![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
psocopteraStarless, Jacqueline Carey standalone fantasy novel, entirely separate universe than anything else afaik. I liked the first third of this a lot, the second third fairly well also, and the third third sadly much less. Like, interesting characters and set-up, but then it degenerated into way-too-straightforward collection and redemption of plot coupons, relying on imagery rather than character beats to sustain interest. Useful exercise for me, though, contemplating why the Kushiel books work so well and this didn't.
Behind this cut, a GIANT SPOILER for a major aspect of the book, which I started the book without knowing about and enjoyed being surprised by: The one cool thing she pulled off, or at least I found it cool, was that the first-person narration opens with an extended training montage of our young hero chosen from birth being raised in the all-male warrior brotherhood yadda yadda and then at some point in his early adolescence our young man finds out that he's afab and just culturally male and everyone knows this but him. And then once he's 16 and off serving his princess he gets to experiment with dressing female sometimes, and eventually concludes he's both but with male pronouns. Which was neat! Except that the heavily gendered and homophobic fantasy world kind of made me miss the queerer world of the Kushiel books, not that they were ever quite as queer as I wanted them to be (Let Imriel Fuck Men 2kForever), but it always seemed like they might be about to be.
Behind this cut, a GIANT SPOILER for a major aspect of the book, which I started the book without knowing about and enjoyed being surprised by: The one cool thing she pulled off, or at least I found it cool, was that the first-person narration opens with an extended training montage of our young hero chosen from birth being raised in the all-male warrior brotherhood yadda yadda and then at some point in his early adolescence our young man finds out that he's afab and just culturally male and everyone knows this but him. And then once he's 16 and off serving his princess he gets to experiment with dressing female sometimes, and eventually concludes he's both but with male pronouns. Which was neat! Except that the heavily gendered and homophobic fantasy world kind of made me miss the queerer world of the Kushiel books, not that they were ever quite as queer as I wanted them to be (Let Imriel Fuck Men 2kForever), but it always seemed like they might be about to be.
