The Mirror Prince
Oct. 26th, 2010 09:26 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
lenora_roseI met Violette Malan at WFC in Calgary, during the Todd Lockwood presentation. (He did the cover of this book. Which I think is decent but not exciting high fantasy -- except for Cassandra's highly un-high-fantasy-like expression, which I lurve, and her jeans, which are barely noticeable. I give Lockwood this, too: everything in it is actually from the book.) She seemed a pretty cool person. This tends to up my chances of reading a book by an author (This was also true of Carol Berg, for example). I also read good reviews of her later work, which also helped. So I decided to try ehr first book, since she'd given me a signed copy of the cover (I seem to recall Lockwood also signed it. It's hiding somewhere, alas, so I can't check.)
This book is in some ways a no-one-counts-the-rivets-on-moving-train book. That is to say, there are several problems with it, but once it got going, I read through it, and only noticed two of the issues as I read, though they're big ones. The others I thought about afterwards. or let pass.
The gist of the story is: Max Ravenhill thinks he's a normal history professor. Cassandra, who's been protecting him over centuries (previously as his lover, and now mostly at a distance) knows he's basically an elven prince, exiled for losing a war. Enemies have decided to either kill him or end his exile early, or imprison him until it ends so he's convenient to hand. So he ends up back in Faerie before he has any inkling who his real self was, scrambling to survive.
As I said, once it gets moving, it goes fast. Malan has a fairly deft hand about doling out information through action and incluing, or at reasonable, "Let's sit down and talk this out" moments, and not telling us things until they need to be told. she's pretty good at drawing characters with motivations and hopes that make sense, and at letting them seize on wrongheaded ideas. For all the time in this that people end up having to explain things (and the backstory is deep and layered, as are some of the bits of worldbuilding), it's surprising how few things are overexplained. I particularly liked the slow development of the idea where the Wild Hunt came from. Some of the dialogue is a bit forced, and some emotions are projected at the reader rather than felt, but these seem to be lapses in skill; underneath, and at heart, Malan is very good at trusting her readers. She also brought it to a pretty good conclusion, tying enough of a knot to satisfy, and fulfilling some of the not-expected but-inevitable hopes. This being her first book, and not a flawless one, nailing the landing is actually damn important; that, more than dialogue or other writing things, leads me to trust future books by her a lot more (And I have a more recent one in the queue).
She does spend rather too long hiding the identity of one on-screen character (Calling him by his title in one place and by his name in another), which led to a bit of eye-rolling after the fact.
So. As to the two bigger gripes.
The racial one is the one I noticed as I went.
i can't recall the exact details of the relation between the Shadowlands (IE, us) and Faerie, but that it's pretty loudly stated that if Faerie falls, so do the Shadowlands. In other words they're more prime, more important.
But this Faerie, while distinctly NOT the Celtic realm of legend, draws mostly on that (or other European ideas as to nature sprites etc.), and doesn't even include token suggestions of other cultural otherworlds, or that "we see water-sprites in this story that seem pretty much like naiads, but there are others more like those of other cutlures elsewhere". There are nods to other cultural sources in the early scenes where they're still in the Shadowlands (Specifically, Toronto), but they vanish quickly.
There are three races of the Riders, or human-like Faerie; Sunward, Moonward and Starward. Who are, respectively, redheads, black-haired (But pale-skinned or at most Latino - at least, one Rider has a Hispanic name, but we don't see him), and blondes. All Caucasian.
There's a strong feeling in this that, if this is the more important world, why is it so narrow in scope and culture? The culture of the Riders has depth and interest, but it's ONE culture. The Naturals (nature sprites etc.) and Solitaries (the main one of whom we meet is a troll, but basically any non-human or nature like denizen of Faerie) don't get nearly as much depth; part of this is time and space in the book, part of it is point-of-view, since the only one of the main characters who'd know them that well is Max, who's either amnesiac or quite busy. And part of it is that the Riders are currently the powerful culture in Faerie.
And part of it is that, as often happens, the primary world *is* a monoculture, without half the depth or complexity of ours. It's claustrophobically small.
There are ways to play this; for instance, making the main motivation a fight to save or destroy *this* country in its small corner of the world, leaving room to hint that the other stories are out there, somewhere. But this is one of those, "We need to save this whole world - and if we don't, Earth dies too" versions of Faerie. That size of stake can't be supported by this size of world.
This also leads to language, and the many problems with it.
First, the invented language suffers from Random Fantasy Apostrophes. This is okay; we really only use three words from the entire language, and they're three without an exact English equivalent. Another mark for the worldbuilding, that she needed three invented words to cover concepts intrinsic to the culture she does examine; one could be passably substituted with "magic", but that carries a cultural baggage that isn't wanted or quite right. Another is almost "Clan" but again, needed to be free of the assumptions we make based on the English word.
But second, and significantly worse, the problem that I chewed on as I was reading (To be fair it occurred to me between reading sessions, not while reading, but then it haunted me a bit): Malan establishes that Faerie has its language. She establishes some other things about the language and what it sounds like. She creates the absolutely ridiculous notion that the language cannot be written down (after coming up with spellings, however awkward and apostrophized, for three of them... this is the one language thing that made for an eye-roll while reading, but it's mentioned in one early scene then never toyed with again).
Yet when they end up in Faerie, everybody speaks English. Max, who has NO memory of his original life (Or several previous fabricated lives, to boot), including details at least as essential as language, and who has to be taught the words mentioned above, and what Faerie call themselves, never once has problems understanding anyone who speaks to him in Faerie. It isn't even handwaved away with some form of Doctor Who Tardis effect, or magic language-translator. It looks, mostly, like it either didn't occur to Malan at all, or like she decided the reader wouldn't care.
Just people who, except for three special words, seem to talk English.
Argh. I'm not sure I'd be more willing to let this slide even if a major part of the scenes I've been working on in the Apocalyptic thing weren't ABOUT trying to figure out how to work across a language barrier (and learn a language), even when a universal translator of sorts is right there in your hand. Language is so essential; we make some core assumptions based on the language we're speaking. Languages have words for concepts other languages didn't even consider. Malan clearly knows this, based on the three words of Faerie language we do learn. So how did she let this pass? Frankly, I'd have taken a handwavium "here's a spell of translation", even though I disagree that such a thing could exist without some problems and bugs, or even "Max forgot everything about being a Rider except the language". Because it would signal that it occurred to her, and that she didn't want to explore it just now, didn't have room for that and the story she wanted to tell. I'm fine with a writer saying, "I can't fit this in the book, sorry. I have 309 pages and I need to cram in all this worldbuilding plus an action adventure."
The last little language twitch I had was with names: the faerie names for one another are literal poetic things - Dreamer of Time, for instance, or Truthsheart. Okay, kind of goofy, but she plays it straight until you can believe in it, she'd not the first fantasy writer to have such names about, and yes, some human cultures named people after attributes or events.
EXCEPT that they also come in two forms, with related but different meanings. So Cassandra is Both Sword of Truth and Truthsheart, Max is both Dancer at Dawn and Dawntreader. This sudden multiplicity of meaning also irked me. I could understand rearranging the grammar, but the meaning as well? Rrgh.
And yet... I do look forward to reading books written later in her career, with more mastery. To see if she ever does address these gaps. Malan has something that makes you keep reading.
This book is in some ways a no-one-counts-the-rivets-on-moving-train book. That is to say, there are several problems with it, but once it got going, I read through it, and only noticed two of the issues as I read, though they're big ones. The others I thought about afterwards. or let pass.
The gist of the story is: Max Ravenhill thinks he's a normal history professor. Cassandra, who's been protecting him over centuries (previously as his lover, and now mostly at a distance) knows he's basically an elven prince, exiled for losing a war. Enemies have decided to either kill him or end his exile early, or imprison him until it ends so he's convenient to hand. So he ends up back in Faerie before he has any inkling who his real self was, scrambling to survive.
As I said, once it gets moving, it goes fast. Malan has a fairly deft hand about doling out information through action and incluing, or at reasonable, "Let's sit down and talk this out" moments, and not telling us things until they need to be told. she's pretty good at drawing characters with motivations and hopes that make sense, and at letting them seize on wrongheaded ideas. For all the time in this that people end up having to explain things (and the backstory is deep and layered, as are some of the bits of worldbuilding), it's surprising how few things are overexplained. I particularly liked the slow development of the idea where the Wild Hunt came from. Some of the dialogue is a bit forced, and some emotions are projected at the reader rather than felt, but these seem to be lapses in skill; underneath, and at heart, Malan is very good at trusting her readers. She also brought it to a pretty good conclusion, tying enough of a knot to satisfy, and fulfilling some of the not-expected but-inevitable hopes. This being her first book, and not a flawless one, nailing the landing is actually damn important; that, more than dialogue or other writing things, leads me to trust future books by her a lot more (And I have a more recent one in the queue).
She does spend rather too long hiding the identity of one on-screen character (Calling him by his title in one place and by his name in another), which led to a bit of eye-rolling after the fact.
So. As to the two bigger gripes.
The racial one is the one I noticed as I went.
i can't recall the exact details of the relation between the Shadowlands (IE, us) and Faerie, but that it's pretty loudly stated that if Faerie falls, so do the Shadowlands. In other words they're more prime, more important.
But this Faerie, while distinctly NOT the Celtic realm of legend, draws mostly on that (or other European ideas as to nature sprites etc.), and doesn't even include token suggestions of other cultural otherworlds, or that "we see water-sprites in this story that seem pretty much like naiads, but there are others more like those of other cutlures elsewhere". There are nods to other cultural sources in the early scenes where they're still in the Shadowlands (Specifically, Toronto), but they vanish quickly.
There are three races of the Riders, or human-like Faerie; Sunward, Moonward and Starward. Who are, respectively, redheads, black-haired (But pale-skinned or at most Latino - at least, one Rider has a Hispanic name, but we don't see him), and blondes. All Caucasian.
There's a strong feeling in this that, if this is the more important world, why is it so narrow in scope and culture? The culture of the Riders has depth and interest, but it's ONE culture. The Naturals (nature sprites etc.) and Solitaries (the main one of whom we meet is a troll, but basically any non-human or nature like denizen of Faerie) don't get nearly as much depth; part of this is time and space in the book, part of it is point-of-view, since the only one of the main characters who'd know them that well is Max, who's either amnesiac or quite busy. And part of it is that the Riders are currently the powerful culture in Faerie.
And part of it is that, as often happens, the primary world *is* a monoculture, without half the depth or complexity of ours. It's claustrophobically small.
There are ways to play this; for instance, making the main motivation a fight to save or destroy *this* country in its small corner of the world, leaving room to hint that the other stories are out there, somewhere. But this is one of those, "We need to save this whole world - and if we don't, Earth dies too" versions of Faerie. That size of stake can't be supported by this size of world.
This also leads to language, and the many problems with it.
First, the invented language suffers from Random Fantasy Apostrophes. This is okay; we really only use three words from the entire language, and they're three without an exact English equivalent. Another mark for the worldbuilding, that she needed three invented words to cover concepts intrinsic to the culture she does examine; one could be passably substituted with "magic", but that carries a cultural baggage that isn't wanted or quite right. Another is almost "Clan" but again, needed to be free of the assumptions we make based on the English word.
But second, and significantly worse, the problem that I chewed on as I was reading (To be fair it occurred to me between reading sessions, not while reading, but then it haunted me a bit): Malan establishes that Faerie has its language. She establishes some other things about the language and what it sounds like. She creates the absolutely ridiculous notion that the language cannot be written down (after coming up with spellings, however awkward and apostrophized, for three of them... this is the one language thing that made for an eye-roll while reading, but it's mentioned in one early scene then never toyed with again).
Yet when they end up in Faerie, everybody speaks English. Max, who has NO memory of his original life (Or several previous fabricated lives, to boot), including details at least as essential as language, and who has to be taught the words mentioned above, and what Faerie call themselves, never once has problems understanding anyone who speaks to him in Faerie. It isn't even handwaved away with some form of Doctor Who Tardis effect, or magic language-translator. It looks, mostly, like it either didn't occur to Malan at all, or like she decided the reader wouldn't care.
Just people who, except for three special words, seem to talk English.
Argh. I'm not sure I'd be more willing to let this slide even if a major part of the scenes I've been working on in the Apocalyptic thing weren't ABOUT trying to figure out how to work across a language barrier (and learn a language), even when a universal translator of sorts is right there in your hand. Language is so essential; we make some core assumptions based on the language we're speaking. Languages have words for concepts other languages didn't even consider. Malan clearly knows this, based on the three words of Faerie language we do learn. So how did she let this pass? Frankly, I'd have taken a handwavium "here's a spell of translation", even though I disagree that such a thing could exist without some problems and bugs, or even "Max forgot everything about being a Rider except the language". Because it would signal that it occurred to her, and that she didn't want to explore it just now, didn't have room for that and the story she wanted to tell. I'm fine with a writer saying, "I can't fit this in the book, sorry. I have 309 pages and I need to cram in all this worldbuilding plus an action adventure."
The last little language twitch I had was with names: the faerie names for one another are literal poetic things - Dreamer of Time, for instance, or Truthsheart. Okay, kind of goofy, but she plays it straight until you can believe in it, she'd not the first fantasy writer to have such names about, and yes, some human cultures named people after attributes or events.
EXCEPT that they also come in two forms, with related but different meanings. So Cassandra is Both Sword of Truth and Truthsheart, Max is both Dancer at Dawn and Dawntreader. This sudden multiplicity of meaning also irked me. I could understand rearranging the grammar, but the meaning as well? Rrgh.
And yet... I do look forward to reading books written later in her career, with more mastery. To see if she ever does address these gaps. Malan has something that makes you keep reading.
