War for the Oaks and the magic of law
Aug. 31st, 2005 11:26 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
avreliaI finished the War for the Oaks by Emma Bull. I liked it a lot, but I expected to like it much more. Unreasonable expectations? May be.
It is strange – reading a book everyone around read long ago and loves. Well, it is never every one really, but enough to pick up the general attitude.
War for the Oaks is a wonderful book and I thoroughly enjoyed it, plus it is the urban fantasy, which at this point is my favorite subgenre.
But there were “buts”. ;)
The heroine is a great fun. It is hard not to like Eddie – but this is the problem, too. Why is she so lovable, where are her shortcomings? She doesn’t leave an impression of a Mary Sue, but she doesn’t feel to me like a real person. She is just a little bit unbelievably cool. Or am I too critical?
The plot itself seems rather predictable – or every plot after certain amount of books read seems so? I can’t say what will happen, but I can guess what kind of event will happen and how it all will work with great certainty. It is not always a bad thing – I absolutely loved the whole development of love between Eddie and the phouka, and even though I could guess, it didn’t spoil the fun.
Oh, and the phouka is beyond adorable. ;)
On the other hand, I quite loved Willy as well – he possess two qualities that I value: desire to learn and curiosity and the ability to change. That’s why I was didn’t like that he died – he just started to change – and I would love to see the progress.
His death brought me thoughts about the characters’ death in general. The death in fiction is always happens by the author’s design, even if the author is following the story and its demands. How the death in fiction may be written (filmed) so it wouldn’t feel contrived? Sometimes it happens – death doesn’t necessarily feels natural, but I don’t think about author, I think about characters, and sometimes I keep thinking about the author, and what the authors means by it – which create the impression of the death for the sake of plot, not the natural part of the story.
For the positive example I can refer to The Sandman – there we enjoy Death’s company ;)
The clothes are described with amazing precision, and the eighties’ clothes sound so funny!
The fairy folk raise the following question – what are they doing in USA? Why would they need to bother about it? Why the Seelie Court is better then Unseelie? Or, better, why the Unseelie court is evil? ( I am not very versed in the Faery lore)
The music is confusing, too. I wish I could hear it – the music on paper is too complicated, it is something I cannot quite imagine, and for the most of the book I felt the characters are speaking a strange language that I should have understood but cannot.
Which lead me to this- there should be more fantasy stories about lawyers and law. Law is the arcane knowledge only a specially trained adept can wield. Once upon a time I wrote a short story about commercial magic. I was seriously stressed, and the story is quite juvenile, but I am still fond of the idea of the enchantment of purchase and sale and magical bonds…
Legalese is formalized and incomprehensible enough to pass for a spell.
The really should be fantasy lawyers. :: looks over her friends list::
And if you know such a story feel free to recommend.
And if you know how law is just like magic, do tell. ;)
It is strange – reading a book everyone around read long ago and loves. Well, it is never every one really, but enough to pick up the general attitude.
War for the Oaks is a wonderful book and I thoroughly enjoyed it, plus it is the urban fantasy, which at this point is my favorite subgenre.
But there were “buts”. ;)
The heroine is a great fun. It is hard not to like Eddie – but this is the problem, too. Why is she so lovable, where are her shortcomings? She doesn’t leave an impression of a Mary Sue, but she doesn’t feel to me like a real person. She is just a little bit unbelievably cool. Or am I too critical?
The plot itself seems rather predictable – or every plot after certain amount of books read seems so? I can’t say what will happen, but I can guess what kind of event will happen and how it all will work with great certainty. It is not always a bad thing – I absolutely loved the whole development of love between Eddie and the phouka, and even though I could guess, it didn’t spoil the fun.
Oh, and the phouka is beyond adorable. ;)
On the other hand, I quite loved Willy as well – he possess two qualities that I value: desire to learn and curiosity and the ability to change. That’s why I was didn’t like that he died – he just started to change – and I would love to see the progress.
His death brought me thoughts about the characters’ death in general. The death in fiction is always happens by the author’s design, even if the author is following the story and its demands. How the death in fiction may be written (filmed) so it wouldn’t feel contrived? Sometimes it happens – death doesn’t necessarily feels natural, but I don’t think about author, I think about characters, and sometimes I keep thinking about the author, and what the authors means by it – which create the impression of the death for the sake of plot, not the natural part of the story.
For the positive example I can refer to The Sandman – there we enjoy Death’s company ;)
The clothes are described with amazing precision, and the eighties’ clothes sound so funny!
The fairy folk raise the following question – what are they doing in USA? Why would they need to bother about it? Why the Seelie Court is better then Unseelie? Or, better, why the Unseelie court is evil? ( I am not very versed in the Faery lore)
The music is confusing, too. I wish I could hear it – the music on paper is too complicated, it is something I cannot quite imagine, and for the most of the book I felt the characters are speaking a strange language that I should have understood but cannot.
Which lead me to this- there should be more fantasy stories about lawyers and law. Law is the arcane knowledge only a specially trained adept can wield. Once upon a time I wrote a short story about commercial magic. I was seriously stressed, and the story is quite juvenile, but I am still fond of the idea of the enchantment of purchase and sale and magical bonds…
Legalese is formalized and incomprehensible enough to pass for a spell.
The really should be fantasy lawyers. :: looks over her friends list::
And if you know such a story feel free to recommend.
And if you know how law is just like magic, do tell. ;)
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no subject
Date: 2005-09-01 01:55 pm (UTC)The plot itself seems rather predictable – or every plot after certain amount of books read seems so?
I think that's part of the problem - this was one of the first real urban fantasies written, but now the genre is fairly common, so anybody reading this book for the first time has probably already read lots of similar books!
Why the Seelie Court is better then Unseelie? Or, better, why the Unseelie court is evil? ( I am not very versed in the Faery lore)
Seelie vs. Unseelie is traditional Faery lore, with the Seelie court typically being nicer towards humans and so forth while the Seelie are completely amoral.
no subject
Date: 2005-09-03 02:56 am (UTC)Exactly. I wish I read it ten years ago. It could rock my world.
anybody reading this book for the first time has probably already read lots of similar books!
Yes, that and that I am reading now much more critically then before - thanks to constant reviewing and arguments about certain TV shows and books in LJ
I'd love to know more - do you have any recommendations - not fiction but something readable.
(my knowledge of Celtic folklore comes from Yeats, Irish ghost stories and some fun books I don't remember names of. But Faery is not so much Celtic as British - with more stuff mixed in)
no subject
Date: 2005-09-01 05:30 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-09-03 02:47 am (UTC)But the sandman is good for every age/mood/nation