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A review by smartcassart
The Enchantress of Florence by Salman Rushdie
2.0
I don't know...
This book should have been a treasure for me. I'm a sucker for lush settings, political intrigue and historical fiction weaved with fantasy so - Mughal India? Renaissance Italy? An epic saga spanning generations and a myriad of colourful characters and cultures as they embark on adventures across the world, among them a powerful enchantress who is also a descendant of Timur and Genghis Khan? Sign me up!
In terms of writing Rushie does not disappoint. It is lyrical, seamless, deliciously excessive in the right places and therefore reflective of the decadent environments he describes, really pushing the boundaries of the English language (though there are many languages spoken in here). I have no complaints about the book's vivid imagery, boundless creativity and whimsy, which is everything I look for in magical realism or fantasy in general, after all.
HOWEVER, it takes more than pretty writing and cool mysterious shit happening (let's be honest - that's what many of the plot devices boil down to) to convince me to rate a book 4 or 5 stars. If a friend of mine wants a fun interpretation of 16th (?) century cross-cultural history and adventure vicariously, or to read for the pleasure of language or flowery, playful writing, I will recommend this without hesitation. But if the friend is looking for a story strong in plot and characters, I'll say move on. Because oh my god... where do I start?
So the plot is clear enough, at least to me - a blonde foreigner and avid adventurer travels to a Mughal capital to seek the audience of the illustrious emperor, Akbar the Great, to tell him his mother's story and convince him of their shared connection. As he regales him with this story, they form a deep bond and we, the readers, are take further back in time to follow the titular enchantress Qara Koz. I wouldn't say the structure is poor, but it is very meandering due to the blonde stranger beating around the bush. Ok, that's fine. However, it is clear the main focus is the story of Qara Koz, which doesn't even really start until more than halfway through the book and even though that is to be expected I still find myself annoyed at this, thinking of it as an interruption, because by then I am quite invested in Akbar's and the blonde stranger's storyline. The emperor's intellectual, spiritual and practical struggles, and the landscape of his city is much more interesting to me, as is his deepening relationship with the stranger who starts this story by sneaking into a ship and poisoning the captain to steal a letter from Queen Elizabeth I (you can't make this shit up) so he's quite exciting too! Rushdie spends so much time painting Sikri in the beginning, explaining the court drama, the emperor's talented peers, the people's dreams, philosophies, struggles and motivations, the diverse inhabitants of this kingdom, that Qara Koz's tale pales in comparison. Because I'm sorry, as much as I want to enjoy the journey of a strong, sassy, willful woman who does what she wants and gets what she wants... I can't enjoy this one. I find her motivations weak, her actions confusing, and most of all, her character lacking. She is not someone anyone can relate to because we are ordinary plebs with no magical powers or superlative beauty.
But can we all agree that being super hot is not a personality? I've read so many books where the heroine is very beautiful and attractive to most men they meet, but usually they have other qualities that give them more depth and even gain the reader's sympathy. I did not feel anything for QK or her lover Argalia or anyone else in their storyline EXCEPT Niccolo Machiavelli, a childhood friend of Argalia. As a loyal civil servant who dedicated his life to serving his nation only to be betrayed by it due to human cruelty and greed, Niccolo's story is criminally glossed over but at no more than a slim 4-5 pages a thousand times more profound than the infatuations of Qara and Argalia. Don't forget this is all happening against the tumultuous background of social and political turmoil, meaning conflicts, betrayal, nationalism and war. War is brutal, and to Rushdie's credit he does acknowledge that, I mean Argalia spends most of the book killing people and leaving a bloodbath in his wake everywhere he goes, but if you write about something like that don't expect me to give as much of a shit about Qara batting her eyelashes and making whole towns fall in love with her. That's just it - apart from one or two instances, she faces next to no conflict, neither do her loved ones, or when they do you just don't really care.
As you can guess, every other women in this story are oversexualized and Just Not As Special As The Heroine. As intelligent and talented as Rushdie is, this work still reeks of a straight (as far as I'm aware) male author writing a fantasy with a lot of sexy women in it who inevitably are objectified. In this regard, this book is not special or surprising at all, but damn it is tiring. Fantasy and magic is NOT an excuse to have female characters who are barely people, OK?
Anyway, 2/5. What a shame.
This book should have been a treasure for me. I'm a sucker for lush settings, political intrigue and historical fiction weaved with fantasy so - Mughal India? Renaissance Italy? An epic saga spanning generations and a myriad of colourful characters and cultures as they embark on adventures across the world, among them a powerful enchantress who is also a descendant of Timur and Genghis Khan? Sign me up!
In terms of writing Rushie does not disappoint. It is lyrical, seamless, deliciously excessive in the right places and therefore reflective of the decadent environments he describes, really pushing the boundaries of the English language (though there are many languages spoken in here). I have no complaints about the book's vivid imagery, boundless creativity and whimsy, which is everything I look for in magical realism or fantasy in general, after all.
HOWEVER, it takes more than pretty writing and cool mysterious shit happening (let's be honest - that's what many of the plot devices boil down to) to convince me to rate a book 4 or 5 stars. If a friend of mine wants a fun interpretation of 16th (?) century cross-cultural history and adventure vicariously, or to read for the pleasure of language or flowery, playful writing, I will recommend this without hesitation. But if the friend is looking for a story strong in plot and characters, I'll say move on. Because oh my god... where do I start?
So the plot is clear enough, at least to me - a blonde foreigner and avid adventurer travels to a Mughal capital to seek the audience of the illustrious emperor, Akbar the Great, to tell him his mother's story and convince him of their shared connection. As he regales him with this story, they form a deep bond and we, the readers, are take further back in time to follow the titular enchantress Qara Koz. I wouldn't say the structure is poor, but it is very meandering due to the blonde stranger beating around the bush. Ok, that's fine. However, it is clear the main focus is the story of Qara Koz, which doesn't even really start until more than halfway through the book and even though that is to be expected I still find myself annoyed at this, thinking of it as an interruption, because by then I am quite invested in Akbar's and the blonde stranger's storyline. The emperor's intellectual, spiritual and practical struggles, and the landscape of his city is much more interesting to me, as is his deepening relationship with the stranger who starts this story by sneaking into a ship and poisoning the captain to steal a letter from Queen Elizabeth I (you can't make this shit up) so he's quite exciting too! Rushdie spends so much time painting Sikri in the beginning, explaining the court drama, the emperor's talented peers, the people's dreams, philosophies, struggles and motivations, the diverse inhabitants of this kingdom, that Qara Koz's tale pales in comparison. Because I'm sorry, as much as I want to enjoy the journey of a strong, sassy, willful woman who does what she wants and gets what she wants... I can't enjoy this one. I find her motivations weak, her actions confusing, and most of all, her character lacking. She is not someone anyone can relate to because we are ordinary plebs with no magical powers or superlative beauty.
But can we all agree that being super hot is not a personality? I've read so many books where the heroine is very beautiful and attractive to most men they meet, but usually they have other qualities that give them more depth and even gain the reader's sympathy. I did not feel anything for QK or her lover Argalia or anyone else in their storyline EXCEPT Niccolo Machiavelli, a childhood friend of Argalia. As a loyal civil servant who dedicated his life to serving his nation only to be betrayed by it due to human cruelty and greed, Niccolo's story is criminally glossed over but at no more than a slim 4-5 pages a thousand times more profound than the infatuations of Qara and Argalia. Don't forget this is all happening against the tumultuous background of social and political turmoil, meaning conflicts, betrayal, nationalism and war. War is brutal, and to Rushdie's credit he does acknowledge that, I mean Argalia spends most of the book killing people and leaving a bloodbath in his wake everywhere he goes, but if you write about something like that don't expect me to give as much of a shit about Qara batting her eyelashes and making whole towns fall in love with her. That's just it - apart from one or two instances, she faces next to no conflict, neither do her loved ones, or when they do you just don't really care.
As you can guess, every other women in this story are oversexualized and Just Not As Special As The Heroine. As intelligent and talented as Rushdie is, this work still reeks of a straight (as far as I'm aware) male author writing a fantasy with a lot of sexy women in it who inevitably are objectified. In this regard, this book is not special or surprising at all, but damn it is tiring. Fantasy and magic is NOT an excuse to have female characters who are barely people, OK?
Anyway, 2/5. What a shame.