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A review by compassrose
Ka: Dar Oakley in the Ruin of Ymr by John Crowley
1.0
Certainly beautifully written, but there's a great deal about this that lands clumsily in 2020. I admit I was put off right from the start, when Crowley introduces a shaman who transitions as part of his coming into power, immediately says "Crows always know what sex something really is," and continues to describe him as female. He then mentions that Crows have a word/pronoun they use for beings whose gender they don't know, and nevertheless proceeds to ruthlessly misgender poor Fox Cap for the rest of his long story.
Dar Oakley himself turns into a kind of Magical Minority, so absorbed in the fate and stories of humans he forgets how to be a crow. His travels to Turtle Island, and the way the First Nations story is swept aside in favour of Civil War ghosts and white people, are awkwardly managed, as is the story of the Native woman the narrator has as a caretaker, and her baby son, affected by fetal alcohol syndrome.
Overall, centres the European experience, and inserts Dar Oakley, European Crow, into First Nations stories in a most uncomfortable way.
Dar Oakley himself turns into a kind of Magical Minority, so absorbed in the fate and stories of humans he forgets how to be a crow. His travels to Turtle Island, and the way the First Nations story is swept aside in favour of Civil War ghosts and white people, are awkwardly managed, as is the story of the Native woman the narrator has as a caretaker, and her baby son, affected by fetal alcohol syndrome.
Overall, centres the European experience, and inserts Dar Oakley, European Crow, into First Nations stories in a most uncomfortable way.
Content Warnings
Persistent authorial misgendering of trans character