1. This third book in the series somewhat lightens the mood: where the last two worlds precipitated and warred constantly, this one has dark elements, but is much more peaceful and traditional fantasy adventure tone. Think Tolkien, as one often does in fantasy, though she pulls little else out of that writer’s works than a balance of pain and pleasure that allows the book to be enjoyable.
2. In short review: Roh’s army and the heroes end up on a feudally peaceful world, sexual tension still intact after the kiss at the end of the last book. Roh breaks with the army early while Vayne and Morgaine get allies for once. Vayne is then separated in an ambush and taken to Roh.
—And this is where Cherryh starts to show what she will become: through exploring Roh’s situation, both complex political intrigue and deep character study come to the fore in a few successive chapters. Cherryh ignores Morgaine for these chapters, preferring to discuss Roh’s struggle with his other self, using that as a springboard the allow Vayne to change in meaningful ways. The building tension through Morgaine's absence for chapter after chapter engages. Later, Morgaine recognizes Vayne’s changes when they are reunited and reinstates Vayne as an honorable warrior, which necessarily changes their relationship too. This is classic Cherryh and it really sucked me in: she is skilled at psychological and political drama.
—Back to the recap: Vayne and Roh call on Vayne’s allies to lead them to Morgaine, which they do, but the army follows. The army tears itself apart when the leadership is decimated—mostly by the main characters—and the novel ends peacefully.
—I include this recap for two reasons: first to point out that Cherryh realizes her strengths, or writes what is interesting to her, and creates a complex world populated by complex characters; second to show that the novel is really in three parts: Vayne and Morgaine, Vayne and Roh, Roh with Vayne and Morgaine. As usual, Vayne is the key element, but he actually changes here, through the influence of Roh, and that allows Morgaine to change somewhat too—she stops not looking behind her and ends up helping the world before she shuts the gate. This is a more confident Cherryh and it shows in an engaging tale told.
3. The writing is good. I remember no moments of astounding beauty or cringe-inducing writing, and the voice she later fully adopts is still somewhat tentative here. But this is better than readable.
4. The theme here grows out of the characters directly. Vayne is split between the ways of his world, and his new experience living with Morgaine’s duty. He wants to be kind and honorable, but he serves a master who lacks interest in morality in order to achieve her goals. Roh is half evil man, half good guy, and the two are struggling against each other. Central to Roh’s struggle is a desire to survive that both sides of him share. Morgaine is hell-bent on closing the gates, but realizes that it doesn’t need to involve so much destruction and hardship. In the cave she plays up her badassery for her purposes, but at other times she actually becomes gentle and loving to strangers. All three are finding their strengths and weaknesses and balancing them. Morgaine’s anger and stubbornness is used as an asset alongside her humanity. Vayne’s love of Roh is finally placed in a proper context in his role as Morgaine’s slave, and it ends up helping his master. Roh’s struggle is able to help all three in his selfless acts, born out of anger over what gave him that split personality. This theme of using our traits and emotions for better ends is throughout this novel.
5. In all, this is clearly the best of the first three novels in the Morgaine cycle of four. I don’t have the fourth yet, so we’ll see if I ever find it and get a chance to review it. But in terms of focus and worldbuilding, Cherryh is really coming into her own here and I like Cherryh a lot, so I’m a fan. But it’s not a great book. That structure feels weird, as if each of the three parts doesn’t quite fit together: it feels like a different author between the first part and the second two parts. It’s not a small complaint, but it’s not debilitating.
No comments:
Post a Comment