Summer Reading: Assassin's Apprentice

In general, I don't enjoy the use of the first person in narrative literature. I think this is because many young adult books are written in the first person, and so I frequently associate the technique with the trashy sci-fi compendiums I used to read in elementary and middle school. The first person also tends to give away the ending to a certain extent, since any protagonist who manages to find time to sit down and write a 400-page tome about his adventures (using a quill and vellum, no less) can't have fared too badly in his own tale. How different the speculation around the ending of Harry Potter would have been had the series been written in the first person!

I was pleasantly surprised to find that Assassin's Apprentice, which is written exclusively in the first person, is an excellent book. The story is told by Fitz, the bastard son of Prince Chivalry, the eldest son of the King of the Six Duchies. The Duchies are beset by the Red-Ship Raiders, a powerful group of pirates who are waging war upon the coastal towns of the Duchies. Secretly training to be an assassin for the king, Fitz tries to navigate court intrigue and his own adolescence without ending up dead.

Of the several things I love about this book, I especially enjoy the fact that in the grand scheme of things, not much happens. This is the first book of the Farseer Trilogy, and Hobb seems to think that there will be plenty of time for defeating the bad guys later in the series. She is much more interested, in this first book, in giving us a chance to get to know the world which she has built, and so the plot is mainly centered around the details of the life of Fitz. That's not to say the book is humdrum, however; the life of a royal bastard secretly training to be an assassin in the midst of a war is anything but boring, but the war itself, though important, provides a backdrop, rather than an impetus, for the plot.

Hobb also clearly values poetic writing, and her prose, though not difficult, is refined, with the occasional SAT word ("lambent") to keep readers on their toes. Phrases like "the brittle night sky" and "the hounds of a man's mind" seem perfectly at home within the rest of the text. She has even created a character, the witty royal jester, who exists at least partially to show off her skill at turning a twisted phrase.

The third great thing about this trilogy is that it is actually the first of a trilogy of trilogies, all set in the same world, the Realm of the Elderlings. The first two trilogies, called the Farseer Trilogy and the Liveship Traders Trilogy, have no relation to one another other than that they take place in the same world. Or so I believed, until I was told that the Tawny Man Trilogy ties the two together. I read The Liveship Traders last summer, and the Farseer Trilogy several years ago. Both, as I recall, feature intricate but believable plots, so I am very excited to see how it all fits together once I finish re-reading the Farseer Trilogy to refresh my memory.

Grade: A

Review of "Traumnovelle" ("Dream Story") by Arthur Schnitzler

Hello. For my first contribution to this blog, I'm going to start with a work of Austrian fiction that most people familiar with the work know only because it was adapted into "Eyes Wide Shut" by Stanley Kubrik. In case it matters, let it be noted that I read the work in the original German, where it is titled "Traumnovelle", which means "Dream Novella", but it is usually translated to "Dream Story" for some reason I don't understand. I think for now I will borrow Brian's basic pattern of reviewing.

Plot Synopsis:
If you've seen "Eyes Wide Shut", then you already have a fairly good idea of the plot, although, like every adaptation, there are differences. In any case, the plot traces the exploits of a married doctor, Fridolin, over the course of one night and the following day. After realizing that he is disappointed by his marriage, he goes in search of something interesting or adventurous in the Viennese night. Eventually meeting an old friend, he goes to a masked ball of the most unnatural sort, and things truly get interesting.

Review:
I thoroughly enjoyed reading "Traumnovelle", largely because the story really is so dream-like yet somehow believable. (I may have enjoyed it on the additional level of having the pleasure of living in the same city as the novel's setting, but even excluding that it is still enjoyable.) Schnitzler works to compose a portrait of an environment where seemingly anything is possible in the night, and in a sort of dream-like reality love and sexuality are continually thrown at Fridolin's feet. Not to give too much away, but an actual dream sequence goes on to show that Fridolin's night is tangled somewhere between dreams and reality, and a fruitless following day proves that it is only in night that these things can happen. There is a weird sense that as unreal or randomly lucky the night is, it is not entirely unreal or impossible. There is a certain connection between all the events and a well-established parallel between the night and day.
While other works by Schnitzler ("Reigen" ("La Ronde" or "Round Dance"), "Anatol") have also focused on the liberality of sexuality throughout all classes of Viennese society in the fin-de-siecle period, only "Traumnovelle" delves so strongly into the dreamworld. Perhaps taking cues from Freud, Schnitzler was clearly interested in what dreams can represent and the worlds they can hide. "Eyes Wide Shut" is a less obvious but perhaps better title for the story, although I would say that the novella is still a better work than Kubrik's film adaptation. In the end, "Traumnovelle" is a fantastic piece of literature and, assuming that the English translation does the work justice, one that is quite worth reading. (It's just a novella, after all.)

Grade: A

Review of “The Blind Assassin” novel by Margaret Atwood

Overview:
“The Blind Assassin” is a lengthy fictional biography primarily concerned with tracing the life of Iris Chase, an upper-class Canadian woman, and her sister Laura Chase. The book interweaves three interrelated stories: Iris Chase’s final days in 1999, her life from birth until the end of WWII, and a novel-within-a-novel entitled “The Blind Assassin.” This embedded novel is about a controversial romance and itself contains a story-within-a-story which is a science-fiction tale also titled “The Blind Assassin.” The book opens with the line “Ten days after the war ended, my sister Laura drove a car off a bridge.” Shortly after Laura dies, her novel, “The Blind Assassin” is discovered and published to great acclaim. The bulk of the book concerns the biographical details of the Iris Chase in the past and present with a gradual sense of mystery and anticipation building as the full story behind the Chase family and the opening car accident are revealed.

The Good:
Atwood is a master of characterization and above all else, this is what really shines throughout the book. Iris Chase is rendered brilliantly, a fully three-dimensional, realistic character whose life appears equally tangible and marked by personality at the age of 18 as it does at the age of 80. Perhaps what is most impressive is the sense that Iris is hardly exceptional, her life has been eventful but not earth-shattering and she rarely controls her own destiny. Atwood captures the means by which a person can slip into the easy routine, always doing what they think is best and yet gradually becoming more passive and unhappy. Similarly, Laura Chase makes the perfect enigma for jaded 20th century readers, a naïve and yet somehow admirable figure quite out-of-place in the era she lives in.
Also notable is Atwood’s writing style, which tends to make some of the slower, overly long passage more palatable. Her frequent vivid use of metaphors and similes gives narration a highly literate and cunning edge with a heavy, healthy dose of cynicism.
As for the story, I found it to be realistic, fairly engaging, occasionally profound and brilliantly concluded. However the plot is really only the sugar on the cake and isn’t the reason this book should be read. Even if the reader has guessed all of the plot twists far in advance (as most readers likely will) Atwood still delivers her revelations with intensity and eloquence.

The Bad:
Despite advertising the science-fiction element of the book as comprising 1/3 of the story, it really amounts to less than 1/12 and it is easily the least satisfying aspect of the book. One is tempted to accuse Atwood of possessing disdain for classical science fiction but it is more likely that it is actually her characters which treat it dismissively. The novel-within-a-novel is ultimately too weak to stand on its own legs (one finds it hard to believe it was met with cult success) and it is merely relegated to its relevance with regard to the primary plot.
The other minor problem I have with the book is its fairly hefty length. Atwood seems to struggle with whether or not she is making a classical modernist novel or an experimental post-modernist novel and so lets elements of both bloat up beyond what is necessary. Despite an ever growing sense of anticipation within the last third of the book, the first two thirds are simply too lackadaisical and often dull, with plenty of well-written prose but nothing new occurring or changing.

Grade: A-