Doing the Unstuck
I'd been trying to get through A Declaration of the Rights of Magicians by H.G. Parry for months and was blaming it on the decreased ability to read long-form stories I've had since the pandemic. I finally DNFed it on July 25th and decided to get on with my reading life. Since then I've finished the graphic novel Carmilla: The First Vampire by Amy Chu and Soo Lee and the largish novel The Justice of Kings by Richard Swan and gotten 45% of the way through Thousand Autumns [Qian Qiu] Vol. 1 by Meng Xi Shi, so it looks like A Declaration of the Rights of Magicians was the problem, not me.
Review of A Declaration of the Rights of Magicians by H.G. Parry: I was so bored of this historical fantasy and it was stalling me on reading anything else, so I finally decided to put it down and move on. I wanted more of the enslaved woman's experience, for example, but instead the section I was in was all about nobleman politicians I really didn't care about. Not much happens to them, really.
I think I also had some problems with major real-world events being recontextualized as having magic bases instead of what actually happened in our reality. These magic reasons are rarely as compelling to me as reality.
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Review of Carmilla: The First Vampire by Amy Chu and Soo Lee: This really didn't work for me. Who Violet actually is was so immediately obvious that I thought it had to be a red herring, but no. Our protagonist, who's reading the original Carmilla, which this book quotes often, has no idea until it's right in her face. There's no sense of seduction or mesmerism, Athena just throws over her current live-in partner for this openly thieving, parasitic, manipulative chick for no reason that resonates for the reader. Because Violet is more "fun"? Said partner gets killed, Athena's grandfather gets killed, the drag queen bartender gets killed... all these people get killed but the protagonist gets out alive and I was so disappointed. There's a very late reveal that actually Athena is the youngest and almost last member of a long line of Chinese vampire hunters. Then her grandfather dies cleaning up her mess and she actually becomes the last one.
I was ready to give this more leeway due to its setting in 1990s New York City, but that wasn't enough to save it. The moody art is nice. I don't know if I might have liked it more if I were Chinese-American, as the protagonist is and the story gets into her cultural background a bit.
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Review of The Justice of Kings (Empire of the Wolf Book 1) by Richard Swan: Something a bit different: a fantasy story with swords and magic but the focus is on legal work and a mystery, with a political edge. The protagonist/POV person is a young clerk traveling with a very dedicated Justice, a lawman who settles legal disputes in far-flung parts of the empire with his sharp mind and some arcane abilities. It's the recollections of that clerk as an old woman, and she tells us upfront that everything in the empire is about to change for the worst.
It starts with a remote village of people caught worshipping in their original religion, which makes them pagans and heretics by the emperor's laws. (The empire is over fifty years old.) The priest temporarily traveling with the Justice disagrees vehemently with his handling of the issue, feeling that all these heretics should have been slaughtered for their crime, and runs off. The Justice doesn't think much of it at the time, certain in his emperor-given authority.
The next case involves the murder of a noblewoman, and that will get much more complicated and dangerous and draw in a far bigger net of crimes, conspiracies, and instabilities in the empire the Justice believes so hard in.
This story and mysteries definitely pulled me in. That said, sometimes the inclusion of the narrator's future knowledge knocked me out of the flow, reminding me again that at least that one character survives through this. It's probably supposed to increase the feeling of tragedy, but having future Helena say at times that the decision they're currently making is stupid annoys me, since it undercuts the characters, who are doing their best with the knowledge they currently have. She's in love with the guard... oh, she's being stupid. The Justice won't the leave the town to go to Sova until the trial is finished because he believes that strongly in doing his job... oh, he's being stupid? Hindsight, of course, is perfect. Sometimes the future Helena busts in to say something meant to increase the feeling of danger in what's coming next, but it's really not needed!
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A short clip of cuteness: Does [orange floofy Dorito cat] Walter like his new tie?
Review of A Declaration of the Rights of Magicians by H.G. Parry: I was so bored of this historical fantasy and it was stalling me on reading anything else, so I finally decided to put it down and move on. I wanted more of the enslaved woman's experience, for example, but instead the section I was in was all about nobleman politicians I really didn't care about. Not much happens to them, really.
I think I also had some problems with major real-world events being recontextualized as having magic bases instead of what actually happened in our reality. These magic reasons are rarely as compelling to me as reality.
--
Review of Carmilla: The First Vampire by Amy Chu and Soo Lee: This really didn't work for me. Who Violet actually is was so immediately obvious that I thought it had to be a red herring, but no. Our protagonist, who's reading the original Carmilla, which this book quotes often, has no idea until it's right in her face. There's no sense of seduction or mesmerism, Athena just throws over her current live-in partner for this openly thieving, parasitic, manipulative chick for no reason that resonates for the reader. Because Violet is more "fun"? Said partner gets killed, Athena's grandfather gets killed, the drag queen bartender gets killed... all these people get killed but the protagonist gets out alive and I was so disappointed. There's a very late reveal that actually Athena is the youngest and almost last member of a long line of Chinese vampire hunters. Then her grandfather dies cleaning up her mess and she actually becomes the last one.
I was ready to give this more leeway due to its setting in 1990s New York City, but that wasn't enough to save it. The moody art is nice. I don't know if I might have liked it more if I were Chinese-American, as the protagonist is and the story gets into her cultural background a bit.
--
Review of The Justice of Kings (Empire of the Wolf Book 1) by Richard Swan: Something a bit different: a fantasy story with swords and magic but the focus is on legal work and a mystery, with a political edge. The protagonist/POV person is a young clerk traveling with a very dedicated Justice, a lawman who settles legal disputes in far-flung parts of the empire with his sharp mind and some arcane abilities. It's the recollections of that clerk as an old woman, and she tells us upfront that everything in the empire is about to change for the worst.
It starts with a remote village of people caught worshipping in their original religion, which makes them pagans and heretics by the emperor's laws. (The empire is over fifty years old.) The priest temporarily traveling with the Justice disagrees vehemently with his handling of the issue, feeling that all these heretics should have been slaughtered for their crime, and runs off. The Justice doesn't think much of it at the time, certain in his emperor-given authority.
The next case involves the murder of a noblewoman, and that will get much more complicated and dangerous and draw in a far bigger net of crimes, conspiracies, and instabilities in the empire the Justice believes so hard in.
This story and mysteries definitely pulled me in. That said, sometimes the inclusion of the narrator's future knowledge knocked me out of the flow, reminding me again that at least that one character survives through this. It's probably supposed to increase the feeling of tragedy, but having future Helena say at times that the decision they're currently making is stupid annoys me, since it undercuts the characters, who are doing their best with the knowledge they currently have. She's in love with the guard... oh, she's being stupid. The Justice won't the leave the town to go to Sova until the trial is finished because he believes that strongly in doing his job... oh, he's being stupid? Hindsight, of course, is perfect. Sometimes the future Helena busts in to say something meant to increase the feeling of danger in what's coming next, but it's really not needed!
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A short clip of cuteness: Does [orange floofy Dorito cat] Walter like his new tie?