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Jan. 27th, 2010 11:52 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
skygiantsSome reasons why Elf Queen of Shannara was one of my favorites as a kid:
1. It is about a girl! There is one other Shannara book that is about a girl (or at least, there was at the time I was growing up; there may be more now.) She is Headstrong and Overconfident and at the end her brother has to rescue her from going evil. Not so in Elf Queen, where Wren basically tears through the jungle overcoming demons and moral dilemmas all by herself. (Well, the snarky porcupine-cat helps too.)
2. It is also the only Shannara book EVER to pass the Bechdel Test, which I liked even though I did not know what the Bechdel Test was. Wren has important relationships with other ladies! That have nothing to do with dudes! It is sad how excited I get about this, but you must understand that this never happens in Shannara books EVER.
3. It is a freaking creepy book. Props to Terry Brooks, who had me jumpy with tension all through the reading of it - most of the book involves our protagonists traversing through Creepy Jungle and getting attacked by monsters, which you'd think would get old after a while, and admittedly occasionally does, but it is a really, really creepy jungle!
4. The Dark Secret of the origins of the monsters, which is not super-original, but is, nonetheless, very creepy. See above.
5. The snarky porcupine-cat, who is too good for the elves, and knows it.
6. How hilariously little page time the semi-hemi-demi love interest gets before he goes evil. And how instead of agonizing about it, Wren is kind of sad but totally accepts it, deals with it, and then heads off to TRACK HIM DOWN and get her important magical MacGuffins back, while her sidekicks are still like "NO IT CAN'T BE! NOT GAVILAN!"
7. How the moral dilemma is basically Wren going, "You said to bring the elves back. You did not tell me the elves were MORONS. >.<"
8. The high body count! Uh, normally I would not be so excited about this, but it is kind of awesomely unexpected how all these people who are set up to be Important Characters totally get chomped and die like a chapter into the Epic Journey.
Other rereading notes: I felt a little bit like a clairvoyant while reading this, because every time a character was introduced, I would remember nothing about them except whether or not they were going to die, and sometimes how. Turned into a vampire! Eaten by a spider! It was a little creepy. Vague premonitions also made the one Coll chapter much harder to read, because I really like Coll and what already looks like a bad decision on the first read looks TEN TIMES MORE AWFUL as a decision when you have faint memories of doom running through your mind from when you were twelve. Soooo I spent that chapter pretty much trying to telepathically send the message "DON'T DO IT DON'T DO IT DON'T DO IT" to a fictional character. Tragically, it did not work. (It never does.)
Also, for some reason, although Wren was totally my point of identification as a kid (see above re: lady protagonist), these days I still continue to identify with Walker Boh more than anyone. I wish I knew WHY.
1. It is about a girl! There is one other Shannara book that is about a girl (or at least, there was at the time I was growing up; there may be more now.) She is Headstrong and Overconfident and at the end her brother has to rescue her from going evil. Not so in Elf Queen, where Wren basically tears through the jungle overcoming demons and moral dilemmas all by herself. (Well, the snarky porcupine-cat helps too.)
2. It is also the only Shannara book EVER to pass the Bechdel Test, which I liked even though I did not know what the Bechdel Test was. Wren has important relationships with other ladies! That have nothing to do with dudes! It is sad how excited I get about this, but you must understand that this never happens in Shannara books EVER.
3. It is a freaking creepy book. Props to Terry Brooks, who had me jumpy with tension all through the reading of it - most of the book involves our protagonists traversing through Creepy Jungle and getting attacked by monsters, which you'd think would get old after a while, and admittedly occasionally does, but it is a really, really creepy jungle!
4. The Dark Secret of the origins of the monsters, which is not super-original, but is, nonetheless, very creepy. See above.
5. The snarky porcupine-cat, who is too good for the elves, and knows it.
6. How hilariously little page time the semi-hemi-demi love interest gets before he goes evil. And how instead of agonizing about it, Wren is kind of sad but totally accepts it, deals with it, and then heads off to TRACK HIM DOWN and get her important magical MacGuffins back, while her sidekicks are still like "NO IT CAN'T BE! NOT GAVILAN!"
7. How the moral dilemma is basically Wren going, "You said to bring the elves back. You did not tell me the elves were MORONS. >.<"
8. The high body count! Uh, normally I would not be so excited about this, but it is kind of awesomely unexpected how all these people who are set up to be Important Characters totally get chomped and die like a chapter into the Epic Journey.
Other rereading notes: I felt a little bit like a clairvoyant while reading this, because every time a character was introduced, I would remember nothing about them except whether or not they were going to die, and sometimes how. Turned into a vampire! Eaten by a spider! It was a little creepy. Vague premonitions also made the one Coll chapter much harder to read, because I really like Coll and what already looks like a bad decision on the first read looks TEN TIMES MORE AWFUL as a decision when you have faint memories of doom running through your mind from when you were twelve. Soooo I spent that chapter pretty much trying to telepathically send the message "DON'T DO IT DON'T DO IT DON'T DO IT" to a fictional character. Tragically, it did not work. (It never does.)
Also, for some reason, although Wren was totally my point of identification as a kid (see above re: lady protagonist), these days I still continue to identify with Walker Boh more than anyone. I wish I knew WHY.
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Date: 2010-01-27 09:24 pm (UTC)I don't think it was this one, I think it involved dragons and made me go huh a lot. This one looks kind of fun and unexpected.
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Date: 2010-01-27 10:10 pm (UTC)(I actually don't remember any Shannara books that involved dragons, but he wrote a bunch after I stopped reading, so it could easily be one of them . . .)
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Date: 2010-01-28 01:48 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-01-28 04:13 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-01-28 04:15 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-01-28 02:59 am (UTC)There is another! The one you mention there is Wishsong of Shannara, but I would argue that Elfstones of Shannara is also "about a girl," as it has strong focus on both Amberle Elessedil and Eretria.
... I am terrified that I recalled both titles and names without having to look them up.
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Date: 2010-01-28 04:10 am (UTC)Also: that is true! I always remember that one as being much more about Wil than Amberle, but you're right, she is also a POV character. Though she does get the Noble Sacrifice treatment at the end. Eretria if I remember rightly is not a POV character. But in my head, I kind of class both Eretria and Amberle with the vast majority of the other women in the Shannara books as 'love interest'. This is probably not fair to Amberle who did have her own motivations, but I don't think is unfair to Eretria, since while she was strong-willed pretty much all of her motivation was centered around Wil . . .
(oh god how do I remember so much of these books)
ANYWAY. Wren also stood out to me because she was a POV character (who did not die at the end) and because she was not anybody's love interest, which was so unusual for Shannara.
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Date: 2010-01-29 04:31 am (UTC)Also, I find it interesting that you now identify Walker. The first time I read Heritage my favorite was Wren, too. I actively disliked Walker. A few years later when I reread the quartet Walker turned out to be my favorite, much to my surprise. I recall thinking that I disliked him the first time because he seemed stupidly stubborn, and loved him the second time because I realized I would be that stupidly stubborn. I retain quite a soft spot for him.
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Date: 2010-01-29 06:38 am (UTC)And yeah, that was exactly how it went for me, too! I ALWAYS used to identify with Wren, and did not care for Walker at all, so it is so weird now that whenever I read his scenes I instantly identify with him. I think it's partly because of that stubbornness, and partly because he's the most genre-savvy of the lot - like, he is always aware that when you end up in a Druid story THINGS END BADLY, NO, FOR SERIOUS, DIDN'T ANYONE ELSE READ THE MANUAL!
(Also, whenever he ends up actually doing it, it reads exactly like someone being enabled into apping that RP character they know they shouldn't. "Well, I'll just do the research . . . . and maybe
pick a usernamefigure out how to use the MacGuffin . . . but JUST BECAUSE I DID THE RESEARCH DOESN'T MEAN I'M GOING TO DO IT. SERIOUSLY. I MEAN IT. damn my lack of willpower")no subject
Date: 2010-01-29 03:50 pm (UTC)Dang, I want to reread these now.
I think I actually started to like him in the Voyage books, and then went back to Heritage and found I loved him. He manages to retain something of his own personality and agency in spite of his DESTINY, and that's something I really like (the Druids before him were more...Druids than people, you know? And that does kind of happen to him, but he expresses reservation and tries not to let it go too far.). And yes, the genre-saavy just makes him seem so much more on top of things than the rest of the Chosen Few!
(That is the BEST METAPHOR EVER for it, oh god, that's exactly what happened!)
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Date: 2010-01-29 04:06 pm (UTC)I amMy inner twelve-year-old is really unnervingly excited for Talismans to come in for me from the library.Dude, he is in the Voyage books? I stopped after the Heritage books and so I did not know! . . . and now I wish you hadn't told me because I am going to have to fight the compulsion to read them for more Walker. >.< But yes! Really I think that's the main reason I like him too. He does all this fighting against DESTINY, which can be annoying, but he has really good reasons for it, and his identity and sense of self is really important to him, and I can so identify with that.
(WALKER: Ooooh, username
COGLINE: I've got some druid icons around here. I'm just saying.
WALKER: ENABLER. >:O)
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Date: 2010-01-29 04:15 pm (UTC)He is central to the Voyage books! I actually really like the Voyage books, they kind of veer more from the Tolkienesque thing and have some great atmospherics. Some of the cast is pretty interesting, too, beyond Walker. (I lost track after the Voyage books, though I actually own more and keep meaning to catch up. >.>)
(COGLINE: You know your friends are all in this "Shannara" rp, it looks pretty interesting.
WALKER: I don't like the premise! *...submits lengthy application*)
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Date: 2010-01-29 04:34 pm (UTC). . . I am more intrigued than I should be. D: I do not have time to read like twelve new Shannara books!
(Meanwhile, Par is all "omg I have just discovered this game it is so exciting *_* EVERYONE SHOULD PLAY" and Coll is like "I don't even like RP! But it's all you ever talk about anymore, so OKAY, FINE.")
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Date: 2010-01-29 07:32 pm (UTC)But Becca! It has Walker and the remains of technology from our world and a half-shapeshifter character and a wimpy elf prince who comes of age and AIRSHIPS. And there are only 3 Voyage books!
(XD And Morgan is all "This is so cool! ...wait once I become emotionally invested it kind of hurts a bit.")
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Date: 2010-01-29 08:40 pm (UTC)ONLY THREE, you say. *weeps* You realize that in this scenario, you are Cogline the enabler! It is you!
(Meanwhile, Allanon will NOT STOP godmodding everyone else, and they are all getting kind of annoyed.)
no subject
Date: 2010-01-31 04:46 am (UTC)I AM A PROUD ENABLER.
(Walker has made some really bitchy rp secrets about that.)