Rachel Neumeier's Blog, page 329

A bit late to the show —

So, I imagine this has been up on the internet for, what, four years or so now? But I only just discovered it:

A book trailer for THE FLOATING ISLANDS.

Pretty cool!

Busy busy busy —

It’s not that I’ve fallen off the face of the Earth. I fell into DOOR INTO LIGHT and have not been able to drag myself to the surface for more than a minute or so. At this rate, even though classes start next week, I should be finishing this wild revision really soon, if not by Monday hopefully in another week or so.

A new Tim Powers novel

Via tor.com, I see that Tim Powers has new book due out next January: Medusa’s Web.

Now, Tim Powers is one of those authors whose work I really admire but don’t really like.

Wait, that’s not right. Let me try that again.

I really like Tim Powers’ books while I’m reading them. But they are hard for me to pick up and I don’t usually feel much inclined to re-read them. Even though if I DO re-read one, I like it a lot. I somehow never remember liking his books as well as I actually do like them. Peculiar, I know, but there it is. I can’t offhand think of another author who strikes me quite this way.

But I do think Powers is a fine writer, one of the great fantasy authors of the modern era.

Medusa’s Web sounds darkish:

In the wake of their Aunt Amity’s suicide, Scott and Madeline Madden are summoned to Caveat, the eerie, decaying mansion in the Hollywood hills in which they were raised. But their decadent and reclusive cousins, the malicious wheelchair-bound Claimayne and his sister, Ariel, do not welcome Scott and Madeline’s return to the childhood home they once shared. While Scott desperately wants to go back to their shabby south of Sunset lives, he cannot pry his sister away from this old house that is a conduit for the supernatural.

Decorated by bits salvaged from old hotels and movie sets, Caveat hides a dark family secret that stretches back to the golden days of Rudolph Valentino and the silent film stars. A collection of hypnotic abstract images inked on paper allows the Maddens to briefly fragment and flatten time—to transport themselves into the past and future in visions that are both puzzling and terrifying.

As Madeline falls more completely under Caveat’s spell, Scott must fight to protect her. But will he unravel the mystery of the Madden family’s past and finally free them… or be pulled deeper into their deadly web?

If you read this before I do, very likely for some of you (Hi, Craig!) let me know: horror or dark fantasy?

Wait, wait, not finished …

Just got Caitlin’s comments on DOOR INTO LIGHT, the HOUSE OF SHADOWS sequel, you know.

What Caitlin said: Everyone’s too passive in this whole half of the plot. Can’t we have an assassination, a coup, an avalanche of disasters?

What I said: Ah, you’re right! So that’s why I felt uneasy about this book!

Major rewrite ensues.

I’m told I am not likely to get actual editorial comments back about MOUNTAIN till the end of September. Well, color me unconcerned about the putative deadline for the finished draft, which was, I believe, in September sometime. Not my fault that I can’t turn a ms. around in a minus number of minutes. It’s fine, though, cause I am in the mood to take apart DOOR INTO LIGHT and put it back together.

Mark Lawrence’s self-published fantasy novel challenge

You remember this self-published fantasy challenge? It’s moving along toward a final winner as the bloggers participating begin to pick finalists.

Here is Fantasy Book Critic’s top three picks. The one Mihir Wanchoo is sending forward to Round Two is a book called UNDER A COLDER SUN — good title — by Greg James.

The summary for this title says:

Khale the Wanderer: dark warrior of legend, a reaver with a demon’s soul.

King Alosse: ruler of Colm, willing to risk everything to save his city and its people.

Princess Milanda: an innocent, kept pure since birth, unknowing of her fate.

Neprokhodymh: the cursed city of sorcerers where Khale must make a choice that will scar him for life, or fall into darkness forever.

But it also suggests this is a grimdark story, so probably not for me. It is free on Kindle, though, if it sounds like your kind of thing.

Bob R Milne at Beauty in Ruins listedfour finalists and then selected SHATTERED SANDS by William G Saraband as his finalist.

Here’s a bit from the Amazon summary:

For years, Tamazi felt she was nothing like the other slave-girls. It was not until her master disappeared, the Great Vizier of the desert kingdom of Rilmaaqah, that a power older than the sands themselves took hold of her; a power that could finally free her, or enslave her forever.

But Bob noted:

This distinguished itself from the first page. The characters were fantastic, full of both personality and surprises, and the world-building was solid, especially in terms of establishing a culture. If there’s any drawback, it’s that the story is so ugly and cruel that it makes for rather heavy reading at times.

So that leaves me kinda thinking, shoot, somebody select something a bit less ugly and cruel, please, because I just don’t care whether the story distinguishes itself from the first page with that comment in there.

Sarah at Bookworm Blues gives her top five choices here and selected BLOODRUSHby Ben Galley to send on to Round Two.

Sarah says:

This one hit all the right notes, with fantastic world building, a captivating story, unforgettable characters, and a plot that refused to fit in any molds. The cover art was amazing, the editing was obviously professionally done and the author has very evident talent. Most importantly, it stuck with me long after I finished reading it, and I’m incredibly anxious to read the other books in the trilogy, and explore more of what Galley has written.

And at Amazon, the summary includes this bit:

When Prime Lord Hark is found in a pool of his own blood on the steps of his halls, Tonmerion Hark finds his world not only turned upside down, but inside out. His father’s last will and testament forces him west across the Iron Ocean, to the very brink of the Endless Land and all civilisation. They call it Wyoming.

Which is catchy, I will say. This is apparently a darkish fantasy, also a Western. Not many Western fantasies out there. I can think of only two offhand: TERRITORY by Emma Bull and THIRTEENTH CHILD by Patricia Wrede. I really enjoyed them both, but two is perhaps not enough to indicate a trend. BLOODRUSH is a dollar at Amazon, I see. I need to take a closer look at it.

Ria at Bibliotropic is sending Barbara J Webb’s CITY OF BURNING SHADOWS to the second round. Here is Ria’s review of that one. Evidently this one is noir-ish in tone.

Fantasy Book Review selected WHAT REMAINS OF HEROES by David Benem to go on to the second round. That title sounds grimdark, but the Goodreads summary implies it might be dark fantasy, not grimdark:

Lannick deVeers used to be somebody. A hero, even. Then, he ran afoul of the kingdom’s most powerful general and the cost he paid was nearly too much to bear. In the years that followed, his grief turned him into a shadow of his former self, and he spent his days drowning his regrets in tankards of ale.

But now an unexpected encounter casts Lannick upon an unlikely path to revenge. If he can just find the strength to overcome the many mistakes of his past, he can seize the chance to become a hero once more.

If the protagonist overcomes his past and becomes a hero, then this probably isn’t grimdark.

And one more: Tyson at Speculative Book Review is sending SOUL FOR TROUBLEe by Crista McHugh on to Round Two.

This one sounds lighter and more fun than some of the others:

Arden Lesstymine (known to everyone as Trouble) likes attention as much as the next girl, but this is getting ridiculous. When an insane stranger is murdered at the inn where she works, Trouble becomes the next Soulbearer for the disembodied god of chaos, Loku. Yes, it comes with the ability to channel the god’s limitless power, but at the cost of her sanity — literally. Now she has a sexy but cynical knight claiming to be her protector, a prince trying to seduce her to his cause (and his bed), and a snarky chaos god who offers a play-by-play commentary on it all, whether she wants to hear it or not. To make matters worse, a necromancer wants to capture the soul of Loku for his own dark purposes, and the only way he can get it is by killing her first.

Incidentally, I note that this one is also available for free on Kindle. Given Tyson’s comments about it, I went ahead and picked it up.

Also, I like the cover:

Baby names

So, you know what is apparently now one of the top 1000 boy’s names for babies?

218 baby boys were named Anakin in 2014. No report on how many got the last name “Skywalker”.

Actually, I kind of like the name.

Fantasy novels that stretch the boundaries

So, Troy Wiggons has a post at Book Riot: 9 Diverse Fantasy Books That Will Challenge Your Idea of Fantasy Fiction

Troy says:

Fantasy recommendation lists are characterized by their safety. Curious newcomers to the genre, having enjoyed their sample of escapist literature, request more stories, more worlds to lose themselves in. More often than not, though, the recommendations that they receive are the same few critically acclaimed authors whose work is all too often presented as representative of the genre.

This is no doubt true, though I roll my eyes at the use of the term “escapist” in this context. Also, I see absolutely nothing wrong with recommending stories that are excellent even if a long-time fantasy reader would say they fit smack dab in the middle of mainstream fantasy. Not only that, I would be cautious about recommending a book that might appeal to the jaded palate of the long-time fan but would perhaps be likely to turn off a newcomer to the genre.

Still, interesting idea for a post, isn’t it?

I have not read a single one of the recommended works, although a couple have been on my radar for a while, including A STRANGER TO OLONDRIA, for example. Troy comments: Samatar’s novel examines the power of words and literacy … Jevick bears a powerful interest in the country of Olondria, and when Jevick’s father dies, he finds himself taking a pilgrimage to Olondria, where he is thrust into a community in flux. A religious war looms, with traditions of literacy representative of the disagreement. Olondria examines some vividly human themes, indeed, examines humanity itself with prose so beautiful that you’ll be recalling passages in your sleep.

Yes, it is comments like prose so beautiful you’ll be recalling passages in your sleep that keep this book from fading off my radar. Of course, one might well argue that many, many fantasy novels examine some vividly human themes, probably including many of the standard works on a typical fantasy recommendation list. Why, I might be able to identify one or two such themes in, say, THE LORD OF THE RINGS, which I imagine is on every single list of fantasy recommendations ever compiled.

Still, fantasy that pushes the boundaries . . . fantasy that steps outside the basic medieval setting and the orphaned-heir type of plot . . . what would you recommend? Off the top of my head, I might suggest:

1. The Sharing Knife series. I think of this one because of the continual focus on ordinary life and ordinary people. Yes, yes, I know that Dag is not just *all* that ordinary. This is still a far cry from a medieval Europe-ish setting with a focus on princes and magicians, kings and warriors.

2. The INDA series by Sherwood Smith. I think of this epic fantasy series in contrast to Troy’s suggestion of THE MIRROR EMPIRE by Kameron Hurley. Not that I have anything against the latter, except that I have read plenty that indicates it is grim grim grim, probably too much so for me, with all the male characters being victims and all the female characters being rapists, and you know, that is not an attraction. Thus, in contrast, INDA, which does odd things with culture and gender without marching off the cliff of sadistic grimdark tropes.

3. BRIDGE OF BIRDS by Hughart. That steps outside the default European-ish setting to an alternate China, plus it’s a total delight. Or UNDER HEAVEN, which of course is longer and darker and different, but still a beautiful alternate China setting.

4. At the moment, I’d also think of THE DAUGHTER OF SMOKE AND BONE, with its war between the “angels” and the “devils”, not to mention working in both contemporary Earth, including Prague and Morocco, and the world of Eretz. It gets grim, but not grimdark; and although complex I don’t think it’s hard to follow, and since it’s beautifully written, maybe it could be both welcoming to newcomers to fantasy while nudging a few boundaries. By the way, have you all read “Night of Cake and Puppets” yet? Well, what are you waiting for? Go read that!

5. Let me see, let me see. How about THE CITY AND THE CITY by Mieville. I’ve only read three of Mieville’s books so far and this one is my favorite so far. Of course I like detective stories, too. But the setting, so very peculiar, is one that *almost* worked for me,and I mean “almost worked” in a good way. I really enjoyed this book and have re-read it twice so far. In fact, now that I think of it, I would like to re-read it again.

6. Jonathan Strange and Mr Norril by Suzanna Clarke. Because, wow. Hand it to anybody who likes literary fiction and thinks all fantasy is basically The Sword of Shannara.

7. The Goblin Emperor by Katherine Addison.

8. Alphabet of Thorn by Patricia McKillip. Those interweaving stories — the myths and legends that frame the main story — very beautiful and unusual.

Okay, eight, that’s enough for now, especially since this is just off the top of my head. Which “unusual” or “pushing the boundaries” fantasy novels spring immediately to your mind?

I will add that some of Troy’s recommended works, particularly The Tale of Yin duology by Joyce Chng and of The Imaro series by Charles Saunders, both do look very interesting.

Recent Reading: HUNTING by Andrea K Höst

So, HUNTING

Is this a YA or an adult story? If you’ve read it, what do you think?

We have a great protagonist, Ash, who is a girl disguised as a boy, a trope I always enjoy if it’s well done. Except she’s not a girl, really. She’s young, but she’s an adult woman.

Ash is 21. She’s passing herself off as an almost-17-year-old boy.

What I like best about Ash: her adult-ness. She can pretend to be a teenage boy quite well, but then she can pretend to be practically anything — she’s a social chameleon, good at observing the social milieu and adjusting her own behavior to get everyone else to do what she needs them to do. She’s not mean about it, but she’s definitely manipulative.

That’s not what makes me declare that she’s an adult, though.

Ash is not just good at sliding into and out of social groups, she’s also good at setting aside her own feelings in order to pursue a goal. Not only that, but if she starts to get angsty, she cuts it off and takes decisive action instead. Not only that, but she automatically moves to protect others, especially children. And not only that, but that scene where she is maneuvering the Rhoi’s heir out of his new fear of heights, that is totally an adult interacting with a boy.

Mind you, I love Ash. But she doesn’t strike me as a YA heroine.

Thornaster is an excellent male lead and his reaction when he finds out Ash is actually a woman is perfect. It’s entertaining how little the revelation matters, in fact; this is one book where it’s not a disaster for the girl to be unmasked. Not only is Ash perfectly capable of dealing with the fallout and anything but emotionally overwhelmed by being revealed, but also she’s surrounded by people who are surprised, but who handle it. I liked this, because I almost always enjoy competent protagonists and dislike angst. But it’s an unusual treatment of the girl-passing-as-boy scenario.

The metaphysical background is the other thing I particularly liked in this story. The stars really are gods, the Sun and the Earth really do bring forth life in a very direct way, it’s all ornate and interesting. I like the butterflies and moths, and *naturally* I particularly like the phoenixes.

I will say, the clutter of names and titles at the beginning could be confusing. Also, this is one murder mystery where a lot of motivations are left dark. Was it *all* mind control weirdness or did some of those people know what they were doing? Why and how did the main bad guy survive? What *about* the mage who was killing herbalists, where did she come from and why did she get involved? She didn’t seem to get a lot out of her presumed deal with the bad guy. I actually felt quite sorry for her, not to mention that the motive for killing the herbalists in the first place seemed thin to me. Also, the final resolution of the problem seemed unduly brisk and simple, though I suppose having gods on your side would be helpful at those moments.

So I’m not sure I would say this is a story to read for plot. If that’s the main thing you enjoy, this one might not be your favorite. But Ash and Thornaster are delightful, watching their relationship develop is a pleasure, and I will certainly be coming back to re-read this one again.

Recent Reading: Kind of a clutter

So, I read kind of a lot of books while working my way through the easy part of this revision. Also because the first part of this week was crowded with fairly stressful time-sensitive stuff that made me drive to St Louis three days in a row. Ugh, how in the world people can stand to commute like that every day, I will never know.

I’m just about to dive into the hard part of the revision, so I should have THE WHITE ROAD ready to go by, oh, Monday, I hope. Then I’ll send it to Caitlin and then I would take the rest of the month off because I don’t have comments back yet about MOUNTAIN (soon, I hear, and hopefully revision for that will be minor) or THE WINTER DRAGON (probably more revision for that one) or for DOOR INTO LIGHT (which I fear will need pretty extensive revision, alas, but I’m sure it’ll be a much better book afterward.)

Except what I DO have sitting here waiting to be revised is an Ezekiel short story for next year, so I need to do that; plus eventually I need to actually write the third Black Dog book . . . there’s no END. At least not for a while.

But! As I said, lots of reading of great books over the past week or so.

1. Catherine, Called Birdy by Karen Cushman. Totally charming. What an irrepressible child Birdy is. Her ingenuity in getting rid of prospective suitors is especially fun, though she’s irrepressible in every other context, too. For a story to bring the “flavor” of the times to life, well, you could hardly do better. Of course it’s quite obvious how the story is going to work out, and it does take authorial intervention. Though for all I know, Birdy really would have poisoned that lout if necessary. I mean, I probably would have.

Man, I am SO GLAD I did not live in Britain during the medieval period.

2. A Wish Upon Jasmine by Laura Florand. And from the medieval period straight to contemporary France, with jasmine flowers everywhere, not to mention Rosiers everywhere. Damien was a great protagonist, and I love Jess. I’m fascinated by the glimpse we got of Antoine, too. It’s pretty clear where that’s going, but finding out exactly how it’ll work out, you know, that’ll be fun part.

3. Sunshine by Robin McKinley. I needed a soothing re-read in there, and though this isn’t the most soothing McKinley title, turns out it was the one that I was in the mood for. Such an amazing beginning on this book. One of the best novel-beginnings ever. I just love how it starts off so perfectly normal and then we get one or two words being used in ways that seem odd (“spartan” as “cool” is the first) and then, of course, we take that sharp turn into paranormal.

4. Midnight Crossroad by Charlene Harris. This is a departure from the Sookie series because that maintained a pretty tight focus on Sookie, whereas the Midnight series has four important pov protagonists. Maybe more as the series goes on, too. The focus really is more on the town of Midnight than on any particular character. In fact, if you had to pick one character as truly The Central Protagonist, it’d probably be Lemuel, who is not a pov character at all.

I actually liked it quite a bit, but enough to pay more than $10 for the sequel? When I have over 200 books on my TBR pile already? Not sure, not sure.

Aaaaand …

5. Hunting by Andrea K Höst. Cause it occurred to me, when I was tired and bored last night, not in the mood to re-read anything and SO not in the mood to revise anything, that I still had a couple AKH books I hadn’t read, this being one of them.

Loved it! It was just what I needed. I will have to write a real review. Maybe tonight, as a break from (sigh) revision.

NPR’s 100 best-ever romances

Even though as you know I am not super-keen on romances in general, this particular list — 100 of the all-time great romances from Jane Austen to today — caught my attention. Because not only is PRIDE AND PREJUDICE on the list, but also:

1. Laura Florand’s THE CHOCOLATE KISS is on it.

2. Sharon Shinn’s ARCHANGER made the list.

3. Megan Whelan Turner’s Queen’s Thief series is included.

…. and I started saying to myself, Gosh, the people who compiled this list know how to pick romances for non-romance readers! And, of course, they are defining “romance” very broadly, or they would not include MWT’s series, which is not really a romance series imo, even though the romance subplots are important.

Evidently NPR started this with a reader poll, got 18,000 responses, and turned the project over to a couple reviewers and a couple of authors to narrow the list down to 100 titles to recommend. So it is reviewers Bobbi Dumas and Sarah Wendell and authors Sherry Thomas and Michelle Monkou who picked those titles to include.

Though they sorted the titles out by category, they made no effort to pick the top ten in each category, so Historical and Contemporary are the biggest. But SFF would be just about as big if they’d folded Paranormal into SFF, which I could go either way on that.

Other titles and authors that I recognize:

Judith Merkle Riley. I absolutely loved her Margaret of Ashbury trilogy

The Pink Carnation (series), by Lauren Willig. This series, a take-off on The Scarlet Pimpernel, is too silly for me.

The Lotus Palace (series), by Jeannie Lin. I have the first book on my TBR pile.

Nine Coaches Waiting, by Mary Stewart. Definitely my favorite of hers.

Kate Daniels (series), by Ilona Andrews. I should hope so! Two thumbs up for Kate and Curren!

The Inheritance Trilogy, by N.K. Jemisin. Again with a series that I loved but don’t think should be considered a romance series.

A Civil Campaign, by Lois McMaster Bujold. Okay, I grant you, that one could be considered a romance, though for romances, well, how about The Sharing Knife series instead?

Cry Wolf, by Patricia Briggs. Interestingly, this count this as Paranormal but Ilona Andrews as SFF. Not sure I agree with their dividing lines.

There’s a wide range of titles on this list, from the Black Dagger Brotherhood series by Ward, with worldbuilding that is at best iffy and a certain tendency toward bloat, to, well, Pride and Prejudice. I definitely don’t feel that readers who love romances would like every book on this list. Still, it’s interesting to glance over and there are a lot of books on here I really love.

The one romance author not on this list whose books I immediately think of: Teresa Romain. I really like her Regency romances. I get that this is a very large category, but too bad not to see her here.

Anyway, you can click through if you’re interested and see which of your favorites are on there and what got robbed.