NEW STORY OUT WOOO! and also alarajrogers: an appreciation · 8:35pm Apr 18th, 2014
So I've got a new story out! It's a dark and sad AU fic starring Her Majesty Queen Chrysalis, and what happened after Discord got released from his thousand-year prison and did a bunch of not-very-nice stuff. A link is to the side. Go read it!
It's based on the works of alarajrogers, who is a fantastic author and horrificially underappreciated to almost theycallmejubesque levels. So, this post is also a paen to her awesomeness.
But before I talk about alarajrogers, I'm going to talk about a different fantasy author. I'm going to talk about a professional author with more than fifteen million copies sold, a 4.2/5 rating on goodreads for his first novel, and whose books are still on the bookshelves of any decent fantasy section in Barnes and Noble or Waterstones more than three decades later. I'm going to talk about Raymond E. Feist.
I've read the Riftwar Saga, and Prince of the Blood. I liked Riftwar Saga and Prince of the Blood, and plan to read a bunch more of his high fantasy work. I didn't love it, though. I was underwhelmed, to be honest, given its prominence within the genre.
See, Magician is interesting. Its protagonists are for the most part likeable, its prose is straightforward, and its paced quickly enough to keep you jogging alongside it.
But its interesting like any airport pulp is interesting. The protagonists don't grip you by the very face like KKat's or J.K. Rowling's do and make you feel for their every loss and victory. The worldbuilding is incredibly derivative. Feist adds absolutely nothing to the dwarves, elves and goblins which he took from Tolkien. You don't feel the extraordinary depth of Tolkien's dying elves or beleaguered dwarves, just copies as if he's going through the motions. In fact, it reads strongly like Tolkien fanfiction, and not particularly innovative fanfiction. The most marked difference is that although dark elves and goblins show up as enemies, most of the fighting for the notMedievalEuropean Mikedemian protagonists is against the notFeudalJapanese Tsurani from another world.
Even for 1982, this was not particularly innovative. In '82, the fourth Thieve's World anthology had been published, a world of sword-and-sorcery whose characters, intrigues, and morality were far deeper than anything Feist managed even by his seventh and eighth books.
The characters in Magician are tolerable, but scarcely compelling. Feist builds his cast like a D&D group build a party — full of easy stereotypes who all fit useful designated roles. The tititular magician's apprentice is young, normal, and has Hidden Talents. His best friend is tall, naturally charming, and a fighter. There are two princes, and the oldest one is tall and blond and just and therefore set to become king one day, while the younger is dark, clever, pragmatic and has 'intelligent eyes'. The court mage is old, wears robes, smokes a pipe and has a long beard and is basically Gandalf. The princess likes fencing and riding and doesn't want to be like other women, who are all boring and terrible. Martin the ranger is an excellent archer, aloof, and gets along well with elves. Laurel the bard is whimsacorial and flighty. The Tsurani warriors are Honorable. The elves are fragile and beautiful and a shadow of their former selves. The dwarves are good and strong and each one can take ten men in combat.
You can hear the cookie-cutter smacking down onto the page, is what I'm saying here.
But, I still enjoy these books. They're low stakes easy reads. The odd character dies every book but it's rarely anyone we care about or our hearts ache for. He's not killing Sirius after a single book. They're popular, and very successful, and I can respect that.
So, how does this all come back to alarajrogers?
Well, I want to praise alarajrogers effusively. I want to call her characterisation absolutely spot on, her emotional tone at once heart-rending and hopeful, and her storytelling skills the very object of my envy.
I want to say that her work is professional quality. But that's not quite true, is it? Feist's books are undoubtedly professional, all very well received, and have definitely allowed him to earn a living. And alarajrogers' works of fantasy far outstrip anything that Feist's books have made me think or feel.
Reading Feist is like playing Dungeon Seige or Torchlight, a mild and entertaining way to whittle away an evening.
Reading alarajrogers makes you see fantastic characters in lights you have never considered them, yet immediately know are perfect.
Go read her work. All of it. Start with Hit Me. Then peruse at your leisure. Her story archive is a Michelin-star buffet. Tuck in.
Thanks for the name dropping, I love this aspect of the author blog posts. Was already following alarajrogers, now I've got theycallmejubesque too. And now I've just gotta locate my spork.
My only prior experience with Feist was Return to Krondor on the PC. Haldon Head was a fun creepy little town.
Thank you, thank you, your check is in the mail. :-)
No, seriously though. I just recently read "Magician" myself and... yeah, engaging enough but kind of weaksauce. Particularly given how very, very little time was given to Pug becoming Milamber. I was disappointed, because as a teenager I loved the "Empire" series that covers the Tsurani side of that conflict (except it's really about how a teenage girl who was about to become a nun when her family was murdered ends up using her intelligence and her willingness to break tradition to save her family house and climb to power, not about the Riftwar really). That one was written by Feist in collaboration with Janny Wurts, which suggests to me that the author I really ought to be tracking down to read more of is Wurts, not Feist.
Hey, you're writing again!
Get to work.
Thanks for the recommendations! Added Hit Me to my read later list.