Quote:
Originally Posted by Elsi
I couldn't finish Kushiel's Dart, and it wasn't really the BDSM stuff that was offputting so much as the fact that the entire universe conspired to beat up on poor Phèdre. My emotional reaction was much like when I read Lord Foul's Bane. I just couldn't like the main character.
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I understand the problem. I read the Chronicles of Thomas Covenant way back, and liked it, I think, because it
wasn't Yet Another Tolkien Clone. I didn't find Covenant as annoying as many have, but I didn't find the second series based on him as appealing as the first, and I've felt no urge to
re-read either.
In general, I don't have a problem with violence, politics, or sex in books per se. I have a problem when any of them are gratuitous, or when the book becomes a forum to push a viewpoint. (Later H. G. Wells titles tended to suffer from this, as his Fabian Socialist leanings took front and center.)
The world in which things are set can also present issues. For example, I enjoy David Drake's RCN series featuring Daniel Leary and Signals Officer Adele Mundy, but I
don't much like the Republic of Cinnabar. The capital, Xenos, is a snake-pit of feuding houses, and it's just as well for Daniel he spends most of his time elsewhere. Daniel is a good guy, but the cause he fights for is "good" only relative to the Alliance of Free Stars, and not a place I'd want to live.
Sympathetic main characters are an interesting problem. I don't have to
like the main characters to enjoy the books, but I
do have to
understand them. For instance, I've read books where the villains are sympathetic: decent, honorable folks, doing their duty for a cause they believe in, who just happen to be working for the wrong side.
And believable villains are a whole other issue. I've read otherwise enjoyable works that failed because I
couldn't believe the villains. They were crudely drawn, with no indication of what formed and motivated them. I always liked Robert A. Heinlein's dictum "No man is a villain in his own eyes". Keep that in mind, and make me understand what the villain wants and why, and how they came to be that way, and you'll have a lot better chance of holding my interest.
(Speaking of which, how many fantasy titles,
starting with Tolkien, have a Great Enemy who is essentially a spoiled deity throwing a cosmic tantrum because he can't have his way? I love Tolkien with a passion, but Melkor/Morgoth's motives are envy and spite because he can't make his own music and do his own creation.)
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Dennis