I mentioned book reviews early on, and I thought at the time I'd be bringing you feedback on Dirty Magic or Of Dawn and Darkness or one of the other books and series I'm in the middle of. But the past few days called for a treasured old favorite of mine instead.
For those of us who've spent our lives haunting the sci-fi/fantasy section, Robin McKinley is one of those names. Even before I'd ever read any of her books, (and after all this time I've only read a couple), I got used to her presence between the Pern novels and whatever Andre Norton books they might have around. I've picked up Deerskin at least a dozen times, but it's never called to me enough to stick.
Unlike Sunshine. Initially published in 2003 and re-released in 2008, it missed the tail end of my own vampire phase (I moved on to assassins at one point and have apparently never left), but fell squarely into the contemporary trend of the Southern Vampire Mysteries and other undead romances. And on the shape of it, it doesn't differ much from form. The Amazon blurb for the book is:
"There are places in the world where darkness rules, where it's unwise to walk. But there hadn't been any trouble out at the lake for years, and Sunshine just needed a spot where she could be alone with her thoughts. Vampires never entered her mind.
Until they found her."
A small town woman in a version of the modern world that knows about supernaturals but doesn't much interact with them, dragged by chance into the larger picture, who finds out more about her own strengths while looking out for herself and her people. There's even something resembling a love triangle with a vampire at one corner. If that formula sounds appealing to you, you'll probably like Sunshine! But even if it doesn't, I recommend giving Sunshine a chance, for a few reasons.
The first is purely and simply the world building. Both in content and delivery. Content-wise, McKinley gives us the tail end of a terrible war, different types of supernatural creature and how they're integrated (or not) with society, supernatural policing agencies, pieces of a fascinating magic system, magic tattoos (a weakness of mine), and vampires that are satisfyingly monstrous. In terms of delivery, I'm always intrigued by modern fantasy that blends the supernatural into the mundane, and this book might be my benchmark. Sunshine is a simple baker, but everyone keeps a few wards around. She doesn't know the ins and outs of supernatural factions or agencies, but she knows what people say about them. The result is a series of small, realistic details and a sense of a greater world beyond what we can see. Our first words on the subject of vampires (and other supernatural creatures, referred to collectively as Others) are given to us by Sunshine with the following disclaimer: "I had kind of a lot of theoretical knowledge about the Others, from reading what I could pull off the globenet about them-- fabulously, I have to say, embellished by my addiction to novels like Immortal Death and Blood Chalice-- but I didn't have much practical 'fo." followed soon after by the helpful observation that "It is technically illegal to be a vampire."
The second amalgam reason is all of the myriad small ways it breaks from form. Vampires are monsters. They aren't charming or misunderstood. They don't live off blood substitute or speak woefully about their tragic histories. "[The smell of vampires] is not attractive or disgusting, although it does make your heart race. That's in the genes, I suppose. Your body knows it's prey [...]" Sunshine does meet and interact with one vampire who differs slightly from the rest, but the crawling wrongness never entirely goes away. And perhaps growing out of that, this really isn't a love story. There are romance elements, but more than anything, it's a story about Sunshine and survival and quiet strength. So if what turns you off the form is the concept of a vampire romance, or if you're simply tired of those tropes, you shouldn't let that deter you.
Finally, and really the main reason I recommend this book and reread it year after year, is the heart. Have you ever sat in the gold of a slanting afternoon sunbeam and appreciated the quiet? This book captures that feeling better than anything else I've ever read. Sunshine, the character, is a gift. She spends her time making her signature Cinnamon Rolls as Big as Your Head and inventing new desserts to feed to people. She buys herself flowers to cheer herself up. She reads ridiculous pulp novels and befriends everyone. She's curious and stubbornly determined and braver than she thinks. We should all be Sunshine. And in her hands the dichotomy between sunshine and family matters on the one side and shadowy darkness filled with magic and monsters feels as natural as the transition from night to day. The story begins with her desire (familiar to most of us, some days) to be somewhere "so exquisitely far from the rest of [her] life", and she ends up somewhere both distant and familiar.
I won't say more for fear of spoilers, but I will add one warning before I go: There is no sequel. If you read this book, you will want there to be a sequel, but according to the author that will probably never happen. The story is complete. There's no actual cliffhanger, but the world and the characters are so vast that you'll be left wanting to know more. More about what Sunshine does next. More about the questions left unanswered. I would trade in every last one of my P. N. Elrod books for a sequel to Sunshine, but as it stands the book's world exists for me in the haze of a fading summer day, and that's enough.
For those of us who've spent our lives haunting the sci-fi/fantasy section, Robin McKinley is one of those names. Even before I'd ever read any of her books, (and after all this time I've only read a couple), I got used to her presence between the Pern novels and whatever Andre Norton books they might have around. I've picked up Deerskin at least a dozen times, but it's never called to me enough to stick.
Unlike Sunshine. Initially published in 2003 and re-released in 2008, it missed the tail end of my own vampire phase (I moved on to assassins at one point and have apparently never left), but fell squarely into the contemporary trend of the Southern Vampire Mysteries and other undead romances. And on the shape of it, it doesn't differ much from form. The Amazon blurb for the book is:
"There are places in the world where darkness rules, where it's unwise to walk. But there hadn't been any trouble out at the lake for years, and Sunshine just needed a spot where she could be alone with her thoughts. Vampires never entered her mind.
Until they found her."
A small town woman in a version of the modern world that knows about supernaturals but doesn't much interact with them, dragged by chance into the larger picture, who finds out more about her own strengths while looking out for herself and her people. There's even something resembling a love triangle with a vampire at one corner. If that formula sounds appealing to you, you'll probably like Sunshine! But even if it doesn't, I recommend giving Sunshine a chance, for a few reasons.
The first is purely and simply the world building. Both in content and delivery. Content-wise, McKinley gives us the tail end of a terrible war, different types of supernatural creature and how they're integrated (or not) with society, supernatural policing agencies, pieces of a fascinating magic system, magic tattoos (a weakness of mine), and vampires that are satisfyingly monstrous. In terms of delivery, I'm always intrigued by modern fantasy that blends the supernatural into the mundane, and this book might be my benchmark. Sunshine is a simple baker, but everyone keeps a few wards around. She doesn't know the ins and outs of supernatural factions or agencies, but she knows what people say about them. The result is a series of small, realistic details and a sense of a greater world beyond what we can see. Our first words on the subject of vampires (and other supernatural creatures, referred to collectively as Others) are given to us by Sunshine with the following disclaimer: "I had kind of a lot of theoretical knowledge about the Others, from reading what I could pull off the globenet about them-- fabulously, I have to say, embellished by my addiction to novels like Immortal Death and Blood Chalice-- but I didn't have much practical 'fo." followed soon after by the helpful observation that "It is technically illegal to be a vampire."
The second amalgam reason is all of the myriad small ways it breaks from form. Vampires are monsters. They aren't charming or misunderstood. They don't live off blood substitute or speak woefully about their tragic histories. "[The smell of vampires] is not attractive or disgusting, although it does make your heart race. That's in the genes, I suppose. Your body knows it's prey [...]" Sunshine does meet and interact with one vampire who differs slightly from the rest, but the crawling wrongness never entirely goes away. And perhaps growing out of that, this really isn't a love story. There are romance elements, but more than anything, it's a story about Sunshine and survival and quiet strength. So if what turns you off the form is the concept of a vampire romance, or if you're simply tired of those tropes, you shouldn't let that deter you.
Finally, and really the main reason I recommend this book and reread it year after year, is the heart. Have you ever sat in the gold of a slanting afternoon sunbeam and appreciated the quiet? This book captures that feeling better than anything else I've ever read. Sunshine, the character, is a gift. She spends her time making her signature Cinnamon Rolls as Big as Your Head and inventing new desserts to feed to people. She buys herself flowers to cheer herself up. She reads ridiculous pulp novels and befriends everyone. She's curious and stubbornly determined and braver than she thinks. We should all be Sunshine. And in her hands the dichotomy between sunshine and family matters on the one side and shadowy darkness filled with magic and monsters feels as natural as the transition from night to day. The story begins with her desire (familiar to most of us, some days) to be somewhere "so exquisitely far from the rest of [her] life", and she ends up somewhere both distant and familiar.
I won't say more for fear of spoilers, but I will add one warning before I go: There is no sequel. If you read this book, you will want there to be a sequel, but according to the author that will probably never happen. The story is complete. There's no actual cliffhanger, but the world and the characters are so vast that you'll be left wanting to know more. More about what Sunshine does next. More about the questions left unanswered. I would trade in every last one of my P. N. Elrod books for a sequel to Sunshine, but as it stands the book's world exists for me in the haze of a fading summer day, and that's enough.
No comments:
Post a Comment