“Swordspoint” is one of my favorite gay romances, despite the fact that the emphasis falls on 17th-century-esque political plots rather than the romance. Richard St. Vier is a dashing and unparalleled swordsman, and Alec Campion is a sarcastic ex-university student who’s not quite what he seems. In some ways, their romance is hard to understand: they’re SO different. On the other hand, the author – who has an amazing grasp of detail – paints their relationship with a visceral sense of longing and belonging. One reviewer comments,

“Alec’s cold and cruel humor is just what Richard needs to get out of his emotionless funk and feel a little. Alec arouses his protective instincts, and Richard’s slow loss of control over his feelings is one of the things that make their relationship so compelling. Richard’s only anchor in his life is his swordsman codex – he will live and he will die by swordspoint – and following how Alec makes his simple black-and-white principles turn topsy-turvy is fun” (1).

It helps that their relationship is the only genuine one in the book; every other relationship turns around money, power, and self-interest. Their romance also enjoys a certain equitability that I really liked. Richard saves and helps Alex, constantly protecting him and at one point avenging his honor: “[a professional killer] who brutally mutilates the man who [violently mistreats] Alec before running home to make tormented love to Alec (all the while covered with blood) – how can this not be sexy?” (2). And in return, Alec saves and helps Richard when the tables are turned, and Richard finds himself facing the gallows in a world of nobles and politics that the poor swordsman doesn’t know how to navigate.

Richard makes for an engaging romantic hero. He’s a trained killer: he does something we would, in real life, find distasteful; yet he practices his craft under a fairly rigid moral code that fits acceptably into the social milieu in which he lives. In fact, he values his honor and reputation above his craft, tending to turn away potential jobs if they don’t fit his moral system. Besides, who wouldn’t want to have a lover who, after someone abuses us, goes out and “gets” them? Well, okay, that’d be kind of psycho in the real world; but in an escapist fairy tale? The entire romance novel industry turns on that very ideal!

Yet even the appeal and strength of the romantic relationship wouldn’t be enough to make this one of my favorite novels if Kushner didn’t have the writing goods to back it up: an intricate and compelling plot, deep but subtle characterization, and a fantastic attention to detail saturated with a wonderful command of the English language. I should emphasize, though, the romance takes second place to the main plot: the machinations of a certain noble aiming at (what else?) self-aggrandizement at the expense of his rivals. It’s wonderful fun watching the convoluted plot unfold step-by-step, and then watching it unravel through counter-machinations by other parties. Until the very end, the reader is never quite sure how things are going to turn. Add in the atmosphere and colorful characters, and we have a winner!

One caveat, though: most of the book details Machiavellian plotting, interspersed with exciting but relatively brief fight sequences. The result is a book that may not appeal to fantasy fans who prefer more adventuring and more action.

Regarding the positivity score, I see this book as an early forerunner of a relatively new breed of gay-interest genre fiction in which gay content figures largely (though perhaps not centrally) but is treated as completely morally neutral. The word “gay” or “homosexual” never even occurs in this book; neither does anti-gay attitude figure in anywhere. There seems to be an understanding, especially among the nobility, that one must still marry even if one’s desires lie with the same sex in order to beget children. But otherwise, no one makes an issue of same-sex interest at all, one way or the other. It’s just there.

At the same time, the book manages to avoid falling into stereotypical traps. It’s not that bad things don’t happen to the gay characters, but they’re offset by (1) it’s obvious the bad things don’t happen because the characters are gay (which is a necessary but not sufficient condition for a high gay positivity score), and (2) the bad things tend to be tempered. For example, if the book didn’t have the ending it does, I wouldn’t score it as being nearly so positive, because it would just be another book reinforcing a stereotype. Instead, the bad things fit in perfectly with the scope and nature of the book’s plot, helping to flesh out the characters and build tension, suspense, and excitement.

The 2003 edition includes three short stories involving Alec and Richard. “The Swordsman Whose Name Was Not Death” makes a very nice epilogue to the novel. “Red-Cloak” is quirky: very brief, a sort of swordsman’s ghost story. “The Death of the Duke” is odd and sad, and the weakest of the three stories.

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(1). Anonymous. “Swordspoint by Ellen Kusher,” (no date provided), http://www.mrsgiggles.com/books/kushner_swordspoint.html (accessed 29 July 2007).
(2) Ibid.

Summary

Twelve years after the first book, Vanyel has become not only a full Herald-Mage but also the single most powerful one. The story opens after he’s spent an inordinate amount of time along Valdemar’s border fighting off evil mages and demon creatures; he returns to capital city Haven exhausted and depleted. And he needs a rest.

So he heads home to Forst Reach. Yes, relations with his parents are still strained – they haven’t yet accepted Vanyel’s homosexuality – but Forst Reach is isolated enough he can take some time to rest without worrying about being conscripted into a new project.

Naturally, his “restful” trip home turns out to be much more than he expected. A small neighboring kingdom verges on war, and a mysterious massacre only worsens the situation. Vanyel must solve the mystery of who or what killed all those poor people before an evil mage takes the throne and threatens Valdemar.

Characters & Narrative

The Last Herald-Mage Trilogy isn’t a single, epic story that covers three volumes, nor is “Magic’s Promise” a direct sequel that leads into the period following the end of Book One, wherein Vanyel trains as a Herald-Mage. As I mentioned in my review Of “Magic’s Pawn,” these books are more character study than plot-driven works. They explore the life of the last Herald-Mage, Vanyel Ashekevron.

Lackey emphasizes plot a bit more in this novel than in the last. About halfway in, the story takes on a distinct mystery flavor. It would appear that young Treven – citizen of the small neighboring kingdom mentioned above – has a powerful magical gift of which he lost control, resulting in the massacre. But is it that simple? Vanyel must explore and sift through clues to piece the scenario together.

I enjoyed the mystery aspect, in part because it forces Lackey to pay closer attention to the plot as Vanyel puts the clues together, one by one. However, like the first book, Lackey focused much more on character (and specifically, Vanyel).

In fact, the antagonists in this book are poorly developed. Lackey relies mostly on the mystery and interpersonal, interfamilial tensions to provide drama. There’s relatively little action and no Big Baddie, and even the little baddies are minor, uninteresting, and under-developed.

She included some nice side stories, like the resolution between Vanyel and his former Arms teacher Jervis. I like the theme that you can’t ever assume anything, and we often hold on to the stories that cause us to be angry even when they’re untrue. So I like when a story forces a character to confront the truth or untruth of his personal stories.

The Gay

In brief, like the first book, we find both positive and negative representations in this volume. Vanyel is a powerful, moral, and heroic gay man; and the author treats his sexuality sympathetically. In other words, the author is at least gay friendly in tone.

I would also add that it’s an innovative portrayal, since Lackey has created a series of fantasy books centering around a powerful, heroic gay man at a time when the mainstream fantasy genre barely even acknowledged gay people exist.

But the book definitely contains negative elements. The major issues in this volume are:

1. Vanyel is celibate, as if a gay man is only acceptable to the reading public if he’s gay in theory only, not actively gay;
2. gay men are all pedophiles; specifically, two adolescents offer themselves sexually to Vanyel, who resoundly rejects the advances, but multiple people assume he’d gladly take advantage of them. The actual stereotype of the gay sexual predator is not played out in the novel, but the prejudice is present. So, as with the first book, the negative themes have a second side, in this case, that this theme is present; but it’s offset by the character and storyline;
3. it’s just a phase, as one very minor subplot shows Vanyel occasionally questioning whether he’s truly shaych (i.e., “gay” in the Valdemaran universe). I imagine Lackey was full of good intentions with this subplot, the idea something along the lines of “Van questions whether he’s truly shaych, and comes to realize he is, because one just is; it’s not a choice. Unfortunately, the fact that the question was even raised undermines the argument; and
4. a continued difficult coming out, reflected in his strained and difficult relationship with his parents, who continue to feel shame that their son, despite his heroism and fame, is one of “those.”
5. I also get the sense of Vanyel having to compensate for his gayness. That is, if he wasn’t the most powerful Herald-Mage, if he didn’t have the highest ethical standards, if he were just average, he’d be looked upon, and consider himself, to be less than other people because he’s shaych. That’s a little bothersome.

For a continued analysis of the gay content of this trilogy, please see my reviews of “Magic’s Pawn” and “Magic’s Price” (forthcoming).

Overall

“Magic’s promise” is easily the weakest novel of the trilogy. The mystery is an interesting diversion; and the introductory parts showing how Vanyel has grown and mastered his powers is important to the conclusion of the trilogy. But Lackey could have easily reworked this and the last book into a single, comprehensive volume.

Also, please note this is a grim book. The first book was also filled with violence, but the darkness was offset by the innocence and naïveté of young Vanyel plus the abiding love of his relationships with Tylendel and Savil. So, it struck me more as high fantasy than dark fantasy. This book clearly falls into the latter category, however.

Summary

Adolescent Vanyel Ashekevron doesn’t fit his father’s notions of what a son should be. In fact, his father, Lord Withen, feels desperate to instill some manly discipline in Vanyel, and decides to send his to Haven, where Withen’s stern sister is a high-ranking Herald-Mage.

Feeling utterly alone, Vanyel resigns himself to a cold and isolated life. But in Haven he meets another young man, Herald-trainee Tylendel, who arouses powerful and unexpected feelings in Vanyel. They fall in love, but family drama leads Tylendel to a terrible act of desperation, which threatens to destroy them both.

Characters & Narrative

Vanyel is simply one of my favorite characters in literature. The Last Herald-Mage Trilogy covers his lifespan from adolescence to death, so the reader gets to grow up with him. He is a sympathetic and engaging character with both strengths and flaws, deeply textured, unique, interesting, and well-written. He’s also gay. Reading this series for the first time as an adolescent myself, I was able to identify strongly with Vanyel and live vicariously through him in a fantasy world.

Narratively, “Magic’s Pawn” is a fast-paced, relatively quick read. It covers a lot of ground in just a few hundred pages: from Vanyel’s unhappy home life to his misguided but understandable attempt to protect himself at Haven to his burgeoning relationship with Tylendel to Tylendel’s disastrous choices to the aftermath and its effect on Vanyel to Vanyel’s training with the Tayledras Moondance and Starwind. Whew!

The novel finds its greatest strength in focusing on Vanyel’s internal life and on his relationship with Tylendel. Lackey has written a character study first, a gay romance second, and fantasy action-adventure third.

The plot tends to be a little disjointed and rushed. On one hand, Lackey clearly does not suffer from the writing disease common to many fantasy author: over-writing. On the other, while she has mastered the art of characterization, the story itself falters. It’s the characters who drive this book: the reader keeps reading because s/he comes to care about these people. And that’s great, and given a competent story, it’s enough.

Still, it could have been an exemplar work of fantasy writing if Lackey had developed the story a little more. Or at least slowed down and given each component of the story a little more depth and exploration. But this is personal peccadilloes: many readers prefer precisely this type of structure (emphasis on character, fast-paced storyline, not much plot detail or depth), so this factor didn’t influence the Overall Quality score very much.

Although “Magic’s Pawn” comprises the first third of a trilogy, it easily stands on its own. The story hints at overarching plot threads that wind through all three books, but that’s pretty much it. As I said, these books are more character study than anything else.

The Gay

And now we come to the meat of my review and analysis. On the whole, this is not a gay positive work. But! It IS a seminal work in the canon of gay-themed fantasy/sci-fi literature, written during a time when homosexuality was largely absent in genre fiction.

As mentioned, I first read these books as a young gay man hungry to see myself represented in the kinds of books I liked to read (fantasy and science fiction). When I discovered a series where not only a major character but the actual HERO was gay, I ate it up! I read the first two books on a cruise ship, but I didn’t have the third with me. I frantically scoured our Alaskan ports of call to locate it. I was starved for this kind of representation.

But reading the books didn’t make me feel good about myself as a gay man. Rather, I felt despondent. Love doesn’t work out for gay men, like it doesn’t work out for Vanyel. Society rejects us, like it did Tylendel and Vanyel. We have to hide our love, and our lives tend to be miserable, like Tylendel’s, and lonely, like Vanyel’s. It never ends well for us. This book communicated to me the worst homophobia that society had already force-fed me: I was doomed to solitary life of misery, and then I would die suffering.

Of course there are positive aspects to her portrayal; and I do not mean to accuse the author of blatant homophobia. She’s done the gay community a service by writing this book and series. In fact, I greatly appreciate the positive aspects – sympathetic treatment of a hero who’s deeply characterized, well-written, and gay. And intended for a mass audience.

Still, I must emphasize, the books incorporate an astounding number of negative gay stereotypes and clichés of the worst sort.

Overall Quality

Just as a fantasy novel, this book has a lot going for it: really great characters in a fast-paced, tightly written story. I was disappointed in the relatively linear and undeveloped story, but the plot and narrative were still more than competent – Lackey knows her stuff. Definitely recommended.

I love McCaffrey’s Pern series. Unlike a lot of modern genre authors, McCaffrey follows the “Keep It Simple, Silly” guideline to fiction writing: a straightforward story (peppered with a few surprises here and there) written with crisp prose and tight editing, populated by a manageable number of engaging and marvelously unique characters. I clearly remember reading “Dragonflight” (another book in the Pern series) one day after school as an adolescent; the book had me utterly enraptured. It’s a rare sequence of books that yields memories OF READING that last for decades.

Chronologically, “Dragonsdawn” is the first book in the Pern series. It follows the human colonists arriving on Pern, establishing a settlement, discovering the deadly threat of Thread, and engineering dragons to combat the Thread. The author interweaves the personal dramas of the myriad characters throughout the story, giving it human interest and depth.

“Dragonsdawn” is easily one my favorites from the Pern series. It’s delightful to watch McCaffrey start with science fiction and end with a fantasy novel. The characters are among the sharpest and most well-rounded she’s created. The engaging story unfolds naturally and quickly; there’s no fluff in this fast-paced novel. What a welcome relief from the modern scourge of genre fiction: overwriting.

For an easy, enjoyable sci fi read, I highly recommend “Dragonsdawn.” You can read it before any of the other Pern books (since it predates them chronologically), after you’ve read the others (as a prequel showing how it all started), or on its own (it’s a completely self-contained story).

Gay Content is low, with a couple of brief references to homosexuality. Specifically, one important female character (Sallah Telgar) has romantic designs on a man who seems at best friendly with her; Sallah wonders if the object of her affection prefers men. McCaffrey also mentions that even those people who are in same-sex relationships have an obligation to reproduce, given that these people are trying to colonize a planet.

On the whole, the references suggest Pernese society accepts gay people (as long as they have kids), but I marked down a little on the Gay Positivity due to “defamation by invisibility.” All the references are abstract. As far as I can tell, none of the named characters (major or even minor) are gay. I appreciate McCaffrey throwing the gay community a bone, but it would have been nice to see an actual gay person, even if minor, in the story.

Overall 4.0 / 5.0 (recommended)
Gay Content 0.5 / 5.0
Gay Positive 1.0 / 5.0

When I walk my dog at night, sometimes I’ll pass a house where the window curtains remain undrawn, and I can peek for a second or two into the alternate universe of someone else’s life. It fascinates me. That’s how reading this book feels. I don’t imagine I am the target demographic for this novel, so I definitely feel like an outsider looking in. Not only am I foreign to Chinese culture, I’m not a mother or a daughter. Men figure only incidentally in this book.

But as I said, that’s part of the appeal. It’s like traveling to an exotic locale without worrying about knowing the customs or language, and fundamentally this book is about human relationships: loves, fears, uncertainties. We see the difficulties of navigating relationships (parental, romantic, and platonic) through miscommunication, cultural divides, and personal woundedness. We are treated to examples of the human spirit shining despite ourselves.

The novel tells the stories of eight women – four Chinese immigrants to the United States, and four of their American daughters. Many of the daughters have siblings, but they are largely ignored. Each woman tells her story over the course of two chapters.

I have seen the movie adaptation several times, so I had visuals in mind when I read about the characters and certain plot points. That helped me to keep the characters and stories distinct in my mind. Be warned though – if you’re new to this novel, it may be difficult to keep track of who is who. For the most part, Tan succeeds at creating unique and richly textured characters, but it can still be tricky to distinguish characters when there are a lot, and many with similar names.

Tan’s greatest strength lies in her prose. She is a poet writing narrative, and as I read I marked several pages just because I thought the words she had written were so beautiful, powerful, and apropos. However, I must admit that the novel did not have the same emotional impact on me as the movie. Perhaps I felt more removed from the book because I did not connect to the characters or stories visually.

Interestingly, the movie follows the book quite closely, and yet emphasizes different plot points, creating a different feel. The movie’s ending also departs somewhat from the book; in fact, while I thought the movie’s ending a little too sudden, it is edited to be more intense, while the novel waters down the finale with additional narrative.

On the whole, I recommend “The Joy Luck Club” as a powerful and well-written foray into the lives of eight very different and yet universally human characters. Despite humanity’s sheer diversity, we all share common threads. This novel illuminates that principle elegantly and powerfully.

Gay-wise, there is one brief mention of a gay hair stylist (he is only referenced; he does not appear). One of the characters (Waverly) identifies him as gay and suggests he has AIDS, leading another character (Jing-Mei, who gets her hair cut by him) to feel momentarily diseased. This portrayal may be appropriate for the specific characters; in fact, the author may have intended it to characterize Waverly as mean and spiteful. Nevertheless, every time a defamatory stereotype, such as gay men being diseased, appears without positive images to balance it out, the portrayal functions as confirmation of the stereotype.