chris_gerrib (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
chris_gerrib) wrote2015-05-20 09:03 am
chris_gerrib) wrote2015-05-20 09:03 am
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Hugo Packet - The Wrong Way to Wright
I am really bouncing hard off of John C. Wright's novellas. For One Bright Star to Guide Them I'm baffled by the attitude to magic. Robertson, our first character, hasn't thought of magic for years, yet the instant he sees a black cat he's all magic!!!! - Then when we visit Richard, he alternates in the same paragraph between "yeah magic, especially if it gets me laid" and "no magic for me, I'm British." Oh, and since when have you described out loud what somebody was wearing to the person wearing it? Sorry, no dice. (Oh, and I checked - somebody on File 770 thinks that Wright forgot the name of one of his characters, and changed it from Sarah to Sally randomly. Not so - she is referred to as both names, but there's no explanation as to why in the story. It would have been better to be consistent.)
For The Plural of Helen of Troy I got five pages into it and found myself wondering who I was supposed to be rooting for and why. I get that Wright was trying for a hard-boiled hero, but for that (or any hero) to work, we need a reason to root for the hero. Kratman did that quite well in Big Boys - I liked Maggie The Tank. I don't like anybody I've met in Troy.
Pale Realms of Shade suffers from a similar problem. I guess I'm supposed to care about Mathias, the ghost, but I'm not told why. Moreover, we spend entirely too much time figuring out that the narrator is a ghost. It's first person, just tell us!
Results - the Andrews is a novel fragment, and the Wrights all have the wrong stuff in them. So my decision is between one-and-done (Kratman then no award) or just no award the whole category.
For The Plural of Helen of Troy I got five pages into it and found myself wondering who I was supposed to be rooting for and why. I get that Wright was trying for a hard-boiled hero, but for that (or any hero) to work, we need a reason to root for the hero. Kratman did that quite well in Big Boys - I liked Maggie The Tank. I don't like anybody I've met in Troy.
Pale Realms of Shade suffers from a similar problem. I guess I'm supposed to care about Mathias, the ghost, but I'm not told why. Moreover, we spend entirely too much time figuring out that the narrator is a ghost. It's first person, just tell us!
Results - the Andrews is a novel fragment, and the Wrights all have the wrong stuff in them. So my decision is between one-and-done (Kratman then no award) or just no award the whole category.
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Well, “The Plural of Helen of Troy” is an interesting story title at least. I could see that showing up in the 1940s or '50s, with whatever storyline. [Come to think on it, there was “Helen o'Loy.”]
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The Customer is Always Right
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(Anonymous) 2015-05-21 03:46 pm (UTC)(link)I actually thought ONE BRIGHT STAR TO GUIDE THEM was fairly clever. The magical kingdom storyline is an incoherent mess and the protagonist is irrational. When I reread that as being psychosis, as the protagonist Richard having a psychotic break and becoming a raving homeless person accosting old friends from his childhood, the story begins making sense. Its actually pretty fun, like AMERICAN PSYCHO crossed with THE CHRONICLES OF NARNIA, and a generous streak of David Icke thrown in.
I wouldn't call it a deconstruction of fantasy but it is a fun "what-if" take on it. Richard's friends meet him first with surprise, then with seeming concern. As they begin to distance themselves from him, Richard warps them into his crazy viewpoint. And he begins to pull figures of authority into his delusions the same way you see UFO crazies fixate on Men In Black and fluoridation and vaccination programs.
I've always been a fan of crazy conspiracy theories so I thought it was fun to think of the kids from NARNIA as middle aged men breaking into museums to steal "magic" swords. I'm not sure if I'll give this story the Hugo but it is definitely more fun than most of the stories I've read this year.
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I'm not looking forward to the novellas.
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No one I've ever known in the US named Sarah goes by Sally, and we treat Sally as its own name (see Sally Ride and Sally Struthers). I'm not surprised that people are confused, but I don't see this as an issue. Other things, yes. This, no.
I'm halfway through the tank story. This is looking very much like a "no award" category for me.
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One Bright Star to Guide Them
(Anonymous) 2015-05-21 07:42 pm (UTC)(link)Anon’s comment has made me think again! The protagonist – Tommy – is a middle-aged single man living in Brighton, the gay capital of Britain. Clearly his problems stem from his inability to come to terms with his sexuality.
Incidentally, can anyone make sense of the time frame of this story? Penny was born in 1940 and died in 1987. Sally/Sarah is under forty, Tommy is a little over forty and Richard is perhaps slightly older. The four knew each other as children, and visited the Summer Country some thirty years ago. If the story’s present is late 1987, early 1988, that would make Penny seventeen at the time – hardly a child.
On the other hand, Richard was expelled from school for getting a girl pregnant. The girl had an abortion on the NHS, which can have been no earlier than 1968. At the very outside Richard might have been eighteen when he was expelled, so he was born in 1950 or later and is only thirty-seven at most. (But the impression given is that he is at least Tommy’s age, if not older.) And if Richard is younger, what on earth was the almost adult Penny doing playing with a bunch of ten year olds? Is this why Tommy can’t come to terms with his sexuality? Either there’s some very strange subtext here, or Wright is a sloppy and careless writer. Given Wright's utter inability to mimic a British voice, I suspect the latter.
A pity he didn't have the services of a good editor.
JK
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