Book Review: Primavera, by Francesca Lia Block
Synopsis:: From the very moment she was born, Primavera's songs made water flow and flowers blossom. She brought new life to the desert where her family lives. But even in Paradise there are dreams that cannot be fulfilled. Primavera is in love with a man who can never be hers-- so when a handsome stranger offers her the gift of a horse-headed motorcycle, Primavera leaves home in search of the magical city of Elysia, the city once ruled by her parents' band, Ecstasia. But in Elysia, Primavera discovers that she has left behind everything she truly needs, everyone she truly cares about-- and, if the city has its way, she will never find her way back home.
This book is a follow-up to Francesca Lia Block's Ecstasia, which I have also reviewed. It is also a complete and utter bore.
Generally, Francesca Lia Block's books are like candy to me-- bright, shining, easily consumable. Sugary and iridescent. Not especially deep, but they do touch on important Young Adult hallmarks, as well as pushing the boundaries of what is commonly found in YA literature. That said, I'm kind of confused about whether or not this book was supposed to be YA-- though published under Firebird press, in its first printing, I think this was originally an adult release. Which, considering the inclusion of much of what would be named by aging soccer moms as moral perversity, that makes a certain amount of sense. Francesca Lia Block has never shied away from controversial topics-- homosexuality, mental instability, rape, incest, abuse. To her credit, she has always treated these topics with care and respect, and above all else, a human and empathetic eye.
As for the novel itself, Primavera seems airy and aimless, and I don't mean that in a good way. In between Ecstasia and Primavera, the desert has become green once more, and the members of Ecstasia have created an oasis for all of the Old Ones they have freed from Under. Calliope and Dionysio are aging, Paul and Rafe are still together, and... oops, Primavera, who is now about twenty as best as I can tell, is completely in love with Paul, who is her mentor, her uncle-figure, twentysomething years her senior, and also gay. On the one hand, it doesn't come out of left-field-- Block has always painted Paul to be magnetic, a kind of Beauty and the Beast rolled up into one lion-maned rock god. The impetus for Primavera's journey comes when one night, she confesses her love for Paul, but he cannot return her love.
So she sets out for Elysia, the city her parents were so eager to escape, on a motorcycle given to her by a fairly shady character. Okay, first of all, I get it. It's magical realism. Everything doesn't have to make literal sense. But are we seriously supposed to believe that a skinny little girl who was raised in the desert with no roads just knows how to ride a motorcycle? Right.
At any rate, considering Ecstasia was so closely tied to the Persephone / Demeter myth, I kept expecting a similar archetypal journey for Primavera, but none exists, to my knowledge. There is a bit of the Persephone myth still in play, with Primavera (literally: Spring, or first Spring), journeying to the Underworld, but that is only a small part of the story. The Persephone tale is often called 'The Rape of Persephone,' with the term rape in the ancient world then implying a forced abduction. This version very literally employs our modern meaning. Despite that, it's more like a journey novel-- in a way, it reminds me very strongly of Candide, with its visions of all of humanity's most grotesque faces. There are bloody, meat-smeared, imbecilic, raping giants, there are greedy, poverty-sticken children who have been taught to hate those who are different (Block's metaphor-- a little boy named River who is part bird-- half-human mutations are all that are left of the animals), there are the addicts of Elysia (there is a nice echo of Lily in Arcadie's tragic story), and it all culminates with Gunn, a controlling, mysogynist bastard. His penis is made of pointy metal-- you figure that metaphor out, eh? In other words, for the bulk of the novel, things just go from bad to worse. If that weren't depressing enough, the metaphors are pretty stark, in-your-face, lacking all of Block's usual artistry.
(As a side note, I had a hard time with a bald, dark-skinned, evil villain named Gunn. I had to continually disassociate myself from all of my previous fangirl perceptions! I kept thinking, "What? Gunn would never do that!")
The adults' thoughts weave through the novel, and they seem somewhat out of place, only serving to tell the reader about how all of the beautiful plants and relationships in the desert are withering without Primavera. And I have to wonder... why? Okay, so I get that we're in Big Honking MetaphorLand right now, and that's all well and good, but I have to say that Primavera herself is more or less a wooden character. As much as the situations she got herself into continually horrified me, I didn't have any real sympathy for her. And the 'songs'? Gimme a break, I skipped every single one. So I think it says something that aging hipsters with little relevance to the overall plot were far, far more interesting than the main character.
As this is a Francesca Lia Block novel, love does in fact save the day. Though Calliope and Paul are both unsuccessful at rescuing Primavera from her nightmare, she does escape from Gunn's prison with the help of a centaur named Pyre. (One nice touch was the fact that Gunn's prison was once the outpost where Paul and Dionysio were raised. Gunn had taken a place where women gathered and entertained-- a sort of sacred harlot's temple in the Greek tradition-- and turned it into a desecrated place of sexual slavery. As metaphors go, this one was more subtle, but quite relevant.) Pyre's innate goodness or something (read: his natural sexuality without misogyny) cures Primavera, and she is able to break Gunn's spell to free most of the slaves and herself. Sure, that borders on beastiality, which, quite honestly, squicked me, but we're in metaphor-land, remember? But they get married, and everything is great in the desert again, and lalalalala. Big sing-a-long, and Candide says 'we shall make our garden grow.'
That's satisfying, right? Whatever. I'm not saying that I'm unhappy that it ended so well. I'm saying that I'm disappointed in the fact that while Block presented many misogynist horrors, she didn't really deal with any of them. Magical Realism or not, it takes more than a change in locale and a new boyfriend to get over systematic rape. And what about the Old Ones from Ecstasia? Such a big deal was made about 'saving' them from Under, but never do we come in contact with any of them. It's all just terribly glossed over.
This book doesn't get my seal of approval. The pacing was off, the language was thin and repetitive, the main character was bland, the metaphors were threadbare, and it took me way too long to read through such a thin volume on sheer account that I was bored.
Memo to FLB: give us another novel about Paul, I beg you. He's the light in any book in which he appears.
2006 Book Log:: http://sihaya09.livejournal.com/439937.html.
This book is a follow-up to Francesca Lia Block's Ecstasia, which I have also reviewed. It is also a complete and utter bore.
Generally, Francesca Lia Block's books are like candy to me-- bright, shining, easily consumable. Sugary and iridescent. Not especially deep, but they do touch on important Young Adult hallmarks, as well as pushing the boundaries of what is commonly found in YA literature. That said, I'm kind of confused about whether or not this book was supposed to be YA-- though published under Firebird press, in its first printing, I think this was originally an adult release. Which, considering the inclusion of much of what would be named by aging soccer moms as moral perversity, that makes a certain amount of sense. Francesca Lia Block has never shied away from controversial topics-- homosexuality, mental instability, rape, incest, abuse. To her credit, she has always treated these topics with care and respect, and above all else, a human and empathetic eye.
As for the novel itself, Primavera seems airy and aimless, and I don't mean that in a good way. In between Ecstasia and Primavera, the desert has become green once more, and the members of Ecstasia have created an oasis for all of the Old Ones they have freed from Under. Calliope and Dionysio are aging, Paul and Rafe are still together, and... oops, Primavera, who is now about twenty as best as I can tell, is completely in love with Paul, who is her mentor, her uncle-figure, twentysomething years her senior, and also gay. On the one hand, it doesn't come out of left-field-- Block has always painted Paul to be magnetic, a kind of Beauty and the Beast rolled up into one lion-maned rock god. The impetus for Primavera's journey comes when one night, she confesses her love for Paul, but he cannot return her love.
So she sets out for Elysia, the city her parents were so eager to escape, on a motorcycle given to her by a fairly shady character. Okay, first of all, I get it. It's magical realism. Everything doesn't have to make literal sense. But are we seriously supposed to believe that a skinny little girl who was raised in the desert with no roads just knows how to ride a motorcycle? Right.
At any rate, considering Ecstasia was so closely tied to the Persephone / Demeter myth, I kept expecting a similar archetypal journey for Primavera, but none exists, to my knowledge. There is a bit of the Persephone myth still in play, with Primavera (literally: Spring, or first Spring), journeying to the Underworld, but that is only a small part of the story. The Persephone tale is often called 'The Rape of Persephone,' with the term rape in the ancient world then implying a forced abduction. This version very literally employs our modern meaning. Despite that, it's more like a journey novel-- in a way, it reminds me very strongly of Candide, with its visions of all of humanity's most grotesque faces. There are bloody, meat-smeared, imbecilic, raping giants, there are greedy, poverty-sticken children who have been taught to hate those who are different (Block's metaphor-- a little boy named River who is part bird-- half-human mutations are all that are left of the animals), there are the addicts of Elysia (there is a nice echo of Lily in Arcadie's tragic story), and it all culminates with Gunn, a controlling, mysogynist bastard. His penis is made of pointy metal-- you figure that metaphor out, eh? In other words, for the bulk of the novel, things just go from bad to worse. If that weren't depressing enough, the metaphors are pretty stark, in-your-face, lacking all of Block's usual artistry.
(As a side note, I had a hard time with a bald, dark-skinned, evil villain named Gunn. I had to continually disassociate myself from all of my previous fangirl perceptions! I kept thinking, "What? Gunn would never do that!")
The adults' thoughts weave through the novel, and they seem somewhat out of place, only serving to tell the reader about how all of the beautiful plants and relationships in the desert are withering without Primavera. And I have to wonder... why? Okay, so I get that we're in Big Honking MetaphorLand right now, and that's all well and good, but I have to say that Primavera herself is more or less a wooden character. As much as the situations she got herself into continually horrified me, I didn't have any real sympathy for her. And the 'songs'? Gimme a break, I skipped every single one. So I think it says something that aging hipsters with little relevance to the overall plot were far, far more interesting than the main character.
As this is a Francesca Lia Block novel, love does in fact save the day. Though Calliope and Paul are both unsuccessful at rescuing Primavera from her nightmare, she does escape from Gunn's prison with the help of a centaur named Pyre. (One nice touch was the fact that Gunn's prison was once the outpost where Paul and Dionysio were raised. Gunn had taken a place where women gathered and entertained-- a sort of sacred harlot's temple in the Greek tradition-- and turned it into a desecrated place of sexual slavery. As metaphors go, this one was more subtle, but quite relevant.) Pyre's innate goodness or something (read: his natural sexuality without misogyny) cures Primavera, and she is able to break Gunn's spell to free most of the slaves and herself. Sure, that borders on beastiality, which, quite honestly, squicked me, but we're in metaphor-land, remember? But they get married, and everything is great in the desert again, and lalalalala. Big sing-a-long, and Candide says 'we shall make our garden grow.'
That's satisfying, right? Whatever. I'm not saying that I'm unhappy that it ended so well. I'm saying that I'm disappointed in the fact that while Block presented many misogynist horrors, she didn't really deal with any of them. Magical Realism or not, it takes more than a change in locale and a new boyfriend to get over systematic rape. And what about the Old Ones from Ecstasia? Such a big deal was made about 'saving' them from Under, but never do we come in contact with any of them. It's all just terribly glossed over.
This book doesn't get my seal of approval. The pacing was off, the language was thin and repetitive, the main character was bland, the metaphors were threadbare, and it took me way too long to read through such a thin volume on sheer account that I was bored.
Memo to FLB: give us another novel about Paul, I beg you. He's the light in any book in which he appears.
2006 Book Log:: http://sihaya09.livejournal.com/439937.html.