James Enge's Wrath-Bearing Tree
Dear Morlock Ambrosius,
I love you, I adore you, I worship you, I have wanted to jump your crooked bones from the MOMENT you first appeared on the PAGE, dang it, and why does Vocate Aloê get all the hot Makers in Laent anyway?
Hi.
Um.
Yeah, Mr. Ambrosius, sir, I just read this book you're in. Wrath-Bearing Tree? And it's, uh, the second book of your origin trilogy, Tournament of Shadows. Last year, I read the first one, Guile of Dragons. And lordy. Can we say "slavering" and "rejoicing"?
I think we can safely say them.
'Cause, see, 'cause I already read the OTHER ONES about you, you know - Blood of Ambrose, and This Crooked Way, and OMG (omg? what? I never write that, but, Morlock, my DARLING, you deserve an o-frikkin-m-frikkin-g, my most BEAUTIFULEST ugliest one! And let's pluralize the "g" shall we, and tack on a "strange" into the bargain!), THE WOLF AGE!!!
So, having read all these, I know how you end up!!!
I know where ALL THESE SHENANIGANS are headed!!!
The Soul Bridge? The marriage? The Graith? Merlin? Ambrosia, who wants to rule the world ("the interesting parts anyway"). Hope. The Strange Gods.
Reading these origin books, it's... it's like, watching someone grow backwards, right? Like ALL THOSE LEGENDS OF MERLIN I grew up with! Do you think your clever author did that one purpose? Mr. James Cleverpants Enge???
(Speaking of Merlin... Your DAD, Morlock, is one scary mo-fo, for all he has a kindly face and boasts as big as the Old Gentleman in Georgette Heyer's The Masqueraders. He's not at ALL like the "How to Handle a Woman" Merlin mentioned in the Lerner and Loewe musical. Or even T.H. White's Merlin, come to that. A whole different level of necromantic machinations, my lad! But I knew that already, didn't I?)
But.
Oh, but.
...Even knowing your future, Morlock, mitigates not the slightest my enjoyment of discovering your past. One wants to know all there is to know about one's favorite paramours protagonists. One wants to see them emptied out (sorry about the seasickness, pal), stuffed full (you really shouldn't drink, you know), spat onto toothy seashores (you're so great about making shoes out of grass and stuff), and screwed to the STICKY PLACE.
And speaking of WHICH, Morlock!
PHEW.
This was the damned SEXIEST book I've read in a while. (I mean, all right, excluding the Chateau de la Grotte Cachée stuff I sometimes read for fun.) Certainly the sexiest book I've ever read written by a man.
Neil Gaiman and Stephen King can write good sex scenes from time to time, and I still maintain that the "back of her moist knees" section of Carlos Fuentes' The Death of Artemio Cruz wins the all-time sexiest scene EVER award, but... YOU GAVE FUENTES A RUN FOR HIS SWEATY MONEY! Lemme tell ya.
Boy, oh, boy. You and Aloê are just so GLORIOUSLY MESSY about it all. You're both like that Greg Brown song:
"She's standing in the doorway
Smoothing out her dress
Sayin' "This life is a thump-ripe melon
So sweet and such a mess."
So good. And wretched. And lovely. And true. And giving of equal time to the women characters, hot diggity!!!
P.S. Your hands.
P.P.S. YOUR EYES. Your LUMINOUS eyes.
P.P.P.S. I know that the "p" stands for "post" which means I should put all of this at the END of my blog. And since your author teaches Latin, he probably will never forgive me, so it's a good thing I never studied ANCIENT LANGUAGES from him, eh? EH?
P.P.P.P.S. See what I did there? All for you, Morlock.
And when I say messy, I do mean that this book was... wildly mucous!
Not just the sex stuff. But there was snot, and blood clots, and ichor, and acid, and glop ALL OVER THE DANG PLACE. Your author is disgusting. It is to REVEL IN.
And ALL his GODS are disgusting too. There's not a one of those bastard Kaenish deities that doesn't have a mouth where NO MOUTH OUGHTTA BE, not to mention thorns, tentacles, bristles, sphincters, and phalluses aplenty. Ga-DOING!
The fight scenes? Splendid!!! Morlock - oh! You certainly get plenty of things to WHACK with your AMAZING GLASS SWORD NAMED ARMAGEDDON!!! DING! You and Vocate Aloê and that cool staff of hers.
And I like that Vocate Aloê has even more POV time than YOU do, even if I hate her guts am perhaps just a bit mildly jealous that she gets to spend all that time with you, in the sack and out of it. I love that scene in the hollowed out pit. I love the part in the canoe. And on the island.
I love that she loves the sea. I love that the sea makes you sick. I love you two together. (All right, but I ALREADY loved you apart from her. But together!) Yes. And you, for one book, not so lonely for once. Oh, not so lonely at all.
I know how you end up. WAAAAAAAHHHHHH!!! My heart, my heart, my heart cannot bear it.
Yes, it can.
MORE!!!
All of that and mandrakes too. And demons. And dragons. And a frikkin APOTHEOSIS WHEEL! And, and, and...
SIGH.
Thank you, sir, dear Morlock, DEAREST MAKER MAN, for keeping me company again. I see I shall have to reread all the others now. Again.
But there are parts of this book that are... Yes. That are going to be very PARTICULAR mood favorites of mine.
WINK!
When you next see him, thank your nice author for me. He rocks like a rock opera. Performed on a gondola. In Italy.
Your devoted,
- C.S.E. Cooney
***
My previous experience of reading James Enge's books are thus chronicled:
Blood of Ambrose - LJ entry
This Crooked Way - Black Gate Blog
The Wolf Age - Black Gate blog
I chronicled Guile of Dragons too (Book 1 of the Origin Trilogy "Tournament of Shadows"), but I'm not gonna link to my meanderings about that here, because it's just a bunch of whining about how I NEVER WANT TO WRITE EVER AGAIN, because all I really want to do is be JAMES ENGE when I grow up!!!
But you should read the book anyway, because it is an AWESOME THING to want to be James Enge when you grow up, and I want YOU to feel that way too! PLUS DRAGONS!!! So hot. And Morlock, he, he, he BLOWS THINGS UP. And is so cute and GAWKY.
And his HANDS! HIS HANDS!
***
I love you, I adore you, I worship you, I have wanted to jump your crooked bones from the MOMENT you first appeared on the PAGE, dang it, and why does Vocate Aloê get all the hot Makers in Laent anyway?
Hi.
Um.
Yeah, Mr. Ambrosius, sir, I just read this book you're in. Wrath-Bearing Tree? And it's, uh, the second book of your origin trilogy, Tournament of Shadows. Last year, I read the first one, Guile of Dragons. And lordy. Can we say "slavering" and "rejoicing"?
I think we can safely say them.
'Cause, see, 'cause I already read the OTHER ONES about you, you know - Blood of Ambrose, and This Crooked Way, and OMG (omg? what? I never write that, but, Morlock, my DARLING, you deserve an o-frikkin-m-frikkin-g, my most BEAUTIFULEST ugliest one! And let's pluralize the "g" shall we, and tack on a "strange" into the bargain!), THE WOLF AGE!!!
So, having read all these, I know how you end up!!!
I know where ALL THESE SHENANIGANS are headed!!!
The Soul Bridge? The marriage? The Graith? Merlin? Ambrosia, who wants to rule the world ("the interesting parts anyway"). Hope. The Strange Gods.
Reading these origin books, it's... it's like, watching someone grow backwards, right? Like ALL THOSE LEGENDS OF MERLIN I grew up with! Do you think your clever author did that one purpose? Mr. James Cleverpants Enge???
(Speaking of Merlin... Your DAD, Morlock, is one scary mo-fo, for all he has a kindly face and boasts as big as the Old Gentleman in Georgette Heyer's The Masqueraders. He's not at ALL like the "How to Handle a Woman" Merlin mentioned in the Lerner and Loewe musical. Or even T.H. White's Merlin, come to that. A whole different level of necromantic machinations, my lad! But I knew that already, didn't I?)
But.
Oh, but.
...Even knowing your future, Morlock, mitigates not the slightest my enjoyment of discovering your past. One wants to know all there is to know about one's favorite paramours protagonists. One wants to see them emptied out (sorry about the seasickness, pal), stuffed full (you really shouldn't drink, you know), spat onto toothy seashores (you're so great about making shoes out of grass and stuff), and screwed to the STICKY PLACE.
And speaking of WHICH, Morlock!
PHEW.
This was the damned SEXIEST book I've read in a while. (I mean, all right, excluding the Chateau de la Grotte Cachée stuff I sometimes read for fun.) Certainly the sexiest book I've ever read written by a man.
Neil Gaiman and Stephen King can write good sex scenes from time to time, and I still maintain that the "back of her moist knees" section of Carlos Fuentes' The Death of Artemio Cruz wins the all-time sexiest scene EVER award, but... YOU GAVE FUENTES A RUN FOR HIS SWEATY MONEY! Lemme tell ya.
Boy, oh, boy. You and Aloê are just so GLORIOUSLY MESSY about it all. You're both like that Greg Brown song:
"She's standing in the doorway
Smoothing out her dress
Sayin' "This life is a thump-ripe melon
So sweet and such a mess."
So good. And wretched. And lovely. And true. And giving of equal time to the women characters, hot diggity!!!
P.S. Your hands.
P.P.S. YOUR EYES. Your LUMINOUS eyes.
P.P.P.S. I know that the "p" stands for "post" which means I should put all of this at the END of my blog. And since your author teaches Latin, he probably will never forgive me, so it's a good thing I never studied ANCIENT LANGUAGES from him, eh? EH?
P.P.P.P.S. See what I did there? All for you, Morlock.
And when I say messy, I do mean that this book was... wildly mucous!
Not just the sex stuff. But there was snot, and blood clots, and ichor, and acid, and glop ALL OVER THE DANG PLACE. Your author is disgusting. It is to REVEL IN.
And ALL his GODS are disgusting too. There's not a one of those bastard Kaenish deities that doesn't have a mouth where NO MOUTH OUGHTTA BE, not to mention thorns, tentacles, bristles, sphincters, and phalluses aplenty. Ga-DOING!
The fight scenes? Splendid!!! Morlock - oh! You certainly get plenty of things to WHACK with your AMAZING GLASS SWORD NAMED ARMAGEDDON!!! DING! You and Vocate Aloê and that cool staff of hers.
And I like that Vocate Aloê has even more POV time than YOU do, even if I hate her guts am perhaps just a bit mildly jealous that she gets to spend all that time with you, in the sack and out of it. I love that scene in the hollowed out pit. I love the part in the canoe. And on the island.
I love that she loves the sea. I love that the sea makes you sick. I love you two together. (All right, but I ALREADY loved you apart from her. But together!) Yes. And you, for one book, not so lonely for once. Oh, not so lonely at all.
I know how you end up. WAAAAAAAHHHHHH!!! My heart, my heart, my heart cannot bear it.
Yes, it can.
MORE!!!
All of that and mandrakes too. And demons. And dragons. And a frikkin APOTHEOSIS WHEEL! And, and, and...
SIGH.
Thank you, sir, dear Morlock, DEAREST MAKER MAN, for keeping me company again. I see I shall have to reread all the others now. Again.
But there are parts of this book that are... Yes. That are going to be very PARTICULAR mood favorites of mine.
WINK!
When you next see him, thank your nice author for me. He rocks like a rock opera. Performed on a gondola. In Italy.
Your devoted,
- C.S.E. Cooney
***
My previous experience of reading James Enge's books are thus chronicled:
Blood of Ambrose - LJ entry
This Crooked Way - Black Gate Blog
The Wolf Age - Black Gate blog
I chronicled Guile of Dragons too (Book 1 of the Origin Trilogy "Tournament of Shadows"), but I'm not gonna link to my meanderings about that here, because it's just a bunch of whining about how I NEVER WANT TO WRITE EVER AGAIN, because all I really want to do is be JAMES ENGE when I grow up!!!
But you should read the book anyway, because it is an AWESOME THING to want to be James Enge when you grow up, and I want YOU to feel that way too! PLUS DRAGONS!!! So hot. And Morlock, he, he, he BLOWS THINGS UP. And is so cute and GAWKY.
And his HANDS! HIS HANDS!
***