(Untitled)

[bookelfe]

Recently I decided it was time to reread Guy Gavriel Kay's The Lions of Al-Rassan, now and forever subtitled in my head A Tale of Three Sexy Religions.Al-Rassan is basically Romanticized Fake Al-Andalus. Romanticized Fake Al-Andalus maintains an uneasy balance between Fake Christianity (Jaddite), Fake Islam (Asharite) and Fake Judaism (Kindath),

Comments

[rachelmanija]

There is no Fake Jewish religious intolerance, the fake Jews just spent a lot of time being intolerated at.

Heee!

I recently re-read A Song For Arbonne, which is also excellent for most of the same things, complete with random bondage. Though with less mystic soulbonds. Have you read it?

[bookelfe]

I have, but it was about the same time I first read Lions (ten years ago or so), so I don't remember much of it except that it has sexy troubadours.

I do not remember the random bondage, but I am fairly sure GGK does not feel any book would be complete without it . . .

[rachelmanija]

You should re-read it! It's very good.

Yes, sexy troubadours. One thing I noticed on the re-read was that Lisseut, the groundbreaking FEMALE troubadour, is a major character in terms of page time, but has very little influence on the plot as a whole, though she does have a poignant unrequited (OR IS IT?) thing for the protagonist.

Usually with this set-up she'd be important because she influences him. She does do that, as a symbol of the Poignant Sophisticated Beauty of Arbonne. But mostly she's there as a character who has her own story which is affected by the main plot, and in her own life, the protagonist is primarily important as an artistic influence on her. I just thought that was cool.

[bookelfe]

Huh! That is pretty cool. I had forgotten all about Lisseut, which is a thing you'd think I would remember!

I was actually noticing as a thing that made me a bit wistful in Lions of Al-Rassan that there are a lot of interesting female characters in the different portions of the story, but none of them ever get to interact with each other onscreen. Jehane spends a few pages thinking wistfully about how much she would like some female friends while surrounded by these Amazing Awesome Genius Dudes, and I wanted to grab Guy Gavriel Kay and go, "you know, you could do something about that! It's not THAT hard."

[bookelfe]

Does Tigana? I mean, I would totally believe that it does and I've just forgotten, but on the other hand maybe he decided that the Epic Tragedy of the whole Dianora/Brandon thing counted as Second Or Third Saddest Of All the Long Tales Ever Told or something.

[rymenhild]

I bet Tigana could count... if you stretched a point pretty far and named Brandin's Fool as Brandin and Dianora's third. He does have an intense relationship with the other two!

[rachelmanija]

That would work. But the more obvious third point is Baerd.

[jinian]

You know, I think when I get around to deciding on my life sexiness goals, I'm actually going to strive to remain somewhere under the "being stabbed with arrows" level.

[bookelfe]

But it's a sexy kind of stabbing with arrows! GGK TELLS US SO.

[amelia_petkova]

I started laughing hard when you gave the character descriptions because it's so true. I really need to re-read this book.

One of my favorite bits that I remember is immediately after Jehane meets Rodrigo, they're riding together on a horse, he asks why she's going to a city, and she says "Because they have beautiful men there," (or something like that) while caressing him. And then he asks plaintively, "Are you sure you haven't met my wife?" Because she screws with his head in the exact same way. LOVE IT.

[bookelfe]

HAHAHA YEP. Rodrigo: so sexy that other sexy people start molesting him on horses as soon as they meet him! Married to a wife who is so sexy that he can do NOTHING ABOUT IT.

[rahkan]

Haha, yay for Guy Gavriel Kay and the Lions of Al-Rassan. I love his fake-history fantasy novels* (although, of course, I love Tigana the best...)

*I even love A Song For Arbonne, because I am big-hearted like that.

[bookelfe]

I went through a massive GGK binge phase not long before I started college. ALL THE FANTASY FAKE HISTORY ALL THE TIME. I haven't reread most of them since, but it seemed to be about time . . .