response to the review of Cast In Silence
Sep. 17th, 2009 09:59 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
serynThere was a review of Cast In Silence by Michele Sagara. I remembered immediately why I do not bother reading reviews. I thought the book, the fifth in a series that started out pretty decent, was fucked 17 ways from Tuesday because the timeline was completely randomized by flashbacks, flashforwards, memory lane cruises, and oh wait! they're still walking down an empty street for no apparent reason.
The author says this was the backstory and she hopes we all enjoy reading it as much as she enjoyed writing it. I think that if a character doesn't need explicit backstory for four books, probably it's conceit on the part of the author. It was, by far and large, the absolute worst book of the series. It was so bad that I will probably not buy the sixth book--- an astonishing result since I have all of these in trade size (another reason to resent this book, by the way, for $12.95, I expect better.)
Anyway, the reviewer said she's "firmly on Team Severn." Which doesn't make a lot of sense if you haven't read the books, but basically Kaylin is this barely-of-age super-powered girl who mostly sucks at her job but is incredibly lucky to have had powerful people notice her superpowers so they endure her pathetic job performance and unprofessionalism. There is a sub-plot of pre-teen romance where Kaylin has been marked by the vampire analogue, claimed by the half-lion, adored by the weredragon, and adopted children with the human assassin before she was 7 years old.
I understand that most people who are reading this as a purely fantasy epic are not interested in the subplot. However, I am interested in that and the book is published by Luna which is an imprint of Harlequin. But Kaylin herself is largely asexual, so it is a very minor element so far. However, Severn is the human assassin she set up house with when she was 7 years old and wanted to adopt little feral girls from the street, she left him when he killed their children. I don't have any comprehension as to how anyone could possibly be on that side in the romance angle. Not only is it uninteresting and speciesist, but ewwww! abusive ex from when she was too young not to imprint on him as an ideal... anyone who is a woman's friend would do anything to keep her from going back to a situation like that. It's sick. And it doesn't matter if he had a good reason, there are things which are unforgivable.
It seemed like most of the point of this book was to remove one of the non-human suitors from the competition. I really don't have a preference right now between the options that have been presented as long as it's not Severn. But the author is setting this up piecemeal so the only choice Kaylin will have is to go back to her abusive ex. She's spent a decade fighting her way out of her broken life but the author keeps slanting things like loving one's abusive boyfriend is "romantic". I was completely skeeved.
But of course the reviewer loved this book because she's on Team Severn. Probably likes Christine Feehan books too where once a man has found his soulmate, she's captured and brutally fucked until she loses all sense of self worth or individualism. It was a horror story and all the reviewers claim it's so romantic that a man would love a woman so much that he loses all control over his behavior. It's really sick, but there is a lot of that in "romances"; the mistaken idea that dominance means no self-control. Severn slaughtered his adopted children and left their bodies for Kaylin, their mother, to find. Even if she forgives him, I don't see how any relationship between them could ever be possible. I also don't see how anyone would want there to be a relationship between them. Just like how I don't see a super-strong vampire man forcing himself on a mundane woman as "seduction". There are some really warped ideas about what is romantic out there.
The author says this was the backstory and she hopes we all enjoy reading it as much as she enjoyed writing it. I think that if a character doesn't need explicit backstory for four books, probably it's conceit on the part of the author. It was, by far and large, the absolute worst book of the series. It was so bad that I will probably not buy the sixth book--- an astonishing result since I have all of these in trade size (another reason to resent this book, by the way, for $12.95, I expect better.)
Anyway, the reviewer said she's "firmly on Team Severn." Which doesn't make a lot of sense if you haven't read the books, but basically Kaylin is this barely-of-age super-powered girl who mostly sucks at her job but is incredibly lucky to have had powerful people notice her superpowers so they endure her pathetic job performance and unprofessionalism. There is a sub-plot of pre-teen romance where Kaylin has been marked by the vampire analogue, claimed by the half-lion, adored by the weredragon, and adopted children with the human assassin before she was 7 years old.
I understand that most people who are reading this as a purely fantasy epic are not interested in the subplot. However, I am interested in that and the book is published by Luna which is an imprint of Harlequin. But Kaylin herself is largely asexual, so it is a very minor element so far. However, Severn is the human assassin she set up house with when she was 7 years old and wanted to adopt little feral girls from the street, she left him when he killed their children. I don't have any comprehension as to how anyone could possibly be on that side in the romance angle. Not only is it uninteresting and speciesist, but ewwww! abusive ex from when she was too young not to imprint on him as an ideal... anyone who is a woman's friend would do anything to keep her from going back to a situation like that. It's sick. And it doesn't matter if he had a good reason, there are things which are unforgivable.
It seemed like most of the point of this book was to remove one of the non-human suitors from the competition. I really don't have a preference right now between the options that have been presented as long as it's not Severn. But the author is setting this up piecemeal so the only choice Kaylin will have is to go back to her abusive ex. She's spent a decade fighting her way out of her broken life but the author keeps slanting things like loving one's abusive boyfriend is "romantic". I was completely skeeved.
But of course the reviewer loved this book because she's on Team Severn. Probably likes Christine Feehan books too where once a man has found his soulmate, she's captured and brutally fucked until she loses all sense of self worth or individualism. It was a horror story and all the reviewers claim it's so romantic that a man would love a woman so much that he loses all control over his behavior. It's really sick, but there is a lot of that in "romances"; the mistaken idea that dominance means no self-control. Severn slaughtered his adopted children and left their bodies for Kaylin, their mother, to find. Even if she forgives him, I don't see how any relationship between them could ever be possible. I also don't see how anyone would want there to be a relationship between them. Just like how I don't see a super-strong vampire man forcing himself on a mundane woman as "seduction". There are some really warped ideas about what is romantic out there.
