One of the side effects of what happened is that I haven’t been able to read. I stare at a page and nothing happens, which is a great hardship for me. So I decided to read something completely unfamiliar to see if it brings me back into the reading mode. I promised people a long time ago I would venture into the fantasy genre, and now it made sense to engage in some good, solid escapism.
Patrick Rothfuss’s The Name of the Wind did serve its purpose in that it got me back into reading. It is entertaining, it reads easily, and it also confirmed my suspicion that fantasy is the genre for lazy authors. Writing fantasy liberates them from the need to do any research and, supposedly, offers an opportunity to write with complete freedom about anything they want, creating alternative universes and fashioning them according to their own will.
Rothfuss’s alternative universe is, however, more secondary and unoriginal than any strictly realist work of fiction I can think of. The parts of the book that are not based on an uninspired retelling of Christian mythology (a virgin birth, a God who is the son and the father at the same time and who sacrifices himself to save humanity, quotes lifted directly from the Bible, etc.) are based on Judaic mythology (kabbalah).
Of course, the most important myth that informs the novel is that of the American Dream. The protagonist overcomes enormous hardship, pulls himself up by the bootstraps from horrifying poverty, puts himself through college and even manages to achieve the impossible and gets a scholarship to attend University (can you get any more American than this?), accomplishes incredible feats of strength and resilience, and is finally rewarded with the most wonderful thing existence can give an individual – his own business. Of course, it isn’t a very successful business. Not even epic heroes end up owning multi-national corporations these days. All that the world’s savior can hope to acquire as a result of his heroism is a dinky little bar with no customers. Still, it’s a bar, and how cool is it to be in charge of dispensing alcohol?
Another problem with the novel is that the construction of the plot is extremely haphazard. As I said, the author is lazy and doesn’t even try to make things conform to some sort of an internal logic of the novel. Sometimes he makes a half-hearted attempt to explain the contradictions that crop up in every chapter but soon tires of the effort. It’s as if Rothfuss took excerpts from books that made an impression on him, changed the names of the characters, and arranged these often incompatible bits and parts of other books in a random pattern.
Reading this novel was comforting in the sense that it offered absolutely no surprises. One knows exactly how each scene will develop. This defeats the escapist goals one might have, but it’s not a bad way to pass the time when you are incapable of doing much else. I know people love this genre and I don’t want to hurt anybody’s sensibilities. Originality is not Rothfuss’s forte but it might be there in other books belonging to the genre.
One regret I have is that I didn’t have access to such books when I was 11. I would have really enjoyed them then.
Clarissa's Blog 
I can see that your recent hardships have not dulled your wit!
LikeLike
Thank you, Hattie. I’m trying.
LikeLike
If you want to read a good novel with fantasy elements, try “Let the Right One In” by John Ajvide Lindqvist. Though it’s closer to “1984” in terms of fantasy elements (minimal amount of them) than to usual fantasy novel and is very dark, even depressing. Don’t know if you now woud want to read something so depressing.
For something lighter (and less deep / serious), I also loved “The Once and Future King” (an Arthurian fantasy novel written by T. H. White). The first part “The Sword in the Stone” is more for children, but as the story progresses, it becomes more and more psychologically interesting. For instance, see the description of Mordred:
Now that she was dead, he had become her grave. She existed in him like
the vampire. When he moved, when he blew his nose, he did it with her
movement. When he acted he became as unreal as she had been […]. He
dabbled in the same cruel magic. He had even become to keep lap dogs
like her – although he had always hated hers with the same bitter jealousy
as that with which he had hated her lovers.
“She” is Mordred’s mother. It’s more like “The Three Musketeers” for me in terms of interesting adventures and easy, nice writing style. Though those books are very different, so you may like the one, but not the other.
The last recommendation is for Terry Pratchett’s “Jingo”. I see it as a parody, set in his fantasy world.
“By jingo!” is an archaic, jocular oath, of obscure origin, used in Britain in the 18th and 19th centuries. The word — with derived forms such as ‘jingoism’ and ‘jingoistic’ — became associated with aggressive, militaristic nationalism as a result of a popular song dating from the Turko-Russian war of 1877-78, which began:
We don’t want to have to fight,
but by Jingo if we do
We’ve got the ships, we’ve got the men,
we’ve got the money too.
Would be interesting to hear your thoughts on any of the three.
LikeLike
Those three are among the best the genre has to offer, each of a different type or sub-genre. So, if you hate 2 out of 3, you still may love the 3rd.
LikeLike
I must definitely second the Pratchett recommendation. His “Discworld” series is one of the funniest things I’ve read. The first novels are a bit weak, but by the time the series reaches “Wyrd sisters” things get funny, and I wouldn’t hesitate to recommend anything between “Small gods” and “Going postal” to anyone, even people who don’t do fantasy.
Clarissa, you should really try “Small gods”. “Jingo” is awesome but it’s better if you have some prior knowledge of the characters, while “Small Gods” is almost a stand-alone. It’s a more intelligent treatment of religion than I’ve seen done by many seriouser-faced authors, and Pratchett’s writing is a delight.
LikeLike
This book sounds like a Harry Potter re-tread. I’ve never read it, and doubt I will.
Most fantasy is I agree slapdash.
I’m guessing you’d like China Miéville better — he’s a better writer by far than most in the genre, and even when the plots are ludicrous the characters are entertaining.
LikeLike
I’ve found Rothfuss’ stuff an entertaining read, but whoever recommended you Name of the Wind to start you up on fantasy was either joking or had very poor taste in books. There’s better stuff out there, as even this occasional reader of fantasy can tell you 😉
LikeLike
We actually put this to a vote and Rothfuss won by a small margin. The runner up was a guy called George Martin, or something like that. I don’t know these writers at all so I had to ask for recommendations.
LikeLike
George Martin is a HUGE waste of time.
LikeLike
He is very popular with students at my university. I constantly see them with his books. Never female students, though.
LikeLike
I was one of those voting against Rothfuss and against Martin. They are both highly selling, yes, but highly talented writers, not so much. Classic doorstop fantasy writers both. Dudefantasy, I call it, due to the typical fanbase. Although neckbeard is a portmanteau I appreciate too. 😉
China Mieville is a decent suggestion, as is Pratchett. You might also try Nnedi Okorafor, for non tolkein influenced mythos, and Rachel Swirsky might work well for you. Hmm. Connie Willis and Mary Doria Russell might also be worth a try.
While I personally like sf & f, (it’s my escapist genre of choice) there are two things I try to bear in mind when making recs: that 90% of any given genre is rubbish (including lit fic, ye gods the pretentious twaddle) although it may still be enjoyable, and that genre reading is a mindset of its own and many genre books are rather less likely to be appreciated by a reader unfamiliar with the genre specific tropes. In other words, I try to look for good gateway books. Rothfuss is not a gateway author, frankly.
LikeLike
Nnedi Okorafor is on the list, too, so we will see how it goes.
LikeLike
George R. R. Martin’s “A song of ice and fire” (which is what everybody’s reading now since HBO is adapting them in a tv series) is a Renaissance Faire telenovela. Fun if that’s your poison, I’ll grant you, but I’m not sure why people would want to inflict that on a non-fantasy reader.
LikeLike
Nnedi Okorafor is awesome, phenomenal, and, quite simply, a literary giant. I am going on record predicting that she will be the first sf/fantasy writer to receive the Nobel Prize for Literature.
LikeLike
What Nnedi Okorafor book would you recommend people start with?
LikeLike
What Nnedi Okorafor book would you recommend people start with?
I think The Shadow Speaker followed by Who Fears Death. All of her books are wonderful. Some people I know think is her weakest one is her first published one, Zahrah the Windseeker. It is a YA with a somewhat predictable plot. She does a lot of research. Her settings are either a future Nigeria, other parts of Africa, or a transplanted Nigerian culture on another planet. Some of her science and technology is a little hard to believe.
LikeLike
George R. R. Martin is a brilliant writer I care more about how the story of A Sond of Ice and Fire develops than I do about the characters, except for one or two. On the other hand, I like Robert Jordan’s Wheel of Time much better. I like his characters, and was always eager to spend more time with them. However, I did not really care how the story ended.
LikeLike
No writer who doesn’t come to a conclusion after 800 pages can be briliant. He has some interesting ideas and is not as painfully derivative as some fantasy authors. But I think fiction should tell a story with an ending.
I actually think it worked better as a TV show because it’s like a soap opera in a fantasy world.
LikeLike
Or as Ben Wyatt put it: “They’re telling human stories in a fantasy world!”
LikeLike
No writer who doesn’t come to a conclusion after 800 pages can be briliant.
I do not think that is true at all. If your story requires 25 main characters, it is too complicated to be done in a mere 800 pages.
LikeLike
Aww, sorry you didn’t like it! But glad to see you actually read it. If you didn’t like this, you’ll hate the George RR Martin books. You observed that no females at the university have them – this is because I have come to the conclusion that his female characters exist to be raped or to be ridiculed as sexual objects. Not exactly a fun read. (As a dedicated SF&F person, I’ve been trying to make it through the George RR Martin books for the better part of a *year*… and I *like* the genre!)
LikeLike
I was looking forward to your takedown of this book. The blog Doing In the Wizard has been doing a chapter by chapter critique of the book that is sharp and funny.
I’m sad that this is your introduction to fantasy and I strongly recommend The Scar by China Mieville. It has wonderful worldbuilding and a strong female protagonist. I also think you will like Gormenghast by Peak. The castle in it is its own world and it doesn’t have fairies or magic or any of the typical fantasy elements.
For something lighter any Pratchett book is lighthearted fun.
LikeLike
“my suspicion that fantasy is the genre for lazy authors”
Theoretically it should be really hard work, creating a plausible and consistent and interesting alternate reality (whether in the past, future or some other planet or whatever). Is really hard work…. which is why almost no fantasy authors seem to really do it (or do a good job of it).
Tolkien did it (if anything too well) and Le Guin did it but that’s about it IME (which is limited since I have a low tolerance for the excesses of the genre).
The other fantasy stuff I’ve read seems improvised and doesn’t hold together in any kind of interesting way (that is when it holds together it’s not interesting and when it’s interesting it doesn’t hold together).
There are similar problems in SciFi (though a higher proportion of SF authors are more successful imo).
LikeLike