Review of Sea Dragon Heir

	Sea Dragon Heir by Storm Constantine 384pp (Trade Paperback) My Rating: 5.5/10 Amazon Rating: 3/5 LibraryThing Rating: 3.53/5 Goodreads Rating: 3.56/5

Sea Dragon Heir is the first book in The Chronicles of Magravandias trilogy by Storm Constantine. The next two books in this epic fantasy trilogy are The Crown of Silence and The Way of Light, respectively.

The novel starts with the end of the independent state of Caradore when it is conquered by a king of a Magravandian house. The lord of Caradore is killed while his wife attempts to hide her children. It is not long before the rest of the rest of the Palindrake family is found and the eldest son is singled out by the king. The new king would like him to submit to a ritual in which he submits all his power as the dragon heir to Madragore. The boy agrees since his mother told him it is important that he remain alive so their line can continue. She said that he must never tell his children of their heritage and that the dragon heir will sleep for a while but will not cease to exist.

Two hundred years later the Palindrake family consists of Everna and her twin siblings Valraven and Pharinet. Although Pharinet has dreamed of the dragons since she was a little girl, it is not until she is fifteen years old that she learns the truth about their heritage from Everna. The Palindrake women were priestesses of the sea dragons, and the firstborn son was the dragon heir who channeled their power. Her brother Valraven is therefore the dragon heir, but he does not know it - and Everna says they must trust in the work begun by their ancestor Ilcretia and make sure Valraven remains ignorant of this role until the time is right.

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Unfortunately, Sea Dragon Heir did not live up to the standard set by Storm Constantine's earlier Wraeththu trilogy (the first book in that trilogy is quite possibly my favorite book of all time). It was readable enough other than a couple of parts that were somewhat dull, especially toward the end, but it was missing that special something that made the Wraeththu books stand out to me. Wraeththu was original and beautifully written with multi-faceted characters that came alive and left me thinking about it for weeks after reading it. Perhaps it is unfair to compare the two since they are so different - Sea Dragon Heir is more traditional fantasy and less introspective and character-driven. However, since I loved Wraeththu so much, I find it impossible not to compare the two and Sea Dragon Heir failed to affect me even close to the same way. Once the book was out of sight, it was out of mind as well.

The early part of the book does read a bit like an old Victorian romance with some fantasy thrown in. Pharinet grows up with her closest friend Ellony and they both dream of princes who will sweep them off their feet as children. They often wonder if they are in love with each other's brothers, and as time goes by it becomes apparent that they are expected to marry them. Ellony is ecstatic about one day becoming Valraven's wife, but Pharinet has no real feelings for Ellony's brother Khaster. As she does come close to marrying age, Pharinet realizes she doesn't want Ellony to marry Valraven - because she is madly in love with her own twin brother.

Pharinet's section was fun to read in a soap opera sort of way and she was an intriguing character. There was the tension of her relationship with Valraven, who is in love with her too. And there's her double-edged relationship with naive, romantic Ellony, who doesn't seem to understand that Valraven doesn't return her feelings. Pharinet is wildly jealous of Ellony and at times she seems to hate her old friend, yet there are also times when it seems as though she cannot completely forget the close friendship she shared with her. Although it was not the most compelling reading ever, these pages did fly by.

Not quite halfway through the novel, the perspective changes from Pharinet to a completely new character, the princess Varencienne. The old characters were still present since Varencienne moved to Caradore; there was just more of her than the others. While the fantasy storyline did progress more during this perspective, Varencienne was more boring than Pharinet. She was a perfectly respectable woman and in some ways seemed more grounded and rational (i.e., she didn't join the Valraven fan club) but parts of her story were rather dull. Like Pharinet, she was obsessive, but her dreams were all for a dead man she'd never even met - all it took was seeing his picture on the wall to set her imagination afire.

One problem I did have was I never understood why all these women were fawning over Valraven. He never did anything to make me believe he was as wonderful as Pharinet and Ellony seemed to think he was, but then I also never felt that we really learned a lot about Valraven even though he was such a central figure as the dragon heir. Other than his sister, he never really seemed to care about anyone, and he cheated on his wife with his own sibling. It was most likely completely intentional that he wasn't supposed to be the knight in shining armor; Storm Constantine does tend to write flawed characters instead of perfectly good ones. It's just that from what I did read about him, it never seemed credible that he'd garner such depth of feeling from so many people (as there is also a young man just as crazy about Valraven as Ellony and Pharinet).

The fantasy part of the story seemed fairly generic and predictable. It's basically the story of an evil king who overthrows a nation, replaces its religion with their own religion, and the struggle of their ancestors to regain their place and the old ways.

For the amount that happened in this novel, it could have been a lot shorter. Toward the end I was definitely losing interest and was ready to finish it. The final pages did leave me somewhat curious as to where it was going, though, and now I'm not sure whether or not I'll read the second book in this series.

Sea Dragon Heir had three-dimensional, flawed characters but they never came alive the same way as others Constantine has written. Although some of these protagonists were fun to read about, there were times the story dragged, particularly as the fantasy aspect seemed fairly standard. I'd recommend newcomers to the writing of Storm Constantine pick up The Enchantments of Flesh and Spirit instead of this novel.

My Rating: 5.5/10

Where I got my reading copy: It was a gift from a friend.

The Leaning Pile of Books

This was a pretty good week for books. Also, I'm almost to the point where I can start reviewing books read in 2010, which makes me happy since that means I'm closer to caught up with reviews than I have been since before the holidays. Right now I have one review about halfway written that I am hoping to put up tomorrow and after that there are only two more to go (with another book almost finished, but three is not too far behind, especially with more recently read books).

Now on to books received this week.

The Summer Queen by Joan D. Vinge

My very favorite book read last year ended up being the last book I read in 2009, The Snow Queen, so of course I had to order the sequel soon after reading it. I read part of the first chapter and cannot wait to read it although I have told myself I cannot until I have reviewed The Snow Queen (which I'm working on a review of now). This is one I will definitely need to read sometime in the near future even if it is so massive it will probably take me forever to do so.

Salt of the Air by Vera Nazarian

Since I ordered The Summer Queen, I got another book so I could get free shipping. Normally I don't buy short story collections, but I do have a soft spot for fairy tales and couldn't resist when I saw this had some, including a retelling of my favorite "Beauty and the Beast." Also, I really like Vera Nazarian's writing style. Plus it includes "Lore of Rainbow," which is set in the same world as Lords of Rainbow, the novel I read by this author (and loved).

Warriors edited by George R. R. Martin and Gardner Dozois

This was another unexpected ARC, and one I was very excited to receive - I'll definitely be reading this anthology. It includes a new Dunk and Egg story set in the same world as George R. R. Martin's "A Song of Ice and Fire" plus stories by many other authors such as Robin Hobb, Peter S. Beagle, Naomi Novik, Diana Gabaldon, David Weber, Carrie Vaughn, Tad Williams and Robert Silverberg. It will be released on March 16.

Sea Dragon Heir by Storm Constantine

This is the first book in "The Chronicles of Magravandias" trilogy. A couple of weeks ago I mentioned that a friend and I made a deal to read each other's three favorite books from last year in 2010. She sent me the ones I didn't already have and this was one of them. It was her very favorite from last year (well, actually I think the third book in this series was but that's not really a good starting point) so I'm supposed to read it sometime by the end of February. Even though I loved Constantine's Wraeththu books and really liked her short story collection The Oracle Lips, I must admit I'm actually a bit nervous about reading this one. I've heard it is one of her weaker books and the reviews for it are very mixed.

Review of The Oracle Lips

	The Oracle Lips by Storm Constantine 398pp (Hardcover) My Rating: 8/10 Amazon Rating: 4/5 LibraryThing Rating: 4.5/5 Goodreads Rating: 3.89/5

Short stories have never been a favorite of mine. I much prefer to read novels since they allow more time to get to know the characters and become immersed in the story. However, Storm Constantine is a favorite of mine and has been ever since I read her Wraeththu novels, which are my favorite books along with Sarah Monette's The Doctrine of Labyrinth series. So I eagerly dug into my copy of The Oracle Lips, a numbered (and signed!) collection of short fiction by Storm Constantine. Although I still prefer the Wraeththu novels, many of these dark stories also appealed to me. Constantine has an incredible way with words and I love the way she tended to end stories on a haunting, ambiguous note.

The Oracle Lips is a very lovely book with a forward by Michael Moorcock and a blurb on each work by the author. It contains twenty-three fantasy and science fiction short stories and one poem. Several stories are related to the worlds in Constantine's novels, including one set in the Wraeththu universe and three about the Grigori.

As with all collections, the tales vary in quality. The earliest work, "Curse of the Snake" is very dense with too much background information and not enough interesting events for a story of its length. Throughout the book, the writing tends toward density and lush, atmospheric descriptions, but with this particular story it was too much and it lost me. As much as I love Constantine's gorgeous writing style, I preferred the stories that had a better balance of description and dialogue.

My favorite of the bunch is "Sweet Bruising Skin," a dark version of the fairy tale "The Princess and the Pea." Constantine always felt that a girl with skin that bruised that easily was rather creepy and wrote a disturbing tale of a prince who would not settle for less than the perfect woman. His mother asks her sorcerer for a princess who will attract him and soon thereafter a mysterious young lady shows up one day claiming to be royalty. When the validity of her statement is questioned, the prince's mother declares the the highborn have particularly sensitive skin and if the woman awakens bruised after sleeping on a stack of mattresses with a single pea underneath, she is indeed a princess. The stranger is so black and blue in the morning that she appears badly beaten. As time passes, the prince's mother begins to realize there is something very sinister about the young woman and determines to discover what her sorcerer is hiding. The tone was at times light with the mother's pompous narrative as she relates the story to another and at times it was very unsettling.

There is a great deal of diversity throughout this collection ranging from the everyday world and contemporary fantasy to mythical fantasy settings to Egypt and archeology to distant planets and aliens to computers and cyberpunk. Common themes include identity, self discovery, gender, and obsession (both romantic and religious) and are handled very well throughout. Constantine does an excellent job of showing infatuation taken too far. I particularly enjoyed how events played out in "Angel of the Hate Wind" when a man wanted a woman so much that he summoned an angel and asked for the her love. Although his wish is granted, the end is extraordinarily tragic.

Constantine has some great opening lines that set up the story and hook you at the same time. The following are some of the first sentences that I found particularly compelling:

We were sitting on the edge of Celestial Alley just watching the night go by, when the girl out of time walked past, looking for a moment to keep. ("The Time She Became")

Sheila met the woman she should have been in the ladies wash-room at Euston station. ("The Oracle Lips")

Donna can feel computers dreaming; they reach out and touch her mind, or so she says. ("Immaculate")

You can waste a lot of time being in love with people. ("Fire Born")

The stories are imaginative, fantastic, and beautifully written, yet they cannot compare to the excellence of the Wraeththu novels even though they share similar themes. This is largely be due to my preference for character driven stories since short stories do not allow for a truly in-depth study of the people within. While Wraeththu shares the same lyrical prose style, it has much more emotion since there is time to get to know the characters, who are each very unique individuals with well-drawn, real personalities.

The Oracle Lips is an eclectic compilation of dense but mostly well-written speculative fiction stories that tend to set a dark, haunting mood. It is a great collector's edition for fans of Storm Constantine, but I'd suggest first time readers begin with the first Wraeththu book, The Enchantments of Flesh and Spirit.

8/10

The Shades of Time and Memory

	The Shades of Time and Memory by Storm Constantine 448pp (Hardcover) Rating: 9/10

The Shades of Time and Memory is the second book in the Wraeththu Histories trilogy by British science fiction and fantasy author Storm Constantine. I would not recommend reading this book (or this review) if you have not read the original Wraeththu Chronicles books and the first Wraeththu Histories book. While The Wraiths of Will and Pleasure, the first of the Wraeththu Histories, filled in some of the gaps in the Wraeththu Chronicles, this book picks up where both the first Wraeththu Histories book and the original trilogy ended.

As with the first book in this trilogy, I was a little nervous about reading this one in case it didn't live up to my expectations. The first book in the new trilogy was really good, but this book actually continued the story after Cal returned to Immanion and was reunited with Pellaz. It turns out my fears were unfounded since I found this book to be as enjoyable as The Wraiths of Will and Pleasure.

One part of this book that I really enjoyed was that it made it seem more difficult for Cal to begin life in Immanion. At the end of the original Wraeththu trilogy, it seemed as though Cal came to the palace, defeated Thiede, restored the relationship between Pellaz and Caeru instantly, and found it easy to adjust to life reigning as Tigron with Pellaz. They lived happily ever after - The End.
This book shows more of the struggles involved with this ending in the beginning of the story. Events played out the same way in a less rushed manner, but it was not instantaneous as the end of the first trilogy made it seem. Pellaz is happy to have Cal back, yet he is resentful of the removal of Thiede. Cal finds that Pellaz has changed over the years. Some members of the Hegemony are planning to remove Cal and put another in his place.

The final members of Pellaz's family are introduced in this book - Dorado, now known as Snake, and his son Moon. Dorado is an exceptionally powerful seer, who is fearful of his vision of his brother the Tigron of Immanion finding him and Moon. Cobweb, a powerful seer who claims to be weak in comparison to Snake, has become aware of Snake's presence and convinces Pellaz they need his brother's powers for the times coming.

Meanwhile, Ponclast the Varr joins forces with a dark and mysterious power to escape the prison he has been in for years. Ponclast has had many sons in preparation for the day when he can fight the Gelaming, and one of these children, Diablo, is granted the power to travel the Otherlanes without a sedim. By accident, Diablo meets the bitter son of Pellaz and Caeru, Abrimel, who is all too eager to defy both his parents and side with Ponclast in the upcoming struggle between the exiled Varrs and the Gelaming.

As always, the characterization is superb. Any character who could be considered evil has motivation instead of just being evil for the sake of it. The characters are not at all black and white and are very vivid. Some of the dialogue struck me as being excellent and more reminiscent of the old Wraeththu trilogy.

As with The Wraiths of Will and Pleasure, this book is more plot-oriented than the very heavily character-oriented Wraeththu Chronicles. The first person perspective is gone and it focuses on a wide variety of characters instead of just one character's perspective.

I highly recommend the Wraeththu Chronicles and Wraeththu Histories series to anyone looking for a unique story with well-written characters. Some may find there is too much focus on interpersonal relationships, especially in the original trilogy, but if that does not bother you, these are definitely well worth the time spent reading them. This series is imaginative, beautifully written, and filled with gray characters who each have their own very distinct personality. I have never read anything else like it and it has become one of my favorites of all time.

9/10

The Wraiths of Will and Pleasure

The Wraiths of Will and Pleasure is the first of the Wraeththu Histories trilogy that Storm Constantine wrote about 17 years after writing the original Wraeththu Chronicles. This book begins about halfway through the first of the original Wraeththu books, The Enchantments of Flesh and Spirit, and ends shortly before the ending of the last of the original Wraeththu books, The Fulfillments of Fate and Desire. For that reason, I would not recommend reading this review unless you have read the original Wraeththu Chronicles or you do not mind if part of the story is spoiled.

I was a little apprehensive about reading this book since I loved the Wraeththu Chronicles so much and I was afraid that revisiting it would be disappointing and not at all the same. Now that I've read the first two books in the Wraeththu Histories trilogy, I still prefer the original trilogy but I did not find this one worse so much as having a different purpose. The poetic writing is not as prominent, but this series is told from third person instead of the first person point of view so all the thoughts of the characters are not as fleshed out and a simpler, more succinct writing style is more fitting.

The first Wraeththu trilogy was more about the individual Wraeththu characters - the story of Pellaz in the first book, then Swift, then Cal. It was an exploration of what it meant to be Wraeththu and the way this new race developed and adjusted (or didn't adjust) to no longer being a part of humanity. The Wraeththu Histories series is less character-driven and more plot-oriented; it is beginning to explore where the Wraeththu and their sister race the Kamagrian came from and why they were created.

In The Wraiths of Will and Pleasure, the affects of the death and rebirth of Pellaz on the rest of Wraeththu-kind is shown. Ulaume (whom we met briefly in The Enchantments of Flesh and Spirit in a scene in which he attempted to overpower Pellaz and strangle him with his hair) is obsessed with getting revenge on Pellaz. He makes plans to cast a spell on Pellaz during an important festival night and instead feels the death of Pellaz very strongly. This affects him deeply and Ulaume runs away from Lianvis and the rest of the Kakkahaar tribe. Soon after, he finds an abandoned Kakkahaar child, whom he cares for and raises.

Meanwhile, in Saltrock, the shaman Orien also sees the death of Pellaz. Eventually, Cal returns to Saltrock heartbroken and sure Orien knows why Pellaz was killed. Flick becomes close to Cal and is devastated when Cal kills Orien (yes, more details on what happened with Cal and Orien are in this book). Flick had promised Pellaz he would find his family one day, so he leaves Saltrock in order to fulfill this promise and meets a mysterious spirit who teaches him about the dehara, a pantheon of gods. Eventually, Flick finds Mima and Terez, the sister and brother of Pellaz, and meets up with Ulaume and the child Lileem who appears Wraeththu yet does not.

The main characters in this book are Flick, Ulaume, Mima, and Lileem, although Pellaz does appear more toward the end which made me really happy. I missed seeing him in the second and third books, but this book has a lot more about him. I was hoping to read more about Vaysh as well since I found him a particularly intriguing character, but he only made a brief appearance or two.

This book also contains more details on the Kamagrian and their similarities to and differences from the Wraeththu, which was interesting since I was not sure exactly how similar they were.

I did find this book a lot harder to get into than any of the original Wraeththu books, probably because it started with characters I knew very little about. Once it got going, I really enjoyed it, although not quite as much as the original trilogy. I still love all the characters - even the minor ones always seem to have their own personalities that set them apart from the others. Each character has their strengths as well as their flaws and is very realistically portrayed.

While not quite as enjoyable as the original trilogy, this book was interesting and well-done. It was fun to see more of Cal's return to Saltrock after Pell's death as well as a few glimpses into Pellaz's life in Immanion. Also, this book tied together events in the first three books so the motivation behind happenings made more sense. I would highly recommend these to anybody who has read the original Wraeththu trilogy.

 

The Fulfillments of Fate and Desire

Recently, I finished the final book in Storm Constantine's Wraeththu Chronicles, The Fulfillments of Fate and Desire, after being glued to it for a good chunk of the day. I was sad to see the trilogy come to an end, but at least there is still the Wraeththu Histories trilogy left to read.

This story was told from the point of view of Calanthe, who was a major character in both of the previous books in the trilogy. Calanthe, not knowing where else to go, ends up working in a whore house for a time. Eventually, he leaves the whore house to travel around Jaddoyoth, on a quest to discover his destiny and who is sending him on journeys to learn from various Wraeththu.

Since this book is about Cal, it also fills in the missing information on what happened to him after he was separated from Swift in the second book.

There is not much I can say about this that I have not already said about the first two books. It is beautifully written, and each point-of-view character has his own voice, making it seem as though each book really could be written by a different person. Cal's voice is more humorous and sarcastic than Pellaz or Swift, making him a pleasure to read about. The other characters are also portrayed as unique individuals with their own problems and motives that set them apart from other characters. I have rarely read books with such strong character development - there are no black and white characters here.

The story is thoughtfully written and contains a lot of interesting speculation on what the world would be like if humanity was replaced by a race of hermaphrodites that is more enlightened than humanity yet very human at times, no matter how hard they try to escape it.

This is one of those books I could not stop thinking about once I was finished. I still don't think it charmed me quite as much as the first book, but I couldn't put it down since I wanted to find out if Pell and Cal ever saw each other again.

9.75/10

The Bewitchments of Love and Hate

The Bewitchments of Love and Hate is the second book in the Wraeththu Chronicles by Storm Constantine. It is much the same as the first book in that it is beautifully written, emotionally absorbing, thoughtful, and fascinating. I almost enjoyed it as much as the first book, but not quite - not because of the book itself, but because I wanted to find out what happened to Pellaz, who was not in this book other than being briefly mentioned on a few occasions.

The second book of Wraeththu is told from the perspective of Swift, the son of Cobweb and Terzian whom we met in the first book when Cal and Pellaz stayed with the Varrs for a time. The story starts with Swift as a young har and is the first part is somewhat of a coming-of-age story. I loved the way Constantine got inside Swift's head as she wrote about his first learning of humans and how he pictured them from what the other Wraeththu told him.

Cobweb tells Swift of the demon Cal who once broke Terzian's heart by leaving and his feeling that Cal will return some day. Terrified by Cobweb's obvious fear of this event, Swift tries to protect the house from evil, but Cal is found one day and brought to their home. As in the first book, the story isn't about action so much as the relationships between characters, but it is very enchanting and well-done.

Many of the characters who appeared in the first book appeared in this one in addition to the aforementioned - Seel, Ashmael, Thiede, and Caeru, to name a few. Constantine has a rare gift when it comes to characterization - I can't remember being as emotionally attached to a set of characters since when I read the first three books of A Song of Ice and Fire. Each of the characters is so real and has their own unique personality - I loved them all.

This book gives more details on some aspects of the Wraeththu that are not explored very fully in the first book - for instance, the different tribes, Wraeththu magic, aruna, and Wraeththu procreation.

I still loved this book, but I felt it lacked some of the magic of the first book. This could have been because I'd already become enthralled by the first book, or just because I really want to know more about what happened to Pellaz. I suspect this is the case since it is no less well-written or beautiful than the first book, and the characters no less endearing. I still savored it and read some passages a couple of times, but it didn't give me that feeling of wanting to start the book all over again when I was done like the first one did (although I would definitely reread it at some point in the future).

Overall, I thoroughly enjoyed The Bewitchments of Love and Hate and highly recommend it to people who enjoy thoughtful, character-driven, unique stories (who have read the first book, of course!).

9.5/10

The Enchantments of Flesh and Spirit

I was recently recommended Wraeththu, an omnibus edition of the Wraeththu Chronicles trilogy by Storm Constantine (consisting of The Enchantments of Flesh and Spirit, The Bewitchments of Love and Hate, and The Fulfillments of Fate and Desire). I'd never heard of these books, which were inspired by Goth culture and written in the late 1980's, but now that I've read the first one, I'm really glad I did - it's now one of my favorite books of all time!

The Enchantments of Flesh and Spirit is the testament of a Wraeththu by the name of Pellaz. As a young boy, Pellaz had heard horror stories of this mysterious new race known as the Wraeththu who stole boys away from their families. One day a young man named Cal comes to town and stays with Pellaz's family. Pellaz knows in his heart that Cal is one of the Wraeththu, and finding him to be beautiful and fascinating, he leaves with Cal to become one of them.

The Wraeththu are a race created by the blood of a mutant human, known as the Aghama, who has become a sort of god to them. They are both male and female, are more beautiful than humans, and possess some "magical" abilities such as telepathy. While they always think of themselves as being better than the humans, the Wraeththu are still part human and are not as immune to creating gender barriers and being emotional as they would like to think they are.

Thiede, a very powerful and well-known Wraeththu, takes an interest in Pellaz and it is his genes that are used to make Pellaz into a Wraeththu. Pellaz excels in his studies, and together he and Cal travel to many different Wraeththu tribes, each having its own unique culture, so Pellaz can learn from them. They are happy for a while, but it turns out Thiede has his own plans for Pellaz, which have some rather tragic consequences.

This is a beautifully written book with a very classical Victorian feel to it. It is at times rather poetic and reminiscent of classical literature, but without the hard-to-wade-through wordiness that is often associated with older books.

This is not an action packed story, which is not to say that nothing ever happens, but it does focus a lot on the characters, their relationships with each other, and what it means to be a Wraeththu. The characters all seem real and each has their own unique personality. I loved them all, especially Pellaz, through whose eyes we see the story unfold.

This book had me mesmerized by page 3. I did not want to put The Enchantments of Flesh and Spirit down. When I got to the end, I wanted to read it all over again (but there were two more books left, so I went forward instead!). It was one of those books where I did not rush through it but often read the same passage a couple of times. When I finished it, I went back and reread parts of it. I thought about the characters and story for days. It's not a book I'll forget about quickly, and being immersed in the world Constantine created with her well-drawn characters is a pleasure.

10/10