Day 09 – Best scene ever

Anna Louise Genoese writes beautifully about the type of scene she likes best. I have been able to come up with a handful of best beloved scenes or moments in books that come to mind, but I wasn’t sure if I could spot a pattern until I typed them all out.

*Sophie (and the reader) realising that Howl knew her secret all along
(Howl’s Moving Castle)
*a discussion on witch cliches ends when a house falls on Granny Weatherwax’s head
(Witches Abroad)
*Cordelia producing the traitor’s head from a shopping bag.
(Barrayar)
*Robin cracking up with laughter when he sees Laurence Olivier in blackface as Othello – one more clue that makes far more sense when Janet learns the truth about him and Nick
(Tam Lin)
*Beauty demanding “Bring me back my Beast”
(Beauty)
*Darcy’s terrible, unexpected proposal to Elizabeth, and her shocked response
(Pride and Prejudice)
*Nick learns the truth about his past
(The Demon’s Lexicon)
*Howard seeing words written on the wall of the spaceship, revealing a startling truth
(Archer’s Goon)

So there we have it. I love the scenes of surprise and revelation. I love sudden shocks, I love characters acting suddenly out of character or beyond expectations. I adore to be tricked, if it’s done well. And I love it when clues are disguised as something else, so that the rereading experience is so very sweet.

Which, quite possibly, explains why my favourite scene of all time is actually:

*The Shrieking Shack. Harry, Ron, Hermione and Remus Lupin face off with notorious killer Sirius Black, but he is far more interested in facing off with Ron’s pet rat… everything they previously believed falls apart, piece by piece, to be replaced by a new version of history, and nothing will ever be the same again. (Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban)

For all JK Rowling’s faults as a writer, that scene is magnificent in what it does, what it sets up, what it says and what it leaves unsaid, not to mention the heady combination of revelation, visual effect and raw emotion. It is not really surprising that she was never able to top it.

(more…)

I’ve had a tab open to this post by Jim C Hines on Girly Books and gender stereotyping all week, pretty sure that I wanted to say something about it, but not sure what.

I understand his bafflement at male readers being hesitant to pick up his new books, the ones with girls on the cover. I remember the almost physical blow I felt the first time an acquaintance told me to my face that he wasn’t going to read my books because he didn’t read anything with female protagonists. (ten years later I’m still going, seriously? Seriously?)

Looking at Hines’ covers, which are gorgeous, it occurs to me how unusual they are in the fantasy genre. Having a female character on the cover, even a female and no male character, is not that unusual – but three women, with no man in sight? I can’t think of another fantasy cover ever that has had such a composition.

Fantasy fiction is not short of female characters, even memorable and important female characters, but it’s hard to escape the fact that so many of the sourceworks, the deeply respected historical texts that helped to form people’s idea of fantasy fiction, tend to place female characters in a vacuum.

From fairy tales through the pulp stories and Tolkien to the epic fantasies of the 1980′s – whether women are crunchy protagonists and point-of-view characters or cardboard love-interests and prizes, what they most have in common is feminine isolation. The princess’s most important relationship is with her potential prince, and her value is often calculated on how well she gets along with male characters. Often this is well meaning – an awesome female character stands out very effectively when surrounded by blokes. Also her awesomeness is often created by an unflattering contrast with other women – she is special, they are drips.

(I do this too, I’m horrified to realise, most of my female relationships in novels are based on conflict, and the best friendships represented are male-female)

These traditions bleed through to modern storytelling, and I can think of so few examples of fantasy fiction which has an emphasis on family or friendship relationships or even teamwork between women. I have to admit, when I first heard about Hines’ Stepsister Scheme my first thoughts were very cynical, that the idea of fairy tale princesses ganging up together and kicking arse/fighting crime was a bit of an old cliche. But thinking about it again – no, it isn’t. It’s horribly original. There just aren’t that many fantasy stories out there that are predominantly about women – and women plural, not just one really great woman.
(more…)