Reviews with content warning for Misogyny - Tigana

I kind of hated this - it had every classic awful mysoginistic fantasy trope like 70x over plus a really weird plot and GoT style incest for no reason just for good measure. It's just completely unbelievable that everyone magically forgot the name of a city because of a curse, and the people who remember the name sacrifice literally everything and start a war to undo the spell? Like... the city is physically still there. The people are still alive. Sure, kill the tyrant because he's a tyrant but everyone was so much more upset about the name being lost??? Who cares at that point? It made no sense to me and none of the characters acted logically at all. There were a few things I did like -- the magic systemfelt different than any other I had read before, the character study of one of the two evil kings was actually extremely intriguing - Brandin was a complex and a questionably redeemed character by the end, and the twist

with the identity of the fool having been Valentin Prince of Tigana all along

really caught me off guard. Those details saved this from a DNF and/or a lower rating but it was still not an enjoyable read at all.

Content Warnings

thecriticalreader's review against another edition

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adventurous dark emotional hopeful inspiring reflective tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.5

Why I Read It:

I borrowed Tigana by Guy Gavriel Kay from my library because I loved A Song for Arbonne.

Review:

Guy Gavriel Kay is an amazing storyteller, and Tigana exemplifies his abilities. Despite the book’s grand scope and numerous point-of-view chapters, the central thread of the story remains strong. The characters are so complex and well-written that at times Kay made me root for the villain and denounce the heroes. Their actions serve as fascinating explorations into trauma and grief’s role in morality. His world feels real and textured, but he does not indulge in any unnecessary paragraphs describing aspects of the world just for the sake of it. Kay also has a strong grasp of how politics—both at the macro and micro level— are shaped by the environment, the actions of individual rulers, chance, and the actions of common people.

My favorite part of Tigana is the ending. It is rare that I find a book with an ending as perfect as this one. He somehow manages to produce a satisfying, dramatic, well-earned ending (with a twist!) that perfectly balances between triumph and believability, conclusion and open-endedness.

My only complaints about this book lie in minor details. There is a wholly gratuitous (non-consensual) sex scene that probably should not have made the final cut, mostly because it feels like a horny indulgence on the part of the author rather than a scene in service of the story. Additionally, the choice to have the only character of color actually be a white person in disguise gave me pause. These sorts of problems did not really detract from my enjoyment of the story, but I could see why someone else might take issue with them.

The Run-Down:

You will probably like Tigana if:

· You like epic fantasy books

· You appreciate a well-told story with complex characters, strong worldbuilding, and a masterfully crafted plot

You might not like Tigana if:

· You don’t like reading books with multiple point-of-views

· You struggle to keep track of multiple characters and storylines

· You prefer morally “clean” protagonists

· You’re not in the mood for a dark story

A Similar Book:

A Song of Ice and Fire by George R.R. Martin. Similarities between these books include:

· Fantasy setting

· Political scheming and intrigue

· Morally gray characters

· Multiple point-of-views

· Dark and twisted elements

Content Warnings

bellaob's review against another edition

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I had such high hopes for this book, having read about Kay's beautiful writing style and layered plotting, which may mean my disappointment with this book is greater than it deserves. But oh boy was I disappointed. The first thing I have to get off my chest, and the thing that was overall most off-putting, is how filthily misogynistic the writing was. I have never read such flat female characters in my entire life. I didn't take the time to check, but I feel that this book almost certainly wouldn't pass the Bechdel test (I know it's for film, but it's such a hilariously simple test that it's genuinely embarrassing that I can't think of one scene off the top of my head that meets the criteria). The main action that the females get to be involved in is acting as sex objects/love interests for the more developed male characters. And a woman being so pathetically weak-willed that sexual attraction trumps the murder and subjugation of her people?? Honestly speechless. If she had discovered Brandin to be a completely different man from what she was expecting, found a way to feel sympathy for him, and ended up genuinely falling in love, I would have taken it with a pinch of salt but could have accepted it. But she barely describes anything about his character that is particularly compelling (apart from 'being powerful' I guess?). He treats her pretty badly, and the main draw seems to be that seeing him makes her go weak at the knees and he's good in bed. For someone who was initially set up as a person with iron resolve, who was willing to degrade herself and die her for her people, giving it all up for a good s**g seems like an about-face that could give you whiplash. The only explanation I can think of is Stockholm Syndrome, but that doesn't exactly counter the idea that there are no female characters with any agency in this story. Being a sex slave isn't sexy, and her enjoying it through Stockholm Syndrome doesn't make it better.

Lets not even discuss the laughable scene where apparently the *only* way to distract someone from learning vital information is to somehow defy the laws of physics and lose your virginity in complete silence, balanced on a ledge in a tiny cupboard, with no lead-up, wearing a floor length gown, as smoothly as the most slick and glamourised Hollywood sex scenes. The random, somewhat non-consensual interlude with the crazy sex addict lady, described as "feline" without even the barest attempt to be less cliché, had me on the fence about whether to laugh out loud or cringe like I've never cringed before. Apparently the encounter was Deep and Meaningful and Transformative, but uncharacteristically for Kay's over-descriptive style he chooses not to illuminate why. And then there are the lesser female characters, whose sole purpose seems to be to showcase the desirability of the male characters by literally falling in love with them at first sight. Happening once would be a stretch, and this occurs on multiple occasions. Lastly, I don't mind medieval-type books being set in a patriarchy and not being some perfect gender-neutral world. If there are matriarchal societies, they don't need to be perfect utopias which have figured out the solutions to all mankind's problems. But don't have the only matriarchal society in the book be taken over by a king before the book starts, and this presented as a really good thing that needs to be preserved at all costs against the possibility of the crazy women taking over again. It's a bad vibe. And blackface, wtf??

Aside from the female characters, the general writing style also fell short for me. It feels like the book is lacking a good edit (or three). Not infrequently, the never-ending internal monologue of the characters, dripping in pathos, passes at slower-than-real-time, making passages drag. Take this example of Devin pausing for a second in a doorway before entering a room (what actually happens) and what Kay writes about it:

"Devin stood in the doorway a moment, unnoticed, and found himself looking closely at the two men. In their silent gravity they seemed to him to be a part of a frieze, a tableau, emblematic in some complex way of all such pre-dawn hours for those on the long roads. Neither man was a stranger to this hour, Devin knew, to sitting thus before a castle kitchen fire among the servants in the last dark hour before dawn, easing into wakefulness and a fugitive warmth, preparing for the road again and whatever turnings it might offer in the day that had not yet begun.

It seemed to Devin that Alessan and Erlein, sitting together as they were, were bonded in some way that went beyond the harsh thing that had happened by that twilit stream in Ferraut. It was a linkage that had nothing to do with Prince and wizard, it was shaped of the things they each had done. The same things done. Memories they would each have and could share, if these two men could truly share anything after what had happened between them.

For years they had each been travelling. There had to be so many images that overlapped and could evoke the same mood, emotions, the same sounds and smells. Like this one: darkness outside, the edge of grey dawn and the castle stir the sun would bring, chill of the corridors and knowledge of wind outside the walls, cut by the crackle and roar of the kitchen fire; the reassuring steam and smell rising form their cradled mugs; sleep and dream receding, the mind slowly turning forward to the day that lay ahead swathed in ground mist. Looking at their stillness amid the bustle of the kitchen Devin felt another return of the sadness that seemed to be his legacy from this long strange night in the highlands.

Sadness, and a distinct stir of longing. Devin realised that he wanted that shared history for himself, wanted to be a part of that self-contained, accomplished fraternity of men who knew this scene so well. He was young enough to savour the romance of it, but old enough - especially after this past winter and his time with Menico - to guess at the price demanded for those memories and the contained, solitary, competent look of the two men in front of him.

He stepped through the doorway."

Seems to me a whole lot of words to say not very much of relevance. Also, in my opinion, if your sentence has one colon, two semi-colons, and 3 commas, you need to be introduced to a little thing called a full stop. There is just generally a lot of purple prose, leading to the descriptions feeling very baggy and drawing attention away from the parts that are actually beautiful and poignant. Why say something once, or better yet show it and allow the reader to draw their own conclusions, when you could dramatically state it six different ways to make sure the point REALLY sinks in? Even when there isn't really a point. The dialogue was at times clever, at times taking itself much too seriously, becoming overdramatic and unrealistic. It just isn't careful writing. People make bold statements about things that they could not possibly have actually picked up on, based on the merest glance from another character. The constant flashing forwards and backwards makes the pacing feel really inconsistent, and confuses the timeline when characters speak as if they know other characters well when in real-time they have only just met them.

Finally, the whole plot centres around the main characters being so hell-bent on revenge for their destroyed culture. Except… for half of them it wasn't their culture, they had literally never heard of or experienced it, and within five minutes of finding out it existed had essentially sworn their life to defending it no matter the cost to themselves or others. Then proceeded to practically dissolve into tears at any mention of it for the rest of the book. Just a touch overdone.

This is probably the most purple book I have read since the later ones of the Throne of Glass series, which are YA and I read as a teenager, and is frankly tone deaf and unrealistic in many places. Overall a fine read if you’re into that I guess, but not even beginning to approach the masterpiece I was expecting.

NB: I rarely write reviews, so the fact that I felt irritated enough to write at this length, and had already formed most of these opinions by the time I was halfway through the book and shouldn't be sick of it yet, tells you something in and of itself.

Content Warnings

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