Excellent summary and commentary, Alf! As you know, I thoroughly enjoyed the book. I wish more literature, not just fantasy and sci fi, were as authentically magical and individual as this
Most Fantasy fiction written these days is short on... fantasy. It tends to be rigid and rule-bound (inspired more by boardgames than literature or folklore) and has a mechanistic approach to the supernatural: "Input A produces predictable output B." Take, for example, this book which I didn't enjoy at all: https://aryngve.blogspot.com/2021/02/book-review-final-empire-book-1-of.html (This review will be reposted on my Substack, with some edits.)
I completely agree. The dreary mechanistic regularity of magic in modern fantasy is matched by dreary, generic conventions in practically every other aspect of it too. Bland, cold characters who feel like they've been dropped in from a teen soap opera, utterly contrived and conventional sub-Tolkeinesque world building, conventionally acceptable social values, and social structures as trite as an american renaissance fair. It's strange how much more original, weird and frankly modern stories written decades ago feel than this contemporary tripe.
Excellent summary and commentary, Alf! As you know, I thoroughly enjoyed the book. I wish more literature, not just fantasy and sci fi, were as authentically magical and individual as this
Most Fantasy fiction written these days is short on... fantasy. It tends to be rigid and rule-bound (inspired more by boardgames than literature or folklore) and has a mechanistic approach to the supernatural: "Input A produces predictable output B." Take, for example, this book which I didn't enjoy at all: https://aryngve.blogspot.com/2021/02/book-review-final-empire-book-1-of.html (This review will be reposted on my Substack, with some edits.)
I completely agree. The dreary mechanistic regularity of magic in modern fantasy is matched by dreary, generic conventions in practically every other aspect of it too. Bland, cold characters who feel like they've been dropped in from a teen soap opera, utterly contrived and conventional sub-Tolkeinesque world building, conventionally acceptable social values, and social structures as trite as an american renaissance fair. It's strange how much more original, weird and frankly modern stories written decades ago feel than this contemporary tripe.