Post-vacation catch-up (I)
22 July 2013 11:27 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
delphipsmithTomorrow there will be pictures of lobsters and sailboats and osprey and swing bridges. Today, the first step in post-vacation catch-up: reviews of the books I read while away.
You wouldn't think that anyone could make four-hundred-plus pages of trudging through dust and heat intriguing. And yet somehow Lessing does it. The very end was a bit of an anti-climax, and I didn't really find it credible that Certain People (who shall remain nameless to prevent spoilage) could successfully track Mara and Dann across an entire continent that's decaying into anarchy and chaos. But if you can look past those two points, it's an interesting take on a distant-future slow-motion environmental collapse.
This is a funny, occasionally warm, sometimes biting, and in places rather horrifying satire on gender. In the world of Egalia's Daughters absolutely everything gender-related (except the actual act of giving birth) is reversed: females are in charge of the government, hold most of the important jobs, and make all the decisions for the family, while males stay home, curl their beards, gossip and raise the children. The reversal extends even to language itself: females are wom (sing.) and wim (pl.) while males are manwom (sing.) and menwim (pl.) -- since it was translated from the Norwegian, major kudos go to the translator for successfully retaining such nuances. Written in the late 1970s during the height of the feminist movement, its historical context is reflected in the story in the form of agitation for equal rights for menwim(!). While I expected story elements like menwim being "homemakers" and wim running the country, the story incorporates the entire spectrum of gender-related experiences, including rape and domestic abuse; in some cases it was downright startling to realize how, even today, society is less appalled by certain behaviors from men than they would be from women. The preceding 200+ pages do such a good job that the last chapter, which consists of the opening paragraphs of a novel the main character is writing about a fantasy world where men are in charge, actually seems weird. Definitely worth a read.
An energetic blending of the sword and sorcery of Michael Moorcock, the mysterious jungle cities of H. Rider Haggard, and the lonely -- possibly mad -- knight-errantry of Don Quixote, with a smattering of H.P. Lovecraft. Solomon Kane is an incarnation of the Eternal Hero; he doesn't remember where he came from, but he has occasional fleeting memories of a far-distant past in which he -- or some earlier incarnation of himself -- battled the Old Gods of fear and darkness as proto-humanity tried to free itself from their bloody grip. And like The Gunslinger (Stephen King's high opinion of Howard is quoted on the front cover), Solomon Kane doesn't know where he's going, only that he is bound to protect the innocent, battle evil, and go forward towards an unknown destiny. (There is, alas, a discomforting racist element to the stories set in Africa; one paragraph in particular is a paean to the Aryan race's strength, intelligence, military abilities, etc. Like Haggard, he was a product of his times, I guess.) That aside, these are tremendously fun adventure tales in the classic Indiana Jones or Allan Quatermaine style, with a dusting of morals/metaphysics. Evil is always defeated, the damsel is always rescued, and the good guy always wins. (Admittedly, sometimes the good guy is the only one who survives, but hey, he is the hero, right?)
I re-read this on vacation last week. I'd forgotten what fun it is :) Milady the thoroughly evil, a sort of 17th-century Black Widow; d'Artagnan so chivalrously romantic, falling in love at first sight; Porthos the lovably pompous goofball, gambling away his horse and inveigling a replacement from his wealthy little old lady; Athos, very obviously A Man With A Secret; Aramis so endearingly bipolar ("I'm going to be a priest...no, she loves me!...no, I'm going to be a priest..."). And oh, the melodrama, the desperate races against time to foil yet another plot, the swordfights and duels and feathered hats! What more could one ask?
Best rat-and-mouse story ever, bar none. I so much wish there was a sequel -- I want to know how they're doing in that valley. (And I don't care what anyone says, Justin isn't dead!)
You wouldn't think that anyone could make four-hundred-plus pages of trudging through dust and heat intriguing. And yet somehow Lessing does it. The very end was a bit of an anti-climax, and I didn't really find it credible that Certain People (who shall remain nameless to prevent spoilage) could successfully track Mara and Dann across an entire continent that's decaying into anarchy and chaos. But if you can look past those two points, it's an interesting take on a distant-future slow-motion environmental collapse.This is a funny, occasionally warm, sometimes biting, and in places rather horrifying satire on gender. In the world of Egalia's Daughters absolutely everything gender-related (except the actual act of giving birth) is reversed: females are in charge of the government, hold most of the important jobs, and make all the decisions for the family, while males stay home, curl their beards, gossip and raise the children. The reversal extends even to language itself: females are wom (sing.) and wim (pl.) while males are manwom (sing.) and menwim (pl.) -- since it was translated from the Norwegian, major kudos go to the translator for successfully retaining such nuances. Written in the late 1970s during the height of the feminist movement, its historical context is reflected in the story in the form of agitation for equal rights for menwim(!). While I expected story elements like menwim being "homemakers" and wim running the country, the story incorporates the entire spectrum of gender-related experiences, including rape and domestic abuse; in some cases it was downright startling to realize how, even today, society is less appalled by certain behaviors from men than they would be from women. The preceding 200+ pages do such a good job that the last chapter, which consists of the opening paragraphs of a novel the main character is writing about a fantasy world where men are in charge, actually seems weird. Definitely worth a read. An energetic blending of the sword and sorcery of Michael Moorcock, the mysterious jungle cities of H. Rider Haggard, and the lonely -- possibly mad -- knight-errantry of Don Quixote, with a smattering of H.P. Lovecraft. Solomon Kane is an incarnation of the Eternal Hero; he doesn't remember where he came from, but he has occasional fleeting memories of a far-distant past in which he -- or some earlier incarnation of himself -- battled the Old Gods of fear and darkness as proto-humanity tried to free itself from their bloody grip. And like The Gunslinger (Stephen King's high opinion of Howard is quoted on the front cover), Solomon Kane doesn't know where he's going, only that he is bound to protect the innocent, battle evil, and go forward towards an unknown destiny. (There is, alas, a discomforting racist element to the stories set in Africa; one paragraph in particular is a paean to the Aryan race's strength, intelligence, military abilities, etc. Like Haggard, he was a product of his times, I guess.) That aside, these are tremendously fun adventure tales in the classic Indiana Jones or Allan Quatermaine style, with a dusting of morals/metaphysics. Evil is always defeated, the damsel is always rescued, and the good guy always wins. (Admittedly, sometimes the good guy is the only one who survives, but hey, he is the hero, right?)I re-read this on vacation last week. I'd forgotten what fun it is :) Milady the thoroughly evil, a sort of 17th-century Black Widow; d'Artagnan so chivalrously romantic, falling in love at first sight; Porthos the lovably pompous goofball, gambling away his horse and inveigling a replacement from his wealthy little old lady; Athos, very obviously A Man With A Secret; Aramis so endearingly bipolar ("I'm going to be a priest...no, she loves me!...no, I'm going to be a priest..."). And oh, the melodrama, the desperate races against time to foil yet another plot, the swordfights and duels and feathered hats! What more could one ask?Best rat-and-mouse story ever, bar none. I so much wish there was a sequel -- I want to know how they're doing in that valley. (And I don't care what anyone says, Justin isn't dead!)
