more Melusine

[rm]

I reached a critical point in Melusine on the subway this morning. If what I think is about to happen happens, it's indication #784545 that I really need to make a list of "occult texts you should read before attempting to use sex magick as a major plot device in your fantasy novel."

Maybe no one cares but me, but I care!

Just because the magick in your fantasy novel isn't real doesn't mean it doesn't have to have internal consistancy, a justification for its processes (why you have to do x instead of y) and some sort of philosophical underpinning. Magick _is_ science, and deciding that it's not and therefore doesn't need rules, FUCKS YOUR NOVEL UP.

Thank you.

Comments

[winterknight.livejournal.com]

WORD.

That is all I can say on that. :p (Zie said, from the depths of background development of zir own world... ew, plagues, gross.)

[rahalia-cat.livejournal.com]

Michael Liljenberg has some good stuff to say about that kind of thing in the FARP SciFi/Fantasy Worldbuilding Tutorials (http://elfwood.lysator.liu.se/farp/thewriting/liljenbergworlds/index.html) recently posted at Elfwood. I've been reading those rather avidly of late.

[torenheksje.livejournal.com]

"occult texts you should read before attempting to use sex magick as a major plot device in your fantasy novel."

Okay, now I'm REALLY curious. And kudos for wanting to get it as "right" as possible - there's too much crap floating around out there. :c)

[rm.livejournal.com]

I actually may put this together and post it, but I don't want to do it as an off the top of my head thing, but rather something pretty detailed with reasoning listed.

It's something someone should do about alchemy as well.

[earthgoat.livejournal.com]

I definitely would love to see your list and reasons behind each!

[earthgoat.livejournal.com]

Please tell me this isn't Melusine by Sarah Monette. Please, please, please. She's going to be a Nifty Guest at the Con I'm working on and I bought her book to do some background. I'm struggling with the intro. It's just...bad. I'm not getting caught by the first three pages, despite wanting to. :/

[rm.livejournal.com]

It is.

I've written a few posts with my struggles about it.

short version:
- attack of the fantasy tropes in a way that distracts.
- one pretty fantastic character who works despite the tropes and cliches (Mildmay); no one else I care about.
- a bit of content both about sex workers and sex magick that I feel isn't grounded in ANYTHING, and if you're gonna go there, you kind of have to make it work.
- this pervasive feeling that all us queers and slashers are supposed to like the book because it has the gay in it, and it's like, "stop providing me with doggie treats and start writing something good."

[earthgoat.livejournal.com]

I thought it was, and with each successive post, I've been cringing more and more every time I look at the book. *le sigh* 'Tis a shame. Her friend and sometimes co-writer, Elizabeth Bear, has written some very good stuff and had recommended her to me.

FWIW, if you enjoy urban fantasy, I suggest Blood and Iron to get the Melusine taste out of your mouth. It has a fantastic take on Faerie in modern times, doesn't get bogged down in magick details, while at the same time never once making you question the magick system.

[rm.livejournal.com]

We're reading Melusine right now for themollyhouse if you want to watch that discussion when it happens. I'll certainly be going into a detailed "why the magick system doesn't work narratively or conceptually" tirade there. she definitely fell in the crack between "vague but not illogical" and "detailed and functional" on that score. It's an easy place to fumble, but it was done so broadly, it amazes me that an editor let her get away with it (although I also wonder if it was an editor's fault, as I could see one arguing against revisitng the sex magick that creates the mess in the first place, in which case that should have been replaced with something of somehow explainably equal force, which was definitely not touching someones shoulder and doing spells on a piece of glass.