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Last week I went to a dance performance with my mother. One of the pieces was an abstract work called As Sleep Befell, and featured a set of leaping shirtless men dancing to the sound of an atonal orchestra and a singer in white robes.
"Hey, that piece reminded me of a book series I read recently!" I said, to which my mother responded with an expression of vaguely weirded-out puzzlement.
I did not explain because the intermission was short and The Killing Moon and The Shadowed Sun are somewhat complicated in their premises . . . but it reminded me that I never wrote them up, so I'LL EXPLAIN HERE INSTEAD.
The books are set in the vaguely Egyptian-inspired nation of Gujaareh, in which the religious practice focuses on the dream-goddess Hananja. Priests of Hananja have dream-based magic and can do a couple of different things. The first book focuses on the Gatherers, who basically kill people by taking their dream-humors -- but nicely! As a public service! So people can die in a pleasant and calm fashion! Unless the people are assholes have been judged to deserve it anyway -- and how they get caught up in a conspiracy to attack a neighboring nation that has a related-but-different culture, which then rebounds to reveal conspiracies within their own priestly organization. Most of the Gatherers are attractive dudes -- this gets a lot of attention because the Littlest Gatherer is madly in love with his attractive, tormented, and often-shirtless mentor -- which, combined with the theme of sleep and the general aesthetic, is probably a large part of how I got here from that dance performance.
The second book focuses on the first female Healer of Hananja, ten years down the line, who then gets caught up in conspiracies related to the fallout of the original conspiracy. It also features a NIGHTMARE PLAGUE. I have a huge weakness for plague stories, I don't know why -- they scare me in a way I find fascinating, I guess -- and brain-plague is twice as scary, you know, that worked really well for me in a terrifying way.
The worldbuilding for the books is fantastic, especially the rich, dense culture-building and the ways that the different cultures (of which there are several) are set up against each other in ways that don't allow for easy judgments from a contemporary reader. The side you're rooting for changes depending on the circumstances, and everyone has valid cultural reasons for believing and doing the things that they do! I ALWAYS LOVE THAT. It is also worth nothing that this is a fantasy world entirely based on an African setting, so there is like one white person in the whole thing and she dies in chapter one. (Though, on another note, there are a lot of assumptions within the cultures presented -- somewhat unexamined within the text, or at least not as much as I want them to be -- about disability and living with disability, mental and physical, and people mostly choosing death instead, so that's something to watch out for.)
Of the two books in the duology, I was a lot more emotionally engaged in The Shadowed Sun, because it hit a lot more of my particular interests -- female protagonist! examining the cultural and political repercussions of major events earlier in the series! NIGHTMARE PLAGUE! -- and, probably because I was more engaged in it, I also had more . . . strongly complicated feeling about the way some stuff played out?
On a visceral id level, if I'm being shown the first woman to do something, I want to see her succeed at it. Which I think is probably not a good reaction to have -- like, on an intellectual level, I also think there's a very good argument to be made that the story of making the decision not to continue down that path and find a third space instead is a really important one to tell as well. It's not Hanani's responsibility to fight through her own mental and emotional exhaustion in order to be a Token First At Something; it's not anybody's.
So I'm getting over kneejerk reaction about that, but I do think it is fair to be a little bit cranky that almost EVERY TIME you get an attractive young woman in literature who chooses celibacy, she ends up deciding that hooking up with a dude is an important part of her life that is not to be missed, and ends up in a romantic pairing. It would be nice, just once, to be introduced to a female protagonist who has taken a vow of celibacy and feel reasonably assured that it's going to stick and be respected.
. . . that may not be quite fair either, Ehiru's vow does stick and is respected, but the way in which the shock and horror of Hanani's new friends that she's never had sex is then followed by Hanani having sex rubs me slightly wrong.
Also I am indifferent to Wanahome as a boyfriend, which may be affecting my perspective here a little, but.
I also have conflicted feelings about the Tiaanet storyline and the resolution of it and, again, the fact that the only way to resolve the madness of wild dreamers -- actually this holds true for Ehiru in the first book too -- is for them to die. I don't know! I mean, it makes for a powerful and emotional story, but it also makes me uncomfortable.
"Hey, that piece reminded me of a book series I read recently!" I said, to which my mother responded with an expression of vaguely weirded-out puzzlement.
I did not explain because the intermission was short and The Killing Moon and The Shadowed Sun are somewhat complicated in their premises . . . but it reminded me that I never wrote them up, so I'LL EXPLAIN HERE INSTEAD.
The books are set in the vaguely Egyptian-inspired nation of Gujaareh, in which the religious practice focuses on the dream-goddess Hananja. Priests of Hananja have dream-based magic and can do a couple of different things. The first book focuses on the Gatherers, who basically kill people by taking their dream-humors -- but nicely! As a public service! So people can die in a pleasant and calm fashion! Unless the people are assholes have been judged to deserve it anyway -- and how they get caught up in a conspiracy to attack a neighboring nation that has a related-but-different culture, which then rebounds to reveal conspiracies within their own priestly organization. Most of the Gatherers are attractive dudes -- this gets a lot of attention because the Littlest Gatherer is madly in love with his attractive, tormented, and often-shirtless mentor -- which, combined with the theme of sleep and the general aesthetic, is probably a large part of how I got here from that dance performance.
The second book focuses on the first female Healer of Hananja, ten years down the line, who then gets caught up in conspiracies related to the fallout of the original conspiracy. It also features a NIGHTMARE PLAGUE. I have a huge weakness for plague stories, I don't know why -- they scare me in a way I find fascinating, I guess -- and brain-plague is twice as scary, you know, that worked really well for me in a terrifying way.
The worldbuilding for the books is fantastic, especially the rich, dense culture-building and the ways that the different cultures (of which there are several) are set up against each other in ways that don't allow for easy judgments from a contemporary reader. The side you're rooting for changes depending on the circumstances, and everyone has valid cultural reasons for believing and doing the things that they do! I ALWAYS LOVE THAT. It is also worth nothing that this is a fantasy world entirely based on an African setting, so there is like one white person in the whole thing and she dies in chapter one. (Though, on another note, there are a lot of assumptions within the cultures presented -- somewhat unexamined within the text, or at least not as much as I want them to be -- about disability and living with disability, mental and physical, and people mostly choosing death instead, so that's something to watch out for.)
Of the two books in the duology, I was a lot more emotionally engaged in The Shadowed Sun, because it hit a lot more of my particular interests -- female protagonist! examining the cultural and political repercussions of major events earlier in the series! NIGHTMARE PLAGUE! -- and, probably because I was more engaged in it, I also had more . . . strongly complicated feeling about the way some stuff played out?
On a visceral id level, if I'm being shown the first woman to do something, I want to see her succeed at it. Which I think is probably not a good reaction to have -- like, on an intellectual level, I also think there's a very good argument to be made that the story of making the decision not to continue down that path and find a third space instead is a really important one to tell as well. It's not Hanani's responsibility to fight through her own mental and emotional exhaustion in order to be a Token First At Something; it's not anybody's.
So I'm getting over kneejerk reaction about that, but I do think it is fair to be a little bit cranky that almost EVERY TIME you get an attractive young woman in literature who chooses celibacy, she ends up deciding that hooking up with a dude is an important part of her life that is not to be missed, and ends up in a romantic pairing. It would be nice, just once, to be introduced to a female protagonist who has taken a vow of celibacy and feel reasonably assured that it's going to stick and be respected.
. . . that may not be quite fair either, Ehiru's vow does stick and is respected, but the way in which the shock and horror of Hanani's new friends that she's never had sex is then followed by Hanani having sex rubs me slightly wrong.
Also I am indifferent to Wanahome as a boyfriend, which may be affecting my perspective here a little, but.
I also have conflicted feelings about the Tiaanet storyline and the resolution of it and, again, the fact that the only way to resolve the madness of wild dreamers -- actually this holds true for Ehiru in the first book too -- is for them to die. I don't know! I mean, it makes for a powerful and emotional story, but it also makes me uncomfortable.
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Also unsure how I feel about the Hanani/Wanahome romance, though I liked him better toward the end, or how the unrequited gay romance in book one ends with one of them dead. It kind of bugs me, but I am not sure if I am angry, or just kind of bothered, or what.
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The ending of the first book didn't hit me particularly in a bury your gays way -- partly because there were a few other casually queer background characters in the text, if I remember -- but I can totally see how it might. Although, heh, I think part of that is that I've just sort of come to terms with the fact that Jemisin's id just does mostly not match up with mine when it comes to romance; like, I have yet to be super enthusiastic about any of the romances in her books, instead I just get stuck thinking "THIS SEEMS LIKE A BAD IDEA" at everybody involved. If Ehiru/Nijiri had been requited I probably would have spent a lot of time thinking "THIS SEEMS LIKE A BAD IDEA" about that too! As it was I spent a lot of time being grateful that Ehiru agreed with me about how much of a bad idea it would be.
I WOULD LOVE FOR THERE TO BE YULETIDE FIC.
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BUT YES having Nijiri as a protag was great! I didn't connect with him as much as I connected with Hanani, but I did really enjoy seeing him grow, and getting to see him again as an adult in Book 2. And ooh, thanks for linking to the short story! I hadn't seen that, and I'm super excited to read it now.
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