All the Windwracked Stars
Elizabeth Bear
368 pp. Tor. $24.95
Pub. Date: 10/28/2008
ISBN-13: 978-0765318824
Reviewed by Paul Stotts
“The wolf sees no reason to salvage this world, when it is already so ruined. He’d rather tear it down. It would not, after all, be the first time. And the Technomancer and her constructs are the only thing between Eiledon and the wolf, and Eiledon and the Waste.” – “All the Windwracked Stars”
Occasionally, a novel can be greatly appreciated without being appealing. Like a piece of art in which one can enjoy the beauty and craftsmanship, but feel no connection with it. No matter how hard one tries, the novel and reader never engage each other; there is only an emotional flatness, a seed of a story that never germinates. Sometimes certain books don’t work with certain readers. This is not a criticism as much as an observation. What doesn’t emotionally connect with one reader could just as likely connect with the next one.
Case in point is Elizabeth Bear’s latest novel “All the Windwracked Stars.” Bear’s novel is beautifully written and expertly plotted, yet the story failed to engage me, lessening the overall appeal of the book for me. There were moments when I got into the story, only to have later events jar me back out of it. However, there was never a point in “All the Windwracked Stars” where the book grabbed hold and refused to let go. Unfortunately, as much as I wanted to like the book due to Bear’s sublime craftsmanship, “All the Windwracked Stars” never generated any interest in me; it was an emotional flatline. But that isn’t to say that it wouldn’t generate interest in others. It contains all the elements necessary to be very successful with readers; I’m just not one of them.
As the novel begins, Muire stumbles across the aftermath of an apocalyptic battle between the children of the Light and the tarnished. She sadly discovers that all of her brothers and sisters of the Light have been killed, leaving her as the lone survivor of the Light. Muire is understandably crushed by this discovery. She is also wracked with enormous guilt, since she owes her survival to the fact that she fled like a coward before the battle began.
Among the corpses littering the battlefield, Muire discovers the valraven Kasimir, barely alive. Kasimir is an extremely intelligent type of stallion that has two heads and wings. The valravens traditionally serve as mounts for the children of Light. Among the cold and snowy field of death, Muire and Kasimir end up eventually saving each other (both literally and metaphorically), creating a timeless bond in the process.
Twenty-three hundred years later, human civilization has risen and nearly fallen, humanity now poised on the brink of extinction. Two hundred years earlier, the Desolation “left all Valdyrgard a salted garden.” Only the ancient city of
Muire, who has been living in Eiledon since before the Desolation, stumbles across a man dying in the streets one night. She takes in his last breath, sucking it down deep into her lungs, a waelcyrge rite by which she chooses him. In choosing him, Muire “accepted his death and accepted as well the burden of vengeance that death brought.” But this vengeance comes with a heavy price, and Muire suddenly finds herself in the heart of a complex mystery. One in which the outcome may affect the very survival of human civilization.
Muire, the protagonist of “All the Windwracked Stars,” was the biggest hindrance to my enjoyment of the book. Due to her guilt over her desertion of the children of Light twenty-three hundred years prior, Muire is emotionally crippled, filled with so much self-hatred that she is more annoying rather than endearing. Her woe-is-me act wore thin quickly. I generally am bored by mopey, angst-ridden characters, so Muire’s inability to “get over it” didn’t make for the most exciting reading. Thematically, “All the Windwracked Stars” concentrates on the Muire’s possible salvation. Can her future actions erase the stain of her past negligence? While I can appreciate this question, her emotional trauma bored me; I felt no empathy for her character. Many of the other characters in the novel like Selene, Kasimir, Cristokos, and Cathoair are quite appealing though. Only Muire undermines the narrative by wallowing in her angst. If she had only spanked her inner emo, “All the Windwracked Stars” would have been very special.
The world of “All the Windwracked Stars” is highly imaginative and creative; the world-building and characterization is generally fresh and unique. Bear’s creativity is wonderful to behold as it informs even the smallest detail of Valdyrgard. The language is beautiful; passages are poetic in their composition. Bear writes with an artist’s sense of language; prose that is elevated above normal genre fiction. For example, Bear writes:
“Since the breaking of the Light the wolf has been listening to the ticking decay. Worlds, like gods, are a long time dying, and the deathblow dealt the children of the Light did not stop a civilization of mortal men from rising in their place, inventing medicine and philosophy, metallurgy and space flight.”
Aesthetically, the novel is a wonder to behold. I was awed intellectually by Bear’s imagination. Only my issues with Muire kept me from fully connecting with the world. If the focus had been shifted onto another character, I likely would have found the material much more engaging. I just couldn’t bring myself to care about Muire.
Last Word:
Despite being beautifully composed and crafted, “All the Windwracked Stars” failed to connect with me. The angst-ridden protagonist Muire is too weepy, her consuming self-hatred too melodramatic and boring. Therefore, I found myself having a difficult time relating to her, and as she serves as the main conduit for the story, this obviously hampered my enjoyment of the novel. This is really a personal objection more than a criticism though. Despite my distaste for Muire, “All the Windwracked Stars” is still a wonderfully imaginative and enjoyable novel.
Final Grade: 77 out of 100
1 comments:
Thank you for the review. Anyway I'm still indecisive whether to put the book on my list or not.
Post a Comment