EWEoF: The Problem with Pastiche

[Ruth]

I'm about half-way through this book (and we're half-way through the month, so I guess that's ok, although I was expecting to read it a bit quicker) and I'm enjoying certain aspects of it - I always like a (view spoiler)[ supernatural pet and Shadow certainly fits the bill there. He reminds me of Bone Dog from our February '23 pick Nettle and Bone (hide spoiler)]. I've also started warming to Wendell, he was initially a bit annoying but I enjoyed the scene where he (view spoiler)[ fought the fairies who were attacking Emily, tearing some of them limb-from-limb and impaling others on a magical tree. It was a really shocking scene that told Emily - and us - what an exiled fairy prince might actually be capable of when he sheds his academic disguise. (hide spoiler)]. In general I like stories which show the dangerous glamour of the fae and this is certainly one of them.

The slight negative for me is that I'm not quite vibing with the writing style. It reminds me of the Lady Trent books (eg A Natural History of Dragons by Marie Brennan in that it's kind of a pastiche of an English Edwardian lady naturalist. The trouble is that there are lots of small anachronisms and Americanisms that throw me out of the story. For example, we know Emily is a Adjunct Professor at Cambridge and a colleage of Wendell Bambleby, who's a tenured professor. Except there were no mixed-sex colleges at Cambridge until the 1960s, and terms like 'tenured professor' are modern American usage that weren't used at Cambridge until the *2020s* (academics at Oxbridge colleges were usually referred to as 'fellows', not professors). There are other things like references to raccoons (not native to the British Isles) and restrooms that just felt... not disastrously wrong but also not in the frame of reference of characters from the time and place the story is supposedly set. I know I'm being a bit picky here but these things just spoil my immersion.

The Lady Trent books are set in a secondary world which just happens to have a kind of Victorian/Edwardian vibe, I think it would have helped if Fawcett had made the same choice. After all, Ljosland isn't a real place, so why not go all the way and say that Emily is an academic at 'Camford University' and Bambleby is from 'Lyreland'? That way the small anachronisms and odd turns of phrase (was 'firing on all cylinders' really in common usage pre the first world war?) would be easier to brush off.

What is everyone else making of this book? I've seen discussion on Discord (including about some of these anachronisms) but there's not much on Goodreads yet.

[TRP]

The Anachronisms and North Americanisms (I believe the author is Canadian) kept throwing me out of the story.

I too, was bothered by the University mistakes. No word about the constituent Colleges of Oxford/Cambridge University (Trinity, Kings, Magdalen etc.) which Oxbridge types tend to mention more than the actual University. It is a little like alumni of the University of California refer to the campus (Berkeley, Merced, Davis, LA etc,) they studied at rather than the Universty as a whole

The raccoons threw me but the thing that really bothered me was the "Handful of Turkish Delight". The author probably used Turkish Delight because it plays an important part in The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe. However if she had actually googled Turkish Delight she would have known that it is not suitable for distribution by the handful. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Turkish...

Also "Candy" is not commonly used in the British Isles. In this alternative 1911 it would probably be referred to as a "sweetmeat"

The problem with these issues is that it makes me feel immensely petty for mentioning them. If you don't know the things she gets wrong, everything is fine but if you do, she loses your trust and the flow of the story is spoiled

[Trike]

Ruth wrote: "The Lady Trent books are set in a secondary world which just happens to have a kind of Victorian/Edwardian vibe, I think it would have helped if Fawcett had made the same choice. After all, Ljosland isn't a real place, so why not go all the way and say that Emily is an academic at 'Camford University' and Bambleby is from 'Lyreland'? That way the small anachronisms and odd turns of phrase (was 'firing on all cylinders' really in common usage pre the first world war?) would be easier to brush off."

First off, “Lyreland”? Awesome. Stealing that.

I happened to have recently read a few non-fiction books about this period so I know the answer about the origin of “firing on all cylinders”: it is an American idiom that entered the language sometime between 1900 and WWI. I believe the first printed example was c. 1912.

I agree with you about the anachronisms and unforced errors in the book. I’ve often complained about this sort of thing in Fantasy novels where the excuse of “they’re translating it to modern language” just doesn’t satisfy. I read one book last year where a character “reacted in a microsecond”. First, no they bloody well did NOT. That is one millionth of a second, an imperceptible amount of time. Second, that’s terminology from early 20th-century engineering investigating radio waves. There’s no need for its improper use in a Fantasy story.

I like the multiverse as well as the next reader, but I’m with you in preferring the Lady Trent method where the whole thing is made up and the countries/institutions/politics are analogues rather than the real thing.

My larger issue with the book was that Emily was Fantasy Karen and just unpleasant. I don’t need to like a character to enjoy a book, but ugh, she was just grating.

[Trike]

TRP wrote: "The problem with these issues is that it makes me feel immensely petty for mentioning them. If you don't know the things she gets wrong, everything is fine but if you do, she loses your trust and the flow of the story is spoiled"

I don’t feel petty about this stuff because it’s an indication of laziness on the part of the author.

For instance, look at The Princess Bride where William Goldman spent weeks researching sword fighting and fencing and included it in the dialogue for the single sword fight scene between Westley and Inigo. It’s even in the movie, which Elwes and Patinkin rehearsed with an actual swordsman. Unfortunately, the set designer didn’t get the memo, so they literally had to come up with new choreography on the spot, so the real-world references they talk about no longer matched their actions.

The opposite can be seen in books like The Poppy War, which just shoves everything Chinese into a blender, combining fact with fiction and reality with myth, because the author knew few people in the West would get any of the references. And the dumbest thing is, there’s no need to use actual stuff from the real world since it’s an imaginary Secondary World. Just make something up! It’s just lazy.

[AndrewP]

On the subject of anachronisms in fantasy, watch the short video of Brian Lee Durfee when he discovers one in his own book!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dIPjS...

[Tamahome]

At least Brian is back from the hospital...

[Seth]

I wasn't too bothered, but read this mostly as a secondary world right from the beginning. Female professors and casual acceptance of homosexual relationships sort of let the cat out of the bag and then the story started moving and I found I didn't really care. Perhaps setting the whole thing in a secondary world would have been better, but when that sort of thing hews too closely to history I don't think that's fun either. Lady Trent is a good example. Fantasy Briton goes to Fantasy Russia and there's a dragon is as creative as that book ever got and neither locale ever bothered to be anything more than that.

Trike wrote: "Ruth wrote: "My larger issue with the book was that Emily was Fantasy Karen and just unpleasant...."

This I don't really agree with either. Emily was socially inept, sometimes even unpleasant to other people, but to pull out 'Karen' is way too far. She is keenly aware of her shortcomings, and even when she doesn't understand them, she feels their effects. This is in contrast to Wendell who uses people left and right, but sweet-talks/glamours them into leaving with a smile on their faces. With Wendell and Emily to choose from, calling Emily's behavior into question feels to me like it misses the mark. Emily just seems like she cares about her research more than she cares about whether you like her, and that seems entirely reasonable as a professorial personality.

[Trike]

Are you saying my feelings don’t matter?! Why are you diminishing me?!

(I’m kidding. My father was full Italian from Brooklyn, which is essentially like being raised by gladiator wolves. 😆)

You’re right, though, “Karen” is probably too much, but boy-howdy I just found her grating, it’s been a month since I read it so I can’t point to exact passages. I don’t know, sometimes stories and characters just rub us the wrong way, which is usually when we get down to nitpicking the futzy little details.

Bonus: I asked Bing AI to create a gladiator wolf and boy did it come through.

[Seth]

Trike wrote: "I don’t know, sometimes stories and characters just rub us the wrong way, which is usually when we get down to nitpicking the futzy little details."

This is entirely true.

Edited to add: My own reactions to characters fawning over Wendell because he is outgoing and pleasant certainly formed part of my opinion about the book. People who can charm a crowd (or even just make small talk) seem to me to posses some kind of fairy magic that makes me jealous.

[Liam]

This is wild to me, because I loved Emily! I love that she was coded Autistic in what I thought was a very realistic and humane way. She self-admittedly had trouble reading people and favored literal interactions, but was aware of and sympathetic to the social ability mismatch and conflicts. Unlike what simply an oblivious and possibly narcissistic "Karen" would be. Emily would be mortified to consider sticking her nose into anyone's business or to ask for much less demand anything of anyone (outwardly at least.... She expects basic professionalism from everyone, sure, but would rather tsk at someone not showing it and avoid them than demand anything from them.)
I found Emily to be a very believable non-typical protagonist who I rooted for as much as saw myself in! Even though I'm (mostly) neurotypical, I saw so many similarities to myself in Emily that I couldn't help but root for her.

[John (Nevets)]

Liam wrote: "This is wild to me, because I loved Emily! I love that she was coded Autistic in what I thought was a very realistic and humane way. She self-admittedly had trouble reading people and favored liter..."

I think that almost exactly summed up how I felt about her as well, and you said it much better then I had tried to on Discord. Thank you.

[Jen]

Liam wrote: "This is wild to me, because I loved Emily! I love that she was coded Autistic in what I thought was a very realistic and humane way. She self-admittedly had trouble reading people and favored liter..."

Partway through the book, I had to Google if the author intended for Emily to be autistic, because that's how I viewed her. I couldn't find anything from the author, but I found reviews that seemed pretty split on "I am autistic and this character is nothing like me" and "I am autistic and this character really resonated with me".
I really loved Emily too!

[John (Nevets)]

Jen wrote: "Liam wrote: "This is wild to me, because I loved Emily! I love that she was coded Autistic in what I thought was a very realistic and humane way. She self-admittedly had trouble reading people and ..."

And both those could be very true.

My understanding is not only is Autism a spectrum, it is also presents itself as more then one possible trait. I do think Emily presents as somewhat autistic. And I also think that was why she was attracted to her first boyfriend, who also seemed to be described as being on the autism spectrum, it was something familiar, and easy for her to relate to. Besides traits that have already been mentioned, she also seems to have an almost photographic memory.

[Iain]

As a secondary world I didn't mind the anachronisms. Well I didn't mind until they started using 'merican academic titles when the original titles work much better in the story (Lecturer, Reader, and Professor).

Some academics would have been Professors but only a few who were the acknowledged leaders in their fields. The number of Professors in the UK have proliferated since the drop in relative salaries since the 1970s.

I think it is appalling the Cambridge has jumped on the everyone is a Professor as it both Americanises and devalues the title for no good reason. (cheap way of getting equality in the number of Professors). Grumble (yells at cloud)..

[Ruth]

Iain wrote: "As a secondary world I didn't mind the anachronisms. Well I didn't mind until they started using 'merican academic titles when the original titles work much better in the story (Lecturer, Reader, a..."

I have to say that I’m enjoying the book more as it moves further away from Cambridge and more into the land of Faerie. I’m about three quarters through now and the story has properly got going. I’ve got the sequel out of the library as well.