The good news is that I’ve finished the last big paper required for graduation (handing it in tomorrow, and good riddance). The bad news is that my wrists hurt again; I’ve clearly pushed my recovery too hard. So, very briefly: The Sanctuary Sparrow is the seventh Cadfael novel; a little darker than most of them, I think, in its claustrophobic portrait of a rather messed-up family, but still enjoyable. (And hey, if anyone out there wants to read 20K words on special verdicts in criminal jury trials, just let me know . . . )
Gaiman, Neil: (201) American Gods
I found Neil Gaiman’s latest novel, American Gods, extremely frustrating the first time I read it. I thought perhaps I would like it better upon re-reading: perhaps my high expectations, or my narrative expectations, got in the way unfairly. I regret to report that I do not, in fact, like it any better now that I’ve re-read it. (This seems to be the week for frustration in this book log.)
Why is it frustrating? Oh, lots of reasons. I did have high expectations for this book, and justifiably so, I think. Since the amazing Sandman comic series concluded its 75-issue run, Gaiman’s novels had been enjoyable but slight, lacking the kind of power and depth Sandman displayed. The tale of a war between the old and new gods of America was just the kind of project I’d hoped to see Gaiman take on.
It may be unjust to compare American Gods to Sandman, since a ten-year monthly epic and a 400+ page novel are quite different formats. But too much of American Gods invites me to do so, to the book’s detriment. There are, of course, the gods, whose incarnations in America are quite different from the ones who dealt with Dream, which is somewhat disorienting, at least at first. (The other disorienting thing about the gods in this book is that Bast’s feline form is exactly what I’ve always pictured myself as in the “If you were an animal, what would you be?” game.) There’s the very basic theme of belief and story, painted over a broad canvas with stories embedded inside the larger tale.
More importantly, there’s the main characters. It’s been observed that Gaiman apparently has a thing for passive protagonists; Dream was passive, but for interesting and ultimately tragic reasons. Shadow just is. He is, in fact, one of the major sources of my frustration; it’s very annoying to be mad on behalf of someone who doesn’t appear to care.
The other main (and related, in spoilery ways) source of frustration is the plot. I don’t object to violating narrative expectations, but I want there to be a payoff for it. Here, I ended up saying, “That’s it? So what?” which is not what you want to do after 400 pages. To be sure, those 400 pages were a very smooth and easy read, with some great stories, characters, and lines (of which my favorite is probably, “Media. I think I have heard of her. Isn’t she the one who killed her children?” “Different woman. Same deal.”). But they don’t, to me, add up to anything: the plot’s resolution, its effect on Shadow—they just leave me frustrated.
A lot of people seem to really like this book, and it’s received quite a lot of critical attention. That’s great; Gaiman has an impressive body of work and deserves the attention. But whatever it is that people are seeing in this, I’m missing it.
Ford, John M.: Last Hot Time, The
Since John M. Ford and Neil Gaiman will both be at Boskone, I thought I should re-read their latest novels before then. I started with Ford’s The Last Hot Time (although maybe Ford isn’t going to be at the convention, because I don’t see his name on the preliminary program any more. Bummer; hope he’s well.). In a way, I think this is the silver lining of having the early stages of carpal tunnel syndrome in my left wrist and having to cut way back on typing: I really like this book, but it’s oddly difficult for me to be coherent about it, so I have an excuse to make this short. Short-ish, at least.
The Last Hot Time is connected to the Bordertown shared universe, but does not take place in Bordertown. (The connections are ambiguous enough, to my reading at least, that I will not venture to say whether the book is set in the same world or a similar one.) Elfland came back sometime in the 1990s; the book is set the Levee, the part of Chicago that borders Elfland. Danny Holman is a paramedic escaping his small-town life in Iowa for the big city; he is given a job by Mr. Patrise, the Levee’s leader, who also dubs him Doc Hallownight. Though the book is set, as best I can tell, in the equivalent of the near future, the style is very much of an earlier era: wide-lapel suits, snap-brim hats, big cars and Tommy guns and smoky nightclub singers and gang wars and all the rest. (Cf. Doc Sidhe.)
That’s the setup. I’m reluctant to talk about the plot, because it sort of unfolds and ties together in a way that might be easy to spoil. There is a plot, let’s just say, though the direction of it might not be obvious at first. And, of course, if a young man runs off to the big city, he’s going to learn a lot about life and himself, which Doc does indeed.
Why do I like this book so much? It’s very strange, but I can’t point to one thing; there are a lot of great things about it, but even naming them all seems oddly insufficient. I will point out that it’s a book that requires careful attention to who the viewpoint character is and how events get filtered through his eyes; I don’t know, maybe I like it so much because it’s a Ford book where I understood all of the key points on my first read! I think, though, that it probably just hit me in just the right time, place, and manner to really resonate. It’s very finely done (and short), so I certainly recommend it, even if I can’t be coherent about it.
(In case you were wondering: my wrist is feeling much better than it was at the end of last week, thank you; I’m just trying to be careful.)