Tag: books

The Secret Names of Selenoth

Daniel reviews A Throne of Bones from a literary perspective:

Subtext flows fast through the story, providing a skeleton that never
shows through the story’s skirts. However, if you want elegant critiques
on the distancing effects of television, the nature of cruelty, the
excellence of warfare, the culture of the Church, the narrowness of
postmodern expectation, the daft inner workings of pseudoscience, the
shortcomings of theory versus application, the invisible nature of
Modalism, or the psychological impact of human flight you’ll find them,
like a rake in his prime, waiting, ready and rich.

But this is a
book designed with a single primary purpose, to revive epic fantasy as a
rooted form, and most readers of fantasy are going to receive this
story as such.

They will not be disappointed.

Names are
important in A Throne of Bones, and I’ll highlight two: Selenoth, the
continent upon which the action takes is, a nod, I believe, to the
element selenium, which occurs naturally in volcanic areas. Considering
the photosensitivity of the material, it seems natural that the land
provides an elemental basis to the development of Selenoth’s primeval
magic.

Even more interesting, however is the name of the main
country: Amorr. Yes, it is a play on the legendary “secret name” of
Rome, which provides a clever signal that this strange society will in
some way mirror the Roman republic. However, more deeply, it is also a
direct tip to the Latin word for “love” and this is where, if the magic
of Selenoth draws the bow, the arrow of Amorr strikes the heart.

Day
is, after all, an incorrigible romantic, and not of the hopeless
variety. The nostalgia, realism and richness of Selenoth is crystalized
through the lens of Amorr, and, to put a fine point on it, love is all
around. Love in degraded, if happy, form in the camp followers and
brothels among the soldiery. Love between sibling reavers on a mission
to draw former victim states into an alliance against certain doom. In a
scene stunning, dreadful, long-coming but still shocking scene, love
grips in stoic, complex anguish.*

The raw and needful love
between man and wife. Long-distance love between the clever (yet
earnest) and the cruel (yet sympathetic). Love of complex relational
intrigues. Love of language. Love of order. Love of family, of honor, of
duty.

Love of dragons. Love of gold. Love of knowledge. Love of
good men, of good life, of good death. A love of the hope that all
things, not some or most, will pass away, and yet that all things, not
some or most, will be restored by the hand of the Almighty. Every page,
for its grit and realism, its tragedy, folly and danger, the thwarted
plans, curses, whoredom, brutality, the death of youth, the loss of
ideals, the temporary victory of murder and evil, is an out and out love
letter to the Immaculate. Death, in all its towering, all-consuming
bleakness, is small, and soon to be swallowed by a love so great it lays
its life down, and in defeat, quite literally overcomes all.

A
Throne of Bones is doorstopping fantasy for far more than its physical
dimensions. Metaphysically, it shuts the door to the world we know and
provides an escape to a better reality, and one far more dangerous than
the one in which we now dwell. It expresses longings (to master dragons,
to find treasure, to save the world on a mission from God, to restore
and enjoy the family, to live abundantly and in reality, enjoy and
defend the relationships that matter, and many, many more) in such
richness of detail.

An aside: fantasists are the bastard children
of organized theology. I don’t mean that fantasy is allegory, and
certainly not direct, symbol for symbol theology. Instead due in part to
the fact that every fantasy, from Phantastes to His Dark Materials, are
created worlds that don’t pop into existence at random. They each have
creators who can’t help that they leave traces of themselves in the
handiwork of their model worlds. While science fiction is typically a
practical exercise or applied thought experiment in galactic or atomic
creation, fantasy distinguishes itself by fabricating the middle ground:
the world as it is commonly known. A Throne of Bones expresses a
theology that views an Almighty who is coming to restore all things, and
the things, even in corrupted state, have their origins in good. Evil
is small and dark and nothing, whose major temporary advantage is its
ability to poison hope and occlude the truth.

Ensoulment, the
major theme of the previous novel in the series, Summa Elvetica, gets to
play in A Throne of Bones in a way that was impossible when it was the
primary pack mule for the plot of the previous work. As previously
established, love is not possible without ensoulment. What is most
fascinating is to see the care in which the author has ensouled each of
his own characters, down to the idiotically short-lived and naturally
evil goblin cannon fodder.

Forget if elves might be ensouled. Can goblins win a fight?

The
book has tremendous surf. There are waves of no fewer than seven
chapters that are powerful, climactic, moving: not just great writing,
but great in meaning. I have been surprised to see (more than once)
complaints about dropped plot threads (such as the dragon) which to me
were quite obviously not dropped, characters that do not naturally
develop (such as Severa) who seems to me to very naturally develop and
comparisons to A Song of Ice and Fire where I see very little
resemblance.

A major criticism I have of the book is something I
naturally expected after reading a chapter or two: music. The book
itself is not lyrical, but technical (though elegant in technique), but
the world of Selenoth, especially with its peculiar response to the
Immaculate, simply cries out for various bits of poetry, hymn and common
song to be in greater evidence. Aside from a muscular (and welcome)
public recitation of poetry (during which Corvus, the listener, falls
asleep!) they are not.

I know, I know. Bad form knocking a book
an entire half-star (out of ten) for what it did not include, but it
really was that noticeable. It isn’t like the author hasn’t included
poetics in previous works: the decision had to be conscious, and all I
can say is that I missed the music. The reader gets smells, sights,
sounds, textures and action, but the lack of music is curious. The
lyrics are there, mixed in with more mundane plot-drivers – they are
simply not drawn out and set to music to make it more obvious for the
reader. There are prayers, but no psalms.

On the other hand,
despite an off-hand reference to musicians, there are also no minstrel
bards to be found, and of that I can’t complain.

Despite its
length, A Throne of Bones is a fast read, and perhaps would benefit from
the occasional gear-shifting song cycle or original poem, just to
remind the reader to linger and look around a moment longer.

Of
course, to truly succeed, the series will need to out-do itself until
the penultimate book (where, if the series is to be great, it must peak,
then echo that peak through the final book and achieve an elegant
slight downslope), which will certainly be a challenge, perhaps an epic
one. However, I simply can’t express the joy in knowing this is a
planned set – a part of a larger story (but don’t worry, this one stands
just fine on its own. Though it ends with a satisfying suspense, it is
no annoying cliffhanger. It will build expectation for what comes next,
but also satisfies.) – and that I have only just begun a lifelong escape
into the reality of Selenoth and Amorr: or, as I think of their secret
names – Magic and Love.

A Throne of Bones (Vox Day, Hardcover Edition)
9 out of 10

*One
note on this, yet trying to avoid major spoilers* – the scene of
anguish is subtle and intensely complex, and argues, in a very brief
moment, a detailed theological argument. I view it as a significant
underpinning to the way the world of Selenoth “works” from a creator’s
point of view – a creator who fully intends to restore all things, and
one who therefore allows space for a man to work out many critical and
seemingly impossible choices for himself.

While every author enjoys knowing that his readers enjoy his work and appreciates support, it is a particular pleasure to read substantive reviews written by those readers who not only enjoy the book, but show a deeper understanding of it as well.  Daniel is too generous, I think, in that while there was some development of Severa’s character it was too crude and clumsy due to the time constraints; I tend to find female characters more difficult to write because their motivations and thought processes are so different from my own.  And his criticism concerning the lack of music is well-placed; there is a distinct lack of melody to accompany the constant rhythm of the legions on the march.

I did, however, agree with him concerning how neither dragon story amounted to any sort of dropped plot-thread.  While I freely admit to favoring subtlety and dropping hints to labored explanations of precisely what happened in all circumstances, that’s not the same as simply leaving a plot point unaddressed. My philosophy is to refrain from telling the reader any more than the perspective character can reasonably expect to know, and I’m not going to divert a character’s inner dialogue for the purposes of exposition any more than is absolutely necessary. 

I was impressed that Daniel correctly nailed both meanings of the city’s name; those who thought it was simply a singularly inept attempt to disguise the name of Rome clearly don’t know much about Roman history.  There are various theories concerning what Pliny described as “the other name of Rome which it is held sinful to disclose except during the rites of the mysteries”; some say it was Amor, others Hirpa.  I incline towards the Amor theory myself, thanks to a number of historical plays on words in both Latin and Greek that juxtapose Roma, Amor, and Eros.

Anyhow, I take this sort of review as a challenge to, as Daniel suggests, see each book outdo the next.  I don’t know if my skills are up to the task, but if I fail it will not be through a failure to try.

In related news, I expect Hinterlands to release The Wardog’s Coin in ebook next week, which will consist of the title story and “Qalabi Dawn”.  For those who would like to obtain a physical copy of the ebooks, Hinterlands will be publishing a hardcover version of Summa Elvetica in May, that will possess a newly designed spine to match those of the Arts of Dark and Light series, and in addition to the titular novel, will contain the following stories: “Master of Cats”, “Birth of an Order”, “A Magic Broken”, “The Wardog’s Coin”, “Qalabi Dawn”, “The Hoblets of Wiccam Fensboro”, and “The Last Witchking”.  I don’t know the exact page count yet, but it should be around 450 pages.

A slip of the mask

I have to admit that I was impressed with this woman’s review of A Throne of Bones, less because she was willing to recognize its strengths while correctly identifying some of its flaws than by her ability to observe what so many other critics simply do not see:

“I hadn’t yet found Mr. Day’s talents to be equal to his claims of superior intelligence. Do pay attention to my verb tenses, please. I had always found his nonfiction articles to lack nuance, but later discovered that this lack of nuance left him open to attacks on his logic, which then created situations of counterattack wherein Day revealed how very coldly logical he was, and in a way that most people couldn’t follow. This led me to believe that Vox Day is a master manipulator, who directs the dichotomous thinking of others [most people, I’ve found, are black and white thinkers, even if they boast high intelligence. And that personality trait is exploitable]”

I think this description is probably a bit too colorful; after all, what sort of master manipulator never attempts to manipulate anyone into doing anything?  I may have some of the abilities and perhaps even the right psychological makeup(1) to be such a creature, but the only thing for which I habitually use my Machiavellian tendencies is to encourage my critics-to-be to expose themselves to an inevitable counterattack.  If you think about it, it’s really nothing more than setting up a defensive position with kill zones, then guiding the enemy’s approach into those zones with the use of misdirection.

However, she is absolutely correct concerning the exploitable nature of the binary thinker.  Regardless of how smart he may be, all one has to do to fatally trap any such thinker is to encourage him to lunge at the lure. Convince him to think that white is black, he will immediately begin to argue in favor of white in reaction, at which point one has no more to do than remove the illusion and he is yours.

Many, if not most, of the questions I initially ask people are simply intended to sound them out.  It’s much more important to know how someone thinks than what they think.  If you know what someone thinks on a certain matter, it may offer a clue as to what they think on another one.  If you know how someone thinks, you can fairly accurately anticipate what they are going to conclude about practically anything, assuming you’re both privy to the same information.

Anyhow, I was particularly pleased to read Mrs. Domschot’s generally positive conclusions about the book because she clearly views the author in a skeptical light.  But one always has to respect those critics who genuinely attempt judge a work on its own merits, regardless of what they think of the author and no matter what their ultimate conclusions happen to be.  Of course, given that she describes herself as a “a non-compliant, anti-authoritarian misanthrope who writes speculative fiction”, it may be that we have more in common than she would like to believe.

(1)After a round of personality tests in high school, the psychologist administering them commented that my profile was an uncommon one as I was unusually high in two areas generally observed to be contradictory.  Apparently it showed that I was an honest and straightforward Machiavellian.

On the book/game front

1. The Wardog’s Coin is finished.  Marcher Lord is presently giving it the editorial polishing and then the novelette will be published in accompaniment with its B-side, Qalabi Dawn.  With nearly 30k words between the two of them; it should be on Amazon for $1.99 before the end of the month.  As with AMB, I’ll be sending out the ebook to those who have promised to review it; if you’re interested, send me an email with TWC in the subject and specify if you prefer epub or mobi format. The title novelette is about a Savondese mercenary who finds himself, and his mercenary company, drawn into the service of the elven king of Merithaim courtesy of an insufficiently researched contract. It is set in Selenoth and introduces a new perspective character who will be appearing in TAODAL: Book Two.

2. A Selenoth-based game will be coming out for mobile platforms towards the end of this year, such as Android and iOS. I won’t say anything more about it now, except that it’s going to be a very different sort of game than anyone is likely to anticipate, and it is going to contain one or two innovations that I expect to be of interest to various people outside of the game industry proper.

3. While Summa Elvetica was a failure in a way that the much less ambitious A Throne of Bones was not, I’m still pleased to learn that SE has its fans who are not put off by its unconventional approach to story-telling.  Seeking the New Earth has posted a nice review of it:

The moment I knew that I did not merely like the novel, but loved it, comes here. I don’t want to spoil it, but I will say this: Marcus discovers evidence that leads him to write the Summa Elvetica, an official treatise on elves, for the church. And what he discovers actually made me cheer. Beale shows his mastery in showing, not telling, in that particular scene, and it lifts the rest of the novel from “pretty good” to “great.”

The conclusion of the novel nearly disappointed me. I thought Beale would go the hackneyed route of, “The church is shown the truth but chooses to ignore it.” Ah, but he has another trick up his sleeve to bring this story to a satisfying conclusion.

Oh! The story ended, but there’s almost a hundred pages left?

Beale actually wrote the Summa Elvetica. He wrote a treatise in the style of the medieval church. It’s included as an appendix. OK, that’s neat and all, but how many of us read medieval religious treatises?

Oh. It’s only a few pages. What else?

Beale includes two short stories set within the world of Summa Elvetica that shine more brightly than the novel. Honestly, the book’s worth the price of admission for either of these two stories. I’m delighted they’re included.

4.  Koanic Soul has posted a review of A Throne of Bones, (warning: considerable spoilers) that is much more accessible and much less insane than one would ever have imagined. Frankly, I was disappointed, as I was expecting long treatises on the conjectured skull shapes and eye sockets of the various major characters.  Or something like that.  Based on the title of his post, it appears Koanic may have reversed the analogy below, but regardless, it’s nice to hear that TAODAR compares favorably with ASOIAF in one way or another.

My preferred form of stimulation is intellectual. Vox’s latest book, A Throne of Bones, is like a 2-day morphine high. Just buy it. If you need convincing, here my review. Vox Day is to RR Martin as a box of pastries is to a pot roast
dinner. One may taste better at the beginning, but the other you
wouldn’t mind eating for the rest of your life.

 5. Speaking of ASOIAF, I was more than a little amused by this discussion on the Martin fan site Westeros.org, which is nominally about A Throne of Bones, but is more devoted to my various ideological and personal shortcomings by Martin fans who haven’t bothered to read the book before opining on the author.  This comment about my discourse with R. Scott Bakker, in particular, made me laugh out loud:

“When you’re the condescending douche in an argument with Bakker you’re in trouble.”

Such is the burden of life as a superintelligence. One ignores at the price of being considered arrogant. One explains at the price of being deemed condescending.

How to write a Great American Novel

I’ve been reading David Foster Wallace’s Infinite Jest, and while it is a well-written and entertaining novel, thus far I have found it to be neither brilliant nor sui generis.  It is intelligent, it features an expanded vocabulary, it is observant, and it is unusually detailed in both physical and psychological terms.

But at least thus far, it is, contra the book’s Introduction, far from unrecognizable.  By way of explanation, I should mention that in the aforementioned intro, Dave Eggers writes:

It’s possible, with most contemporary novels, for astute readers, if they are wont, to break it down into its parts, to take it apart as one would a car or Ikea shelving unit. That is, let’s say a reader is a sort of mechanic. And let’s say this particular reader-mechanic has worked on lots of books, and after a few hundred contemporary novels, the mechanic feels like he can take apart just about any book and put it back together again. That is, the mechanic recognizes the components of modern fiction and can say, for example, I’ve seen this part before, so I know why it’s there and what it does. And this one, too — I recognize it. This part connects to this and performs this function. This one usually goes here, and does that. All of this is familiar enough. That’s no knock on the contemporary fiction that is recognizable and breakdownable. This includes about 98 percent of the fiction we know and love.

But this is not possible with Infinite Jest. This book is like a spaceship with no recognizable components, no rivets or bolts, no entry points, no way to take it apart. It is very shiny, and it has no discernible flaws. If you could somehow smash it into smaller pieces, there would certainly be no way to put it back together again. It simply is. Page by page, line by line, it is probably the strangest, most distinctive, and most involved work of fiction by an American in the last twenty years.

Now, I haven’t finished the book yet, so it is entirely possible that it features depths as yet unplumbed by me.  But since I’ve been reading the book in the awareness of the statements made above, what has actually struck me in reading it is how absolutely familiar it was.

It genuinely makes me wonder if Eggers has ever read John Irving, Tom Robbins, or even Robert Anton Wilson.  While Infinite Jest is much larger in scope and looser in plot than any books I have read by either of the first two authors, and while Wallace is a noticeably more intelligent writer than Robbins and one apparently less obsessed with his formative years than Irving, there are elements in the work of all four writers that are every bit as recognizable as the elements one can recognize is Martin, Abercrombie, Erikson, and Sanderson, in Brooks, Goodkind, and every other would-be Tolkien, in the romance genre, in the wereseal genre, and in the vampire genre.

Take a few quirky but highly intelligent characters.  Go into excruciating detail concerning the minute-by-minute existence of their quotidian routines, especially regarding the sexual or toilet aspects, then throw in some highly implausible gonzo drama produced by their relationships with their cartoonishly dysfunctional families or inexplicably deformed lovers.  Be sure to have a strong amateur sporting element, be it wrestling or tennis.  At all times, be careful to utilize the high-low technique of an unfamiliar and elevated vocabulary taken straight from the OED alternating with the crudest vulgar slang.  The perspective, at all times, is one of vaguely bemused detachment; the narrator is more observer than actor.

The point, of course, is that there is no point, and life has no more meaning to it than the meaning one happens to find in the process of watching it proceed around one.  Now, perhaps I am incorrect about this, at least with regards to Infinite Jest, and I am quite willing to discover that I am wrong.  And yet, if I am not, that should speak volumes about the predictable nature of this supposedly flawless book.  Correct me if I am wrong, by all means, but my initial impression is that this is little more than an oversized member of the Garp genre.

I’m not saying I don’t like the book.  I do.  I’m not even saying it is not a great book that merits all the praise it has received.  I will not have an opinion on that until I finish it.  What I’m saying is that thus far, I am experiencing far too much literary deja vu to consider this anything more than a fine example of its particular genre.

Mailvox: the line between F and SF

An SFWA author writes concerning the upcoming SFWA election:

 I voted for you and my ballot’s going out tomorrow in the mail. I thought your opening statements were hilarious! Outlandish, too….  But anyway I liked most of your ideas for SFWA.

The idea of establishing two Nebula awards — one for SF and one for F is really over the top. They overlap. Just as a good story also overlaps with dark elements. (Which we politely do  not refer to as “horror” but it is.) This is the main reason I’m writing you –I’d like to know just how you would possibly chop SF & F in half –when novels and stories contain elements of both. “Hard” sf isn’t the only definition of Science Fiction. “Hard SF” implies that there is some explicit element of science explained within the story or novel (which Landis and Haldeman do well) but it’s not the only element and anything we imagine becomes fantasy.

This was my response:  In answer to your question, those nominating a novel for a Nebula Award would be expected to indicate that they considered the nominated work to be either F or SF as part of the nomination process.  A novel that received both SF and F nominations would have both types of nominations counted but would be put up for the award in the category that received the most nominations, assuming that it received enough combined nominations to qualify.  If the author happened to disagree with the categorization and the difference between the two categories was between one and three nominations, then the category would be switched at the author’s request.

Obviously, if everyone nominates something that is clearly Fantasy and the author prefers it to compete in the Science Fiction category because he believes he is the second coming of Isaac Asimov or because he thinks it will be easier to beat out Star Trek 562: Spock Takes a Nap than the most recent rewrite of a Brontë novel published by Tor Books, there would be no reason to accommodate that.

But if a book could be reasonably considered to be either science fiction or fantasy, to such an extent that it is unclear to the readers, there is no reason not to permit the author to determine which category the book most properly belongs.

SF/F Corruption: Part II

I had intended to continue on the SFWA theme with which I began the Corruption in Science Fiction series, but a pair of articles concerning the legitimacy of the bestseller lists caught my attention after being featured on Slashdot over the weekend:

The other day, I received an unexpected phone call from Jeff Trachtenberg, a reporter at The Wall Street Journal. He said he wanted to talk about my bestselling book, Leapfrogging. At first, I was thrilled. Any first-time author would jump at the chance to speak with such a high-profile publication. But it turned out Trachtenberg didn’t want to discuss what was in my book. He was interested in how it had made it onto his paper’s bestseller list. As he accurately noted, Leapfrogging had, well, leapt onto the Journal’s list at #3 the first week it debuted, and then promptly disappeared the following Friday.

Suddenly, I wasn’t so thrilled anymore. I was just about to sit down to dinner with my family and now I was being put on the spot to discuss my role in perhaps one of the most controversial practices in the book publishing industry. I was tempted to make an excuse and plead the 5th. But I wound up talking to Trachtenberg several times over the next few days….

Trachtenberg asked me about my experience with a company called ResultSource,
the firm I had hired to help me hit the bestseller list from day one.
Trachtenberg said he had contacted all of the major New York publishers,
but no one would speak to him about the firm or the role of so-called
“bestseller campaigns” in helping authors reach the coveted status. No
comment. Dead silence.

I can’t say I was eager to be the first person to go on the record
about the topic. But then I realized something – Trachtenberg’s
surprising phone call was an opportunity to live up to what I urge my
readers to do in my book Leapfrogging.  I’ve seen the phenomenon of corporate silence repeatedly in my
career. There’s a big, smelly, ten thousand pound elephant in the
conference room. Everybody knows it’s there, but no one’s willing to
take the risk and point it out. As Trachtenberg was discovering,
bestseller campaigns are the unacknowledged pachyderm of the book
business.

There’s good reason why most industry insiders would prefer that the
wider book-buying public didn’t learn about these campaigns. Put
bluntly, they allow people with enough money, contacts, and know-how to
buy their way onto bestseller lists. And they benefit all the key
players of the book world. Publishers profit on them. Authors gain
credibility from bestseller status, which can launch consulting or
speaking careers and give a big boost to keynote presentation fees. And
the marketing firms that run the campaigns don’t do so bad either.

This sort of thing is hardly a new practice; the Scientologists kept L. Ron Hubbard’s books on the bestseller lists for years this way.  Nor is it a surprise to know that there is some hinky business going on behind the scenes at the New York Times; there usually is, and the NYT has gone to great lengths to keep hidden the method it uses to determine its bestsellers.  But it is a little surprising to see that all of the major New York publishers appear to be involved in this practice, at least to the extent that they are unwilling to openly deny that they utilize such tactics in order to market their books.

Now, upon reading this, my thoughts immediately went to a particular publisher of science fiction and fantasy, which just happens to be a publisher that appears to place an inordinate energy of effort into winning awards.  It also loves bestseller lists; here is Tor congratulating itself on its many bestseller listings in 2010 and 2011.

Tor was particularly pleased by its 2011 showing, in which its “30 New York Times bestselling books this year” annihilated their “2010 release list of 20 bestsellers”.  Interestingly enough, however, the Publishers Weekly list of the 115 bestselling fiction novels for 2011 shows precisely one Tor book on its list: The Omen Machine. Terry Goodkind. Tor (108,809).

After reading this, it also occurred to me that despite McRapey’s tale of the starship ensigns who were expendable hitting #15 on the New York Times bestseller list, Redshirts not only didn’t show up in PW’s list of science fiction bestsellers for last year, it’s only #6 on Tor’s own list of its top sellers, behind the immortal Imager’s Battalion by L. E. Modesitt, presently ranked 19,446 on Amazon a month after its release.  And despite being “a New York Times bestseller”, according to Publisher’s Weekly, Redshirts didn’t even make the top ten in the science fiction category in 2012, coming in behind at least three other Tor novels and a novel published in 1965.

Science Fiction

1. Ender’s Game by Orson Scott Card. Tor. 100,387
2. Ready Player One by Ernest Cline. Broadway. 50,593
3. Star Wars: Darth Plagueis by James Luceno. Lucas Books. 31,543
4. The Ultimate Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams. Del Rey. 27,220
5. Star Wars: Apocalypse by Troy Denning. Lucas Books. 26,140
6. Dune by Frank Herbert. Ace. 25,532
7. A Rising Thunder by David Weber. Baen Books. 25,348
8. HALO: The Thursday War by Karen Traviss. Tor. 24,936
9. HALO: Glasslands by Karen Traviss. Tor. 24,932
10. The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams. Ballantine. 24,120

That doesn’t denigrate McRapey’s achievement in selling so many copies of a derivative and mediocre novel, but merely points to the varying degrees of what is claimed to be a “bestseller”.  (One can, indeed, one should have contempt for McRapey as an SF author, but he is without question the finest self-marketer and stunt writer in SF/F today, even if he hasn’t reached the mainstream heights of AJ Jacobs.)  On a tangential note, it’s a fascinating snapshot of the sickly state of science fiction to see how many of its current and confirmed bestsellers are either works derived from games and movies or original works first published between 30 and 50 years ago.  Regardless, the fact is that most of Tor’s “New York Times bestsellers” observably fit what we are informed is the profile of the fake bestseller.  They appear on the list for a single week, only to vanish the following week, never to make another appearance there again.

Here is another observable anomaly.  According to John Scalzi himself, Redshirts sold 26,604 copies in 2012.  That’s very good by today’s standards, especially for a hardcover, but it falls considerably short of the 100,047 copies of Neal Stephenson’s Reamde sold, which novel PW reports as being the 115th-bestselling book of 2011.  And yet, Reamde spent only one more week in the top portion of the NYT bestseller list than Redshirts, (ranking 4 and 12 vs 15) despite selling nearly four times more copies.  Is the latter ranking credible, especially in light of what we now know about major publishers gaming the bestseller lists?  And how did Tor/Forge manage to produce “30 New York Times bestselling books” when only one was listed among the top-selling 115 books published that year?

Keep in mind that The War in Heaven sold 35,000 copies and I never thought that it was anything remotely close to a bestseller.  (It probably could have sold more, thanks to the brilliant Rowena cover, but that was the print run, which sold out.  I’m still convinced that what killed that series was Pocket’s foolish decision to do their own imitation Left Behind cover for Shadow rather than leaving it up to Rowena and me.  I still have the sketch somewhere; it was going to be an awesome painting of Mariel and Melusine in combat.) 

None of this conclusively proves that Tor Books is engaging in the questionable marketing tactics mentioned in the Wall Street Journal article, but it certainly raises some serious questions about the legitimacy of its claimed “bestsellers”, just as there are serious questions about the literary legitimacy of its infrequently reviewed, modestly-selling Nebula-nominated novels, such as, for example, its two 2012 nominees: Ironskin (64 reviews, 3.5 rating, #35,470 in Books) and Glamour in Glass (18 reviews, 4.3 rating, #409,451 in Books).

Because, after all, nothing says “science fiction” like tedious derivatives of Jane Eyre and Jane Austen.

Mailvox: still relevant

While I tend to largely forget about past books in favor of a) the most recent one, and, b) those I’m currently writing, it’s nice to occasionally be reminded that people are still reading the older ones.  SA writes of his recent encounter with TIA:

Nietzsche’s famous response to his critics was, “Swallow your poison; for you need it badly.” There are realizations that begin by tasting a bit like poison, but end up being just the medicine we need. Vox Day’s book is like that — atheists will instinctively hate it at first, not just because of its content but also because of its ironic writing style. “Poison pen” it may sometimes be; but it’s exactly the sort of “poison” they really need. As anyone who can think philosophically, or even anyone with an ounce of common sense knows, atheism is inherently irrational, since it depends on claiming certainty about a matter it obviously could never know for certain.

Day calls the atheist bluff. Teeing off on some of the chief proponents of irrational atheism today — Dawkins, Harris, Hitchens and Onfray in particular — the author debunks their empty rhetoric with the simplest of weapons: facts. Particularly good is the author’s treatment of the old canard “religion causes wars,” for which he provides so much counter-evidence that the reader is left wondering why anyone ever thinks such a thing is true. He simply takes the atheists at their word, and tests their claims against the available evidence.

In a way, it’s unfortunate that Day resorts so often to the ironic tone, because opponents will be all too quick to jump on that stylistic feature and claim the author is a mere stylist without substance. That charge would be untrue, and a more calm tone might prevent that, showcasing the evidence rather than the rhetorical flourishes. However, flamboyancy and irony of tone have never stopped atheists from loving Nietzsche or uncritically embracing the random rhetoric of mere stylists like Harris or Dawkins, so their objections might be a trifle hypocritical.

On the good side, Day’s book is immensely readable, and at times is simply laugh-out-loud entertaining. You can dash through it in a night, and indeed, it’s hard to stop reading once you start. The central argument is not a scholarly approach so much as a popularly-accessible one; but that does not diminish the ultimate seriousness of the arguments advanced therein. Anyone who is already a theist, or anyone who is still seriously thinking about the atheism-theism debate can find in this book a helpful resource for casual debate. But the atheist “faithful” who have already closed their minds to the evidence may simply find it teeth-grindingly irritating.

It probably won’t escape anyone’s attention that the New Atheism is done, having mutated into helpless silence in the face of Islam on the one hand and A+ feminism on the other.  It’s remarkable to see that women can even ruin atheism; it’s a tactic that we theists should have utilized long ago.  After all, the sort of mind that is prone to atheism in the first place is going to be particular susceptible to cries of “sexism” and “racism”, and there are few groups more male and white than a gathering of atheists.

SA’s point that rhetorical flourishes can detract from the dialectic arguments is an accurate one, but the problem is that they are necessary for the majority who are not capable of following the dialectic arguments.  What TIA exposes, in crossing the rhetorical divide, is that there is very little but rhetoric in most of the New Atheist arguments, which is why a dispassionate dialectical critique would have been an error and left its atheist readers unmoved.  The venom and the spite with which so many atheist reviewers have responded to TIA over the years is proof of its effectiveness in that regard.

It’s also good to see SA single out what has probably been the primary accomplishment of TIA, which was the conclusive debunking of the “religion causes war” line.  We’ve seen less and less of that ever since TIA came out, and the historical evidence has even begun to creep into scientific journals such as Nature.  While I have no doubt that the Left will do everything it can to be sure I am never credited with having successfully demolished that line of attack against religion in general and Christianity in particular, (it’s amusing to see all the references to a $300 encyclopedia that it is perfectly clear no one has even seen, let alone read), I’m very pleased to see that mendacious, but rhetorically effective argument increasingly absent from the atheism-religion discourse.

And SA’s email is a useful reminder that as long as atheists attempt to rely upon the arguments it criticizes, TIA will remain relevant.

A new blog and some book reviews

Zero Sum inaugurates his new blog with a review of A THRONE OF BONES:

This book is monumental. The sheer size of the hardback version is simply staggering. On the cover, there is an intricate array of bronzed scrollwork surrounding a skull. Its quality, finish, and attention to detail are readily apparent. It sits on my bookshelf and carries a commanding presence that is only rivaled by Webster in mass, and very few in quality. Each chapter has a header using the skull and some artwork, it’s a nice touch.

But you don’t buy the book for its cover, so onto the details. The book uses multiple points of view throughout the book highlighting and interlocking web of storylines…. The book to me was initially very complex, between the characters, terrain, alliances, politics and military strategy.

I should probably mention that the second print run of the hardcover does not feature the skull from the cover as a chapter heading, but replaces it with new artwork by the cover artist featuring a pair of wyverns with their tails intertwined.  The dustjacket is also now gloss rather than matte, and the errata from the first run has been corrected.

Didact’s Reach reviewed the novel and actually found it superior to Martin’s series.  I wouldn’t go that far myself, but it’s certainly encouraging to know that it at least merits the comparison.

I’ve read every one of the books in A Song of Ice and Fire, and this beats the pants off all of them. Even A Storm of Swords. Seriously. It’s that good.

This book works because it doesn’t pretend to be more than it is- an epic historical fantasy novel. The utterly depressing and frankly pointless moral nihilism of ASOIAF is nowhere to be found; in its place is a powerful and uplifting vision of faith and republican virtue, challenged as it is on every side by civil war, dark magic, and loss of faith. The frankly ludicrous “realistic” sex scenes in ASOIAF are thankfully nowhere to be found here; in fact, the sex is kept largely out of sight, which I think is a good thing, as it reduces the number of distractions significantly. It doesn’t try to do anything other than tell a truly epic story. And if you’re an avid reader of historical fiction and non-fiction, of the Ross Leckie/Robert Harris variety, then you’re in for a real treat.

ATOB is set in the same intriguing fictional world of Selenoth as SE, a world that fuses the best traditions of the ancient Roman Republic with many of the ideas of the Christian Church as embodied by the Holy Roman Empire. The world is both strange and familiar, and as a literary device, I have to say, this is damned effective. I’ve read my share of Roman history too, so I really appreciated the little details that Vox put into the book. For instance, the scene in which Valerius Corvus observes the “coronation” (if that is the correct word) of the new Holy Father is exactly what I would expect from the martial and spiritual traditions of a Roman Republic, where god-kings were cast aside in favour of Republican rule, combined with the clear separation of Church and State that is a founding principle of Christian theology. The battle scenes are particularly effective displays of Vox’s thorough command of military history; he switches almost effortlessly between individual perspectives of the horror of battle to large-scale tactical views of the conflicts, without losing coherence or purpose.

This thread at r/Fantasy is more than a little amusing.  I’m really enjoying “A Throne of Bones.” Best not to read about the author first. It’s a delight to see the always-open minds of the fantasy-reading rabbits at work. I particularly enjoyed this remark: “I just googled the guy and I already hate him.” But I quite appreciate reluctant praise from those who dislike or even despise me, as it is arguably the most meaningful.

Allusions of Grandeur also reviewed the book, but you may want to think twice about reading the review as it does contain a spoiler or two despite the reviewer’s apparent desire to avoid them.

A Throne of Bones is a long, remarkably dense work of fiction.  That it is well-written and compelling helps to hide this fact, especially when you read this in the Kindle format, for once you start reading, it is very difficult to stop.  As such, the sheer entertainment value coupled with Vox’s need to constantly propel the plot forward at a rather fast clip (much like what you would expect from the TV show 24), makes this book seem shorter than it is.

I will not attempt to summarize the plot, as a) I don’t want to reveal spoilers and b) doing so would almost be a novel unto itself.  Nonetheless, the plot of this book revolves primarily around war, and most of the subplots revolve around this as well.

What makes this book both an entertaining and fascinating read is that Vox draws on his rather tremendous depth of knowledge and literary theory to create a world that is quite imaginative and “realistic,” which is in turn populated with characters that are interesting, sympathetic, and multi-dimensional…. a good portion of the plot conflicts are moral conflicts, which make the
conflicts meaningful.  The characters are not random actors that exist
simply as plot devices.  Rather, they are characters with their own
beliefs, motivations and moral codes.  Whether you agree with any given
character’s motivations or not, you cannot deny that any given
character’s motivations are what make the story so compelling.  In fact,
the constant moral conflict found with Marcus Valerius is what makes
him such a compelling character.  Watching him struggle with him
adjusting his theological studies to the real world of war causes you to
sympathize with him.

And what do you do with witches?

“The thesis of The World Until Yesterday is that we in
industrialized societies have much to learn from people who make (or
recently made) their living by hunting-and-gathering or small-scale
farming.”
– National Public Radio on Jared Diamond’s latest ode to the primitive life in Papua New Guinea

“A young mother was tossed screaming on to a pyre of tyres and burned alive after being accused of killing a neighbour’s six-year-old son with sorcery.  Kepari Leniata, 20, ‘confessed’ after she was dragged from her hut, stripped naked and tortured with white-hot iron rods.  She was then dragged to a local rubbish dump, doused in petrol and, with hands and feet bound, thrown on a fire of burning tyres. As the mother-of-two screamed in agony, more petrol-soaked tyres were thrown on top of her….  The tragedy unfolded after Miss Leniata’s young neighbour fell sick on Tuesday morning. He complained of pains in the stomach and chest and was taken to Mt Hagen hospital where he died a few hours later. Relatives of the boy were suspicious that witchcraft was involved in the death and learned that two women had gone into hiding in the jungle.  After they were tracked down, the pair admitted they practised sorcery but had nothing to do with the boy’s death. Miss Leniata, they said, was the person responsible.”
– Mail Online

Clearly we have a lot to learn from such a simple and noble way of life. I don’t know about you, but I find it more than a little amusing that the poster boy for modern pop science is advocating a Rousseauean idealization of a state of nature that happens to include the great historical secular bugaboo, witch-burnings.  As I have repeatedly pointed out, far from being progressive, secular post-Christianity is more regressive than 7th century Islam.  It’s ultimately a return to the mores of precivilized paganism.

Saruman: the misunderstood hero

Adrian Simmons presents an interesting and unusual take on The Lord of the Rings:

The more you know about Sarumon, the more sympathetic to his situation you become. He is the first picked to go, and the first to arrive in Middle-earth. He journeys to the east with Aratar and Pollombo, and those two don’t return (not much is said about the blue wizards, but honestly I get the feeling they kind of flake out altogether — a very real danger with volunteers who get to bring their friends along).

But Sarumon’s always second fiddle. Right from the start Varda makes it clear that he’s not in charge, and later when the White Council is formed, Galadriel doesn’t want him in control of that august body either. And he learns that that weenie Gandalf (who comes to Middle-earth one hundred years later) gets one of the three rings of power the day he freaking lands. Ugh! The humiliation! You’d retreat to the fastness of your ancient tower, too.

Sarumon’s activities are not well defined, but there are hints that he tangles with ring wraiths, and he is in the thick of it when the White Council goes to Dol Guldur to deal with the Necromancer. After Dol Guldur, he withdraws a bit, but even then he is still working on the Sauron problem, and his solution is as awful as it is cunning. You have to keep in mind, he’s come to Middle-earth, he fights the good fight (for over a thousand years), stress causes his hair to turn from black to white, he gets the keys to Orthanc, and he discovers the palantir. And after Dol Guldur is where the Big Plan starts.

And here is the tragedy of it all, as Sauron and Sarumon were co-workers back in the day, they have a remarkably similar ‘corporate culture’, and a pretty similar worldview — and this is why the wise don’t really want Sarumon in charge — because his answer to Sauron will be to become Sauron, Ring or no.

Sauron, of course, knows all this, and that’s why it is so easy for him, via the palantir, to pluck at Sarumon’s pride and ensure that, like the gung-ho fireman, he overestimates his own abilities and underestimates the situation, and his teammates have to burn valuable time and resources bailing him out.

And since Sarumon can’t force Men or Elves to fight his Big War, he comes up with the idea of the half-orcs/Urik-hai. The injunction by the gods? Doesn’t say shit about orcs, does it? Hell no it doesn’t! So, really, it was only a matter of time before Saruman realized that he could raise an army of his own orcs to take on Sauron’s. Give him another hundred years and he won’t need the damn Men or the Elves. It really has a whole Stalin vs. Hitler vibe, doesn’t it?

I guess it just goes to show that no one likes a “letter of the law” guy.  Wizard or no.  Read the rest at The Black Gate.