Reading Well: The Blacktongue Thief by Christopher Buehlman

Posted on January 9, 2024 by Daniel (@MKNN)

Christopher Buehlman‘s The Blacktongue Thief (2021) is, simply, the best swashbuckling fantasy novel I’ve read in years.

In some ways, that’s it: perhaps Reading Well should move to being one sentence reviews.

The protagonist lives right in the middle of the genre: a smart-talking, street smart, vagabond thief on the run, complete with Daddy issues and a love interest. The story is set in a world recovering from a long and bloody war that has decimated the populations of several cultures. The “bad guys” are a race of goblins, and while, yeah, they tend to eat the humans, they are also drawn with some depth and sensitivity.

Lovely swashbuckling epic. Great protagonist, deep world building. Best pure fantasy read in quite a while, and one where I truly hope the author decides to extend the story. Currently, there is a prequel set for release in 2024, but no word on a continuation of the characters from The Blacktongue Thief itself.

Highly recommended.

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Reading Well: Illuminations by Alan Moore

Posted on August 30, 2023 by Daniel (@MKNN)

I was so excited for a new collection of short stories by Alan Moore …

Some background may be useful: Moore was a relatively significant figure in my academic work for a few reasons. First, the formal structure of graphic narrative–comics–is an interesting one to me and Moore is a dominant figure in the field in the late 20th century. Second, his occult practices are of interest as well. Moore essentially decided that he wanted to make a run at experiencing this religion thing, and somewhat arbitrarily chose an early Greco-Roman snake goddess, and had (and presumably is still having) a fascinating relationship with 20th century neo paganism. Whatever one takes away from his experiential claim, the notion that the act of devotion matters more than the object of devotion is a good question to ponder.

All that to the side, when Moore nails something, he’s also a truly gifted writer. Illuminations (2022) has some examples of that: Hypothetical Lizard (which also exists in a graphic novel form), Cold Reading, and Location, Location, Location are great: smart, spooky, taut, and evocative.

And then comes What We Can Know About Thunderman. 240 pages of inside joke fiction set in the the comic book industry of the 70s, 80s, and 90s. I would assume it was cathartic for Moore to write, and that, if that kind of long-form parody is your thing (or if you know the people being caricatured), is probably amusing. But it is also awfully self-indulgent, and, along with a few of the other pieces, makes the whole collection feel very lightweight.

So, ultimately, disappointing. Some jewels for the completist in you, but otherwise, skippable in the Moore canon.

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Reading Well: A Master of Djinn by P. Djèlí Clark

Posted on August 16, 2023 by Daniel (@MKNN)

You would think a fantasy/ steampunk detective story with multiple strong female leads set in an alternate history where Cairo is the most powerful city in the world in the early 20th century would be right up my alley.

Somehow, though, P. Djélì Clark‘s A Master of Djinn (2021), falls short for me. It’s a great premise: in the late 20th century, an opening between our world and that of various magical forces (most notably, Djinn) was created, propelling Egypt into prominence as the most technologically advanced nation in the world, with the British empire fading, and both the European powers and the United States scrambling to find ways to compete.

The protagonists work for an arm of the Egyptian government tasked with investigating and managing magical phenomena, and the plot centers around the sudden appearance of someone who seems able to control and manipulate the Djinn to their own ends.

Clark’s Cairo is well described, especially in how they navigate the overlap of the daily practice of Islam and Middle Eastern mythology made real. But it also falls short, for me, of ever truly evoking the country or the city. In some ways, while N.K Jemisin‘s The Killing Moon (which I just realized I have not written up yet, whoops, adding it to the list) is far more fantastical and bears far less direct resemblance to 20th century Egypt, it also feels more deeply Egyptian. Part of this may reflect on Clark’s use of near-caricatures for the non-Egyptian characters. On the one hand, sure, turnabout is fair play and all that; on the other, it feels like we’ve moved beyond that to a place that demands that, if one group is presented with a certain realistic richness, all should meet that same level.

Clearly, this is a very subjective reaction. The whodunnit side of A Master of Djinn works well, and the various plot twists are handled well, without telegraphing the final turns too overtly. There are at least one more book in the series.

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Reading Well: An Unkindness of Ghosts by Rivers Solomon

Posted on August 2, 2023 by Daniel (@MKNN)

2017’s An Unkindness of Ghosts is my first foray into Rivers Solomon‘s work. It is a story of resistance against oppression, explicitly seen through the dual lenses of class and race, all set on a ship hurtling through space on what is often termed a “generation ship” in the genre. The name derives from understanding that, if space travel is performed at speeds below the speed of light, the journeys will take centuries, spanning generations and creating an environment where various cultural practices may take form in surprising ways.

The voyage of the Matilda is not a happy one: very stark divisions along both class and racial lines are enforced on the ship, with a nearly omnipotent leader figure at the top. Life on the lower decks is brutal, and the available strategies of resistance are often limited. Solomon’s use of different linguistic styles among the various decks/class levels is very smart and very well done, a constant reminder of the way language and privilege are related.

The protagonist is queer and neurodivergent, and Solomon’s decision to foreground their modes of perception may be key to your enjoyment of the novel. I found them incredibly compelling, and found Solomon’s ability to present their challenges responding to indirect communication, their struggles with interpersonal relationships in general, and their complicated relationship with their duties and abilities as a healer all quite impressive, making the narrative constantly engaging and, perhaps more importantly, serving as an active disruption of a lot of classic science fiction tropes.

My guess is those three paragraphs have you squarely intrigued or you’ve already moved on. If you’re still here, you’ll be interested, and probably enjoy, An Unkindness of Ghosts.

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Reading Well: Black Water Sister by Zen Cho

Posted on July 18, 2023 by Daniel (@MKNN)

Zen Cho‘s Black Water Sister (2021) does three things exceptionally well.

First, it captures a contemporary young, female protagonist with care, detail, and empathy. Born in Malaysia, but raised in the United States, she has now returned to Malaysia with her parents, and is a bit lost, both in ways somewhat generic to people in their early 20’s facing the overwhelming challenge of answering the question what will I do with my life? and in ways related to returning to a culture that is familiar and foreign at the same time.

Second, there is Malaysia itself. This is not a novel where you’ll learn about the country’s history or the complicated weave of its current politics. But it is full of small details–language, landscapes, lingo, and the like–that thoroughly ground the narrative in a thickly realized setting.

Finally, it does all this in the context of a good old-fashioned possession/ ghost story spanning multiple generations of a family. The first two points impact this as well–the protagonist is skeptical in a nicely modern way, and the “ghost” is decidedly Malaysian.

The 21st century is a particularly challenging setting for novels: incorporating the ubiquitous nature of technology while maintaining narrative momentum and interest is difficult, and Cho does an excellent job at navigating this: there is a long-distance relationship mediated over Facetime, the constant use of Google to answer questions about what is really happening, etc., all done without allowing the writing to slip into a series of text exchanges or search results.

Overall, the novel is engaging and entertaining. Recommended, especially if you are interested in a small dose of insight into what contemporary Malaysia might be like.

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Reading Well: The Witch’s Heart by Genevieve Gornichec

Posted on April 25, 2023 by Daniel (@MKNN)

The Norse myths are a rich source of inspiration, so much so that they have been done poorly far more often than they have been done well (see Neil Gaiman’s Norse Mythology for an example of a deeply faithful example of the latter).

So I picked up Genevieve Gornichec‘s The Witch’s Heart (2021) with some trepidation.

Happily, the book delivers. It focuses on Angrboða, who appears in the Norse canon as the wife of Loki and the mother of three figures tightly entwined with the apocalyptical happening of Ragnarök (the wolf Fenrir, the serpent Jörgmungandr, and Hel, who becomes the ruler of the underworld). Angrboða is a Jötunn, belonging to the category of beings that are neither human nor gods and her story is closely entwined with the familiar stories from the source material which, for the most part, happen off-screen.

Instead, The Witch’s Heart is centered on Angrboða’s friendship and loves, and the mixing of the two. Most successfully, it depicts the two primary love affair of Angrboða’s life–Loki, with whom anyone who has glanced at the Norse material is familiar, and Skaði, who may be new to many. Each is presented with great emotional care and compassion–quite the challenge in Loki’s case, given his consistently … selfish? self-centered? self-serving? take your pick … outlook on the world.

But Gornichec manages to make Angrboða’s love for the trickster God to resonate as honest and true, and the journey from friendship to more-than with Skaði is equally moving. All of this is done without losing an essential Norse quality–a disregard for suffering, a welcoming of a glorious death, a recognition that prophesy has decreed a looming end-times (in this case, one in which your offspring and your lovers all play vital roles).

This is not a romantic fairy tale, however: the title refers to Angrboða’s relationships, but also to her actual heart, which spends a fair bit of time outside of her body, and plays a key role in the resolution of the narrative. There are battles and blood and witchery a-plenty; but there is also a mother mourning being rejected by her daughter, and railing against the impudence with which the (mostly, but not exclusively, male) Gods do as they will, ignoring the consequences.

If that mixture of mythic source and love story sounds intriguing, The Witch’s Heart is highly recommended.

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Reading Well: Piranesi by Susanna Clarke

Posted on April 18, 2023 by Daniel (@MKNN)

Susanna Clarke‘s Piranesi (2020) is a quirky, engaging novel.

Part whodunnit, part meditation on mental health, the novel follows its protagonist through an alternate space, a massive mansion containing a nearly infinite network of rooms, situated by a shattered seaside.

The protagonist discovers many of the twists and turns of the whodunnit along with the reader, making it harder to summarize without giving much away. There is a gateway between this alternate space and “the real world,” and the heart of the novel beats around who passes between and what their motivations are.

It is a testament to Clarke’s skill that the narrative perspective succeeds: the protagonist is clearly troubled, if not damaged, and Clarke does a fantastic job balancing what they know and don’t know with information only privy to the reader. It’s a fine line–reveal too little and the reader is frustrated; reveal too much and the dramatic tension wavers.

I think your tolerance for mystery will determine a lot of your enjoyment of the book: I found figuring it out quite engaging, and the final turns–which may strike some as overly optimistic–instead struck me as a sweet solution to the story, placing the book firmly in the camp that argues that there is, indeed, a way back from very dark times.

If Clarke’s name rings a bell, her earlier, hugely successful novel, Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell, was a decently converted Netflix series a few years ago. To her credit, while equally inventive, Piranesi is a strikingly different book, in tone, outlook, and content.

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Reading Well: White is for Witching by Helen Oyeyemi

Posted on April 11, 2023 by Daniel (@MKNN)

We’re back with some more Helen Oyeyemi (see Boy, Snow, Bird and Ginger Bread) with 2009’s White is for Witching as I move throug the rest of her output (some of which I read before I started these little web entries).

Oyeyemi is, in my opinion, at her best when she is leaning into creepy … and, boy, does White is for Witching lean that way. The evil in the story is a literal house; the protagonists are its inhabitants, most significantly the third generation of a haunted family.

It is a lovely, strikingly haunting, eerie novel full of scenes that may, if you’re unlucky, revisit you in your dreams. Themes that wind through a lot of Oyeyemi’s work–race and how it manifests in diverse ways; sexuality and its repression; how gender shapes social interaction–are present here, and ultimately your enjoyment of the novel will depend on how successfully you think she balances the horror narrative and those other interests.

For me, it is easily one of her finer achievements, a book that will remain with you long after you hit the last page.

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Reading Well: Jade City by Fonda Lee

Posted on February 24, 2023 by Daniel (@MKNN)

One of the beautiful and frustrating things about genre writing is that a single magnificent idea can carry an entire work.

For me, such is the case with Jade City (2017) by Fonda Lee. The setting is a pseudo-Asian metropolis, and the idea revolves around the natives’ relationship with jade, which confers super-human powers upon them. Or, most of them–there are some people immune to jade’s effects, others that are overly sensitive to it and must protect themselves from exposure. But for those trained in it, jade, worn in jewelry of all types, embedded in weapons and in skin, and prominently displayed to show status, is the ultimate indicator of power, and enables a set of powers that translate to a level of otherwise unattainable physical prowess.

It’s a great idea–the city is controlled by an uneasy peace between family clans which, of course, breaks down, pitting the jade-enhanced warriors against each other in both political and physical conflicts.

From there, your mileage may vary. I enjoyed Jade City, found the core characters well drawn and the setting intriguing. Lee has a nice eye for action, and the scenes of hand-to-hand combat–which is really hard to write, actually–are very well done. At the same time, other than the notion of jade itself, there is little new here: we have inter-generational conflicts, we have a prodigal daughter, we have a well-executed final gambit to reverse the course of the conflict, and we have a clear setup for following novels.

I enjoyed it, in a page-turning way, and in admiration of how compelling the notion of jade itself is throughout the book.

Intentionally or not, the whole thing is superbly cinematic and would translate very well to screens, big or little.

Jade City is the opening novel of a trilogy that I may finish at some point.

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Reading Well: A Stranger in Olondria by Sofia Samatar

Posted on February 17, 2023 by Daniel (@MKNN)

Sofia Samatar‘s A Stranger in Olondria (2013) stands out most of all for its literaryness, it you’ll allow the word.

This is a fantasy novel that reads more like historical fiction, like a finely detailed account of lives lived a few centuries ago. But, with light touches of fantasy/magic sprinkled throughout. The general form of the narrative–a journey from the isolated hinterlands to the thriving capital, and beyond–is well-traveled, but the world Samatar creates is very thick, in the best sense of that word, and the attention to detail–to the sights and smells, to the professions and social structures, and to the lived experience of the lives of her characters–stands out.

Your enjoyment of the novel will depend, at least partially, on your addiction to pace: a lot happens, but nothing happens terribly quickly. This is a novel to savor and enjoy–and to some, that screams boredom, but I would argue that, in a genre so dominated by page-turners with little to remember about the specificity of their settings, it’s a rare pleasure.

A Stranger in Olondria is followed by 2017’s The Winged Histories, which I hope to get to sometime this year.

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