less religion would equal (mostly) less frustration

[cahn]

Have I mentioned that everyone needs to read The Chosen and The Promise by Chaim Potok? Yeah, well, there it is. I've read a couple others by him and wasn't able to get into them, but... wow, these two belong in the category of "every time I reread they blow me away." It's about a genius and his best friend, except that it isn't: it's about family and religion and love and textual criticism and fathers and sons and Judaism and silence and grief and love. And just so well done. This is in my Top Twenty Of All Time. (I made a list of my Top 10 last week, just for kicks, and it just narrowly got edged out of the ten by To Kill A Mockingbird, but not by much!)

I probably shouldn't have reread these in close conjunction with the Mary Russell books. This weekend was The Game. I do really like these books-- they are rather addicting-- but as a person who takes religion more-or-less seriously (even if my faith fluctuates wildly) it really annoys me when it's not done right in books. (Someday I shall rant/rave about Curse of Chalion, which does it so very right that I actually hated it the first read through; it's now one of my Favorite Books Ever.) And Russell's religion frustrates me no end. She's always pointing out that she's a Jew, where by "always" I should say "whenever there is a pig or pig products around." And she gets all huffy about it, and how annoying it is that she's expected to eat pork, whatever. But she never displays any other sign of being Jewish (as opposed to a Christian, or a secular humanist). Does she go to synagogue? Ever? Does she celebrate any of the feast days? Does she observe the Sabbath, like, at all? Does she even know any other Jewish people? She saw a miracle happen to a Christian: did this have any impact on her Jewishness at all? Argh. Plus which she seems to be okay in this book with eating lobster (well, okay, that's not explicitly stated) and curry, which last time I checked was often made with meat and, uh, milk.

Also, this morning I was pointed to this article on the Atonement which also frustrated me, because it purports to explain why the Atonement was necessary and then... doesn't. He's all, "The innocent always suffer when someone sins, like Jesus on the cross, therefore the Atonement makes sense!" Uh, no. If I committed adultery, my innocent husband would suffer, yeah. But if he then commits suicide (which is the basic logic equivalent of this guy's argument), that doesn't make any sense. Look, stop trying to apply logic to these things. You'll just annoy me.

Comments

[countrycousin.livejournal.com]

Got here from your dammit_holmes post - I was busy during your LMB posts and didn't follow up on those. We seem to share some reading interests. The Chosen is one of my favorites; you summarize it well. I didn't think The Promise was as strong, but I enjoyed it more than Asher Lev or its sequel whose name I can't recall. Davita's Harp returned to form a bit, and had a cameo appearance by Reuven Malter and a briefer one by his father.

The theology of the Chalionverse does seem rather more reliable than local theologies do, although that doesn't seem sufficient to avoid deadly religious squabbles. There seem to be some saints and divines who can get things to work somewhat reliably, and a circle of insiders who believe them well enough to support them. With all of the corruption that we saw in Chalion I'm surprised more of it didn't seep into the religious orders.

Yes, there do seem to be quite a few May-(if not December, at least late August) relationships. Ista didn't do quite as well that way, although I thought she did quite well for a grandmother who had lived with the stress and depression that she had. None of the mature men seem to even have been fathers, much less grandfathers. There are various stories about Holmes - I wonder what Mary will detect regarding potential step-children. That one seems significantly more age spread than any of LMB's. Closer to Menolly-Robinton (in Pern), although nothing came of that.

Re: M.R. observances - I have known many who identified themselves as Jewish but were, to friends, not readily distinguishable from, say, secular Humanists. But I am not Jewish and no doubt miss details.

I better wrap up - I've probably exceeded comment limit. May I friend to follow your posts?

[charlie-ego.livejournal.com]

Yes, please feel free to friend, I love talking (er, ranting) about books. If you haven't figured that out, ha.

Yeah, I like Chosen rather more than Promise, but I very much like the set. Hee, I too tried both the Asher Lev books and Davita's Harp, but didn't like them as much, though Reuven's cameo made up for a lot.

I really like Ista's romance, actually; she's the only LMB heroine I can think of who actually gets a younger guy (though I guess Miles and others end up with people their own age, which is also nice). I really want Mary to have ended up with Lord Peter. Because I'm weird that way. But mostly because Russell/Holmes still does make me slightly squicky what with the huuuuge age difference, even though I feel all squee! while I'm actually reading the books. And I worked out that Peter would only be 10 years older, which is not so bad, and maybe they could've met through Mycroft and gone gallivanting about together instead of Russell and Holmes, and... why are you looking at me that way? Um. Not that I"m obsessive, or anything.

I guess I hold Russell to a higher standard re religion because she studies theology. And because she makes such a big deal about the pork, like, every time it shows up. But I guess maybe I shouldn't, because she is not exactly a narrator who consistently gives details about everything.

[countrycousin.livejournal.com]

I suppose she's ultra reform? Why then worry about the pork? As long as it is cooked enough. Yes, you have a point. Studying theology should focus one on the important observances - Kim's lama makes a point of that - but you'd think a few more would be important . . .

[threeoranges.livejournal.com]

atalantapendrag put it very well when she remarked on Russell's "Amazing Fluctuating Judaism!": in BEEK she shows she's willing to eat pork products (ham, iirc), yet give her the choice of places to go in the world and she suddenly remembers her faith and answers "I desire to walk through Jerusalem".

Perhaps we could try to meta it away? We could argue that her Jewishness was initially put on hold as a result of her mental trauma: when she goes through the cathartic discussion with Holmes about the car crash, that acceptance of her own guilt made her eager to believe in a God with the ability to forgive, hence the fervent renewal of her Judaism. Not that LRK puts that explicitly on the page, but given Russell's preference to keep certain sections of her life from the reader, this thesis could just about work.

Except she doesn't go to synagogue... Oh well, maybe she's hidden her dedicated worship from the reader, just as she "hid" her aunt and her maths tutor in BEEK.

[charlie-ego.livejournal.com]

Russell's "Amazing Fluctuating Judaism!"

Heh. I like that. Yeah, the whole Jerusalem thing, I was all, "wait, what? Where'd that come from?" But I do like your thesis. Maybe she's really been at synagogue this whole time.

[taimdala.livejournal.com]

Hello, been a member for a while, but mostly lurked.

If I could venture my spin on this topic, I'd say that the Kanon is Russell's autobiography and I think she edited things out when she wrote it. And because of that, I cannot take everything she's said in them at face value. Even in her autobiography she felt the need to hide certain areas of her life, maybe even deliberately misrepresent events and things to preserve her privacy.

It does make for inconsistencies, and I wish she had found a different method than the one she chose, when the need to conceal something sensitive came up. It's like getting a jigsaw puzzle with several pieces that were designed to be wonky, so as not to fit.

Maddening.

[charlie-ego.livejournal.com]

Yeah, that seems reasonable... and in fact it's probably the only way to read it and stay sane.

On the other hand, the miracle still balks me. Because she did mention it, after all, and then never followed up on it... bah. Oh well.

[taimdala.livejournal.com]

Taken at face value, the miracle doesn't seem to have much purpose than to be something fantastic and odd, does it?

If you took it as an outward manifestation of emotion, of transformative power of love, then you could sort of look at it as a nice little foreshadowing of Russell's personal epiphany on love and how admitting she loved Holmes would transform her life. Even heal her of the emotional damage dealt her over the years, just as Margery's miracle healed her of the physical damage she'd suffered.

I said this so much better on Laurie King's Virtual Book Club forum discussion on MREG. You can reach the VBC here: http://www.laurierking.com/vbulletin/ if you're not already a member or lurker.

But, yeah. The miracle did stick out like a sore thumb at the end. As much as the fact that it wasn't conclusively proven that Iris Fitzgerald's killer was ever caught and arrested. I don't entirely believe that the person who did her in was the same person who attacked Margery and Russell in that alley with the knife, or was the person responsible for the three deaths the previous summer. And what about Claude Franklin's connection to Tommy Buchanan? And Buchanan's role in Franklin's drug business? Buchanan was already established in the drug trade. Franklin was a newcomer. Did their turf overlap? How did Buchanan take someone poaching customers on his preserve? Did Franklin have designs in taking over Buchanan's territory? How did Margery fit into all of this? And so on.

Laurie had a nice little world going on in the background that she never fully developed and I wanted to see more of it--in its connections to the Temple and Margery, Iris' murder, what happened to the power vacuum created with Franklin's death...and what the hell was Franklin doing with a house out in Essex, anyway? It's way too far out from his London base of operations to be of any use to him in the long term. Yet, wasn't it revealed in the narrative that he'd had it for some time? And what was he doing bivouaccing in that wharfside warehouse anyway? You see? Way too many loose ends.

I guess it will be up to us to fill in the blanks. If there's one thing you can be sure of, it's Laurie's given us lots of stuff to write pastiches about. ^_^

[charlie-ego.livejournal.com]

This is very interesting, because you are approaching it more from the plot-loose-ends point of view and I was thinking of it more from the character-development point of view. (Most of the things you mentioned didn't register as things I was worried about, though I agree I really wanted to see more about the Temple world.) I was upset that the miracle, which really seemed to shake the foundations of everything she believed in (rationality vs. religion-in-fuzzy-sense), did not seem to lead to any long-term changes either intellectually or emotionally-- after MREG it was as if it never happened. But maybe that's what I get for reading it after a couple of character-arc series :)

I like your parallel of the miracles/Holmes, btw! (I went and read your post on the boards.)

[taimdala.livejournal.com]

I was approaching it pretty much from a personal angle. I remember vividly what it was like to risk losing my single person's autonomy in exchange for my married person's partnership. It's scary, it's exciting, it's exasperating. But no matter what I had thought it would be beforehand, it didn't even come close to what I actually gained. It was very much like a miracle and many people will search for it...and never find it, if divorce rates are to be believed.

So in terms of Russell and her love for Holmes, I just thought that it nicely paralleled Margery's miracle.

[charlie-ego.livejournal.com]

Yeah, sorry, I meant the "loose ends" thing, not the miracle/relationship parallel. Which (the parallel, not the loose ends) I really liked :)

...but you say more about loose ends in your other comment, so I'll reply to that one :)

[taimdala.livejournal.com]

Ooooh, plot threads left dangling....they irritate me to no end. Now I know real life is seldom tidy when it comes to endings, but one of the perks of fiction is the expectation it will be *unlike* real life, and that fictional endings will wrap everything up. It's all fantasy, really, and one of the main reasons we read it.

So when I run across a fictional work I like, I want it to deliver the things I like. An ending that ties everything up is one of them.

With MREG, Laurie left a lot dangling, so much so that I have to wonder if she deliberately did it to give herself hooks for future stories. Then the other books got written and those danglers no longer made sense to revisit.

I guess that's what fan fic is for, eh? ^_^

[charlie-ego.livejournal.com]

I totally agree. I hate loose ends. (I also hate when novels have disparate plot threads that never come together in any meaningful way, but that's a separate rant.)

I also hate loose character arcs... I've been spoiled recently by several series in which the protagonist really changes dramatically over the course of several books(/TV seasons), and I was hoping this series would do the same, which it doesn't. I mean, nothing really wrong with that either, but it just seems like it could have been taken to the next level and become something I loved rather than something I like a lot. If that makes sense.