It's a big slab of a book, but I didn't notice, as I was lost and away with Cal in Wonderland most of the time, and I was almost sad to finish it. The central conceit of a magic carpet, and the wonders it contains is a great one to hang a fantasy on, and this is indeed fantasy, albeit one with a grotesque edge of horror, particularly in the villains, who are among the nastiest in fiction. It's a masterful piece of work, full of Barker's vision, parts of it poetic, other parts showing off his visual imagination to the full, and all of it grounded in the character of Cal Mooney, lost in the lights of a vision of something he doesn't understand, but knows that he needs. I got more out of it this time round, reading it in a solid chunk over two days. It's a surprise any of it stuck with me at all really, but I found on rereading this weekend that large chunks of it were there in my memory, flickering lights, raptures as Barker describes them, seductions and visions of elsewhere to make your heart break. I first read WEAVEWORLD back in the late '80s just after it came out, and did so while on a boat trip around the Chester area on the Shropshire Union canal, so it was an episodic reading experience, punctuated by working locks, taking in scenery, and visiting a huge number of pubs.
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