Reviews - Tony Hays, Jo Walton
Jan. 13th, 2011 11:33 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
wilderthanThe Killing Way (Tony Hays)
Now I've read a handful of historical mysteries, I'm starting to see trends -- the interest in the physical things surrounding the stories: how this was built or by whom, what purpose this serves, etc. I'm really not so interested in that: I know how castles are built, and often by whom, or at least what particular purpose they've served, and I am far more interested in reading about people.
Fortunately, to some extent, I can say that Tony Hays delivers both. He invents the central character, the narrator, Malgwyn, in a way that reminded me a lot of Bernard Cornwell's Derfel in The Winter King et al. A one-armed ex-warrior-cum-scribe, he's bitter toward Arthur for saving his life, still angry at the Saxons who caused his wife's death, and feels himself unworthy of being with his daughter, who he leaves with his brother to be raised by him. Woven around the murder mystery and political plot is his slow realisation that his life isn't over, that he has a family to take care of, and that killing Saxons doesn't satisfy his hatred and pain anymore. This is all reasonably well done, and despite being one-armed, Malgwyn is a capable warrior and, when not drunk, he is a clever man.
Which is, of course, why Arthur saved his life, and why Arthur turns to him when a murder is blamed on someone close to him. Arthur is about to take the throne -- or, as it's framed here, succeed the last Rigotamos, the head chieftain of all the Brythonic tribes -- and he needs to find out the truth of the murder, and fast, as other chieftains attempt to use it against him. The portrayal of Arthur is a familiar one, closer to the Arthur of Geoffrey's Historia or Wace and Layamon's Bruts than to the Arthur of French romance. He's capable, good in war, fair, and a Christian man, with Roman pretensions. Hand in hand with this goes the fact that figures like Lancelot and Galahad are not present.
More unusually, Gawain is not present either, and no relationship to Arthur is stressed. He's referenced a couple of times, but never appears. One of the main figures in the story, other than Malgwyn and Arthur, is Kay, who is treated very well here: he is noble and good-hearted, loyal to his lord, although supposedly he has a temper (which isn't really displayed much). I really enjoyed the portrayal of Kay, who -- like Arthur -- isn't touched by any of the French tradition. That's really what prompted me to give it four stars, despite not being really overwhelmed with the rest of it, which I found to be reasonably standard fare for a historical mystery story.
If you're fond of Tristan, you won't really enjoy his portrayal here. He's allied with traitors, and a coward, and the sort of man who mistreats women. It's an interesting way to choose to portray him, though.
Ultimately, it's easy to read, and kind of interesting to see which characters Tony Hays uses and what he does with them. I'll read the sequel, and likely anything else he writes for this series, but it hasn't even really approached my favourite Arthurian stories.
The Divine Sacrifice (Tony Hays)
The sequel to The Killing Way, this is another Arthurian mystery novel. I don't think you need to read the first book if all you're interested in is the mystery, but if you're interested in the emotional development of the main character, then you'd be better served by reading the first book.
I enjoyed The Divine Sacrifice less than The Killing Way, I think. It's less about Arthur, and Arthur's rule, particularly in the first half or so, and more about a complex situation involving both religious issues and personal ones. The answers to the mysteries weren't particularly a surprise for me, but nor was I particularly involved in them. The character of Patrick was an interesting one, and Malgwyn's development continued somewhat, but Kay -- a major feature of the first book, for me -- wasn't really present, and Bedevere didn't move forward to take that place as much as I could wish.
Another thing that bothers me is the... racial determinism. It's very black and white: Saxons are bad. The Scotti are bad. Admittedly, it's told from the point of view of someone who has no particular reason to be sympathetic in any way to the Scotti and Saxons. Still, Bernard Cornwell managed to make the Saxons the enemy at the same time as rendering them human -- I'm thinking of the narrator, Derfel, and his father... I suppose it could be moving to a less black and white view of the Saxons, as Malgwyn comes to terms with his reasons for fighting them.
Reading the author's notes is interesting, too. He refers to unsympathetic Welsh material, which I'm guessing must be the hagiographies, as I can't think of anything else I've read that is particularly unsympathetic.
(Sometimes, I long for a bibliography in books as much as I would in an academic essay. Hah.)
Tooth and Claw (Jo Walton)
Tooth and Claw is a Jane Austen-ish tale, of maidens with slightly compromised virtue, inheritances, betrothals, law suits... Except, all those involved? They're dragons. I really enjoyed how Jo Walton handled this aspect: she sets up a whole culture for the dragons, with plenty of history in the background -- not detailed so that it drags down the plot, which is very much about the present, but enough to feel real.
I have to confess, when I first started reading it, I didn't get into it very much. I picked it back up tonight, though, and read the last two thirds of it all in one go, giggling in the appropriate places and squirming on the edge of my seat, wondering how things could possibly turn out alright.
It's fun. It's inventive. It has characters you can get to care about -- I think my favourite is Sher: he seems so basically good, despite his flightiness initially, and he comes to care so much about Selendra.
My only quibble is in that something, whatever it was, in the first third that failed to catch my attention. And, I suppose, how much Jo Walton crammed in here that she didn't really get to examine in the detail I would have been interested in: the issues of the enslaved dragons, the foreign dragons, and the True Believers.
On further thought, that is just like Jane Austen, though, e.g. the light mention of the slave trade in Mansfield Park.
Now I've read a handful of historical mysteries, I'm starting to see trends -- the interest in the physical things surrounding the stories: how this was built or by whom, what purpose this serves, etc. I'm really not so interested in that: I know how castles are built, and often by whom, or at least what particular purpose they've served, and I am far more interested in reading about people.
Fortunately, to some extent, I can say that Tony Hays delivers both. He invents the central character, the narrator, Malgwyn, in a way that reminded me a lot of Bernard Cornwell's Derfel in The Winter King et al. A one-armed ex-warrior-cum-scribe, he's bitter toward Arthur for saving his life, still angry at the Saxons who caused his wife's death, and feels himself unworthy of being with his daughter, who he leaves with his brother to be raised by him. Woven around the murder mystery and political plot is his slow realisation that his life isn't over, that he has a family to take care of, and that killing Saxons doesn't satisfy his hatred and pain anymore. This is all reasonably well done, and despite being one-armed, Malgwyn is a capable warrior and, when not drunk, he is a clever man.
Which is, of course, why Arthur saved his life, and why Arthur turns to him when a murder is blamed on someone close to him. Arthur is about to take the throne -- or, as it's framed here, succeed the last Rigotamos, the head chieftain of all the Brythonic tribes -- and he needs to find out the truth of the murder, and fast, as other chieftains attempt to use it against him. The portrayal of Arthur is a familiar one, closer to the Arthur of Geoffrey's Historia or Wace and Layamon's Bruts than to the Arthur of French romance. He's capable, good in war, fair, and a Christian man, with Roman pretensions. Hand in hand with this goes the fact that figures like Lancelot and Galahad are not present.
More unusually, Gawain is not present either, and no relationship to Arthur is stressed. He's referenced a couple of times, but never appears. One of the main figures in the story, other than Malgwyn and Arthur, is Kay, who is treated very well here: he is noble and good-hearted, loyal to his lord, although supposedly he has a temper (which isn't really displayed much). I really enjoyed the portrayal of Kay, who -- like Arthur -- isn't touched by any of the French tradition. That's really what prompted me to give it four stars, despite not being really overwhelmed with the rest of it, which I found to be reasonably standard fare for a historical mystery story.
If you're fond of Tristan, you won't really enjoy his portrayal here. He's allied with traitors, and a coward, and the sort of man who mistreats women. It's an interesting way to choose to portray him, though.
Ultimately, it's easy to read, and kind of interesting to see which characters Tony Hays uses and what he does with them. I'll read the sequel, and likely anything else he writes for this series, but it hasn't even really approached my favourite Arthurian stories.
The Divine Sacrifice (Tony Hays)
The sequel to The Killing Way, this is another Arthurian mystery novel. I don't think you need to read the first book if all you're interested in is the mystery, but if you're interested in the emotional development of the main character, then you'd be better served by reading the first book.
I enjoyed The Divine Sacrifice less than The Killing Way, I think. It's less about Arthur, and Arthur's rule, particularly in the first half or so, and more about a complex situation involving both religious issues and personal ones. The answers to the mysteries weren't particularly a surprise for me, but nor was I particularly involved in them. The character of Patrick was an interesting one, and Malgwyn's development continued somewhat, but Kay -- a major feature of the first book, for me -- wasn't really present, and Bedevere didn't move forward to take that place as much as I could wish.
Another thing that bothers me is the... racial determinism. It's very black and white: Saxons are bad. The Scotti are bad. Admittedly, it's told from the point of view of someone who has no particular reason to be sympathetic in any way to the Scotti and Saxons. Still, Bernard Cornwell managed to make the Saxons the enemy at the same time as rendering them human -- I'm thinking of the narrator, Derfel, and his father... I suppose it could be moving to a less black and white view of the Saxons, as Malgwyn comes to terms with his reasons for fighting them.
Reading the author's notes is interesting, too. He refers to unsympathetic Welsh material, which I'm guessing must be the hagiographies, as I can't think of anything else I've read that is particularly unsympathetic.
(Sometimes, I long for a bibliography in books as much as I would in an academic essay. Hah.)
Tooth and Claw (Jo Walton)
Tooth and Claw is a Jane Austen-ish tale, of maidens with slightly compromised virtue, inheritances, betrothals, law suits... Except, all those involved? They're dragons. I really enjoyed how Jo Walton handled this aspect: she sets up a whole culture for the dragons, with plenty of history in the background -- not detailed so that it drags down the plot, which is very much about the present, but enough to feel real.
I have to confess, when I first started reading it, I didn't get into it very much. I picked it back up tonight, though, and read the last two thirds of it all in one go, giggling in the appropriate places and squirming on the edge of my seat, wondering how things could possibly turn out alright.
It's fun. It's inventive. It has characters you can get to care about -- I think my favourite is Sher: he seems so basically good, despite his flightiness initially, and he comes to care so much about Selendra.
My only quibble is in that something, whatever it was, in the first third that failed to catch my attention. And, I suppose, how much Jo Walton crammed in here that she didn't really get to examine in the detail I would have been interested in: the issues of the enslaved dragons, the foreign dragons, and the True Believers.
On further thought, that is just like Jane Austen, though, e.g. the light mention of the slave trade in Mansfield Park.
