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Oct. 5th, 2012 12:29 pmI did a big reread of Ysabeau Wilce's Flora Segunda books over the summer so that I could catch up to and read the new one, Flora's Fury: How a Girl of Spirit and a Red Dog Confound Their Friends, Astound Their Enemies, and Learn the Importance of Packing Light.
Just to recap, the Flora Segunda books are set in a bizarre version of Aztec-colonized magical California, full of complicated politics, weird supernatural artifacts, ghosts, spirits, bird-people, and fabulous fashion. Flora herself is a plucky heroine who is usually pretty good at saving the day in between complaining about her chores and homework. The real draw for me, though, is the dark and complicated backstory underlying the cracked-out adventures, which is full of incredibly fascinating women:
- Flora's mother General Fyrdraaca, who basically runs the country
- Flora's big sister Idden, perfect soldier turned REVOLUTIONARY but still prone to nagging Flora about her homework
- The Butcher Brakespeare, renowned murderess and national antihero
- Nini Mo, "the Coyote Queen," RANGER SPY, Flora's role model in all things
Anyway, onto the third book! I had some mixed feelings about it -- much of it involved Flora making a bunch of terrible teenaged decisions and NOT SPENDING TIME WITH HER MOM when all I wanted was for her to spend time with her mom. Also, I thought we were done with love triangles, but we are not done with love triangles.
On the other hand, it did give me a whole extended sequence in which Flora travels around with her undead quasi-evil fake grandfather Hardhands, and he gets on her nerves so she turns him into a spectral octopus. She calls him Octohands. I CRACKED UP.
. . . but not as hard as I laughed when her undead quasi-evil spectral octopus fake grandfather started bothering her to get together already with Love Interest #2, who is a were-bear, because he really wants adorable were-bear grandbabies, THEY WOULD BE SO CUTE AND BADASS, COME ON, FLORA. This is basically the best plot point I have ever seen emerge from a spectral octopus grandfather in fiction and therefore I can't complain all that much.
Plus I am super excited for the next one because ( spoilers! )
Just to recap, the Flora Segunda books are set in a bizarre version of Aztec-colonized magical California, full of complicated politics, weird supernatural artifacts, ghosts, spirits, bird-people, and fabulous fashion. Flora herself is a plucky heroine who is usually pretty good at saving the day in between complaining about her chores and homework. The real draw for me, though, is the dark and complicated backstory underlying the cracked-out adventures, which is full of incredibly fascinating women:
- Flora's mother General Fyrdraaca, who basically runs the country
- Flora's big sister Idden, perfect soldier turned REVOLUTIONARY but still prone to nagging Flora about her homework
- The Butcher Brakespeare, renowned murderess and national antihero
- Nini Mo, "the Coyote Queen," RANGER SPY, Flora's role model in all things
Anyway, onto the third book! I had some mixed feelings about it -- much of it involved Flora making a bunch of terrible teenaged decisions and NOT SPENDING TIME WITH HER MOM when all I wanted was for her to spend time with her mom. Also, I thought we were done with love triangles, but we are not done with love triangles.
On the other hand, it did give me a whole extended sequence in which Flora travels around with her undead quasi-evil fake grandfather Hardhands, and he gets on her nerves so she turns him into a spectral octopus. She calls him Octohands. I CRACKED UP.
. . . but not as hard as I laughed when her undead quasi-evil spectral octopus fake grandfather started bothering her to get together already with Love Interest #2, who is a were-bear, because he really wants adorable were-bear grandbabies, THEY WOULD BE SO CUTE AND BADASS, COME ON, FLORA. This is basically the best plot point I have ever seen emerge from a spectral octopus grandfather in fiction and therefore I can't complain all that much.
Plus I am super excited for the next one because ( spoilers! )
