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hbdee 's review for:
The Undertaking of Hart and Mercy
by Megan Bannen
One is charmed by a book but, then, the very next one, by a wholly different kind of author, turns out to be an unequivocal masterpiece from its first pages. You find yourself wondering why you give out so many 4 star reviews when occasionally a novel deserves 10 stars. This is NOT the second book worthy of 10. (Beartown is, written by Fredrik Backman of A Man called Ove fame.)
So. Criticism first. Megan Bannen has written a hate-to-love romcom novel attempting also to be embedded in horror-fantasy. She renames the days of the week awkwardly, with the likes of Wardensday, Sorrowsday, and AllGodsday, in an indecipherable sequence known only to her; she actually expends several pages detailing ad nauseam the complete religion of her fantasy locale, which nevertheless remains equally indecipherable. There are vampire-like creatures siphoning the bodies of the living in an area apparently imprisoning the old gods in a mist, where criminals are using illegal portals to gain access. Well and good, as far as it goes. But there are virtually no physical descriptions of any location; compare that to the novels of Olivia Atwater, books of a similar kind, whose vivid descriptions of place allow us to visit as though we might one day live there. In this novel, by contrast, equimares, transportation akin to horses, are initially described only as having purple hides; we only discover, very late, that they may be waterborne. The lack of descriptors achieves ridiculousness when she renames trucks as "ducks." They use gas, they have tires--they're not ducks in any sense, so--why? This mystery is never addressed.
Then she throws in the nimkilim, formerly messengers of the gods, now relegated to delivering human mail. These are wonderful characters in the form of an owl, a rabbit--even, briefly, a stork. They seem to be in the wrong book.
Much else is otherwise so completely, normally familiar that the weirdness of place truly gets lost. The characters drink shiraz and merlot. The female protagonist can't escape her underwire bras and the way they make sweat chafe in delicate places. ("her perspiration-soaked shirt clung to her back, and her boob sweat made the underwires of her bra chafe her skin"); the rest of her underwear is just the same as ours. We recognize all the foods they eat, right down to cream puffs and scones. We're so familiar with OUR normal, taken for granted in this novel--and the author has so failed to imagine the novel's locations--that we're left with nothing on which to hang the pretense of fantasy.
The love story is also very familiar: they despise each other for half the book and then suddenly, as in so many books of this sort, they're head over heels. However! Here, the author excels. She has created two highly compelling, very lovable characters, even if they are solidly predictable. I fell in love with both of them, together and separately. Mercy is a smart, competent businesswoman who can heft a body all by herself, and she's sassy, perhaps relentlessly so. Hart is rough and rugged and, yet, the most unprepossessing man in relation with the opposite sex. He expects no return when he is apologetic. And he completely understands, and insists upon, the proper use of "whom." He reads voraciously! (Gods, where are men like THAT, in real life?
If the reader embraces Coleridge's "willing suspension of disbelief," they can become fully immersed in the love story. I cried buckets (ok, so my husband died recently, I'm excused.)
Finally, deus ex machina delivers a grand HEA finale! Who doesn't love a good deus ex machina. 4 stars. On to finish Beartown.
So. Criticism first. Megan Bannen has written a hate-to-love romcom novel attempting also to be embedded in horror-fantasy. She renames the days of the week awkwardly, with the likes of Wardensday, Sorrowsday, and AllGodsday, in an indecipherable sequence known only to her; she actually expends several pages detailing ad nauseam the complete religion of her fantasy locale, which nevertheless remains equally indecipherable. There are vampire-like creatures siphoning the bodies of the living in an area apparently imprisoning the old gods in a mist, where criminals are using illegal portals to gain access. Well and good, as far as it goes. But there are virtually no physical descriptions of any location; compare that to the novels of Olivia Atwater, books of a similar kind, whose vivid descriptions of place allow us to visit as though we might one day live there. In this novel, by contrast, equimares, transportation akin to horses, are initially described only as having purple hides; we only discover, very late, that they may be waterborne. The lack of descriptors achieves ridiculousness when she renames trucks as "ducks." They use gas, they have tires--they're not ducks in any sense, so--why? This mystery is never addressed.
Then she throws in the nimkilim, formerly messengers of the gods, now relegated to delivering human mail. These are wonderful characters in the form of an owl, a rabbit--even, briefly, a stork. They seem to be in the wrong book.
Much else is otherwise so completely, normally familiar that the weirdness of place truly gets lost. The characters drink shiraz and merlot. The female protagonist can't escape her underwire bras and the way they make sweat chafe in delicate places. ("her perspiration-soaked shirt clung to her back, and her boob sweat made the underwires of her bra chafe her skin"); the rest of her underwear is just the same as ours. We recognize all the foods they eat, right down to cream puffs and scones. We're so familiar with OUR normal, taken for granted in this novel--and the author has so failed to imagine the novel's locations--that we're left with nothing on which to hang the pretense of fantasy.
The love story is also very familiar: they despise each other for half the book and then suddenly, as in so many books of this sort, they're head over heels. However! Here, the author excels. She has created two highly compelling, very lovable characters, even if they are solidly predictable. I fell in love with both of them, together and separately. Mercy is a smart, competent businesswoman who can heft a body all by herself, and she's sassy, perhaps relentlessly so. Hart is rough and rugged and, yet, the most unprepossessing man in relation with the opposite sex. He expects no return when he is apologetic. And he completely understands, and insists upon, the proper use of "whom." He reads voraciously! (Gods, where are men like THAT, in real life?
If the reader embraces Coleridge's "willing suspension of disbelief," they can become fully immersed in the love story. I cried buckets (ok, so my husband died recently, I'm excused.)
Finally, deus ex machina delivers a grand HEA finale! Who doesn't love a good deus ex machina. 4 stars. On to finish Beartown.