InsaneJournal

Books, 2008
1. God's Secretaries, by Adam Nicholson, 2. American Born Chinese, by Gene Yang, 3. Over Sea, Under Stone, by Susan Cooper 4. The Dark Is Rising, by Susan Cooper.

5. Greenwitch, by Susan Cooper

Some prophetic lines from the first pages of the book: "Nothing's hidden," said Jane sadly. "It's all too obvious."

And then, later, "Not one of us has any feelings that are of the least consequence." (Merry said, lacking irony.)

On the other hand, now that I know what to expect (and what not to expect), I liked it a lot more than the others. I'm just reading for plot now, like one would watch particularly bad television on Lifetime or something. Daytime TV.

And also, the Greenwitch is my favorite character (thus far, over the course of three books, the only people I like are Bill and Ms. Withers, or rather, Bill/Ms. Withers, Paul, and the Greenwitch. Um?). She actually changes and grows during the course of the book -- she trusts Jane and gives up her secret, twice. And Jane is very nearly almost interesting.



6. The Grey King, by Susan Cooper

To recap: I was bored with Over Sea, Under Stone; Lorraine wasn't very impressed either. I was bored with and annoyed by the fatalism in The Dark is Rising; Lorraine liked this a lot one more than I did. I thought Jane and the Greenwitch were almost interesting in Greenwitch (but was still bored with and annoyed by the fatalism in and irritated off by the lack of coherency in Greenwitch); Lorraine was disappointed (but she liked Jane and the Greenwitch too).

The Grey King I almost very nearly read with a moment or two of pleasure. Boring? Yes. Entirely too fatalistic? Yes. But Caradog Pritchard is a fascinating counterpoint to the Grey King, and in the end, proves more powerful than the Grey King ever could be in all the ways that really matter. I still can't stand the magic that is totally random and without any sense of order or meaning. The fatalism just got worse for me (not just Will now, but Bran too? What the fuck?). (The whole thing in the mountain, with the dudes, and the questions, really pissed me off. How much more random and pointless and without explanation can you get?)

And now, for a change of pace, let's tackle a little gender analysis. Gwen might have been an interesting character, as thus far she is the only one in all of the Great and High Fantasy That Doesn't Actually Make Any Sense who has any agency whatsoever, but of course her whole plotline in the book is that she almost got raped and her fiancé almost committed murder, so she ran away. What? No, really, what? And that entire subplot -- the one that I thought was much more interesting than the main plot, and might have been the only interesting part of the four books I've read so far -- was hinged on two guys still fighting for the love of a woman a decade later. This is a woman, mind you, whom they had only known for a day or two (and whom one of them tried to rape). And of course the woman doesn't exist in the story at all; she's entirely backstory.

So: not better, precisely, but my expectations have been completely beaten down so I enjoyed it more. (No blatant misspellings? It must be a good book!)