Scan barcode
A review by declaired
The Lost Sun by Tessa Gratton
4.0
First new book of 2016! I've had this living in my kindle library for a while, and when I ran out of data, plus still kinda fussy & fuzzy from oral surgery, it seemed like a good time to just hang out with a solid YA novel. (and it is a solid YA novel)
THINGS I THOUGHT ABOUT "THE LOST SUN" in no particular order:
- I am not naming any names but I am here to HEAVILY IMPLY that if you want a series that puts a non-American mythos/ pantheon and puts them in the United States, United States of Asgard does more and does it with greater depth and transformation than some of the other series out there. Some of which I mean in details of the setting-- all of the state names are changed, the geography is probably sketched a little differently, the make and model of cars all show the Norse influence-- the details in the worldbuilding are very exciting. But MOSTLY what I mean is:
- WHEN THE MYTHS ARE RESPUN THEY ARE RESPUN TO STRIKE A CHORD (pull a thread?) WITH THE MODERN AUDIENCE, with relevant feminist, social justice, and queer awarenesses.
- The book I am not naming any names of made Circe into a rude joke about misandry. The United States of Asgard made Fenris the Wolf into a teen girl with a story of hunger and destruction and /sympathy/.
- If the book were composed entirely of the Fenris the Wolf section it would be five stars hands down A+++
- There is an incredible OT3 vibe that is complicated but also so, so canon. The love is there, the love is explicit.
- I enjoy questions of identity in stories, because what else are you going to talk about if not "what makes the self," and that's a pretty major component of the journey.
- "What we do is not all of what we are."
- I have another rant that is about ladies because 1) what else do I talk about 2) this book is a good book to have feelings about ladies:
- women don't get to have stories where they go out on epic roadtrips by themselves, women so rarely get stories where they face the dark and the dark blinks first. It's always fear, because the narrative in America is one that says "you have to keep yourself safe. Here's how. Here is your fear." And although Astrid is wandering around with a big berserker warrior (no matter that he's reluctant and afraid of that side of himself), she /would/ have set off without him. She leads the journey, she rents the rooms, she gets the car and starts the journey, she's the one who is safe in the world, and she is never afraid of the dark. I don't see that enough.
- I feel rude not talking about Soren or Vider or Baldur like at all, because after all it is Soren's journey as well, of self-acceptance and finding a place in the world and with other people, and of not being afraid of yourself (or of becoming your father), and all of his steps are important and good, and the world has a lot more room for empathetic narratives about black boys who are afraid of the world and their place in it
- and Vider is a spitfire and I adore her and everything about her
tl;dr excellent characters, yay for diversity (in several lanes), the worldbuilding details are fun, the narrative treats ladies with respect, also there are sequels but the story does wrap up fairly satisfactorily independently.
THINGS I THOUGHT ABOUT "THE LOST SUN" in no particular order:
- I am not naming any names but I am here to HEAVILY IMPLY that if you want a series that puts a non-American mythos/ pantheon and puts them in the United States, United States of Asgard does more and does it with greater depth and transformation than some of the other series out there. Some of which I mean in details of the setting-- all of the state names are changed, the geography is probably sketched a little differently, the make and model of cars all show the Norse influence-- the details in the worldbuilding are very exciting. But MOSTLY what I mean is:
- WHEN THE MYTHS ARE RESPUN THEY ARE RESPUN TO STRIKE A CHORD (pull a thread?) WITH THE MODERN AUDIENCE, with relevant feminist, social justice, and queer awarenesses.
- The book I am not naming any names of made Circe into a rude joke about misandry. The United States of Asgard made Fenris the Wolf into a teen girl with a story of hunger and destruction and /sympathy/.
- If the book were composed entirely of the Fenris the Wolf section it would be five stars hands down A+++
- There is an incredible OT3 vibe that is complicated but also so, so canon. The love is there, the love is explicit.
- I enjoy questions of identity in stories, because what else are you going to talk about if not "what makes the self," and that's a pretty major component of the journey.
- "What we do is not all of what we are."
- I have another rant that is about ladies because 1) what else do I talk about 2) this book is a good book to have feelings about ladies:
- women don't get to have stories where they go out on epic roadtrips by themselves, women so rarely get stories where they face the dark and the dark blinks first. It's always fear, because the narrative in America is one that says "you have to keep yourself safe. Here's how. Here is your fear." And although Astrid is wandering around with a big berserker warrior (no matter that he's reluctant and afraid of that side of himself), she /would/ have set off without him. She leads the journey, she rents the rooms, she gets the car and starts the journey, she's the one who is safe in the world, and she is never afraid of the dark. I don't see that enough.
- I feel rude not talking about Soren or Vider or Baldur like at all, because after all it is Soren's journey as well, of self-acceptance and finding a place in the world and with other people, and of not being afraid of yourself (or of becoming your father), and all of his steps are important and good, and the world has a lot more room for empathetic narratives about black boys who are afraid of the world and their place in it
- and Vider is a spitfire and I adore her and everything about her
tl;dr excellent characters, yay for diversity (in several lanes), the worldbuilding details are fun, the narrative treats ladies with respect, also there are sequels but the story does wrap up fairly satisfactorily independently.