9 posts tagged “br: fantasy”
I've just finished reading Yume no Hon: The Book of Dreams by Catherynne M Valente. This little novel is about a hermit-woman called Ayako who lives in the shadow of a five-layered pagoda on the side of a mountain, and dreams up other selves and existences.
Yes, this is one of Valente's "weird ones", in the best possible way that a story can be weird. As usual her poetic prose is richly sensual, thick with wonderful images, and the ideas she weaves into the story are just as wonderful -- Oedipus and the sphinx's riddles; quantum physics (which, yes, I can wrap my head around); the fall of Troy and of her village at the same time; a Babylonian creation myth that becomes her own story of creation/reshaping. And more, of course.
I want to know what could have been spun from the lumpy black silk... perhaps I already know.
I shan't share the true beauty of this novel, the line near the end that brought a smile of sadness and happiness to my face -- that lesson is there, waiting, for the interested to learn, and I shan't spoil it. Suffice to say that this is a beautiful, moving tale, one that shall stay with me for a very long time, and I highly recommend it to any reader who (a) was intrigued by my review (obviously; I aim to intrigue), and (b) wants something very different to what they'll find on a high street bookshelf.
Minor point of interest: The book
comes in two cover-colours -- red or blue -- with a small variation in
the texts of each. Mine was actually the blue one, but the
amazon-vox connection only gave me the red one.
I think I have been bitten by the Short Story bug. A year and a half ago, I had never written anything shorter than the opening chapters of novels. Just over a year ago I wrote my first short story - MCFUTURE - a work-inspired piece that, I'll be the first to admit, is far from original but was brilliant fun to write, though now I consider the quality of the writing rather sub-standard. Not long after that I wrote my second short story - FLIGHT - based on a reaction I'd love to have been able to give to my boyfriend's snooze alarm.
I was very proud of myself. Two short stories! I uploaded them to fictionpress and left it at that.
Then, earlier this year, I wrote STATUES for the Writers of the Future Contest and, while that story was 16k and definitely has more to be told, I think it started something. Because I have since written A SHADE OF YELLOW, TANSU, THE BEAUTIFUL COLLECTION and EMPIRES AND GLASS, as well as three short-short pieces (less than 1000 words, one of them less than 100 words) and a few more shorts-in-progress.
The latest addition to the menagerie of short fiction is A FAY OF STEAM, a steampunk fairytale that I'm writing to send to Cabinet des Fées. It's set in the city of Retyelnen, in which A SHADE OF YELLOW takes place, and is set before that story.
In all honesty, I quite like this bug. Not only will it hopefully net me some publication credits, but I've found that writing short stories is brilliantly fun. I can play around with different ideas that aren't developed enough to become novels, or that I don't have time to develop into novels, and with different narrative styles (like present tense and first person) that I wouldn't use in a novel. So bite on, dear bug!
.....And what is it that can distract a good bug? Only a good book, and I have found one in the wonderful The Orphan's Tales: In the Night Garden by Catherynne M Valente. How good is this book? Let me tell a story:
Today I decided to finally get my arse in gear and head on over to the British Library to register, because a book I need to read is there and I'm sure I'll find it a useful resource for the rest of the year. It's about an hour's round trip from where I live, via the London Underground. When I reached the BL, I discovered that you required both proof of identity and proof of address, and I did not have the latter. I had wasted an hour. Normally I would be viciously pissed off at this, but not today. Another hour spent on the Underground meant another hour reading Catherynne M Valente's book. No other book has made me enjoy wasted time to quite that degree.
The book is about a strange girl who lives in the Palace Gardens, shunned by the court. A daring boy approaches her and she begins to tell him stories - fairytales, with stories within stories within stories, woven together and told in Valente's wonderful lyrical prose. It is an absolutely fantastic book, a feast for the imagination.
Read the opening - HERE!
Read her short story The Maiden-Tree - HERE!
Read her short story Bones Like Black Sugar - HERE!
Catherynne M Valente is a fantastic author, and I heartily recommend everyone to buy In the Night Garden.
I was drawn to this book because of this post, comparing Temeraire to Eragon and remarking upon the fact that, although they both have the same basic premise of "our hero finds a dragon egg and the dragon that hatches becomes bonded to him", the execution is SO different. Temeraire (known as His Majesty's Dragon in the US) is basically the Napoleonic War with dragons. Our hero, Laurence, is a captain in the English Navy. They attack a French ship, find an egg on board and realise it's close to hatching. Laurence makes his officers draw lots to see who'll get it, but when the dragon hatches it goes for him rather than the guy who drew the short straw. He names the dragon Temeraire, and has to go away for training in the Royal Air Corps.
What makes this book noticeably different from the other dragon books I've read is that it really was a short straw. Eragon thinks getting a dragon is cool, even though it leads to his uncle's death; in Anne McCaffrey's Pern books, getting a dragon is a great thing for all the viewpoint characters who have one. But here, Laurence is annoyed. It means he has to leave the command he loves, he can't marry the woman he wants and his position in landed society is lowered. I really felt sorry for him, and hoped everything worked out okay. I couldn't give two shits about Eragon.
Laurence is a brilliant character. Naomi Novik really exemplifies the art of showing and not telling - she doesn't need to tell us that Laurence is intelligent, generous, a good leader of men, and at times flawed. She shows us. Temeraire is also well rounded and interesting, with his own quirks; and the relationship between the two of them is very charming. By the end of the book they care for each other, love each other (no, not *that* way); it feels like a relationship between two equals, between two interesting people who have bonded on a very deep level. When the Air Corps try to take Temeraire away and give him to a better candidate rider, both he and Laurence are really upset; when the Corps realise this seperation won't work, and they are reunited, the ensuing scene was so sweet. Novik manages to make the relationship touching, never cheesy.
The other characters are also individual - they are people, not cardboard cutouts designed to fulfill certain roles (mentor/love interest/gruff companion) *coughPaoliniyousuckcough*. There are no 'roles'; obviously Laurence and Temeraire are trained, but there is no mentor figure, nothing like that. Just people.
The setting feels very realistic to this history student. Sure, I don't specialise in the era, but nothing felt out of place. It felt like a real world. From what I can tell, the development of the war parallels history; despite the dragons' presence, the outcome is the same. One reviewer on amazon didn't like this; for some reason he/she expected the dragons to be a tool to change history. I prefer the parallel. Guess this could be a personal preference.
What really brought this all together, making the book such a fantastic read rather than just an excellent one, was Novik's writing style. The words flow off the page like a gentle stream. Even when the characters speak with a formality suitable to the era, it feels natural. It's amazing.
Do I have any complaints to voice? Well, one: In the final battle, Temeraire saves the day by using a never-before-seen ability. It's a bit too much of a Deus ex Machina for my liking; but, hell, I could live with it. It didn't make me annoyed, like deus ex machinas normally do; I just felt it could have been done a bit better.
That aside, this was a brilliant read. I heartily recommend it to all fantasy fans and also to anyone who wants to dabble in fantasy but doesn't want hardcore specfic. A resounding 5 / 5
(Cross-posted to __fantasynovel and my LJ account)
I recently picked up Devices and Desires by KJ Parker. It looked interesting enough - the protagonist is motivated by revenge, not 'the greater good'. Upon reading, I learnt that he's an engineer (and a good one, thus an intelligent man) who thinks in long-term schematics. This obviously means he could realistically concoct a decent revenge plan. Well, that's good.
The other characters are interesting enough. Valens started out as a whiny teenager, but the book quickly cuts forward to him as a shrewd political leader, so that's good too. Orsea, the Duke of the other country is a reluctant leader, brought into rule unexpectedly by a reasonably sensible political system - basically, the Duke had only daughters, who can't rule (why not?), so one of them must marry the future ruler. But to avoid a massive civil war between the powerful aristocrats, the husband is chosen from among the lesser aristocrats. Thus, Orsea was not raised for the role like Valens and isn't as sensible. The culture that the engineer comes from is interesting: a technologically advanced society for the setting that maintains a strict monopoly on its knowledge.
I'm a bit worried by the romance between Valens and the wife of Orsea, particularly as Valens spent a few pages going on about how their relationship isn't love, because that's all political; instead it's a kind of friendship; but it was so border-line angst, and I fear there will later be a scene where he sings joyfully about how it *is* love after all! The answer to the first question on this worries me too.
But I could just about stomach a corny romance if everything else was good.
I'm 148 pages into this 700-page tome and, frankly, it feels like pushing through a quagmire. She just goes on... and on... and on... Take, for example, this paragraph:
"It took a little longer, maybe the time it takes to eat an apple, for the rest of the committee to realise what had just happened. Nobody said anything, of course. It wasn't the sort of thing you discussed, except in private, two or three close colleagues talking together behind locked doors. In politics, it's what isn't said that matters. The fencers say that you never see the move that kills you; in politics also. It appears out of nowhere, like goblins in a fairy-tale, but once it's happened you start to smell of failure. People who used to look at you and see the next director of finance or foreign affairs start turning their speculations elsewhere, and the brief hush when you enter a room has a different, rather more bitter flavour." (Any typos are mine)
Stop it already! Please!
I personally think the bits I've put in italics could be cut without ruining the meaning. In fact, it would be better without them. And this is the kind of thing she does, this labouring of a point when a few lines would do the trick.
And what is with the second-person? Maybe it's just me, but I hate the damn thing when it's used in this talking-to-the-reader tone.
Worse than that, though, is the length of her paragraphs. That above is about half of the paragraph; the other half should be seperated because the subject changes, but no, it's all one. And ALL her paragraphs are like this unless it's during dialogue. One paragraph was more than a page long. It hurts my eyes to read that much, especially when half of it's irrelevant.
What this book needs is the sweet, sharp touch of an editing!axe. Trim out the waffle, slice up those paragraphs. But because KJ Parker is now a Successful Author, the liklihood of anyone other than the author doing this is quite low. To be fair, I haven't read any of her other works so I don't know if the problem is a new one or it's always existed, but now she's successful there's little chance of it changing. Because if there's one thing I've noticed in the writerly world, it's that Successful Authors can get their own way. Laurell K Hamilton is one fine example of this, and while KJ Parker is FAR better than the lady of Sue!pr0n, the same disease is rearing its head.
I don't know if I'll finish this book. But I am definitely putting it aside for a while - perhaps I'll read The Snow Queen by Joan D Vinge next, or continue reading the Lady Snowblood manga series (inspiration for Tarantino's Kill Bill, and very cool). It's not that I don't enjoy heavy prose. Some of the books on my shelf, waiting to read, are Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell and Gormenghast. What I don't like is un-necessary weightiness, when the book is bogged down by ponderous content. I had the same problem with Tad Williams' Shadowmarch: it was damned interesting but should have been at least half the length, and I'm halfway through with a vague intention of going back to it someday.
Blergh. I want to continue Devices and Desires, I want to know what happens, but I'm put off by the thought of wading through the quagmire to get anywhere. Pick up the axe, lady!
Cleolinda Jones condenses ten blockbusters into hilarious 15-minute (or, in the case of LOTR, probably a bit longer) parodies. My personal favourite was Star Wars Episode 2, but they all had me laughing. This book's definitely worth checking out, just as bit of humorous, light reading for when you don't have time to read something more serious and in-depth. If you liked this, or want a flavour of her style before buying the book, check out her online parodies. Troy and V for Vendetta made my sides hurt.
My rating: 5 / 5
The book is set at the end of time, a decadant future where the few remaining humans possess the power, created by their ancestors, to do precisely what they want. There are no more technical innovations because everything has happened in the past; rather, they spend their time having fun, shaping parts of the world to suit their tastes, and collecting menageries of time travellers, aliens and prominent people from history.
Jherek Carnelian is one of these people, unusual for having been born the natural way but otherwise totally normal. That is, until he decides that he is going to fall in love with a time traveller from the late Victorian era, Mrs Amelia Underwood. He has to travel through time, witness the end of time and learn a heck of a lot before, at the end of the book, they are together.
What I like about the romance in the book is that it felt realistic. Mrs Amelia Underwood, a proper Victorian woman, refuses to succumb to Jherek's advances because she knows she should return to her era and be with her husband - even though she doesn't particularly like the guy. She doesn't instantly love the decadance and immorality of the end of time (they slept with anyone - Jherek tells her he slept with his mother first because she was the closest), but resists it right til the end. It made her a far more believable and interesting character. Jherek, meanwhile, has to understand the full range of human emotions, and comes to realise that love isn't a game. At the end, I felt they deserved to be in love, that they had been through enough and come to respect and understand each other enough to earn the label 'love', unlike in some books where a bit of bickering, a hug and some passionate sex means twoo lurve.
At times the book was a touch too silly for my tastes, but overall I really enjoyed it. It's definitely worth reading as a taste of something a little bit different.
My rating: 4.5 / 5
Bellis is a fantastic character. As someone I know said, the prose doesn't present her with a resounding chorus of 'you must love this woman'; on the contrary, I wouldn't fault anyone for disliking her. She's frigid, cold, sullen, hates Armada and everyone in it, and is used by two characters for plots that she only realises the truth of after they've occurred. Though she distinctly isn't, it feels like she is driving the plot because she thinks she is. She's gritty and real and one of the best characters I have ever encountered.
The other characters are great too. The Lovers are totally fucked up, Uther Doul is probably one of the deepest, darkest assassin-type characters ever written, Tanner Sack is less interesting (in my personal opinion) but no less real, Shekel is kinda cute, and so on... As for the plot - well, that's fucking awesome. I won't say any more on it, so as not to ruin it for anyone. This book is a testament to everything that the fantasy genre can be but usually isn't, and I recommend it to everyone who's sick of the usual clichés and wants to experience what fantasy should be like.
A resounding 5 / 5
Ganking the amazon summary: "In New York, 1893, society portrait painter Piero Piambo is feeling jaded, endlessly subordinating his art to capture the likenesses of the nouveaux riches. Then comes a commission he cannot refuse. He is offered a fortune to depict the mysterious Mrs Charbuque, but is not allowed to see her."
To gain an impression of her likeness, he asks her questions about her past. She helped her father examine snowflakes for portents of the future, until he found a pair of identical snowflakes and gave them to her. They whispered visions of the future to her, and she became the Sibyl, relating those visions to others from behind a screen. At one point she married, but she wouldn't allow her husband to see her and this eventually drove him into a murderous rage. His return to New York complicates things somewhat for Piambo, as a series of strange murders spread through the city.
At times the narrative style was a little too heavy and rambly for my taste, but overall it did the job well despite being the dreaded first-person. The plot is little more than already described, though there's a good twist at the end. I found the narrator (Piambo) likeable enough: I understood his dilemnas and approved of his ability to make mistakes when he should have known better. All in all it was an interesting book.
My rating: 4.5 / 5
Having recently moved into a new house, Coraline decides to go exploring - and finds a doorway into a strange likeness of her house with a sinister Other Mother who wants to be her real mother. With the help of a black cat, Coraline must free her parents from the Other Mother's snare.
The fact that this is a children's book did not detract from my enjoyment fo it. The plot is simple but effective, the delivery is good, the characters are interesting. In fact, I think the delivery is perhaps Gaiman's most effective. He often has a slightly simplistic style, and in a children's book it worked really well whereas in his adult books it occasionally grates on my nerves. I think my only complaint about the character of Coraline is her awareness that children want what's not best for them - that, in my opinion, is a very mature awareness. Her age is never given but I assume it's in the region of 8 or 10; I don't think children that age possess that kind of self-knowledge. But other than that she acts her age, so I can forgive her that one fault.
A brief, enjoyable read: 4.5 / 5
A typographical error produced the word 'Alsiso' and a bunch of authors were invited to create short stories around that word. Obviously the genres vary, though the majority of them are fantasy/scifi. And, as with any short story collection, there are some that I thought utterly fantastic and others that I struggled to finish.
My favourites are one where a woman must get pregnant in order to locate precious metals, one where an expedition to another planet meets an interesting fate to the background of 'alsiso' birdcalls, one where the word 'alsiso' has been tucked away in historic paintings, one where saying the word will result in a hideous death, and a few others I can't quite recall right now. I also liked KJ Bishop's brief one about the word's passage through history. In all, this was an interesting collection, and worth getting if you're into short stories or fancy a change of pace.
My rating: 4 / 5
A darkly fantastical story, The Etched City is a prime example of the wonders the fantasy genre can yield when the writer isn't afraid to do something new.
I was drawn by the cover and by an except on the back: "Have you seen a
split cranium, growing flowers like a window box? I saw that, a mere
hour ago." Also, I admit, after the publisher Tor gave me the
wonderful The Carpet Makers I wanted to see what else they've been publishing lately.
I wasn't disappointed. Though at the beginning I had no idea
where the plot was leading, or even what the plot was, by the end I'd
been drawn completely and utterly into the weird and wonderful world
depicted within these pages.
It begins
with Raule, in the desert. She bumps into an old associate,
Gwynn, and together they flee the desert and their enemies to the city
of Ashamoil. There things get weird. Gywnn, you realise, is
the main character, though Raule's story continues to be told in the
sidelines and intertwines with Gwynn's at times. A gunslinger currently
employed as the henchman of a slave trader, Gwynn is surprised to find
himself depicted in an etching. He becomes determined to track
down the artist and, with the aid of a delightfully trippy scene where
he gets high, he finds her. While he becomes closer to the
strange artist Beth, his 'career' runs into trouble. It is with
Beth, though, that the weirdness happens. It's hard to describe.
Think of warped, chimeran dreams brushing against reality, and
you're close to the focus of this book.
My
only complaint is that it took a while to get started.
Nonetheless, I thoroughly enjoyed the beginning. KJ
Bishop's worldbuilding and characterisation is brilliant, staying far,
far away from the medieval-fantasy-crap clichés. Raule and Gwynn
- and the Rev, Beth, and the other characters - are all interesting,
three-dimensional people, happily populating the fuzzy grounds of grey.
In reviews on amazon I've seen her work
compared to China Miéville's; it's a fair comparison, but she has her
own style. For one, she doesn't give massive infodumps.
While Ashamoil is very much a tangible place, it's not nearly as
thoroughly described as New Crobuzon, perhaps for the better. If
asked whether I preferred this or Perdido Street Station, I
think I'd lean slightly towards this, but I wouldn't blame anyone for
sliding the other way. It's a touch choice.
A resounding 5 / 5.
KJ Bishop Linkspam:
Check out her website, where you can find links to extracts from Chapter 1 and Chapter 7.
While I don't think they're the best bits to take extracts from -
Chapter 7 is one of the best but the really good bit hasn't been
included in the extract - hopefully they'll give an indication of her
style.
I found this interview
with her particularly interesting, as it helps explain why Raule starts
off as the viewpoint character, only to leave it all to Gwynn once they
reach Ashamoil.
Another good interview.
Link to her flash fiction, Silk and Pearls.
It's fantasy, and kind of fable-like, and though the first few
paragraphs are background infodumping it gets very good, with a
wonderfully dark ending.
Link to her short story, The Art of Dying. Much to my delight, it features Gwynn, providing a window of sorts into his life after The Etched City. If you read this and like it, you'll love her novel.
Fat Charlie in Anansi Boys is the worst of them all. At the beginning he is a total weakling, unable to do anything in the face of his too-cool brother. In fact, I found the first third or so of AB a perfect example of why the extremes of character - 'too cool' and 'too pathetic' - are best avoided. I couldn't stand either of them. I had no sympathy for Fat Charlie because he refused to do anything at all, and I didn't like Spider because he was a total arsehole.
However, once Fat Charlie realised he had to do something because Spider was completely ruining his life, the book started to get interesting. This is where the Caribbean folklore of Anansi and the other animals started to come into play, because Fat Charlie is the son of Anansi (who featured in American Gods, mostly called Mr. Nancy). When the book became more supernatural, Neil Gaiman's talents really came into the fore; even the real-life stuff got great, with Fat Charlie's boss and how everyone ends up on a Caribbean island for the climax, though the climax itself was definitely a supernatural affair. Overall I'm glad I bought Anansi Boys - slog through the beginning and it becomes an enjoyable piece of braincandy.
Neverwhere is my favourite Neil Gaiman book at the moment, simply because of the fascinating world Gaiman created in London Below. Familiar tube stops and stations come to life: Angel Islington is an angel, Temple and Arch seems to be deity-curse-awe-word, Earl's Court is actually a court... and much more of the same ilk. The characters of London Below are quirky and wonderfully imagined, and as always Neil Gaiman's simple yet beguiling prose draws you into his world.
With my slightly negative experience of the weak hero in Anansi Boys, I was a bit worried Stardust would have a weak hero too. But no, for Tristran Thorn is probably Gaiman's strongest hero from the outset. Though he's a bit shy, he's determined to get the girl (even if she's not the right girl) and sets out on a quest to retrieve a fallen star. Thankfully there is no questing - he arrives at his destination by candlelight, and returns to his home village of Wall by a mixture of candlelight, cloud, flying ship and horse-and-carriage, all of it told in such a way that you appreciate the journey without being bogged down in scene after scene of trudging through fields. Though this is Gaiman's shortest novel by far (a mere 194 pages, compared to the 372 pages of Neverwhere and the 451 pages of Anansi Boys - not to mention the 635 of American Gods), he packs plenty of plot and imagination into the pages. To retrieve the fallen star Tristran must journey through the world of Faerie, and this world is fantastically realised. The true nature of the star, the people who want to retrieve it and the various other details of this world are all top-notch.
Neil Gaiman has a brilliant imagination and all his books are a must-read if you want to see what can be done with the fantasy genre. My favourites so far are Neverwhere and Stardust, though I really liked American Gods as well and enjoyed Anansi Boys. With the exception of AB, they're all 5-star reads; AB, because I found the first third so annoying, earns 4.5 / 5.
My review of American Gods
My review of his collection of things, Adventures in the Dream Trade
Title: Perdido Street Station
Author: China Miéville
Genre: Fantasy / science fiction / horror / steampunk
Length: 867 pages
Read: July 2006
Rating: 5 / 5
Summary on the Back:
The metropolis of New Crobuzon sprawls at the centre of the world. Humans and mutants and arcane races brood in the gloom
beneath its chimneys, where the river is sluggish with unnatural
effluent, and factories and foundries pound into the night. For more
than a thousand years, the Parliament and its brutal militia have ruled
here over a vast economy of workers and artists, spies and soldiers, magicians, junkies and
whores.
Now a stranger has come, with a pocketful of gold and an
impossible demand. And inadvertently, clumsily, something unthinkable is released.
As the city becomes gripped by an alien terror, the fate of millions depends on a clutch of renegades on the run from lawmakers and crime-lords alike. The urban nightscape becomes a hunting ground. Battles rage in the shadows of uncanny architecture. And a reckoning is due at the city's heart, under the vast chaotic vaults Perdido Street Station.
My Comments:
This a big book of imagination. There is no other way to describe it. ... Well. It's weird. Really weird. Weird and wonderful and so full of ideas it's almost bursting. The ideas and the storytelling kind of weave together at the beginning of the book, as China Miéville shares the history and development of New Crobruzon whenever the characters go somewhere. While he can get a bit infodumpy at times (and it was enough to put my mum off), I found it really interesting. The plot is gripping right til the end, and the various races he comes up with are such a breath of fresh air after all the Tolkein ripoffs you see these days. The races even get their own Wiki page!
I could go on raving about this book but that would be boring. Instead, why not pick up a copy of your own? I heartily recommend this to anyone who likes scifi/fantasy and wants something new and different.
Title: American Gods
Author: Neil Gaiman
Genre: Fantasy
Length: 635 pages
Read: July 2006
Rating: 5 / 5
Summary on the Back:
Days before his release from prison, Shadow’s wife, Laura, dies in a mysterious car crash. Numbly, he makes his way back home. On the plane, he encounters the enigmatic Mr. Wednesday, who claims to be a refugee from a distant war, a former god and the King of America.
Together they embark on a profoundly strange journey across the heart of the USA, whilst all around them a storm of preternatural and epic proportions threatens to break.
My Comments:The question posed by this book is: What happens to all the gods that people brought to America and then forgot about? With barely anyone left believing in them, what are these gods to do?
The answer is just as good as the question. Neil Gaiman writes with an imaginative and easy-to-read style that draws you until, unknowingly, you've read several hundred pages and you're desperate to keep reading. The pacing is good, the plot is fantastic and the culmination of it all is suitably twisty and ingenious.
Not much more to say, really, other than this is a great read and a welcome break from the fantasy=quest-in-medieval-knockoff-world formula.
