52+ in 2009

[lumineaux]

Mr. Timothy by Louis Bayard
Timothy Cratchit (no longer Tiny) deals with life as an adult and tries to solve a mystery involving dead young girls.  If you're a Dickens fan (and I am not) there are apparently any number of little shout-outs to other Dickens stories throughout the book.  I enjoyed this less than the other 2 Bayard books I've read recently, but I think that it is due to my not being a Dickens fan in the first place.

I re-read The Belgariad by David Eddings.
  I'd forgotten how much time is spent on traveling around from place to place in these books.  I'd also forgotten how much takes place in a fairly short time once the action really kicks in.  Some of the mannerisms that Eddings uses in the first two books in order to maintain the suspense grate a little.  But the characters are still witty under fire and the sense of wonder is still there.

The Mallorean, however, did not age well.  I got halfway into the second book and got completely bored with it.  It is too much of a rehash of the original without the charm.  The characters' quirks have taken over their personalities.  Back on the bookshelf it went.

I'm also re-reading the Dragonriders of Pern and the Harper Hall series by Anne McCaffrey. 
Both series are very much artifacts of the time when they were written.  I don't think the "a woman can't do _______" plotline has a lot of traction any more, and that's precisely what Dragonflight and the first two Harper books are.  But, these books were written before McCaffrey and her editors had milked Pern for every cent it could produce, and there's still a certain crispness and cleverness that is lacking from later books set in the same world.  Cynical readers will find the archetypical Mary Sue in Menolly of Harper Hall.  I can't say that they're wrong, but she has charmed me since I was her age even so.

Comments

[tonypatriquin.livejournal.com]

I agree about the Mallorean. I think part of the problem was the Belgariad's success -- Eddings had the clout to make the second series longer/wordier, and it suffered for it.

What's a "Mary Sue"?

[lumineaux.livejournal.com]

"The prototypical Mary Sue is an original female character in a fanfic who obviously serves as an idealized version of the author mainly for the purpose of Wish Fulfillment. She's exotically beautiful, often having an unusual hair or eye color, and has a similarly cool and exotic name. She's exceptionally talented in an implausibly wide variety of areas, and may possess skills that are rare or nonexistent in the canon setting. She also lacks any realistic, or at least story-relevant, character flaws — either that or her "flaws" are obviously meant to be endearing. She has an unusual and dramatic Back Story. The canon protagonists are all overwhelmed with admiration for her beauty, wit, courage and other virtues, and are quick to adopt her into their nakama, even characters who are usually antisocial and untrusting; if any character doesn't love her, that character gets an extremely unsympathetic portrayal. She has some sort of especially close relationship to the author's favorite canon character — their love interest, illegitimate child, never-before-mentioned sister, etc. Other than that, the canon characters are quickly reduced to awestruck cheerleaders, watching from the sidelines as Mary Sue outstrips them in their areas of expertise and solves problems that have stymied them for the entire series. (See Common Mary Sue Traits for more detail on any of these cliches.) In other words, the term "Mary Sue" is generally slapped on a character who is important in the story, possesses unusual physical traits, and has an irrelevantly over-skilled or over-idealized nature."
http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/MarySue