![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
brigdhThe Word for World is Forest by Ursula K LeGuin. One of LeGuin's better-known stories – at least I think it is; it certainly had the feeling of a story you've seen referenced many times before. Humanity has discovered an unspoiled forest world and (shocking twist here) immediately begun to commercially exploit it. The native inhabitants are a species of small primates with green fur that the humans use as cheap animal labor. Slowly some of the humans begin to realize the Athsheans are as sentient as themselves, but any attempt at equality or compassion comes too late, after the formerly peaceful Athsheans have begun to band together in armed revolt. Nor are all the humans as equally interested in giving up their privilege.
You've read this story a hundred times before, seen it in every movie from Avatar to Disney's Pocahontas to Dances with Wolves. LeGuin's version gains its force from its shortness – sometimes one says more with less – its unflinching portrayal of violence, and its focus on the Athsheans. Too often in these stories the central point is how thewhites humans are enlightened by contact with the aliens; here, LeGuin spends more time depicting how Athshean culture struggles to adapt to the arrival of humans, and how that adaptation will have long-lasting, fundamental consequences to them and their descendants. The writing is very much of its time (The Word for World is Forest was first published in 1972) and the main villain, Captain Davidson, is every cliche of a deranged Vietnam soldier. And yet, as familiar as the main subject matter is, as old as it seems at times, this is a novella well worth reading. Its sharp insights are as new as ever.
Hamilton's Battalion by Rose Lerner, Courtney Milan, and Alyssa Cole. An anthology of three romance novellas, all tied together by the conceit that each has a character who was part of the battalion led by Alexander Hamilton during the storming of Yorktown at the end of the American Revolution. Three of my favorite authors of historical romance in one book! Each story also focuses on bringing out the diversity of American history, which I seem to recall industry buzz back before the book came out that this gave them difficulty in finding a publisher, forcing it to be self-published, but I can't google any confirmation of that, so perhaps it's just misremembered gossip. (Hamilton's Battalion is self-published, but Milan at least has expressed an economic preference for doing so; the publisher therefore doesn't really confirm anything one way or the other.)
"Promised Land" by Rose Lerner stars Rachel Jacobs, a woman disguised as a man in order to join the American army and turn herself into Corporal Ezra Jacobs. She's done an excellent job throughout most of the war, driven by her belief that Jewish soldiers can earn a place for Jewish citizens in the new country of the United States, when she recognizes a man walking through her regiment's camp one day. Problem one: she knows him, which means he might recognize her and give away her secret. Problem Two: he was always a Loyalist, so he's certainly a British spy. Problem Three: he used to be Rachel's husband, and is just now finding out that she's not really dead, but faked her death in order to join the army.
Lerner does an excellent job in illustrating the problems between Rachel and Nathan that caused their marriage to fall apart, and an equally excellent job of making me believe they could fall in love a second time and actually make it work this go-round. I also liked the struggle between Rachel and Nathan's ways of being Jewish - how important is keeping kosher? celebrating holidays? following the rules? "Promised Land" is an amazing story, and I can't recommend it highly enough. (It's also the only one of the three novellas in which Hamilton himself features at all, and even here he has quite a minor part to play.)
"The Pursuit of..." by Courtney Milan is the story of Corporal John Hunter, former enslaved man currently fighting for the Americans, and Henry Latham, British officer and son of aristocrats, who impulsively fakes his own death during the siege of Yorktown in order to follow John as he walks several hundred miles back to Rhode Island to check on his family.
It's essentially a road-trip novella, and I do love a good road-trip. Milan is also very, very good at writing banter, and the conversations between sober, practical John and flighty, loquacious Henry are consistently hilarious. Especially the running joke about bad cheese. Milan convincingly shows how two men from such very different backgrounds could come to trust one another. My only complaint is that I think the novella would have benefited from being longer; the ending felt a bit rushed, if only because Milan does such a good job at illustrating the potential problems in this relationship that the characters seemed to overcome them too easily. But I point this out not at all to dissuade anyone from reading it; I absolutely adored it.
(I have no reason to believe Milan is familiar with the Benjamin January novels, but if you wanted to read "The Pursuit of..." as a 50-years-earlier AU of Ben/Hannibal, well... you could do that. Easily.)
"That Could Be Enough" by Alyssa Cole is set later than the previous two novellas, in 1820 Harlem as Eliza Hamilton tries to gather papers and witness accounts to preserve the memory of her now-deceased husband, Alexander. Mercy, a young black woman and former orphan, is her secretary in that task. Mercy has fallen in love before, and had her heart badly broken when the woman scorned her in order to marry a man. She has therefore sworn to let no emotion enter her life, nor to write the poetry she once loved. This determination melts shortly after her first meeting with Andromeda Stiel (granddaughter of one of Hamilton's soldiers), a black dressmaker who dreams of opening her own boarding house. Prim Mercy and exuberant Andromeda have some difficulties and misunderstandings to overcome before they can find happiness, but it all works out in the end.
Hamilton's Battalion consists of three excellent novellas, which would serve well as an introduction to these authors or for devoted fans like me. I can't recommend it enough.
I read this as an ARC via NetGalley.
You've read this story a hundred times before, seen it in every movie from Avatar to Disney's Pocahontas to Dances with Wolves. LeGuin's version gains its force from its shortness – sometimes one says more with less – its unflinching portrayal of violence, and its focus on the Athsheans. Too often in these stories the central point is how the
Hamilton's Battalion by Rose Lerner, Courtney Milan, and Alyssa Cole. An anthology of three romance novellas, all tied together by the conceit that each has a character who was part of the battalion led by Alexander Hamilton during the storming of Yorktown at the end of the American Revolution. Three of my favorite authors of historical romance in one book! Each story also focuses on bringing out the diversity of American history, which I seem to recall industry buzz back before the book came out that this gave them difficulty in finding a publisher, forcing it to be self-published, but I can't google any confirmation of that, so perhaps it's just misremembered gossip. (Hamilton's Battalion is self-published, but Milan at least has expressed an economic preference for doing so; the publisher therefore doesn't really confirm anything one way or the other.)
"Promised Land" by Rose Lerner stars Rachel Jacobs, a woman disguised as a man in order to join the American army and turn herself into Corporal Ezra Jacobs. She's done an excellent job throughout most of the war, driven by her belief that Jewish soldiers can earn a place for Jewish citizens in the new country of the United States, when she recognizes a man walking through her regiment's camp one day. Problem one: she knows him, which means he might recognize her and give away her secret. Problem Two: he was always a Loyalist, so he's certainly a British spy. Problem Three: he used to be Rachel's husband, and is just now finding out that she's not really dead, but faked her death in order to join the army.
Lerner does an excellent job in illustrating the problems between Rachel and Nathan that caused their marriage to fall apart, and an equally excellent job of making me believe they could fall in love a second time and actually make it work this go-round. I also liked the struggle between Rachel and Nathan's ways of being Jewish - how important is keeping kosher? celebrating holidays? following the rules? "Promised Land" is an amazing story, and I can't recommend it highly enough. (It's also the only one of the three novellas in which Hamilton himself features at all, and even here he has quite a minor part to play.)
"The Pursuit of..." by Courtney Milan is the story of Corporal John Hunter, former enslaved man currently fighting for the Americans, and Henry Latham, British officer and son of aristocrats, who impulsively fakes his own death during the siege of Yorktown in order to follow John as he walks several hundred miles back to Rhode Island to check on his family.
It's essentially a road-trip novella, and I do love a good road-trip. Milan is also very, very good at writing banter, and the conversations between sober, practical John and flighty, loquacious Henry are consistently hilarious. Especially the running joke about bad cheese. Milan convincingly shows how two men from such very different backgrounds could come to trust one another. My only complaint is that I think the novella would have benefited from being longer; the ending felt a bit rushed, if only because Milan does such a good job at illustrating the potential problems in this relationship that the characters seemed to overcome them too easily. But I point this out not at all to dissuade anyone from reading it; I absolutely adored it.
(I have no reason to believe Milan is familiar with the Benjamin January novels, but if you wanted to read "The Pursuit of..." as a 50-years-earlier AU of Ben/Hannibal, well... you could do that. Easily.)
"That Could Be Enough" by Alyssa Cole is set later than the previous two novellas, in 1820 Harlem as Eliza Hamilton tries to gather papers and witness accounts to preserve the memory of her now-deceased husband, Alexander. Mercy, a young black woman and former orphan, is her secretary in that task. Mercy has fallen in love before, and had her heart badly broken when the woman scorned her in order to marry a man. She has therefore sworn to let no emotion enter her life, nor to write the poetry she once loved. This determination melts shortly after her first meeting with Andromeda Stiel (granddaughter of one of Hamilton's soldiers), a black dressmaker who dreams of opening her own boarding house. Prim Mercy and exuberant Andromeda have some difficulties and misunderstandings to overcome before they can find happiness, but it all works out in the end.
Hamilton's Battalion consists of three excellent novellas, which would serve well as an introduction to these authors or for devoted fans like me. I can't recommend it enough.
I read this as an ARC via NetGalley.
