tower vs mirror
Sep. 3rd, 2020 10:30 pmI finished The Silent Tower last night, and realised that one of the things I remembered wasn't actually in there at all. The line "I swear to you I didn't kill him" isn't even accurate in spirit, because, yes, actually, he did kill him.
(Also the line is not "Like Middle Earth? Cool" but "Like Middle Earth? Far out," which matters becase it sets up Antryg's response of "Well, in terms of proximity to the ultimate center of power, not as far out as this world." Admittedly I mostly remember that line because the lack of hyphen in Middle-Earth drove me nuts.)
Eventually I figured out that I was conflating The Silent Tower with Stephen R. Donaldson's The Mirror of Her Dreams, which I read at about the same time. (Visual memories of library copies of both Darkmage and Mirror on the bed at my grandmother's house, which would put it at summer, age eleven or twelve.) There's some amount of thematic overlap: a woman pulled into a fantasy realm, unsure who to trust, falling in love, surrounded by complex political machinations, ending on a cliffhanger having realised too late that her beloved is actually the White Hat. Understandable confusion.
The Mirror of Her Dreams hits a bunch of my buttons: some neat characters and interactions ("Joyse, it's your move"), a fascinating magic system, and a complex twisty plot that the characters are feeling their way through. It's also shot through with Donaldsonian misogyny, and the second volume fails to live up to the promise of the first. (In the second volume, What's Going On is mostly known, and the interesting castle intrigue and characters are traded for a generic fantasy Hit All The Map Points journey. If it had been half as long it might have worked.) I actually moved hardbacks of the duology across the country a decade ago, though I then reread them and they went in the pre-condo purge.
The Silent Tower isn't quite so obviously Tucker-catnip, but it's just ... quietly a better book. Hambly likes and respects her characters, even the "evil" ones (well, maybe not Witchfinder Peelbone). And as I recall the second book nicely reflects the first, instead of just dumping out all the cool stuff for more less-cool stuff.
I haven't owned my paperbacks of the Windrose Chronicles in a very long time, though. I have no idea what I was thinking. Probably "I have not read these in a decade and do not want to move them across the country." Oh well. The ebooks are mildly-frustratingly poorly formatted: section breaks have been consistently miscoded, and about three-fourths through The Silent Tower the table of contents just gave up entirely. But they're complete, and convenient, and I'm happy to have them.
Footnote: Someone on tor.com noted that the mad wizard Antryg is The Doctor, specifically Tom Baker, which makes Joanna and Caris companions. And now I cannot unsee The Silent Tower as "skewed alternate-universe Doctor Who self-insert fanfic." Which is, I hasten to add, not a knock on it. It's pretty great.
(Also the line is not "Like Middle Earth? Cool" but "Like Middle Earth? Far out," which matters becase it sets up Antryg's response of "Well, in terms of proximity to the ultimate center of power, not as far out as this world." Admittedly I mostly remember that line because the lack of hyphen in Middle-Earth drove me nuts.)
Eventually I figured out that I was conflating The Silent Tower with Stephen R. Donaldson's The Mirror of Her Dreams, which I read at about the same time. (Visual memories of library copies of both Darkmage and Mirror on the bed at my grandmother's house, which would put it at summer, age eleven or twelve.) There's some amount of thematic overlap: a woman pulled into a fantasy realm, unsure who to trust, falling in love, surrounded by complex political machinations, ending on a cliffhanger having realised too late that her beloved is actually the White Hat. Understandable confusion.
The Mirror of Her Dreams hits a bunch of my buttons: some neat characters and interactions ("Joyse, it's your move"), a fascinating magic system, and a complex twisty plot that the characters are feeling their way through. It's also shot through with Donaldsonian misogyny, and the second volume fails to live up to the promise of the first. (In the second volume, What's Going On is mostly known, and the interesting castle intrigue and characters are traded for a generic fantasy Hit All The Map Points journey. If it had been half as long it might have worked.) I actually moved hardbacks of the duology across the country a decade ago, though I then reread them and they went in the pre-condo purge.
The Silent Tower isn't quite so obviously Tucker-catnip, but it's just ... quietly a better book. Hambly likes and respects her characters, even the "evil" ones (well, maybe not Witchfinder Peelbone). And as I recall the second book nicely reflects the first, instead of just dumping out all the cool stuff for more less-cool stuff.
I haven't owned my paperbacks of the Windrose Chronicles in a very long time, though. I have no idea what I was thinking. Probably "I have not read these in a decade and do not want to move them across the country." Oh well. The ebooks are mildly-frustratingly poorly formatted: section breaks have been consistently miscoded, and about three-fourths through The Silent Tower the table of contents just gave up entirely. But they're complete, and convenient, and I'm happy to have them.
Footnote: Someone on tor.com noted that the mad wizard Antryg is The Doctor, specifically Tom Baker, which makes Joanna and Caris companions. And now I cannot unsee The Silent Tower as "skewed alternate-universe Doctor Who self-insert fanfic." Which is, I hasten to add, not a knock on it. It's pretty great.