourites of his works.
Coldheart Canyon A Hollywood ghost story about a famous actor who undergoes plastic surgery to remain young but, after the operation is botched, he retreats from his adoring public only to find the further secrets of Coldheart Canyon, the area his house is in.
Incarnations and
Forms of Heaven - Barker was, originally, a playwright and his fiction was something he started doing as an aside. These two books contain six plays between them, covering a wide array of topics, from his early days.
The Abarat - the first book of his childrens' series that Disney spent millions buying off him (he actually sold it before he'd written it by inviting Disney to a warehouse where he showed 400 paintings he'd done and told the story to them by using the art as his narrative). It involves a bored girl skipping school and ending up in the Abarat, a strange world of 25 islands where every island is always one hour of our day. (Yes, my maths is correct ;p )
Galilee - an epic romance between America's famous dynasty (think Kennedy) and a family whose roots and existence is based in myth.
The Essential Clive Barker - If you can find this in a library, take it off the shelf and dip into the small extracts of his works. They'll certainly give a better idea of his ability.
As an aside, Douglas E. Winter wrote his biography,
The Dark Fantastic.
My personal preferences are
Imajica,
Sacrament, and
Galilee and I do like to return, every now and again, to
The Books of Blood.
The best thing about him is that he has evolved rapidly from
The Books of Blood to his latest in that, although his work still contains fantasy elements, he has shed the horror tag completely. Somebody, really, should tell the bookshops though.
