Bartlett and the Ice Voyage by Odo Hirsch

This short children's book is a lot of fun. It has adventure and clearly delineated characters and there is a lot of interest in watching choices that characters make, and why. Few authors can create dramatic tension over whether a character will keep their promise or not.

A taste of Hirsch's offbeat style can be found by reading this interview. The little pencil drawings by Andrew McLean complement the story nicely.

Bartlett and the Ice Voyage first published in 1998

Child of a Rainless Year by Jane Lindskold

I was reading this book thinking yes, a so far well done version of coming of age story, (sub genre, young woman receives inheritance and sets off to find the mystery of her past and birth parents); when suddenly the woman turns out to be in her early fifties as she sets off to see her inherited house and look for her past.

One of the themes of this book is that other coming of age, when parents die and we stand on the threshold of old age ourselves. Or late middle age, as Old Age seems to have shifted to being older than 70 now. The other theme is change and thresholds, when we choose to change or stay the same, and whether we accept parental views of us or not. The author is American, so naturally change equals growth equals a good thing. Which it is in this book, though not always in real life.

I enjoyed this book, though around the middle I was thinking not much has happened yet. However, most of what we learned turned out to be necessary, though maybe not the detailing of what most meals were - though you could make the case the author is using food to show how Mira has moved to a different culture in the shift from Ohio to New Mexico. I also enjoyed the deftness with which the author set a fantasy in the modern world, email and magical happenings rarely seem so right together on the same page.

The climax of the book was particularly strong. This is the first Lindskold I have read, but I will look for more.

Child of a Rainless Year was first published in 2005

Other reading and Chetwynd-Hayes

I have been reading New Scientist magazines from the library, and re-reading some Patricia Wentworths, and trying a few library books. R. Chetwynd-Hayes (World of the Impossible) completely failed my style test. He is full of people retorting and admitting and enquiring and pleading and snapping instead of just saying. Even when it is obvious who is speaking he has to tell you. This gets very wearing in just a few pages.

The stereotypical characters are English and the time supposedly the 1960's, for the brief time they are in Britain, but their speech and class relationships seem pre-World War II or earlier. One character is given a briefing paper on all the characters (including himself) and where they are going, and all seven pages are plonked into the text at that point. This is lazy writing.

After a while I started flicking pages at random, looking for cliches; I never had to read more than half a page to find one. How did this bloke get the British Fantasy Award? Even if it wasn't for this book, which I didn't finish.

World of the Impossible first published 1998

Poetry and Wislawa Szymborska

When I read a translation, I often wonder how much is the author and how much the translator. Here are 2 translations of the same poem, which is about an idea so translates better than most I should think. I like lines from both poems. Szymborska won the Nobel Literature prize in 1996 for her poetry, and is a very interesting poet.

In Praise of Feeling Bad About Yourself
The buzzard never says it is to blame.
The panther wouldn't know what scruples mean.
When the piranha strikes, it feels no shame.
If snakes had hands, they'd claim their hands were clean.

A jackal doesn't understand remorse.
Lions and lice don't waver in their course.
Why should they, when they know they're right?

Though hearts of killer whales may weigh a ton,
In every other way they're light.

On this third planet of the sun,
among the signs of bestiality
A clear conscience is Number One.


IN PRAISE OF SELF- DEPRECATION

The Buzzard has nothing to fault himself with.
Scruples are alien to the black panther.
Piranhas do not doubt the rightness of their actions.
The rattlesnake approves of himself without reservations.

The self-critical jackal does not exist.
The locust, alligator, trichina, horsefly
Live as they live and are glad of it.

The killer-whale’s heart weighs one hundred kilos
but in other respects it is light.

There is nothing more animal-like
than a clear conscience
on the third planet of the Sun.

There are more translated poems here, try the two about the soul (one poem, different translators, one version much better than the other I think) and my favourite, A Word on Statistics.

When the King Comes Home by Caroline Stevermer

In this short book Stevermer uses that difficult to achieve technique, the first person narrative where we see the person's character as they tell the tale - think of Browning's dramatic poetry, such as My Last Duchess.

Hail Rosamer has the artist's single minded determination and blinkered view.The obvious disparity between Hail's view of her character and her place in events, and those of the people around her can be amusing, and yet it is fairly subtly done. And the events are interesting - Stevermer has no trouble producing interesting plots.

This is the first Stevermer I ever read, the one that made me seek out other books she had written, and on re-reading I still like it best.

When the King Comes Home first published 2000

A Scholar of Magics by Caroline Stevermer

An interesting theme in this book is its look at what different people need and want to live a satisfying life. What is a satisfying life to one person may not be to another. Though this is just a side issue to the plot, which is seen through the eyes of an American in Britain (late Victorian or Edwardian times).

Though this is set soon after A College of Magics, you don't need to have read the first book, as it is not a direct sequel, more set in the same world. Jane Brailsford is the only common character on stage. I like this book better than the first, probably because of the assortment of clearly delineated and eccentric characters. And the ending, of course.

Patum Peperium, or Gentleman's Relish, is an anchovy paste.
A Scholar of Magics first published in 2004

A College of Magics by Caroline Stevermer

The first time I read this book I liked it but thought it was a little disjointed. It doesn’t seem that way on re-reading though. The book is divided into 3 parts, in the first Faris goes to a college cum finishing school (and reads a lot of three part novels), the second is journeying (with several stops) and the third, well that would give away too much plot.

Faris has had plenty of things in her life to make her defensive, which makes her uncomfortable for many people as a Point Of View character. Also this book makes you feel the emotional cost of being a hero and losing what is important to you. Usually this story is told from the POV of a trusty sidekick rather that the hero. So much more comfortable for the reader to be able to sympathize with losses from the outside! Not that the ending is that miserable at all.

It is also a fantasy that is not medieval, and although set around 1900, is not steampunk. This is one of those books that some people like a lot and most people don’t. I like it a lot.

A College of Magic first published 1994