Mary Gentle, The Book of Ash

[heresluck]

Here's a book situation I'd like some input on from those of you in the know...

A year or so ago, I picked up the first volume of Mary Gentle's The Book of Ash (published in two four volumes in U.S. paperback). It had ended up on my list on the basis of its being mentioned by someone (don't remember who) in an LJ conversation about something (don'

Comments

[cofax7]

I think The Book of Ash is uncategorizable, and also brilliant. I do need to reread, because as you note it's quite an investment of effort.

I was, however, very pleased I stuck with it (urged on by Mely). Even if I'd never read anything else by Mary Gentle, I can't fault her ambition. She takes what looks like a fairly simple alternate universe (in which a woman could become a mercenary captain in the 1500s), and warps it, and twists it, and turns it into something else entirely. What it ends up as, I can't tell you. *grin*

That said, I think the sequence is a bit too long -- the last volume, in particular, drags a bit. But the story she's telling, the slow revelation of what's actually going on -- man, it's more than enough to make it worth the investment. It's a mind-fucker of the best sort.

You should also read Golden Witchbreed and Ancient Light; they're more (if earlier) examples of Gentle doing subversive things with the genre.

Just MHO: YBMV, as the Buffistas say.

[coffeeandink]

What Suela said.

The series was published as one huge novel in the UK, which I think is the right way to look at it, and although it contains more medieval warfare than I have ever cared to read about, I thought it was worth going through those sections for the HSQ and mindfucks of the plot. I was especially pleased when the framing sequence proved critical rather than arbitrary. I think books two and three were my favorite of the four.

I'm also fond of Golden Witchbreed and Ancient Light (the latter is a minority opinion), although I would call Ash, Rats & Gargoyles, and The Architecture of Desire her most accomplished work so far. I was really disappointed not to see 1610, Or A Sundial in a Grave in the Wiscon dealers' room, because it hasn't been published in the US yet and I haven't been able to convince myself to spring for international shipping.

[coffeeandink]

A year or so ago, I picked up the first volume of Mary Gentle's The Book of Ash (published in two volumes in U.S. paperback).

I didn't catch this the first time through; in case it wasn't clear from comments, The Book of Ash is four volumes, not two.

[heresluck]

Yes, got it; I knew there were more, but hadn't realized all *four* were originally one volume. Yikes.

another two cents

[leadensky]

So, for those of you who've read The Book of Ash, I'd like to hear why you liked it and/or what I should like or find interesting about it.

Has horses, rats, human breeding programs, and robots, all in the same book by someone who isn't C.J. Cherryh.

The ending makes my head hurt. It's everthing cofax said it is, but it still makes my head hurt.

The grit and horror of warfare are brillantly displayed. So if you're a fan of gently done Authur romances, this is probably not your cuppa.

Even with the warfighting and the ending aside, it is *very* dense. Not Tolkien dense, but towards that end of the scale. And it only gets more dense towards the end.

Mely rec'ed it. You should always listen to Mely when she talks about books.

-hossgal

Re: another two cents

[heresluck]

Thank you; very helpful. Gritty and dense are not inherently problems for me, as long as I know the book's going somewhere interesting.

Of course, if I'd remembered that Mely was the reason I'd gotten it in the first place, I wouldn't have needed to ask. My only defense is that so MANY things are on my list because of Mely that I can no longer be expected to keep track. Heh.

[ide_cyan]

ASH rocks. Someone gave me the first volume of the US edition. I read that, and then I went and bought the huge UK one-volume edition (1113 pages! Wooo!) that was available in a Montreal bookstore in paperback, and passed on the first volume to someone else. It's one of the two Gentle books I've managed to finish (the other one being Grunts!) so far. In fact, I devoured it in what... a week? two?

Stick with it. The book only gets better and better, as as Mely said: the framing structure is critical. And don't let anybody spoil you about the plot twists!!!

(Or the jokes. Page 820. Bwahahahaha...)

[kate_nepveu]

Wandering by . . .

I read all of _Ash_, compulsively, and then looked at it when I was done and said, "You know, I didn't actually *enjoy* that."

Partly it was the gritty, but mostly when I thought about the framing story I refused to believe it: I just can't accept the main narrative as an academic translation. And the framing device does, as others have said, demand that you take it seriously.

This probably says more about me as a reader than about _Ash_. If the framing story hasn't bothered you so far, you're probably good to go with the rest.

[coffeeandink]

Oh, I couldn't take the main narrative seriously as a translation -- it's just not a medieval narrative, even with embellishment. But that didn't affect my opinion of the rest of the framing story.

[kate_nepveu]

It's been a bit since I read it, but you're right--of course it is not, and can not be, a translated document, particularly given the ending. Maybe I wouldn't have minded that if the frame story wasn't there, and so I could treat the translation as a polite, err, fiction. (Cf. _The King's Name_.)

Anyway. I certainly appear to be in the minority when it comes to _Ash_. (It's interesting to me how purist I've become about, umm, integrity of narrative devices, if that makes sense.)

[heresluck]

I read all of _Ash_, compulsively, and then looked at it when I was done and said, "You know, I didn't actually *enjoy* that."

This interests me because it's almost exactly my own reaction to the first volume, but for different reasons.

Thanks for commenting, and especially for explaining that your reaction had to do with the frame story; the framing device isn't putting me off (at least not yet), so based on your thoughts and others', I'm going to keep on with it.