Chalcedony hills and opal oceans

Years ago I read this attractive Pushkin Press paperback which, unusually for a 19th century novel, comes with no introduction or footnotes. The publisher's website provides a brief summary of this 'little known' 1864 novel by George Sand, translated by Sue Dyson: While working in a small geological museum, Alexis Hartz meets his cousin Laura, who has discovered a way to enter a geode. Travelling through a vast and glittering landscape of brilliant crystals, Alexis falls passionately in love with Laura. But when they return to the ordinary world, only friendship remains. He yearns for the perfect world of the crystals, and returning there becomes a perilous obsession. I am fascinated by the idea of crystal landscapes, maybe because J. G. Ballard's Crystal World was one of my favourite books as a teenager. Here I thought I would extract some sentences from an early part of the book describing what Alexis is shown by Laura, and provide some appropriate illustrations. I was with Laura in…