We were featuring D. Barkley Briggs’s Corus the Champion, which was a really great read. My one qualm about it was feeling like so many elements of the plot were too familiar. Anyway, Dean very graciously responded to my review, and I thought I’d post his response here because it really does touch on a major issue genre writers face:

Rachel, thank you for your thoughtful review. I appreciate the insights, and also the frustration of feeling the familiarity of a sub-genre’s distinctives. As far as I can tell, that’s the double-edged sword: color too much inside the lines, and people may feel overexposed to the story (i.e. that it is derivative of other works), but color outside the lines, and people who wanted an epic fantasy may feel cheated, i.e. “If I wanted steampunk, I would buy steampunk!” Personally, I wrote what I like to read: epic fantasy, and tried to do it in a way that raises the bar for the quality of what the Christian market could expect from such a title. As you briefly and graciously referenced me in the company of Tolkien, Lewis, Alexander, Cooper and Kay (swapping McKillip or LeGuin for Lawhead), I’m quite pleased. Thank you!

Let me say, first off, that Dean absolutely HAS raised the bar. He deserves those comparisons, and the genre distinctions he’s referring to–including many familiar motifs, background myths, and even plot points–will no doubt make their first encounters with many young readers in his books. Those young readers couldn’t ask for a better introduction, in my opinion. And the quality of writing, plus serious depth in the themes and characters, make these books original as well–I don’t want to give the false impression that they’re completely derivative.

(Mind you, I say all this based on Corus alone. I ordered Book of Names from Amazon, but it arrived with a tragically bent-double cover. I’m sending it back but will pick up the rest of the series when I get a chance.)

All of this makes me wonder anew, however: how restrictive are the boundaries of genre, really? As a reader, do you go after books in a certain genre looking for something familiar, or for something distinctive? Have you had an experience like Dean describes, where an author coloured too much outside the lines and you felt cheated? Does it bother you to run across familiar things in different novels, or do you actually want that?

I’m curious, so please do share your opinions if you have them.

One other thought on this: when you read inside a certain genre all the time, that genre tends to shape your imagination. Maybe that’s why fantasy-style stories come so naturally to me, and “real-world” stories don’t. The first book I ever tried to write was a fantasy that ripped off Lloyd Alexander and Terry Brooks in equal measure, and even now I find “derivative” scenes and ideas in my stories a lot. They just seem to be part of the way I think. Maybe that’s a reason to read outside of your genre?

In Corus the Champion, the second book of the Legends of Karac Tor by D. Barkley Briggs, the brothers follow separate quests, accompanied by warriors, monks, and legendary figures of long, long ago. As Hadyn, the oldest Barlow boy, tries to deliver his message of impending war to the five lords of Karac Tor, dodging assassins and braving the intricacies of politics, Gabe, Garrett, and Ewan join the search for two legendary figures who lie at the center of two worlds: Corus, the Champion, long thought dead; and the Sleeping King—a figure of immense mystery with a strange connection to Earth.

But neither of the missing figures will be found without sacrifice. It is Ewan, whose gifts of song and sight connect him most intimately to the mysteries of Karac Tor, who must pay the greatest price.

The story of this series is becoming a legend in itself in Christian fantasy circles: the first installment, The Book of Names, was originally published by NavPress, who dropped their fiction line only weeks before Corus the Champion went to print. After several years, the series was picked up by AMG/Living Ink, whose Christian fantasy list gets more impressive every year. The series has been well worth the wait for readers. Briggs’s writing is sharp and descriptive, almost stylistically poetic, and the story is fully engaging.

Nor is this a story just for children or young adults: like all really good fiction aimed at this age group, the story is timeless. Its explorations of spirituality and truth, lived out by the White, Gray, and Black Abbeys; its tackling of beauty, selfishness, and sacrifice through the haunting world of the Fey; and its heart-wrenching and honest look at despair and forgiveness in the story of Corus the Champion are all themes that will resonate with adult readers—in ways that we can bring back into our own world with us.

Initially, I found the story hard to get into—not because the opening isn’t exciting, but because of the overwhelming sense that I’d seen this before. So much of the plot has been done before, by C.S. Lewis and J.R.R. Tolkien and Susan Cooper and Lloyd Alexander, with a little Stephen Lawhead and Guy Gavriel Kay thrown in. Much of the blame for this lies in source material: Briggs is drawing on the same Arthurian, Norse, and Celtic (chiefly Welsh) mythology that underlies many of those groundbreaking fantasy books, and there can only be so many variations.

But Briggs is a good writer, deserving of a place among the aforementioned names: young readers who are encountering the source material for the first time in his work will not share my frustration. Rather, they’ll discover a world of wonder that is beautifully wrought. He does the sources proud, and that is no small thing.

At the end of the book, I found myself facing that same frustration again, as the Orcs—er, Cauldron-Born—er, Goths—march on Helm’s Deep. Or rather, Röckval. But I forgave him, because the story had done what great fantasy ought to do: it had ignited my passion to see the Great Story beneath the apparent mundanity of my own life and to seek for myself the power of truth.

For the Five Tenets of the White Abbey ring true here as in Karac Tor:

Light is truth,
Truth is knowledge,
Knowledge is hope,
Hope is vision,
Vision is Light.

And it will light our world as surely as it lights the world of Karac Tor.

Highly recommended for readers of all ages.

The first and third books in the series, The Book of Names and The Song of Unmaking, are also available from Living Ink.

(Disclaimer: I received a copy of this book for review from the publisher.)

European mythology, great writing, deep spirituality, and an exciting (if familiar) story: this month’s book tour is for Corus the Champion, Book 2 of the Legends of Karac Tor series by D. Barkley Briggs. The series has been a long time coming to print after the original publisher dropped it, but it is finally here, and it’s a credit to AMG/Living Ink’s increasingly interesting line of Christian fantasy books (they also publish C.S. Lakin’s fairy tales and Bryan Davis’s adult dragon stories).

Review coming tomorrow, and an essay of some sort on Wednesday. For now, the links:

Corus the Champion at Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/Corus-Champion-Legends-Karac-Tor/dp/0899578640/

The author website: http://hiddenlands.net/index.php?Itemid=49&id=19&option=com_content&task=view

And of course, the rest of the tour. Check ‘em out: The CSFF usually gets some fantastic reviews and discussions going:

Gillian Adams
Noah Arsenault
Beckie Burnham
Morgan L. Busse
CSFF Blog Tour
Carol Bruce Collett
Theresa Dunlap
April Erwin
Victor Gentile
Nikole Hahn
Ryan Heart
Bruce Hennigan
Christopher Hopper
Jason Joyner
Julie
Carol Keen
Krystine Kercher
Marzabeth
Shannon McDermott
Rebecca LuElla Miller
Eve Nielsen
Sarah Sawyer
Kathleen Smith
Donna Swanson
Rachel Starr Thomson
Steve Trower
Fred Warren
Phyllis Wheeler
Nicole White
Rachel Wyant

But their attempts to find the map and keep it out of the hands of Archelaus Burleigh, the Black Earl, will send them careening into worlds and times they never dreamt of — and at cross-purposes with other ley travelers whose existence they know nothing about.

I have never found Stephen Lawhead to be an author who inspires the breathless turning of pages; his plots tend to unfold slowly, and the incredibly well-researched and authentically depicted settings of his books invite readers to soak themselves — when they do, the experience is usually rewarding. But in this case, the setting is not a culture or time period; it’s an idea: of the universe as multiverse, navigable by invisible lines that jump time, space, and dimension; and inhabited not so much by people as by immortal souls.

In my view, this is both a strength and a weakness. The whole concept of the multiverse and of ley travel is fascinating, definitely worth steeping yourself in. But at the same time, the idea isn’t always easy to grasp (just ask the characters); and the sheer breadth of this story makes it hard to steep yourself in any particular atmosphere or even get close to any particular character. I found myself getting blissfully lost in one place or one character’s story but then having little motivation to pick up the book again once I’d put it down. The nonlinear nature of the plot (which is totally appropriate for the setting of ley travel) also tended to work against any real tension or suspense. Add to that the omniscient voice, and we get the sense that we are watching a story unfold that is somehow predestined, that has already happened. The combined effect is to invite detachment from the story while encouraging engagement with an idea.

If my review of The Skin Map (Book 1 of the Bright Empires series) was ambiguous, it was because I found it hard to express my feelings about a story that wasn’t over yet — one, in fact, in which the major themes and plot thrust were only beginning to emerge. The Skin Map laid ground, and I was interested to find out how The Bone House would build on it.

And now? The Bone House was more interesting, more exciting, than The Skin Map; more thought-provoking as well. But I still find it hard to review. The story and its themes are still emerging. Like Kit, the chief protagonist, I find myself observing this story, going along with its flow, being interested in its people and places, and yet still not really having a clue what is going on.

Becky Miller of the CSFF, in her review, wrote, “Instead of picking at the story to find something to fault, I’d rather give my thoughts on what might be coming or what it all might mean. The Bright Empires series is, in part, a mystery, after all. And part of the fun of mysteries is to try to make educated guesses, then see how close you came to the way things actually are, story wise. ” I prefer to keep out of the guessing game for now. This is an intriguing series, puzzling in many ways, frustrating in others, always pointing to an enlightenment that lies just ahead — in the next world, across the next ley line, and (hopefully), in the next book.

(A note to readers: Do not even try to read this book without reading The Skin Map first. I’ve seen some incredibly unfair reviews by readers who did just that — in no way is this book a standalone. And a disclaimer: A copy of The Bone House was provided to me by the publisher.)

Least of all to Stephen Lawhead, who has been one of my favourite writers since I was a young teenager.

With that in mind, I thought I’d wrap up the tour by writing about an aspect of Mr. Lawhead’s writing that has always made it outstanding. (I will review the book when I’ve had a chance to read it properly.) And that is his grasp of history.

The Bone House, like most of Stephen Lawhead’s books, is set in an otherwhen. Actually, it’s set in many otherwhens, and just as many otherwheres: 18th-century England, ancient Egypt, Egypt in the 20s and 30s, 17th-century Prague, Etruria before the dawn of the Roman Empire (ten points if you’ve even ever heard of Etruria), and, I’m assured by the cover, the Stone Age. Notably absent is the Celtic world, which he has fully explored in other books.

The remarkable thing is how fully he’s able to delve into every one of these settings, even if he only drops us there for the equivalent of a few minutes. Never do you get the feeling that you’re just seeing a temporary, airbrushed backdrop: every setting has texture, and depth, and detail. I recently read a review that praised his abilities as a writer on the “sentence level,” but it’s much more than that: good sentence-level writing can only partially cover up for a lack of substance in the details.

And it’s there that he excels. He always has, and he still does.

As the settings of the story change, the world kaleidoscopes around us in a finely wrought rush of landscapes, colors, weather, food, social strata, speech patterns, clothing, transportation, eating utensils, desert cooling systems, musical styles, and moods. And in all of it we get a glimpse of another story, a much larger one, across which Bright Empires is only playing: the story of humanity, and the world, and everything in it. The story we’re a part of every day, but to the details of which we only rarely pay attention.

Genre fiction can only benefit from this kind of attention to detail. May we all read and learn.

Bright Empires is a many-layered story exploring the idea of “ley travel,” a way of navigating time, space, and dimensions–with villains, of course, ready to give chase across all three, and heroes in the process of discovering more things in this world than were ever dreamt of.

The book’s Amazon page (my affiliate link) is here: The Bone House

The author’s website, including trailers for both this book and the whole series, is here: StephenLawhead.com. Stephen Lawhead is a prolific and often fascinating writer, and one of the first people to successfully write speculative fiction with a strong Christian base for a secular market. He is one of the reasons I write speculative fiction myself–his Song of Albion Trilogy and Pendragon Cycle remain among the greats of “recent” speculative literature. (I haven’t read Byzantium, considered by many to be his greatest work.) All that to say, check out his website. It’s an interesting and worthwhile stop.

And the rest of the tour, also interesting and worthwhile, is represented by these fine folks:

Noah Arsenault
Red Bissell
Thomas Clayton Booher
Beckie Burnham
Morgan L. Busse
CSFF Blog Tour
Jeff Chapman
Carol Bruce Collett
Karri Compton
D. G. D. Davidson
Theresa Dunlap
April Erwin
Victor Gentile
Tori Greene
Ryan Heart
Bruce Hennigan
Timothy Hicks
Christopher Hopper
Janeen Ippolito
Becca Johnson
Jason Joyner
Julie
Carol Keen
Krystine Kercher
Marzabeth
Katie McCurdy
Shannon McDermott
Rebecca LuElla Miller
Joan Nienhuis
Chawna Schroeder
Kathleen Smith
Donna Swanson
Robert Treskillard
Steve Trower
Fred Warren
Phyllis Wheeler
Nicole White
Rachel Wyant

But it’s in The Monster in the Hollows that this series steps up and takes its place as a true fantasy epic — still quirky, still definitely located in the world of Aerwiar and not in Middle Earth, but firmly rooted in epic soil. The Monster in the Hollows is a bigger, sadder, older, and more beautiful part of The Wingfeather Saga than we’ve seen before.

(Warning: series spoilers ahead.)

The story begins, as all good sagas do, where the previous book left off: with the Wingfeather family sailing across the Dark Sea of Darkness in search of refuge in the Green Hollows, homeland of Nia Igiby Wingfeather and the last place in all of Aerwiar that is still free. But what begins as a warm welcome for Nia and her children quickly turns sour when the transformation of Kalmar is revealed: the Hollows are still free because its people have vigilantly driven every Fang from their land, and they are not keen to welcome one into their bosom now.

A startling sacrifice from Nia convinces the Hollowsfolk to accept all of her children — but no sacrifice can buy their trust. Janner, Kalmar, and Leeli settle into their new home and school, caught between the delight of being children again, with a home far from Fangs and from fear, and the knowledge that they are outsiders here. Janner struggles to love and protect his brother even as he resents him for estranging them.

But something strange is happening in the Green Hollows. A monster lurks in the shadows, a voice calls to Janner out of eerie visions, and Kalmar, it seems, has a secret . . .

In The Monster in the Hollows, Andrew Peterson once again weaves a tale that rings as true when it’s exploring the firesides of home as it does when it’s delving into the exotic places and peoples of a beautifully rendered fantasy world. As ancient secrets are revealed, revolutions are fostered, and the forces of evil gather for attack, we find ourselves caring just as much — or perhaps more — about the love between brothers, the faith of a mother, and the success of children in school. The forces of good, after all, are not concentrated in some distant castle or far-off king, but in frail human vessels in need of family, forgiveness, and the power of hope.

As before, the story is primarily told through the eyes of twelve-year-old Janner, the oldest of the Igiby children and the Throne Warden of Anniera whether he likes it or not. Much of the saga’s attention hovers, with Janner, at the outer edge of childhood. But the more adult story which readers have been able to glimpse all along through Podo, Nia, and Artham comes into the foreground in a greater way in The Monster in the Hollows, as Nia especially takes on a more central role.

New characters are introduced — including the memorable Head Guildmadam of the Ban Rona school, Olumphia Groundwich — and subplots from previous books carried to their conclusions. (I found the further fate of Sara Cobbler to be particularly interesting, and particularly affecting.) The setting, Ban Rona of the Green Hollows, is likewise more adult: the fearsome toothy cows, bomnubbles, and snickbuzzards of Skree — terrifying as they could be — have faded into the background, replaced by the rotting, misshapen cloven of the Blackwood. Where Glipwood Township was as amusing as it was oppressed, Ban Rona is the stuff of legends. And this book, for the first time in the saga, is entirely devoid of footnotes.

All in all, The Monster in the Hollows is a wonderful read, both entertaining and deep, and an effective launching pad into the fourth and final book in the series. For that, we’ll have all just have to wait, content in the knowledge that it’s likely to be worth waiting for.

I promise that by Wednesday, I will actually write a review of The Monster in the Hollows.

Getting this far has been a journey, let me tell you. First, there have been other Wingfeather Saga tours, which I always missed. I’m not sure why, but I did. Then there were all the glowing reviews, the knowing smiles and inside jokes, the general sound of CSFF “huzzah!”ing that gave me to know I was missing a really good series. I visited the Rabbit Room website, decided to be a fan of Andrew Peterson in general, and grew sadder and sadder inside about so consistently not actually reading his books.

So, this time, when the CSFF was going to feature Andrew Peterson again and I was actually going to be able to participate, I reacted with glee. When the book arrived (a fine and bookish book if ever there was one), I trotted down to the local Christian bookstore and bought his first two books, because by jingo, starting with Book 3 in a series is not right, and I was going to do this right.

That was … last week?

I thought the Monster in the Hollows tour was for October, y’see. Obviously somebody wasn’t paying attention.

So far I have read On the Edge of the Dark Sea of Darkness and have stopped just short of the climactic ending of North! Or Be Eaten, and before I go to sleep tonight I intend to be well into the book we are actually touring. I am greatly enjoying the series (except for the gross parts; I’m not a small boy); I’m finding it funny, moving, and quite beautiful at times. It’s also scarier than I expected, but in what might be a kind of commentary on life, underlying much of the scariness is comedy, and so we are assured that this book isn’t really so scary after all, so much as it’s funny. Or else it’s really not so funny after all, so much as it’s scary … or funny. I’m not sure.

Series overview coming tomorrow; review of the Book I’m Supposed to Be Reading on Wednesday, just in time to cap off the tour. In the meantime, check out some websites and the rest of the tour!

The Book I’m Supposed to Be Reading (aka The Monster in the Hollows–published, it would appear, by the author’s own company, which is a switch from the first two books, which were published by WaterBrook. This actually makes me quite happy, for reasons of being independently published myself.)
The Wingfeather Saga (mostly a blog, with illustrations and encyclopedic bits)
The Author’s Website

Aaaand the tour links:

Gillian Adams
Red Bissell
Jennifer Bogart
Thomas Clayton Booher
Beckie Burnham
CSFF Blog Tour
D. G. D. Davidson
Cynthia Dyer
Amber French
Nikole Hahn
Ryan Heart
Timothy Hicks
Jason Joyner
Julie
Carol Keen
Shannon McDermott
Rebecca LuElla Miller
Mirriam Neal
* Eve Nielsen
Joan Nienhuis
Donita K. Paul
Sarah Sawyer
Chawna Schroeder
Tammy Shelnut
Kathleen Smith
Donna Swanson
Rachel Starr Thomson
Robert Treskillard
Fred Warren
Phyllis Wheeler
Nicole White
Rachel Wyant

“It’s too late . . . I’ve come this far, and I’m not giving up now. Beauty is leading us home.”

“You may find nothing at all. Or else a tyrant who takes away your freedom.”

“And I may find the freedom to choose what is best and go on choosing it. All the time. Free of disappointment. Like kites that fly for their master for the joy of it. Without strings.”

“It saddens me that you cannot imagine life without someone to serve.”

“It saddens me,” said Cal-Raven, “that you think joy comes any other way.”

(from The Ale Boy’s Feast by Jeffrey Overstreet)

During my recent series on The Auralia Thread over at Speculative Faith, I had the privilege of interviewing Jeffrey Overstreet. We talked about art, surprises, questions, and this final book itself. He said he’d immensely enjoyed the interview; it posted on my birthday–so that made it even more fun.

Rachel: Before we even start, let me say thank you for an extraordinary reading experience. In The Ale Boy’s Feast especially, I found myself reading a story that not only enveloped me in its world and characters, but caused me to look at my own life differently. I’ve been challenged to pay more attention to the beauty that surrounds me and think about the realities it might be pointing to—and to stay faithful to the dreams God has given me, knowing that ultimately they will lead me to Him. That might not even be exactly what you were trying to say, but I appreciate the message!

Jeffrey: Thank you so much, Rachel. I wanted to tell the best story I could, given the time and resources available to me.

I knew that my job was to pay attention to the characters, their decisions, the consequences of those decisions, and the textures of the world in which all of this took place. As for any “messages,” well… I wasn’t going to worry about that. I believe that a storyteller should focus on bringing the story to life, and messages will emerge on their own. If the storyteller stops and concerns himself with delivering messages, than the storytelling suffers and becomes heavy-handed.

So I’m delighted to hear that the story meant something to you. I learned a lot from following these characters around, and if readers learn lessons of their own, that’s an extra blessing.

Rachel: The Auralia Thread’s most obvious theme is art, and the power of art to call us beyond ourselves. But it certainly isn’t the only theme. What other themes were in your head when you began, and what themes have arisen in the writing process? Have any surprised you?

Jeffrey: It all started with the question, “Why do most people reach an age where they fold up their imaginations and put them in a closet? Why do most people decide that make-believe is just for kids?”

But later, that led to questions about what leads people to lose their curiosity about the truth, and to set up camp in a particular church denomination or a particular political party or a particular academic discipline and to toss away the lenses that might help them see the truth more fully.

I think that almost any theme I could highlight would be a theme that surprised me. I didn’t go into the story to explore themes. I went into the story because a question inspired a picture in my mind—an intriguing picture of a society that made imagination illegal. I wanted to step through that picture frame, explore that society, and get to know the broken-hearted character who was so grieved by it.

As a result, pretty much all of what transpired surprised me. I didn’t start with an agenda to fulfill or a lesson I wanted to deliver. I was curious about characters whose stories are still teaching me lessons.

Rachel: Speaking of surprises, what other aspects of the series have surprised you?

Jeffrey: Many of the relationships of the characters changed considerably over the course of the series in ways that really surprised me.

Read the rest of the interview here.

So, are you intrigued? Ready to read the series (or finish it)? I have a book to give away, and you can win it here at this blog. But you must do something, because I’m all about reciprocal giving.  In a comment, link to a review you have recently written and posted online. I will pick a commenter at random for the win. Check back here to find out if your name has been drawn!

And thanks for coming along on this tour. It’s good to be back.

He tightened his picker-staff grip, desire rotting into resentment. Most creatures of the ground had vanished from the Expanse, caught by the underground menace or fleeing its clutches. Krawg had pursued that rusty-hinge chirp, compelled by hunger and, even more, by a longing to see feathers lift a mystery into the air, to hear a song take to the sky.

So when a cry pierced the dusk and a solitary shadow winged low over the river–a stark and simple rune written on the sky’s purple scroll–he held his breath.

Beauty.

He glanced about to make sure he was alone, then smeared his tears with his sleeve. It was a bird. A bird with tousled crestfeathers and a ribbon tail gliding northward. In Krawg’ chest a pang rang like an alarm bell. He wanted to join the bird there, suspended.

“Ballyworms, Warney. What’s wrong with me?”

(from The Ale Boy’s Feast by Jeffrey Overstreet)

Quoting from my review at Speculative Faith of The Ale Boy’s Feast (all of which, including a plot synopsis of the whole series, you can read here):

I loved The Ale Boy’s Feast. As the above plot summary indicates, it should not be read apart from the rest of the series—but read within its context, it’s a challenging, moving story that is both a heart-pounding adventure and a heartbreaking song. Jeffrey Overstreet’s writing has only gotten better, as even those characters who appear only for a few scenes are depicted with the detail that makes them human. His prose has all the density and mystery of poetry, demanding that readers pay attention. Not in any way a simplistic allegory, this book nevertheless offers us a lens through which to see ourselves, our world, our stories, and our history; a lens through which to cast aside deception and embrace beauty and truth.

I find myself at a loss, really, to sum up all I experienced as I read this book. I feel that I have read many different stories and could review them all, or I could just rise on a whirlwind of words, images, impressions—of glassworks, kites and kitemakers, golden ale, underground rivers, far northern mountains, toys, wings, love, death, nightmares, tears, men, women, and children. I close the covers and savour the names, the places, the accents, the people.

I can’t really do it all justice. The best I can do is encourage you to read this book, to read all four, and savour the feast with me.

I shall post my recent interview with Jeffrey tomorrow, and give you a chance to win a copy of the book. Until then.