Thoughts on/from Jack Vance's Suldrun's Garden

I am currently listening to Suldrun's Garden from Jack Vance's Lyonesse series.


Jack Vance is my favorite author, regardless of genre. He is literary and imaginative, and I think I've finally figured out what it is about his writing that I love so much. His attention to detail translates into vivid imagery, brilliant turns of phrase, wit, and sly social commentary. His humor is wry without the sharp elbow to the ribs that Fritz Leiber is sometimes guilty of. This attention to detail results in rounded characters and world building without the simple formulaic fractility that seems to be the crutch of the current glut of best-selling authors.


Attention to detail is nothing new; the specificity of focused vision is the hallmark of keen writing, but also tiresome writing. That's not it. He is able to focus his vision on a story set in a lush garden o ideas. The garden is--gasp: cliché--organic. For me it isn't the detail of visual imagery that I find so compelling it is the way he grows and interweaves cultures.


For example. In Lyonesse a certain king has an affection for birds. An affection that has become an affectation grown to an obsessive madness: he has passed laws forbidding eating eggs, courtiers wear decorative feather plumage, he has an implied encyclopedic knowledge of birds.


So what? Every dm's campaign has people like this. Yes, that is partially true. This can be found in many campaign settings, but often those cultivated eccentricities overrun the garden with weeds and the setting begins to feel like the marvel universe with every pet character clamoring for special attention. In Vance's creations the natural hierarchy is preserved and the eccentricities manifest from and according to the permissiveness of the power structures, while varying according to the local constraints.  We see this in real life too.


Everyone has their particular interest or hobby, outside of their vocation, to which they would love to devote more time, or even turn into their primary occupation. This interest is a matter of emotional feeling and interest and submits only to logic in terms of budgetary, time and social constraints. A king so disinclined to regard social approbation, indeed even encouraged in the their benign diversions, has a freedom of excess to an extreme that can corrupt social norms, and form cultures. It is not hard to imagine such a source for many real life cultural norms. It is the affect of individuals in power, whether on the small scale or large, in times of crisis and peace, whether powerfully acute or gently chronic, which, through their influence, generate these customs, idioms, rituals, philosophies. Each incident a thread in a tapestry upon which individual dramas play out. This is what Vance does: he takes an observation, exaggerates a quality, then deconstructs it, then lets it form the living background for his stories.

A Campfire tale

 Some things never change.  Clichés for one; ogres for another.  No matter how many stores he hiked through he couldn’t find a backpack that fit right. Now his back menaced him with a stab of pain between his shoulder blades with each step.  But it was a beautiful day and he could forgive little pains, and the egalitarian assumptions of stoned backpack designers.

 The trail had wearied his legs, but invigorated his spirit. The ogre sat on a granite boulder at the edge of the sky blue mountain tarn, drew a soiled burgundy kerchief from his belt and dabbed the sweat from his brow. He doffed his deep lugged hiking boots, tilting them one by one until bits of gravel rolled free, a libation for the gods of the earth and sky. He set his boots next to him, waved his feet, and wriggled his toes to loosen the sweaty socks.  His feet drying he lay one arm across a belly that refused to diminish, encouraged in its rotundity by late night snacks, and let the other stroke his wire haired pointer.  The ogre’s sigh of contentment sailed along the surface of the tarn and vanished in the cool mountain air.  He could relax for an hour or so before he built a fire and ate dinner.

      The sky was clear and he eagerly anticipated the night’s heavenly jewelry display.  He had money in the bank, a tan skinned Hummer, a Rolex on one wrist and a rolodex of blondes to wear on the other, but this was his real treasure. A sapphire sky turning amethyst as the sun set, and later a silver moonlit lake set in a band of granite beneath a diamond twinkling sky.  It had been too long since he’d done this. He’d promised his father he’d do it more, to keep his memory alive, to keep the old ways alive.

      Some things change. It was too bad the homesteaders had used all the trees around the lake, though there had been scant few to begin with, for he would dearly have loved to roast his meal with a spit. That was okay though.  The children would taste fine raw. He had preferred them that way since he was a kid.  One crack on the skull with a rock at the right angle, purse the lips just so and the brains leapt into your mouth, warm and squishy if fresh, snotty and slippery if allowed to cool.  That was the best part, like eating the inside of a marshmallow first. His mother hated that, said it was bad manners.  Ma and Pa homesteader could simmer at the edge of the fire pit for a while.

     He cracked open a keg of Coors. To get a taste of the Rockies. He took a sip, smiled and held the beer up with one hand, tilted it and nodded to his father’s memory, “To you dad.”

The Paper Magician Book Review

The Paper Magician by Charlie N. Holmberg
My rating: 2 of 5 stars

I don't typically read (or listen in this case) to YA books so that should be taken into account when looking at my rating and what follows.



The author has a keen eye for detail and pace. Immersion is not a problem and the magic system is unique and interesting. However, I feel the book settled for a semi-romance plot when it could have gone in a more original direction. I say semi-romance because rather than a true romance the main character, impetuous, plucky, stubborn and a naturally talented magician, develops a crush for her mentor in the course of a week or so and it is not clear (thankfully) whether he reciprocates these feelings. What he does do is smile in his eyes. Occasionally he grins in his eyes. His eyes are so expressive that the rest of his face must be a mask, or completely covered in wolfboy, Chewbacca, werewolf, sasquatch hair.



The heroine, Ceony, develops her magical abilities rather too quickly, even with her mentor Emery's help guiding "her folds" (um phrasing!). She builds a fully functioning heart from paper after mere days of apprenticeship and reading an anatomy book or two, which are clearly placed there to justify this ability and nothing more.



The story takes a bit of dive when Ceony wanders through Emery's actual heart. In a seemingly endless series of flashback-esque sequences we are bludgeoned with (unintentional?) allegory.
There are some unexpectedly dark scenes with riven bodies of men, women and children, and of course blood magic. I have no problems with the dark and gritty. Evil characters using blood magic is par for the course in fantasy, but it seems out of place in a world of magical paper dogs. One minute we're following the character as she learns to make magical snow flakes from paper, and the next a bloody heart is being ripped out of someone's chest. Whimsy to dire bloody magic, I think, needs a bit more preparation than 'we covered that for a paragraph back in magician's school'. Maybe the shocking transition was intentional, I don't know.



The spell that ended the confrontation with the big bad guy (girl in this case) was so powerful that I am curious to see how this plays out in the 2nd book. The potential ramifications of such a spell are immense.






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The Blade Itself by Joe Abercrombie
My rating: 5 of 5 stars



I think I may have inadvertently sold a bunch of Joe Abercrombie books and pissed off some elementary school parents and teachers.



Let me explain.



My son, Leif, hates reading. Everyone in our household loves to read, except him. My daughters are avid readers, I read multiple books every week, and my wife loves to read non-fiction, but my son hates reading.


Leif was in a special reading class throughout most of elementary school. His reading deficit grew out of his dislike for reading, and I suspect as his peers passed him by, being the stubborn boy he is, his apparent ‘inability’ was only reinforced.


His mother and I tried everything. I bought him special reading books as a supplement to the work his resource teachers were doing with him. Felicia and I worked with him on his reading and writing and read to him nightly. Leif loves comic books and video games, especially RPGs and games that let him build things—Skyrim and Minecraft were his favorite games forever, only recently being replace by Fallout 4. Above all he loves Mario. So I bought him comic books, video game tie-graphic novels, and encouraged him to play RPGs that required reading. All of this helped. His reading improved slowly, but not enough to get him out of the special reading class. Additionally, since he loves fantasy and sci-fi shows I bought him books in those genres.


First I tried the Hobbit, hoping the anticipation of the forthcoming movies would generate interest. I’d read a chapter to him, then he’d read a chapter. Nope. He wasn’t interested; it was too boring. Then I tried Harry Potter. His sisters loved the Harry Potter series—hell, I loved the Harry Potter series. I think our daughter, Maia, read the series several times. It took him months to read the first book, but he finished it. It was our first success and he was now reading above grade level. He was no longer in special reading classes. I knew he had it in him the whole time, if he could just be interested. Still he thought the first book was boring and had no interest in reading the rest of the series. Besides he’d already seen the movies and no matter how much we assured him the books were better he just had no interest. Same with the Maze Runner, the Hunger Games etc.; not interested.

Part of the problem here is video games. They allow him to immersive himself if ways that reading cannot, as any video gamer can attest. His favorite games let him build, create and see what he imagines. Even in games that don’t allow the sort of freedom of expression he desires he can still make things. When he plays Skyrim, or Fallout, he spends most of his time redesigning his characters appearance. In Super Smash Bros he builds levels. And when Mario Maker came out…oh boy. Now don’t get me wrong we don’t let him spend weeks at a time playing video games. In fact, he is only allowed to play them on the weekends and has to earn the time playing them through chores, homework (which includes reading), and going to his martial arts classes.


Because he loves the immersion and creativity so much I started playing D&D with him. His first character he was roughly based off of Mario and his second was based on Batman. Who doesn’t want to be Batman? At the same time I gave him the first book of Fafhrd and The Gray Mouser. He loved it, but didn’t feel like reading anymore of them. Which is understandable. Fritz Leiber is amazing, but it’s a little dense for an 11 year old whose reading experience amounts to little more than half a shelf. However, his vocabulary and reading comprehension soared.


During this time I began writing again, and he decided he wanted to write too. He began writing and drawing his own comic book. Story construction isn’t new to him, he’s been making stop-motion films on his NintendoDS with Legos for years. They usually involve Batman and Mario beating the shit out of all comers. His comic book is similar, but it’s about his D&D barbarian. Ah, I remember the days…


Then one day Leif, now 12, overheard me talking about how awesome The Prince of Thorns by Mark Lawrence is and he asked if he could read it. I didn’t think he was quite old enough for that book, but I didn’t want to discourage him from reading so I suggested The Blade Itself, which is probably darker fare than most people would give their 12 year old. And truthfully I had some reservations even though I find it to be not very dark or grim.


So he started reading The Blade Itself and he loves it! He brings it to school to read during the silent reading time and I’ve caught him reading the book on his own without being asked. I could kiss Joe Abercrombie. Well not really, I mean he is cute, but no-homo.


This is where it gets humorous. A couple of days ago his teacher was teaching the class about writing hooks. She had each student read the first two lines of their silent reading book and the class as a whole would then rate the book on a scale of 1 to 3 with 1 being boring and 3 being amazing. I have no idea where she got this scale from. Everyone read their openings and the books scored 1 to 2 with no book achieving a 3. Then it was my son’s turn.


Leif was terrified. Not only because he’s an intensely shy child and insecure about his reading abilities, but also because the first page contains the word ‘shit’. To understand his anxiety you need to know that at his school children are not allowed to read ‘The Hunger Games’ without express written permission of their parents because it contains material that is too dark and violent. He was worried that they would find something wrong with the book (like I don’t know—one of the main characters being a torturer), or worse find it incredibly interesting and make him read more, discover the violence and cursing, then ban him from reading it. His experience went like this:


Mrs. Namewitheld: “Leif, please tells us what the book is called.”
Leif: “The Blade Itself”
Mrs. Namewitheld: “No. Tell us the title.”
Leif: “The Blade Itself.”
Mrs. Namewitheld: “No. The Title!”
Leif, exasperated, nervously holds up the book so she can see the title and all the blood on the cover. His hands are shaking. “The title is The Blade Itself.”
Mrs. Namewitheld: “Please read the first two sentences.”
Leif still shaking, his heart pounding: “ Logen plunged through the trees, bare feet slipping and sliding on the wet earth, the slush, the wet pine needles, breath rasping in his chest, blood thumping in his head. He stumbled and sprawled onto his side, nearly cut his chest open with his own axe, lay there panting, peering through the shadowy forest.”



He says the teacher’s eyes went wide as did all the other kids’. It was unanimously voted a 3. The only one for the class. Leif is suddenly cool and kinda edgy. He asked me to take him to the book store and buy him the second book.




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Assassin's Apprentice by Robin Hobb
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I put off reading this series for years. A good friend of mine had recommended it to me, but I found the premise unappealing. Even less so after I attempt the first of the Night Angel trilogy. The books I rate 5 stars tend to be in the literary fantasy or dying earth subgenres. This book was nearly a 5 for me despite being neither of those things.

The Assassin's Apprentice is a tale about loyalty and loss. It is a bildungsroman about Fitz the bastard of the king-in-waiting Chivalry. As a member of the royal bloodline he has a gift for Farseer magic, called the Skill in this series, fighting, stealth work, and for the lesser magic known as the Wit.

Robin Hobb weaves a deft first person tale of loss and growth. While Fitz is not the farm boy come hero of the ages, he is nevertheless a down on his luck hero of the land. In true country fashion Fitz loses first his mother, then his dog, then his father, then his mentor and nearly his life. He is forced into courtly life and a world of intrigue that he is ill prepared for.

Had it not been for a number of glaring plot holes, occasional lull in the story, and Fitz's lack of curiosity this would have been a solid 5.


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I am half-way through Sanderson's Mistborn: The Final Empire. I like it a great deal more than I thought I would, and quite a bit more than the The Way of Kings (which, I am also halfway through).
Sanderson's magic systems have been lauded as amazing and unique. They are definitely unique. However, I don't think they are amazing.


Sanderson's first law states: Sanderson’s First Law of Magics: An author’s ability to solve conflict with magic is DIRECTLY PROPORTIONAL to how ...well the reader understands said magic.

That is all well and good. A well defined magic system allows the author to used the known variable of magic in plausibly dramatic ways and prevent the deus ex machina (deus ex magica?) that Erikson has been accused of in his Malazan Book of the Fallen.


However, it seems that the readers understanding of said magic system is INVERSELY PROPORTIONAL to the mythic atmospheric qualities said magic can generate. In works with less defined magic systems, where the mysterious nature of magic is preserved, whether epic such as Lord of the Rings, or heroic/sword and sorcery such as Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser, a greater sense of wonder and the numinous is preserved. The resolution of a mystery is rarely as gratifying as sense of mystery. The preservation of mystery, I feel, leads to a world of greater depths, where unknown energies eddy in shady, unexplored parts of the world, and fey and infernal beings gambol in liminal thresholds.


When everything is carefully defined for the reader it feels too much like an rpg. Everything has it's little niche in a carefully catalogued encyclopedia that can be indexed. It is an odd blend of nihilistic fantastica or fantastic scientism.


This doesn't mean that a reader cannot find a sense of wonder or escapism in the works, rather it is diminished by degrees of definition.

Faust and thoughts on Fantasy

I am currently listening to an Audio version of Faust. Audiobooks comprise a good two thirds of my 'reading' because I have very little to occupy my mind at work. I occasionally have to discern between ambiguous white minerals with the aid of acid or steel pick, determine the magnitude of a fault, or decide if the green clay is black enough to be black clay or if the black clay is a seam or veinlet, but by-and-large my work has become little more than rote drudgery. Well...ok worm burrows and stylolites are still pretty cool.

There is something primal in the story of Faust that I think all knowledge/information workers can identify with. Many of us get into the work, whether a science field or otherwise, because we have a desire to explore the mysteries, and not just the mysteries of spreadsheets. That exploration changes you. Often for the better, but not always. The abyss stares back, doubts gather like shadows around a lone candle flame. Unlike Faust most of us come to realize that the ambition of knowing everything is not only impossible, but dangerous. Beyond knowledge workers Man has always been curious about what is really real. And in this reality each person looks for an increase in happiness in the future and an abatement, if not extinction, of the pervading angst that results from uncertainty.

The pessimist author divines apocalyptic visions of near future dystopias of every sort from 1984 to the Maze Runner, whereas the optimist prognosticates technological utopias of varying degrees, all of which are suspicious to the realist who sees the future as possessing the same variegated strata as today however shaped by advances in our understanding. Individuals, and societies change, but human nature does not. You can lead a man to reason, but you can not force him be reasonable.

 
Faust is a lovely admixture of the story of Job and the story of Icarus. It is a classic because it cuts to the heart of the conflict between human desire and rationality. This primal temptation is frequently found in classics and fairy tales, but lost on most modern fantasy. Instead of this, and other inner conflicts, we are often served up derivative archetypes treading the same old Campbellian monomyth. Sure the monomyth applies to Faust, but that's not the point. Changing the clothes on a puppet won't bring it to life. Nor will convoluted magic systems, flawed characters, or crisis for the sake of crisis. Sure all those things can help, but they don't replace desire, hubris, a sense of destiny (or self-loathing), or a sense of overcoming for breathing life into a story.

If we look at some of the great characters of fantasy, the ones that aren't just stand ins for the reader to identify with (Frodo, Harry Potter), we see desires and aversions that drives them to irrational acts. This leads to a crisis wherein they either overcome and triumph or submit and suffer tragedy, in the really great stories they experience both. This irrational desire is often personified as some Other, whether Mephistopheles, the One Ring, the Man with Thistledown Hair etc. Its deeply satisfying, in a primal way, when the hero overcomes the Other (the dark one), because it allows us to watch the drama in an almost clinical manner. We can identify with the hero as he overcomes the enemy without having to identify as the dark one ourselves.


Sometimes, and more commonly of late, we find that our heroes are not so pure and the dark one isn't so dark. They are, the both of them, relatable and disturbing. This leads to a moving resolution as the tension of the climax abates. We are relieved, but saddened. This is often the case with heroic fantasy, sword and sorcery, and grimdark. I find this to be less satisfying in the primitive manner of high fantasy except to the degree that the characters move closer to the extremes of the good/evil scale. In such works the writer's prose needs to be very sharp to carry the story. Of course, there are plenty of people who enjoy violence and grit for the sake of violence.


In soap operas such as A Song of Ice and Fire we find characters that range from the realistic to ridiculous. This panoply of personality types, sprinkled with just enough dragons and magic to make it fantasy (and therefore allow for a distancing veil), coupled with keen prose, is, what I suspect, makes the story so gratifying to such a broad range of people. But, it is just a Soap Opera. There are no grand ideals, no deep revelations, no cracking of the marrow of the human experience, which is another reason it is popular entertainment.


  In truly atrocious works of fantasy, the characters are merely caricatures that trade on the familiarity of their derivations. So powerful is the sense of the familiar that people will turn to them again and again no matter how bad, no matter how repetitive the story becomes (Drizzt Do' Urden). Faust is a fantasy of high and low order. It explores, like any epic fantasy, the various levels of society. It does so with an eye to human nature that most, but not all fantasy, lacks.