(no subject)
May. 19th, 2020 10:03 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
skygiantsI am very glad Caroline Stevermer has a new book out and is Back on the Scene, but The Glass Magician feels like it's in a sort of weird place halfway between the kind of books I usually associate with Stevermer and the kind of books I associate with Current Marketable YA.
The premise: it's the Gilded Age, only the upper-crust are also magical shapeshifters, called Traders because they trade shapes with animals and also presumably because they have built vast robber baron merchant empires, although it's not entirely clear how these things are linked. Other people, called Sylvestri, have tree magic, and everyone else (Solitaires) has no magic and just goes about doing normal Gilded Age things. (The thing where every type of person has a Category that Starts with a Capital Letter is definitely one of those things I associate with Current Marketable YA.
Also, as a sidenote, Stevermer very assiduously introduces everyone by race and magical status -- 'a white Solitaire,' 'a black Trader,' etc. -- which, I do appreciate the earnest effort to make it clear that this is not an all-white cast, but because .a) she never references anything other than 'white' or 'black' and b.) there's no indication of how the entire separate magical caste system has affected nineteenth-century race relations and thus what race means in this context, it took me forever to figure out that was actually what she was doing and this wasn't some additional descripter to tag the type of magic. ANYWAY.)
Thalia, Our Heroine, is an orphan young stage magician who unfortunately has begun to suspect that she might also be a Trader, which would be deeply inconvenient for her career.
Other inconveniences to her career:
- the rival magician who has somehow managed to get a clause in his contract stating that anyone else who does the Bullet Trick in any major theaters of the syndicate is in breach-of-contract
- the manticores who wander the city attempting to drain the magic of inexperienced Traders
- the stage manager/mentor who is turning out to have Secrets
- the upper-class Trader potential love interest, Ryker, who wants to hire her to convince his headstrong teen sister Nell that she really doesn't want to become a stage magician, however much she might think he does
Okay, the upper-class Trader potential love interest is not actually an inconvenience to her career, but he is an inconvenience to me personally because he is such a Privileged Asshole YA Love Interest and I dislike him so much ... I deeply resented every second he was on the page. A pity, because I have in the past usually found Stevermer love interests charming!
Anyway, Stevermer is very good generally at fantasies of craft and I really wanted the book primarily to be about the conflict between Thalia's new magic and her career plans and stage magician-craft. And indeed, whenever the book is in fact about stage magician-craft, it's a lot of fun and I truly appreciate all the loving research that Stevermer has put into not just the techniques of the stage effects themselves, but also the practical and logistical and business elements of the stage magic community.
However, we don't get anywhere near as much of it as I would like; instead the book is primarily about her learning to tap into her new powers under Ryker and Nell's wing, and secondarily about attempting to resolve the issues with her stage manager while also solving a murder mystery, and not very much about Thalia's own dreams and drives at all. It feels like perhaps that part of Thalia's journey is intended for a second book?
In fact there's quite a lot that feels intended for a second book, as most of the major relationships are left somewhat unresolved and a bombshell reveal is dropped at the end that gives Thalia a clear Next Step to explore. I also kept expecting some kind of worldbuilding reveal that would at least a little critique the extremely rich Gilded Age Traders and their monopolies on powers and money markets, rather than representing them as pretty much uncomplicatedly aspirational, and this did not in any way happen ... but I would like to give Stevermer the benefit of the doubt on this and hope that she does intend to do so when she does the rest of the things that are not finished in this book. On the other hand, the book so far as I can tell is being marketed as a standalone, so who knows! I will for sure read a sequel if it happens, anyway; I really would like to give Stevermer the chance to sell me on this world and narrative even though this first book did not quite get me there.
The premise: it's the Gilded Age, only the upper-crust are also magical shapeshifters, called Traders because they trade shapes with animals and also presumably because they have built vast robber baron merchant empires, although it's not entirely clear how these things are linked. Other people, called Sylvestri, have tree magic, and everyone else (Solitaires) has no magic and just goes about doing normal Gilded Age things. (The thing where every type of person has a Category that Starts with a Capital Letter is definitely one of those things I associate with Current Marketable YA.
Also, as a sidenote, Stevermer very assiduously introduces everyone by race and magical status -- 'a white Solitaire,' 'a black Trader,' etc. -- which, I do appreciate the earnest effort to make it clear that this is not an all-white cast, but because .a) she never references anything other than 'white' or 'black' and b.) there's no indication of how the entire separate magical caste system has affected nineteenth-century race relations and thus what race means in this context, it took me forever to figure out that was actually what she was doing and this wasn't some additional descripter to tag the type of magic. ANYWAY.)
Thalia, Our Heroine, is an orphan young stage magician who unfortunately has begun to suspect that she might also be a Trader, which would be deeply inconvenient for her career.
Other inconveniences to her career:
- the rival magician who has somehow managed to get a clause in his contract stating that anyone else who does the Bullet Trick in any major theaters of the syndicate is in breach-of-contract
- the manticores who wander the city attempting to drain the magic of inexperienced Traders
- the stage manager/mentor who is turning out to have Secrets
- the upper-class Trader potential love interest, Ryker, who wants to hire her to convince his headstrong teen sister Nell that she really doesn't want to become a stage magician, however much she might think he does
Okay, the upper-class Trader potential love interest is not actually an inconvenience to her career, but he is an inconvenience to me personally because he is such a Privileged Asshole YA Love Interest and I dislike him so much ... I deeply resented every second he was on the page. A pity, because I have in the past usually found Stevermer love interests charming!
Anyway, Stevermer is very good generally at fantasies of craft and I really wanted the book primarily to be about the conflict between Thalia's new magic and her career plans and stage magician-craft. And indeed, whenever the book is in fact about stage magician-craft, it's a lot of fun and I truly appreciate all the loving research that Stevermer has put into not just the techniques of the stage effects themselves, but also the practical and logistical and business elements of the stage magic community.
However, we don't get anywhere near as much of it as I would like; instead the book is primarily about her learning to tap into her new powers under Ryker and Nell's wing, and secondarily about attempting to resolve the issues with her stage manager while also solving a murder mystery, and not very much about Thalia's own dreams and drives at all. It feels like perhaps that part of Thalia's journey is intended for a second book?
In fact there's quite a lot that feels intended for a second book, as most of the major relationships are left somewhat unresolved and a bombshell reveal is dropped at the end that gives Thalia a clear Next Step to explore. I also kept expecting some kind of worldbuilding reveal that would at least a little critique the extremely rich Gilded Age Traders and their monopolies on powers and money markets, rather than representing them as pretty much uncomplicatedly aspirational, and this did not in any way happen ... but I would like to give Stevermer the benefit of the doubt on this and hope that she does intend to do so when she does the rest of the things that are not finished in this book. On the other hand, the book so far as I can tell is being marketed as a standalone, so who knows! I will for sure read a sequel if it happens, anyway; I really would like to give Stevermer the chance to sell me on this world and narrative even though this first book did not quite get me there.
no subject
Date: 2020-05-20 03:32 am (UTC)No one has mineral magic?
P.S. Why is it an inconvenience to Thalia's career that she might be a shape-shifter? Is it the kind of magical shape-shifting that is not entirely under the person's control? Is it fixed to one animal form and hers isn't very good for stage magic? I feel like a stage magician who could pull themselves out of a hat would clean up on the halls.
no subject
Date: 2020-05-20 03:47 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2020-05-20 03:49 am (UTC)*waits, patiently*
no subject
Date: 2020-05-20 12:53 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2020-05-20 04:47 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2020-05-20 08:36 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2020-05-20 04:47 am (UTC)The urgent, immediate reason is that an untrained shape-shifter attracts manticores, so she is basically Monster Catnip until she gets her powers under control, which means no stage performances in the interim even if she weren't also embroiled in the murder mystery etc.
The more long-term but also more potentially surmountable reasons is that the whole schtick for stage magicians here is that it's not Trader or Sylvestri magic, it's stage magic. Not "it's a trick," but "it's the Mystical Powers Of The Beyond" (in that way where everyone who's not a little kid knows that's a schtick and there's stagecraft going on, but they still enjoy being fooled for the length of a show and wondering how they did the impossible thing). So being able to do real magic makes it more of a "great, what's the point?" thing if people know, and also I think gives a certain suspicion -- you're not an ordinary magicless Solitaire, you're a TRADER, how do we know you're not cheating?
(That said, it is fixed to one animal form and I don't think they have much magic beyond the one shapeshift option, unless that's going to come up in the hypothetical sequel or I missed it. So it's not as if she suddenly has vast illusion powers or whatever.)
...Also there's just a big social gulf between Traders and Solitaires, and I think that's the longer-term issue as much as anything. Like Becca, I wish we'd gotten more time delving into this part of the worldbuilding!
no subject
Date: 2020-05-20 04:53 am (UTC)Okay! That is a suitable whatever the plot impediment equivalent of a MacGuffin is called. (Does a trained shape-shifter still attract manticores but can deal with them, or . . . ?)
Like Becca, I wish we'd gotten more time delving into this part of the worldbuilding!
I too would like to know how being a particular kind of shape-shifter leads to vast industrial empires.
no subject
Date: 2020-05-21 09:27 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2020-05-21 10:57 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2020-05-21 05:30 pm (UTC)This is true and also I don't think I have ever seen a novel of political intrigue among powerful shape-shifters kick off with the upsetting news that, indeed, the crown prince just became roadkill, or got eaten by a perfectly mundane owl.
no subject
Date: 2020-05-20 04:48 pm (UTC)I'm sure in context it makes sense, but as a sentence that is so hilariously random.
no subject
Date: 2020-05-20 08:39 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2020-05-21 10:55 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2020-05-22 04:16 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2020-05-20 12:06 pm (UTC)Beth explained the career challenges well, and I think the idea of stage magic existing in a world with real magic with a sentiment of 'you can't be a stage magician if you have real magic, that's CHEATING' is such a fascinating one that I wish it had been ... delved into ..... at all ........
no subject
Date: 2020-05-20 02:36 pm (UTC)It was just like "animal . . . vegetable . . . normal people?"
the idea of stage magic existing in a world with real magic with a sentiment of 'you can't be a stage magician if you have real magic, that's CHEATING' is such a fascinating one that I wish it had been ... delved into ..... at all ........
Maybe in the second book?
no subject
Date: 2020-05-21 10:59 am (UTC)There's a lot that I hope for from an as-yet-entirely-hypothetical second book!
no subject
Date: 2020-05-21 05:32 pm (UTC)Are people's animal-shapes and particular trees in fact seen as some kind of companion or double? (In asking this question, I realize I have interpreted Sylvestri as kind of like dryads, which they probably are not.)
no subject
Date: 2020-05-22 04:23 am (UTC)They are not! Well, not by Traders themselves, at any rate. Some non-magic folk may -- Thalia at the start doesn't seem to, but she also doesn't seem to be sure how Traders see it, either -- but it's pretty clearly two different body shapes for the same mind. Per the explanation, they don't see their human form as any more or less themselves than the animal one. (They do see their soul as just so big that it doesn't fit into one shape, or at least the one explaining this does, but I don't think we're supposed to take that at face value.)
(In asking this question, I realize I have interpreted Sylvestri as kind of like dryads, which they probably are not.)
They do not seem to be, but we don't see a ton of their society really! They experience time differently, they have nature magic, they love decorating everything with and in imitation of plants, and generally they seem to have a somewhat different way of looking at the world that may not be solely cultural, but they're not visually distinct from non-magical humans nor tethered to one location/plant/forest/etc. I would be very interested to learn more about Sylvestri in this hypothetical hoped-for future novel, but it's not my top priority on the long list of hopes here, mostly because I also enjoy them being mysterious and not interested in hanging out with Traders OR Solitaires, thank you very much.
no subject
Date: 2020-05-20 03:45 am (UTC)The plot also felt pretty... straightforward (which would be fine if I liked the other things the book was doing more). I wanted a twist with manticores just being misunderstood/Thalia turning out to be a manticore, but if that is happening it will have to be in the sequel. Also not a huge fan of the Hamlet school of solving mysteries, I wanted there to be an extra twist about who really dunnit.
Also couldn't tell if the book was trying to set up standard YA love triangle with Ryker and manticore hunter guy (who was clearly far more interesting), or if the latter is just going to end up with Nell.
no subject
Date: 2020-05-20 12:11 pm (UTC)I also expected the manticore hunter to turn out to be the love interest when he first appeared -- he seemed a much more Stevermer-ish kind of character, generally -- or at least to do something, but instead he mostly just did his job ... I mean, no shade to him! Doing your job is a good thing to do and he was very competent at it! However, narratively speaking, I expected more from him.
I did however love the giant stupid magic show at the end. Did it make any sense? Obviously not, why did the cops and the murderer even accept the invitation? Was it NONSENSE DRAMA using ELABORATE STAGE TRICKS? yes, and therefore I was super into it. :D
no subject
Date: 2020-05-20 12:58 pm (UTC)I think there is a categorical difference between Books Set In A Time and Books That Interrogate That Time, and this one falls in the previous category? My own preference is for the latter, and I sort of expected it to be the latter, but it is the former for sure. I do wonder if she's planning a book two where we'd get more in-depth interrogation of the world.
no subject
Date: 2020-05-21 10:39 am (UTC)That said, it did really feel to me as if it was written with a book two expected, but perhaps not confirmed Because Publishing.
no subject
Date: 2020-05-20 09:28 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2020-05-21 10:41 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2020-05-21 11:57 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2020-05-20 04:51 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2020-05-20 12:12 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2020-05-20 12:38 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2020-05-20 12:54 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2020-05-20 02:18 pm (UTC)/was also technically a Nineties Kid, but missed out on entire genres due to daydreaming.
no subject
Date: 2020-05-20 03:10 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2020-05-21 10:49 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2020-05-21 05:33 pm (UTC). . . thank God.
no subject
Date: 2020-05-21 11:05 pm (UTC)(Not a fan of love triangles - I wonder why they've gotten so popular?).
no subject
Date: 2020-05-20 02:23 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2020-05-21 10:53 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2020-05-21 11:06 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2020-05-24 04:58 am (UTC)BTW, the family who run the magic craft shop are essentially the Martinka magic family with the serial numbers filed off, as are many other characters in the book.
Given the absolute wealth of bizarre betrayals in the magic scene in the Golden Age, I was also hoping the non-compete plot would be less of a red herring.
I expected a lot more from this book than we got, so I'm really hoping we get a sequel that opens the world up a bit more. This book feeling oddly like a prelude.
no subject
Date: 2020-05-21 03:12 am (UTC)When I wrote it up, I said that I thought the worldbuilding wasn't very deep nor broad enough and it felt solidly YA. I don't consider that a good thing.
Some questions that occurred to me--sylvestri seems to be New World. Are there none in Europe/Asia or do they not immigrate? Traders historically were actually traders so a Romany or Jewish analogue? How are Trader children safe within their mansions before they learn to control their powers? Some sort of magic? A Trader who does have control emits a sort of ward-away? Hmmm.
Possible spoiler below....
So were Thalia's father and David Nutall lovers?
Let me expand on that a little bit. When the hint occurs, Thalia basically goes "la-la-la-don't-want-to-know" so I wonder if that's supposed to be Thalia not wanting to change her view of her father nor of David or is because society is the same in this world as our was in the same time period?
no subject
Date: 2020-05-21 10:55 am (UTC)I ALSO WONDERED about Thalia's father and David Nutall! There certainly seemed like ... a vibe. But again it's very difficult to tell from the text as presented whether societal attitudes about anything mirror the way they would have been in our own!