The Last Dragonslayer

I am a big Jasper Fforde fan, and have enjoyed all of his books. When I saw, in Dec. 2010, that he'd written a book for kids called The Last Dragonslayer, I immediately picked it up. With a series of events that happened on the personal front, I was left without much reading time, and ended up not getting to read the book until about a year after I'd purchased it. I am very glad I finally found the time to do read it, despite being later than I'd like.

Something about it had a feel that was a bit like another of my favorite authors, Diana Wynne Jones. I was glad to see that Fforde's use of magic The Last Dragonslayer had a flavor that was much like that found in DWJ's books. But the humor was firmly Fforde's (Ffordian?), and the humor is always a big part of what I love about his work.

The Last Dragonslayer is a wonderful quest story, raising questions of fate, magic, and the world in which we live. I highly recommend it for readers of all ages.


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At the Back of the North Wind

I finished reading George MacDonald's classic tale At the Back of the North Wind earlier this week, and reviewed it at the Christian Fiction website.  For those less interested in the Christian perspective in the novel, I thought a note here might be warranted.

George MacDonald is a great story-teller.  He can be really funny, and he draws up a past age through his writing.  In his day, children's literature was really just coming into its own, and MacDonald was a big part of that process.

At the Back of the North Wind is addressed to the child reader, but I think it certainly has a much broader appeal than that.  It is a well-constructed piece, fully of whimsy and imagination.  The places the novel takes us are well put together, with images that draw you in to want to read more.

There are many people who might like to lay claim to the title of father of the modern fantasy genre, but I think it is arguable that MacDonald forms at least a good bit of the root system of that whole branch of literature.  At the Back of the North Wind is one of the classic pieces that establishes him in the genre, written back in the days when no one really thought of such a genre existing at all.  He was admired by many writers who came after him, and his fiction left an indelible mark on this whole field of writing that has grown to be so huge in today's book market.



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Voices

A friend loaned me Urusula Le Guin's Voices recently. I picked it up over the weekend and finished it in just a couple of days. As soon as I'd read the first chapter, I knew I was going to read it straight through in a relatively short time, and that feeling of being firmly in the grip of a good story didn't let up. It's been a while since I last read a Le Guin novel (at least 3-4 years), and I'd almost forgotten how good she can be.

Voices is a book about healing, and about being broken. It is both profound and moving. If ever there has been a tale to make me believe the pen is mightier than the sword, this is it. Never have I seen diplomacy presented in such active terms, making the tale seem action-packed, even though there is surprisingly little fighting in it. The violence we see is not romanticized into some heroic act, but presented in the stark realities of the suffering inflicted by violent acts — suffering that can damage generation after generation, if allowed.

Here are a couple of things to whet the appetite, quoting from the book:

"I'm sorry, now, for that girl of fifteen who wasn't as brave as the child of six, although she longed as much as ever for courage, strength, power against what she feared. Fear breeds silence, and then the silence breeds fear, and I let it rule me. Even there, in that room, the only place in the world where I knew who I was, I wouldn't let myself guess who I might become." (page 32)

"I get along with animals and they get along with me. The gift is called calling, but it's more like hearing, actually." (page 73)

"'Heathen,' they called us. A word we learned from them. If it meant anything, it meant people who don't know what's sacred. Are there any such people? 'Heathen' is merely a word for somebody who knows a different sacredness than you know." (page 126)

"We've sung your poem 'Liberty' for ten years now here in Ansul, in hiding, behind doors. How did that song get here, who brought it? From voice to voice, from soul to soul, from land to land. When we sing it aloud at last, in the face of the enemy, do you think you'll be silent?" (page 169)

"Love of country, or honor, or freedom, then, may be names that give that pleasure to justify it to the gods and to the people who suffer and kill and die in the game. So those words — love, honor, freedom — are degraded from their true sense. The people may come to hold them in contempt as meaningless, and poets must struggle to give them back their truth." (page 296)


There's plenty more like that — moving passages couched in the middle of a good story. I'll just quote these few parts, though, and hopefully that will be enough to let the book jump out and begin to work its magic on you too.

After all, what could I say about the book that would better recommend it than that it overflows with lines like these?

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Waterhorse

I finally got around to watching the movie Waterhorse on DVD this past weekend. It was a fun movie, one that made me smile several times. I picked that one to watch because I didn't feel l like anything heavy, just wanting something nice and relaxing... and even cute, Waterhorse was a perfect fit.

The Scottish landscapes in the film are quite beautiful, and the little Loch Ness Monster is quite cute. The boy who acts in the film does a nice job, and it all comes together well enough.

If you are looking for a DVD to enjoy on a quiet night at home — one of those that is just nice for "switching off" — pick up Waterhorse. It's just perfect for that kind of viewing.

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Where Do You Go for Good Science Fiction and Speculative Poetry?

Where do you usually go when you are on the hunt for a new work of science fiction or speculative poetry? For me, I like to shop at the Genre Mall online. They have a very wide selection of fiction, poetry, and magazines to choose from. I've bought a fair number of titles from the Genre Mall, and have never failed to be impressed with the work. A large number of small publishing houses choose to distribute their work from the Genre Mall, so it houses a very nice selection of work that may not be available elsewhere. And, when you buy there, you are supporting the real grassroots movement of the genre.

I've also come across a very interesting site recently called Anthology Builder. I like how you can tailor make and anthology there, and have it put together in a way to suit your own needs and desires. I've already written a more extensive explanation about it at my main blog, so if you have some short stories you'd like to put up for sale, or if you are looking for good stories to read, you might pop in over there to have a look at how it works.



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Which Version Do You Prefer?

I recently finished reading The Crystal Cave. It was not that long ago that I read The Mists of Avalon, and I found the two stories very similar. I know, I know.... it is the same basic story, so of course they are similar. But that's not what I meant. I was referring to the telling of the story. I would have expected a bit more difference than I found, to be honest. For instance, The Once and Future King is quite different from either of these two (and happens to be the one I prefer of the 3).

Even though the Merlins who appear in Cave and Avalon are quite different, and Avalon is told from a much more firmly defined female perspective, I still somehow found the two books to be a little too much alike for my tastes. (And, to be honest, neither particularly suited my taste anyway.)

What about you? Do you have a favorite of these three modern versions of Arthur's story? Or perhaps another that you like better than any of these?

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Boundaries Between Reality and Fiction

My nephew and I have been engaged in long discussions lately about the boundaries between reality and fiction.
This video clip seems appropriate, at the moment.




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Ocean of Flames

When I started this blog, I tried working on a fiction-writer's exercise, creating characters who would speak in each entry. It didn't go so well for me, and I am really not much of a fiction writer anyway. I have seen some bloggers, though, who post their fiction in blog entries, and I always enjoy stopping in to read a story in progress.

I recently came across Ocean of Flames, an ongoing fantasy piece that is fun to read. It is a relatively new blog, and so it's easy to get caught up reading the installments now. They show a lot of promise, and I am looking forward to seeing the story continue to unfold!

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Elfking

I just finished reading Elfking by Susan Price. It was a rather odd book. While in some ways (language) it was easy to read, there was something about it that made it go rather slow for me. It was heavily steeped in Norse mythology. I liked that, but also found it a bit convoluted.

The characters of Elfgift and Unwin didn't strike me the way I felt they were "supposed" to. Somehow, neither was quite sympathetic or dispicable enough. There was something a little too cardboard about Unwin, and a little too glittery about Elfgift. The thing I suppose I ended up enjoying most in the novel was the Norse mythology at its center. But the characters and story, in their own right, didn't do a whole lot for me.

Even so, I did finish the book, and even read the last 150 pages or so in one sitting. It was readable, but the early parts didn't really capture my attention.


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Speculative Fiction

I recently visited a place that keeps a bookshelf set aside for bookcrossing. I first heard about Bookcrossing.com from another blogger, and have had a good time “setting books free” after registering them at the site. I’ve had an equally good time “catching” books released by other bookcrossers. On my recent “hunting trip,” I came across a find that could not have been any better, as far as I am concerned -- John Costello’s Science Fiction Films. I have been having a great time reading through the little volume at a very leisurely pace over the past couple of weeks.

I am quite a fan of science fiction, but am a much bigger fan of the more general category of writing that I’d term “speculative fiction,” encompassing not only science fiction, but fantasy, imaginative tales about possible parallel worlds or possible futures for our world. It’s an area of fiction that can really captivate me, whether talking about 1001 Arabian Nights, Star Wars, The Matrix, or Diana Wynne Jones’s Chrestomanci. I pretty much love it all.


Continue reading this article at my new blog

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What Makes Fantasy?

I've been thinking about the question of what makes fantasy, fantasy? How do we define the genre?

I know there are some things that immediately mark a text as fantasy. Talking animals would be one good example of that. Or fairy godmothers, that sort of thing. But what else goes into shaping the genre? Earthsea is, but is it more because of the magic, or because of the otherworld setting? (Oh yeah, there's another marker or two.)

It is interesting to contemplate what goes into formulating a genre, and what marks it for us so that we can say to a friend, "I've been reading this great fantasy book..."

(These thoughts came up when a friend and I were discussing whether or not Jasper Fforde's work should be labeled fantasy.)

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Summer, Romance

As I mentioned in an earlier post, Northrop Frye in his book Anatomy of Criticism has pointed to summer as the season for romance. This isn't talking about romance in the sense of boy meets girl and all the things we associate with "romantic" in movies and books today here. It's not about sexual love, but about quests and knights and idealism... that sort of thing. We're talking here Arthur and his Knights. That's the typical idea of a "romance."

In Frye's scheme, the various genres are represented by a season, and summer is for romance. It is preceded by spring's comedy, and followed by autumn's tragedy, with the yearly cycle ending in winter's irony/satire. Of course, in the death of the year's end, we are promised the renewal once again of spring.

Fantastic literature and speculative fiction is often thought of as fitting into summer, following the story arc of romance. All the stories of young heroes going off to find manhood and glory fit into this mold. A more dystopian type of writing, which is a large subgenre of speculative fiction in its own right, would fit more with a winter motif. But, still, summer seems to reign supreme in many fantasy novels.


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The Making of a Fantasy Story

I've been giving some thought recently to what makes a successful fantasy novel. I've pondered works like Harry Potter and Eragon, books that would surely count as "successful" by anyone's standards. What made them so successful?

I think it is clear, especially from these two examples, that to achieve loads of sales (especially in a short time), one has to understand the genre of fantasy. Both of these examples are very conscious of their placement with in a specific genre, and they pay due respect to the typical genre markers.

While that may begin to sound formulaic to some, you can't deny that it is a formula for success. Any argument against it seems to be butting one's head against the wall. These books and movies, like it or not, sell.




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A Change of Pace

I'm going to be making a change of direction again in this blog in the near future. Up till now, I have been exploring some various aspects of good story telling in my own way. I don't want this blog to be an experiment anymore. Rather, I want it to be a place for sharing knowledge.

I've done a fair bit of study over the years on what makes a good story. I teach literature, and have examined the question of genre quite carefully over the years. I am also very interested, and have done a fair bit of study about, reader responses to various texts.

In the very near future, I am going to begin to use this blog as a spot for keeping notes about the question of what makes a successful novel. Especially a fantasy novel. And I will consider the idea of readers' responses to fiction, and give some thought to how that plays into the creation of a successful novel.

In addition, I'll be reviewing some movies and thinking about how the viewer/reader/audience might play into the creation of films, and how this in turns shapes our viewing experience. I'll also review a fiar number of movies.


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