Reminder: The Merlin Conspiracy
A brief reminder that discussion on The Merlin Conspiracy, by Diana Wynne-Jones, will begin on Saturday, April 30th. If you haven’t had a chance to read it yet, give it a go!
Title: Tortall and Other Lands: A Collection of Tales
Author: Tamora Pierce
Summary: A collection of short stories by YA fantasy author Tamora Pierce, most exploring characters and countries around her “Tortall” series.
etc: I found this collection to be a thoroughly mixed bag. One or two of the stories I loved, one or two of them I found completely uninteresting, and one of them actually made me kind of angry. But I’ll start with the good.
The pick of the book for me was A Dragon’s Tale, told from the perspective of the dragon Skysong, aka Kitten, who first makes an appearance in the novel Wild Magic. While paying a visit to the new Emperor of Carthak, Kitten discovers a woman who is an outcast from her village, and is determined to help her. This story was, to me, Pierce at her best - strong female characters, interesting magical creatures, and a young protagonist determined to make the world a better place. Definitely the highlight of the book for me. Enjoyable, although not quite as satisfying, were Tortall short-stories Lost and Student of Ostriches.
Nawat I struggled with. Pierce fans will recognise the character as the crow-turned-man from the Trickster books. Nawat follows the titular character dealing with both raising children and his identity as a crow, and in many ways is a story addressing cultural identity - Nawat’s partner, Aly, objects to many of his crow-like child-rearing customs, while he finds those of humans just as distasteful. The concept of a half-animal half-human identity interested me a little, but for the most part I was just sort of bored by the story. Having said that, though, I didn’t enjoy the original Trickster books for a number of reasons, and never like either Aly or Nawat that much.
Of the non-Tortall stories, both Mimic and Plain Magic were great, and in terms of world-building did not feel dissimilar to Pierce’s Emelan and Tortall worlds. Huntress was more urban fantasy, which isn’t really my jazz. Testing is the only non-fantasy story in the book, but I really enjoyed it - it is set in a group home for teenage girls, and is based on Pierce’s own experiences as a house mother.
[The next section contains SPOILERS!]
Book of the Month - April
Apologies for the delay in posting this!
In honour of the brilliant Diana Wynne Jones, April’s book of the month is The Merlin Conspiracy.
Nick and Roddy are two teens from two different worlds. Nick is an ex-prince who lives with his adopted father, a horror writer; Roddy is the daughter of two Royal magicians, living in a traveling court. Nick dreams of becoming a Magid and traveling through alternate worlds; Roddy is more concerned with keeping her best friend out of trouble. But when Roddy discovers that the latest Merlin - Britain’s chief wizard - is caught up in a plot that threatens to destroy not just her own country, but the entire multiverse, she summons Nick to come to her aid - and the two begin a journey that will lead them to talking elephants, dark family secrets, and terrifying repercussions for mistakes they did not even know they’d made…
Discussion on The Merlin Conspiracy will begin on Saturday, 30th April.
Book of the Month discussion: Six Suspects
When a wealthy and sadistic young man is murdered, the police find their suspects easily enough - six party-goers with guns - six party-goers, each with their own motives for killing Vicky Rai, who was not above a little murder and bribery himself.
Vikas Swarup allows each of his ‘suspects’ to give us their own stories, and in doing so explores the worst - and the best - of Indian society. Classism and corruption are the biggest themes, as we have star-crossed lovers, and the insiduous dealings of bureaucrats and politicians out to do little more than line their own pockets. There’s also celebrity, as a Bollywood actress learns that while she may have escaped her past, there is still plenty of room to make mistakes; racism, as a young man from a small tribe discovers that city life isn’t everything he hoped it would be; and some forays into spirituality, as an unlikeable man is seemingly possessed by the spirit of Mahatma Gandhi. Swarup also injects a fair amount of humour into the book through the character of a working-class American who accidentally falls in love with an Indian actress.
Points to consider include:
- Swarup is an Indian diplomat. Does this novel appear to have been written with an Indian, or a foreign audience in mind? Do you think the American character represents Swarup’s ideas of America and Americans?
- Swarup’s first book, Q&A (also known as Slumdog Millionaire) was lauded by some as a work which opened the eyes of Westerners to the “real” India. Is this also the case with Six Suspects? Are readers likely to have their assumptions about India challenged by this book?
- The six suspects receive a mixture of happy, sad, and tragic endings. Did you feel that each ending “fitted” each character’s story? Do you think the mixture of conclusions was realistic?
- While this book is based around a murder, it is more concerned with telling the stories of its characters than investigating Vicky Rai’s death. Were you satisfied with the final revelation of his murderer?
Reblog this post with any discussion or reactions you have about Six Suspects.
Six Suspects was such an awesome book. I couldn’t stop reading it. Incidentally, I recommend everyone read Q & A. The book is really awesome, and deals with some interesting issues.
Reminder: Six Suspects
A brief reminder that discussion on Six Suspects, by Vikas Swarup, will begin on Saturday, March 26th. If you haven’t had a chance to read it yet, give it a go!
Book of the Month - March
Six Suspects, by Vikas Swarup (best known for his book Q&A, which became the international hit film Slumdog Millionaire) follows the lives of six suspects in a murder trial - six people from very different walks of life, including a movie star, an ex-thief in love, and an illegal immigrant. While the reader learns of the lives and motives of each of the suspects, they are also faced with the question - is finding the murderer the same as finding justice?
Discussion on Six Suspects will begin on the weekend of the 26th/27th of March.
Book of the Month discussion: Wide Sargasso Sea
Wide Sargasso Sea begins with the story’s main narrator, Antoinette Cosway, recounting her childhood. Antoinette is white Creole, the daughter of a former slave owner, and is all too aware that she doesn’t “belong” anywhere - not with the black former slaves, who call her a “white cockroach”, but not with the other white landowners, either, who only want to make fun of her pretty young mother as solitude and poverty drive her towards madness.
The second part of the book is told in turns by Antoinette and her unnamed husband. From the beginning he fails to understand her, and as rumours about her past start to circulate it becomes very apparent that he only married her for her land and money, which now totally belongs to him. He tries to sever her connection with her past, renaming her “Bertha”; he both pushes her away and claims her as his own property, and Antoinette knows that her own tenuous grasp on life and living is beginning to slip away.
The story concludes with Antoinette in England, now in the full time care of a woman named Grace Poole; she has become the “madwoman in the attic” of Charlotte Bronte’s Jane Eyre, and the reader is left to themselves to remember her ultimate fate.
Wide Sargasso Sea explores the myriad of racial and cultural tensions in Jamaica in the years after the Emancipation Act. There is a strong feeling of hatred and distrust between the different the various peoples, despite individual relationships that are formed. Identity and belonging are also strong themes; Jean Rhys expertly shows us Antoinette’s insecurities as a Creole who does not belong in the place that she loves, but does not belong in Europe, either.
Antoinette’s story runs parallel to Jane Eyre’s in many ways - unwanted by her family, a long period of illness, and sent away to a religious school - but unlike Jane, who must work for a living and can eventually assert her own independence and marry the man she loves, Antoinette is an heiress who must lose her own means when she marries a man she barely knows.
Please reblog this post to discuss anything of interest to you.
Title: A Waltz for Matilda (2010)
Author: Jackie French
Summary: When Matilda’s mother dies, she sees only one option - to leave the city slums and track down her father, a sheepfarmer in the drought-stricken Outback. But her father’s got his own problems - and Matilda is going to need every ounce of determination she’s got to face down the challenges life is giving them both.
etc: While the beginning of the book is loosely based on the famous Australian song, the story itself focuses solely on Matilda - who finds herself in possession of a sheep farm, and is determined to make something of it. This book is in many ways about the birth of Australia as a nation, and French tackles a wide range of subjects - unionism, the temperance and suffrage movements, racism and the slaughter of the Aboriginal people, and the changing national identity from “British” to “Australian”. It’s not a heavy read, fitting more into the “young adult” category of books, but absolutely fascinating and I couldn’t put it down.
French doesn’t shy away from any of the social issues she portrays. From the beginning she has Matilda hearing rumours of Chinese child-snatchers, contrasting with the Chinese store-keeper’s wife, who is determined to have her sons seems as “Australian” as possible, as she knows that they will likely marry white women. The shearers’ union is fighting for better pay for all its members - but initially, at least, its members are all white, and they don’t care that Aboriginal farm-hands don’t even get paid in money, but only in rations.
Matilda’s own views are more egalitarian than most of her contemporaries, yet she is not without her own prejudices and ignorance. She doesn’t understand why her talk of “wild natives” hurts her Aborigine friends, or that the land that she is so proud of owning is land that their people could once use freely. Still, part of Matilda’s appeal as a character is that while she is ignorant, she does want to learn - and she is willing to fight to make a difference for everyone.
Something else that shines through French’s writing that I also noticed in her book A Rose for the Anzac Boys (also highly recommended!) is how much she concentrates on female friendship, and on women supporting each other. Matilda’s first real support on the farm is an elderly Aboriginal woman; her second is a rich white city woman, a member of the temperance and suffrage movements who admires Matilda’s determination. The men in Matilda’s life, by contrast, never seem to know how to treat her; some try to take care and protect her, while others see her as a challenge or a threat.
Anyway, I found the story completely un-put-downable, and think everyone should read it. The end.
Since my dash has been full of discussion on Anthropology and the Evolutionary Sciences.
I recommend everyone read ‘Anthropology & Colonialism’ by Talal Assad. By far one of my favourite books on Anthropology
