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beccaelizabethI'm reading "The King's Buccaneer" by Raymond E Feist (I think is spelled that way, is in the other room and I'm lazy)
I'm vastly unimpressed with the series thus far. I'm only reading this one because I grabbed a book on the way out the door to go to the hairdresser the other day.
There's a character who was born with a deformed foot.
So they've spent the first chunk of book talking about how he's all upset and defensive about it but really he can cope perfectly well, in fact is the best swordsman and horseman and all the other things, and really he just lacks confidence. You know, the MarySue flaw set.
So this isn't a disability as such, it's just a cosmetic difference they've made a huge big deal about.
There was something mentioned earlier in the book that I just decided to ignore, when the Big Powerful Magician tells the boy that his foot wasn't healed by magic because secretly the boy wanted it to be that way.
But now we get to a big scene where the boy goes and heals himself.
Because, you see, it isn't that something has happened to his foot in an entirely random and neutral way. It was a lesson. Possibly from the gods. And now he has learned stuff he gets to go and undo it.
Because - and this makes me want to throw the book across the room - the real reason he wants to be deformed like that is so he has an excuse for failing.
... yes, because disability is such a *handy* thing that way.
And it manages to get worse. He goes into a dream state and has visions of his mother hugging him, and this is a Bad Thing because really her coddling has been holding him back, and to successfuly break free and make himself well (because he's the only one that can make himself well; subtext: why hasn't he made himself well yet? Well his mother was babying him, so) he has to kill her. Symbolic, of course, in a vision, with a knife. But he makes this big inner transition from protected child to adult by killing his mother.
And then hacking his own foot off. In the vision.
Because that's the way to get rid of the flaw in his body.
And the thing that gets me - the clincher, it's all pretty messed up - is that there's no *need* for it. He hasn't found a task that would require his foot be healed. He has instead discovered that actually it looks pretty distinctive. Yes, he's gone through this horrible painful experience that puts all the blame on him except for his mother's portion because he's suddenly supposed to look normal.
He's getting rid of his deformity so he can look like everyone else.
It's not just me, right? This is pretty fucked up? I mean it start with a super-competent-despite-disability portrayal ignoring all accuracy then makes a disability into a moral issue, the boy's own fault, his mother's fault, a moral weakness, and bad primarily because it represents difference, all at the same time.
That's just a *mess*.
The book has not gone flying yet primarily because I have spent far too much time in libraries to be able to do that from a standing start.
I'm just *vastly* disinclined to bother reading another page of the thing.
Especially since the other reason the boy wants to do all that is so he can go chasing the kidnapped girl of his dreams. The useless one who got all stripped naked and taken for a slave in an earlier chapter. There was lots of pawing. And nothing from the girls' pov.
I kind of want to say that there's nothing from a disabled person's point of view in this book either. I mean there's a pov character who allegedly has a disability, but it's so glossed over it's a nothing-much. It repeatedly says how 'like most people with a lifelong affliction' he has compensated to the point it doesn't slow him down at all, and then it makes him all prickly and oversensitive about it without actually making anybody say bad things about it which just makes it all his thing and not even a reaction at all. So it's basically written like it's a confidence flaw. The only time it slows him down is when he gets his foot stomped playing football, and really, that happens to everyone. So it's just stupid.
I want to write better stories. With proper people in them. Not cardboard cutouts who buy off all their Disadvantages with XP.
I'm vastly unimpressed with the series thus far. I'm only reading this one because I grabbed a book on the way out the door to go to the hairdresser the other day.
There's a character who was born with a deformed foot.
So they've spent the first chunk of book talking about how he's all upset and defensive about it but really he can cope perfectly well, in fact is the best swordsman and horseman and all the other things, and really he just lacks confidence. You know, the MarySue flaw set.
So this isn't a disability as such, it's just a cosmetic difference they've made a huge big deal about.
There was something mentioned earlier in the book that I just decided to ignore, when the Big Powerful Magician tells the boy that his foot wasn't healed by magic because secretly the boy wanted it to be that way.
But now we get to a big scene where the boy goes and heals himself.
Because, you see, it isn't that something has happened to his foot in an entirely random and neutral way. It was a lesson. Possibly from the gods. And now he has learned stuff he gets to go and undo it.
Because - and this makes me want to throw the book across the room - the real reason he wants to be deformed like that is so he has an excuse for failing.
... yes, because disability is such a *handy* thing that way.
And it manages to get worse. He goes into a dream state and has visions of his mother hugging him, and this is a Bad Thing because really her coddling has been holding him back, and to successfuly break free and make himself well (because he's the only one that can make himself well; subtext: why hasn't he made himself well yet? Well his mother was babying him, so) he has to kill her. Symbolic, of course, in a vision, with a knife. But he makes this big inner transition from protected child to adult by killing his mother.
And then hacking his own foot off. In the vision.
Because that's the way to get rid of the flaw in his body.
And the thing that gets me - the clincher, it's all pretty messed up - is that there's no *need* for it. He hasn't found a task that would require his foot be healed. He has instead discovered that actually it looks pretty distinctive. Yes, he's gone through this horrible painful experience that puts all the blame on him except for his mother's portion because he's suddenly supposed to look normal.
He's getting rid of his deformity so he can look like everyone else.
It's not just me, right? This is pretty fucked up? I mean it start with a super-competent-despite-disability portrayal ignoring all accuracy then makes a disability into a moral issue, the boy's own fault, his mother's fault, a moral weakness, and bad primarily because it represents difference, all at the same time.
That's just a *mess*.
The book has not gone flying yet primarily because I have spent far too much time in libraries to be able to do that from a standing start.
I'm just *vastly* disinclined to bother reading another page of the thing.
Especially since the other reason the boy wants to do all that is so he can go chasing the kidnapped girl of his dreams. The useless one who got all stripped naked and taken for a slave in an earlier chapter. There was lots of pawing. And nothing from the girls' pov.
I kind of want to say that there's nothing from a disabled person's point of view in this book either. I mean there's a pov character who allegedly has a disability, but it's so glossed over it's a nothing-much. It repeatedly says how 'like most people with a lifelong affliction' he has compensated to the point it doesn't slow him down at all, and then it makes him all prickly and oversensitive about it without actually making anybody say bad things about it which just makes it all his thing and not even a reaction at all. So it's basically written like it's a confidence flaw. The only time it slows him down is when he gets his foot stomped playing football, and really, that happens to everyone. So it's just stupid.
I want to write better stories. With proper people in them. Not cardboard cutouts who buy off all their Disadvantages with XP.
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no subject
Date: 2007-05-22 07:11 am (UTC)(Not.)
no subject
Date: 2007-05-22 11:51 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-05-22 08:10 pm (UTC)That isn't a disability, it's a lame plot device. Yeesh. The rest of it sounds like a boy-toy book, of the sort so bad that even the SU won't read it.
Furthermore, if the book is that bad, there is no shame in getting rid of it. Read the ending if you must, and then donate it someplace. Share the pain.
I know you can write better stories than that because I've read one.
no subject
Date: 2007-05-22 08:34 pm (UTC)Which is something about confidence and fear of failure and, as far as I can tell, learning to kill without feeling bad about it.
because obviously chronic pain is all in the mind, and a learning experience.
*feels ill*
The books are a series, and I gave up buying them a couple of books after this one. Actually I think the next couple of books were book club freebies so I gave up buying them with this one. The only good thing you can say about them is they're consistent. You know exactly the shape of the plot before you start one.
I has already a box of books waiting for me to send them somewhere. So far I've only managed to part with three. Although to be fair some of them are still here because I would feel bad letting someone else fall for it. There's one book on magic that iirc manages to be extensively plagiarised and yet very very wrong.
also, :-) about my fic. I try. slowly.