(no subject)

[skygiants]

I promise this is the last post I'll make talking about Otherland, but the thing is, after I read all of Otherland, I found out Tad Williams had written a postcanon novella which I had never read and which was published in a collection called Legends II.

So Legends II (and, presumably, Legends I, and Legends III if it exists) is basically just a whole bunch of tie-in novellas from People Who Sold Really Fat Fantasy Novels in the Nineties, each preceded by an earnest three-page summary of the FIVE THOUSAND PAGES OF TEXT you are supposed to have read to really appreciate this story. It is a snapshot of a simpler time. A time when everyone really, earnestly believed that there were only going to be six Song of Ice and Fire books.

...obviously I read the whole book, so I'm just going to go down the list.

1. "Homecoming," Robin Hobb

Actually I quite liked this! Robin Hobb's Fitz/Fool books left me pretty cold even as a teenager, but I vaguely remember really liking the Liveship Traders trilogy, which was not really about kings and battles but much more about trade and economics and difficult cultural change, and featured a storyline about an unpleasant Mean Girl who goes off and undergoes tremendous character growth and becomes a productive person. This story is also about an unpleasant Mean Girl who goes off and undergoes tremendous character growth and becomes a productive person; she is a SOCIETY WIFE and ARTIST and then they all get shipwrecked in the dangerous magical jungle and she uses her society artist skills to build everybody houses. I am down with this. I have been operating under the assumption that the Liveship Traders books would not hold up on the reread, but perhaps I am wrong about this, given that this ended up being my favorite story in the book. . . . of course the bar was not very high.

2. "The Sworn Sword," George R. R. Martin

This is also not bad! I had previously not read any of the Dunk and Egg stories, which are about a low-class teenaged knight and his even more teenaged secret prince squire in the pre-GOT era; in this one they accidentally get in the middle of a petty argument between two nobles about who diverted whose stream that escalates quickly. Nobody is raped, and only one person dies, and the POV character is fairly likable, and it doesn't go on for three thousand pages!

3. "The Yazoo Queen," Orson Scott Card

This ties in to the Alvin Maker series, which I think I read at least one of but remember NOTHING about now, which ... judging from this story, is probably all to the good. In this one, the hero smugs his superpowered way onto a raft with his teenaged black sidekick, smugly pre-empts his teenaged black sidekick at freeing a bunch of slaves from the hold, and smugly gets snippy at his teenaged black sidekick for daring to voice the opinion that some people might prefer to be alive and slaves than dead. Also, there are Aztec cannibals; also, there is a bizarre cameo from Abraham Lincoln; also, there is dialect.

4. "Lord John and the Succubus," Diana Gabaldon

I do remember that I read half of the first Outlander book over the course of a couple nights when I was babysitting, but I never finished it. So while I was reading the story I went to Wikipedia, because I was curious, and ... those books are still going? Really? ANYWAY. This is a mystery story in which Lord John, secretly gay British officer, discovers that there is not really a succubus haunting the German troops he's hanging out with and it is all a clever plot. Which would be fine and pretty enjoyable, if the clever plot did not involve a murderous Romani prostitute and her child-murdering ancestors. >.<

5. "The Book of Changes," Robert Silverberg

So this is from something called the Majipoor series, which I have not read or even heard of. Which, given that from what I could tell the overarching plot of the series appears to be "humans colonize planet, heroically oppress original inhabitants" is ... probably ALSO all to the good. That said, this story was probably the funniest I read, because I don't think Robert Silverberg realized that he was basically writing the exact same plot as a slash fanfic Beauty and the Beast AU.

FURVAIN: I am a naive noble poet who has never managed to write a great work! I'm going to naively ride off and see the world!
KASINIBON: I am a LITHE, CATLIKE BANDIT and now I have CAPTURED you for RANSOM but mostly I just want to ADMIRE you and TALK TO YOU ABOUT POETRY.
FURVAIN: Funny how there aren't any women in your bandit stronghold. And how you take me for long walks to see the beautiful scenery every day, and invite me to fancy dinner every night. And recite poetry at me, like, ALL THE TIME.
KASINIBON: Yes ... funny, that ...

At this point I was really, honestly amazed when the plot turned out to be "and then Furvain was divinely inspired to write a stupid-sounding epic poem about his colonialist ancestors" rather than "and then they had sex everywhere in the bandit castle."

6. "The Happiest Dead Boy In the World," Tad Williams

Given that this story is the whole reason I read this book to begin with, it is KIND OF DISTRESSING to me that it's actually the most bizarre and nonsensical story in it ...?

So, OK, the plot of this story is about how several virtual Ava-clones in the network come and accuse virtual Orlando of getting them pregnant, and Orlando is like ????? and then it turns out that Otherland is ... starting its own semi-autonomous virtual persons breeding program ...? by storing virtual genetic data from semi-autonomous virtual dudes such as Orlando and and other semi-autonomous virtual clones, and dumping that genetic data into the wombs of semi-autonomous virtual ladies like the Ava clones whenever they happen to pass through a point where a virtual dude already passed???????

And everybody's reaction to this is like "whoa! Fascinating! Isn't evolution cool!" and Orlando's like "great, I'm excited to be a dad!" NO ONE's reaction is the APPROPRIATE LEVEL OF HORROR that suddenly all these semi-autonomous virtual ladies have had BABIES DUMPED IN THEIR WOMBS WITHOUT CONSENT AUGH WHAT, WHY, with a healthy side order of WTF.

...but at least Sam's gender and sexuality remain canonically ambiguous? So that's ... something ...

7. "Beyond Between," Anne McCaffrey

This is probably the first Anne McCaffrey I have read in something ten years. Maybe fifteen. It's ... inoffensive? Nothing horrific happens? Someone dies on a borrowed dragon and there's some saccharine stuff about dragon heaven. Anne McCaffrey is not a very good writer, news at 11.

8. "The Messenger," Raymond E. Feist

I know I did read, like, a whole trilogy of Raymond E. Feist books, but I literally do not remember a single thing about them now. That said, this story was actually kind of weirdly charming in how straightforward and nondescript it was. An army messenger goes and delivers some messages between armies while having a bad cold. He's cold and cranky and occasionally the enemy shoots at him. That's it, that's the story.

9. "Theshold," Elizabeth Haydon

I also read the Rhapsody books but all I really remember is that sequence in the underground tree cave at the beginning of the first book that felt like it went on FOREVER. And then it was star-crossed love all the way down. This story was about the last five guards commanded to remain behind on an island that's about to be kablammed by a volcano JUST IN CASE everything is not utterly doomed, but it's, like, 99% sure that everything is about to be utterly doomed. The plot is actually reasonably touching, in a 'stoic people stoically face certain death' sort of way. If only the prose were better ...

10. "The Monarch of the Glen," Neil Gaiman

This is a sequel to American Gods and was sort of disconcerting for me to read, because, on the one hand, Neil Gaiman has an actual style and the prose in this story is leaps and bounds better than anything else in the entire volume, and on the other hand I still didn't care. It's not like there's a particular reason why I didn't care, either; I do remember a time when I loved American Gods but that time seems strangely distant and far away.

11. "Indomitable," Terry Brooks

Aww, it's a whole Shannara book in miniature! Jair Ohmsford gets a message from the shade of Alannon, hangs out with Cogline, blithely uses magic, gets increasingly depressed by psychotropic scenery, fights ancient evil, and is unnerved and corrupted by magic, all in the span of thirty pages. There were several of the authors in this volume (George R.R. Martin, especially) where I was like "you should write in miniature all the time, it seems to cure most of your problems!" But Terry Brooks in miniature is just pure Essence of Terry Brooks.

So that was a fun trip down Memory Lane! Ah, fantasy in the nineties. Actually, this book was published in 2004, but it still exudes Essence Of The Nineties. I do count myself lucky that Piers Anthony was not included.

Comments

[sophia_sol]

This post is beautiful, and I am distressingly reminded of my teenage years when I was a very non-discerning reader. I loved Card's Alvin Maker series, and Silverberg's Majipoor series, and McCaffrey's everything, and Hobb's whatever the first trilogy was called, and......yep. I spent a lot if time in the bowels of my library's sff section.

[kate_nepveu]

Ewww, I did not remember that about the Lord John story. (Lord John is my favorite. I want him to be happy at the end of the series more than anything. I wish his side-books were more consistent, or indeed stayed in my head at all.)

[nocarename]

Huh.

I have on my bookshelf right now two paperback volumes titled Legends 1 & 2 which appear to makeup the first two thirds of Legends I after some googling and poking at Amazon.
I hadn't noticed that there was more of them. Like, I somehow missed that these were only the first two thirds even.

Which goes to show just how invested I am in tracking down everything ever produced by the authors, I guess?

[shati]

I still can't tell if this is the Legends I read. Like these could be the GRRM and Anne McCaffrey stories I very hazily remember or ... I could've read slightly different stories by them ARRRGH

Haha, Google exists! I read Legends #1. It had Terry Pratchett in it!

[damselfish]

I am not entirely sure the Liveship books would hold up, particularly not the Malta plot. I read them in college and loved the hell outta the books but kept shouting YOU ARE THIRTEEN AND HE IS TWENTY!* Shame because I really loved the dumb/mean girl becomes a better person and also mean people have their reasons/worldviews too. Actually I loved the hell out of most of the characters of those books and I may have to read them again because they were my jam in so many ways. Just... maybe slightly... less so Malta's plot.

*I don't remember how much time passed but he was definitely early twenties when he started courting her and oh noooooo. I'd be like "awww this ship is cute" and then remember, the dude was my age as I read the books and she was essentially a high school freshman. I would be very happy if someone would roll along and go "oh no actually you misread it. Dude was twenty in magically mutating rainforest years, which is different!"

[jinian]

OH TAD WILLIAMS NO.

[ceitfianna]

I read the first Legends book, so far the story in there is still the only Wheel of Time one I've ever read. Otherwise I recall nothing, but I love your takes on this one and now I know not to buy it. Though apparently there was Pratchett, I like my anthologies but many of them are forgettable or make me go, huh, this needs more or stop it.

[scifantasy]

There is no Legends 3.

Legends, the first one, was a big deal when it happened...it had the first Dunk & Egg story that set that up, it had (at the time, given that Sanderson has written another) the only non-novel Wheel of Time story (which got expanded out into its own novel later), it had a Pratchett short story, one of only a few he has done (and which I mentioned to you, along with the anthology itself, a few years back), it had a Stephen King novella in the Dark Tower, and so on.

The second was carried mostly on the strength of Gaiman (and Martin somewhat), as I recall, though of course fans of the other authors went for theirs.

(You do not want to have much contact with the Alvin Maker series, no.)

[pedanther]

I read the Wheel of Time one, and said to myself, "Hey, this guy is actually pretty good when he's not allowed to ramble on at whatever length he feels like."

Then he announced that he wasn't happy with it and was rewriting it as a 300 page novel, and that was the moment I gave up on the Wheel of Time series entirely.

(The Pratchett story features Granny Weatherwax, and is a sort of spiritual precursor to the Tiffany Aching books.)

[ceitfianna]

Its been far too long since I read it but I must have enjoyed that story. I think there was a GRRM one too, another author who should be given a page limit.

[pedanther]

There is kind of a Legends 3, but it's called Far Horizons and is for fat sci-fi authors instead of fat fantasy authors. (Haldeman, Brin, Pohl, etc. - and yet more Orson bloody Scott bloody Card.)

[tree_and_leaf]

Nobody is raped, and only one person dies, and the POV character is fairly likable, and it doesn't go on for three thousand pages!


Clearly an imposter!

The "Monarch of the Glen" story is included in most current British editions of "American Gods", if any one's interested, but I mt admit that while I still love AG, and the story's well written, I was awfully meh about it.

[oyceter]

Oh man, I totally loved Malta in the Liveship Trader series for exactly those reasons! I am a little afraid re: rereading them, though, because I keep remembering all the stuff with the pirate guy and Malta's older sister who wanted to own the liveship (Althea??) and OMG SO RAPEY.

[sgac]

I reread the Liveship books recently.

They are full of teenage sulking. 'You kicked me off my ship so I'm gonna sulk.' 'You stuck me on this ship so I'm gonna sulk.' 'You won't let me go to the ball so I'm gonna sulk.' The 14 year olds acted like 14 year olds (though Althea was old enough to know better).

Malta's storyline did include a lot of her mother and grandmother fretting over how she wasn't old enough to be courting. From the Rain Wilds point of view, early marriage is justified by short lifespans and insane infant mortality. (Malta: never mind that he might have growths on his face. ALL YOUR BABIES WILL DIE. And in the sequels I've skimmed, that is indeed what happens.)

[minutia_r]

Is it possible that you didn't care about "Monarch of the Glen" because Shadow is the most passive protagonist to ever be passived? I have that story in a Neil Gaiman collection and good lord. It would a much better story if he did or even showed a passing interest in anything. (I feel the same way basically about American Gods.)

[varadia]

The thing I know about the Majipoor series is that once I bought Valentine Pontifex from a bookstore and made it through about 80 or 90 pages. Immediately after this the book gave me the same 80 or 90 pages, upside-down, then gave me page 210 and the end of the book.

And then I stopped caring. So. Yeah.

[rymenhild]

I read all the Alvin Makers. The first one or two were good (if you don't mind the dialect and don't have the political acumen to recognize the deep wrongness in the book's portrayals of Native Americans and African-Americans). The rest... well. I think I found out at some point later in high school that Alvin was a thinly veiled founder of Mormonism. Then I realized there was something *really* creepy about the way, in the last two or three books, young women who wanted to destroy Alvin's reputation kept claiming that Alvin had sexually harassed them even though Alvin was TOTALLY INNOCENT AND VIRTUOUS AND FRAMED AND TOTALLY FAITHFUL TO HIS WIFE. Alvin was framed, if I recall correctly, several times.

You haven't missed much.

Edit: I also could NOT bring myself to believe that Taleswapper, with his friendly American dialect whatever, was actually William Blake. What. No.

[genarti]

Oh geez. I would say ORSON SCOTT CARD, WHYYYY, but, well. Orson Scott Card.

I read the first one and kind of liked it -- I was old enough (in high school, I think?) to recognize that there was some wrongness going on here, but not old enough to nope out on the basis of that alone. Although to be honest I have no idea if I ever finished the book. But I never went back and read the others in the series. It sounds like that was a good call.

[genarti]

Ahahaha oh god, I am cackling with nostalgia just from reading these summaries! YOU ALMOST MAKE ME WANT TO READ THIS BOOK TO WALLOW IN 90SNESS. SAVE ME, MY LAZINESS.

(Except the Lord John book, because AUGH EW NO and I don't even have any nostalgia for the Outlander series to carry me through. With Alvin Maker I'd at least have the combination of having read the first book one time and going in with an OH ORSON SCOTT CARD NO attitude to everything. ...With Outlander I'd just have the expectation that I was gonna be confused by everything, I guess.)

I did read one Majipoor book! Lord Valentine's Castle. I remember enjoying it but being very confused, and suspect it's slightly less bewildering of a book to people who've read the first ones in the series. I barely remember the plot at all, except that our hero is a wandering juggler with Heroic Amnesia and hints of an entirely guessable ~secret past~, like, you know, maybe he's secretly Lord Valentine or something NAH HOW COULD THAT BE. I don't remember a thing about the worldbuilding, though.

[genarti]

If it helps, it's by far the shortest and the tightest of the Wheel of Time books! Only three main characters and several secondaries, and a fairly straightforward plot. I read it, and that was the gateway that let me actually get through Eye of the World and then later books after I'd bounced off it a couple of times.

This probably doesn't help, because all your points remain extremely salient.

[cahn]

I really liked the first three, I remember (hey, I was a kid), and then I kinda gave up. So I appear to have missed most of the young-women stuff, thankfully. I mostly just remember that by the fourth or fifth book it had devolved into "let's see how many cameos of completely random political figures we can work in, at the expense of either plot or characterization!"

The weird thing is that it's not like Card doesn't acknowledge polygamy in Mormonism (he actually once wrote a whole novel about early Mormonism dealing with Joseph Smith's polygamy and how ugly it was for a lot of the people involved) but... huh. Guess he has Issues about it, news at 11. And of course Saints is from his earlier-and-not-nearly-as-crazy period and the later Alvins... aren't.

And ALLLLLL the agreement about Taleswapper! Even in high school I remember being completely taken aback by it.

[nny]

Is the George R. R. Martin one the one with the staved in helmet?

[luzula]

This post provided me with much amusement! \o/

and featured a storyline about an unpleasant Mean Girl who goes off and undergoes tremendous character growth and becomes a productive person

Yes! This is what I remember, too, though it's been many years since I read them, so I have no idea if it would hold up for me now.

[pedanther]

If I remember correctly, Lord Valentine's Castle is the first in the series. (By publication order, at least. There may have been prequels at some point.)

I started reading it once, it turned into a kind of Amnesia Plot I usually bounce off, I bounced off it, and that was it for me and Majipoor.

[skygiants]

Ha, man, I'm with you -- as this post probably proves, I was SO non-discerning in my teenaged years. If it had a brightly-colored cheesy dragon on the cover, I was there, man, I was SO THERE.