Author: Emera

Dealing With Dragons, by Patricia C. Wrede (1990) E

Date read: 6.8.10; umpteenth re-read
Book from: Personal collection
Reviewer: Emera

book dealingwithdragonsI feel like I shouldn’t need to introduce this book or this series. If you’ve never read the Enchanted Forest Chronicles, what have you been doing with your life? Before Catherine, Called Birdy, before Ella Enchanted, before Robin McKinley’s heroines, Cimorene rocked my life. A princess who really just wants to fence, learn Latin, and be a dragon’s librarian/cook/mystery-solver? Sign me up, please. Add in Morwen, an acerbic, ginger-haired, hypercompetent witch with spectacles, bottomless sleeves, and a house full of attitudinal cats, and you have two pinnacles of no-nonsense badassery. In this first installment (actually published second, as the fourth book, chronologically, was the first written), Cimorene runs away from home and, thanks to the advice of a talking frog, promptly becomes the princess of a dragon named Kazul. While occupying her days with cooking, cataloguing, and fending off meddling wizards and persistent knights bent on her rescue, Cimorene uncovers a plot that threatens the dragon kingdom, and sets out to unravel it with the help of her new friends.

For the past few years I’ve been hunting down, very much out of order, the original hardback editions of the series, with Trina Schart Hyman’s cover illustrations (see above). When I finally got Dealing With Dragons, I couldn’t resist an immediate re-read, and luckily, the humor, energy, and inguenuity of Wrede’s writing hold up just as well with later reads. Though it’s clear to me now how utilitarian much of her writing is (e.g. “here I will insert a scene of Cimorene giving Kazul a bath so I have an excuse to make them talk about dragon history for a chapter”), and how often the plot relies on convenient coincidences to move it along, the characters are still utterly winning, and the world full of marvelous, clever detail. The book can be summed up, really, as delightful.

I was also struck this time around by my realization of how extremely polite Cimorene is, at the same time that she’s entirely intolerant of fluff and indecision – I had remembered how sarcastic she is, but not how carefully and strategically sheathed she keeps that sarcasm. Tears of admiration were wiped!

Go to:
Patricia C. Wrede: bio and works reviewed
Talking to Dragons, by Patricia C. Wrede (1985) E

New X-Men: Hellions (2005) E

Date read: 12.23.07
Read from: Digital collection
Reviewer: Emera

book hellionsA four-issue side-series off of the most recent New X-Men storyline, featuring, obviously, the current crop of Hellions, Emma Frost’s protégés and the New X-Men’s bestest rivals within the Xavier Institute. Written by Nunzio deFilippis and Christina Weir, pencils by Clayton Henry.

At the end of the school year (and prior to the events of M-Day), Julian/Hellion brings his team members back to California with him to hang out at his family’s mansion. Unfortunately, after a typical Hellion-style scuffle at the airport, his parents cut him out of the family fortune. Spiteful and disgruntled, Julian digs deeper into his parents’ background, and ends up making a deal with the same figure who got his parents rich – the Kingmaker, who proceeds to grant the dearest wish of each of the Hellions. Sooraya/Dust is reunited with her mother at an Afghan refugee camp, Cessily/Mercury finds herself welcomed home again by suddenly loving parents, Santo/Rockslide becomes a wrestling star (dream big, boy), and so on. But after the trial period is up, The Kingmaker returns to extract payment…

This was a REALLY fun read, and  made me realize how boring by comparison pretty much the entirety of the New Mutants series was, revolving as it did around petty disputes and page after page of overwritten adolescent moping. Not that Hellions was that much deeper or more novel, but let’s face it, rebellious teams are pretty much always more fun (even if their leader is a twit), and being limited in length, the series packed a lot more interest into a lot fewer pages. The writing was tight and featured equal helpings of action and character exposition; I’ve always been fond of Cessily and Sooraya in particular, so it was fun and occasionally genuinely affecting to see a bit into their pasts and family lives.  Coloring was too shiny for my tastes, but the pencils and inks were strong and consistent. All in all, something that might actually have re-read value for me, unlike the rest of the pre-M-Day New Mutants/New X-Men: Academy X storyline. (No, I don’t know why I kept reading it, either. Of course as soon as most of the irritating characters had been dispensed with and Skottie Young started doing the art and I was getting genuinely interested in the series, it was cancelled.)

Go to:
Nunzio deFilippis: bio and works reviewed
Christina Weir: bio and works reviewed

Wringer, by Jerry Spinelli (1997) E

Date read: 10.11.10
Book from: Personal collection
Reviewer: Emera

Adapted from the back cover:

“In Palmer LaRue’s hometown of Waymer, turning ten is the biggest event of a boy’s life. It marks the day when a boy is ready to take his place as a wringer – the boys who wring the necks of wounded pigeons at the annual Pigeon Day shoot. It’s an honor and a tradition. But for Palmer, his tenth birthday is not something to look forward to, but something to dread. Because – although he can’t admit this to anyone – Palmer does not want to be a wringer. But he can’t stop himself from getting older, any more than he can stop tradition. Then one day, a visitor appears on his windowsill, and Palmer knows that this, more than anything else, is a sign that his time is up. Somehow, he must learn how to stop being afraid and stand up for what he believes in.”

Jerry Spinelli, like many otherwise excellent children’s book authors, most often falters when he leans too heavily towards explicit didacticism. Wringer, with its themes of resisting bullying and peer pressure, could easily fall into this category, but I was extremely pleased to find it instead an organic and moving story. Occasionally a character’s behavior might be a little too conveniently suited to the needs of the plot and message to be credible, but overall – I couldn’t put it down, cried twice, and found much of the writing startlingly beautiful. One reviewer observed that Wringer benefits from being less “antic” than Maniac Magee (my longtime favorite Spinelli novel), and as much as I love Maniac’s picaresqueties, I agree that Wringer makes for a quieter, more intimate emotional experience.

Above all, the main characters are written with great psychological acuity. Spinelli evokes Palmer’s half-articulated fears both vividly and believably, and his relationships with his mother and his friend Dorothy are deeply charming and hilarious and true-to-life. In general I appreciated that Palmer’s parents are so gentle and empathetic, especially now that I’m actually old enough to sympathize with the adults in children’s books, and not just regard them opaque and rather less interesting than the protagonists.

Another favorite element: the deep wonder and precision with which Spinelli describes Nipper, Palmer’s pigeon friend, as well as Palmer’s own eagerness to learn about pigeons:

Continue reading Wringer, by Jerry Spinelli (1997) E

Favorites from the stash: The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam

One of many books of which I’m really fond, despite it not being exceptionally attractive or at all rare. It’s a bargain hardcover edition (Peter Pauper Press) of the Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam from the 1950’s or ’60’s, and it’s really kind of cheesy-looking (rather like Edward Fitzgerald’s occasionally back-of-hand-pressed-to-brow maudlin*, very loose translations), yet utterly charming. It’s only about 4 inches by 6 inches, and it’s printed in three colors, with decorative motifs and some awesomely faux-riental illustrations by Jeff Hill. Unfortunately I neglected to get any photos of the latter, but you can probably get an idea just looking at the rest of the book…

Continue reading Favorites from the stash: The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam

Night Watch, by Sergei Lukyanenko (1998) E

Date read: (incomplete) 10.17.10
Book from: Borrowed from Kakaner
Reviewer: Emera

Adapted from the back cover:

“Set in contemporary Moscow, where shapeshifters, vampires, and streets-sorcerers linger in the shadows, Night Watch is the first book in an epic saga chronicling the eternal war of the ‘Others,’ an ancient race of humans with supernatural powers who must swear allegiance to either the Dark or the Light. The agents of Light – the Night Watch – oversee nocturnal activity, while the agents of Dark keep watch over the day. For a thousand years both sides have maintained a precarious balance of power, but an ancient prophecy has decreed that a supreme Other will one day emerge, threatening to tip the scales. Now, that day has arrived. When a mid-level Night Watch agent named Anton stumbles upon a cursed young woman – an uninitiated Other with magnificent potential – both sides prepare for a battle that could lay waste to the entire city, possibly the world.”

I grabbed this off of Kakaner’s shelf at some point, having heard that the movie adaptations of the series were good, and being a bit of a sucker for urban-fantasy romps (as evidenced by my shameless obsession with the Dresden Files). I sampled two chapters before deciding to give the rest a miss. What I read seemed a bit silly and mostly predictable; I didn’t feel particularly intrigued by the characters or the world-building, especially given the obvious moral binary. Andrew Bromfield’s translation reads fluently, so I’m going to assume that any faults lie with the original text: namely, abuse of ellipses and exclamation points (“This was real power! With real perseverance!” “Damn!” “Faster!” “A female voice!”) and a general atmosphere of cheesy, humorless melodrama. Characters growl in anger, angst about unquenchable blood thirst, and so on.

Also, not the fault of the book itself, but still hilarious – a further excerpt from the back-cover summary: “With language that throbs like darkly humorous hard-rock lyrics about blood and power, freedom and responsibility…” – That is some quite specific throbbing.

Go to:
Sergei Lukyanenko: bio and works reviewed

World War Z, by Max Brooks (2006) E

Date read: 8.24.10
Book from: Borrowed from my cousin
Reviewer: Emera

In brief:  ZOMBIE OUTBREAK etc. Global pandemonium ensues.

So I assumed at first that this was in novel form, and was mildly intrigued since I’d never read a novel-length zombie survival story. (ETA: Oh wait, I have: Warm Bodies.) Turns out it’s actually in the format of interviews with various survivors of “World War Z:” soldiers, community leaders, doctors, lone survivalists, a feral child, etc., brought to you by the author of The Zombie Survival Guide. Most of it is schlock, especially any part of it that aspires to any emotional or philosophical depth and the so-called “satire,” which amounts to making very obvious fun of Corrupt Politicians, Shallow American Suburban Housewives, and so on. (Also, I must salute Brooks for his incredibly creative choices in making two of the three or four total Asian characters, respectively, a blind samurai zombie-whacker and a former otaku turned “warrior monk” (barf).)

But what fun schlock it is! The interview format gives Brooks an excuse to play out as many obsessively detailed scenarios as his zombie-nerd brain can churn out, from panics fueled by the failure of a fraudulent zombie-virus vaccine, to reappropriated medieval castles under siege, to all the intricacies of anti-zombie warfare and weapon design. (Possibly my favorite section: a long interview regarding the training of military dogs to track, and sometimes lure, zombies. It tickles the part of me that insisted on using attack dogs when playing Red Alert against my brother.) There are also numerous satisfyingly suspenseful episodes and creepy moments: the narrative of an American soldier who is ejected from a damaged plane and lost, alone, in a zombie-infested forest; the realization of a submarine crew that that odd sound is the clawing of dozens of submerged zombies that have surrounded their vessel. (Brooks’ zombies survive drowning, and can re-reanimate if thawed after being frozen, which leads to the fabulously grisly image of a world with its polar regions abandoned to hordes of half-frozen zombies.)

All in all, World War Z made for some great summer reading. I suppose it’s a little late to be reporting that, but there’s always room for a little brainless (pun?) entertainment. If you’ve ever discussed zombie outbreak contingency plans with friends, you’ll likely enjoy this.

Go to:
Max Brooks: bio and works reviewed

A very happy October to all

On a very blustery, ashen autumn day indeed –

“The skies they were ashen and sober;
The leaves they were crisped and sere –
The leaves they were withering and sere;
It was night in the lonesome October
Of my most immemorial year:
It was hard by the dim lake of Auber,
In the misty mid region of Weir –
It was down by the dank tarn of Auber,
In the ghoul-haunted woodland of Weir.”

– from “Ulalume,” Edgar Allen Poe

—–

“The lucidity, the clarity of the light that afternoon was sufficient to itself; perfect transparency must be impenetrable, these vertical bars of a brass-coloured distillation of light coming down from sulphur-yellow interstices in a sky hunkered with grey clouds that bulge with more rain. It struck the wood with nicotine-stained fingers, the leaves glittered. A cold day of late October, when the withered blackberries dangled like their own dour spooks on the discoloured brambles. There were crisp husks of beechmast and cast acorn cups underfoot in the russet slime of dead bracken where the rains of the equinox had so soaked the earth that the cold oozed up through the soles of the shoes, lancinating cold of the approach of winter that grips hold of your belly and squeezes it tight. Now the stark elders have an anorexic look; there is not much in the autumn wood to make you smile but it is not yet, not quite yet, the saddest time of the year. Only, there is a haunting sense of the imminent cessation of being; the year, in turning, turns in on itself. Introspective weather, a sickroom hush.”

– from “The Erl-King,” Angela Carter

My reading lately: Poe, for the first time in years; Ligotti (meh^10 – why is he compared to Poe?); Sarah Arvio’s collection of poems about her ghostly “visitors,” Visits from the Seventh. Anyone have any other recommendations for October-appropriate reading?

– E

Books within dreams within books within dreams…

(It didn’t get that far, but maybe it will eventually, if I ever edge over some critical tipping point between “this is the part of my brain that is not filled with books” and “ALL IS BOOK HERE”…)

I suddenly remembered just now that I had a dream last night about reading a book by Jeff Vandermeer, whom I haven’t actually read yet. I don’t remember what the book was about anymore, but I remember it being fragmentary, illustrated, and mystifying. Dream-book, come back!

That further reminded me that about a month before I actually read K. J. Bishop’s The Etched City (my review), and was eagerly anticipating having the time to read it, I had a dream about reading it, a sketchy, dust-filled dream built around the one or two clear snippets I remembered about the book from Vega’s review of it (desert, outlaws, irreal city). When I actually read the book, I was only briefly disappointed that the city in it didn’t look anything like the one I dreamed about, since the actuality (“actuality”?) was just as satisfyingly mysterious, though a lot more humid. I’m still trying to figure out what was happening in the dreamed etched city, though.

Does this ever happen to anyone else?

– E

The Unicorn Sonata, by Peter S. Beagle (1996) E

Date read: 8.1.10
Book from: Personal collection
Reviewer: Emera

(Photos originally featured in New books for August last year.)

After being left with distinctly mixed feelings for China Miéville’s Un Lun Dun (review), I experienced a bout of paranoia that maybe I was just getting too old for YA books. Cue further wibbling and visions of  nostalgically longing but tragically unconsummatable glances at the YA section of the library. Luckily, The Unicorn Sonata came up shortly after on my reading pile. While The Unicorn Sonata is not a great book, it is a quite good one, and – most importantly to me at the time of reading – it encapsulates the joy and sweetness that I associate with so many of the books that were childhood favorites, at the same time that there are flickers of darkness and more adult ambiguity very close to the surface.

Joey Rivera is an unhappy 13-year-old who’s most at peace when visiting her roguish abuelita in her nursing home, or cleaning and singing in the local music shop whose proprietor she’s befriended. One day, a mysterious boy named Indigo enters the shop, offering for sale a spiraled horn that plays haunting music that only he and Joey can hear. Soon after, Joey finds herself walking out of the streets of Los Angeles and into a world called Shei’rah, where she encounters a host of mythological creatures, some friendly and some dangerous – perytons, fauns, unicorns. The unicorns, Joey learns, the land’s Old Ones, are threatened by a mysterious plague of blindness. As her time in Shei’rah nears an end, she begins seeking out answers to the disease’s origins, and to the other mysteries she’s encountered in the land.

Again, none of this may be strikingly original, but all of it is written with easy grace, good humor, and exuberant imagery. The characters are well-developed for the length of the book, and their dialogue sharply written. I found Joey’s relationship with her abuelita sweet, if a little cliché, and also enjoyed the portrayal of her friendship with a lonely brook-jallah, a kind of predatory nymph. All in all, Joey’s time in Shei’rah often reminded me of the uncomplicated joy and peacefulness of scenes from the earlier Narnia books. In fact, I’m not unconvinced that there’s some deliberate referencing going on, since Joey first enters Shei’rah while walking past a streetlamp, and thereafter encounters – what else but a faun. (Though Shei’rah’s fauns are of an earthier, hairier, riper-smelling variety than Mr. Tumnus.)

I was also intrigued that the central crisis is eventually revealed to be metaphysical, rather than external, in origin, relating to the tensions running through Shei’rah’s more discontented inhabitants, but found the reveal a little too abruptly and patly delivered (“oh, and here’s the moral, by the way”) to be entirely convincing. Nonetheless, it adds another layer of complication to an already surprisingly nuanced fantasy.

Art – Robert Rodgriguez’s full-color illustrations were occasionally a little too… baroque for me (the unicorns look a little gnarly), but they certainly contribute to the book’s rich atmosphere and luxurious look, and I enjoyed his referencing of tapestry patterns in the fields and foliage.

Finally, thank you again to Vega of the Athenaeum for picking up a signed copy for me from Comic-Con!

Go to:
Peter S. Beagle: bio and review index
The Last Unicorn comic #1, by Peter S. Beagle, art by Renae de Liz and Ray Dillon (2010) E
The Last Unicorn comic #2, by Peter S. Beagle, art by Renae de Liz and Ray Dillon (2010) E
The Innkeeper’s Song, by Peter S. Beagle (1993) E