I have a soft spot in my heart for Garth Nix’s writing since reading Sabriel a decade ago. I was really excited to receive an digital ARC of The Left-Handed Booksellers of London and it did not disappoint!
This book gave me Stranger Things vibes because of the 80’s setting but with a dash of traditional British fantasy (think Douglas Adams) and none of the gore. Our protagonist, Susan, is an 18 year old artist who is on a quest to find her father, a man who has been out of the picture her entire life. She has little clue as to who he is with no help from family members. Susan encounters Merlin, the wizard, when he turns her “Uncle” (no relation) into dust. Merlin is on his own quest but befriends Susan only to learn that she is hunted by all sorts of creatures. Merlin is also part of a police force that helps protect the citizens of the Old and New Worlds. He has a larger than life personality and wit. You can’t help but rooting for Susan, Merlin and Vivian.
The writing in this book is light and fun with dry humor, perfect for middle grade (10-13) or fans of Terry Pratchett. I thoroughly enjoyed this book and escaping the dark headlines of today. Don’t hesitate to order a copy of your own!
I received a digital ARC in exchange for an honest review.
The Epic of Gilgamesh has sparked me into thinking about women in literature and storytelling, and how in some ways we are unusually misogynistic in the way we tell stories compared to…most of history
I’ve been reading the Foster translation of the epic, and it’s striking how…not-antagonistic the text is toward women.
For one thing, a significant portion of the characters with important roles are female. Gilgamesh and Enkidu are obviously the important ones, and Utnapishtim to a degree, but we also have Inanna, Ninsun, Shamhat, Siduri, Utnapishtim’s wife, and even Aruru, who gets credit here for being the supreme creator being.
I was surprised as well by how neutral the text is in portraying them. Shamhat, the ‘harlot’ (“sex worker” doesn’t work here, because there are some spiritual/religious connotations here as well i think?), is…just a character. She isn’t demonized, we aren’t supposed to despise her. Siduri is just a weird lady running a tavern at the end of the world all alone. Ninsun, Gilgamesh’s mother, is a source of wisdom and authority.
There are repeated occasions throughout the story where other characters seek out female characters because of their power and/or wisdom (e.g. Gilgamesh going to Ninsun for help interpreting his dreams, the gods summoning Aruru to create someone to oppose Gilgamesh). They’re also actually allowed to speak in the story.
I remember being surprised by it when I read the Iliad that we actually got to hear Briseis speak, just as I was by how much talking women do in Shakespeare.
I think I expected less because the storytelling produced by the present day world around me set the bar so low.
In the Original and Prequel trilogies of Star Wars, there are, like, at most six female characters with speaking roles that I can remember (Leia, Padme, Mon Mothma, Zam Wessell, Beru Lars, and the decoy queen in The Phantom Menace whose name I can’t remember). You probably don’t even remember some of these, because they were not important at all. It’s like if Dexter Jettster happened to be female.
That’s just the thing, though, isn’t it? Dexter Jettster is male. Chewbacca is male. Obi-Wan Kenobi, Mace Windu, Yoda and Qui-Gon Jinn are male. Sebulba, the pod-racer that explodes in Episode 1, is male, Jen Porkins is male, Greedo is male, Poggle the Lesser is male, Boss Nass is male, Salacious Crumb is male, Captain Panaka is male, even the droids are at least coded as male. There is no reason for it.
I don’t know quite enough about Marvel to compare, and honestly haven’t bothered with Marvel in a few years, but only one of the original Avengers is female, as well as only one of the original Guardians of the Galaxy, both were defined by their relationships to major male characters, and both died. The focus on the male characters is overwhelming. 
We’re used to stories that barely have any female characters in them. The Lord of the Rings has what, three? four? women? Stories that actually have similar proportions of men and women receive backlash, as Scott Lynch did when Red Seas under Red Skies had “too many” women (it was still predominantly male!) Even books that are praised as “feminist” or appear to be focused on women neglect the actual presence of women. I only read the first two Throne of Glass novels, but I can only remember two female characters in it apart from the main character, and iirc both of them die. (It’s not a 'feminist’ series at all, but I digress.)
We’re actually backsliding in some respects, if you ask me—in visual media, traditionally “unattractive” women are disappearing. Weird women are disappearing. “Strong Female Character” has become just another trope as restrictive as any of the other roles “allowed” for women. We see people looking backward at characters like Edna Mode as unusually human and well-represented when I’m not convinced that they were at the time.
And now the Epic of Gilgamesh seems unusually woman-focused and not-misogynistic. I wonder how we got here…
I’ve just started to really look at people funny when they praise books, esp YA books, for having “strong female characters.”
Like someone in my YA lit class praised Children of Blood and Bone for having women that are “allowed” to fight and be independent and have significant roles in the story, and how important the book is for including that. And I just.
Alanna: The First Adventure is 30+ years old, Dealing with Dragons is 30+ years old, Sabriel is 25+ years old, so it’s not like independent, self determining female leads were invented yesterday in YA. Graceling, the Hunger Games, and a lot of the foundational Girl That Fights YA turns fifteen years old soon. A girl that was 16 when the first of the Hunger Games trilogy came out is now 30, and in a few years may be able to give the books to her own daughter to read.
Meanwhile, over the recent 3 or so years popular YA books are dominated by plots about girls trapped in castles, bound by curses, or in arranged marriages whose stories all hinge on falling for boys.
YA romance and romance subplots have always been a thing, sure.
But I seriously feel like, idk, 10 years ago, plots where the romance was a vital element (or the primary element)fit into their own niche significantly more, and books that were primarily “fantasy” actually were, well, primarily fantasy.
Am I making this up in my head? Has anyone else noticed this? There definitely used to be YA fantasy that actually centered significantly on worldbuilding and non-romance plot instead of being primarily romance with either a court intrigue or a fairy tale retelling backdrop.
What i’m trying to highlight is the huge boom in YA books where
the female protagonist falling in love with a man
the female protagonist being betrothed or otherwise having her sexuality controlled and restricted
is a REQUIRED element of the plot (and often the magic and worldbuilding) as in the story itself hinges on it.
There’s also been a small explosion of YA books with the female MC being a “sacrifice,” being given over to something as currency/appeasement, or otherwise fulfilling a very passive, inanimate role (e.g. Poppy being the “Maiden” in From Blood and Ash or whatever the title was.) What is UP with that.
It would be ridiculous to attribute something like this to a single author, but I’m still going to say that Sarah J. Maas did not help any of this good god
YA readers are growing up with ACOTAR and TOG now, not any of the numerous “strong” heroines that were defining in the 90’s and 2000’s, which means they’re growing up with SJM’s INTENSELY gender essentialist, tradwifey A/B/O lite faeries labeled as “feminist” fantasy.
Both series have a 500+ year old faery “male” “claim” and impregnate an 18-19 year old girl, and both series sexualize the “domination” and aggression of the “males” (in the throne of glass series, the endgame love interest fucking. bites the protagonist without her consent to uhh. “claim” her.) In ACOTAR in particular the plot eventually revolves around the pregnancies of the main female characters, by their aggressive, controlling fae “male” “mates.”
I have read excerpts from later Throne of Glass books and the way female characters are described is. disgusting?? like one thing in particular that’s branded into my brain is a teenager being described as looking like she would have been “barely past her first bleed, if not for the size of her breasts” or something like that.
And the smut scenes aren’t even sexy.
The upside to this is that the YA category seems to have collapsed quite a bit overall and doesn’t enjoy anywhere near the popularity that it did even just 3 years ago.
Hopefully when it all settles we’ll have new areas of growth in the places all the readers have cleaved off to.
Just read Terciel & Elinor (by Garth Nix) and was inspired to redraw my previous Old Kingdom folks and add Terciel in! He’s hoping the rain comes down a little harder…
I’ve always absolutely loved the visual idea of the Clayr, dark skin, platinum hair and bright eyes, so this piece was long over due.
Couldnt quickly find any descriptions of Sanar and Ryelle other than their basic Clayr-ness so I just had fun with their hair, I thought the curly would be a bit different.
The charter marks in the background were something I just sketched up at the last minute but I liked the effect.
Clariel and her mask. Just a rough sketch right now. At the moment I don’t have a physical copy of the book (just an audiobook) and I need to go look and confirm some details before I can finish the lineart here.
Does the walker choose the path…or the path the walker.
Lirael and the Disreputable Dog. I just finished reading Clariel not too long ago and have since then been rereading the rest of the series.
Just a sketch right now, but I’m excited to start coloring this one. I’ve not drawn a lot of animals so I had a lot of reference for Dog. She looks very wolfish but that’s what I was going for.
Trying out some designs for Lirael from the Old Kingdom Series. While living with the Clayr Lirael wears a headscarf to cover her hair since it’s a different color. All that’s really said about the style is that she wears it in the style that some of the older Clayr wear them.
So yeah just wanted to try out some designs. I like three and four more, probably four being my ultimate favorite.
More Sabriel. This time with Moggot. Just a sketch to test drawing Sabriel again and try out Moggot. I absolutely love Moggot, he’s probably my favorite character in the series. I’m not very practiced in drawing animals so this was a go at drawing a cat.
First post. I’ve had this one around for a while but just decdied to post it up on here as well.
This is Sabriel walking into death from Garth Nix’s Sabriel. I only just read these books within the last year or so and just absolutely fell in love with them. It’s just an added bonus that Tim Curry reads the audiobooks and it’s so fantastic.
I tried to not take anything from the cover art for the books and just go off of descriptions in the book. I designed the bell bandoleer to be able to be opened from the top or the bottom and the charter marks in her hands were just random ones that I came up with.
I did sadly forgot her sword and I didn’t realise till I was about halfway through coloring her, but otherwise I’m really happy with her.
Very conceptual graphic novel images of Sabriel: Prologue I did yrs ago. Where the cold blue & white was for Abhorsen, and the flaming red for Kerrigor.
“One of the POV characters is a woman and she’s really kick ass. Plus there’s war, magic, rebellion, spies, lots of really awesome characters and a mule that thinks he’s a duck.”
Uprooted by Naomi Novik
“It’s FANTASTIC.”
The Ranger’s Apprentice by John Flanagan
“The main characters are men, but the women are kickass and actually have important functioning roles in the plot!”
We recommend:
Literally Anything by Brandon Mull (Fablehaven or the Beyonders especially)
You might feel weird picking up a 600-page-each-book series written for 5-8th graders but believe me when I say that these books are so damn phenomenal, you’ll be glad you did. Really imaginative stories. Good characters. Patton Burgess.
The Name of the Wind (of The Kingkiller Chronicle series) by Patrick Rothfuss
A more adult fantasy novel that is so unbelievably good I can’t even put it into words. Just do it.
Sabriel by Garth Nix
A classic. No explanation needed.
An Ember in the Ashes by Sabaa Tahir
We love a good two-perspective story. Bonus points for supporting an author who is a WOC!
The Young Elites by Marie Lu
This story is not without its weak moments, but A+ for a non-Medieval England setting and main characters with physical deformities. Also revenge is good.
A Court of Thorns and Roses by Sarah J Maas
Beauty and the Beast retelling. Curses, trials, fairies. If for nothing else, read for the scene where the protag gets mad at the two male characters and paints portraits of their faces on pigs’ bodies for hours.
I want to add more book recommendations, so if you have any good ones, send them our way!!!
Lirael by Garth Nix - A Summoning Goes Awry. . A couple weeks ago, @victoriaying asked what existing property we would want a chance to turn into a graphic novel, and I immediately knew my answer. Garth Nix’s Lirael in particular would be a DREAM to adapt, but the whole Abhorsen trilogy compromise some of my favorite books of all time.
It’s been ages since the last time I read the Seventh Tower series by Garth Nix, but I’d been meaning to read it again, so this weekend I sat down and blasted through all six volumes. (At around 200 middle-gradey pages each, they’re not a heavy read.) I did remember enjoying the series when I read it the first time—probably way back around when it was published between 2000–2002—but very little else. All I remembered was that I liked them enough, so they’d survived several cullings of my ridiculously large book collection until such time as I could reread them and rejudge.
Having finally done just that, I am happy to report that the series is definitely an enjoyable read, although I probably won’t be holding onto them for another round a decade into the future. I was impressed to see that The Seventh Tower uses magic and worldbuilding in a fascinating way that allows for a deconstruction of privilege that feels organic to the story, while providing us with a strong female touchpoint character as well. Although, given that it was Garth Nix writing, I probablyshouldn’thavebeensurprised.
