Tanith Lee Read-Through

Every few years, I take a look at my bookshelves and see how many old paperbacks I’ve collected over the years. How long has it been since I read these? This often gives me an urge to do a read-through of everything I have by a certain author.

This year, it’s Tanith Lee. Lee was a new, hot author in the 1970s. That’s when I made the jump from checking out library books to buying paperbacks with my own money. They were inexpensive then, as low as 75¢ or $1. Lee was one of the first authors I started buying consistently.

Fantasy from the Seventies has a distinctive feel. They were coming off the incredible blockbusting of Lord of the Rings in the Sixties. Everyone, authors and publishers alike, was trying to figure out how to incorporate the high fantasy elements from Tolkein — the long journey, the presence of historic artifacts scattered around the countryside — into current work. Fantasy in the Seventies rambled through fantastic vistas, bringing in odd details to clash or blend. There was a lot of absurdity and/or political cynicism. You can see it in Lee’s work, in Jack Vance, Michael Moorcock, A. E. Van Vogt, and others.

Lee stood out with her blend of science fiction, fantasy and sometimes horror. Her voice was distinctive, and her subject matter often edgy. She did experimental things, like creating a whole slang for the teen protagonists in her Don’t Bite the Sun series. One of her hallmarks was to have a young protagonist who is bright and bold, but also awkward. They often had a companion/familiar who was clumsy and propelled the plot with their antics.

The first of her books I’m re-reading is The Black Unicorn. It’s an explicitly YA trilogy about a teenager whose mother is a sorceress, but has no such power of her own. She’s bored, cooped up in her mother’s castle of random sorceries, so off she goes.

I thought I had all of Lee’s books from the Seventies and Eighties, but now I’m seeing a few gaps. Maybe I borrowed some of her books from the library after all. Anyway, I’m sure I can easily find them at used book stores.

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