Review: Marco Polo and the Sleeping Beauty, by Avram Davidson and Grania Davis

Review: Marco Polo and the Sleeping Beauty, by Avram Davidson and Grania Davis

a review by Rich Horton

Marco Polo and the Sleeping Beauty (1988) was the last novel Avram Davidson (1923-1993) published in his lifetime. As with his posthumous novella, The Boss in the Wall, it was a collaboration with his ex-wife Grania Davis. Davidson and Davis divorced amicably and remained close, and, in fact, Davidson was godfather to Seth Davis, Grania's son with her second husband, and Seth has been doing excellent work as Davidson's literary executor, bringing much of his work back to print, and publishing some unsold novels and memoirs as well. Grania Davis (1943-2017) was a significant author in her own right. She published a couple of dozen short stories, and several solo novels, most notably, perhaps, Moonbird (1986), a fantastical tale set in Bali.

This novel primarily concerns the mission of Marco Polo, along with his father Niccolo, and his uncle Maffeo, to seek out the rumored castle of the Sleeping Beauty. They have been in China (Cathay) for some years, working for the Mongol Emperor, Kublai Khan, and the aging Kublai is interested in the Sleeping Beauty's apparent immortality, not to mention her beauty, and also is interested in any hope of a cure for his favorite son, Prince Chenghin. 

That's the basic setup, but the real point of the book is to present a humorous (and slightly satirical), romantic, colorful and adventurous travelogue through the wonders and perils of Asia in the 13th Century. In the manner we expect from an Avram Davidson novel (see: the Vergil books and the Peregrine books, not to mention Adventures in Unhistory), this particular 13th Century is based more on the legends and fancies prevalent at the time than it is on our history, though it hews at least in the basics to the biographies of the Polos and Kublai Khan.

Pretending to be collectors of the Khan's salt tax, the three Polos, along with Marco's slave Peter the Tartar, the scholar Yen Lung-chuan (who believes all is illusion, even fierce animals attacking them), and a party of the Khan's soldiers, attempt to follow the ambiguous directions on a map which purports to show the location of the Sleeping Beauty's castle. Along the way they gain and lose allies, such as the mighty Norseman Olavr; the beautiful acrobat Su-Shen, with whom Marco falls in love; a clever miniature sphinx, who is always riddling (of course); the herbalist Hua T'o; and a strange traveling knight, who goes by many names, but mostly (in this narrative) Hou-Ying. They encounter dragons, griffins, huge snow leopards, frogs, a trickster monkey, cannibals, dog-headed pirates, sea-dragons, ghosts, warrior nuns, a giant talking carp, and many further marvels. They visit much of the Khan's empire, plus Bur-Mien, the Pleasure Island, Tebet, and other places. They are menaced repeatedly by Cumanian rebels allied with Kublai's rebellious cousin Kaidu Khan. And we are treated to some of Marco's earlier dealings with Kublai Khan, including witnessing his disastrous attempts to invade Japangu.

This is all a bit discursive, but never boring. (Though I imagined at times that Grania Davis was grabbing the reins from Davidson, and insisting the narrative move forward.) But the depictions of the wondrous and fearful creatures and locales is enjoyable. The tone is usually light, but some darker, and some sweeter, scenes convince, particularly Marco's romance with Su-Shen. The resolution of the plot is logical -- consistent with the outlines of the Sleeping Beauty story but sensible in the context of Kublai Khan's desires. It is not a great novel, but a fun one.

Resurrected Review: Cavalcade, by Alison Sinclair

Here's a review I wrote back in 2000 of Alison Sinclair's novel Cavalcade.

Cavalcade

by Alison Sinclair

Millennium, London, 1999, (originally published 1998), £5.99;

ISBN: 1-85798-564-8

A review by Rich Horton

This interesting novel is set entirely on an alien spaceship. The book opens just as hundreds of thousands of humans have woken up from being transported from Earth to the ship. This was entirely voluntary: the aliens came and announced that they'd take anyone who wanted to go. People are segregated by language, it seems, and we follow the viewpoints of a few people in the English language area: Stan Morgan, a NASA scientist attached to a U. S. Army squad which hopes to learn enough about the spaceship to be able to return to Earth with the data; his niece Hathaway, a pregnant teen who just wants a new life away from her stressful home; Stephen Cooper, a disaffected young man who was afraid he would be wanted for murder and who found the ship a convenient way to run really far away; and Sophie Hemmingway, an upper class American research M. D. who fears a genetic disease will give her Alzheimer's by the time she's fifty, and who hopes to learn from the aliens.

The story starts somewhat slowly, but the characters are interesting enough to hold our attention. Almost everyone is surprised by the way the ship works. No electrical device will work, shattering Sophie's hopes of research, and frustrating many people's belief that they will be able to communicate with Earth. Food supplies seem to be a problem, but in time the ship itself starts to make food. Shelter is a problem, but the ship can be altered to provide this as well. A variety of societies quickly form: an all-women society (complete with explicit allusions to Tiptree's "The Women Men Don't See"), an anarchic group, and the main group, an attempt at a cooperative society run by an expert in refugee camps.

The novel follows to some extent the stresses involved in setting up these groups, and in their interaction, but the more important problem is understanding the ship and the aliens, who don't seem to want to communicate. Morgan and his army squad attack the problem somewhat analytically, including a dangerous expedition into a dark core area which might be the control room. Stephen Cooper, always a loner, explores the ship on his own and also finds the control room. Hathaway is an artist, and she finds that her attempts at painting on the ships walls provoke a response that may be communication.

Then a series of crises bring things to a head: first a plague which kills many of the humans, followed by Stephen's past catching up with him, then conflict between the different societies, and finally an emergency as the ship seems to begin to break down. The final parts of the book are very exciting, and the resolution is quite original, and also very moving. The central mysteries are resolved fairly and in an interesting manner, the plot is resolved excitingly and without cheating, and the book's theme is strong and saisfying, and deeply science-fictional. In some ways it is reminiscent of Octavia Butler's Xenogenesis trilogy, or perhaps one might say it is almost a response to that work.

All in all, this is a very satisfying novel, highly recommended. It is well-deserving of its position on the Arthur C. Clarke Award shortlist for its year of publication. One might quibble over a few details. Some of the plot is set into motion by odd coincidences. One gets very little sense that the ship is populated by any humans but the English speaking ones, though Sinclair is careful to mention that their are enclaves for every culture and (major) language. And as I said, the opening is a bit slow. But these are minor points, and on balance I was very pleased. (Also, while I admit to being predisposed to this statement by knowing that Sinclair is Canadian, this seemed a very Canadian book, even though none of the major characters is Canadian.)

Review: The Dragon Waiting, by John M. Ford

Review: The Dragon Waiting, by John M. Ford

a review by Rich Horton

I read this novel back in the '90s sometime, and I liked it but I felt that I didn't quite get it. I had decided it needed a reread, and my book club put it on the schedule -- so I did reread it! I bought the audiobook, read by Gerard Doyle. I assumed I'd find my own copy to have as reference ... and I couldn't find it! So I bought a used paperback, and ended up alternating listening and reading. And, naturally, I then remembered that my own copy was a hardcover! I'd been looking in the paperbacks. So now I have two! I will add that the new edition -- my audiobook but also the recent Tor trade paper reprint -- has a very nice introduction by Scott Lynch.

John M. Ford (1957-2006) was one of the most interesting and original SF writers of his time. He first impressed me with a story called "Mandalay", in Isaac Asimov's Science Fiction Magazine in 1979; other great short works include "Walkaway Clause", "Fugue State", and "Erase/Record/Play". I loved his second novel, The Princes of the Air, and also Growing up Weightless. He was a first-rate poet as well -- I am particularly fond of his Arthurian poem "Winter Solstice, Camelot Station" (which I discuss in this Black Gate piece). I also liked his two Star Trek novels, The Final Reflection and How Much for Just the Planet? His works were each very different to the others, in multiple genres, doing varied things, but always beautifully written, elliptical, complex -- resembling, say, Gene Wolfe and Dorothy Dunnett, among others. At his too early death (from a heart attack, perhaps caused by complications of Type 1 diabetes) he left an unfinished novel, Aspects (finally published in 2022), which I adore -- I think it would have been recognized as one of the great works of 21st Century Fantasy had he had a chance to finish it. (I review it here.) 

Somewhat notoriously Ford's novels went out of print after his death, and it seemed impossible to get them reprinted, as his estate was in a mess. Somewhat miraculously, Isaac Butler, a journalist and new-hatched Ford enthusiast, was able to track down his heirs and untangle the issue, which was apparently largely due to his agent leaving the field approximately as he died. Thus many of his novels have been reprinted, and some more books may be in the offing. The first to be reprinted was The Dragon Waiting.

The novel opens with an historical note, in which Ford tells us that the novel is a fantastical alternative history, though attempting to use period appropriate technology, and also true historical characters of the period (especially Richard III.) There follow three chapters introducing three of the four main characters (none of whom is present in the historical record.) In the first, Hywel is a ten year old Welsh boy, who is lured by a wizard sensing his talent to both free the wizard and go off with him to learn to use his talent, despite the wizard's dire warnings. In the second, Dimitrios Ducas is a teenaged boy whose father is the governor of a Gaulish province of the Empire of Byzantium. Dimitrios comes to realize that his father has essentially been exiled, and that as his family has a potential claim to be Emperor, there is danger of worse. He also has a remarkable talent to inspire loyalty in his friends, who include the native Gauls. All this -- and his mother's ambitions -- lead to a tragic result, and further exile for Dimitrios. In the third chapter we meet Cynthia Ricci, in her early 20s, a doctor serving Lorenzo de' Medici. The maneuvering of the states of Italy, especially with regard to the prospect of Byzantine rule, ends up with Lorenzo (and Florence) at the mercy of the Duke of Milan, and Cynthia and her father (also a doctor) are entangled in the mess. (The main action of the book is set roughly at the same time as Jo Walton's excellent novel Lent, and it was interesting to see Ford's portrayals of some of the characters from Lent, especially Marsilio Ficino and Girolamo Savanarola. As I know that Jo is a fan of Ford's novels, I'm sure she was aware of these parallels.)

Ford never tells us outright (until an afterword of additional historical notes) the Jonbar point of this alternate history, but it's clear that it lies with Constantine's successor, Julian the Apostate. In this history, Julian succeeded in his goal of rejecting Christianity, and established a rule for the Byzantine Empire that no faith would be given preference. By the 15th century, the Byzantine Empire controls much of Europe, with about half of Gaul under British control, and occasional nominally independent states around and between the major powers.

The main action of the novel starts a bit later, at an inn in Northern Italy. A group of travelers have gathered, just ahead of a storm. These include Timaeus Plato, a venerable scholar, with his companion, a soldier named Hector; Charles de la Maison, a French mercenary; Gregory von Bayern, a natural scientist; Claudio Falcone, a courier; Antonio Della Robbia, a Medici banker; and a gentlewoman named Caterina Ricardi. It is soon revealed that a wizard, named Nottesignore, has been sent to the stables. The reader fairly readily guesses the identities of Timaeus Plato, Hector, and Caterina Ricardi -- who have already been introduced to us. The rest of this section involves much conversation, a couple of murders, and a key revelation -- that Gregory von Bayern is, in fact, an expert in artillery, and a vampire. After a visit to France (or the remnants thereof), and encounters with Louis XI and the Margaret of Anjou, the widow of Henry VI, and an attempt to gain possession of a document giving George, Duke of Clarence, the crown of England instead of his brother, the current king, Edward IV; the main quartet (Hywel, Dimitrios, Cynthia, and Gregory) head for England, where they will become enmeshed in efforts to manage the future of the English crown, partly (or mainly) as an attempt to forestall Byzantine influence.

I won't say much more about the plot -- perhaps I've already said too much. But it is rich and complicated, and there are many more fascinating characters to meet: Richard III, of course (though he's not yet the king); a Christian Welsh witch named Mary Setright; Anthony Woodville, brother-in-law to King Edward IV, and a man regarded as a renaissance man, England's perfect knight; numerous other intriguers, including for example John Morton, rumored to be a wizard (and the originator of "Morton's Fork" in our history); and of course Edward's young sons, the famous "Princes in the Tower". There is lots of action -- battles, daring rescues, desperate treks. There is lots of magic -- wizardly spells, a remarkable dragon, alchemy. There are acts of wrenching heroism, and of dreadful treachery, and some that might be both at once. The resolution is powerful and moving. 

But most of all there is character. Cynthia's agony over her acts of violence, in violation of her oath as a doctor. Hywel's battles with letting his wizardly powers consume him -- apparently always a danger for wizards. Dimitrios' attempts to find a man to whom to be truly loyal. And Gregory's agonized struggle with his vampiric needs. I am no fan of vampire novels, on the whole, but I rank two as truly worthy: George R. R. Martin's Fevre Dream, and this novel. 

It is very well written, not simply on the prose level, though that is excellent, but on the emotional level. Line after line hits exactly right -- tears our hearts out or exalts us. "That's why she must go with Hywel: there are better quests than war." "Her eyes hurt, as if she were crying, but any tears would be lost in the rain. Lost the silver owl and gained an ugly blob of lead -- an alchemical miracle." "We forget that anyone who can curse can bless." "Once I have learned properly to hate, Uncle, then will I truly be King?" "There was no explaining to them the taste of their blood in his mouth." "We are what the world makes us. And half the world is Byzantium, and the other half looks East in wonder."

I will add one more note -- this rereading was immensely helped by referring to the Draco Concordans, a fan-produced concordance to the novel, mainly the work of Andrew Plotkin, with contributions by several other people. It does a great job clarifying the timeline, explaining both the real and alternative historical elements, and highlighting some of Ford's little jokes. (I found a couple that the Concordans missed -- the apparent nod to Roy Batty's death speech from Blade Runner (which appeared as Ford was writing the novel) and a nod to Mae West's autobiography Goodness Had Nothing to do With It.)

Capsule Reviews: A Dream of Wessex, by Christopher Priest, plus three others

Capsule Reviews: A Dream of Wessex, by Christopher Priest, plus three others

by Rich Horton

I like Chris Priest's writing a lot "An Infinite Summer" is one of my favorite SF stories. The Inverted World was one of the first serials I ever read in an SF magazine (Galaxy, in 1975 or so), and it fairly blew me away.  I read Darkening Island (Fugue for a Darkening Land) at just the right age to be impressed by its non-linear narrative structure. But for some reason, maybe because his books don't seem to get much push in the US, I haven't been following him lately. I have just now read what I believe to be his fifth novel, A Dream of Wessex (US title The Perfect Lover), from 1977.  This is a very interesting novel, and very intriguing.  

The basic idea is quite "Priestian", a (very little) bit reminiscent of his first novel, Indoctrinaire: in the near future of 1977 (1985), a research project is set up whereby a group of people sort of "pool" their unconsciousnesses and create a realistic world 150 years in the future.  Ostensibly this is to explore what might be done to reach a more pleasant future.  The dreamed future is set on "Wessex", which is the western part of England after it has been separated from the mainland by earthquakes, with the new channel roughly along the path of the river Stour.

All of England is communist, and part of the Soviet sphere, while the US is Islamic.  (The notion that this is a more pleasant future, or realistic, is one on which one's mileage may vary.)  The "dreamers" all have alter-egos in Wessex, and they return periodically to report. But one of them, David Harkman, has never returned. Another, Julia Stretton, goes looking for him, while she also worries because her abusive former lover has maneuvered his way onto the project. Julia and David fall in love in Wessex, but all is threatened when Julia's lover begins to change the parameters of the future world. The idea is a bit barmy, I think, but it's appealingly solipsistic, as well. The idyllic scenery of Wessex is well-evoked, and the resolution is very nicely handled. A different, but very interesting, book.

Indoctrinaire

Indoctrinaire was Christopher Priest's first published novel. A British scientist, working on a mysterious project in the Antarctic for the US government, is kidnapped by a couple of rather odd people and taken to a strange prison in central Brazil.  After some time he realizes his captors don't really know what to do with him, and he escapes to discover the real nature of his imprisonment, which I won't realize for fear of spoilers.  I didn't find this a very successful novel on the whole.  It showed promise, but the ultimate revelation was silly, and much of the plot was highly contrived.  Priest did manage to pull off a fairly moving and somewhat true-to-his-character ending.  He got much better quickly, with Fugue for a Darkening Land and The Inverted World.

The Separation

This is an alternate history, comparing two time streams -- ours, and one in which Rudolph Hess's mission to England was successful and England made a separate peace with Germany in 1941. The personal story is expressed via a pair of twins, Olympic rowing champions, who play different roles in the two time streams. I liked the book, but had reservations about Priest's careful arrangement of his alternate history to be roughly comparable to ours despite comparative Nazi success -- in my words, Priest palmed about 6,000,000 cards.

"The Discharge"

Much stranger is Christopher Priest's "The Discharge", a new Dream Archipelago story, which originally appeared in a French anthology. This is a long novelette about a man who comes to awareness at the age of twenty, with almost no memories except that he is an artist, as he is conscripted into the army to fight in the 3000 year long war. The story tells of his war experiences, but more closely of his artwork, especially in the odd style called "Tactilism". This is an odd and not completely successful story, but the writing and the images are sufficiently interesting to make it well worth reading, even if the plot and internal logic don't quite cohere.

Review: The Haunting of Hill House, by Shirley Jackson

The Haunting of Hill House, by Shirley Jackson

a review by Rich Horton

I am not particularly a fan of horror, but I do like psychological characterization, and there is a sort of horror that uses horrific elements of the narrative as a means of characterization. I also have enjoyed Shirley Jackson's short fiction, and so have thought for some time that I need to read some of her novels (primarily this one and We Have Always Lived in the Castle, the two that seem best regarded among her ouevre.) And, finally, one of my favorite writers, Elizabeth Hand, just wrote an authorized sequel to The Haunting of Hill House -- A Haunting on the Hill. This provided the final spur to to reading Jackson's novel.

And you know what? I ended up reading it in late October -- so it's a well-timed Halloween read!

I both read and listened to the book, having bought the recent Penguin Classics reissue, with an introduction by Laura Miller; and having also got the audiobook narrated by Bernadette Dunne. I listened to the book on the way to work, and read it at night, so probably I experienced it 50/50.

Hill House is an isolated house in a rural part of the East, one assumes upstate New York though that's not specified. The nearest village is Hillsdale, about six miles away. The house's reputation is ominous, and it has been unoccupied for a couple of decades, except for occasional renters, who always leave much before the end of their lease period. 

The latest renter is Dr. John Montague, a professor who has an interest in occult matters. He stumbled across the story of Hill House -- built in the late 19th Century for a man whose wife died just as they moved in, mostly lived in by his two daughters, who ended up fighting viciously over the property, finally ceded to the estate of the companion to one of the sisters, who (the companion) had committed suicide in the house. Dr. Montague invites a number of people who seem to have had psychic incidents of their own to stay there with him one summer. Two accept: Eleanor Vance, a spinster in her early 30s, just freed from the tyranny of caring for her ailing mother, and Theodora, a free-spirited and vaguely artistic woman who has quarreled with her roommate. The two come to Hill House, along with Luke Sanderson, the somewhat raffish son of the current owners, and of course Dr. Montague.

The action takes place over about a week. Eleanor is the main character. She is beautifully realized (and Theodora is also well-depicted, though Luke and Dr. Montague never really come much into focus.) She is clearly yearning for, let's say, a life -- after decades of oppression at the hands of her mother and then her married sister. But she has no idea how to go about that, and she clutches at whatever scraps of friendship are offered by Theo or Luke. Dr. Montague is a prosy middle-aged man, and much of his character is revealed late in the book when his rather awful wife shows up with her elderly male friend Arthur. (They are obsessed with psychic manifestations, and things like planchette, in a way that annoys Dr. Montague.) The other character of mild prominence is Mrs. Dudley, the housekeeper, set in her ways, a wonderful cook but not a very friendly person, and like all the locals, profoundly wary of Hill House.

Over the few days they are there, there are disturbing incidents. The House is architecturally weird, easy to get lost in. There are horrible messages written on the walls, some in blood. There are noises in the night, and things seem to want to get into everyone's rooms. Strange things happen outside as well. And much of this seems directed at Eleanor. Meanwhile, Eleanor is getting attached to Theo (and it is strongly hinted that Theo is a Lesbian -- though Eleanor seems to have no real concept of adult relationships with either men or women.) Eleanor seems more disconnected from reality -- or connected to Hill House's (un)reality -- as time goes on -- and this leads to a dark resolution. 

It's very well written, and eerie without ever being quite, well, horrific, which makes the shocking ending more effective. We don't really learn what's going on -- and that's right, because mystery is part of the affect here. It's a very good novel, very involving, and a good example of a book that does not outstay its welcome. Definitely recommended.

As for Laura Miller's introduction -- it's solid work, well done. I have read a lot of Laura Miller's writing about books, and she's always worth reading. That said, I felt that she and I didn't quite read the same book -- her view of Eleanor was not wrong, but it wasn't quite mine. Which is fine -- but I'll adduce that as yet another piece of Jackson's mysteriousness.

Review: The Navigating Fox, by Christopher Rowe

The Navigating Fox, by Christopher Rowe

a review by Rich Horton

Christopher Rowe's new novella is The Navigating Fox. It's set in the same universe as his 2019 story "Knowledgeable Creatures", which I reprinted in The Year's Best Science Fiction and Fantasy, 2020, so I have been looking forward to this story.

This is a world in which many animals have been "uplifted", apparently by magic, so that they are "knowledgeable" -- the assumption is that they are human-level intelligent and can speak. (I will note right away that both stories in this world end up questioning some of the bases for these assumptions.) The story is told by Quintus Shu'al, who is the world's only "navigating fox", and perhaps the only knowledgeable fox. Quintus has just returned to the city of Aquacolonia, hoping to gain some information he has been promised concerning his origins -- the secret of who made him "knowledgeable".

He attends the meeting of the Sodality of Explorers, in which one Octavia Delphina is giving a paper which demands the expulsion of Quintus from the Sodality, due to the loss of the Benedictus Expedition (and Octavia's sister Cynthia) on an earlier journey that the fox led. (As a "navigating fox", his special ability is to navigate the "Silver Roads" that allow faster and (supposedly) safer travel across the continent.) Neither Octavia nor Quintus get what they want -- instead, they are inveigled into joining an expedition organized by the Holy, or priest, Scipio Aemilanus, who wishes to be led to the gates of Hell, and close them, thus ending Death forever. (It was Scipio who had promised Quintus information about his origins.)

The bulk of the story follows this expedition, with flashbacks to the earlier Benedictus Expedition. The new expedition includes Scipio, Scipio's spy, the crow Malavus, Quintus, Octavia, twin raccoon cartographers named Loci and Foci, and most interestingly, Walks Along Woman, a knowledgeable bison from the Great Northern Membership, an important polity of the continent. (Along with some assistants to some of these people.) Quintus leads both journeys on the Silver Roads, but critical things happen when they step off the roads, including meetings with the Lady of Toosa, an important woman (or women?) in part of the continent, and with whom Quintus as a, shall we say, complicated history. 

Everything converges at the gates of Hell, if perhaps not the gates Scipio might have preferred. More than Scipio's quest to end Death is involved, including political matters such as the health of the Empress who rules Aquacolonia (and much more); the true nature of knowledgeable creatures, not to mention humans; the fate of Cynthia Benedictus; and of course the origin of Quintus.

The story raises as many or more questions as it answers, and the questions are interesting. The location of the action is one question, though it seems plausible that the continent on which the action occurs is a version of North America, with Aquacolonia perhaps mapped to New Orleans (?) and the Empire based in Europe. (But again, who knows, and does it matter?) The real nature and history of knowledgeable creatures (and humans) is another. The ultimate consequence of the various political entanglements hinted at here. And so on.

It's advertised as a caper and a fable, and I don't think that's exactly wrong but it kind of misses the point, for me, anyway. It's funny at times, like a caper, and it's clever, and the characters are fascinating (especially Walks Along Woman), and of course talking animals seem like creatures from a fable -- but to call this a fable seems to me to do a disservice to the animals (knowledgeable and voiceless), who are not just variations on Peter Rabbit or Mr. Toad or the bears in Goldilocks: they are real people with real goals. I think there is a novel -- perhaps a grand novel, a saga -- buried in the potential of this milieu. What we have already is wonderful, and -- not to put any pressure on Christopher -- there is potential here for something truly special.

Review: Hild, by Nicola Griffith

Review: Hild, by Nicola Griffith

by Rich Horton

Nicola Griffith made her reputation in the SF field, with such novels as Ammonite and the Nebula winner Slow River. She has also written contemporary novels. But though I had a feeling I would enjoy her work, I had only read a few short stories. In 2013 she published Hild, which received a good deal of adoring attention in the SF field. It is set in 7th Century England, and it is about a real historical figure, St. Hilda of Whitby, but many of the reviews I read implied that it was a fantastical retelling of St. Hilda's life. But all the reviews I read said it was very good.

So -- it got on my list of books to read. But for one reason or another (partly my focus on short fiction) I hadn't got to it. And this year the sequel, Menewood, came out. And so I finally pulled the trigger, and read Hild. Or, actually, listened to it! The audiobook is read, very well, by Pearl Hewitt. I also bought a copy of the physical book, which I think is very much worth it, partly to see how the names (and some other words) are really spelled. (For example, a very important character the pronunciation of whose name made me think "Keon" is actually named "Cian".) Plus, there's a glossary and a family tree. (To be honest, a map would have been fine as well!)

Anyway ... this is the story of Hild's life from about age 3 to age 18. Hild is the daughter of Hereric, part of the royal family of Deira, one of a number of small kingdoms in England, specifically the North, indeed Northumbria. When Hereric is poisoned, Hild's mother Breguswith moves them to the household of her uncle Edwin, the King of Deira. Hild grows up with the pressure of her mother's prophecy that she will be the Light of the World, while largely being raised by Onnen, her mother's body woman (and a wealh -- which means not Anglisc, so lower class (wealh eventually became "Welsh"), and speaking a different language, Brythonic); and always playing with Onnen's son Cian. Hild learns something of fighting from Cian, and even more of scheming from her mother, who pushes her to use her talents to become the King's Seer. To be clear -- this truly is an historical novel, not a fantasy at all, and while many characters think Hild can truly prophecy -- indeed, that she's a witch (haegtes) -- Hild's powers are entirely natural -- tremendous observation skills, judgment of people's characters, understanding of politics. Some of this is her ability, and some comes from her mother's instruction. 

Edwin's power grows, and his territory and influence are greatly expanded, in some part because of Hild's help. He becomes the Overking of the Anglisc, and founds the Kingdom of Northumbria. He is a widower, but soon marries a woman from Kent (with Frankish ancestry as well) -- and she is a Christian, so Edwin eventually converts, and begins to bring his subjects to the faith as well (for essentially cynical reasons.) All along Hild is helping him, and scheming, both for his and advantage and her own. Cian remains a close friend, and she makes a close woman friend in Begu, the daughter of Mulstan, an influential man who marries Onnen. Hild also buys a slave, Gwladus. The story follows Hild's education -- she learns writing, and Latin, from a captured Irish priest, Fursey; and she learns arms from Cian; and she becomes a Christian as well, though an enemy of the harsh bishop Paulinus. (Both Hild and Paulinus, in the long run, are canonized.) 

I don't want to detail the plot any more. It's intricate -- the scheming reminded me of Dorothy Dunnett, at times -- and it's also true to what we know of history. Certainly Edwin's story is an established part of history. His career as King is the center of the plotline -- various wars, marriages, negotiations with rivals, subjects, and foreign powers. 

The parallel plot details Hild's life, and the lives of those close to her: Cian, Begu, Onnen, her sister Hereswith, and others. This is both intimate -- there are love affairs, religious developments, personal growth (as with Cian's increased prominenence as one of Edwin's gesiths, or chief fighters.) It is also important to the main plot -- Hild in particular is portrayed as vital to Edwin's rule. The life of the historical Hild in this period is little known, and Griffith is free to invent much, but her inventions are consistent with what we know of St. Hilda's later life (though I suspect her prowess as a warrior is somewhat greater than that of the real historical woman.) More than the plot, the book is really fascinating in very convincingly describing life in England at that time -- the food, the travel, the politics, the way women live, class divisions, trade, clothing, religion, music, farming, war -- and more. There is action, and lots of talking, even some very well done sex scenes. It's an utterly involving novel.

It seems true to its time, and to the people of that time. Griffith avoids (at least mostly) giving her characters, even Hild, anachronistic views. She mostly avoids cutesy references to the few things people of our time will know about that time. (There is a sneaky Beowulf reference -- though Beowulf may have been written as late as the 10th Century, its events date to a century or so before Hild's time.) Hild is an exceptionally well-portrayed character. And the novel ends up being really moving and powerful at times. It ended, I confess, slightly before I expected (I cheated, and read up on history!) But the sequel, Menewood, is out now. And I suspect there will be at least one further novel.