Wheel of Stars

by Andre Norton

Gwennan Daggert descends into a strange nightmarish world and struggles to defeat the evil power of the mysterious Tor Lyle

Genres: Fantasy, Science Fiction, Urban Fantasy, Science Fiction Fantasy, Ebooks, Fiction

320 pages, Mass Market Paperback

First published January 1, 1983

About the author

Andre Norton, born Alice Mary Norton, was a pioneering American author of science fiction and fantasy, widely regarded as the Grande Dame of those genres. She also wrote historical and contemporary fiction, publishing under the pen names Andre Alice Norton, Andrew North, and Allen Weston. She launched her career in 1934 with The Prince Commands, adopting the name “Andre” to appeal to a male readership. After working for the Cleveland Library System and the Library of Congress, she began publishing science fiction under “Andrew North” and fantasy under her own name. She became a full-time writer in 1958 and was known for her prolific output, including Star Man’s Son, 2250 A.D. and Witch World, the latter spawning a long-running series and shared universe. Norton was a founding member of the Swordsmen and Sorcerers' Guild of America and authored Quag Keep, the first novel based on the Dungeons & Dragons game. She influenced generations of writers, including Lois McMaster Bujold and Mercedes Lackey. Among her many honors were being the first woman named Gandalf Grand Master of Fantasy and SFWA Grand Master. In her later years, she established the High Hallack Library to support research in genre fiction. Her legacy continues with the Andre Norton Award for young adult science fiction and fantasy.

Reviews

[Werner]

Although Andre Norton was an enormously prolific and successful speculative fiction writer, my experience with her work has been underwhelming. Although this is the only one of her books that I list on my shelves, I read another one aloud to my wife in the late 80s, and also started and failed to finish reading one to myself besides this one. I don't list the latter two because I've forgotten the titles (and in the case of the other one I didn't finish, found it so unengaging that I literally remember nothing else about it, either!), and the author's bibliography of writings is so huge I don't deem it worthwhile to hunt through it to find either of them. (That says something, given my usual interest in trying to track down prior reads!) Barb liked the one we read together, but I found it excruciatingly bland and boring, with a linear progression of the child protagonists through a series of challenges for which a handy key to overcoming was predictably provided each time. (In fairness, it was intended for elementary-school age children; but it's worth noting that even as an adult, I can often get into and like books written for kids, if they're engaging and well written. This one wasn't.)

Wheel of Stars was a library check-out in the very early 90s, and an attempt to give the author's work a last chance. The initial set-up in roughly the first two chapters was actually good, drawing me into a tale of possibly supernatural menace in a remote little New Hampshire village in then-contemporary times, with a librarian heroine and a nice build-up of atmosphere. Then it abruptly took a turn into seemingly becoming an entirely different book, with the two main characters seeming to be reliving a confrontation in a past life in a weird and unreal setting which had nothing in common with modern New England. That sudden nose-dive into cuckoo-land killed my nascent interest in the book. :-( This evening, wondering if I had been unfair to the author, I decided to explore some of the reviews on this site. When I read the one by fellow Goodreader Valerie (https://www.goodreads.com/review/show... ), I concluded I was fortunate to escape when I did! So I won't re-visit (nor rate) the book, and will leave this note explaining my shelving as the sole monument to my Andre Norton explorations. :-) To all those who've loved her work, I'm happy for you; it would be a dull world if we all liked the same things!

[Filip · Rating 2 out of 5]

I don't care enough about this book to even bother writing how pointless it was.

[Valerie]

If I've read this before, I have no recollection of it. I hope the blurb copy is as inaccurate as such descriptions often are.

Well, yes and no. This book combines a fairly detailed and interesting description of winter in New England with a totally unnecessary superimposed (ancient) disaster/recovery story.

The viewpoint character is one of Norton's typical deprived women--an orphan raised by an aunt miserly on both material and emotional planes. The Aunt's death (which is offstage) mirrors the death and (slow) resurrection of the ancient society (for which there is, realistically, no evidence. If it's been concealed (lest people lament too much over their losses), it's been too well concealed, even in people's memories).

Both the 'good' and the 'evil' survivors of the old society (apparently the same people, cycling through time in a sort of 'cold sleep' alternation) are meddlesome, arrogant, and hateful (ie filled with hate). They don't consider the humans who've forgotten their lost glory to be capable of anything but slavish 'development' under the oversight of their ancient masters. Their only real dispute is whether they should control the ordinary people directly, or indirectly through 'teaching'. Either way, the (quite reasonable and competent) people of a town that's alternately called Waterbridge or Whitebridge (likely the name was changed midstream, and not all the references were replaced) are construed to have no say in the matter, and one presumes this applies to the rest of humanity as well. The pretext for this is that they managed badly on their own. Did they? Or did the 'Guardians' just invent this idea (or spin the evidence) to suit their own plans?

The ancestral society is almost completely undescribed. At one point we're shown a storeroom of their treasures, salted away against disaster. But there's no exploration--the treasures comprise just another roadblock in the protagonist's way. And the lives of the people in the society, their histories, their customs, etc, are shown only at the end, when they're already cracking under disaster, and in very sketchy detail, even then. For example, why did the temple have a dungeon under it? Why did the society have such destructive relations with other dimensions? Why didn't the people have any way of detecting and defusing the disaster centuries before it happened? For all their vaunted 'Power', they seem to have been remarkably helpless people.

Which leads to another question: At this late date, is it even worthwhile trying to resurrect the ancient society? Or would it be better to let people find their own way, haltingly and erratically as they are? The book is set after 1980 (the eruption of Mt St Helens is glancingly referred to, as if the (completely unsurprising) eruption of one volcano in the circum-Pacific Ring of Fire were necessarily a portent of global disaster), yet despite a few contemporary references, the snowbound town is treated it as if nothing had changed in the centuries since it was built--and not much in the centuries before that.

[Cornerofmadness · Rating 2 out of 5]

I've been dragging this around since I bought it back in high school when I was reading everything by Andre Norton. Thirty years later I finally read it to a) get it off my shelf and do what a book is meant to do and b) I needed something for my 'something on the TBR pile forever' challenge. Thirty years qualifies...only now I'm disappointed I've been carrying this around so long. It is definitely one of Ms. Norton's minor works. It took me weeks of setting it aside then bulling through it to make it to the end. It's dull and confusing and really not that interesting.

To be fair the opening and the closing were interesting but even they have problems. Gwennan Daggert, librarian in a small library in New England, has an interest in the standing stones (yes, there are some up there that resemble those in the UK). She gets the interest of Tor Lyle, an arrogant man and his elderly relative, Saris who owns the large house where the stones are. Saris invites Gwennan to dinner much to Tor's dismay. They appear to be into some mystical things but really, Gwennan's not that interested in that. However, a sense of dread falls over her when she's out at night looking at the stones. Soon a stinky creature with red eyes begins to stalk her at her remote house that used to be her aunt's.

So it had the makings of a decent urban fantasy or horror but then it completely derails and wallows around almost all the way to the end. Saris disappears. Gwennan spends far too much time whining and worrying about the fact that Saris seems to have given her a magical amulet and a duty to protect the stones and how weak and untrained she is. How could she ever do this? Tor, who seems to be her enemy, is so much better trained and stronger and how oh how could she stand against him?

Part of this really has to be Norton's age. She was writing for what, nearly 50 years by the time she wrote this. She was born in the nineteen teens and I get that back in those days women weren't that independent but I know she wrote more independent women than Gwennan. I really just wanted to slap this woman and have her get on with it.

But the other part of the derailing was the sudden intrusion of another reality when Gwennan becomes (or was in another life or I'm not even sure what the heck happened to be honest) another woman for a brief period. This is where the story really goes off the tracks. The idea that she is somehow part of this rebirth and protection family is central but the idea never gels. Who were these people? What is their power? Why does Tor covet it so? It just never comes together.

The ending makes an attempt but it feels rushed and half done and nothing much gets answered. I guess what I'm saying is go find something else of Andre Norton's to read. The Witch World Series, The Forerunner, something anything but this. She was the only woman named Grand Master by the SF writers of America (and may still be the only one. I'm not sure on that account). There are better stories than this one. This can now leave my shelf after thirty years. I wont' be rereading it.

[Jenny Thompson · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book is definitely not my favorite Norton, but there were things to like about it. My edition was illustrated, which was pretty awesome. There is also something just so beautiful about the way Norton writes. I almost want to read it out loud. It is also stylistically very different than so many fantasy novels I read nowadays. It seems like everyone is writing in hopes of being adapted for the screen, and this novel definitely did not do that. It had its own bizarre rhythm which I inexplicably found both frustrating and enchanting.

[Virgil Boen · Rating 3 out of 5]

There's a copy here at a motel in tucson I'm staying at, and since Ms Norton was very much a favorite many years ago, I started on it. It has very much a Norton feel, but it also seems a bit disjointed. There's some intriguing mystery hinted at, but I'm not sure if I'm going to continue, as the disjointed is distracting, and the familiar is feeling a bit formulaic at this point. It might be a better intro to Norton for a younger person who hasn't read dozens of her books.

[Alexia Cambaling · Rating 3 out of 5]

I might write a proper review some other time but here are some of my thoughts:

It's a bit confusing. The writing style was clear and unadorned but the story confused me. Some parts I didn't get what was going on but I soldiered on and eventually understood what was happening.

Romance novel this is not. I saw some reviewers call it romance and at the time I read this I was in the mood for something romantic so I was surprised when it turned out not being one. It may seem like it but this is distinctly fantasy.

It's a standalone and resolves the story pretty satisfactorily in about 300 pages. No bloat and no pages wasted.

The story confused me but I like the style. I might pick up some older standalone SFF books after this.

[Virginia Murphy · Rating 5 out of 5]

Bizzare and intriguing.

As so many of her stories, a world of wonders unknown to us. Or maybe forgotten over time. A stand alone story of another time impacting us at a point of change.

[Sandy Shin · Rating 2 out of 5]

The first Andre Norton book did not like or enjoy

[George Polansky · Rating 4 out of 5]

This did not catch my attention, therefore I found it a difficult read.

[Michele M Barron · Rating 5 out of 5]

The Amazing World(s) of Andre Norton

Truly in all of my reading. No one creates like Andre Norton!
If you are a reader or Fantasy or Sci-Fi then I suggest reading her books.

[James]

The scion of an ancient family and a young woman tortured by bizarre nightmares become involved in a monumental struggle between the forces of good and evil.

[Doris · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is in the British Isles, and has a old fashioned manor house, an aged but not elderly aunt, and a mysterious somewhat mentally unstable cousin. It touches on a common theme in Norton's books, where there is a portal to other worlds, and a seemingly insurmountable problem in this one.

I would have preferred a stronger heroine, but for the time and audience it was written for, I suppose it was considered very good.

Overall, I liked the story, thought the characters were well built, and have kept this on my shelves to read again.

[Cashew · Rating 2 out of 5]

I bought this book a long time ago and only now decided to read it. My copy has a spaceship on the cover so I was sure it was a science-fiction novel...
The beginning of the book was very promising but then I was a little disappointed with the construction of the characters.

[Jana Denardo · Rating 2 out of 5]

I'm a big Andre Norton fan. What a career she had but I'll be honest, this is not even close to being her best work. It's slow, dull and confusing with a female lead who spends more time whining about how weak she is than she does trying to fix the situation.

[rebecca j · Rating 3 out of 5]

Not what I would consider some of her best writing - but at least it was one I hadn't read before and it fit in the Spring Challenge!

[Theresa · Rating 4 out of 5]

science fiction epic from one of the core women writers