book reviews for winged people (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
booksofafeather) wrote2011-03-10 10:51 pm
booksofafeather) wrote2011-03-10 10:51 pm
Entry tags:
The Wayfarer Redemption
Short review: A heroic war story of a similar type to The Black Gryphon, in which a people threatened by a strange monstrous enemy discover that what they believed about their world and its history is not what it seems. However, for this sort of story, I liked The Black Gryphon much more. The different races were interesting and there were some beautiful descriptions in some places, but it's hard to like the characters so the story feels slow... I can't really recommend it. There's also some sexist aspects and a lot of violent scenes.
Writing: As said before, I found that the characters weren't people I could like easily... at the beginning you get a feeling that what they believe is wrong, which has a plot reason, but it means that it's hard to sympathise. I also felt that there were a lot of places where the book could have gone into detail about what a character's feelings were and had some interesting story, but it just skimmed over the surface so the emotional connections didn't feel deep. It feels more like a description of what people did than what they felt, which I guess is just not the kind of story I like.
From a winged person's perspective...: The winged people in this book are interesting... they had some habits that seemed false for me but also some that seemed realistic. There are some beautiful parts like how one of the children's wings had to be sung into being. One of the main characters is half Icarii (the winged people), but the book missed out on any opportunity for him to think about how this feels to him... whether he has any longing to be more physically like them or not. They come into it quite late though so for most of the book you don't see them, and I felt in general that there were a lot of opportunities to explore what "being a winged person meant" since the book was all about conflict between races, but I didn't see it at all. Most of the time you see them they're being injured. I don't think there's enough of them in here to recommend it just for that.
Trigger warnings: Rape. Mistreating women. A lot of horrific war violence that's described graphically, including a lot of damage to wings. Some characters lose their wings in the war.
More thoughts...: I started by finding this a slightly boring book... I didn't agree with the main characters and it had too much talk of who is illegitimate, court politics, and brute-like, warring men. Then there was a moment at which it turned around drastically and things are not as they seem, and I thought that this book was going to save itself... but then it lost itself again. There were a couple of moments like that. It gives high hopes that it might go to interesting places, but in the end, it couldn't live up to that.
Too often a character is described as "only a woman" or some negative reference is made to women. Usually, reading a book I will not think too badly of it if it's just one time (although I mention it), but this book did it a lot. I think it was trying to show the viewpoints of some of the worse characters, but the problem is that you start out with these characters so it's hard to like them, and no one ever challenges it.
I felt that Axis' half heritage could be used to do an interesting otherkin narrative. Being trapped between the worlds, which did he feel more like? But it isn't talked about... his concerns are more about whether he has a family and what his fellow people think about the "Forbidden" (as the non-humans are known by the humans) than what he feels about being half-winged person. Similarly the book could have shown some interesting thoughts on what it's like to be winged, but you didn't see inside the characters enough to know. There were a few little nice details about them, like how one of the characters felt his vanity was hurt as well as his body when a large number of his feathers were pulled out to treat an injury (I'm not sure that's the best way to treat a wing injury but...), but it never goes into detail. I think they try so hard to make the characters be "hard warrior types" that you can't know what makes them come alive.
Also, there are things like a character running his wing over the stone wall to feel where he is going even though he was also using his hand... if you are close enough to use your hand, it's needless to use a wing and you might damage the feathers. Maybe there was some extra sense of the wall's structure that he could pick up more easily using the feather vibrations, but again it isn't told about. The lack of any detail on things like this really lets the book down I think.
Well... I wanted to like this... but I couldn't in the end... I guess I would have to give it a two. It's a shame because there is so much they could have done interesting things with. I guess that for the heroic war stories, I'm going back to Mercedes Lackey. ^^;
Writing: As said before, I found that the characters weren't people I could like easily... at the beginning you get a feeling that what they believe is wrong, which has a plot reason, but it means that it's hard to sympathise. I also felt that there were a lot of places where the book could have gone into detail about what a character's feelings were and had some interesting story, but it just skimmed over the surface so the emotional connections didn't feel deep. It feels more like a description of what people did than what they felt, which I guess is just not the kind of story I like.
From a winged person's perspective...: The winged people in this book are interesting... they had some habits that seemed false for me but also some that seemed realistic. There are some beautiful parts like how one of the children's wings had to be sung into being. One of the main characters is half Icarii (the winged people), but the book missed out on any opportunity for him to think about how this feels to him... whether he has any longing to be more physically like them or not. They come into it quite late though so for most of the book you don't see them, and I felt in general that there were a lot of opportunities to explore what "being a winged person meant" since the book was all about conflict between races, but I didn't see it at all. Most of the time you see them they're being injured. I don't think there's enough of them in here to recommend it just for that.
Trigger warnings: Rape. Mistreating women. A lot of horrific war violence that's described graphically, including a lot of damage to wings. Some characters lose their wings in the war.
More thoughts...: I started by finding this a slightly boring book... I didn't agree with the main characters and it had too much talk of who is illegitimate, court politics, and brute-like, warring men. Then there was a moment at which it turned around drastically and things are not as they seem, and I thought that this book was going to save itself... but then it lost itself again. There were a couple of moments like that. It gives high hopes that it might go to interesting places, but in the end, it couldn't live up to that.
Too often a character is described as "only a woman" or some negative reference is made to women. Usually, reading a book I will not think too badly of it if it's just one time (although I mention it), but this book did it a lot. I think it was trying to show the viewpoints of some of the worse characters, but the problem is that you start out with these characters so it's hard to like them, and no one ever challenges it.
I felt that Axis' half heritage could be used to do an interesting otherkin narrative. Being trapped between the worlds, which did he feel more like? But it isn't talked about... his concerns are more about whether he has a family and what his fellow people think about the "Forbidden" (as the non-humans are known by the humans) than what he feels about being half-winged person. Similarly the book could have shown some interesting thoughts on what it's like to be winged, but you didn't see inside the characters enough to know. There were a few little nice details about them, like how one of the characters felt his vanity was hurt as well as his body when a large number of his feathers were pulled out to treat an injury (I'm not sure that's the best way to treat a wing injury but...), but it never goes into detail. I think they try so hard to make the characters be "hard warrior types" that you can't know what makes them come alive.
Also, there are things like a character running his wing over the stone wall to feel where he is going even though he was also using his hand... if you are close enough to use your hand, it's needless to use a wing and you might damage the feathers. Maybe there was some extra sense of the wall's structure that he could pick up more easily using the feather vibrations, but again it isn't told about. The lack of any detail on things like this really lets the book down I think.
Well... I wanted to like this... but I couldn't in the end... I guess I would have to give it a two. It's a shame because there is so much they could have done interesting things with. I guess that for the heroic war stories, I'm going back to Mercedes Lackey. ^^;