![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
XL: Vonda N. McIntyre, Dreamsnake (1978)
Set in the same universe/planet as The Exile Waiting, but outside of the Center. The central character here is Snake, a healer, whose dreamsnake is killed when she is trying to save a patient. The rest of the novel features an attempt to track down a new snake so that she can fulfil her job, her adoption of a young girl, and the two people who are following. I paused a few pages in, to check on the sex of one of the characters, and noted for how long it is not specified - but the characters here are in a male-male-female triangle, which proves prophetic of the novel's big reveal. The snakes are deeply symbolic of course, and it's relative rare to have a female on a quest narrative.
C.J. Cherryh, Brothers of Earth (1976)
Before I read this novel I only knew two things about Cherryh - her novels are difficult to keep up with and not to try to match her pint for pint. That may actually only be one thing. But a certain academic journal editor of my acquaintance turned out to be a light weight. We lost them for a period until someone when looking for them in the toilets and talked them into unlocking the cubicle door. I recall bouncing off Downbelow Station twenty years ago, a space opera with no discernible good guys. Not very Star Wars.
This is Cherryh's first or second (published) novel, apparently late in the Alliance Universe sequence, but it start very much in media res (is that the phrase?) with someone watching they spaceship explode and escaping to a quasimedieval planet, part of which is run by an alien who happens to be of the enemy race. The human is taken is by a family but is caught up in the rivalries of the planet, and tragedy strikes. I'm thinking the model for this is the John Carter of Mars books, where a technologically advanced human interacts with a relatively primitive but richly imagined society, though I'm hampered by not having read those books. If memory serves that's the paradigm of The Ginger Star by Brackett. Science fantasy in the pockets of space opera.
Next to no one has written about Cherryh, wouldn't you know it? There's another opening for a book, but not one I fear by me. I have another eight Cherryhs of the period to read (I lack Hestia), and I will read them, although it's a tear of priorities. I'm not sure where they will all go in the book, and my priority at the moment was meant to be reading award nominees (so the Faded Sun trilogy beckons). On the other hand, I might find myself getting attuned t her style at long last. So far I've found it easier to respect than like.
Set in the same universe/planet as The Exile Waiting, but outside of the Center. The central character here is Snake, a healer, whose dreamsnake is killed when she is trying to save a patient. The rest of the novel features an attempt to track down a new snake so that she can fulfil her job, her adoption of a young girl, and the two people who are following. I paused a few pages in, to check on the sex of one of the characters, and noted for how long it is not specified - but the characters here are in a male-male-female triangle, which proves prophetic of the novel's big reveal. The snakes are deeply symbolic of course, and it's relative rare to have a female on a quest narrative.
C.J. Cherryh, Brothers of Earth (1976)
Before I read this novel I only knew two things about Cherryh - her novels are difficult to keep up with and not to try to match her pint for pint. That may actually only be one thing. But a certain academic journal editor of my acquaintance turned out to be a light weight. We lost them for a period until someone when looking for them in the toilets and talked them into unlocking the cubicle door. I recall bouncing off Downbelow Station twenty years ago, a space opera with no discernible good guys. Not very Star Wars.
This is Cherryh's first or second (published) novel, apparently late in the Alliance Universe sequence, but it start very much in media res (is that the phrase?) with someone watching they spaceship explode and escaping to a quasimedieval planet, part of which is run by an alien who happens to be of the enemy race. The human is taken is by a family but is caught up in the rivalries of the planet, and tragedy strikes. I'm thinking the model for this is the John Carter of Mars books, where a technologically advanced human interacts with a relatively primitive but richly imagined society, though I'm hampered by not having read those books. If memory serves that's the paradigm of The Ginger Star by Brackett. Science fantasy in the pockets of space opera.
Next to no one has written about Cherryh, wouldn't you know it? There's another opening for a book, but not one I fear by me. I have another eight Cherryhs of the period to read (I lack Hestia), and I will read them, although it's a tear of priorities. I'm not sure where they will all go in the book, and my priority at the moment was meant to be reading award nominees (so the Faded Sun trilogy beckons). On the other hand, I might find myself getting attuned t her style at long last. So far I've found it easier to respect than like.
