What I was reading a few weeks ago, actually
After rereading the three previous books, I read
Winterkeep by Kirsten Cashore.
From the beginning, it’s clear there’ll be more trippiness in this book than in any other in the Graceling Realm series so far. In a pattern followed throughout all the parts of this book, the POV is split between five characters, and every part starts with that of a sentient seacreature, who may or may not be a legendary figure from a fairy tale. She is not the only sentient animal in and around Winterkeep, there are the silbercows, purplish creatures, like seals but larger, although they reminded me of dolphins, who interact with some humans; the blue foxes, who are said to telepathically communicate with a human of their choice; and, in a cameo appearance, sponges, who are, I presume, meant to remind us of cracky cartoons that I don’t watch. There have been trippy passages in past books, such as when Katsa and Po go up the mountains in ‘Graceling’ and that period when Fire is out of her right mind thanks to Leck, but still.
We return to more familiar characters in Bitterblue City, in a series of chapters that made me think ‘Whoa, exposition central’. For a while, I wondered whether it would have been better to set ‘Winterkeep’ earlier - it takes place about five years after the end of ’Bitterblue’ - and show a lot of what’s explained. The Monsean alliance with the Pikkians and Dells has led them to discover a whole new, technologically advanced continent, to start ro trade and interact with its countries, and to learn at least one new language. Bitterblue’s reforms have started to take root in Monsea, while the Council is facing up to the consequences of dethroning a bad king, as the new government that replaced him is no great shakes either. The seven kindgoms have become the seven nations although the people of Torla call it the Royal Continent. A message about the McGuffin mineral, zilfinium, makes Bitterblue think she should finally agree to visit Winterkeep, the nearest country to the Royal continent, and investigate the mysterious deaths of two of her advisers there.
My disgruntlement about the exposition was somewhat mollified by our also gettig caught up on the romantic front. Bitterblue has moved on from Sapphire (who now has a thing with Skye, Po’s brother)…to a series of lovers, one of whom accuses her of not giving away her heart. It’s not anunfair accusation. Meanwhile it’s clear that Giddon, still based at Bitterblue’s court, would do anything for her, and she’s in danger of pointing to the highest peak and saying ‘Climb that.’
But she asks him to come with her to Winterkeep, along with Hava and less interesting characters. (I had wanted to see Helda react to the ship, but instead we get to see Hava be a brat around Gibbon’s tolerance.)
The other big POV character is Lovisa Cavenda, one of the children of Winterkeep’s ruling elite. Her parents are big political players. Aged sixteen, she collects secrets and information, but in searching for the solution to a minor mystery, finds out there’s a lot she doesn’t know.
At first, Lovisa is not entirely sympathetic, although our sympathy grows as we understand how abusive her life has been (something she too comes to realise). What’s interesting is that after a run of absent, mainly good mother’s (Katsa’s dead mother never even gets named IIRC, Fire’s mother died when she was a baby, and Ashen, Bitterblue’s mother, memorably died when her daughter was 10), Ferla Cavenda is a bad mother, her punishments are cruel and sadistic. Lovisa lives in the Academy, and gingerly returns home for visits, for she loves her three younger brothers and her father is her favourite parent, but it’s clear from having grown up in a house of machinations, where Ferla uses ‘her’ fox, who is telepathically bonded to her, as a spy why Lovisa’s worldview is so cynical and why information is her currency.
The Monseans party arrives at winterkeep, but after a terrible calamity. They are particularly well equipped to see through the facade of Winterkeep’s lies, for all that they are less technologically advanced and Bitterblue has been cheated by many Winterkeep businesses. Their mental fortitude, honed by Leck’s reign and interaction with the Dells, the abilities of Gracelings like Hava, and all the trauma that Bitterblue, in particular, has endured help them.
But they have to face dreadful things - without giving too much away, it was Bitterblue’s need to ration tears that got to me. Separated, both Giddon and Bitterblue turn to imaginary constructs of the other for strength - Giddon already had a fairly good idea of how he felt about Bitterblue, and flashbacks only underline what was obvious from the previous book, namely that he had good reason to still hope, despite the stream of boyfriends.
This book is more candid about sex than previous ones in the series, though still in an YA appropriate way, but it’s part of how the damaged Lovisa navigates her world, not fully understanding her power and privileges, not quite getting how sex fits into an emotional context for the longest time.
There’s also an environmental theme: the silbercows talk to humans in the hope that they will realise that the sea and land are connected, that human activity has an impact on them. One of Winterkeep’s political parties, the Scholars, pays lip service to environmentalism, but who the silbercows choose to talk to is telling.
And there there’s ‘foxkind’ and their secrets. I got a bit irate that we learn quite early on that the fox that was bonded to Ferla Cavenda has a name, but it’s not used. Instead it’s always that circumvoluted ‘the fox that was bonded to Ferla Cavenda’ although by the end I could see it was intentional, but it didn’t quite work.
Lovisa has to do things that she thought were unthinkable, as the learns that people she thought she knew did even worse. The contrast between her perspective of herself and that of others is striking, but changes, as her perspective grows. She gets to see more of Winterkeep, leaving Ledra, its capital city, for the ‘country’ and ‘the north’ gaining a glimpse of the lives of non-elite members and how they shift.
There were points, more perhaps at the beginning, when the various elements seemed so disparate - and it takes a long time to bring them all together - where I wondered whether the author’s heart was entirely in this book. I mean, I appreciated finding out what happened next in Bitterblue’s reign and with her and Giddon, so as a reader I was glad Cashore had returned to this series after ‘Jane Unlimited’. In Lovisa and Bitterblue, we see two examples at different stages of damaged girls growing into strong young women, who will help other girls, as Bitterblue helps Lovisa. As Katsa helped Bitterblue - there’s a key moment where a memory of Katsa hugely helps Bitterblue. There are mantras: ‘you are worthy of love’ and ‘I am stronger than what X is trying to make me feel’ for readers who empathise. There are consequences and possibilities. Apparently Cashore is writing about Hava next, Hava, the spy, Hava, who loves her half-sister (and probably knew that she’d got together with Giddon, even as Bitterblue was still trying to keep it on the QT.) I’m clearly invested in these characters, and it’ll be interesting to focus on a girl with magical powers - Bitterblue’s and Lovisa’s extraordinary powers arise from their positions and experiences. But for all that the Gracleing realm has got more complex, none of the boks have quite reached the standard of ‘Graceling’.
This entry was originally posted at https://shallowness.dreamwidth.org/473273.html.
Winterkeep by Kirsten Cashore.
From the beginning, it’s clear there’ll be more trippiness in this book than in any other in the Graceling Realm series so far. In a pattern followed throughout all the parts of this book, the POV is split between five characters, and every part starts with that of a sentient seacreature, who may or may not be a legendary figure from a fairy tale. She is not the only sentient animal in and around Winterkeep, there are the silbercows, purplish creatures, like seals but larger, although they reminded me of dolphins, who interact with some humans; the blue foxes, who are said to telepathically communicate with a human of their choice; and, in a cameo appearance, sponges, who are, I presume, meant to remind us of cracky cartoons that I don’t watch. There have been trippy passages in past books, such as when Katsa and Po go up the mountains in ‘Graceling’ and that period when Fire is out of her right mind thanks to Leck, but still.
We return to more familiar characters in Bitterblue City, in a series of chapters that made me think ‘Whoa, exposition central’. For a while, I wondered whether it would have been better to set ‘Winterkeep’ earlier - it takes place about five years after the end of ’Bitterblue’ - and show a lot of what’s explained. The Monsean alliance with the Pikkians and Dells has led them to discover a whole new, technologically advanced continent, to start ro trade and interact with its countries, and to learn at least one new language. Bitterblue’s reforms have started to take root in Monsea, while the Council is facing up to the consequences of dethroning a bad king, as the new government that replaced him is no great shakes either. The seven kindgoms have become the seven nations although the people of Torla call it the Royal Continent. A message about the McGuffin mineral, zilfinium, makes Bitterblue think she should finally agree to visit Winterkeep, the nearest country to the Royal continent, and investigate the mysterious deaths of two of her advisers there.
My disgruntlement about the exposition was somewhat mollified by our also gettig caught up on the romantic front. Bitterblue has moved on from Sapphire (who now has a thing with Skye, Po’s brother)…to a series of lovers, one of whom accuses her of not giving away her heart. It’s not anunfair accusation. Meanwhile it’s clear that Giddon, still based at Bitterblue’s court, would do anything for her, and she’s in danger of pointing to the highest peak and saying ‘Climb that.’
But she asks him to come with her to Winterkeep, along with Hava and less interesting characters. (I had wanted to see Helda react to the ship, but instead we get to see Hava be a brat around Gibbon’s tolerance.)
The other big POV character is Lovisa Cavenda, one of the children of Winterkeep’s ruling elite. Her parents are big political players. Aged sixteen, she collects secrets and information, but in searching for the solution to a minor mystery, finds out there’s a lot she doesn’t know.
At first, Lovisa is not entirely sympathetic, although our sympathy grows as we understand how abusive her life has been (something she too comes to realise). What’s interesting is that after a run of absent, mainly good mother’s (Katsa’s dead mother never even gets named IIRC, Fire’s mother died when she was a baby, and Ashen, Bitterblue’s mother, memorably died when her daughter was 10), Ferla Cavenda is a bad mother, her punishments are cruel and sadistic. Lovisa lives in the Academy, and gingerly returns home for visits, for she loves her three younger brothers and her father is her favourite parent, but it’s clear from having grown up in a house of machinations, where Ferla uses ‘her’ fox, who is telepathically bonded to her, as a spy why Lovisa’s worldview is so cynical and why information is her currency.
The Monseans party arrives at winterkeep, but after a terrible calamity. They are particularly well equipped to see through the facade of Winterkeep’s lies, for all that they are less technologically advanced and Bitterblue has been cheated by many Winterkeep businesses. Their mental fortitude, honed by Leck’s reign and interaction with the Dells, the abilities of Gracelings like Hava, and all the trauma that Bitterblue, in particular, has endured help them.
But they have to face dreadful things - without giving too much away, it was Bitterblue’s need to ration tears that got to me. Separated, both Giddon and Bitterblue turn to imaginary constructs of the other for strength - Giddon already had a fairly good idea of how he felt about Bitterblue, and flashbacks only underline what was obvious from the previous book, namely that he had good reason to still hope, despite the stream of boyfriends.
This book is more candid about sex than previous ones in the series, though still in an YA appropriate way, but it’s part of how the damaged Lovisa navigates her world, not fully understanding her power and privileges, not quite getting how sex fits into an emotional context for the longest time.
There’s also an environmental theme: the silbercows talk to humans in the hope that they will realise that the sea and land are connected, that human activity has an impact on them. One of Winterkeep’s political parties, the Scholars, pays lip service to environmentalism, but who the silbercows choose to talk to is telling.
And there there’s ‘foxkind’ and their secrets. I got a bit irate that we learn quite early on that the fox that was bonded to Ferla Cavenda has a name, but it’s not used. Instead it’s always that circumvoluted ‘the fox that was bonded to Ferla Cavenda’ although by the end I could see it was intentional, but it didn’t quite work.
Lovisa has to do things that she thought were unthinkable, as the learns that people she thought she knew did even worse. The contrast between her perspective of herself and that of others is striking, but changes, as her perspective grows. She gets to see more of Winterkeep, leaving Ledra, its capital city, for the ‘country’ and ‘the north’ gaining a glimpse of the lives of non-elite members and how they shift.
There were points, more perhaps at the beginning, when the various elements seemed so disparate - and it takes a long time to bring them all together - where I wondered whether the author’s heart was entirely in this book. I mean, I appreciated finding out what happened next in Bitterblue’s reign and with her and Giddon, so as a reader I was glad Cashore had returned to this series after ‘Jane Unlimited’. In Lovisa and Bitterblue, we see two examples at different stages of damaged girls growing into strong young women, who will help other girls, as Bitterblue helps Lovisa. As Katsa helped Bitterblue - there’s a key moment where a memory of Katsa hugely helps Bitterblue. There are mantras: ‘you are worthy of love’ and ‘I am stronger than what X is trying to make me feel’ for readers who empathise. There are consequences and possibilities. Apparently Cashore is writing about Hava next, Hava, the spy, Hava, who loves her half-sister (and probably knew that she’d got together with Giddon, even as Bitterblue was still trying to keep it on the QT.) I’m clearly invested in these characters, and it’ll be interesting to focus on a girl with magical powers - Bitterblue’s and Lovisa’s extraordinary powers arise from their positions and experiences. But for all that the Gracleing realm has got more complex, none of the boks have quite reached the standard of ‘Graceling’.
This entry was originally posted at https://shallowness.dreamwidth.org/473273.html.