Johnson, Alaya Dawn - Racing the Dark
Tue, Jun. 30th, 2009 03:19 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
oyceterLana wants most of all to be a diver, like her mother, but soon, changes in the environment mean the death of the mandagah fish whose jewels they harvest, along with the death of her island's lifestyle. Lana is then apprenticed to the witch Akua, and... stuff ensues. Lots of stuff!
I was extremely confused by the pacing of this book. In the beginning, it was because I had this categorized in my mind as a young adult fantasy, which I am not sure it is.* As in, we begin with Lana hitting puberty and going through a rite of adulthood. I had fully expected the book to go into why the mandagah fish were dying and what it meant for Lana, but then the book very quickly moves on to that to greater problems. The mandagah fish are a symptom, but they are not the whole mystery. The POV also switches a fair amount, which also ran counter to my expectations. Again, when I got more used to the book and started thinking of it more as epic fantasy in my head, everything made a lot more sense. I have no idea if this confusion will strike anyone but me, as it feels fairly idiosyncratic...?
Anyway. There is a lot going on in this book!
First of all, I enjoyed the setting a great deal. It's based on Pacific Island cultures, with a smattering of Asian influence (mochi!), and it doesn't feel much like anything I've read before. I also like the magic system, which is based on sacrifice and is approrpiately dark. There are also bound spirits, linked charms, volcanos, and harbingers of DOOM. Everything feels extremely complex and fleshed-out, and I particularly like seeing the differences among the islands and the cities on the islands. There's a whole lot of world in this book, which was a very pleasant surprise.
However, I also had a lot of problems with the book. After I got over my first issue with the pacing, I continued to have other issues with the pacing. The book feels like it skips from moment to moment, not always tying them together. I give it a fair amount of leeway for this, as it's the first of a trilogy and I'm guessing it's setting up a lot of puzzle pieces that will only come together in the final volume. However, I couldn't always find a thread through even the similar pieces, or the plot elements that starred the same characters (ex. Lana going from a diver to a witch apprentice to... something else). As such, it felt like a very disconnected read. I was constantly trying to figure out how much time had passed, where I was, who I was with in terms of the story, and what each character had to do with each other.
This was more pronounced around the end of the book, where we're introduced to several new characters with very little background as to who they are. This wouldn't be as big of an issue if I didn't get the sense that the new characters are going to be fairly important in the next books, and if they didn't have a very close bond with Lana. I felt there wasn't enough time dedicated to that relationship, particularly given how quickly it deepens and how much weight it's given. And there's a giant plot twist that happens about two thirds of the way in which didn't feel adequately forshadowed at all—I think Johnson tried to in the prologue, but we all know what people say about prologues.
One last complaint is that Lana never quite comes together as a character for me. Much of it is because I felt as though she was reacting to things throughout the entire book, from her rite of passage gone awry to her apprenticeship to Akua to what comes later. I didn't see as much of her making her own choices and carving her own path, more deciding what to do with her life based on the circumstances at the time. As such, it was hard getting a feel for her, since I felt like she changed depending on what circumstances she was in.
In conclusion: very rough in terms of pacing and structure, but with a lot of cool ideas in terms of the magic and the setting. And yay POC characters and world! I think it'll be interesting seeing where the trilogy goes from here, since I currently have no idea, and I suspect many of the structural issues will work themselves out once Johnson has written more novels.
* I realize defining "young adult" is an exercise in futility. My personal definition, which I was completely unaware of until this book did not fit and confused me, is that YA has a certain immediacy to it. This can either be in terms of plot, which can span a long time period but feels scarf-down-able and in the moment, or in terms of cast, which tends to be fairly small. Or, uh. Something like that. *handwaves* And of course the coming of age bit, which I think is a part of this book, but not the driving factor.
I was extremely confused by the pacing of this book. In the beginning, it was because I had this categorized in my mind as a young adult fantasy, which I am not sure it is.* As in, we begin with Lana hitting puberty and going through a rite of adulthood. I had fully expected the book to go into why the mandagah fish were dying and what it meant for Lana, but then the book very quickly moves on to that to greater problems. The mandagah fish are a symptom, but they are not the whole mystery. The POV also switches a fair amount, which also ran counter to my expectations. Again, when I got more used to the book and started thinking of it more as epic fantasy in my head, everything made a lot more sense. I have no idea if this confusion will strike anyone but me, as it feels fairly idiosyncratic...?
Anyway. There is a lot going on in this book!
First of all, I enjoyed the setting a great deal. It's based on Pacific Island cultures, with a smattering of Asian influence (mochi!), and it doesn't feel much like anything I've read before. I also like the magic system, which is based on sacrifice and is approrpiately dark. There are also bound spirits, linked charms, volcanos, and harbingers of DOOM. Everything feels extremely complex and fleshed-out, and I particularly like seeing the differences among the islands and the cities on the islands. There's a whole lot of world in this book, which was a very pleasant surprise.
However, I also had a lot of problems with the book. After I got over my first issue with the pacing, I continued to have other issues with the pacing. The book feels like it skips from moment to moment, not always tying them together. I give it a fair amount of leeway for this, as it's the first of a trilogy and I'm guessing it's setting up a lot of puzzle pieces that will only come together in the final volume. However, I couldn't always find a thread through even the similar pieces, or the plot elements that starred the same characters (ex. Lana going from a diver to a witch apprentice to... something else). As such, it felt like a very disconnected read. I was constantly trying to figure out how much time had passed, where I was, who I was with in terms of the story, and what each character had to do with each other.
This was more pronounced around the end of the book, where we're introduced to several new characters with very little background as to who they are. This wouldn't be as big of an issue if I didn't get the sense that the new characters are going to be fairly important in the next books, and if they didn't have a very close bond with Lana. I felt there wasn't enough time dedicated to that relationship, particularly given how quickly it deepens and how much weight it's given. And there's a giant plot twist that happens about two thirds of the way in which didn't feel adequately forshadowed at all—I think Johnson tried to in the prologue, but we all know what people say about prologues.
One last complaint is that Lana never quite comes together as a character for me. Much of it is because I felt as though she was reacting to things throughout the entire book, from her rite of passage gone awry to her apprenticeship to Akua to what comes later. I didn't see as much of her making her own choices and carving her own path, more deciding what to do with her life based on the circumstances at the time. As such, it was hard getting a feel for her, since I felt like she changed depending on what circumstances she was in.
In conclusion: very rough in terms of pacing and structure, but with a lot of cool ideas in terms of the magic and the setting. And yay POC characters and world! I think it'll be interesting seeing where the trilogy goes from here, since I currently have no idea, and I suspect many of the structural issues will work themselves out once Johnson has written more novels.
* I realize defining "young adult" is an exercise in futility. My personal definition, which I was completely unaware of until this book did not fit and confused me, is that YA has a certain immediacy to it. This can either be in terms of plot, which can span a long time period but feels scarf-down-able and in the moment, or in terms of cast, which tends to be fairly small. Or, uh. Something like that. *handwaves* And of course the coming of age bit, which I think is a part of this book, but not the driving factor.
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