Zachary Tringali's Blog, page 5

The Young in Young Adult and Fantasy

Whenever I finish reading a book, I can’t help but go searching for reviews immediately. Good or bad, I love diving in and seeing if there are things I missed or how people’s opinions lined up with mine. Recently I’ve read two Fantasy books that seemed to be dissimilar in almost every way. Prince of Thorns is a modern take on the Fantasy genre in almost every way: it’s a short, fast-paced, personal story of revenge set in a post-apocalyptic world filled with grit and violence. Heir of the Night is a traditional fantasy about a kingdom in danger from an old, evil enemy. Checking the reviews after, though, I found a similarity.

Both had more than a few negative reviews based on the fact that readers weren’t sure if the books were actually Young Adult novels. The main character of Prince of Thorns, Jorg is fourteen years old and the main character of Heir of the Night, Malian, is around twelve years old. Some readers seemed to think this was just too young for main characters in an fantasy and that their age kept them from enjoying the novels.

It’s a curious thought. Something seemed strange about it. Eventually I went to my bookshelf and started pulling down books and at the end, I’d found more than I’d even thought.

The Name of the Wind by Patrick Rothfuss

The Farseer Trilogy by Robin Hobb

Bone Doll’s Twin by Lynn Flewelling

The Red Wolf Conspiracy by Robert V.S Redick

I won’t bore you guys by going on, but these are just a few of the books I thought of right away that had young main characters and are shelved/found in the Fantasy shelves and not in the Young Adult shelves. Of course, Rothfuss and Hobb’s books are narrated by older versions of the main characters, but the books are mainly stories of the younger characters with reflections from the adult versions. Coming of age and youth rising to power while learning about the world and themselves is a pretty large trope in the genre. You could even argue that Frodo was young, because even though he was 33, he was just coming of age and considered a “tween” by Hobbits.

Genre separation is more often a business decision than a creative one. Sure, a lot of writers work within a specific genre that they love, but there are no guideposts of where one genre ends and another begins. You can have fantasy mixed with horror, or romance, or almost any other genre based on what story the author has in mind to tell. So, the question is what pushes a book from a fantasy with young characters to a young adult book that’s fantasy? And what turns it the other way?

You could say it’s sex or violence that pushes a book out of the Young Adult genre, but that just isn’t always the case–unless, of course, you’re dealing with straight up erotica. A sort of 50 Gandalf the Grey situation. There are plenty of Young Adult books now that deal with mature themes. Maybe they’re a little different in the way they’re expressed, but it is present. And in novels like Heir of the Night, there’s not an overwhelming amount of violence or sexual content, whereas a series like The Hunger Games has its fair share of violence and Kristin Cashore’s novels never shy away from addressing adult themes like marriage, sex, pregnancy, and murder.

In my mind, one of the big things separating Young Adult fantasy from traditional fantasy is directness. I thought about calling this simplicity at first, but there are too many negative connotations that could go along with that. I don’t mind the characters or the plot are any less deep, but by and large Young Adult books are shorter and they need to get to the point faster.

Fantasy books commonly run around 500 pages or more, whereas Young Adult fantasy runs anywhere from 300 to 400 pages. This creates an overall feeling of directness and moving towards a target, whereas some Fantasy novels take a lot of time considering subplots, side characters, and more. As a result, the pacing is faster.

There’s also the concept of tone and while no two books will have the exact same tone, YA writing and tone seems to strive to create a sort of genuine feeling of connection between the main characters and the reader, often by using a closer view point on the main character, whether its first or third person.

At the end of the day, it can feel a little bit like asking “What makes something young adult?” is like the age old question “What is art?”–”You’ll know it when you see it.” But even that proves to be a tricky answer since some readers think a character’s age is enough to push the book into one genre or another and the industry itself seems to disagree to an extent.

Friday Reads: Fool’s Fate, Take Two

(A Note: Following is a review of the sixth book in a series, but this review will remain spoiler free!)

I know I already talked about this book on the blog to a certain extent, but to be honest, one post isn’t enough. Ten posts wouldn’t be enough to aptly review a series that, in its final installment, did more for me in one book than some series manage in their entirety. Starting with the first book of The Farseer Trilogy and ending five books later with the conclusion of The Tawny Man Trilogy, Robin Hobb created a series of novels that is unique in its depth, breadth of emotion, and I have no doubt that the story will stay with me for a long time to come.

For those who haven’t read any of the series yet, The Farseer Trilogy and The Tawny Man Trilogy can be described as the story of a king’s bastard growing up learning to be an assassin. You could say it’s a story about changing fate, or about dark magic, or falling in love with the person you can never be with. All of those things would make it sound more cliche than it really is. The fact is that it’s about the characters and their relationships with each other. It’s about a boy who was abandoned when he was five years old and raised in the stables, and how that creates walls in his life, and how he tries to befriend people and find some kind of peace with all of the craziness in his life.

The plot is interesting, but it’s the characters that really sell the whole thing. It uses the fantasy genre as a lens to show real, human problems, and that’s where I think the genre is strongest. I’ve talked a little before about the relationship between historical fiction and fantasy and how fantasy novels feel stronger and more solid when they have that one foot in reality, and I think the same is true here. Dragons, magic swords, kings and all are great, but they mean nothing without connecting us to them through incredible, real characters. These books really get that.

As for this book in particular… To be honest, I approached Fool’s Fate with a mix of dread and excitement. It was another book about Fitz and The Fool–his fool. It was also the last book. The ending of a series is a tricky feat. It’s so easy for things to fall flat and by the end of a long running series, there are so many threads that there’s no possible way you can tie them up. I’m still smarting from the ending to Battlestar Galactica! That’s another story for another day, though.

I got increasingly nervous as the book reached its conclusion and the final threads of the plot were resolved with 200 pages to spare. But Hobb’s books have always been about the characters, and the long denouement that followed the central events of the book created one of the richest, most satisfying conclusions I could imagine. The series shows characters grow from children to adults, characters die over the course, and some are born, but all of them are changed by the events of the series.

It all came down to three words, and they were the three perfect words to end on.

Short Story: A Good Man

The NaNoWriMo 50K is done and the holiday season has begun! Unfortunately, the holiday season brought a terrible cold with it. I’ve been sick for about a week, and now that I’m finally starting to feel better I have to play catch-up on all the things I’ve missed. So, for today, I have another short story for you! A Good Man is a story about two very different brothers: one the heir to a throne, the other crippled by sickness and addicted to a dangerous power.

Title: A Good Man

Length: 5,400 Words

Pitch: Brothers, dragon blood, addicting and deadly magic

I hope you enjoy!

A Good Man

“Tell me again how they ran.” Gethin climbed up the balcony, tore past the curtains, and fell into Lewella’s bedroom laughing. He collapsed onto the featherbed, lounging beneath the canopy, and picked at the buttons on his doublet, the thick leather sticking to his skin. He could still feel the thrum of lightning dancing in his chest. Peeling the mask off his face, he cast it aside onto the pillows.

“They ran like mice. Oh, if you could have seen the looks on their faces!” Lewella lingered on the balcony, her fingers curled in the draperies. The moonlight washed across her, turning her skin to perfect alabaster and her hair to amber waves washing across her shoulders. She dropped her own mask to the floor and Gethin drew a sharp breath to see her wide blue eyes. “I’ve never seen power like that before…” She touched her chest where her breath swelled. “Ioan turns a blind eye to the thieves that run rampant in the streets. He cannot control them no matter how royal he is.”

“My brother has ever believed in order and rules. He lets it soften his heart. He cannot even think that his men might be misleading him.” Gethin licked his lips, pulling his gloves off and throwing them on the floor. “I know well enough not to trust men so easily.”

“All of the kingdom must grieve that it is he who will sit the throne and not you. You saved all of those people and they don’t even know it.”

“We did that, Ella. Together. The blood of the lightning wyrm. My man tells me that lesser folk have broken beneath its will. Not I!” Gethin propped himself up onto an elbow, still struggling with the buttons. The webs of power knotted between his fingers still, begging for release and making him clumsy. His hands shook, his fingers slipped and he cursed beneath his breath.

“Let me help you, my lord of lightning.” Lewella fell on top of him, her nimble fingers tearing at the buttons; she slid her hands in to feel him beneath the doublet. The hair of her arms stood on end to touch his skin, her eyes turned wide and bright as her tongue danced across her lips. Her hair fell about them like a curtain, her voice a purr in his ear. “We must be quiet, if my mother hears…”

“What then? I am the king’s son. His eldest son.” Gethin arched a brow and sat up, catching her beneath the arms and holding her over him. Her hair tickled his nose, her lips soft and sweet so near his own.

“I wouldn’t care if you were the baker’s son, I want to kiss you in the sun. When can we be away from all of this?” She bowed her head to his neck and kissed beneath his ear, whispering, “I’ve grown so tired of this place, these rules.”

“When the time is right, you know that, Ella. You are still just a girl. So young, so pretty.” He stroked her cheek with his thumb, the last of his power diffusing between them and turning her cheek warm and pink. “So fun to corrupt.”

“Is that so?” Lewella laughed so loudly that Gethin had to clamp his hand across her mouth. She breathed hot air into his palm and began to hike her skirts about her waist, straddling him beneath the canopy.

“Ella, sweet Ella.” Gethin coiled his fingers in her hair and drew her in. Their lips met and he was consumed with longing for her.

He didn’t hear the men until the chamber doors banged open. Lewella froze above him.

“You cannot go in there! The lady Lewella is sleeping.” A chamber maid clung to the arm of a guard, hauling back against him though he did not seem to notice her efforts.

“She doesn’t appear to be sleeping,” the guard said as he pulled Lewella up off of the bed. He was dressed in full regalia, his steel armor turned copper in the torchlight, his navy half-cape a slice of midnight dancing behind him. Several guards amassed behind him with their hands on their swords, but he raised a hand and stopped them. “Get out.”

The men did not move. “But Ioan, sir—” one began.

“I said get out. You disobey me?” He turned on them and cast the first man bodily out the chamber doors. The next ones followed meekly, their jaws hanging open and tongues nearly lolling out between their lips.

“Brother,” Gethin said as he lounged on the bed, a sour knot growing in his stomach. The strength was leaving him, there was too little even to stand. Better to make his fight from the comforts of the bed. He smiled. “I did not expect you.”

Ioan slammed the chamber doors shut and in turning he raised a hand to strike Gethin. His hand lingered, wavered. He knotted his fingers back through his golden hair instead and growled deep in his throat. “This cannot go on, Geth. My men got word of the disturbance in the markets. I’m just thankful you didn’t kill those men. And you!” He turned, pointing a finger at Lewella.

“Oh, stifle yourself, Ioan. Leave her out of this.” Gethin mopped the sweat from his forehead. He chambered a cough in his chest, turning it into a grunt of annoyance. “Your guards do a shit job of controlling the streets. Consider it a favor that we cleaned up your mess.”

“Honest, good men don’t go about wearing masks, Geth.” Ioan picked the mask up from the pillows and turned it over in his hands. The fine wax work stained his fingers blue but did not bend to his touch. It was a deep blue near enough to black, the wax swooping down into a pointed chin, faceless but for the eyes. “And in our family’s own colors. You cannot take justice into your own hands.”

“He is the true heir. H can do as he will!” Lewella said, gathering her courage and standing up straighter.

Oh, but Gethin loved her then as if he never had before. He hid a smile behind his hand to watch her pretty chest swell in her black corset, heaving for breath. Never mind that he was no longer heir; those were thoughts for darker days.

“I don’t care if he is the king himself.” Ioan towered over her, his face turned dark. “He is sick and this—this chicanery is liable to get you both killed.” Ioan grabbed Gethin by the collar of his doublet and hauled him up out of the bed with ease. “We are leaving now, madam Lewella. I hope you take it as a warning and not a kindness that I woke your house staff but did not wake your parents. I will not be so considerate next time.”

“Brother—” Gethin began, his anger rising, choked off by the tightening in his throat.

“Enough, Geth. Your palanquin awaits you below. They will take you home while I clean up your mess.” Ioan turned Gethin around to march him back to the door.

The rage! It seared his skin like a brand. “I!” He proclaimed, turning on his heels. Ella was looking at him, her eyes were soft and wet; he hated to see that look in them. They were eyes that saw weakness. “I do not need to be treated like a child. I can and will walk home. Alone!”

He threw the things from the dresser on his way to the door, scattering books and candles all across the floor. His knees gave out and he pitched forward, catching himself by the doorframe. He dare not look back, not when he could feel their eyes on his back still; it was enough to make him ill. Worse enough that Ioan had shamed him in front of Lewella; he would not suffer their pity now.

“Younger brothers should not be so disrespectful,” he muttered as he left the chambers.

#

Ioan didn’t know what to do with his brother.

He had loved him once; he still did, but it wasn’t the same. Ioan even looked up to him when he had been younger, before Gethin had gotten in over his head and Ioan had to start taking responsibility on his behalf.

There was blood in the alley—Ioan could clean that much himself. It was dark enough that no one would see to ask what he was doing. The brick walls had been charred and turned black, though, and he could do nothing for that. He would have to send a runner in the morning with enough coin to keep the shop owners quiet. He needed to take it out of his own purse so his father would never know; so their mother wouldn’t have to think about it.

Dark had fully fallen when Ioan finally returned home. He peeled his leather gorget off of his neck, blinking blearily into the torchlight and swiping his hands across his eyes. “Mari? I didn’t think you would still be up.”

Ioan nearly toppled backwards as his little girl bolted from beneath the dining table, latching her arms around his legs. Ioan was thrown for only a moment before he was laughing. He lifted her up into his arms and tousled her golden hair.

“I told Nia that everything was fine, but she insisted on waiting up to see her father.” Mari smiled from the table. She tilted her head to the side so her hair fell across her back, showing the delicate slope of her neck and the soft silver charm in her earlobe. “I know better than to try to stop her. She inherited your bullheadedness.”

“We wanted to make sure you were safe!” Nia threw her arms around her father’s neck and rest her head against his shoulder.

“Well then, I thank you.” He bowed his head to hers and blew the hair from her face, sharing a secret smile. He sat at the table beside Mari, settling their daughter on his knee. “Has your uncle Geth returned home yet?”

“Oh, yes!” Nia curled her tiny fingers around Ioan’s hand as he held and bounced her. “He said he was very tired, he wouldn’t even do a magic trick for me.”

“You know you mustn’t bother your uncle Geth, sweetie. He’s very sick.” Mari leaned across the table, touching the girl’s back softly and smiling. “Why don’t you run along and check with Rhian that the soup is almost ready? I’m sure your father is very hungry.”

Nia looked up to her father’s face briefly; he nodded and she scampered off.

“I don’t feel safe with him here, Ioan.” Mari cupped one of his hands between hers, rubbing until his stiff palms became soft. “We have a child, and you will be king sooner than later.”

“Mari, you know I can’t send him away.” Ioan looked down at their hands, feeling guilt get the better of him. Gethin was his burden, not hers, and Mari had dealt with it longer than any other might. He raked his fingers back through his hair. “Father won’t have him anymore, he’s been disavowed. Mother cries just to see him. We can’t very well put him out in the street, he’s still my brother. In truth, I worry more for the Lewella girl. She’s addicted to the power, she doesn’t know what she’s getting involved with.”

“Do you know, Ioan? I have heard terrible noises from his chambers at night…” Her mouth softened and she shook her head. “And what if the people find out what he…” Mari paused, looking nervously down the hall. She whispered, “What he does. What he is. If you think the people wouldn’t raise the Ackart family to the throne if they found out, you’re wrong. It’s hard enough that you are the younger brother. You have such wonderful dreams, Ioan. I just don’t want to see them dashed before they can be realized.”

“I know that, Mari.” He touched her hand and kissed her, breathing in the sweet scent of honey on her skin. “I just need a little more time. I know I can get through to him. How can I help the kingdom if I can’t help my own brother?”

“Just promise me you’ll think of yourself, too, Ioan.” She ran her fingers along his beard and smiled sadly. “I don’t want you to have to give up your dreams for anyone.”

“Don’t worry, Mari. Things are going to change this time.”

They kissed and the thought of pain—of sorrow and fear—melted away.

#

The magic left Gethin by dawn.

He was relegated to his body again—his frail, sick, weak hearted body.

Gethin had no choice but to suffer his brother’s smiles when he came up with the morning tray of breakfast, displaying how easy it was for him to climb the stairs to the tower. He even came dressed in all of his clothes of the knighthood. The dawn sun glinting off of the steel armor made Gethin’s head pound and his stomach turn.

It took every ounce of control not to be sick all over Ioan’s polished boots.

He had to listen to Ioan talk about when Gethin used to be a knight as well. Back before he was disavowed, before the sickness was so thick in his lungs that he could barely walk, let alone ride a horse. No doubt Ioan thought the stories would cheer him up, but Gethin knew that he could never be that man again. They were only pretty stories, now.

It was always worse when Ioan would leave and Gethin would be alone.

A servant would come up at the head of every hour to ask him if he had need of anything, or to bring him cups of watered wine. As if he was a child. Lewella came to visit him before dusk, but Gethin thanked the gods that the servants had the presence of mind to check if he was awake and well enough to receive her. He instructed them to send her away. Immediately. He sat up in bed and hid behind the curtains as he watched her leave, her hair swaying in the wind like a candle flame.

What good was a beautiful girl if he was too weak to hold her in his arms? If his mind was too fogged by pain to enjoy the sweetness of her words or the curve of her breast.

By day he was too cold, by night he was too hot. By midnight he had cast the sheets off of himself in a fury and decided that he would not go another hour by himself, weak and desperate with his head pounding so. Ioan had posted guards by the door. His younger brother had grown smart with age, but he didn’t know everything.

He didn’t know about the secrets walls that led to the cellar. Or maybe he did and didn’t think anything of it. He certainly couldn’t know that Gethin snuck down into the cellars and knew how to navigate the stone maze beneath the kingdom.

Making it through the labyrinth was a slow process. Gethin fought for every inch of ground he gained. He was forced to lean most of his weight on a walking stick, humiliating as it was. He had to be careful, and when the coughing fits took him he had to sit down to stop the walls from spinning. If he didn’t sit down until it was over he would lose his bearings and get lost.

By the time he reached the menagerie his legs and arms were shaking. He was coughing more often than not. He could feel his breath rattling in his chest, haunting his footsteps.

Gethin pulled himself in through the floor of the menagerie, sweating and cold. The room smelled stale and sour, the rushes on the floor were dirty and the torchlight far too dim.

“I heard you had been locked away.” The man squatted by Gethin and lowered the cellar door after he was through. His white eyebrows rose, crinkling his forehead.

“No differently than any other time.” The words were dry, they scratched his throat and he coughed blood into the rushes. He held his hand out and the man hurried about, finding a waterskin and throwing it to him. Gethin drowned himself in it, his chest heaved and he spat out half of what he drank. Spittle clung to his lips and dripped onto the floor. “I have no money; Ioan took away my purse and coins.”

“A shame.” Owain shook his head and turned his back to him.

“You would leave me like that?” Gethin felt tears welling in his eyes and they fueled his anger. His legs would not obey him and so he took a clay pot from the tableside and threw it into the dark. It cracked against the wall, a mere hair above Owain’s head. It shattered and the pieces fell among the dirt and dung.

“You do me a disservice, my lord. You know I would not leave you that way. I was only fetching the lantern.” Owain turned, his expression softened beneath the light. “You know I don’t do any of this for love of money.”

“Then why?” Gethin wiped the spit from his mouth, his chest heaving from the strain of casting the pottery.

“You do what your brother will not, isn’t that clear? If he doesn’t know what crimes happen in the city then he is not capable of leading the guards; if he knows and does nothing then he is corrupt. Tell me, which of those ideals would you prefer to see made king?”

“Enough, Owain! That’s my brother you speak of.” Gethin would strike him, only… he fell back into the shadows, feeling a cold sweat break across his forehead. “He is busy with too many things. The throne is demanding and yet they expect him to lead the knights as well. Never mind him, Owain.”

“I spoke out of turn, my lord. I beg your forgiveness.”

“What do you have for me?”

“News.” Owain took the lantern down from the wall. His face and clothes were as dirty as the room and twice as wrinkled. “Word that bandits will be making a trade in the markets again tonight. Stolen gold with the king’s crown marking. Your brother’s men have already been cut in for part of the profit. The guard will do nothing to stop it.”

“And the other thing? What about the blood?” Gethin mastered his body. It took all of his will to stop from shaking as he hoisted himself onto his feet. Even still he teetered sideways and fell back among the crates stacked with feed and hay. He made himself a throne amongst them, sitting and looking out at the cages in the menagerie. The cells were too dark, but he could sense the beasts inside. He felt the pulse of his heart on the tip of his tongue. “I need it, Owain.”

“Of course you do,” Owain said. He went to a cell of iron bars and raised the lantern. A wyrm swam through the orange light, its body lithe and young, covered more by slick skin than scale yet. It was small enough to nearly fit between the bars. It writhed across the dirty floor, slithering back into the shadows until only its red eyes shone through the dark.

“A baby!” Gethin scowled. “No, Owain. Are all you Ackarts as foul as this? No wonder they keep you in the cellar and your cousins from the throne. I am of royal blood, it will not do. Find me a better one. Where is the lightning blood?”

“Drained, sir. Your appetite has been quite… prodigious of late. There is one full sized left, but I warn you, he is not as kind as the others have been. Lightning blood is but child’s play to this. Have you ever thought to control fire?” Owain held the lantern above his face, his skin turned yellow as a melting tallow candle. He turned to the next cell and the wobbling ring of light shone on the belly of a great black wyrm within. The beast snarled and lashed out, fire smoldering like coals beneath his scales. “Nasty, vicious thing. Forgive me, in your present state I must caution you against—”

“Do not belittle me, Owain.” Gethin doubled over, putting his face in his hands as the coughing took him. He spat out blood, hot and sticky between his fingers, making his stomach curdle. His head pounded and his eyes stung just to blink. “Just do it.”

“Very well.”

It was almost all Owain ever said. It was why Gethin liked him.

Gethin leaned back and Owain came to him in darkness, his dagger a thin sliver of light. Gethin shut his eyes and let out a tiny, shaking sigh when the blade kissed his skin. He felt the bad, sick blood pouring out of him, running down his arms. He let his body go limp and pictured himself as he had been once: young, strong, a knight with the world at his feet. All of it was possible again.

“I need you to open your eyes, sir.”

How long had passed? Time was so strange during the bloodletting. Gethin opened his eyes, milky and fogged. He was almost used to the sight of the brass syringe. The pain did not matter, nothing mattered but the blood of the wyrm. He looked up to the rafters and watched the ravens play as the needle slid into his eye. He took a deep breath as the bad blood left him; Owain pressed the plunger down and the blood of the wyrm turned his skin to fire.

By the time it was done the rushes were sodden with blood and sweat.

Strength flooded him to the bone; Gethin blinked blood from his eyes and leapt to his feet. The sweet burn of fire tickled just beneath his skin, lingered at the back of his throat; the anger and passion of the wyrm roiled deep in his belly, but he pushed it down with a mad laugh.

He left through the door. The cellar was for rats, the labyrinth was for sneaks, and he was a king. Gethin walked into the night and knew that the streets were his. Let Lewella see him now in his full power, now. He could burn away the memory of the weak thing Ioan had made her see.

And leave nothing behind.

#

Ioan went to Gethin’s chambers when he heard the guards sound the alarm. His heart sank like a stone as the door open and the torchlight shone across the empty room. He threw back the bed covers, even knowing that Gethin wasn’t under them.

“Papa?” Nia called from down the hall, her head peeking out the doorway. Her hair was a golden halo around her sleepy, red eyed face. “What’s happening?”

“It’s nothing, sweetheart. Go back to bed. I just need to straighten the guards out.” Ioan scooped her into his arms and kissed her on the head. He put her back to bed and put out the lantern.

Ioan whispered sweet goodbyes to Mari as she helped fasten his cuirass about his chest. She didn’t say a word about Geth, she didn’t have to. He could see it in her eyes and it tore a wound down to his heart. He caught her hands and kissed each fingers and last her lips before he joined the guards on their horses.

Ioan could see the fire from the streets, blooming from the market and catching.

#

The air blazed red with fire, alive with screams. Power sizzled on the edge of his fingertips and danced at his whim. The wax mask was soft on his face, melting beneath the heat of the flames. One of the bandits tried to stand and Gethin raked his hands through the air. Great gouts of flame caught on the wind and scored the man, sending him reeling back and toppling over the bodies of his companions. His paltry cloth armor burst into flames and his face twisted in anguish as the fire leapt and consumed him.

“See how they fall, Ella? Look at them!”

But Lewella wasn’t looking, not at them. She was looking at him. Her auburn hair was dancing on the wind, her face turned wan and white and her pretty mouth was twisting, saying things he couldn’t hear. The power boiled in his ears. The words meant nothing to him. Everything was consumed by the hiss and roar of the flame.

Wasn’t she happy? He could feel the sweat beading and dripping down the back of his neck. He had brought her here to show her what he could do. Hadn’t she been happy, didn’t she want to rule the night with him? She could be a goddess with him! They had stopped the bandits and she had laughed, the men had run and she had hoisted her dagger in victory.

It wasn’t enough.

She looked scared. She needed more. She needed to see.

She reached for him but he wrenched away from her. The power burned too bright, too consuming, and he couldn’t stand to be touched. The people stared even as they ran into the streets and their eyes were like daggers raking across his skin. Why wouldn’t they leave him alone? He threw fire in their way and they scattered like mice. A deep rage coiled up from his belly and burst in laughter and flame.

He fell onto his knees and the fire overcame him, the laughter twisted into a scream.

Where was Lewella?

#

“Lord, the smoke is too thick. We can’t go any further.” The guardsman reared his horse in around the market square. He and all of the other men had pulled their cloth gorgets up to cover their mouths, their eyes squinted and turned pink from the smoke.

“Wait here, I will go alone.” Ioan coiled the reins in his hands. The other horses bucked, but Ioan knew his mare. He controlled her with a soft whisper and the press of his heels. Together they jumped into the haze of smoke, galloping towards the beacon of fire flashing in the streets.

Ioan pulled the reins and leapt the horse across the corpses and barrels scattered across the cobblestones. He drove them into the fire and found Gethin wavering in the heavy fog, his skin blistered red. Fire caught on the thatched roofs, leaping from building to building and setting the city ablaze. The people cried as they watched. Gethin’s wax mask had slipped off of his face; it melted and dripped down his face like blue blood.

“What happened here?” Ioan climbed down from his horse and caught his brother by the shoulders. He shook him and when that did nothing, he struck him hard across the face. The smell of death and fear hung around him like a shroud; Ioan knew nothing but that his brother had done it.

Geth crumpled beneath the blow and fell onto his knees. He wretched blood, fire blooming from his hands. Gethin cried, his tears blue and waxy as they rolled across his cheeks. He fell upon a charred body, wrapped his arms about her and drew her near. Her hair was brittle and black but beneath it, Ioan could see the streaks of red.

“I didn’t mean to do it. Why did she have to get so close? Why couldn’t she be happy?” Gethin looked up from the corpse, his face black with soot and blood.

“She…” Ioan’s lips fumbled over the words. His stomach roiled and he was sick in the streets. Lewella had been so young, she had been sweet and beautiful and now she was naught but skin and bone. Her face was bone white where the mask had melted onto her skin, black where it had burned. “Geth, what did you do?”

“What am I going to do, Ioan? She’s dead, she’s really—” Geth choked on a sob and put his face in his hands. “—I didn’t mean to kill her! I didn’t know. I couldn’t control it. I thought I could, but…”

Ioan knelt beside him and pulled Gethin into his arms.

The sight of Gethin made him sick; touching him made his stomach churn. His brother was a murderer. What could he do? He was crying with him, pushing Geth’s hair back from his face and saying soft, nothing words.

“Listen to me, Geth.” Ioan held his face in his hands and forced him to look ahead. “You need to run, brother. You need to run or you will die here.” Ioan had learned to be practical; how to be cold and hard when he needed to. It was the only way he had survived. And now, looking out into the crowd of onlookers, he knew that they would remember this night. They would not forget the king’s own son with blood on his hands. No amount of gold would be enough for that.

“Where can I run to? Nowhere is safe. The king’s guard will follow me to the ends of the world.” Ioan sniveled and coughed; he wiped his face with his hands and turned his paled skin bloody. He bent over Lewella’s body and howled. “Ella! Ella will be dead no matter how far I run.”

“Enough!” Ioan threw Geth back into the street. His frail body bent in such a way as to look broken and Ioan leapt on him, his jaw tight and nostrils flaring. His chest contracted with each breath of black smoke. “They will not hunt you if you’re dead.”

“B-brother—”

“But I cannot kill you. I have never been strong enough to do that. Should I have?” Ioan sank back onto his haunches. He looked at Lewella, her body more black than milky white, her eyes cloudy and unseeing. He should have done as Mari asked; he should have done worse to stop this from happening. “You’re my brother, but you can’t be any longer. If you want to live you need to change.”

“How can I live? How can I live anymore?” Gethin cried.

“You have to live, because if she died and that is not enough to change you, then…” Ioan stopped. Then there was no hope, then. Gethin would never be well again. He couldn’t believe that, couldn’t stomach it. He stood on shaking legs, the world spinning. “Run, Gethin.”

“Run where?”

“Run to the far corners of the world, as far as you can. Take a boat from these lands.” Ioan touched his forehead. He was not a man to pray, but he did then. If not for himself then for his family, for Mari and Nia. He dropped his voice to but a whisper. “Run. I will tell the guards that I found and killed you, that I threw your body into the ocean. They won’t doubt me.”

“They will disavow you. You will lose everything! There is no greater sin—”

“You think I don’t know?” Ioan felt such an anger unleashed in his chest. He was holding his sabre before he knew it, his grip white knuckled. “The Ackarts will take the throne. I am doing this because of you, so you had better not let me down, Gethin. Leave this place, you are dead to me.”

He heard Gethin cry out but he turned away from him. Ioan bent and scooped up the body that had once been Lewella. She felt as light as a feather, the life had gone out of her and left only a shell.

He would never forgive Gethin for that.

#

“Papa, are you okay?” Nia crept into the chambers and hooked her arms around his shoulders, hugging him from behind. “It won’t be so bad. Mommy says the new house will be better, she says we can get a dog!”

“Does she?” He tried to laugh, but the sound was dry and brittle. He smoothed a hand across his face and caught Nia in his arms, pulling her around into his lap. He sat by the hearth, sorting through his papers. He unrolled one of the parchments—the drafting for a royal library. It had been a nice thought, a good dream. “I’ll be fine sweetheart.”

Ioan rolled up the parchment and threw it into the flames with the others.

Gobble Gobble Gulp

It’s Thanksgiving!

Okay, it’s not Thanksgiving yet, but I’m leaving to drive down to my parent’s house in South Florida later tonight and I wanted to get a post up before then. One of the nice things about going home now is that I don’t really have access to a PC, so I can totally zone out and, more importantly, spend most of the time in a hammock reading books. Lots of books. On the downside, it means any and all blogging and things must be done from my Kindle Fire. So, there probably won’t be any blogging until I get back.

So an early Happy Thanksgiving to everyone!

There’s been a lot to be excited and happy about lately, and I’m hopeful that it’s just the start of things. Thanks to my girlfriend, friends, beta readers, and family for being awesome and always being supportive; thanks to all of the great people on Twitter who are ALWAYS fun to talk to and to all of you here who read the blog. I hope everyone has a fantastic Thanksgiving and/or Thursday!

A few things of note before I finish up here:

I’ve got a Facebook Page now! Due to the speed of posting and all of that, any book news will go up there first and it’ll also be a place to link blog posts as they go up and also anything I think you guys will get a kick out of. Like this.

I’ve updated the short stories tab up there! It now actually contains short stories. Who would have thought? I’ll be posting a few more up on the blog after Thanksgiving, so the tab will see a little more action as that happens.

And, last link: If you haven’t seen it yet, Patrick Rothfuss’ Worldbuilders charity is happening again now! His most recent post had a lot of good, geeky ways to support the charity and help those in need.

Well, that’s it for me today. I’ll catch you guys on Twitter. Hope you have an awesome week!

NaNoWriMo: DEFEATED!

The beast has been slain!

Although, in that scenario I suppose it’s not as exciting since in around a month it’ll rise from the grave again and I’ll have an even tougher slog besting it. Draft two is never simple or easy. But still, I’ve completed the first draft of The Masks of Valdune, the story I’ve always just referred to as “Sherlock Holmes in Fantasy Land.”

So, I actually wrapped up the 50K required by NaNoWriMo in a mad dash on Friday. I think it’s my fastest pace yet and, to be honest, the two weeks are kind of a blur, now. I used this November to work on a novel I’d originally set aside after 20,000 words (for various reasons, most relating to the frustrations of trying to write a mystery novel by the seat of my pants), and so November brought me to a 70,000 word completion of the novel as a whole. Which is short for me, but I’ve come to realize that I add about half the length back on again in my edits, so the final thing will most likely end up somewhere around 100K+

This NaNoWriMo came on the tail of just finishing another novella, so it was definitely interesting switching gears from a sort of Viking-inspired adventure to a Victorian-Sherlock-Holmes-Fantasy detective story. What was even more interesting was trying to write a detective story with only the most basic elements of planning going on beforehand. Back when I was doing the original 20K of this project I made a blog post here about how difficult it was to organize my facts and how much I wanted a giant whiteboard to chart things out.

How I wish I had taken that advice from my past self!

I operate best when I’m writing by the seat of my pants. In On Writing, Stephen King compared writing a first draft with digging out a fossil. You uncover this behemoth figure beneath the sand, guessing at its shape and slowly picking away at the details. It’s a mad, exciting dash as you get caught up in character’s heads and you start to figure out the plot that’s been building in your head all along.

Trying to apply that method to a mystery/detective story, however, maybe isn’t the best way to go about things. I had a general idea for how I wanted things to end and for the most part I think I nailed a lot of the beats that I wanted to, but by the time I hit the 50,000 word goal I was starting to see how much better the ending would have been if I’d lined everything up beforehand. On the other hand, any time I try to extensively plot a novel before I dive in, the spark is extinguished, and so the knots and the tangle are a mess, but at least it’s a mess I can work with.

And besides, that’s what draft two is for!

If you want to learn more about The Masks of Valdune, the awesome Nadine Ducca featured me on her blog about NaNoWriMo and the page includes a summary of Masks and even a sample in the form of a few pages. You can find the blog post here!

How about you guys? If you’re doing NaNoWriMo: How’s it going? And are you adhering to a strict plot you established or writing by the seat of your pants?

Friday Reads: Fool’s Fate by Robin Hobb

All right, so Friday has rolled along and between reading Hounded by Kevin Hearne (which I’ll maybe do a post about next week) and NaNoWriMo, I’ve only gotten around 200 pages into Fool’s Fate, so this won’t be a proper review of that book. What it will be is a blog post about the series as a whole. Because I love it. And because it deserves at least one post about why.

Robin Hobb has made a name for herself as a fantasy author unafraid of putting her characters through hell. That’s nothing, you might say; you’ve read Game of Thrones, you might even say, but that doesn’t begin to compare. Not even a little bit. What I find to be so heart wrenching about the Farseer Trilogy (and the follow-up, The Tawny Man trilogy) is that the melancholy and sadness feels very personal. Its not about the characters you love dying, it’s about growing to love characters who are inherently flawed and often build walls in the way of their own happiness.

While sometimes Hobb’s books can lean heavily towards characters and internal conflict at the expense of pacing and plot that’s the backbone of most fantasy novels, I think it more than makes up with it by presenting what has to be some of the best characters in the genre. It’s been incredible getting to see the characters grow from the first book into the sixth, where they don’t seem to just be taller, grumpier, and older versions of themselves, but actual adults who carry the weight and their history and the emotional scars with them.

Fool’s Fate has been one of those books I’ve dreaded reading. It’s the last book in the journey of Fitz and the Fool (for now, at least) and I just don’t want it to end. And I’m worried about where it will end, given Hobb’s willingness to let her characters meet with unhappy endings. The right ending isn’t always the happy one, after all.

Short Story: The Girl Who Outsmarted Her Own Shadow

As you can see by the wordcount bar over there on the right, this week has been a mad dash for NaNoWriMo words. Between that WIP and work-work, my brain is totally scrambled. But I still wanted to get something up for the blog! So, I’ve decided to flesh out that “Short Stories” tab at the top, starting now, by posting one of my stories here.

Title: The Girl Who Outsmarted Her Own Shadow

Length: 3,500 words

Pitch: Fairy tales; folk tales; a girl, her dog, and her shadow

I hope you guys enjoy!

The Girl Who Outsmarted Her Own Shadow

The night had many rules and Silvara knew them all.

“Don’t go anywhere at night without a torch. When I’ve finished eating, I must always burn the bones, because Father says burying them just makes the Night Things come out to dig them up, which I don’t understand because you say the Night Things never cross the—”

“Silvara,” her mother said.

“—Anyway! Whenever I go out, I’m to tuck an iron coin into my left shoe, since I’m right handed,” Silvara continued, taking off her left shoe and hopping on one foot as she pulled the coin out. “Which I don’t really understand, either, because left handers are demon-cursed, so why does the rule make a point of mentioning left handers? Unless at some point—“

“That’s quite enough.” Mother sighed, tapping her foot on the ground.

“And most important, I mustn’t ever, under any circumstances, cross the river. Why not, though? There’s nothing out there.” Silvara finished counting off the rules on her fingers. Mother wouldn’t let her back in the house until she’d counted them all in detail, but snow had slipped down the back of her right shoe and melted under her heel, and she was getting tired of hopping with one foot in the air.

“And how do you know there’s nothing out there?” Her mother stood in the doorway, arms folded, brow furrowed. Watching.

“I’ve been near the river and I’ve never seen anything. Not even any footprints on the other side! So why mustn’t I cross it?”

“Because,” her mother said, the way she always did. “And just because you didn’t see it doesn’t mean it’s not out there.” Mother shook her head. “All right, you’ve suffered enough. Hurry in before you catch your death.” Mother plucked the cap from Silvara’s head as she scurried inside, her boot already half off and flung into the rushes before she had reached the hearth, wiggling her toes close enough to the flames that her mother called out, “Mind yourself!”

“You’re likely to burn your toes off!” Silvara chanted at the same time her mother did, rolling over with laughter when her mother’s cheeks turned as red as summer tomatoes.

“Yes, well you—” Her mother began.

“—won’t be laughing when it happens!” Silvara finished for her.

Drawn by the sound of laughter, Agi came running in with his fur mottled gray and brown, tracking muck and snow inside and shaking himself out so the room smelled of dirty, wet dog. Silvara looked up just as Agi pounced upon her, throwing her arms back and rolling with him across the floor.

“Agi, you stink,” she said, to which the dog growled harmlessly and put more force into his wrestling tirade. He was larger than her twice over, making her work to try to get her arms around him and pin him to the ground, but he was good at wriggling out of her grasp and popping back up away from her as if by magic, set to pounce, the fire glimmering over his silver fur and shining on his snow-damp nose. “Where have you been?”

“Probably off making trouble for us again, I’ve no doubt,” her mother said, sniffing loudly and giving Agi a withering glare.  Agi laid down, his tail thumping the ground and ears flapping down. “That’s better. Now, you mind Sil, Agi,” she said as she worked the toggles of her dark sable cloak, the one Father had brought back for her from the last big hunt, the one that shone and flowed about her like a living shadow whenever the moon was out. “Now, I have to go across the way to Geiri’s farm. He’s promised us a nice cut of lamb for our stew tonight. You’ll mind each other, won’t you?”

“Of course,” Silvara said. Agi wagged his tail.

“Somehow I don’t trust you…” Mother hesitated at the door, her hand on the knob and the wind sweeping in behind her, tousling her golden hair. “Heavens, but I’ll be glad when your father gets back. You’ll remember the rules?”

“Always bury your iron coin with your left hand, not your right, and if you cross the river, do it while carrying a torch,” Silvara began, purposefully twisting the rules as she counted them off on her fingers.

“Sil!” Mother said, huffing, but she smiled a little, anyway. “That’s enough. Just see that you don’t burn your toes off, all right?” She hurried out with that, ducking her head against the snow just starting to fall.

Silvara ran to the door after her mother, pushing it shut against the gales of wind. Snow gathered in the entry and her mother would expect it cleaned by the time she got back, but Sil swept it away quickly with her foot and scurried back to the hearth, kneeling by the fire.

“Agi, do you know what I found today?” she whispered and Agi put his head in her lap, barking once. “The woodcutter’s boy took me out into the forest to bring in the water, but while he was gathering kindling, I crossed the river.”

Agi thumped his tail against the ground and whined.

“Don’t give me that look! There was nothing there, of course, just like I expected. But I found something. A treasure buried under a tree root.” She eyed the door, biting her cheek and holding her breath, half expecting Mother to barge back in. When she didn’t, and Agi bayed impatiently, Sil fished inside her winter coat and took the treasure from her pocket—a stone on the outside, cracked down the middle to reveal the shimmering crystal within, glittering with all the colors of an aurora. She held out in front of the fire, cupped in both hands; the flames curled and danced in the crags of the crystal, making it look like it glowed in her hand. “What do you think it is?”

Agi yipped as he leapt up, nipping at her hand hard enough to draw blood and taking the stone between his teeth. “Ow! Agi, no!“ Silvara cried out, sucking the blood from her palm. Agi bolted for the door, pawing at it, but she caught him before he could nose it open and they wrestled, rolling across the room and knocking heads until the stone went flying—falling—clattering—and then rolling into the fire. It scattered the embers, throwing sparks like the fireworks Silvara had once seen in the big cities.

“Agi, look what you did!”

Agi barked, tail wagging.

Silvara crawled closer to the hearth, watching the fire spit colors and searching for any sign of the stone. An explosion of gold and greens shot out and she flinched back, covering her eyes with her hands as she scrambled backwards across the room with Agi howling at her side. She peeked through the gaps in her fingers to see her shadow swinging around in front of her as if it grew from the flames. The shadow stretched, arms and legs grown long and thin, and from the fire it took two sparks for eyes and black embers for teeth, guttering orange and yellow in the dying light when the shadow creature stopped growing and stared—and smiled.

“Where did you come from?” Silvara asked, shuffling back on her elbows, wary of standing and giving the creature more shadow to move with. As she drew back, he moved with her, until she hit the wall. Agi yipped from her side and snapped at the shadow thing, but its spindly arms and legs moved like leaves in the wind, twisting and pulling, leaving Agi biting only air.

“Oh, we’re always with you,” he said, his voice like the hiss of kindling flames.

“I’ve never seen you before.” Silvara braced herself against the wall, pulling herself up, knees wobbly. She rubbed her eyes with the back of her hand, one at a time, too worried even to blink.

“I’ve always been right there; you people are just so clever at not looking. It’s a wonder, really, that you never notice. You’re all so afraid of the dark that I almost never have a break.” He moved, his shadow body cast through the kitchen, disappearing in pots and pans, beneath boxes and the long wooden table. He rifled through things, throwing out jars, pots, pans, and crocks of honey that broke and scoured the floor with clay shards, leaving sticky trails through the dirt. “We’re always there, waiting, watching, but we can’t take shape on this side of the river. Not by ourselves. I should thank you for bringing me back, but I’ve grown so hungry…” He licked his lips, his tongue just a darker shadow passing over the embers of his teeth. “Manners are always the first thing to go.”

“I think you should leave, now. There are rabbits in the woods, I’d bet there are rabbits on your side of the river, too. I saw the b-burrows,” she said, biting her cheek on the last when fear made her stammer. Silvara straightened, putting a hand on Agi’s head, and did not flinch when another dish shattered. “I’d thank you not to ruin anything else!” she shouted, seeing him lifting another jar, this one filled with jam. “And I wish you luck in finding whatever it is you’re looking for.”

The jar slid from his fingers, or through them, and cracked against the floor. Mother would be angry.

“Can’t do that,” he said, slinking back to her with one great, long stride. The fur on Agi’s body stuck up at all ends and a growl rippled through him. “Don’t they teach children anything these days? You’re bound to me, now, or I’m bound to you. However you want to look at it. You’ve given me your shadow—”

“You took it!”

“—and next will be your heart. I’ve grown so lonely out on the riverside. Oh, how I long to be with people again. I grow so tired of hares and fish, who never say anything the least bit interesting.” The shadow stretched quite marvelously, reaching up to the thatching on the roof, great lengths of his body popping and cracking like fire before he settled back down. “It will be nice to wear the human skin again.”

“Wear—you want to wear me?” Silvara scrambled backwards, searching through the dirt for her iron coin. She tipped over one of her shoes and threw it as the shadow followed after her, but it only passed right through him and landed in the fire, scattering ashes. She ran for her other shoe. “Leave me alone!”

“I can never leave you alone. We’re attached, you and me. Don’t you want to know how many other people in town are like me?”

“Others?” she choked on the word.

“You didn’t think you were alone, did you? Everyone goes over the river eventually.” He laughed, oh, he laughed like the wind and like cold winters and flowers dying and the hard, packed dirt under the ice rinds. He reached for her; Agi leapt and went right through him, tumbling across the floor. “Butcher, baker, and candlestick maker. One by one. There’s no place to hide.”

Silvara found her iron coin under her cap and brandished it before her like a very small sword.

“Oh, it’s much too late for that,” her shadow said, and then he smiled and raised his hands, and then Silvara was raising her hands, and she was smiling as well. He sighed, and so she sighed too. “It feels good to be in control again. I’ve spent so long living in the dark.”

“What’s happening to me?” Silvara said, her teeth clenched tight as his were, so her words were just mumbles against the roof of her mouth.

“You’ve had your turn controlling me, now it’s my turn. Think of how much fun we’ll have! Think of all the things we’ll eat.” The shadow turned his head to Agi, who recoiled and barked, baring his teeth; the shadow smiled. Silvara could already feel her muscles growing tighter, like when she’d slept too long in a bad spot and woke up stiff and aching; her heart hammered against her chest, but how could she tell if it was really her or if it was him? She thought she tasted something in the back of her throat, something like hunger and blood and things buried in winter snow.

“You mustn’t hurt Agi,” she managed to say, her voice now barely a whisper.

“Are you starting to come around at last?” he asked, sitting on his haunches and reaching out to pet Agi. He stroked the shadow of the dog, and so it was Silvara’s hand who scratched that spot between Agi’s ears that the dog loved so much. “It’s ever so much better when you just agree. I grow tired of exerting my will.”

“What about my mother? I’ll agree if you won’t hurt my mother.”

“Why would I hurt your mother? She’s one of my friends already. It will be a happy reunion!”

“No, I don’t believe you!” Silvara wanted to cry, she wanted to, she could feel it but her body wouldn’t do it and it made her scream, but her mouth wouldn’t do that either; the scream rattled around inside her, knocking against rib bones and sinking in her belly, making her shiver.

“You didn’t believe I existed a little bit ago. Doesn’t mean it’s not true.” The shadow flicked an invisible speck of dirt from his knee. “Now, you said you’d stop fighting. I thought we were going to have a deal.” The shadow sighed, stroking Agi’s neck with her hand in a way that didn’t seem at all comforting, but rather threatening.

“Okay—okay! Just, just, just…” she stammered, and wasn’t sure if it was her or him mocking her. “Just let me say goodbye to Agi.” The shadow stared, gesturing to his and her hands already on the dog. “Properly,” she managed. “I need to put out his food and water, and I can’t trust you to do it.”

“Oh, very well, if it will move things along.” The shadow gave her control and Silvara pitched forward, falling onto the floor as all of her muscles relaxed at once. Agi ran to her, his breath hot on her face, licking her cheek as she blinked away the pain.

“Come on, Agi,” she said, whispering and watching the shadow from the corner of her eye. She filled his dish with food and then she found the buckets of river water, dragging one out from the kitchen. In the reflection of the water she could see herself, but her eyes were darker, deeper, like a shadow lived there now, and it made her shiver.

“I think the first thing we’ll do is go out for a nice steak, fresh from the cow,” Her shadow was saying as he flickered about the wall, paying her no mind but rather looking wistfully out the window. “Or maybe a pig. Oh, I love pigs. I think we’ll do that. I can already taste it.” He threw his arms in the air and spun around, freezing then for a moment, the embers of his eyes staring. “What are you doing?”

“I’m not afraid of the dark,” she said, and she even smiled a little—and it was her this time, it really was. He tried to get control of her again, but she had already heaved the bucket and as he raced towards her, his shadow darkening her eyes, the river water shot through him and hit the fire. The flames hissed and smoke filled the air, shooting out from the hearth and wafting through the room. It floated up into the space between them and hid him from her, covered his eyes and his yellow smile, it took away his shape until all that was left was the sound of his scream rattling through the room like the first winds of winter. “And there are no shadows in the dark.”

Silvara fell, her legs giving out; the bucket tumbled from her hands, rolling away. Agi ran to her, panting, yipping, tail wagging, and she hugged him. “Why didn’t I listen to you, Agi? I’ll never not listen to you again.” She petted him for a good, long time, until the wind came in through the window and startled her to moving again.

Mother would be home soon, or the creature that was Mother. Silvara scurried to the fire, crouching in the ashes, and dug out the stone that had fallen in. It was cold to the touch, somehow, and she broke it. She had to throw it against the floor several times, making Agi jump, but eventually it cracked open into hundreds of tiny, shining pebbles, and she thought she could see a shadow in each one, hissing at her as they floated away, sinking into the darkness; the stone turned black and lifeless.

“Agi, you have to help me,” Silvara said, and Agi turned in a quick circle, baying quite loudly. “We need to find mother’s stone before she gets back. It must be here somewhere.”

The kitchen was a mess of broken jars and sticky, spilled jam. Silvara dug through the cupboards, heaping jars out and onto the floor with as much care as she could spare, knocking over more than one. Agi put his nose to the ground and sniffed through the room, ears, tail and belly all low to the ground. They tore through boxes, turned over pots and pans, scoured the floor in flour from bags; Silvara even stuck her arm up to the elbow in a giant crock of honey, fishing for anything and finding nothing.

The wind howled and shook the door on its hinges; Agi jumped at it, pawing and nearly reaching the bolt that he nosed, trying to open it.

“Of course, she wouldn’t hide it in here!” Silvara cried, following Agi’s lead as she threw back the bolt. He ran out ahead of her, a silver streak in the night, sniffing around the border of the house and stopping just under the kitchen window. Silvara fell to her knees and started digging. The snow stuck between her fingers and froze under her nails, turning her skin red, but she kept digging until she felt dirt, and just beneath the surface she felt the rough, craggy face of a stone.

“What’s all this?” Mother called from down the road, a clay platter of cut lamb in her hands. Silvara turned just in time to see the platter drop and break on the ground; cut meat rolled into the snow and blood splattered onto her shoes. Silvara dug and even as she began to pry the stone out, her mother cried, “You mustn’t touch that!”

Mother grabbed her by the back, pulling her away, the crook of her elbow caught around Silvara’s neck and dragging her back through the snow. Silvara could see her mother’s shadow, then, the shadow she had never bothered to look at before, much larger than her own had been; it had pointy, yellow teeth and wild blue-iris eyes; it had a mouth that wouldn’t stop screaming and when it reached out its hand for Silvara, she could feel her mother’s nails scratching the soft skin of her throat.

Agi howled and pounced, ripping at the apron Mother wore and pulling her back into the snow. The moon cast great shadows over the ice; Agi’s shadow stretched like a wolf twice his size, and Mother’s shadow reached out for him. Sweat broke on Silvara’s forehead and she scurried back to the hole, breaking her nails digging. Agi cried and whimpered, she could see him recoiling and Mother reaching, coming for them both.

“I always knew that dog was a mistake!” Mother howled, swatting Agi hard with a piece of the broken platter. Agi fell backward, rolling through the snow, just as Silvara prized the stone away from the ground at last. She spun back from her mother’s grasp, holding the stone above her head, chest heaving. “Don’t! You mustn’t, you cannot!” Mother’s voice howled, only it wasn’t her voice, it was the voice Silvara recognized from her own shadow: deep, hollow, and cold as death.

Silvara threw the stone with a force and it cracked upon the frozen ground, casting great shards of colors into the air, catching the light of the moon as they glimmered and dissipated. The cry of the shadow left with the last great gales of wind and Silvara ran to Agi, falling by his side and wrapping her arms in his thick, soft fur.

“Agi, are you all right?” she cried into his fur, feeling his breath coming in staggered little hiccups. As the last colors of the stone faded into darkness, Agi began to pant and his heart began to thump, and soon he was squirming out of her arms and yipping again, licking the tears from her cheeks.

“Silvara…” Mother’s voice, distant, quiet as a mouse. Silvara hadn’t noticed how much warmth it had been missing before, but she heard it now. She ran to her mother, nearly leaping into her arms to hold her. “What are we doing out here?” Mother touched her face and looked surprised to feel the tears on her cheeks. She looked down at the mess by her feet; the lamb scattered across the snow, the broken platter, and just laughed as she ran her hand back through Silvara’s hair. “I guess we’ll have vegetable stew tonight. Come on in, or we’ll both catch our death out here.”

Friday Reads: The Winter Prince

My knowledge of Arthurian legend is maybe a little weak, but I do love the mythos. I loved Gillian Bradshaw’s Hawk of May (and if you haven’t read it, you should!) and I enjoy the BBC show Merlin, so when I heard about The Winter Prince, a Young Adult book about Arthur’s children, my interest was piqued.

A short 200-pages, The Winter Prince reads more like a novella than a full novel most of the time. It’s a close character study about the child of an incestuous romance between Arthur and Morgause; you might know him as Mordred, in this book he’s named Medraut. The theme of incest seems to run throughout the entire book, with the main character showing more than a little interest for his half-brother and half-sister, as well. While a little odd, it’s certainly keeping within the general atmosphere of many myths.

If you can get beyond that element, the book presents a startlingly deep insight into the emotions of a character who has grown up abused both physically and sexually. Medraut is prone to dark thoughts at times and odd flares of temper. He’s led a hard life and, not only that, he can’t be recognized as an heir to the throne and must instead take care of his hair-brother, Arthur’s legitimate, younger, son.

The Winter Prince shines when it comes to characters. It creates an interesting portrayal of everyone involved. Based on the pacing, the themes, and the general structure of the novel, I honestly don’t know that I would have pegged it as a YA book if I hadn’t known already. YA certainly doesn’t need to be all bubblegum and roses, but this book is decidedly introspective and–well–to be quite frank, it’s slow, even at only 200 pages.

That’s not to say it’s not enjoyable, but it certainly wasn’t what I was expecting. There’s something to be said for subverting the expected, though, and this book presented a kind of beautiful, haunting atmosphere of grief, loss, and the weird shapes of love.

Overall: It was an interesting book and I’ll most likely check out The Coalition of Lions at some point, although I’m in no huge rush to.

Learn More: The Winter Prince on Amazon ; Elizabeth Wein’s Webpage

If you liked this book you might also like: Hawk of May by Gillian Bradshaw; The King Must Die by Mary Renault

Fantasy and Historical Fiction: Sister Genres

George R.R. Martin’s fantasy series A Song of Ice and Fire is undoubtedly one of the most talked about and successful series currently running in the genre. Bernard Cornwell is a writer with over 50 novels to his credit, and he happens to be one of my favorite authors when it comes to historical fiction. I’ve loved Cornwell’s work ever since stumbling upon a copy of Agincourt in the bookstore, and it goes without saying that his Viking saga The Saxon Tales is one of my favorites series ever.

So, you can imagine how interested I was when I heard GRRM and Cornwell had a sit down conversation/interview. Of particular note, to me, was the way the conversation (which can be found here) started:

GRRM: It has long been my contention that the historical novel and the epic fantasy are sisters under the skin, that the two genres have much in common. My series owes a lot to the work of J.R.R. Tolkien and the other great fantasists who came before me, but I’ve also read and enjoyed the work of historical novelists. Who were your own influences? Was historical fiction always your great passion? Did you ever read fantasy?

BC: You’re right – fantasy and historical novels are twins – and I’ve never been fond of the label ‘fantasy’ which is too broad a brush and has a fey quality. It seems to me you write historical novels in an invented world which is grounded in historical reality (if the books are set in the future then ‘fantasy’ magically becomes sci-fi). So I’ve been influenced by all three: fantasy, sci-fi and historical novels, though the largest influence has to be C.S. Forester’s Hornblower books.

Maybe it’s just because I’ve thought this for a while myself, or because I’m a fan of historical fiction, but I thought it was great to see these two authors talk about this.

It would be hard to deny the impact and importance of history when it comes to Fantasy. The typical milieu relies so strongly upon an idea of history–most often European, and also most often taking place in the middle ages–that the two ideas are intertwined. GRRM calls the landscape of A Song of Ice and Fire Westeros, but the novels could just as easily have taken place in Britain. The influence of the war of the roses in the series is certainly no secret, and reading this tidbit of their conversation really led me to wonder if part of the success of Ice and Fire is due to its strong grounding in history.

Ask a fan of Ice and Fire what they love about the series, and most likely they’ll tell you it’s partly because it feels so real–in addition to the intricate plot and the fabulous characterization, of course. I enjoy Fantasy novels that stretch the bounds of reality, but I find myself most eagerly coming back to and enjoying those that establish a strong sense of connection with our history/world.

I remember an episode of Patrick Rothfuss’ Storyboard (I believe it was the episode about Urban Fantasy) where he mentions Tim Powers and how he often accomplishes fantastic elements so well because he doesn’t begin there but, instead, begins by telling you a series of true things and establishing a sort of credibility with us, the readers, before dropping the fantasy on us. To relate this back to the Ice and Fire example, I’d say that the dragons and magic of the series are so successful because they’re launched from this foundation of a well established world. Sure, it has seasons that last years, but for the most part George R.R. Martin works hard to show us that his world isn’t so different from our own, and then when he brings in white walkers or dragons, we’re not as likely to flinch and for a moment we might just believe.

Likewise, Patrick Rothfuss has a fantastic magic series in his Kingkiller Chronicles–in my mind–because of the fact that it has such a strong basis on real world science. It’s borrowing from that solid foundation of things we know and understand as facts and then using that as a jumping off point. By starting with things we believe to be inherently true, it makes the logical leap for our mind to believe that magic is possible that much easier.

I guess what I’m trying to say is that I love Fantasy novels that really embrace this connection and I’m always happy to see things like that. I appreciate the farther out Fantasy as well, with wildly different worlds and crazy magic, but the stuff that blurs the line is probably the most interesting to me.

How do you guys like your Fantasy? Bizarre and truly out there? Perhaps a world and culture based on history? Or do you prefer authors like Naomi Novik and her Temeraire books who take an established setting and add magic to it?

Fantasy Review: The Charnel Prince

Okay, so this review was slightly delayed by the exciting news last Friday, but I still wanted to get my thoughts up on Greg Keyes’ The Charnel Prince. Warning: this review will contain one or two spoilers for the first book in the series, but I’ll try to make the spoilers very slight! I promise they aren’t huge.

The Charnel Prince is the second novel in Keyes’ The Kingdoms of Thorn and Bone series. I really enjoyed the first book, The Briar King (and I did a small review on GoodReads here), although I did experience a few hiccups specifically when it came to some of the romance subplots.

There’s never a dull moment in The Charnel Prince. As the second book in the series, Keyes has introduced all of the key players already and has allowed himself the space now to explore the plot. His clean, tight prose gets us moving immediately in the right direction, making the book immediately engaging. The first half of The Briar King was a bit of a slow burn, so this was definitely an improvement.

Everything I loved about the first book is still here. Keyes handles fantasy tropes with a kind of deft ease, paying them their due but always managing to escape the boring cliches. His characters are interesting, flawed, and entirely engaging.

I think it’s very easy to use multi-POV as a kind of shortcut to making a fantasy world seem broader, and as a result it can lack depth, but Keyes handles it well. He also manages to accomplish the one thing that has always interested me about multiple point of view novels: the actions certain characters take are viewed differently depending on which character you’re currently reading. A character might do something that seems entirely reasonable when you’re listening to their approach, but it’s only when you get into another character’s head that you realize perhaps it wasn’t as reasonable as you’d thought.

Changing perception this way, based on character, is so human that I just can’t help but love it. It’s something that Robin Hobb does so well, and I was glad to see it in The Charnel Prince. It really does flesh the characters out and provides a nice touch of humanity despite the fantastical going-ons.

That said, The Charnel Prince isn’t without its flaws. Similar to the first book in the series, I just don’t get the romantic subplots here. In the first novel, a relationship between the knight Neil MeqVren and the princess Fastia developed almost out of nowhere. They shared little more than a paragraph or glance between one another and then nothing for a time. Suddenly, by the end of the book, they were in love. I could stomach that well enough–it was, after all, only a subplot. I took it as perhaps a fleeting infatuation.

But in the second book, their odd love plays an even larger and more confusing role. I appreciate that this subplot could have added more tension to Neil’s chapters in the book, but I don’t think it was fully realized and just left me feeling empty about the whole thing.

Another thing that bothered me in The Charnel Prince is the reliance on fate to get things done. I understand fate as a trope in fantasy and I do think it can be useful and even interesting! I don’t feel that it’s the case here, though. Rather than having destiny add a layer of depth to the plot, it’s instead used as a sort of get-out-of-jail free card. Characters are constantly put into near death situations only to be saved by the hand of fate, sending them the right person at the right time whose role seems to be to act mysterious, get the plot where it needs to be, and disappear.

The reliance on fate was never so heavy handed that it ruined the book for me, but it did leave me feeling a little annoyed with some of the arcs.

Overall: Negative points aside, I did enjoy The Charnel Prince. It was an entertaining ride and even though sometimes the characters were short-changed by unfulfilling subplots and fate, they’re still interesting and entertaining. I’ll certainly be reading the third book in the series.

Learn More: The Charnel Prince on Amazon; Greg Keyes on GoodReads

If you liked this book you might also like: The Princess Bride by William Goldman; Assassin’s Apprentice by Robin Hobb