Book Review – Monette, Sarah. “Mélusine” (2005)

Overall Quality 4.0 / 5.0 (highly recommended)
Gay Content 2.5. / 5.0 (mostly hetero, but major gay characters / relationships)
Gay Positivity 4.5 / 5.0

Summary

Mélusine is a Paris-esque city, set in quasi-Medieval times. A magical creation, the Virtu’, helps protect the city and its central structure, the Mirador. But evil Malkar destroys the Virtu’ by using the power of one of the principal viewpoint characters, wizard Felix Harrowgate, against his will. Unfortunate, Malkar’s actions drive Felix Harrowgate insane; and no one believes that Felix didn’t willfully destroy the Virtu’ himself. Meanwhile, the second viewpoint character, Mildmay, a thief, lives among the poorer sections of the city, called the Lower City. Through Mildmay, the reader comes to better understand the culture and contradictions of Mélusine.

Clearly, “Mélusine” comprises the first act of a larger story. The novel traces one important storyline (Felix’s madness), but the central issues – Malkar, the destruction of the Virtu’, the ensuing chaos in Mélusine – await the next book(s) for resolution.

Quality

At its heart, “Mélusine” is a character study focusing on two divergent fellows with a secret connection: the wizard Felix Harrowgate and the thief Mildmay the Fox. Monette does an absolutely fantastic job of characterization. These characters breathe. Jasper Fforde has written a series of clever, tongue-in-cheek mystery novels which postulate that characters from books actually have a real existence in some kind of alternate dimension. Characters like Felix and Mildmay have enough breadth and depth I can imagine them in that vision, with lives outside the scope of this book.

The reader penetrates deeply into their histories and psyches; but the author doles out the information in a natural, organic fashion. It rarely feels that she’s “telling” about these guys as opposed to “showing.” Her lovely grasp of language benefits the character study: Felix and Mildmay, though they come from similar backgrounds originally, occupy different social strata at the time of the story. Monette paints that fact vividly, from the way they speak to the way they think. Felix and Mildmay are two of the most interesting fantasy characters I’ve met. I think it also says something that I enjoyed reading about Mildmay, the straight character, as much or more than Felix, the gay character. Usually it’s the other way around, because I tend to automatically identify more with the gay characters. Of course, that may have something to do with Felix being insane for most of the book; and Monette conveying the madness quite effectively.

Ah, but the beauty of her character study doesn’t stop there. The deep and well-presented characterizations provide a foundation for Monette to explore relationships in all their multitudinous forms. We encounter romances that sour, that end in tragedy, that go unrequited; rivalries exploited, intensified, resolved; attacks that are vicious, other times half-hearted, sometimes ignorant; aid rendered out of love, self-interest, or even revenge; familial relationships which bloom, twist, and fail. The most interesting, and unexpected, relationship exists between Felix and Mildmay.

Of course, the novel has its weaknesses. It’s truly dark fantasy as it not only incorporates dark themes but also portrays acute suffering at length. In fact, I had to take a break from reading the book after about 100 or 150 pages because the beginning is just so bleak. Poor Felix. But after I resumed reading, I realized the beginning is the worst as far as that goes.

I can’t say I’ve read too many novels where my favorite part was the middle third, but that’s the case with “Mélusine.” The beginning is important in introducing the characters and the conflict. But the middle really settles into some exciting and suspenseful action. The last third was tedious at points; much of that portion follows a journey across a country, and it gets repetitive and old. Monette’s meticulous attention to detail did not serve her so well here; she would have done better to edit this section so the action would have moved at a faster clip. The ending picks up, though, and I was satisfied with the conclusion. Although, as I’ve already indicated, not all the plot questions find resolution.

I encountered two more serious weaknesses, as well.

First, Felix and Mildmay get the lion’s share of the author’s attention and consideration. Secondary characters sometimes get the puppet treatment, i.e., they exist to serve the plot. As a result, they make sudden choices that do not make sense in terms of their history. For example, one of Felix’s romantic interests rejects him bitterly at a certain point; it’s an important plot development, but it doesn’t make any sense. It doesn’t fit the romantic interest’s personality, or his relationship with Felix. Similarly, another character advocates for Felix, but then suddenly turns around and becomes an antagonist, and it doesn’t make any sense to me why. It’s just what the plot called for.

Second, a related complaint: the plotting itself is occasionally contrived. Again, the author really focuses on characters and relationships, with the plot taking second priority. Certain scenarios that arise hold a strong whiff of, “because that’s what needed to happen.” Even if it’s silly and/or out of place. The worst example comes towards the late middle section of the book, when the author needed to separate a group of characters from each other.

Gay Content

This book falls into a relatively new breed of genre fiction where major gay characters and content populate the novel without any indication of anti-gay sentiment. In other words, gay relationships are fully accepted components of the social milieu, with no adverse consequences to the characters who pursue them. Some novels in this category, like “Swordspoint” by Ellen Kushner, never even mention the word “gay.” “Mélusine” does distinguish between straight and “molly;” nevertheless, no one seems to care whether a person prefers opposite-sex or same-sex romantic partners.

I really enjoy that laid-back and easy-going approach to including gay characters, a far cry from the attitude that a story should only incorporate gay content if it’s somehow directly and explicitly relevant. That attitude, while sometimes understandable, inherently differentiates gay relationships from straight ones, which creates a slippery slope into value judgments about the relationships. At best, it creates a gay-as-issue-of-the-week situation. It’s also artificial; gay people don’t show up in real life only when expected or when “relevant.” We’re just a part of the social fabric of civilization, like it or not. It’s nice and refreshing to see that kind of portrayal in a fantasy novel; but it’s the fact that the author has apparently decided not to incorporate social and institutional homophobia into the representation that really makes a novel like “Mélusine” stand out in terms of gay positivity.

That helps compensate for the fact that the main gay character, Felix Harrowgate, has a really awful time during the novel. Ordinarily, a gay character being put through the ringer recalls one of the two fundamental stereotypes that play out with disproportionate frequency in media portrayals of gay people: if you’re gay, bad things are going to happen to you. But the way homosexuality fits into the framework of the world of “Mélusine,” it’s easy to recognize that the bad things that happen to Felix (and there are a lot of them) in no way relate to his being gay. That’s incidental; it’s just part of who he is. It’s also very important to note, lots of bad things happen to the other main character, who’s straight; so the author is not singling out the gay character for mistreatment.

I’m still including this novel in the category “The Victimized Gay.” Even though Felix is not victimized because he’s gay, it’s still another image of a disproportionately large pile that says, “Bad things happen to gay people; sucks to be gay!” But the way Monette handles homosexuality in the novel largely offsets this stereotype, so its impact on the Gay Positivity score is muted.

I can’t exactly call “Mélusine” a gay fantasy novel; and I really like that. It’s a mainstream, wide-release fantasy novel with major gay content that’s treated on parity with the heterosexual content. That alone is an innovation. Kudos to Sarah Monette and her publishers.

Overall

I definitely recommend this book. Despite its weaknesses, it’s a strong story with a fascinating array of characters. If you like dark fantasy, you’ll enjoy the book from the get-go. If not, steel yourself for a hardcore first 100 pages or so before the story really turns into an engaging action-adventure.

Tags: Gay Fantasy