kketcham327's review
adventurous
dark
hopeful
inspiring
fast-paced
5.0
Content Warnings
Moderate: Drug abuse, Pedophilia, Gun violence, Emotional abuse, Homophobia, Incest, Terminal illness, Domestic abuse, and Child abuse
Minor: Racial slurs and Rape
nofriendofmine's review
emotional
reflective
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
2.0
Gossamer Axe tackles a lot of heavy themes, including child abuse, rape, homophobia, racism, and substance abuse. They're all handled pretty terribly. In its effort to try and denounce racism, it ends up being pretty racist itself. The book is very heavy handed with its Celtic pride, and then we have our one POC character who needs to be saved by our lord and savior, Christa, from an abusive relationship. 'Cause brown women aren't proud or strong enough to do it themselves, unlike Celtic women. That's how it's framed in the book. Oh, she also
Spoiler
dies immediately after her gay awakening towards the end so that she may be replaced by Christa's girlfriend as the band's singer.This really should not be marketed as a lesbian novel when the two main characters are actually bisexual, but I suppose the language did not exist in the mainstream at the time of its publishing in 1990. Christa bones the depressed male lead Kevin and turns him into a man with the power of Celtic pride. Or something. This whole subplot is what really started turning me against the book when for the most part, it was smooth sailing initially.
Christa wins the Biggest Sue of the Year award. I actually quite liked having a character be so sure of herself and wise and knowing and kind and capable of whooping everyone's ass at the thing she's good at – music. I really enjoyed the idea of having this ancient person with magic capabilities existing in modern times, raising eyebrows when people witness her strange mannerisms and subtle magics, making people question their own perceptions of reality. The problem is that she was never wrong, ever, and everybody who wasn't explicitly a villain was fawning over her. It reminded me of the Bechdel test, only this time the test is to see if we could have two non-evil characters hold a conversation without praising Christa. I'm exaggerating only a little. I still liked Christa, but the author's clear affinity for this character got tiring rather quickly.
I think it had a lot of interesting philosophy about music in the context of magic and religion. Music heals and is a force of change. It was, of course, very centered on 18th century western classical music theory in its approach, but I could tell a lot of love and research went into this element of the novel. While I play music, I'm not a western musical theory nerd and I don't understand much of the jargon, but I still found those parts enjoyable to read. What I didn't appreciate was how male-centric all of the music references were. Granted, metal was and still is a male-dominated genre. I was just disappointed that only a single female musician (Lita Ford) got any sort of reference, which wasn't even praise. For a book centered around themes of feminism and uplifting women, it really dropped the ball in this regard.
There's a subplot which very minutely touches on BDSM, and I get the sense that the author thinks that stuff is for yuckos and nasties. I found that interesting because music and sex are compared at several points in the book, and BDSM is a counterculture in which people are able to express themselves freely and feel at home in. Much like metal. A lot of the struggles of the characters involve finding a place to belong and being true to who they are. Not to mention, genres of music like metal and punk directly derive their aesthetic from BDSM gear. I'm likely nitpicking.
In the background of all of these poorly handled attempts at addressing social issues is the land of the fey, I forget what it's called. This is where Christa's girlfriend is being held captive and has been trapped here for fourteen centuries. The whole point of this place is that nothing ever changes. I don't have much to say except for the fact that the fey villains here felt straight out of a cheesy 80s fantasy cartoon. Not for everyone, but I found it charming. It seemed to be a commentary about the dangers of stagnation by clinging to tradition.
The biggest redeeming quality of the book for me is the friendship between the women. Found family is one of my favorite tropes, and it's very present here. I feel like it's very rare to find media that has strong friendships between women, let alone between five. Of course, most of it was about how much they all adored Christa, but I'll take what I can get.
It's hard to say how much I liked Gossamer Axe. I know I'm going to be thinking about it for a while, and I think that counts for something. I'd feel a lot better about it if it weren't for all of the racism (shoutout to the line about a certain character's English being great despite being latina!) and Gossamer Axe feels very of its time and not in a good way. But hey, the cover's great.
Spoiler
bury your gays, and I would have loooooved knowing that the actual f/f romance only happens in the last ten pages out of around 350.
Content Warnings
Moderate: Murder, Racism, Sexism, and Toxic relationship
natalielorelei's review
5.0
I have no idea how to rate Gossamer Axe, because it hits a bunch of my personal guilty pleasure buttons and I love it so much, but it is also thoroughly ridiculous and '80s-tasticly terrible. (And LITERALLY EVERYTHING about Monica's characterization and storyline is racist. That is, unfortunately, not an exaggeration.)
I suppose I'll go with 5 stars on a purely personal level, but I'd also like to state that I really do not recommend this book, unless you think "LET US VERY EARNESTLY AND VERY '80S-LY FIGHT FAIRIES WITH HEAVY METAL (AND TERRIBLE DIALOGUE) IN DENVER, COLORADO WHILE HAVING '80S-TASTIC SUBPLOTS ABOUT SUCH THINGS AS 'PAGANISM >>>> CATHOLICISM' AND 'MEN ARE THE WORST' WITH AN UNFORTUNATE SIDE OF UNINTENTIONAL BUT GODAWFUL RACISM" sounds like a good time, in which case, have at it, is this ever the book for you.
I suppose I'll go with 5 stars on a purely personal level, but I'd also like to state that I really do not recommend this book, unless you think "LET US VERY EARNESTLY AND VERY '80S-LY FIGHT FAIRIES WITH HEAVY METAL (AND TERRIBLE DIALOGUE) IN DENVER, COLORADO WHILE HAVING '80S-TASTIC SUBPLOTS ABOUT SUCH THINGS AS 'PAGANISM >>>> CATHOLICISM' AND 'MEN ARE THE WORST' WITH AN UNFORTUNATE SIDE OF UNINTENTIONAL BUT GODAWFUL RACISM" sounds like a good time, in which case, have at it, is this ever the book for you.
geometryfailure's review
adventurous
emotional
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
4.5
threadybeeps's review
3.0
The Mists of Avalon and Jem & the Holograms had a pure and earnest book baby, and its name is Gossamer Axe.
morgandhu's review
5.0
Gael Baudino's Gossamer Axe is one of my favourite books, which is probably why I keep rereading it. It's hard to put into words what draws me to it over and over again, except to say that it hits all the right emotional and thematic buttons for me, with a good hard punch that generally has me crying about a dozen times.
Bare bones synopsis: two sixth century Irish lovers, both student bards, sneak out at night to listen to the elves. They are caught and taken to the land of the far, where nothing ages or changes. One of the lovers, Chairiste, uses a magic elven harp to escape, but cannot free her lover Siubd. The magic of the harp keeps her young as she tries again and again to break her lover free, but fails in the face of elven harper Orfide's superior technique, knowledge and magic. Finally, after 200 years, she discovers heavy metal, realises that this new musical form, with it's raw energy, power and passion is weapon she neds to counter Orfide's advantage, trades in her harp for a double-headed axe, forms an all-woman band, and blasts her way into the Twilight Realm to rescue her beloved.
What grabs me about it:
It's powerfully feminist and woman-centred.
It's a Celtic-themed fantasy (even though it's woefully historically inaccurate).
It's a lesbian love story with a happy ending.
It's one of the first fantasies with an unrepentant queer protagonist.
It's all about women breaking free of the control of men and owning their power - each member of the band is a woman with a misogynist past to overcome.
It's music and magic - and to me these have always gone together.
It takes on the nasty guilt and shame elements of Pauline Christianity that surround women and sexuality, and counters them with a sex-positive goddess spirituality.
It's about undying, totally unconditional love.
Sure, it has flaws, but it also has a cult following and if you are one of those who gets caught up in it, it's a part of you forever. And in recent years, it has become even dearer to me because when I read it, I hear echoes of a dear friend, now departed for the Summerland, who loved this book as I do, and who lived parts of it in her own life as a woman who loved women, as a master musician, and as a woman who fought to be freely and fully herself. So now as I read it again, I raise my cup and sing for all the women who love women, and fight for their right to be proud and free, and especially for the memory of Julie Songweaver.
Bare bones synopsis: two sixth century Irish lovers, both student bards, sneak out at night to listen to the elves. They are caught and taken to the land of the far, where nothing ages or changes. One of the lovers, Chairiste, uses a magic elven harp to escape, but cannot free her lover Siubd. The magic of the harp keeps her young as she tries again and again to break her lover free, but fails in the face of elven harper Orfide's superior technique, knowledge and magic. Finally, after 200 years, she discovers heavy metal, realises that this new musical form, with it's raw energy, power and passion is weapon she neds to counter Orfide's advantage, trades in her harp for a double-headed axe, forms an all-woman band, and blasts her way into the Twilight Realm to rescue her beloved.
What grabs me about it:
It's powerfully feminist and woman-centred.
It's a Celtic-themed fantasy (even though it's woefully historically inaccurate).
It's a lesbian love story with a happy ending.
It's one of the first fantasies with an unrepentant queer protagonist.
It's all about women breaking free of the control of men and owning their power - each member of the band is a woman with a misogynist past to overcome.
It's music and magic - and to me these have always gone together.
It takes on the nasty guilt and shame elements of Pauline Christianity that surround women and sexuality, and counters them with a sex-positive goddess spirituality.
It's about undying, totally unconditional love.
Sure, it has flaws, but it also has a cult following and if you are one of those who gets caught up in it, it's a part of you forever. And in recent years, it has become even dearer to me because when I read it, I hear echoes of a dear friend, now departed for the Summerland, who loved this book as I do, and who lived parts of it in her own life as a woman who loved women, as a master musician, and as a woman who fought to be freely and fully herself. So now as I read it again, I raise my cup and sing for all the women who love women, and fight for their right to be proud and free, and especially for the memory of Julie Songweaver.
demackison's review
5.0
It has been a long time since I read this book, but lost my beloved copy during a divorce. I still miss it.
therewithal's review
3.0
The premise of this is pretty ridiculously awesome but the execution didn't really live up to it for me. Also, liked the other characters but could have done without spending half the book on Kevin.
danikaellis's review
4.0
I picked this up because it looked ridiculous and fun (Ancient Celt harpist rescues her girlfriend from a timeless dimension using the power of rock and roll!) It turns out, though, that it's actually pretty serious, and deals with a lot of dark, heavy subject matter. A lot. Child rape/incest, someone dying of AIDS, homophobia, racism, abuse--to name a few. But it's also about chose family and healing and rebirth. If you can handle the subject matter (and are okay with this being very 80s), it's a solid read. I want to read more by her.
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