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lightreadsThis is the first book of a duology, a fantasy/romance with the emphasis on the romance. Our couple consists of Fawn Bluefield – farmer girl, eighteen, pregnant, running away from home – and Dag Redwing – one-handed, widower, fiftyish, from the militaristic Lakewalker culture. Dag and his patrol are tracking a malice, an immortal life-leeching menace which can only be dispatched with a sharing knife (a nice little conceit that is not worth ruining). The malice captures Fawn for nefarious purposes – you see where this is going – and in the course of rescue and saving the world, Dag and Fawn are bound together by a bit of a magical accident.
Huh. That was . . . fine. Kinda weird, though. The summary above sounds like a whole book, but it’s barely the first seventy pages. The rest is unapologetic romance, the sort of stuff that is usually relegated to the last five pages of a fantasy book where the couple mutters to each other about how the folks back home really aren’t going to like this. And I don’t object to the romance. I like Dag and Fawn – though I really hope there’s an actual, you know, reason for such an unnecessarily large age difference, because he’s older than her father and it’s distractingly icky once or twice. Part of the point is, of course, the innocence/experience trope, and the wisdom and revitalization they give to each other, but seriously, he could have lost fifteen years just fine. And while we’re on the subject of things that through me out of the narrative, let’s talk about anachronisms – your barely literate farm girl should not be thinking in percentages. She gets the concept of half and half probability, I’m sure, but she does not know what fifty percent is. I’m just saying.
Anyway. Like I said, it’s really not the romance I object to, because I was the one shaking my head and muttering about how sketchy and unsatisfying the tiny pagespace given over to developing the romances was in her Chalion books. And I’m reserving judgment on the frankly weird shape of this book, considering it is the first volume of a duology.
It’s just that the last two hundred pages of the book felt more than a little candy-coated, and there is nothing more likely to bore me in a book. It’s not the pure domesticity I’m having a problem with, nor the fact that the single dangling magical plot thread is all but ignored for two-thirds of the book, because after they save the world the heroes really do go home to the folks and hang out in the kitchen a lot. We just don’t normally get to see it. And the next volume promises to address the plot. But there was just something sort of pat about the whole thing as they tended to each other’s old, quiet damages (and I genuinely like that sort of thing, too). I like both my romance and my fantasy to have a lot more rough edges to them, and romance/domesticity are not by definition candy-coated. This book had an awful lot of smooth edges, pregnancy out of wedlock and all. This sort of polished smooth structure worked very well in Curse of Chalion because the very ordained, this person fits into this slot in the story quality was part of the plot. But when you’re playing that out back home on the farm, it’s just, well . . . fine.
It’s a good book, certainly, with clever writing and a nice little cultural divide to explore. But I believe the intent was to loft a romance up there, arching over plot, rather than dangling it from underneath as an afterthought. And, well, I just didn’t make it all the way up there – I walked around carrying this book with me all weekend, rather than the other way around. I’m glad I borrowed and not bought, and I hope the second volume accomplishes a lot more for me.
Huh. That was . . . fine. Kinda weird, though. The summary above sounds like a whole book, but it’s barely the first seventy pages. The rest is unapologetic romance, the sort of stuff that is usually relegated to the last five pages of a fantasy book where the couple mutters to each other about how the folks back home really aren’t going to like this. And I don’t object to the romance. I like Dag and Fawn – though I really hope there’s an actual, you know, reason for such an unnecessarily large age difference, because he’s older than her father and it’s distractingly icky once or twice. Part of the point is, of course, the innocence/experience trope, and the wisdom and revitalization they give to each other, but seriously, he could have lost fifteen years just fine. And while we’re on the subject of things that through me out of the narrative, let’s talk about anachronisms – your barely literate farm girl should not be thinking in percentages. She gets the concept of half and half probability, I’m sure, but she does not know what fifty percent is. I’m just saying.
Anyway. Like I said, it’s really not the romance I object to, because I was the one shaking my head and muttering about how sketchy and unsatisfying the tiny pagespace given over to developing the romances was in her Chalion books. And I’m reserving judgment on the frankly weird shape of this book, considering it is the first volume of a duology.
It’s just that the last two hundred pages of the book felt more than a little candy-coated, and there is nothing more likely to bore me in a book. It’s not the pure domesticity I’m having a problem with, nor the fact that the single dangling magical plot thread is all but ignored for two-thirds of the book, because after they save the world the heroes really do go home to the folks and hang out in the kitchen a lot. We just don’t normally get to see it. And the next volume promises to address the plot. But there was just something sort of pat about the whole thing as they tended to each other’s old, quiet damages (and I genuinely like that sort of thing, too). I like both my romance and my fantasy to have a lot more rough edges to them, and romance/domesticity are not by definition candy-coated. This book had an awful lot of smooth edges, pregnancy out of wedlock and all. This sort of polished smooth structure worked very well in Curse of Chalion because the very ordained, this person fits into this slot in the story quality was part of the plot. But when you’re playing that out back home on the farm, it’s just, well . . . fine.
It’s a good book, certainly, with clever writing and a nice little cultural divide to explore. But I believe the intent was to loft a romance up there, arching over plot, rather than dangling it from underneath as an afterthought. And, well, I just didn’t make it all the way up there – I walked around carrying this book with me all weekend, rather than the other way around. I’m glad I borrowed and not bought, and I hope the second volume accomplishes a lot more for me.
no subject
Date: 2006-11-15 05:59 pm (UTC)Yes. I expect we'll see a lot of reciprocity in the next book. We've seen how Dag is disabled in Fawn's world (though he functions a lot better than the farmers expect); next we'll witness Fawn's disability in his world, i.e. how her lack of groundsense makes it difficult for Fawn to function in the Lake Patroller community.
Although, given that Nattie has a trickle of groundsense, it's not impossible that Fawn will turn out to have a bit as well (runs in families?). In fact, I wouldn't be surprised to find that Dag's and Fawn's halfbreed children turn out to be the salvation of this milieu where the Patrollers' ranks are suffering from attrition but there seems to be an inexhaustable supply of malices to fight.
Roadworn. What a perfect word for Cazaril!
no subject
Date: 2006-11-15 10:38 pm (UTC)farmers expect); next we'll witness Fawn's disability in his world, i.e. how her lack of groundsense makes it difficult for Fawn to function in the Lake
Patroller community.
Oh, I like that formulation of it, and it makes me wonder if she'll more directly address the internal strains of a relationship where one party has ground sense and the other does not -- we're getting a lapful of the external on everything, and it seems only fair.
The point about their potential children is particularly interesting in the light of the fact that there are apparently two more books after the sequel to this one -- another duology, I think. Though if it's even centered on Dag and Fawn/their family, I don't know. I also don't know why farms and lakewalkers don't interbreed -- why there seems to be a very specific lakewalker prohibition, that is. Simple insularism and pragmatism about the demands of their life, or . . . something else?
A romance with worldbuilding, indeed. Frustrating.
no subject
Date: 2006-11-16 04:46 pm (UTC)Some of it may be simple racism. But I think some may also be practical conservation of resources. If groundsense is a necessary tool in hunting malices, and if there aren't enough Lake Patrollers to go around (as seems the case given the way Mari scolded Dag for not producing LP babies), then to raise half-LP children who would presumably have less groundsense could, well, doom the world.
Dag was able to use his groundsense to make up for his physical limitations when dealing with Fawn's family. His maturity and insight into human nature stood him in good stead as well; he was able to revise his approach to the Bluefields when he learned how their cultural expectations were different from his own.
I want to see whether Fawn will demonstrate any special strengths to balance her lack of groundsense when she's in the LP camp. She will be going in as a deaf person among the hearing, into a culture that prizes hearing highly (shades of Miles again). I'm hoping LMB will show us something other than determination and charm on Fawn's part when it's Fawn's turn to meet the inlaws.