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On Will of the Empress....
The new Circle book. I forget what the new quartet (?) is called, specifically, but you know the broader series.
This is only very minor spoilery stuff I'm listing, and it's really nothing that we didn't already know from conversations Tammy's had online, but I'm cutting it anyway.
Daja's gay. Or, almost certainly gay, though possibly bi instead. Rosethorn's bi (and apparently not bound to any sort of vow of celibacy). There's a lot of gay just floating around. People have had sex. People have formed opinions on sex. People have had flings, and serious relationships, and they're only two years older than Harry and crew - and, most importantly, this isn't the center of the book, though it has a reason for being more important than it was in the last Harry Potter book.
Remember when I was discussing slash, and making the point that adding a bit of gay to a book isn't making it "that sort of a book", and it's not tantamount to having to make a huge Statement on homosexuality? I find it interesting that JKR has no problems with interracial relationships, but thinks that having even a hint of gayness would be turning the book into one of Those Kinds of books - and annoying that there are fans in the world who accept this attitude without criticism, apparently not realizing that by having a series full of straight people is making a very clear and definite statement about homosexuality.
We all remember the Protector books. At one point, a character turns an insult (do you only hang around your female friend because you want to sleep with her) back at the insulting person (is that why you hang around your friends?), prompting Our Main Character to muse a bit about sexuality. While no character in that book is explicitly pointed out as gay, at the very least gay people are acknowledged to exist in Tortall. Not just gay people, but homophobia, racism of the sort we can easily recognize, sexism... JKR touches on racism in a very roundabout way, and doesn't go near the others, as near as I can see.
In this book (different series, same author), we've got homosexuality, explicitly, among our main characters. And I didn't feel like I was being preached to. I didn't feel like the entire book was to tell me that Gay People Are Good. So I'm not seeing the problem here. This is the way these things should be written - not isolating our gay characters from the rest of fiction so that they stand out, just... there, like in real life.
Also, this is the way romance should be written. Despite the fact that a key point of this book was centering around the attempts to get Sandri to stay in this Empress' country, including three (count them!) attempts to kidnap her and marry her off that way, as well as several less tacky attempts to flirt her to death, not to mention several complaints about Briar's affairs, and Daja's gay awakening - I didn't think the relationships were forced, or taking up too much of the book, or taking time away from the other plot points - their renewing their family, and recovering from the events of the last quartet.
The other comparison I'm making here is in terms of length. One of the really good things JKR's popularity has brought was an ability for people to publish longer books, especially in the kids/young adult section, moreso for fantasy. She's proven that people will by those.
This isn't really great for those who aren't being sufficiently edited (and yes, I'm looking right at Rowling for most of the HP series, though I'll agree she got better in book 6), but those with... well, I'll say more experience here, since it's fairest... they are really benefiting. They can write more fleshed out books than before, and, additionally, they know how to use that space, which newer writers might not.
This was a good, dense book - and while I'll agree that some parts of it probably weren't strictly necessary, none of them were worthless. This is something JKR had in her earliest books (strict editors, I imagine) and then lost for a while, and probably is only really learning now.
Now, for my report on the book on its own merits: I liked it. My only real complaints would be that it's a bit slow-moving, and that on the issue it tackles as an issue (legalized sexism and abuse) Tammy does tend to go on just a bit.
But really, it's a good book, and I've always found that the Circle books are better than the Tortall books because there's less MarySueism going on. It's still there (all four of them are ridiculously powerful? Wha?) but it's not nearly as annoying. Tammy does, in my view, tend to Sue up her characters. It's an affliction, I'm sure.
Y'know, I just realized I have *no* icons from her books. Oh dear. Must remedy that.
This is only very minor spoilery stuff I'm listing, and it's really nothing that we didn't already know from conversations Tammy's had online, but I'm cutting it anyway.
Daja's gay. Or, almost certainly gay, though possibly bi instead. Rosethorn's bi (and apparently not bound to any sort of vow of celibacy). There's a lot of gay just floating around. People have had sex. People have formed opinions on sex. People have had flings, and serious relationships, and they're only two years older than Harry and crew - and, most importantly, this isn't the center of the book, though it has a reason for being more important than it was in the last Harry Potter book.
Remember when I was discussing slash, and making the point that adding a bit of gay to a book isn't making it "that sort of a book", and it's not tantamount to having to make a huge Statement on homosexuality? I find it interesting that JKR has no problems with interracial relationships, but thinks that having even a hint of gayness would be turning the book into one of Those Kinds of books - and annoying that there are fans in the world who accept this attitude without criticism, apparently not realizing that by having a series full of straight people is making a very clear and definite statement about homosexuality.
We all remember the Protector books. At one point, a character turns an insult (do you only hang around your female friend because you want to sleep with her) back at the insulting person (is that why you hang around your friends?), prompting Our Main Character to muse a bit about sexuality. While no character in that book is explicitly pointed out as gay, at the very least gay people are acknowledged to exist in Tortall. Not just gay people, but homophobia, racism of the sort we can easily recognize, sexism... JKR touches on racism in a very roundabout way, and doesn't go near the others, as near as I can see.
In this book (different series, same author), we've got homosexuality, explicitly, among our main characters. And I didn't feel like I was being preached to. I didn't feel like the entire book was to tell me that Gay People Are Good. So I'm not seeing the problem here. This is the way these things should be written - not isolating our gay characters from the rest of fiction so that they stand out, just... there, like in real life.
Also, this is the way romance should be written. Despite the fact that a key point of this book was centering around the attempts to get Sandri to stay in this Empress' country, including three (count them!) attempts to kidnap her and marry her off that way, as well as several less tacky attempts to flirt her to death, not to mention several complaints about Briar's affairs, and Daja's gay awakening - I didn't think the relationships were forced, or taking up too much of the book, or taking time away from the other plot points - their renewing their family, and recovering from the events of the last quartet.
The other comparison I'm making here is in terms of length. One of the really good things JKR's popularity has brought was an ability for people to publish longer books, especially in the kids/young adult section, moreso for fantasy. She's proven that people will by those.
This isn't really great for those who aren't being sufficiently edited (and yes, I'm looking right at Rowling for most of the HP series, though I'll agree she got better in book 6), but those with... well, I'll say more experience here, since it's fairest... they are really benefiting. They can write more fleshed out books than before, and, additionally, they know how to use that space, which newer writers might not.
This was a good, dense book - and while I'll agree that some parts of it probably weren't strictly necessary, none of them were worthless. This is something JKR had in her earliest books (strict editors, I imagine) and then lost for a while, and probably is only really learning now.
Now, for my report on the book on its own merits: I liked it. My only real complaints would be that it's a bit slow-moving, and that on the issue it tackles as an issue (legalized sexism and abuse) Tammy does tend to go on just a bit.
But really, it's a good book, and I've always found that the Circle books are better than the Tortall books because there's less MarySueism going on. It's still there (all four of them are ridiculously powerful? Wha?) but it's not nearly as annoying. Tammy does, in my view, tend to Sue up her characters. It's an affliction, I'm sure.
Y'know, I just realized I have *no* icons from her books. Oh dear. Must remedy that.
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The interracial thing, I'll take your word on it - but when JKR was asked about gay relationships, she said exactly what I said she said - "it's not that kind of book". I do not find that answer acceptable, not from her, and not from the fans. I find it even less acceptable when you consider the way everybody was paired up in the last book.
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That said, she's not the Perfect Romance Writer, either. I continue to find Daine's romance (marriage!) with Numair to be icky.
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Not to say that I don't enjoy sex, that is. It just has never been *that* much a part of my life, so I often have had the odd sense that the characters were all being slipped massive doses of pheromones or something.
I agree that relationships in the HP books seemed really contrived/one-dimensional and could have used gay characters when they were supposed to reach that point. As much as people always want to strangle me for this opinion, though, I don't think that JKR is actually capable of creating that much character depth.
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I don't think that JKR is actually capable of creating that much character depth.
No arguments here. I can't say how much I'm sick of potentially important characters being nothing but cardboard cutouts - even core characters! (Ah, well, this is why God invented fanfic, I suppose, though what one does when one doesn't like that, I don't know.)
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Not read the books. *grins*
As an aside, why do you call Tamora Pierce "Tammy"? It seems very familiar; do you get to talk to her in forums or through an email list, maybe?
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Now I really oughta finish the first Circle book so I can read the rest, huh..
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While I myself have not spoken to her, I know many people who have, in various fora - and not just scheduled chats to Talk to Your Favorite Author, either. As near as I can tell, the woman has no fear of rabid fans :)
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The interracial thing, I'll take your word on it - but when JKR was asked about gay relationships, she said exactly what I said she said - "it's not that kind of book". I do not find that answer acceptable, not from her, and not from the fans. I find it even less acceptable when you consider the way everybody was paired up in the last book.
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That said, she's not the Perfect Romance Writer, either. I continue to find Daine's romance (marriage!) with Numair to be icky.
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Not to say that I don't enjoy sex, that is. It just has never been *that* much a part of my life, so I often have had the odd sense that the characters were all being slipped massive doses of pheromones or something.
I agree that relationships in the HP books seemed really contrived/one-dimensional and could have used gay characters when they were supposed to reach that point. As much as people always want to strangle me for this opinion, though, I don't think that JKR is actually capable of creating that much character depth.
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I don't think that JKR is actually capable of creating that much character depth.
No arguments here. I can't say how much I'm sick of potentially important characters being nothing but cardboard cutouts - even core characters! (Ah, well, this is why God invented fanfic, I suppose, though what one does when one doesn't like that, I don't know.)
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Not read the books. *grins*
As an aside, why do you call Tamora Pierce "Tammy"? It seems very familiar; do you get to talk to her in forums or through an email list, maybe?
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Now I really oughta finish the first Circle book so I can read the rest, huh..
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While I myself have not spoken to her, I know many people who have, in various fora - and not just scheduled chats to Talk to Your Favorite Author, either. As near as I can tell, the woman has no fear of rabid fans :)
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