Two novellas that I wanted to be longer

[cahn]

I also want these writeups to be longer because I loved both of these, but given my abysmal track record lately of posting, I wanted to just make sure I talked about them!

Spear - Griffith - let's see -- I don't think it will be spoilery to say that this is an Arthurian romance / bildungsroman of a young woman who grows up in a cave with her mother but eventually finds out about King Arthur and his knights. And it's a retelling of the Peredur romance! And combines it with Irish mythology! I was so delighted by this twist; it suddenly makes the weirdness of Peredur somehow make a lot more sense?? It has a happy ending! -- and, I mean, it does have a significantly more coherent ending than that romance. But you could tell there was a whole novel in here wanting to get out about the Morte part of the Morte d'Arthur, but which is only referred to in the most glancing and oblique of terms in this novella. (But it's there -- Arthur has flaws, not limited to his relationship with the sword; Mordred exists.)

The Iron Children - Fraimow - obligatory disclaimer that Becca is great :D -- also, this is about cyborg military theological nuns with mental bonding/bondage/control, and, like. If this is not tailor-made to my specific interests and tropes I can't tell you what is! (My absolute favorite bit: when the baby nun, in the middle of a miserable military situation, takes a brief digression into cyborgian theological talking points. YESSSS.) I loved the different points of view, how different characters have very different takes on the situation (which involves assassination attempts and espionage and etc., and I also loved how baby nun was trying so hard to figure out which religious soldier was which; I feel your pain!), their whole process of working out what they think and how they feel about the whole mental control thing, and how there is a great deal of compassion for everyone in this story <3 And then the ending opens up a whole range of complicated possibilities that -- ah, darn it, now I want the extraordinarily complex novel that deals with the aftermath of all of this! :P

Comments

[dolorosa_12]

For some reason I had missed that Spear was a retelling of Peredur (and had certainly missed the inclusion of Irish mythology) — this information is sending the novella even higher to the top of my list than it was before!

[cahn]

I had no idea about Peredur until actually reading it and when the clue dropped I was like "OMG!!" :DD I really hope you like it, and either way will be interested to see what you think! :D

[sophia_sol]

What did you think of Spear overall? The things it's doing are all great, as you say, but somehow it didn't quite move me.

I just finished The Iron Children yesterday myself! it's sooooooo good!!!

[cahn]

I loved Spear! I know it wasn't your favorite, but I was just so absolutely there for genderbent Peredur with bonus Irish mythology that it just carried me through a lot :) I do think though that Griffith's natural bent is for more long-form than this is, because I kept feeling like it wanted to be a lot longer -- so there was this sort of vague feeling of dissatisfaction that she was clearly cognizant of all the things that would come up in a longer-form work but didn't have the space to do anything about it. (As opposed to Garter as a Lesser Gift, which didn't have that pull toward being longer though there was clearly room for a lot more in that world.)

It's soooo good, isn't it?!! Your review is so great, gonna go comment there right now :D

[sophia_sol]

Yeah I really do think I would have liked Spear better if it were longer! I'm glad it did still work for you though. And YES Garter fits exactly into the length it is, even as it gestures to a bigger world with more stories!

[cahn]

Yes! I also didn't have this problem with Iron Children so it's a bit disingenuous to put them both in a post that says I wished both were longer, but on the other hand it's true :D And it's also true that I loved them both, though in different ways!

[sophia_sol]

haha yes, Iron Children fit its length perfectly, AND ALSO I want to read a million more words of it!