sigh
So I’m reading a new fantasy book.
And it’s not a bad book. Far from it; the writing, the pacing, the premise - all engaging and good. The world is solidly built, just reminiscent enough of a particular human epoch to be recognisable, but otherwise original. The various POV characters are compelling and distinct. I want to know what happens next.
But.
I’ve realised, as I’ve been reading it, that something is leaving me cold: the presence of so many archetypes. Powerful vizier, mad prince, too-old-for-this-shit assassin, wilful-unwilling bride - no matter how well-executed here, they’re characters I’ve seen before. And most of the time, I can deal with that: I read SFF, after all, and as much as I love to deconstruct tropes, I still enjoy a lot of them. I don’t even think it’s necessarily a problem with this specific book, except inasmuch as it represents a personal tipping-point - a type of critical fatigue.
But I am just so sick of picking up SFF novels and finding that, while the author has gone to great lengths to invent an original plague, a complex political system, a fantastical city or somesuch, the gender roles are still constrained, familiar and dull and, usually, oppressive. I’m sick of the grizzled old warrior encountering yet another nubile young ladymage, swearing to protect her even as she offers to cook for him, taking his own admiration of her body as a sign that he’s not yet too old, damn it, then dashing in to rescue her when her magic and courage conveniently leave her damselled. I’m sick of reading about powerful men seeking comfort in the arms of grateful, powerless dependent women who are nothing to them but status and bodies, convenient and hollow. I’m sick of unwilling women being forced into marriage by the political machinations of men; sick of powerful women cast as background villains; sick of knowing within the first hundred pages that nothing in the emotional interactions between these characters will surprise me, because their culture is all predicated on a social system I’ve seen used as default a hundred, a thousand times before, and which has therefore become invisible, safe.
I’m sick of realising that none of the female characters will surprise me - or rather, be allowed to surprise me. I’m sick of realising that none of the male characters will be truly sympathetic, because they’re written to treat the women as background noise or alien creatures requiring a separate set of rules. I’m sick of realising there will only be straight men and women, no third gender or genderqueer characters, no discussions of sexuality beyond a handful of variations on heteromonogamy and the various social tenants used to support it.
You know what stories like this are? They’re The Jetsons, no matter whether they’re set in an alternate past or a possible future. All the truly alien, magical stuff is tools - technology, or its absence; magic, or its absence; cities and temples and ships and coins - and that can be fun, until you realise Jane is still doing the housework while Judy is mocked for spending her father’s hard-earned money on clothes. It exhausts me, and even though this book is making an effort and is otherwise engaging enough that I’ll keep on reading, right at this moment, I just feel sad and tired.
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If you ever do set up that company, I’ll be one of your first customers.
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Not sure there’s much I can do beyond buying/reading/plugging any stuff you produce (my own Great Academic Time Sink...
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