(Chanson de Guerre Book 1)
Published April 28, 2021
Written by Christopher Fly
Provided by the author for review
By the Gods's Ears first book in The War Song series is a great first published book for Christopher Fly. I say that to begin with because I think it ascends far higher into the appreciation of the reader than most first books. Currently the state of publishing and publishers is such that many authors without skills but determined will can self publish rather easily. There are other would be authors who have great skills and honed talents, that in the past might have been lost in the competitive battle field of publishers, but in the present are able to find their way to market. So in the present many works find a way to the reader, but not all are worthy of the journey. This book reads like it is written by a long time veteran, and from one who is skilled and talented in ways that deserve to be read. As a Christian I wear a ring bearing the Cross of St Lorraine, as well, I am deeply moved by the story of Joan of Arc. As a historian, of numerous areas of history, the Hundred Years war is an event of great interest to me. So it should not surprise anyone that where this book takes place and when, finds a motivated reader in me. Rarely is such a work randomly sent that would arrive so welcomed. I also speak some French, so culturally, this work has a feel that is from the first, likely to succeed. That isn't an accident, by the way. When an author writes something that succeeds it is almost always due to research, creative intent, and due to quality of creative ability.
The story takes place in a mythic form of France, of the period just prior to the Hundred Years War between England and France, in the 12th to 13th Centuries. The lives of common people, nobles and lords, and those who work the land, are well illuminated in this book. A couple who live and work the land, farmers and parents, are brought into a situation that threatens their happy lives, that threatens the future of their daughter, and reveals how lives, however common, often hide both mysteries and secrets, and threats challenge the stability and hope found in family. Prince Henri of the kingdom of Darloque has a desire. He longs to be wed to the daughter of farmers Gilles and Murielle, named Emmeline. The response of the parents isn't seen in a kind of reactions of shouting over their bliss and Glory to God our place in the kindgom is secure. It is quite different. They first want to have their daughter flee and go into hiding. Then they realize, maybe their only hope is found in the old King.
However, more is truly at stake than a forced marriage, or the simple quest of the prince to become married. Yes, Prince Henri has desires, of course some being desires of the flesh. But, he has a far more dangerous desire, to destroy his enemies in a war. This particular war is one that had already ended and the issues between the former combatants seemed resolved. But Henri has his own view of what needs to be done, and his people as those of the enemy will all suffer if the war occurs. This would already seem enough to fuel a wild ride and story. But Murielle has a past and knows secrets that will radically change her own personal relationships and the situations she enters. And beyond Murielle's secret, there are Gods and powerful people who stand to benefit or lose in the wars, and confrontations. But who can challenge the power of a God, or Gods?
One aspect of this that promises to pay off more in the future, is the deft ability of the writer to imply and demonstrate the dangers that await. There are armies and conflicts both to happen and resolve, but rather than a Tolkienesque five armies battle, the military aspect of this work is realistic, daunting, and tells the reader much more and more painful events bode ill to the future. Clearly for me, not just for a first book but for books in fantasy in general, this author has a knowledge of human wars, fought in medieval times, and he is able to display that knowledge well. Finally of note, I have people all the time asking me what genre a book I recommend is from. And while fantasy or military fantasy would be a quick and easy label, the realms and characters presented in this work feel real. So the verisimilitude achieved is well done.
NEWS FROM THE SLEEPLESS FOOL
As usual, I've been crushed by various issues in this life. I have now been dealing with endless rather severe pain. I have no sleep. I have more surgeries on the horizon. Part of the pain has been directly physical, as I've learned my shoulders and neck are so messed up that even surgery just touches upon the problems. The residual issues from dealing with pain has left me sleepless for so many days on end, I'll begin to get no comprehension when reading, confused when writing, and getting lost while driving. Sleep is an amazing tool in your healing journey, unless you don't sleep and I've been averaging 3 hours a night still, we thought surgery would end the madness, and it just keeps going on, and on.
I was invited to be a guest at renaissance or similar themed show upon the beautiful and delightful American South. It would include a free table but no travel money and no hotel coverage. So that is a dead on no, I make precious little money, and travel and lodging are expensive. And recently I've learned that the show I was associated with in Minnesota now charges a fee to table as a creative. Since the fee is more than I would make selling, that is a no as well. In each case the price for me would mean I am paying to attend a convention and I'll have more money in my pocket if I do not go, than if I do. Now, I DO realize that money is precious, and especially after the pandemic, the riots and the general malaise due to the events of our world. But I haven't the money to pay for the privilege of not selling something.
As a result of the conventions no longer working for me, as well as world issues, I will be selling more from home, apparently. So, if you are interested in any of my books, poetry, prose or comics, write me at AlexanderNess63@Gmail.Com and have a subject line of sales offers and books. I have a list of all of my credited published works at this link. Perhaps don't assume all books are print, but many are. I only send to US addresses, due to past issues with Canada post and the horrific costs of mailing to the EU and the UK, or elsewhere.
If I can't sleep and dream I can at least write about doing them. However, oddly perhaps, while I liked the comics shown, they had a huge advantage in story telling over the novels shown, because art elevates words when done well. And yet, as you will see, the comics were good, but not so memorable, while the books considered with generally all great for the writing, if not always for the concepts or how it all played out.
In the 20 years I've been online writing, I've mentioned to people comics that are based upon dreams as inspirations. I've been asked what the better ones are or if they are back issues which ones have been the best. I do confess, however much I like various writer's works, the subject isn't really what moves me to buy a comic. Sandman, Sandman Dream Hunters and The Dreaming are related in terms of the setting, characters and events. I do still read Sandman related books, I think the art for The Dream Hunters is unbelievably good, and the Dreaming is a solid work. But they don't rank in my favorites. A Nightmare on Elm Street as adapted by Chuck Dixon is a quality comic for the art, as well as story. But I pursue A Nightmare on Elm Street movies and comics even less than most other subject matters or concepts. Rick Veitch released a number of books related to dream stories and were quite good for what they were. The concept of doing stories based upon dreams is one that is open for deeper digging I think. Veitch did a few collections, I think, of the series. If the comic book Narcolepsy Dreams didn't really feature dreams, it was more about surreal life experiences and deeply personal short seemingly biographical stories. The dream in the title refers to how we pursue a dream of sorts when we write the story of our life.
If I seem to be less enthused about the comics presented, I can say the books featuring dreams are mostly magnificent. It is possible with prose to write well without entertaining, and the reverse is true as well.
The Compleat Crow by Brian Lumley features a epic hero, fighting or facing enormous evil and violent creatures of the realms of HP Lovecraft's Cthulhu mythos. Titus Crow is brave, perhaps naively, and doesn't flee when he should, and this character trait makes for some wonderful scenes. It is in the chapter Elysia where Crow meets up with characters from his stories in Dreamlands (as created by HP Lovecraft) and they fight evil dark forces together. It is rather brilliant.
Whispers in the Ear of a Dreaming Ape isn't directly about dreams, but I'd argue that there is nightmare to be found. The work by Joshua Chaplinsky is dark, weird, and filled with surreal concepts to blow your mind to bits. It is truly powerful and it is successful despite being a collection of short stories and in the genre of weird fiction, which I think often causes readers to see the work with less respect than deserved.
Agents of Dreamland Caitlin R. Kiernan (who also wrote the above mentioned The Dreaming) is for the sort of people who demand to read new, refusing to read tropes, and constructs a number of mini novellas to in the end form a whole work. The idea of it all has spies and dark happenings, government agents and secret societies, and horror. It was really quite good, if it also seemed somewhat less complete by the end. If there are further volumes I would like to read them.
Wanderers by Chuck Wendig features a sleepwalking sickness or plague that begins to affect the world's population. And then when you think you are reading a horror story something like apocalypse raises its head. It isn't a great book, but I think the writing is good enough to recommend it. My issues about it were that the concepts and characters were really well done, but the author chose to interrupt his story with lessons from the heart of a politically concerned person. I'll leave that description and let you assume, I don't think the book is bad, just, well, when you are reading a story and it feels more like a lecture, you might not agree with the author, and you might lose track of the story.
As mentioned when discussing Brian Lumley's awesome work, HP Lovecraft created a different kind of setting, the Dreamlands, where humans live when they are not awake. It is rather a brilliant concept because it changes the feel of most of Lovecraft, which is dark, mirky, insane into something even hopeful, heroic and thoughtful. I've read and enjoyed a ton of Lovecraft's Dreamlands (and other works) and adding it here raises the level of quality quite high.
Lastly is a work by HG Wells that I very much enjoyed. The Sleeper Awakes was also titled in revision, When the Sleeper Wakes. In this story a fellow named Graham in 1897 takes drugs to deal with raging insomnia, and the drugs work, he wakes up 200 some years later. The people of the day can't see how the rulers control the workers, and the title refers not to the process of sleeping, but an allegorical aim, where the people of the day are sleeping and needing to be awakened to their destiny. It does have aspects of social values lecturing, but HG Wells could do that, he was talking about the reasons for his morality tale, and it works.
A BRIGHT MAN'S WORDS THAT GIVE ME FOOD FOR THOUGHT
I think that I've read all or most of Friedrich Nietzsche's works. It features an unusually artistic story telling style and a sharing of a core of ideas about social and cultural purity. His ideas are accompanied by a narrative voice, and are not didactic. Together his use of style and his dramatically spoken ideas, may lead, sometimes, to the uninitiated or surface level understanding only reader to assume that the intent of the author/speaker, is telling either a known fact or a fictional story. To some his style and deeper concepts make the works formless and void. Ultimately Nietzsche's work became a philosophy backing for ideas and beliefs like Nihilism, or even a bastardization of Solipsism, and yet his work is not in actuality ripe for such selective use. Nietzsche would weave an ideal that was both ignored and derided as much as has been perceived as dangerous to consider due to the consequences of false application. It is, honestly, a philosophical idea that I think does come with errors in his expressed idea.
In my reading of his collective works, I arrived at the view that he did
not suggest if God was dead it was a good thing, as those who
bastardize his views suggest. In the society's emptiness of universal
beliefs or acceptance of God, God has effectively died, rather than
truly died, if he ever lived. That is, Nietzsche's views aren't about
God at all, but the role of God in common people's lives. He called for a
need for human intellectual and moral development. In his mind that
death of God would require the appearance of a higher race of man.
Nietzsche's arguments were therefore simple, if God was dead society had
to initiate the ascent of a new higher man, the so called Übermensch. This
concept is almost as predictive as it is explanatory of human need for a
universal adaptation of reason. Some readers and philosophers have
tried to link Nietzsche to Anti Semitic views. And one could see why
some argue that he was a racist, in his works Nietzsche utilized a
concept that Jews as immigrants or really, any people joining a nation
following conquest, did not enter the cultural mix, as might have been
the case in the past. Jews then were a proof that if a culture does not
have a central agreed upon GOD or ideal, there would be no cultural
assimilation. If one group agreed upon a Christian god, Jews another
god, and pagans other gods, the ideal of one cultural ideal of society
falls short.
I've known people who fear the ideas of Nietzsche,
but I think the thing that they fear instead is the idea of who they
perceive Nietzsche is. I've no doubt many who read him don't dive deep,
and even fewer try to figure out his ultimate point, I think even many
bright people refuse to consider the arguments he made. A political
science professor once asked me why I didn't agree with his lecture
point, which the point was that weak minds like the works or ideas of
Nietzsche, and dictatorships rely upon that sort of thinking. He was
stunned to hear me say, I don't think that is the case, I think the case
is rather the opposite. Weak minds never truly understood him, and even
well trained thinkers could mistake his ideas. The leaders and those
following said leaders actually did not understand what he said. By his
call for a society to aspire to create a new human mindset, one that
uses rational arguments versus emotional ones, Nietzsche was
misinterpreted by many, and the only ones getting his core ideas were
the bright readers, thinkers, listeners.
Nietzsche as a human was
flawed, and his work has been too easily adapted by others without
keeping the central concepts, he remains a thinker with influence and
some value. A sad point in the life of Nietzsche was his losing his
mind towards the end of his life, and his racist sister changed his
words and sent out booklets and letters suggesting that Nietzsche was in
fact the racist others had accused him of being. But the sister was
found out, eventually. Sadly, the sister was shown to have lied, but
not before a lot of false ideas attached to him were floating about,
polluting the entire field of future debate.
GETTING ME TO REVIEW YOU
First off, I can be found on Facebook, Twitter or through email at Alexanderness63@gmail.com.
I accept hard copies, so when you inquire at any of these places, I'll
follow through by telling you my street address. I no longer have a post
box, although I regret that. It was a crushing defeat to no longer
have a p.o. box, when I came to realize I was getting so little product
it made no sense to pay for the privilege to not receive mail at both my
home and at the post office. If you send hard copies for review I will
always review them, but if you prefer to send pdf or ebooks to my email,
I will review these at my discretion. I don't share my pdf/ebooks, so
you can avoid worry that I'd dispense them for free to others.
My Poetry Blog AlexNessPoetry.Blogspot.Com
My Amazon Page Amazon.com/author/AlexNess
Lovecraft Styled Horror CthulhuDarkness.Blogspot.Com
Atlantis and other Lost Worlds AlexNessLostWorlds.Blogspot.Com
I have an email list for my poetry blog, AlexNessPoetry.Blogspot.Com If you are interested please send me an email asking to join the list. I have 3 new poems appearing daily. When or if I have new books, the first people to know will be on the list, and I offer deals there for new products. Send an email toAlexanderness63@gmail.com to join the list. I promise never to sell the list or share it.
No comments:
Post a Comment