The Unfinished Song: Initiate by Tara Maya
For anyone new to Rehabilitated Hack Writer Recommends, I target my book reviews towards novelists (you can find my prior reviews here). I also need to point out that this is a review of the first book of a series, not the series itself.
Before we dive headfirst into the fantasy pool of epic goodness that is Tara Mara’s The Unfinished Song: Initiate, we need to take a step back and formally define what epic fantasy is in the novel landscape of 2012. The classic definition of epic or high fantasy is it’s a sub-genre of fantasy set in invented worlds.
I hate that definition.
To me, epic fantasy needs to be, well, epic. Epic. This is fun, but not epic, fantasy:
A mysterious, sexy pale-skinned sword dancer hires an infamous mercenary to find her kidnapped brother. The mercenary learns there is more to women than bedding them, while the sister learns that if she lets her quest define her life, she becomes defeated before the rescue of her brother ever begins.
Bonus points if you can guess that book, by the way.
Now this, this is epic:
The good peoples, it seemed, never defeated the evil that threatened to consume them all, only delayed the final battle. The dark and vile lord who threaten freedom everywhere wrapped his essence into a ring, and now a band of unlikely heroes must cast the ring into the fiery pit of its creation or see it reunited with its maker. Setting out on their quest with the best intentions, the task soon falls to the smallest and unlikeliest hero while the armies of evil marshal to crush everything in its path. If the hero doesn’t destroy the ring and thus the dark lord in time, there won’t be anything left to save.
Epic fantasy is ambitious. Epic fantasy is grandiose. Epic fantasy is bigger than the sum of its parts. It’s heroic, it’s classic, it’s is all-encompassing and all-consuming fantasy. There are stakes. The stakes are high. You could say that the stakes are (wait for it!) epic.
And Mara’s Unfinished Song: Initiate is an introduction into 21st century epic fantasy. Here’s the teaser:
Dindi can’t do anything right, maybe because she spends more time dancing with pixies than doing her chores. Her clan hopes to marry her off and settle her down, but she dreams of becoming a Tavaedi, one of the powerful warrior-dancers whose secret magics are revealed only to those who pass a mysterious Test during the Initiation ceremony. The problem? No-one in Dindi’s clan has ever passed the Test. Her grandmother died trying. But Dindi has a plan.
Kavio is the most powerful warrior-dancer in Faearth, but when he is exiled from the tribehold for a crime he didn’t commit, he decides to shed his old life. If roving cannibals and hexers don’t kill him first, this is his chance to escape the shadow of his father’s wars and his mother’s curse. But when he rescues a young Initiate girl, he finds himself drawn into as deadly a plot as any he left behind. He must decide whether to walk away or fight for her… assuming she would even accept the help of an exile.
Now I know what you are thinking. You’re thinking, wow, that sounds cool, but um, that doesn’t sound too epic to me.
Oh, my friends, pour a cup of hot tea and wait for it. Don’t let the girly frou-frou cover and character-driven teaser fool you. Behind the rich, detailed world-building lies the heartbeat of an epic fantasy tale that rises above the bounds of mythology and into a coming-of-age novel that will leave the reader yearning for more. Maya clearly dips her plot and characters in several different mythologies, yet the book has a distinctive voice that tugs at your heartstrings.
Let’s deconstruct the goodness going on here.
World-Building
Maya’s world building kicks ass. It’s unique, it’s ambitious, and it has an undercurrent of femininity that, without the advent of the interweb tubes, the story Maya is trying to tell never would have seen the light of day. It’s so different it is, and I say this with no exaggeration, a high fantasy literary bomb of mass destruction. It is not so much a filled with troupes and familiar themes as it becomes a classic example of the very idea of world-building.
How does she accomplish this? Maya’s neolithic setting latches on the magical undercurrents of the world she envisioned and never lets them go.
For example, stone-aged peoples in the real world were concerned primarily with survival. Gender roles and relations follow a path necessary for the continuation of the individual and the group. There is a reason when an attractive woman smiles at a man she unconscionably puts her hair behind an ear, why rejection impacts men and women differently and why we are creatures of instinct despite our technological advancements.
Yet, toss magic into the fray. Magic, like technology, lends itself to the removal of the disparity of force. Maya takes this one step where few tread: it’s not necessarily what you can wield, but more what you know. Dindi’s quest isn’t so much a classic grab-onto-the-power but an unlocking of a mystery.
That moves us back to the impact of the type of magic Maya puts forth. Women, in her tribal society, have distinct roles but they are far from simple property. Women need to bear children so the society she has shaped takes that into account, but it’s not as if the magic is something that sits around in a feudal or even Victorian society as if it’s a character by itself rather than infused into the setting. It has a distinct feminine vibe without the politically correct bullshit.
This is evident from the ground up. It’s in the way characters talk. You might think ancient peoples would also have a primitive language and culture. But neolithic-era people with magic? Maya nails this. It’s in the way they dress, how they pick their mates, how they relate to other tribes, how they view politics, honor and duty. In a world where magic comes forth from a dance, where pixies, talking bears, and fae abound–Maya uses this magic as the glue to everything: setting, plot and characterization. It is the basis of her world-building and because of the creative and talented way she does it, Initiate comes off as highly original, unique and engrossing.
I’m not exaggerating here. World-building. How To. Tara Maya. Initiate. Read it.
Characterization
My number one surprise with this book is that this book has guy stuffs in it. I could talk at length how fascinating Dindi is, how she comes across as both vulnerable yet puts aside her fears to do what must be done. How she seems like she is fourteen going on eighteen one moment, and fourteen going on twelve the next. Maya pens her as tenacious and doesn’t shy away from giving her a sexuality. Dindi’s great.
My little fantasy heart, however, belongs to Kavio.
Because Kavio kicks ass.
Kavio, actually, is a tragic figure. Maya gives him nobility and youthful idealism as his moral fiber, and tosses him into situations of conflict where it becomes apparent that Kavio greatest enemy is himself. Kavio is a good guy, but he’s also a weapon of mass destruction. He follows the rules when obviously he could, quite simply, make up the rules himself with his magic. He’s like a Jedi Knight being given a ticket by a traffic cop. Press hard, Kavio, you’re making five copies. The cop has a gun and feels superior, but Kavio could turn him inside out, burn his cruiser, go to the station, and have it swallowed whole by a rent in the earth while blood pixies rip out everyone’s eyeballs through their noses making the police station scene in The Terminator look like a scene from a Jane Austin novel.
Instead, he signs.
Did I mention he’s a bad-ass?
As a writer, Kavio fascinates me mightily. I’m beginning to wonder if someone handed Maya an honorary penis because she hones in on the masculine feel of Kavio with laser-like focus. She nails what I call the Tragic Masculine Paradox: when confronted with an attractive young woman coming-of-age, the man of honor is torn with feelings of protectiveness as a father figure yet desires as a lover. You see this in fiction all the time. Rarely do you see it done with such empathy and understatement. Many writers go overboard with this, giving this a tragic (and pervy) element. Maya, however, simply presents it as-is. Kavio has bigger problems than his youthful naïveté.
Dindi’s feminine, innocent beauty, simply highlights Kavio’s main attraction: Dindi is magically powerful. Without going into the rest of the series, he’s slowly falling in love, and love, my friends, is messy. Dindi is more than a girl and then more than a young woman. She’s the catalyst to…
But I digress. Dindi isn’t the only character in a come-of-age journey in Initiate.
Plot
Which leads us to the clever, delicious plotting, and how we come full circle back to our discussion about epic fantasy.
A prevalent, and welcomed trend in speculative fiction is the come-of-age journey set in a fantastic (be it wonderful or dystopian) setting. I am a huge sucker for these types of stories, and in Initiate, Maya plots a literal come-of-age journey as Dindi goes out to become a woman, ready or not (and no, she wasn’t ready).
But epic fantasy has stakes. Big stakes. End-of-the-world (or worse!) type stakes, but unlike much of what is out there today, this book is surprisingly not a coming-of-age novel with an epic plot line to give the character’s punch and excuses to reveal their literary humanity. No, this is a book that provides the foundation for the true story: the battle with the malevolent forces out to crush humanity. It’s not exactly Clan of the Cave Bear meets The Lord of the Rings, but you get the idea.
Dindi is on a personal journey and she yearns to become a magical dancer in the society she was born in. However, if, as a reader, you’re paying attention, you can spot the epic plot that Maya is serving up like drops of water to the thirsty.
And this is where we depart the shackles of traditional publishing. Maya fearlessly has plotted out a twelve book series and each book is building on that plot in a relentless, epic fashion. Let me be very clear, I am not a big fan of many-book fantasy series. Many of them have problems with continuity, editing, and, quite frankly, sometimes as a reader, I feel I’ve been ripped off around book four because I’m being milked rather than being cleverly entertained.
eBooks, and today’s book market, however, has expanded the types of books we can find and buy, and Maya’s greatest accomplishment as a writer is taking full advantage of medium. The twelve book format, based on her world-building, is not only daring but also a little slice of epic fantasy goodness, and her skill at characterization draws the reader right into her world.
It’s epic fantasy by our very definition, and it’s yummy. Give me those twelve books. I’ll gladly ready every one of them. If you love a good fantasy series fix, Maya’s your drug dealer, Baby.
More Please
You can tell I’m a fan. Initiate is a wonderful, rich and diverse book and the series thus far is a fantasy reader’s fantasy series. I do have quibbles with it, but they are nits in the larger picture. I’m not a fan of the cover art. I disagree with some of the editorial decisions made and feel Maya’s talent could easily support books of larger word counts, smoothing some of the abruptness of the plot presentation.
Yet these are mere nits because from a storytelling standpoint, it just doesn’t work, it’s a slice of Awesome Toast with Bacon. I tell my non-writer, but reader friends, the Era of the Reader is upon us. Novels like Initiate proves that assertion. If you are a writer, take a step back from all the meta that goes on with writing, look at the bigger picture, and read Initiate. You’ll realize the sum of the book is bigger than its parts, and, at its heart, epic fantasy many readers want to buy, but haven’t really been able to do so.
I give Initiate four bacon strips out of five. And while this is a singular book recommendation, I’ll just drop a teaser that as good as it is, the other books in the series get better.
Stand with Her or Not at All
Center of the Sun
Conjure One
***
Young girl in the market
Music to the men
When the men leave
Her eyes are red
When her eyes are closed again she sees the dark market of above
And she sings
‘They say the most horrible things
But I hear violins, when I close my eyes
I am at the center of the sun
And I cannot be hurt
By anything this wicked world has done’
Young boy in the market
Follows all the men
When the men leave
He’s out of his head
When his eyes are closed again he sees the dark market of above
And he sings
‘They break the most beautiful things
But I hear violins, when I close my eyes
I am at the center of the sun
And I cannot be hurt
By anything this wicked world has done
I look into your eyes
And I am at the center of the sun
And I cannot be hurt
By anything this wicked world has done’
Center of the sun
Young boy in the market
Sees the girl alone
And asks her
‘Have you lost your way home?’
She sings
‘You say the most beautiful things, just like my violins’
I look into your eyes
I am at the center of the sun
And I cannot be hurt
By anything this wicked world has done
When I close my eyes
I am at the center of the sun
And I cannot be hurt
By anything this wicked world has done
‘Cause
I hear violins
I hear violins
I hear violins
I hear violins
Center of the sun
I hear …violins
Opening Line
The landscape Josh glided through was bleak and blasted, a twisted caress of despair and destruction, yet it was nothing compared to the dark memory of the girl that abused his thoughts.
Across the Universe by Beth Revis
Here at the R.H.W. Blog, we target book reviews to people who write novels. There are many other book reviews on Across the Universe out there tailored for readers.
Across the Universe by Beth Revis is a contemporary young adult science fiction book of monumental science fiction YA goodness. There is a particular fondness for YA sci-fi on this blog, as the 9.3 blog readers will attest. Before we get into Across the Universe, let’s talk about that topic specifically: YA science fiction. We need to go there to come to grips on why Beth Revis has awesomesauce for blood.
Dystopian Settings in YA Science Fiction
YA science fiction has historical roots in dystopian settings. What industry labels as simply “dystopian” really used to be thought of, by readers, as “science fiction”, if they thought about the genre label at all.
Enter vampires, urban fantasy, contemporary and paranormal (although vamp fic is a paranormal offshoot). You could say these killed off classic science fiction under the guise of character-driven stories marketed (successfully) to girls, and science fiction stories along “classic” lines was not meeting the needs of a new vastly expanded audience.
We could say that… and it’s BS. Science fiction is alive and well, simply nudged into a little dystopian niche that is selling like chocolate in an all-girl high school student store. There are only so many books and book publishers to go around, in the traditional sense. What sells, sells. That “classic” science fiction for young adults fell by the wayside wasn’t elitism, but it wasn’t the fault of science fiction itself. It was capitalism.
This is only brought up because as novelists, we need to practice the art of eye-rolling. Take for example the following conversation:
“Science fiction as a market for youth is dead.”
“What? What about The Hunger Games? Uglies? Unwind? Or…”
“That’s dystopian fiction.”
(rolls eyes)
“Don’t roll your eyes at me! It’s true. Simply placing a book into the future doesn’t make it science fiction…”
(rolls eyes)
“Maybe classic science fiction for youth is dead…”
“You mean, maybe classic science fiction for youth is underutilized and underrepresented?“
This was an actual conversation, by the way. No names are given to protect the guilty.
Why digress to talk about the current YA book market in speculative fiction? Because the current market has its roots in the older market. And there were some amazing young adult science fiction books in dystopian settings.
Enter John Christopher
The king of dsytopian settings is John Christopher. His legendary Tripod trilogy was a chilling tale of alien conquest and subversion, where as a teen, your own parents turn against you because they have been “capped”. It’s a mind-control device turning people into hypnotic slaves for unseen alien masters.
Christopher nailed all the dystopian YA elements, and one could say, defined them. There is one complete and utterly horrific subplot, where the unseen aliens (in the first book) take the prettiest young girls to “the masters” city once winning a beauty contest, and these girls are never seen again.
Once the truth is known what happens to these girls, oh my. There’s nothing explicit about it. It’s just evil. Pure, understated, evil, and from a literary standpoint, so very delicious.
We’ll come back to John in a moment.
What Makes Dystopian YA So Delicious
There no mystery why dystopian fiction provides a fertile ground for young adult novels. It’s delicious because the setting is great for the come-of-age story. As teens and adults, we yearn for places to put context to growing up, and nothing says “grow up!” like oppression and tyranny, especially in the future. In dystopia, everything is about the removal of choice. And nothing makes a greater young adult story than a teen trying to make choices where it seems like there is none. It often is a choice of defining oneself correctly, or dying.
So much goodness.
Enter Across the Universe. Across the Universe nails the dsytopian feelings of oppression and tyranny, and as a dystopian novel it just doesn’t work, it sparkles brightly (sparkles like stars, heeee). The setting, particularity for Amy, the main character, goes from a disturbing familiarity to an assault on everything it means to be a teen girl growing up. Like Christopher, Revis serves up the terrible with glee, and like Christopher, it is both hauntingly subtle yet at times overpowering and overt.
The Value of Choice in Across the Universe
Unlike Christopher, Revis parties in the gray areas of choice and consequences. She parties hard. Right at the beginning of the book, Amy must make a choice and ho-boy (ho-boy being a technical term), is it a doozy. When she “wakes up”, the novel is a quest for the truth. A mystery presents itself and it spirals out of control as she and Elder (a teen boy training to become a leader) come to grips with the awesome evilness of a society built on lies.
And here is where we depart our dystopian study, and how Across the Universe plays in the genre, because the book is so much more.
Ho-boy is it ever.
What is Classic Science Fiction, Anyway?
Let’s not be coy. There are certain elements of science fiction that can be called “classic” and applied to books aimed at young adults, such as Rite of Passage by Alexei Panshin and to a larger extent, Cities in Flight by James Blish. I could go on and on but those are “classics” and not “dystopian” (although in Rite of Passage the main setting is not perfect by any means).
Science fiction, in essence, is more than a look in the future and the use of some thing that, if it didn’t exist, the story would come apart.
Classic science fiction holds elements of what I call The Want. The want to know. The need to know. The yearn to understand. Star Trek was up front about this: this is a story of people who want to know more.
There’s a Star Trek: The Next Generation episode where the Enterprise is on a mission. On the way, they find a curious hole in space and wonder what it is. The plot is summed up like this:
“Hey, there’s this funny hole in space.”
“Not really relevent to the current mission.”
“Let’s look at it anyway. It’s kinda cool.”
“Okay.”
(soon afterwards)
“Whoops.”
That right there is classic science fiction.
Across the Universe is Classic Science Fiction
Beth Revis nails this. She sticks the yearn to know, the itch to understand, in a 10-point landing. The story takes place on a colony ship, the Godspeed, and what a brilliant story it is. There are problems with the Godspeed. Deep problems. People problems. Technology problems. Problems with simply being in space.
The colony ship is a familiar troupe, and as a science fiction setting it works: a big ship in space going from point A to point B.
Setting, though, is only a small part of it. Science fiction authors should pay close attention to the underlying thematic in this book. Revis goes so far as to place Amy, a runner, in a place where she can run, but soon she realizes there is nowhere to run to. She just isn’t metaphorically trapped by her youth and inexperience, she’s trapped by the cold, hard, reality of space. There is nothing for Amy. Labeled as “nonessential” and alone from anything familiar (including safety), she turns to the search for truth, not simply as a means for survival, but because that’s all she has left.
And oh, Ender, the boy born on the ship. How he yearns. He yearns both for knowledge and the right to know knowledge. He yearns for the stars. He also yearns for the truth.
Indeed, at one point, someone in the novel dies for the yearning. It drives him crazy because he literally is designed to know and question, but because of the dystopian society he lives in commits the cultural equivalent of the Russian Winter Mistake, his creative intellect never goes anywhere. It drives him to the edge of disrepair and beyond.
So Brutal. So full of storytelling goodness.
So classic.
And Finally, Character Driven vs. Plot Driven Elements in Across the Universe
Is Across the Universe a character driven novel mercilessly targeted to teen girls, because, you know, boys don’t read and that’s what sells to girls?
Do it with me folks:
(eye-roll)
No. It is not, and a novelist wanting to write a page-turner targeted to teens should pay close attention. Revis drives the central elements of the novel by events that are both based on character motivations and actions, but also plot elements that interject themselves into the story in which Amy and Elder have to react.
That is, of course, life, and especially a poignant way of looking at the process of growing up. If a writer takes anything from Across the Universe, study how Revis does this, because she pulled it off like this was her tenth published novel, not her first.
Final Thoughts
So here we are. We have a brilliant come-of-age story in a dystopian setting with classical science fiction themes delivered by the yin-yang dance of characterization and plotting. How wonderful Across the Universe is!
While I am loath to even type the word “I” in a book review (witness the thousands of book reviews where the “reviewer” simply talks about themselves), I need to confess I had a dream about Across the Universe the night I finished reading it. I can’t even remember the last time I did that. To say the book sticks with you after you finish it would be an understatement.
Now that I have read the book, I don’t particularly like either the cover or the title. While the starry background makes sense given the way some of the characters feel about stars, both the title and cover art do not convey the wonderful, yummy mystery hidden inside. That’s just me. It’s also me that I didn’t like one of the intense scenes where I felt a different outcome would have made Amy more of a young woman many girls yearn to be.
Of course, the book was expertly written with a distinctive voice even when the viewpoints flipped back and forth between Amy and Elder. Readers will appreciate the subtle foreshadowing and the mystery-in-a-mystery plotting. Readers will also appreciate masterful world-building that never bores you, only teases you and makes you thirsty for more. All these things are the hallmarks of an excellent novel, and as a debut it was a stunning and thrilling page turner. On the Rehabilitated Hack Writer Scale of Book Goodness, I give it four slices of bacon out of five, and it is literally a genre defining book in the Young Adult market segment.
Lies We Tell Girls
The loss consumed Davis.
If there were stages of grief, he felt he was at the very most bottom, standing in a hole, looking up at a sky getting farther and farther away.
Reality suddenly intruded on his circular thoughts. Someone else had left flowers. They weren’t even wilted, but the petals where sagging in the rain.
Davis added his own. They made a nice, soggy, arrangement.
***
Two months. Summer gone. Today it was a teacup, with a teabag of jasmine tea. The rain had filled the cup, the raindrops going plip and sending small waves of water over the rim.
She never drank jasmine tea.
At least, she never drank jasmine tea in front of him.
***
A winter rain. More flowers. These were bright and vivid, as if picked to dispel the ever-present grey winter gloom. A beacon of color.
He left the mistletoe next to the flowers. He could imagine holding the sprigs above her head, giving her the flowers and receiving a sweet kiss in return.
The kisses were the most cruel of daydreams.
***
At his apartment, Davis stared at the calendar.
I see you, he thought.
***
Early spring.
The man was tall and well-dressed in his trench coat, expensive shoes and tight-fitting black leather gloves. One of those men would would look good in a hat, only he wasn’t wearing a hat, and the rain was in his dark hair.
Davis walked to his side and stood next to him, both of them silent. They were silent for a long time.
“She always liked the rain,” the man said, staring in his cup of petals. Japanese maple petals.
“She loved Japanese maples, she did,” said Davis.
The man turned to him.
“Joshua?” David asked.
The man nodded.
Joshua. The boy who moved away. She confessed to him one day after a glass of wine in the late hours, that her first love was a boy named Josh. Her parents told her she could not follow the boy.
She was too young to be married, they said.
There would be other loves, they said.
Davis remembered the look on her face when she told him this. There were other loves all right. Other loves after a broken heart. She cried, finally, when he touched her face after she sat there staring into her empty wine glass.
Crying like Joshua. Silently.
Davis set down the very same glass, or the glass he liked to think was the same, and grabbed the man. Joshua was stiff and then it was as if he melted.
“Why? Why do we tell girls those lies? Why do we hurt them so?” Joshua whispered.
“They were just trying to hold onto something they loved. But it’s never right to lie to a girl.”
“No,” said Joshua, “it’s not.”
Good vs. Evil in the Shade of Ink
Ah, the life of a consultant: the move from one contract to another.
Perfect for the little ADD Monster inside all of us.
This is an exciting re-engineering contract. I get to plumb the depths of the undocumented and air our all the deficiencies.
So, what does that have to do with writing or reading?
Nothing! Ha! But I am behind in my blog list of things to do (as you can see by the lack of updates). This always happens when I switch contracts. I need to find my rhythm. I am almost there.
I have been thinking a lot lately about the artistic expression of the battle between Good vs. Evil. Then I watched this movie:
The Indy movie Ink is gathering hype, as it should. The pacing is masterful, right from the slow beginning to the crescendo of the ending. The extraordinary clever writing. The understated special effects.
But, dear 9.3 blog readers, this is, at the core, a story of Good vs. Evil in the most basic sense to its most insidious. It encompasses every major Good vs. Evil thematic you could possibly imagine wrapped up in a glorious narrative rapture, from the overt to the slices of gray so thin you can see through them.
I don’t normally review movies, but I will review Ink after I post my next book review.
Bottom line: If you have a Good vs. Evil theme in your writing, don’t even talk to me until you’ve seen this movie.
Cinders by Michelle Davidson Argyle
Disclaimer 1: This is a book review for novelists. There are many other reviews about Cinders, this one is for those who like to write books.
Disclaimer 2: I placed 3rd in one of Michelle’s short story contests in a blind judging. Please don’t think I’m doing a bit of quid pro quo, because I can assure you I am a vicious reader.
I always thought Cinderella was a bit of a whore.
You can’t blame Disney’s Cinderella for being a whore. The girl’s stepmother and sisters abused her, making her life a living misery. Going back to the classic tale, we can all put ourselves in her shoes (get it—put ourselves in her shoes? Oh, I am so clever!), and who can resist the charm of the Prince searching for the girl who enticed him and then taking her away to live happily ever after?
The classical definition of a whore is somebody who does things for selfish reasons. Add a bit of the magically seduced prince, and there you have it.
Thus, it was with trepidation that I started reading Cinders, attracted to the book because I love novellas and I thought the cover was smashing. It was supposed to be a coming-of-age-story with a bunch of girly girl mixed with whimsy. I was even expecting talking animals.
Goodness was I mistaken.
Cinders by Michelle Davidson Argyle is a literary wonder with perfect, sparse prose obscuring a multi-layered depth that is haunting as it is breathless. When I finished the book, I just sat there in my chair outside staring at the trees in the sun. Cinders captivated, disturbed, infatuated, crushed, bewildered and beguiled me.
It’s difficult to know where to begin on an in-depth review with something so overwhelming complex born of simplicity, but there is the obvious. The prose.
Argyle’s delicious, sensual, twilight and shadow prose.
Here is one example:
“Not yet. Let me sing you a song.” He sat with her near a bush with white flowers, the same ones in her hair, and as he sang, the smell of clover grew stronger. He helped her lie down. Petals fell from his hair when his lips brushed hers. She closed her eyes and saw Isaac bruising Rose’s horse, his arm moving up and down, the cat licking her paws.
See, I’m a red-blooded American Male. I like my steak waved in a warm room, apple pie and watch movies where stuff blows up in space. A productive evening for me is when I’ve managed to clean all the guns without running out of CLP.
Yet, that excerpt right there made my heart go pitter-pat. I read that and I was breathless, the feeling you get when you look at a girl for the first time and realize you’re crushing hard.
For the writer, Cinders is a decent into the visceral, as that example shows. It’s not a la la la literary going to describe a flower in twelve metaphors visceral, but a dark, sensual, haunting flowing river of words that sits at the bottom of your gut like a fiery Cognac. Argyle’s prose is sparse, her mastery with such few words speaks to a deep, creative talent, and she uses her creativity to breathe life into the lifeless.
In Disney’s adaptation, Cinderella is a story about a girl becoming a woman in order to escape her awful life while snagging the man of her dreams in the process through magic and rodent Tom Foolery.
“Cute talking animals” is code for “this is a child’s story for entertainment” and as such that’s what Cinderella, the character, was.
Argyle’s characterization is so fascinating and her Cinderella is a compelling, complex figure different from the original literary tale before it. It is impressive how Argyle turns a vapid fairytale shell into a young woman, but Cinderella here is a wonderful, flawed person yearning to make her own choices.
And make them she does. I was rooting for Cinderella through the entire book because her yearning selfishness, even though justified, was tragic to behold. Even at her worst mistakes, at least she made them. Choice. Has there ever been such a literary theme worthy of published words?
But I digress.
How I loved that seductive, lethal yet empathetic Cinderella. What, you say? Cinderella? Lethal? Seductive?
Oh, yes. That and more. Cinderella makes mistakes, and people die. Cinders, my friends, is a book with an impressive body count, like any good fairytale. Despite the darkness that Argyle serves up as pebbles falling into a still lake, the book isn’t about death, but about life: living, learning, and loving.
She also loves, oh how Cinderella loves. Her love is consuming and fearful; she loves with her mind and her body, and her passions and desires elevate her from her magical prison of her own making while driving her to the cliff of despair. Argyle pulls this off with mastery for the complex wrapped around the simple.
Cinders is a love story, but it’s also a coming-of-age-story, and the truly amazing part of this novella is the themes and plot intertwine
s to the point where it’s difficult to tell the difference between the two. It’s also a raw story with under-the-radar world building, a world that comes alive in the fewest words possible. The setting is so vivid, it mesmerizes the reader who turns page after page and all too soon, the end of the book comes like a punch in the gut.
The ending is a study in perfection, a true “didn’t see it coming, but should have,” moment of pure bittersweet. That’s the summation for the writer: Cinders is a study in perfection. The perfect cover. The perfect tagline. Even the bookmark is perfect. The perfect story. Perfect prose. The perfect novella. It’s magical. You could stick this novella in a time capsule, move it forward two hundred years, and for the lucky reader who dug it up, she would say “oh!” and yearn for more.
Argyle banished Disney’s whore from my mind. It was as if she never existed, and in her place is a woman of empathy and beauty, a mixture of danger tempered with love.
Perfect.
Momma Was Wrong
Momma always told him to watch out for certain girls, and after a while, he learned “certain girls” was Momma’s code for “girls who want in your pants to break your heart or make off with your wallet.”
The girl in front of him was Momma’s worst nightmare.
It was Valentine’s Day in Southwest Washington. That meant the cold, ever-present rain. The fireplace was going at it with the snap and crackle to remind everyone that it was there, the sleeping dog next to it, trying to will herself closer in warm doggie dreams.
The Merlot bottle stood half-empty, sitting on the table next to the photo album. They had been giggling over the photos for quite some time.
She had disappeared while he was fetching cheese and pouring the rest of the wine, but now she was back, wearing her dancing heels and the red dress she loved to wear salsa dancing, the one with the slit that went to the ceiling. She put on slow jazz, the singer with her sensual tale of love and longing in French, all sexy and warm.
He stood and put a hand around her waist, and one across her back. One of her hands came up behind him and she ran fingers through his hair. She swayed into the music, swayed into him, and her lips came up to his ear. She smelled of grapes and flowers, but also that dangerous woman scent that she loved to use like a weapon.
“Dance right into me,” she whispered. “Dance into me.”
Momma was wrong. The girls that knew how to say the perfect things at the perfect time were the ones that needed watching.
It was their eighteenth wedding anniversary.
“Dance right into me,” she said again, and sighed when he kissed her.
Larry Correia Kicks Ass
I was having a very interesting conversation with my 10-year-old.
First off, that kid is wicked smart. Takes after his mom.
We were talking about (get this) urban fantasy or to mix genres, paranormal urban fantasy.
He asked me “are there any urban fantasy books for guys, besides the guy who wrote Monster Hunter International?”
MHI is one of his favorite books.
My brain struggled. Was there? Non-dystopian?
I told him that urban fantasy was very popular with women, so much so that if there was something out there that had universal appeal, I didn’t know about it. It got lost in the noise.
“That sucks,” he said.
Yes, Thing One. It does suck. But hey, look at this from Larry Correia:
Yeah, Thing One and me we’ll be all over that one. Have you ever seen such a pulp-goodness hint of steam punk noir cover? I sure haven’t.
It’s official, author Larry Correia is kicking ass.
How to Write a Love Scene
I have been accused of having mad love scene writing skills.
Of this, I am truly guilty and now impart the Rehabilitated Hack Writer Secret to Writing Hot Love Scenes.
- Pour glass of wine
- Put the Stacey Kent playlist on random
- Press Play
- Start typing
It’s that simple, folks.
No need to thank me, that’s just the kind of guy that I am.
New Post in Adventures in Writing
Like a stripper needing rent money at the end of the month, you can find me every Wednesday at Adventures in Writing.
Today, I talk about elements of style, horror, and science fiction.
Contest Entry
Contest entry for author Natalie Whipple’s Weather Contest.
Post a link to yours in the comments!
***
Terrance was dreaming about the war again. Each one was different, and this one carried with it an aura of menace, taunting him in his sleep. The only thing constant about the dreams was the weather.
In this dream, the tank wing stopped at the start of the carnage, and they all got out and shut down the tanks, so it was quiet. Sixteen men walked through the blasted Iraqi armor, trucks and tents. The Iraqi dead lay everywhere. In the blasted tanks, the blown trucks, lying out of the tents, strewing this way and that, bodies mangled unbelievably, hundreds of bodies all in name only. To an objective observer, they were just parts. The sand was wet with their blood, the air smelled like burnt metal, burn bodies, burnt fuel, the tang of blood and viscera, and yes, even fear and terror. The wind carried an eerie sound, mostly the tenor of burning accompanied by the whooshing and whirling moans of the breeze low across the sand. When it blew across his face, he could taste death. The sky was a sickly gray-yellow, the sun more of a suggestion.
Perhaps, if it rained in his dreams, he would stop coming back to the desert.
It never rained when he was in the desert, and so his memories would never wash away. All they did was congeal, like blood.
A New Post in Adventures in Writing
As a reminder, you can find me over at Adventures in Writing, every Wednesday, until the END OF TIME ITSELF.
Today I talk about, um, coffee.
Atmosphere
Previously on Hack Writer TV: Characterization
***
Terrance dreamed about the war again. Each one was different, and this one carried with it an aura of menace, taunting him in his sleep.
The tank wing stopped at the start of the carnage, and they all got out and shut down the tanks, so it was quiet. Sixteen men walked through the blasted Iraqi armor, trucks and tents. The Iraqi dead lay everywhere. In the blasted tanks, the blown trucks, lying out of the tents, strewing this way and that, bodies mangled unbelievably, hundreds of bodies all in name only. To an objective observer, they were just parts. The sand was wet with their blood, the air smelled like burnt metal, burn bodies, burnt fuel, the tang of blood and viscera, and yes, even fear and terror. The wind carried an eerie sound, mostly the tenor of burning accompanied by the whooshing and whirling moans of the breeze low across the sand. When it blew across his face, he could taste death. The sky was a sickly gray-yellow, the sun more of a suggestion.
They found their forward scout’s buggy with a few holes in it, but it was mostly intact. Other dreams had the buggy blown to pieces, but this one was more accurate than most, with just enough changed detail to let Terrance know the dream world trapped him here. Outside the riddled tent next to the buggy was Logan, hands bound behind his back with a bullet hole in the back of his skull. Inside the tent was his crew, more of the same treatment.
The tank wing walked aimlessly among the dead, Terrance noting each man coming to the same realization that he did: their holy vengeance did not serve their slain brothers well. What they did went beyond revenge. It went beyond obscenity; as if some fell, dark forgotten god of vengeance offered his services, and the only price an accurate look into what each man was capable of doing, how far they could go.
How far they could sink.
The LT came back with the white, impromptu flags some of the Iraqis had been waving, most of them stained with blood. He tossed them on a burning tank, and stood there looking at his stained hands.
“What does this mean LT, what does this all mean?” asked Terrance.
He looked at Terrance, a blank look of a man with only a thread of soul left.
“Now we’re all sons of bitches.”
Wife Unit Literary Influences
The Wife Unit has a sneaky literary influence on me. She has a penchant for historical mystery novels, or the character-driven historical novel. She introduced me to a type of book I use to by-pass, what I now call the “Über-researched” novel. A story full of show, but you can feel the undercurrents of the setting because the author made it come alive. The details are not in your face, but oozing from the page, taking you back to the time of the setting.
I started to appreciate this type of mystery, and as a researcher, cracking open one of these gems is a special treat.
I have one word for this type of book: NOM!
When I joined Twitter, I followed a few people I exchanged email with prior, and suddenly I had several followers who in turn were following the people I was following who followed me back. Did you follow all of that?
One of these people was Gary Corby. Gary is not a heavy Tweeter, but sometimes he would say something about his work in progress or the novel he wrote previously that would peak my interest. Gary seemed like a researching, fun writer, and his blog was a hoot. I will admit, after awhile, I just wanted to read the damn book. Like now, a clear case of book lust.
Now he has an agent, and his novel I was so interested in makes its way to bookstores in 2010 as the THE EPHIALTES AFFAIR. How exciting! I plan to immediately preorder it and hand it to The Wife Unit to read. Then I can harass her proper, with “Are you DONE WITH THAT YET?” and passive-aggressive husband behavior such as walking into the room when she is reading and delivering a big sigh.
In any event, at the very least, I shall enjoy finding a genre specific book in the Wife Unit Category before she does. These little one-ups keep me slightly ahead of the curve.
Lastly, if you like historical mysteries, bank on Mr. Corby. Five minutes in his blog will leave you drooling for more.
Chapter of Doom
Book Project was such a bitch this last month. I rewrote Chapter Fifteen several times, each time I became more frustrated with the results. With two other books under my belt (the first one now stored under the bed), this is the first time encountering this phenomena.
I began to think the preceding chapter was the real issue. I may be the Hack Writer, but I understand the basics of novel writing: a crappy chapter in a good book inadvertently has a bad intro.
This was not the case. I simply failed to set the right tone, the right bit of atmosphere. Chapter Fifteen is all about atmosphere, getting it right from the get-go.
Here is getting it right:
In my mind, I expected a nasty bit of business crawling through tunnels, destroying shielded kill bots one-by-one—like a jumpy horror vid with aliens bursting forth from dark recesses to impregnate Brittney and Tiffany with devil spawns after wiping their personality from their brains, turning them into mindless baby-factories.
Actually, that describes the last years of the war.
I am not going to reveal getting it wrong, ha. Let us just call a truce, Your Little Sister and I. We now return you to your scheduled program of 1500 to 3000 words a day.
The Memory of Scent
The house smells so wonderful, with the grand fir waiting for its new tree stand, sitting in a bucket off in on corner.
My penchant for Scrooge-like feelings during the holiday season has slowly been replaced by warm memories of my children’s joy for the season. For young boys, yes, Christmas is a lot about presents. If you are a good parent, if you could overcome the bombastic rampant commercialism, there is an underlying simplicity about the season that can pull at the heart like no other time.
This morning Thing Two came in while I was getting dressed, wanting to know if we could go get Thing One’s Christmas present tonight. How cute is that? I’ll tell you how cute it is, it is a bit of the ultra-cuteness.
Yes there are the presents. But then there is the smell of the tree. The gingerbread house. The decorating. The Christmas cookies. The story of Christmas. Grandpa and Nanna. Daddy’s Christmas Day roast. Santa. The music. The warm fireplace and the happy dog.
Long after those presents are gone, the memories of our close family during this time will linger on. One day my sons will be walking in one of the great national forests around here, and after the morning rain, smell the fresh scent of grand firs. And it will smell like Christmas.
And that will be magical, always magical, even in the dead of summer, it will be Christmas magic.
Dancing with Setting
Bunny Trouble is near-future science fiction book set on the northern Washington Coast. It takes little description on my part to describe the scenery. In fact, if I told you this novel takes place in a small town on the wild and rocky Washington Coast, a town with a lighthouse and a river harbor, bordering the Olympic National Rainforest—I bet in your mind you have a really good idea of what it looks like. It might not match my idea, but when all is said and done, the picture in your mind is going to be better than anything I can describe to you.
Imagine that! I assume you’re a smart person!
The Baby Dancers is neither a contemporary nor a near-future science fiction book. It is Young Adult Fantasy that moves around to different environments, some of them quite different than the world we live in today.
This transition was not easy for me; it was a struggle, actually.
Yesterday I wrote 2,500 words in one of these environments. It felt good, as if I fell into a rhythm. I added a bit of tension, and a whole lot of action. I felt like the scenery description added a nice flare to the atmosphere and resultant action, neither understated nor overdone.
This bodes well. It was really fun, and a joy to write.
Nom!
Unwind by Neal Shusterman
My book reviews are targeted towards novelists (my prior book review can be found here).
Neal Shusterman’s Unwind is a near-future science fiction horror tale that can be summed up in one word: delicious. Quite simply, Shusterman goes where few dare to tread. If you have a love of edgy Young Adult fiction, then look no further. This book belongs on your shelf for several reasons, one of which is the intense questions that get asked, each one more thought-provoking then the last.
For an older gentleman like me, Neal Shuterman’s Unwind can be compared to a John Christopher novel written by Steven King.
The plot goes like this: abortion is illegal… on unborn children. During their teen years, parents can decide to send their child away to be “unwound” where 99.44% of their body is harvested.
The book centers on three teens that are now “unwinds”:
- Connor, chosen to be unwound because he is a rebellious teen
- Lev, who was born to be unwound based on his parents religious beliefs of tithing
- Risa, chosen by the state to be unwound simply because they decided that they could not afford to keep her alive
These three escape their fates in a fortuitous freeway pile-up. Now all they need to do is survive until they are eighteen, when they no longer can be unwound. Capture means not death (so they say), because all the parts are reused, the unwind is divided into parts for a cheerfully waiting populous where the art of doctoring is rare but surgeons rule the health scene.
Sound positively hellish? Well it is. The undercurrent of unstated horror is relentless in Unwind and then BAM! It goes from the unstated to the all too real like a punch in the gut. Literally, I felt vaguely ill at the end of the novel. The subtleness of the cruelties with smiles suffered on these children builds to an epic crescendo that cumulates in one of the most terrible bits of sheer creep that I have ever read.
If you care to write edgy fiction, then look to this horror novel because that is what it is. There is little gore in Unwind worth mentioning, oh no. Like a Japanese horror movie, there is a sense of malevolence running through this sick and twisted society that looks so much like our own—yet is so different.
Or is it?
Consider if you will, the teens that were dumped at Nebraska’s hospitals. The mirrored reflection is not a dark twin of our light. Far from it, the parallels in this dystopia are sometimes all too familiar, and all too normal. And that is what makes it a chilling read for teens and adults.
For the Young Adult novelist, this study of unrelenting intensity warrants your attention. There is more here to scrutinize, than just pacing, atmosphere and plotting.
Unwind asks tough questions rarely found in a book targeted for teens. What is the beginning of life? When exactly does life end? What is the nature of consciousness? What are the consequences of anarchy when the law is so very flawed? In a world of villains, who is the true villain?
What are the ethics of compromise?
This, my friends, is a book that never talks down to the audience it was designed for, as the questions posed above compose a heady literary wine. You will be hard-pressed to find an action-packed book filled with such teen reflective goodness.
Another important part of this book is the voicing. Written in the third-person present tense, the word-smiting lends a flare not often encountered. The way the book is crafted lends itself to a sense of urgency; I was dubious going into it, but Shusterman pulls it off with his screenwriting experience shinning through.
If it seems like I am gushing, I guess I am. I do have some minor faults and quibbles with the novel, none really I feel necessary to drag out for the sake of being fair and balanced. If you write Young Adult fiction, it’s a must read simply because it does something rare: For the reluctant teen reader, it is a novel that will draw him in and leave him wanting to read more—because the type of entertainment given by Unwind can be found nowhere else. For the already fan of outstanding Young Adult fiction, it is euphoric lifeblood for the mind. There is not a bit of fluff betwixt its pages.
That’s a win-win combination of awesomeness that deserves your purchase and study. For what better result could there be for an author of Young Adult speculative fiction?
Foundations of light and shadow
This morning, Thing Two could not wait to show me his book order catalog from kindergarten. Remember the book order, the magical list of books you could check off? Then your parents would erase most of your choices, and the agony of only picking one or two? The books would someday show up at your desk like magic?
I almost passed out from a terminal case of teh cuteness! He was smiling and showing me the books he wanted to order. Gosh, I love you, you little book lusting squirt.
My boys are little readers and it fills me with pride. Truly, I am blessed. It provides my inspiration, and sometimes when I am alone by myself with my thoughts… I smile.
There are good people in this world.
I see them all around me.
I envision some going on to defeat evil, and triumph over wickedness.
That no matter what the odds, their intellect and attitude carries them across the chiasm.
This is the foundation of the worlds I create in words.
oppressive isolation
One of the best fantasy stories I had ever come across was not from a book. It was a video game.
Myst, in fact.
Myst was the very first fantasy experience that made me feel… alone. How could a video game capture or cause those feelings? You’re walking around, looking, looking and the isolation is oppressive, both visually, but more importantly, through the plot you have to pull up, bit-by-bit, puzzle-by-puzzle. It was magical and it was sinister. There were no monsters, there was a void. The crashing waves. The silence of non-talking. A library of books with more questions than answers.
I played Myst and vowed that I would capture the essence of that aloneness in a novel. Could I use oppressive isolation as conflict? Could I create a compelling protagonist that could grow out of the comforts of silence?
I am not talking about plot, mostly, I am referring to atmosphere and setting (no, not a “marooned on a island” story). I have a character in mind. Now all I need is a plot.
Delerium – Just a Dream
Walking barefoot on the shore
Hypnotized by the ocean roaring
Thoughts of you drifting in and out
Never fails to calm me down
I still see your eyes when light hits the water
And I’ve never seen a color so beautiful
So blue… Ocean blue
I keep moving to the distant sounds
And visions of you drifting in and out
Clouds mixing with the sand and the sea
Sounds get carried on the ocean breeze
I still hear your voice from across the horizon
And wasn’t that you walking into the shadows?
In time I’ll believe it was just and illusion
In time I’ll believe it was only a dream
I still see your eyes when light hits the water
And I’ve never seen a color so beautiful
I still hear your voice from across the horizon
And wasn’t that you walking into the shadows?
In time I’ll believe it was just and illusion
In time I’ll believe it was only a dream
Till then I will breathe you in from the ocean
And walk with the waves rolling under my feet
