Fantasy: reliable content

[mtbikemom]

I would probably recommend it to my mom, but not my twelve-year-old nephew.  Yet. 

Perfect parameter description!  You have recommended to your mountain biking mom, anyway.  = ]

Thanks for the link, Ookla.  Very nice taste of good things to enjoy on the cold, rainy days to come on the Central Coast of CA. 

Scenes of rape, incest, torture, murder, etc . . . are a part of real life, unfortunately, and are often integral to the heroic story line.  When do they cross that sometimes-movable line into the disgusting, gratuitous, morbidly obsessive?  When is it acceptable and when is it just a bit too much? 

   Tigana by Guy Gavriel Kay is pushing its limits for me right now.  I'm going to have to clean my brain a bit after this.  The lust-deranged Alienor of Castle Borzo is, to me, a gratuitous character.  Maybe there will be consequences for her behavior, but she is written with far too free a hand s far and those of us whose parents suffered the real consequences of the free-love late sixties and seventies cannot read a scenario like this without (yet more) eye-rolling.  Pleeez.

    But the story and characters keep me reading.  I am glad that I can hopefully trust other of Kay's works, so sez Miss Silk.  He also gets lost in "saying rather than showing" all too often.  But his characters' thoughts and motivations ring true and his voice of inspiration is obvious.  By inspiration, I mean that indefinable quality of the author's connection with his/her muse;  when the story writes itself and teaches the author something he/she did not know, when things are just simply amazing and winsome . . . you know what I mean.  We know it when we read it, anyway.   

Going to read Bookstore Guy's review site today, especially for the new EE Knight book.

[Frog]

I just wanted to add a quick plug for Shannon Hale. I just finished one of her more recent books (A YA novel of an updated fairytale using aspects of a Mongol society called Book of A Thousand Days) and really enjoyed it as she seems to be one that gets better each time. Nice and clean too for the young and young at heart.

[little wilson]

I agree with Frog about Shannon Hale. I haven't read a whole lot of her stuff, but what I have read is very good and clean. Definitely material I'd recommend to some of my younger cousins (I'd say nephews or nieces, but I don't have any ).

I also have another recommendation. Libba Bray's "A Great and Terrible Beauty." It's the first book of a trilogy. It's YA. I'd recommend it to any teenager (or older) fantasy reader. It's pretty clean. Not as clean as Hale's, because there's some innuendo, and a couple dreams, but nothing serious. The plot, setting (Victorian England), and strong characters make it a really good read overall.

And of course, Gail Carson Levine for the really young. I love Ella Enchanted. Along with some of the rest, but EE is my favorite of hers. Fairy tale twists are cool, especially when they're actually twisted a lot, but still recognizable as the fairy tale.

[Bookstore Guy]

A local guy is sending me an ARC of his novel (I hope). It is a dark-ish fantasy novel. His name is John Brown, and the novel is SERVANT OF A DARK GOD, and is released in October. I'll let you know how if fits in the "reliable" parameters.

[Peter Ahlstrom]

John Brown will be on Writing Excuses sometime before the book comes out.

[Bookstore Guy]

I figured as much, especially since Brandon gave him a good quote.

[mtbikemom]

Thanks, all!  Shannon Hale sounds great for me and my two young teen girls.  I love the idea of both the Mongol settings and Victorian, especially if research is sufficient to give insights into those cultures.  (My own half-written story idea is much more historical fiction than fantasy so far.)

After finishing Kay's Tigana, I needed a bit of Victorian fare to put my mind in a more wholesome place.  The end of this long story was not worth the sometimes-salacious journey for me, I am sad to say.  The final chapters were  melodramatic and hokey.  A good ending is a precious thing, I'm finding.  Hope I can write one.

Here's recommending Elizabeth Gaskell, especially Sylvia's Lovers (tragic) and Wives and Daughters (more like Jane Austin).  Wives and Daughters was dramatized by PBS years ago and is a hidden treasure to be found on Amazon/Ebay and watched more than once. 

Got my hands on Hobb's Assassin's Aprentice and am looking forward to a good read!  Keep the recommendations coming!

[little wilson]

Oh, Elizabeth Gaskell...I've been meaning to read her. I watched a mini-series done by the BBC a few years back called "North and South" and it was based on her book (which is similar to Pride and Prejudice, yet much more complicated). The mini-series is fantastic, and I've heard the book is even better.

[mtbikemom]

   Gaskell's characters jump off the page and into one's heart almost from the start.  They are full-bodied and multi-dimensional.  The content is often highly edifying to anyone who tends to a Biblical worldview and inspiring to anyone who seeks to live a better life.  Probably because Mrs. Gaskell was a collector of stories wherever she lived/visited and tended to fall in love with certain colloquial people/places/legends in the British Isles.  She writes brutally, but lovingly, and this is great to read.  Her imagery is poetic and the use of language is typically delicious for writers of that era. 

   Thanks for reminding me of North and South, LW.  That will be great to read sometime and then watch on Netflix if available.  "Wives and Daughters" is available to watch for free (with subscription) on NF, I just discovered.  We are off-topic here since this is neither sci-fi nor fantasy, but will be a wonderful discovery for those Jane Austin lovers who would like more of the same. 

  Horray, Libba Bray's books are available at my local library.  Thanks again, LW!

[Bookstore Guy]

The only Pride and Prejudice I care about is the one with zombies.

[mtbikemom]

Btw, Bookstore Guy, Carol Berg books are dark.  Very dark and violent, but never without connection to plot and motivation.  Do not be alarmed at her "fantasy/romance" designation, she writes gritty-but-mostly-wholesome and always, always surprises.  Last plug, I promise.

[Bookstore Guy]

they are on "The List." we are reading like crazy, and the Carol Berg novels are coming up soon-ish i think. You are right though, those covers remind me of bad romance manga...yikes...

[mtbikemom]

I can't even look at them (Berg's covers).   Protagonists are always too pretty and I haven't been into pretty boys since about 1977.  (One bad one spoiled it for all the rest.)  Besides, by the end of her books, everyone has been beat to a pulp and can barely move for injuries.  I exaggerate, but not by much!  At least, artistically, Roc covers are far superior to anything on a Robert Jordan book.  Ever.

[Bejay]

(IIRC) Michael Stackpole's Age of Discovery-Triologie is rather clean and a good read overall.

[Patriotic Kaz]

A Mote in God's Eye is good clean classic Sci Fi. Not to mention it follows the christian faith and isn't a "godless universe" which i believe was what you disliked about Asimov.