Tag Archives: Cool Things

They Come in Pairs

Posted by natechen on

One of the seminal manga of the early 21st century was Himoru Arakawa’s Fullmetal Alchemist. It’s a gripping story full of interesting characters living in a deep and fantastical world with a clear and understandable “magic” system. The story began simply and spiraled out into seemingly ever more complex layers. At the end, however, the place we began turned out to be the place we arrived at: The maxim that mankind cannot gain anything without giving something of equal value in return. The fundamental law of alchemy proved to be the fundamental law of the story.

Arakawa has a flair for characters and simple but striking visuals in action scenes, skills she has levered in her artwork for other series. However she hasn’t produced her own fantasy story in over a decade. Silver Spoon, her love letter to the farmers of her home island of Hokkaido, is a great story but also a very mundane one. When I heard she had launched Yomi no Tsugai (localized as Daemons from the Shadow Realm, a literal but somewhat cringey translation), a new fantasy work, I was immediately interested.

First, and perhaps most interesting, Yomi no Tsugai is set in contemporary Japan. While Arakawa’s previous original creation was set in the modern era adding a layer of the supernatural on top of that added a level of depth and, just as importantly, gave her the opportunity to add a rich symbolic language to her story like she did in Fullmetal Alchemist. I cracked open the first chapter with great anticipation.

I was not disappointed.

That said, I was very, very surprised by the nature of the story Arakawa presented. Fullmetal Alchemist featured what is known as a “hard” magic system, where there is a system of supernatural occurrences that work on a series of concrete, almost scientific rules. The story’s titular alchemy has several solid, predictable maxims. Mass must be conserved. Energy needs to come from somewhere. The dead cannot come back to life. Our protagonist, Edward Elric, is a man of knowledge and reason, as befits a master of what is essentially a branch of science in his own world. Edward and his brother Alphonse are as close and brothers can be. The bonds between Edward and his family are a central driving force in his life and he relies on them from beginning to end.

Yomi no Tsugai has what is known as a “soft” magic system. There are few or no hard and fast rules in a soft magic system, they represent the bizarre and inexplicable forces in life that mankind have always struggled to understand and live with. In this case, these forces are called tsugai, spirits of the netherworld that bind themselves to certain people. Tsugai have abilities based on what they are and usually follow some kind of theme. They’re unpredictable and often hard for people to understand. There’s only one concrete rule about tsugai; but more on that in a moment.

Our story opens on the birth of our protagonist. This is not a normal place to start, in fact it would be downright inadvisable except that Yuru and Asa are children of prophecy – twins born on a day where light and dark are equal, one at night and one during the day. This condemns them to a cruel fate. They have the potential to access phenomenal abilities for the low, low cost of dying once and, whether they want to pay that cost or not, others are happy to force it upon them.

The twins are cruelly separated and then cruelly brought together again. Circumstances conspire to destroy all trust between them and Yuru, our protagonist, is forced to leave his home and doubt almost every meaningful connection he has formed in his entire life. Even the village he was brought up in was a lie. Yuru has been raised in a society still living in the middle ages and when he leaves he finds himself in modern day Japan, with all the culture shocks that come with that. It turns out that Yuru is totally ignorant of the world he lives in. The only thing he has to rely on are Sayuu-sama, the guardian deities of his home village. Sayuu-sama are tsugai, the spirits that live in two stone statues that defended the gates of the village for four hundred years. This brings us to the one hard and fast rule of tsugai.

They come in pairs.

The statue on the Left and the statue on the Right are as opposite as they can be. The Left is a stoic woman, not given to expressing herself much, with a hard attitude and a tendency to go out and solve problems proactively. The Right is a boisterous, outgoing man. He defends what he cares about, expresses his fondness for others readily and encourages Yuru to think for himself. Only their stone bodies and dedication to their master Yuru join them together.

What’s fascinating is that, just like equivalent exchange in Fullmetal Alchemist, this paired yet opposite nature of tsugai is reflected in every aspect of the story. Yuru and Asa are fraternal twins, a boy and a girl. Through the story we quickly learn that they pair day and night, light and dark, binding and release, stoicism and emotivism. They are caught between two warring factions, one of which pursues modernity, the other which tries to restore the past. Asa chooses to align herself with a faction, Yuru announces his intention to stand alone.

It’s as if every aspect of the story is slowly revealing itself as another tsugai who’s character, powers and intentions we have to wrap our minds around in order to understand the narrative. It’s brilliant but also exactly what I should have expected from Arakawa. She’s very deliberate with her storytelling. Perhaps far more so than I ever anticipated. It was only when I got current with Yomi no Tsugai and went back to reread Fullmetal Alchemist while I waited for more of Yuru’s story that I made the final discovery. I’ve hinted at it already. That is, of course, that Yomi no Tsugai and Fullmetal Alchemist are also a pair.

They pair hard and soft magic. A fantasy world and a world like the present. A protagonist of science and reason with intact relationships and a protagonist of ignorance and naivety who’s trust has been broken. The thematic core of Yomi no Tsugai looks like it has been implemented in such a way as to duplicate that theme even when it’s just sitting on a shelf next to Arakawa’s previous work! That’s a very meta inference to make, I know. And yet creating a good story requires such care and intentionality that I can easily believe that Arakawa went to that level when crafting Yomi no Tsugai.

Is it true? I don’t know. But I certainly intend to keep reading ’til I find out.

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A Secret Unshared

Posted by natechen on

When Rachel Griffon finds a stone statue of a woman with bird’s wings standing abandoned in a forest she’s perplexed. She’s heard of creatures like women with dragonfly wings. She’s heard of creatures that look like women with wings instead of arms. She cannot think of anything like a woman with bird’s wings growing from her back and that’s particularly unusual for Rachel because she never forgets anything.

This striking and memorable scene is our first clue to the mystery at the heart of Rachel Griffon’s life.

You see, Rachel lives in a world where a powerful society of secret magic users lives alongside normal people, hiding their existence with guile, magic and secrecy. Rachel attends the Roanoke Academy of Sorcerous Arts where – wait! Wait! Come back!

It’s true, the core concept behind L. Jagi Lamplighter’s Rachel Griffon story is pretty well trod ground at this point. However, there’s more to Rachel than a Harry Potter clone. For starters, unlike most of what I read in Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone, Roanoke Academy has a very realistic feel to the social dynamics that swirl through its halls. Rachel spends a fair chunk of her time navigating that social minefield without that side of things getting ridiculous or oppressive, which is a nice touch. While teenage drama is not my cup of tea I think the intended audience will find it engaging and Lamplighter shows how a teenager handles those challenges without endorsing any of the bad behavior that inevitably results from some of these hurdles.

However, Rachel’s story is not primarily a social drama, it’s a hero’s story. While the social battlefield is part of the story it’s not the primary focus, rather the focus is on the mysteries that result in Roanoke becoming a very dangerous place. Rachel has a unique tool for solving these mysteries in her photographic memory. It actually lets her slip out of mind altering spells with shocking ease and makes it very easy for her to remember all the details of her lessons – to say nothing of all the little clues that didn’t mean much at first but eventually all point to the source of whatever problem she’s facing in a particular tale.

However, where Rachel is a very powerful mystery solver she’s not a very powerful wizard. She can’t tackle these problems on her own. She doesn’t have a whole lot of magical muscle to put behind her spells, she’s incredibly tiny so she doesn’t have regular muscle either and she’s a little naive in the way she looks at other people. She has to rely on her friends and family to overcome many of the challenges she faces. For some protagonists that could be an issue. However, Lamplighter takes pains to construct each of her stories in ways that let Rachel play an active role in every stage of the narrative by playing to her strengths.

Rachel has strong morals that often put her in conflict with others who find the occasional compromise acceptable and drive her to right wrongs, whether or not that’s something a young girl should be responsible for. She has a strong sense for deductive reasoning which allows her to leverage her excellent memory. And she has an ability to connect with people quickly that allows her changing social landscape to present opportunities without dragging her along on a railroaded plot. Finally, Rachel has an incredible ability to keep secrets.

Every Rachel Griffon story revolves around some kind of secret or another and Rachel is often the first to figure it out. However she’s not always the first to share it. Rachel finds a special thrill in knowing things others don’t and being able to share those secrets at the moment where they will make the most difference. She knows this is her power. That she’s so proactive in using it and takes such joy in using it to help others is a credit to her, even though sometimes she does misuse it.

You have to understand that in order to understand Lamplighter’s masterstroke. You see, Rachel’s entire story is structured so that we can share this thrill with her because we know something she does not. We know that the stone woman with bird’s wings is an angel. The strange orphan words that seem to have no meaning in Rachel’s world – words like steeple and saint – encompass ideas that mean nothing to Rachel but are commonplace to us. You see, the core mystery in Rachel’s story revolves around something we know that her entire world has forgotten.

For a girl with a perfect memory that’s a terrifying thing to contemplate. She may also be the only one who can remember it again. So she tries to piece together the threads and figure out why someone would hide a piece of history away, why strange creatures like the one called Moloch are forcing their way into the world by violence and deceit and why a lion and a raven were arguing in her bedroom one night. She doesn’t even realize that conversation is one of the most important clues she has. But we know.

We know that Rachel’s world has forgotten Christ and His Church. But a secret on that scale cannot be kept for long.

Rachel’s entire story gives us a chance to keep a secret until the moment she’s ready for it. So far, she hasn’t reached that point but the ride to this point has been wild. I can’t wait until we reach the moment when it’s all revealed.

Unexpected Fun With L. Jagi Lamplighter

Posted by natechen on

If you were to walk through the forest and happen across a statue of a woman with feathered wings sitting in a clearing beside a long abandoned stone building, what would you think? Most likely you would assume you’d found an old church, long abandoned by its congregation. Perhaps you’d share a moment of comradery with the place’s guardian angel before continuing on your way. Regardless, you probably wouldn’t find that much out of place with it. 

When Rachel Griffon happens on such a scene at the beginning of The Unexpected Enlightenment of Rachel Griffon that’s not at all how she reacts. 

Rachel has no idea what the statue is when she discovers it and that takes some real doing since she has a flawless memory and has read every travelog, adventure tale and bestiary in her grandfather’s library. Her grandfather was one of the foremost scholars in the World of the Wise, for him to not know something takes quite a bit of doing. It is the mystery of the winged woman, along with a dozen other small things, that forms the core of Rachel’s drive through the course of the story. She wants to know the secrets of the world. Then she wants to share them, for it’s the thrill of revelation that truly fascinates her. 

As a twelve year old girl, nearly thirteen, you might expect the secrets that most interest her to be of a particularly mundane variety. However, while some mundane middle school drama afflicts Rachel, it’s not the focus of the story. The Roanoke Academy of Magical Arts has a great deal more going on in its ancient hallways than just puberty driven angst. 

Anyone remotely familiar with the Harry Potter franchise will immediately understand the core premise of L. Jagi Lamplighter’s series. Rachel Griffon is newly enrolled in magic school and in the halls of that school she will find far more of an education in far more things than she expected. The hidden wizards of her world – the Wise – live far more complicated lives than she expected. Rachel herself isn’t quite what you’d expect of a Harry Potter knockoff. 

Now before I go on let me address that obvious issue you may be raising right now. “Nate,” you say, “middlegrade fantasy is a very worn out genre. How can you expect me to get invested in yet another tale of magical teenagers going to magic school?

I understand this objection. But Lamplighter brings a sense of myth that is badly lacking from a lot of middlegrade literature. Many books written for teens try to tap into the sense, so common in young people, that the world is new and undiscovered and everything that exists just came into existence moments ago. Lamplighter, on the other hand, presents us with a world that is ancient and shaped by strange forces that have left Rachel and her friends in very unenviable postions. Yet those forces are not all hostile or malevolent. Some of them are but most of them are just consequences of big decisions made ages ago, they are signposts of a history that must be understood and lived in by our heroes if they ever hope to make anythign of themselves or their world.

It’s a much stronger approach to worldbuilding and character growth than I’ve found in most middlegrade writing, and that alone makes it worthwhile. Add in the mysteries and character dynamics that Lamplighter does so well and you have a very strong read for just about any audience.

Back to our protagonist. She’s a well bred young woman with loving parents and a noble lineage. Magic was always something she knew of, while her mother held a fondness for the mundane people – the Unwary – that helps her keep a fairly nuanced perspective on the world around her. While a flawless memory helps her with the study of magic, she’s no great talent. Many of her peers pick up their lessons faster than she does. 

Rachel doesn’t even have a grand destiny laid out before her. Some of her friends are fated for heroics, but Rachel herself isn’t one of them. If she wishes to do some great thing for the world around her she’ll have to find that work and take it on herself. 

The conflicts at Roanoke are deeply steeped in the history and lore of Lamplighter’s world. As you might expect of a story starring someone who never forgets, connecting details of past events to unravel current problems is an ongoing theme in this story. Rachel delights in gathering facts, making connections and revealing her secrets at the right moment. We delight in seeing whether she’s chosen the right moment (which she does often) or if youth and naivety have deceived her and she’s misread the situation (which isn’t rare). 

Beneath all the flashy magic spells, shadows of old evils and standard schoolyard drama, however, Rachel faces deeper issues. One touch I really liked came in the third novel. After several weeks of chaos, emotional strain and traumatic events, Rachel finds herself on the verge of a very believable mental breakdown which is resolved, as so many things in her life, by the unexpected but totally coherent application of her flawless memories. It’s hard to describe more without spoiling the moment, so I’ll leave it at that – suffice it to say this is one of my favorite moments in the series so far. 

Another interesting deep current running through Lamplighter’s novels is the twin questions of purpose and allegiance. Rachel is constantly looking at her loyalties to friends and family and comparing them to her own wants and goals. She’s a very driven character, but also a very devoted one. Reconciling her strong sense of duty to principle and loyalty to others is difficult for her. Her principles are challenged and some are worn down in ways that don’t benefit her. Five novels in and Rachel still doesn’t have a clear cut, highest standard for her life. Yet. 

But there are hints. 

One of the greatest achievements Lamplighter reaches with her series is inviting the audience to share Rachel’s delight in knowing a secret. Yes, we follow her adventures and know many of the secrets she knows. However, things go a layer deeper than that. You remember our opening thought experiment, of finding a guardian angel by a ruined church? This is a secret we know that Rachel does not. 

There are other hints to that secret in the early pages of the first book. Rachel owns a model of broom known as a steeplechaser. However, no one knows the meaning of the word steeple. It’s an orphaned word, like saint, so old that its meaning is lost even though people still use it. And, of course, there is the familiar. All the students at Roanoke have familiars but Rachel’s roommate brought a particularly unusual one. A lion, miniaturized for convenience. A lion that talks to a raven on the windowsill in the middle of the night. Even among the Wise, even among the enhanced creatures known as familiars, animals don’t talk. 

But these two do. The lion isn’t supposed to be there, the raven says. He was called, the lion explains, and where he is called no earthly power can keep him from answering. Not even in a world where knowledge of him has been locked away. 

This is the secret we know, but Rachel does not. We know the Lion of Judah and we get to watch Rachel slowly discover him in spite of the painstaking efforts made to hide him from view. In spite of the fact that the lion here is behind enemy lines. In spite of all the other things clamoring for her attention. This part of Rachel’s story is what truly gripped me as I read Lamplighter’s books. It was a brilliant idea, executed in a way that did a wonderful job of holding my attention. If watching someone discover that secret seems like a worthwhile tale to you, I would highly recommend this tale. 

Mary’s Wedding – Simple Excellence

Posted by natechen on

I recently had the opportunity to go and take in a little theater. The name of the show was Mary’s Wedding by Stephen Massicotte and I went in with very few expectations. I’d never heard of the play and the description didn’t tell me much beyond it being set around World War I and the two actors portrayed a young couple in love. It didn’t exactly inspire confidence. I had confidence in the group producing the show, all for One Productions doesn’t go for saccharine stories after all, but I sat down in the theater with some reservations. 

I needn’t have worried. 

Before we break down the story itself let me say a few words of praise for the production itself. First, the cast of Jessica Munsie (Mary, Flowers) and Cooper Beer (Charlie) did fantastic work. Their performances were sincere, emotive and engaging. They studied horseback riding to add authenticity to some of their scenes and it showed. They had great chemistry with each other and the audience. The set was also perfect, built in two layers and full of props used in surprising and interesting ways. From the use of wheeled railings as doors and horses to the upper level’s many duties as hills, bridges and the deck of a ship, the minimalist set did everything it needed to and more without ever straining belief. 

Many people say seeing how a trick is done makes one appreciate it less. Mary’s Wedding is the kind of show that convinces me that the opposite is true. I caught a dozen little flourishes, like the causal setting of a hat on a platform as an actor walks around behind the stage, that speak to the practice, dedication and proficiency both actors developed while preparing for the show. It made me enjoy the performance more and not less. Well done, one and all. 

Now for the story itself. Mary’s Wedding focuses on the titular Mary as she dreams on the eve of her wedding. We are introduced to this dream by one of its chief figures: her sweetheart, Charlie. He tells us we are seeing a dream, and as it is a dream we must understand it follows its own logic and its own sense of time. It’s a great opening soliloquy, drawing from concepts we often see in Shakespeare and intended to lull the audience into the theater of the mind. Many plays do this, in one way or another, because the sets and costumes may be great but we know, deep down, they’re not real and the illusion of the stage is not as powerful as, say, that of the movie screen. 

A good storyteller knows how to weave the spell that creates this illusion of reality for audience and sometimes that’s as simple as asking them to step into the narrative with us. It’s a bold approach, and Massicotte deserves props for taking it. I know it worked for me. 

From this simple introduction a clap of thunder snaps us into the narrative itself – Charlie, seeking shelter from a thunderstorm and Mary calling out to him. This ominous opening gives way to Mary and Charlie’s first meeting, as they both hide from the rain in a barn. Mary is recently arrived in Canada from England, Charlie is a longtime resident of the area so they’ve never had opportunity to meet before. Mary helps Charlie overcome his fear of the thunder by coaxing him to recite poetry. Charlie only knows The Charge of the Light Brigade so that is what he quotes. 

This is when I realized this story didn’t have a happy ending. 

The dire stanzas of Tennyson’s poem weave throughout the play, a simple foreshadowing for a simple man. Charlie is like the cavaliers Tennyson describes – fixated on his duties and carrying them out. He knows things could end badly for him, but he presses forward regardless. This is contrasted with the poem Mary cites as something she has no wish to live out: The Lady of Shalott.

Subtlety, thy name is Stephen. 

All joking aside, these simple allusions give Mary’s Wedding a chance to weave these grandiose and romantic notions of duty and heartbreak into a very simple romance story. Mary and Charlie are from different worlds and different social standings but they fall in love. We see their relationship as it struggles to survive awkward meetings in the town streets, flubbed meetings with families and ultimately Charlie’s decision to join up and fight in the Great War in 1914. Interspersed with stories of the growing romance are stories of Charlie’s time in Europe, told to Mary through letters he sends home from the front. 

Both aspects are told in a blunt and straightforward way. This is not a Hollywood romance or war movie. Much of the pretense of such stories are stripped away, with Massicotte focusing on very realistic dialog and motivations for his characters. Charlie’s letters home sound very much like those I’ve read in compilations of first-hand accounts from any number of wars from the present day back to the American Civil War. Mary and Charlie’s relationship is free of flowery promises or generic statements of affection. 

Many stories could be fairly criticized for trying to characterize their protagonists using well know works of literature. But, while Massicotte is doing that in his script, he is also doing something a little more complicated than that. He is showing his characters use these poems to try and express themselves to each other. The Charge of the Light Brigade grapples with many philosophical questions that people think about but rarely try to articulate to each other. When forced to explain the horns of a dilemma like that which Tennyson describes, the average person will fail to put their thoughts into their own words. So, they turn to the poets. 

It is this, I think, that makes Mary’s Wedding work. It shows us simple, everyday people as they put their hand to every tool at their disposal to connect with each other and share their struggles. It’s an impressive achievement. 

The portrayal of Flowers, Charlie’s commanding officer during his time in Europe, is another fascinating device. Flowers is portrayed by the same actress who plays Mary. When Flowers and Charlie first meet Charlie is on the troop ship headed to Europe, smoking while watching the ocean at night. Flowers finds him and asks what he’s thinking about, to which Charlie admits he’s thinking about a girl back home. Flowers warns him not to do that, or soon enough he’ll be seeing her everywhere – which, of course, he already is. The close friendship the two develop is illuminating and powerful, and Jessica Munsie’s portrayal of Flowers was so excellent that I never confused her with Mary in my mind. It provides us a look at another side of Charlie, one we need to really appreciate before the story concludes or the conclusion will not be as powerful as it should be. 

Ultimately, Charlie never comes home. 

Charlie only lives in the dream, now, and soon enough Mary must wake up and continue on with her life. Her wedding day is coming. There is still a good life ahead of her, even with all the grief and regret that came from her parting with Charlie. That is the promise at the end of Mary’s Wedding. It’s a bittersweet ending, but the only ending their story could possibly have had. The thunder we heard at the beginning of the story is quiet now, and the rains have left poppies in their wake. And just like Mary, we must wake from the dream on that stage and leave Mary, Charlie and Flowers behind. 

As nearly as I can tell, while many of the events in Mary’s Wedding actually happened, Charlie and Mary were not real. Their story was a dream we shared for a moment. But we can carry that simple dream with us in our waking lives, a reminder that the peace we have was bought at great sacrifice. A reminder that after loss we can still carry on. Those simple messages are a powerful gift, and one I am grateful to have.  

Fall 2021 Reading Wrap-Up

Posted by natechen on

I am a writer, and so I read. What have I read recently? Strap in. 

Thrawn: Greater Good, by Timothy Zahn 

I’m a longtime lover of Zahn’s work and, while I’m not invested in the Star Wars franchise these days, I will make an exception for him. His latest series in that franchise focus on a new origin for his fan favorite character, Grand Admiral Thrawn. The first trilogy of books was somewhat interesting, but largely existed as peripheral works to the TV show Rebels, which I haven’t watched. That did reduce my investment in the series some, although I found the second novel in that trilogy very enjoyable overall. However, his second trilogy allows him the freedom to play around with the kinds of world building and open ended tactical inventiveness that is fun to read and dig in to. Beyond that, we get to see a wide array of interesting characters at different levels of society all trying to play out their interests and balance them against the titular greater good. 

Beyond that, Zahn is playing an interesting game. In most of his novels we learn a great deal about his antagonists and follow a lot of the game from both sides of the gameboard. However, in this trilogy Thrawn’s opponent is hidden from view for 95% of the story, which gives it a different flavor. A warning – outside of Thrawn himself this novel has very few ties to the wider Star Wars galaxy. If you’re not a fan of the character and you’re looking for Star Wars, rather than just Thrawn, it may not be for you. 

For Crew and Country, by John Wukovitz 

This is another niche book. As a long time student of the Samar Island action during the Battle of Leyte Gulf, I try to read every book on the subject that comes out (which is about one every four or five years.) Crew and Country is a complete service history of the USS Samuel B. Roberts, from its commissioning to its loss in combat on 25 October, 1944. This is not really a good book for people new to the topic to read. (Read The Battle for Leyte Gulf by C. Vann Woodward or The Battle of Leyte Gulf: Oct. 23-26 1944 by Thomas J. Culter before this book if you’re not familiar with the story at all.) 

While Last Epic Naval Battle by David Sears or Last Stand of the Tin Can Sailors by James D. Hornfischer are brilliant retellings of the story from the level of the normal crewman, and Hornfischer also goes deeply into the story of the Roberts, Wukovitz digs into that one specific crew to the point where you almost feel like you’re talking to someone who served with them. Every other retelling of the story presents the reader with a jumble of crazy events unfolding in parallel, which is understanding as that’s how a battle plays out. But in Crew and Country diversions from the decks of the Roberts are brief and this creates a very different atmosphere to the crews training, Crossing of the Line, service in the Pacific and final defense of Taffy 3. 

Perhaps it takes a person who’s spent a decade trying to learn new tidbits about a six hour period of history to appreciate this book. All I can say is, if that’s the case, you should try it some time. This book, and the men it pays tribute to, are treasures that you deserve to enjoy. 

When Christmas Comes, by Andrew Klavan 

I reviewed Klavan’s Another Kingdom trilogy some time ago. While I found the way he released and promoted that series very interesting, as a fantasy series and allegorical tale it was merely above average. Klavan is a good storyteller and master of the crime story (Werewolf Cop made that clear when I read it) but he never put in quite the research into the practical aspects of things like sword duels, armor and other aspects of medieval life to quite sell them when they came up in his story. 

But with When Christmas Comes, Klavan has returned to his roots. As a crime story, its suitably dark and gripping. Cameron Winter is a fascinating protagonist, with an understandable malaise about his character that both he and we hope to see dispelled. And the story is full of unsavory characters we can loathe as well as sympathetic ones we can attach to. If it has one major weakness it would be brevity. 

When Christmas Comes is a very noir story, with purple prose, a man with a solid moral core, and a lot of very nasty people around him. Those are both its biggest selling points and the thing I believe most detractors will dislike. That said, it’s not a wildly inventive tale. If you like an expertly executed crime story, this will not disappoint. But it’s not as inventive as the Another Kingdom novels or Werewolf Cop. I highly recommend it to fans of crime drama and character studies, and perhaps the casual murder mystery crowd. But beyond that, I don’t know as the story will have much purchase. 

Soulfinder: Demon’s Match and Black Tide, by Douglas Ernst 

Iconic Comics puts out a number of fun adventure titles but of all of them Soulfinder is the darkest, most mature and most interesting. In many reviews, these would automatically equate to being of the best quality. I do not believe you need dark or mature themes or even deep and interesting concepts to create an excellent story. In fact, adding these things to a subpar story can make it worse, not better. 

All that said, Soulfinder is probably the best comic Iconic offers, which I say as no slight to their other titles. Father Patrick Retter is an infantry veteran turned priest who gets offered the chance to take the ultimate blending of his skills – a position as one of the Vatican’s Soulfinder Exorcists. 

The Soulfinder narrative moves on multiple levels. Retter has personal relationships that range from close friendship to tense family ties. And there are demons. He has responsibilities to the parishioners at his church and presumably, at some point, his own matters of faith to consider. Also, demons. 

Ernst has put a lot of interesting things in the air and he juggles them quite well, delivering good stories and good characters while avoiding many of the common traps stories about exorcist priests often fall into. I know that Ernst is a devout Roman Catholic, a veteran and a widely travelled man. He’s done his research and brings a lot of knowledge and authenticity to the table. Retter and his allies are likeable people with a lot of good skills and good heads on their shoulders. It’s also nice to see a story that not only isn’t shy about matters of faith, but actively embraces them. That may turn off a small portion of the audience but even openminded atheists have read and enjoyed the series, so I find I can recommend it to anyone over 12 whole heartedly. Younger readers may find the themes and concepts a little over their head and the imagery unsettling. 

And that’s the reading round up for this essay series! We now move back to my next fiction project so, as is traditional, there will be a week off before coming back to the preface of the  

Shaking and Straining – Of Circumstances and Art

Posted by natechen on

My favorite band of all time is Five Iron Frenzy, a little known third wave ska band of the mid ’90s and early ’00s. I was introduced to the band when I was eleven or twelve and just starting to form my own tastes in music and it was also the first band I won a convert for, introducing a fellow Boy Scout named James to their music a few years later. When the band went into retirement in 2003 it was the end of an era of my life. I still have all their albums save their first, and listen to them on a semi regular basis. Thanks to poor messaging I missed the opportunity to back the Kickstarter for FIF’s first reunion album, Engine of a Million Plots. But I did catch the campaign for their latest album, Until This Shakes Apart.

The contrasts are quiet interesting. Where Million Plots is one of the strongest albums in FIF’s discography, Until This Shakes Apart is… not.

The music of Five Iron Frenzy evolved a lot during their roughly decade long absence from the scene. It became a bit more melancholy, a bit less recklessly optimistic. That’s understandable, given the changes in outlook age can bring, but even with the change in tone Million Plots featured the same irrepressible energy I’ve always associated with the band and added a kind of seasoned wisdom to them that was pleasing and wholesome. Lyrically outside of the disappointing “Zen and the Art of Xenophobia” the band’s songs kept focused on the kind of big picture storytelling I’ve always associated the band with. The songs are about the human condition, how it leads us astray, and, to a lesser extent, how we escape our worse natures and strive for our better.

Engine of a Million Plots plays much like a story. Many of the tracks roll into one another and tell us about the dangers of hubris and blind escapism, while reminding us that holding out for the good things does eventually pay the biggest dividends, even if it isn’t always fun.

Shakes Apart is much more focused in the here and now. The music is almost lethargic, it feels like a slog to listen to sometimes. The lyrics are also very based in the present moment. Where Million Plots talks about the timeless parts of the human condition, Until This Shakes Apart is focused on the unique circumstances surrounding its creation. There’s a place for that in art, no doubt. But that place was rarely the music of Five Iron Frenzy.

It’s true, tracks like “Giants”, “Goodbye, Goodnight” and “The Untimely Death of Brad” had points that ring true even now, some twenty years after originally written, but even those, while based on immediate events, drew out timeless truths about the human experience. On the other hand, tracks from Shakes Apart like “In Through the Out Door”, “Lonesome for Her Heroes”, “Renegades”, “Tyrannis” and “While Supplies Last” share the dull, unpleasant, scolding tone of “Zen and the Art of Xenophobia”, displaying a disdain and lack of empathy for their targets that is ugly and frankly laughable. Granted, third wave ska was heavily influence by punk, a truly dreary, scolding, self important genre of music, but for the most part FIF had avoided punk’s worst tendencies until now.

Shakes Apart does manage to hit some highs, with “So We Sing” bringing a little of FIFs old optimism back and “Auld Lanxiety” is a very potent reminder of the power of music to bring comfort. “Homelessly Devoted to You” is a wonderful, sweet love song and “One Heart Hypnosis” lampoons our addictions to social media brilliantly. “Like Something I Missed” and “Huerfano” are wonderful, fun tracks to listen to. But all told, that leaves about half the album below par and much of that steeped in a very offputting shroud of self-righteous lecturing.

Most notably, the silly, irreverent, purely humorous songs that were Five Iron’s strongest brand for decades are entirely absent from this disk. Even Million Plots had “Battle Dancing Unicorns with Glitter.” Perhaps over the years something has been lost.

And perhaps it was merely circumstance. Million Plots was written and released during the Obama administration, when many of the social and political goals FIF advocated for were coming to fruition. Shakes Apart was primarily written during the Trump administration, a dark time for the self styled progressives that fill the bands ranks. It was disappointing and trying for those progressives I know in my personal life, even though I found little changed for me personally from the administrations of 44 and 45. It wasn’t uncommon for them to become bitter, preachy and caustic. Most art became that way as well. Perhaps it’s not surprising that Five Iron was caught in the flow.

Perhaps they can turn things around with their next album, if one arrives. We’ll have to wait and see. Still, it was an interesting outcome, and I felt strongly enough about it to add this review to my scheduled essays. I hope you got something out of this. See you next week.

Spring 2020 Fiction Roundup

Posted by natechen on

It’s been a while since I read or watched a fresh tale and felt truly inspired to sit down and think through everything I loved and hated about it, what worked and what didn’t. That’s partly because I haven’t been reading as much fiction as in days past and partly because I haven’t seen as much that really impressed me in the last few years. Maybe our cultural institutions are on the decline. Maybe I’m just more jaded and cynical about media these days. Maybe it’s a combination of both.

That said, I’ve had the pleasure of watching, reading and listening to some very entertaining fiction in the last year or so months and I thought I would share some of it with you. Strap in, because we’re going to go through this quick!

We begin with Another Kingdom by Andrew Klavan. I covered this series once, after the first season concluded. With the conclusion of the audio version of this series now out and available for free on the YouTube you can sit down and enjoy a truly rousing adventure story that takes many of the shibboleths of modern culture (particularly in Hollywood) to task while showing one man’s transformation from timid and uncertain to confident and purposeful. There’s a lot of interesting allegories at work in the story, clear enough to speak to the audience but general enough not to come off as preachy. While Klavan’s prose sometimes belabors a point a little too much and Knowles’ performance still doesn’t always sell the female characters listening to Another Kingdom is still quite the fun experience.

In much the same vein, This Sounds Serious is a hilarious sendup and love letter to the true crime podcast. From the rivalry of two very odd twin brothers to the fascination an entire small town in Washington has with Joe Rogan, the creators of this spoof podcast series has an eye for the absurd that they always try to emphasize while crafting fun and devious crime stories to tell us about in a mockumentary fashion. There’s not a lot of great traditional character work here, nor are you likely to grow over attached to any of the characters as the cast will mostly change from season to season. But there is a kind of suspense built over time and it is quite fun to listen to, even if you’re not likely lot laugh out loud more than once or twice an episode.

The Dragon Prince is an interesting take on a fantasy property. While I’ve found its approach to some issues to be a little lacking in thought on the whole it builds good characters and takes a nuanced approach to most of the issues it discusses, showing even its obviously evil characters as well rounded and even occasionally sympathetic characters. It has an eye for action and a wonderful aesthetic to its world. While a lot of questions about the philosophical questions it wants to ask are unanswered at this point on the whole I prefer that willingness to let the issues breath. For example, Dragon Prince brings up issues of prejudice quite often. So far, the issues that prejudice presents have never been resolved in a single episode, as many other shows aimed at younger viewers would insist on doing. Some of the lesser side characters are never confronted about their prejudice since confronting this lesser evil would take away from the character’s ability to pursue other goals, forcing them to chose which good ends they will pursue. Thus we see the characters interacting with prejudice in much more realistic, true to life ways. That’s nice to see, and I’ll probably continue to follow Dragon Prince until its run is over.

If you’re wondering what I thought of Castlevania Season 3, as I said in my Castlevania Seasons 1 and 2 review, I’m happy with where that story ended and don’t plan on watching it. However, Sei Manos, an interesting blend of the Western and a Kung Fu film, produced by the same studio as Castlevania, manages to bring a new level of smoothness to the animation while crafting a radically different tale about a Kung Fu master with a devilish secret who dies, leaving his three pupils to struggle with various dark powers as they try to unravel the bizarre blending of drug trafficking and occult powers that threaten their small Mexican town in the late 1970s. It’s mostly intense action but, much like in their previous vampire tale, the writers and animators find plenty of human moments to leaven its ghostly tale. But more than that, it manages to take an animated character, who tends to take a lot of their personality from their voice actors, and make him a mute while still giving you a clear window into his personality and desires. A remarkable achievement, all things considered.

A Letter for the King is very different from many fantasy products aimed at young adults. It presents us with a totally normal protagonist – no, not totally normal. He’s probably a bit weaker and more cowardly than most. It then sends him on an adventure pursued by friends and foes alike, with the charge to deliver… well, a letter to the king. The journey will cost Tiuri far more than he thought, and along the way he will have to confront poor decisions on the part of himself, his family and his friends. He’ll find that his good character is rarely rewarded by the world around him. And in the end he’ll make things right not with magic, strength or cunning but determination, trust and courage. There are major failures in the writing of this series, particularly as regards the climax. But the heart behind the message and the decision to put character at the heart of the conflict makes it a refreshing change from most of its peers.

Last summer I was beta reader for a novel called The Last Warpiper, which is a fantasy novel about an elite soldier who plays the bagpipes.

Wait! Come back! The bagpipes are broken for most of the story!

In all seriousness, Warpiper is a very straightforward, John Wick kind of story about a man who has been wronged by the King and has only one means to set things right. It’s good worldbuilding, an interesting protagonist and anthropomorphic cats. What more could you want, amiright?

Marion G. Harmon’s Repercussions marks a major inflection point in his Wearing the Cape series. Hope Corrigan spends the first three years of her career as a professional Cape protecting the city of Chicago but in this story we see her scope of operations believably enlarged to an international scale. It’s been interesting to watch Harmon’s slow building stakes over the past three or four novels and in this one he has finally decided to go all in and swing for the fences. Many superhero stories try to do this far too quickly, putting the fate of the world in the balance very quickly and it frequently strains believability. This is Harmon’s eighth book and he’s just now getting to the global stage. Rather than coming too soon, I’m almost annoyed it’s only happening now. But only almost – this was an excellent paradigm shift for the series and if you like the series or superhero lit in general it’s well worth reading.

That’s all of the really noteworthy stories I’ve taken in since I started writing Pay the Piper. If you’re looking for something to do in the next few weeks (but why would you be?) then they’re well worth checking out. If you’ve already read them, be sure to let me know what you think!

The Big Short – Larry Correia’s Target Rich Environment

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It’s always hard to talk about short story collections. Even when they’re written by a single author there’s rarely any kind of narrative through line, they frequently lack a shared cast and tend to vary wildly in tone. In my experience the best way to tackle them is to discuss the author so before we get to Target Rich Environment we need to talk about Larry Correia first.

Correia is a somewhat popular fantasy and science fiction writer known for long, pulpy novels with an emphasis on crazy action and bizarre creatures. While many of his characters are characters they aren’t the deepest examples of character writing in the world. These stories are written for the penny dreadful enthusiast and feature exotic locations, pretty women and hard fighting. There’s lots of good, honest fun to be had but not much in the way of the deeply psychological or introspective. That alone should be enough for you to decide whether you want to read it or not, but if you really need convincing I’ll say a few words about the stories themselves.

Monster Hunter International is Correia’s biggest franchise and features a solid ten books, six by Correia alone and four with cowriters. There are two shorts in the collection featuring MHI, one that stretches back to a time before most of the existing stories, the other focusing on a side character from the main novels as he struggles with the personnel issues that come from working in professional monster extermination. Both stories feature the kind of B movie, fast moving zaniness that defines the MHI franchise and are fun, but not particularly remarkable. MHI has worked best when Correia lets his imagination run free and follows wherever it goes, something a short story doesn’t always allow. While neither story feels incomplete they don’t really measure up to other MHI stories.

The Grimnoir Chronicles are a different take on pulp, focusing less on action and adventure and more on the moody feel of a film like The Maltese Falcon. While MHI ostensibly takes place in the world we know, Grimnoir is in a neon soaked 1920s where magic is spreading through the general populace and changing the face of warfare and espionage. Both the Grimnoir shorts in the collection focus on the franchise’s protagonist, Jake Sullivan, and tell a little about his life before and after the Grimnoir trilogy. The second also hints that Sullivan’s story stretches out beyond the three books and two shorts he’s appeared in. They’re great stories for fans of the franchise, but only the first will really jell with people who haven’t read Jake’s other adventures.

There are a number of shorts set in other people’s worlds, using original characters. These are pretty much what I’d expect – again, adventure stories with fun action and fun characters that don’t work the brain too hard. But it’s in the collection’s original stories that we find the hidden gem. “The Adventures of Tom Strange, Interdimensional Insurance Salesman” is Correia at his best. While the premise is a bit sillier than he usually goes for, Correia wisely chose to steer into the absurdities of interdimensional insurance, piling one misadventure on top of another in an ever evolving pile of goofiness until you don’t really care if Tom’s weapon of choice is the Combat Wombat, or that Correia himself (from a parallel dimension, of course) sits atop one of the most powerful organizations in the cosmos or even that Tom’s intern is a hapless, Starbucks chugging wimp. All you really care about is seeing where the story goes and how much it will make you chuckle. The original audiobook version was read by Adam Baldwin, which I’m sure added to its appeal.

On the whole, Target Rich Environment is a great investment for the short story lover or the adventure story lover. It’s not the greatest pick for the person who overthinks his reading material. But if you have  a long international flight coming up you could do worse than taking this book along with you.

Into the Spiderverse – Focus Please

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Sometimes a movie comes along that is such an achievement in one area that it overwhelms any and all shortcomings it might have in other areas. Such a film is Into the Spiderverse.

Let me come out and say it right away, the animation of this movie is so far beyond anything else an American digital studio has achieved that it needs to be taught in animation schools. Practically every frame of it is perfect and it’s many stylistic choices, such as visualizing sound effects and internal monologues as a comic book might, enhance its charm rather than distracting from it. If visual appeal were all that counted this would truly be the greatest Spiderman tale ever to grace the silver screen. Alas, while film is a visual medium it is still a storytelling medium and by that measure Into the Spiderverse doesn’t quite stack up.

The fact is, the movie has too many plot threads and doesn’t quite weave them together into a web the way it would like. Spiderverse looks like a simple passing the torch movie at first glance. Peter Parker is Spiderman but he gets killed in a battle with the Kingpin. He passes the necessary information to defeat the Kingpin to a graffiti artist by the name of Miles Morales, who just so happens to have been bitten by a radioactive spider – just like Peter – and tasks Miles with stopping the Kingpin before things get worse. The problem is Miles has no idea how to do that or what kinds of things will be getting worse.

Things get weirder when Miles meets a much older version of Peter Parker with a slightly different hair color who has retired from Spiderman life and turns out to be from an alternate dimension. Miles enlists alternate Peter for help, although after hearing his backstory he’s not entirely sure this is the best source of advice he could find. Still beggars can’t be choosers and the two set off to foil the Kingpin. It turns out the villain is building an interdimensional bridge and the two have to close it. To do that they wind up enlisting the help of Spider Gwen, Spider Noir, Spider Ham and Cyber Spider, four other alternate dimension people who also got bitten by radioactive spiders and have their own backstories.

Oh, and Miles’ uncle? Who taught him how to paint and is also secretly a supervillain and thus on the outs with his brother, Miles’ dad who is a cop? Turns out he’s working for the Kingpin and that makes things even more complicated. Miles also needs to understand his powers and adjust to a new school and generally try and fit in to teen life.

Follow all that?

No, you probably didn’t. The movie doesn’t help matters either, moving at a breakneck pace and rarely stopping to explore anything with any depth. To be fair to the film, the classic Spiderman themes of power, responsibility and family, embodied in Miles, and his father and uncle, get a good amount of time and development. These parts of the story are deep and leave an emotional impression. But the rest of it gets less development and often comes off as rushed or flat. In particular, the alternate Peter is rushed and the other Spiders are flat, one note characters. And as a group the Spiders are kind of muddled, sharing one basic backstory and very similar powersets. The film comes off as very, very unfocused.

And it’s the worst kind of unfocused. There’s nothing wrong with any of the ideas Spiderverse offers. It just can’t stop and develop many of them enough for them to feel important. And those ideas it does develop are strong enough to tell me that if it had focused on two or three of its ideas it would have been great instead of just good. Honestly, I’d have rather had a movie with Miles, the Alternate Spiderman and the Kingpin with just Miles’ uncle as an employee rather than the much more overstuffed film that’s on offer. Into the Spiderverse wants too much of a good thing and, much like the DCEU that tried to cram years of franchise building into a few films, it winds up a worse product than it could have been as a result.

Still, that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t watch it and enjoy it. It’s good execution on great themes and it is a joy to behold. It’s just not everything it could have been – or the greatest film outing for Spiderman.

Who in the World is Carmen Sandiego?

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The greatest movie theme song ever written is Ghostbusters. It’s fun, swingy and catchy, the kind of tune that crawls into your subconscious mind and emerges whenever it’s most embarrassing. By the same token, one of the greatest TV show themes ever written belongs to Where in the World is Carmen Sandiego?, a geography trivia gameshow that I remember fondly from the days of my youth. It was performed by the excellent vocal group Rockapella and it had some of the best wordplay and catchiest melodies on PBS. When the gameshow morphed into a history trivia show with a time travel theme the biggest loss was the theme song and Rockapella.

By the same coin, the one place I’d say Netflix’s take on Carmen Sandiego falls short is in its loss of that theme song.

This new Netflix take on the franchise is not the first attempt to morph the computer adventure games/quiz shows into a story driven animated series. There was a similar take run on Fox Kids in the mid-nineties, and in the spirit of disclosure I should note that I’ve never seen a full episode of that show. Neither have I played any of the adventure games – although we did own the “Where in the USA is Carmen Sandiego?” board game and I watched a lot of the PBS quiz shows, which gave me some familiarity with the franchise.

For those not familiar, all iterations of the franchise up until Netflix’s Carmen Sandiego have revolved around detectives from the ACME Crimenet trying to locate and capture renowned international superthief Carmen Sandiego, most notable for her snazzy red coat and hat, penchant for stealing outrageous things from unlikely places, and on the nose naming sense. (Her criminal empire goes by “VILE”. Yes, really.) The franchise also tended to be very upfront with the fact that the audience was expected to participate. Players of the computer games were addressed directly, and called “Player” by name. Likewise, in the Fox cartoon, there was a mute figure by a computer who the other characters relied on for information who they referred to as Player, and who would often be left with trivia questions to answer at commercial breaks – with the expectation that the audience would make guesses as they waited for the show to come back on, of course.

The most interesting aspect of the quiz show, for me as a young child, was that Carmen very frequently got away. The challenges of the show were hard and gumshoes rarely made it through the final round successfully and, if they couldn’t finish in time, Carmen eluded them. Likewise, the other iterations of the franchise kept Carmen a step ahead of her pursuers so that she could sneak away to plot a new crime in a new installment. Her henchmen and goals would change but she was a constant. That made her the most well defined, most interesting part of the franchise.

Moving her from the role of villain to misunderstood hero must have been a natural move for the Netflix writing team. By transforming Carmen from a globetrotting crimeboss to a catburglar trying to turn over a new leaf, the latest incarnation of the franchise does a lot to push the story towards a coherent narrative with clear and constant conflict, rather than just a series of random trivia challenges as in incarnations past.

Carmen was always a bit of a mysterious figure, the better to turn up in surprising situations with no clear motive. This new take preserves that mystique by making Carmen’s origins a bit of a mystery to even herself (Orphans! A writer’s favorite kind of child!) but gives her simple and somewhat idealistic motives that make her an accessible protagonist, rather than a distant antagonist.

Fortunately, although the central character is radically reimagined, everything else about the franchise is firing on all cylinders. ACME and VILE are still part of the world; Carmen is a VILE defector and ACME is a spy network dedicated to finding and bringing down VILE. Carmen’s support team is made up of familiar faces. Zach and Ivy, homages to the protagonists of the Fox series, provide Carmen’s field support while her comms and research person is a Canadian white hat hacker who goes only by Player. And VILE’s criminal network still spans the globe and targets cultural artifacts, so the story still travels everywhere and brings up lots of local trivia like local customs, imports and exports and fine works of art.

There are new elements in the mix, like the ACME agents Chase Devineaux and Julia Argent, who are Carmen’s foils on the other side of the law. They’re introduced in a way that almost makes them feel like red herrings – they work for Interpol at first – but slowly grow to be more and more of a pain in her side. Keeping the ACME Chief as the hard faced lady from the quiz show rather than the floating head of the games and cartoon was a nice touch, even if most of the witty dialog that made that character so much fun hasn’t worked its way into the show yet.

VILE is similarly a mix of old and new. Since they basically appeared only as antagonists who players had to find, VILE operatives tended to appear alone or in small groups and never discuss how their organization worked. With the focus now on a former member of that organization, that’s changed. VILE has many more characters here than in days past, and the only familiar one is The Contessa. Pretty much everything else is made from scratch, and they offer an interesting slew of villains to serve as foils for Carmen. They’re interesting characters who manage to avoid being cartoonish villains, but I must admit I miss the likes of Double Trouble or Vic the Slick. They wouldn’t fit quite as organically in Carmen’s new world so I understand why they aren’t there, but it’s still a small disappointment.

However, after watching all of Carmen Sandiego, I still feel there’s something missing. Beyond Rockapella, that is. Carmen isn’t going anywhere, personally speaking. She’s set out to bring down VILE on her own – fair enough. Maybe she has something to prove. Maybe she just wants to definitively turn over a new leaf. But so far what this radical new direction means for her as a character hasn’t been addressed. That keeps the series from being more than just a romp through a nostalgic property, which is too bad because the studio behind it really put in the work to make an engaging show on pretty much every other front. If we were going to delve into Carmen Sandiego as deeply as we delved into world cultures I might be tempted back for another season. As it is, I’m probably going to pass.

Unless Rockapella comes back. Get on that, Netflix.