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A review by rancidslime
The Last Herald-Mage by Mercedes Lackey
4.0
I think Mercedes Lackey might be like... the only straight author I'm totally willing to give a pass to for the whole "buried gay main character" thing - both because the details of the Last Herald-Mage trilogy were hammered out well after the main arc of it was decided, and because you can almost tell that she's spending the last two books being like "AAAAAA SHIT FUCK I'M SORRY I'M SORRY" and course-correcting when she apparently realized what the current trajectory of the books MEANT in the broader context of writing LGBT characters, especially at the time.
Like, yes, Tylendel kills himself, which traumatizes the shit out of Vanyel, who then spends the next several years in mourning, but also the two do wrap around to being reunited (first through reincarnation, then through becoming basically guardian deities). Yes, Vanyel has to deal with a shitload of homophobia, but the way later books play out implies that because Vanyel was such a larger-than-life hero to Valdemar (one whose gayness was both crucial and undeniable), homophobia in modern-day Valdemar is considered by most modern main characters to be somewhere between stupid and softly treasonous/un-Valdemaran. So like, yes, the road there isn't GREAT necessarily, but Lackey's determination to write LGBT characters with pathos and compassion PLUS the fact that we end up with a setting where one of the country's biggest national heroes was undeniably unambiguously gay means it's a pretty fuckin' small price to pay tbqh.
As for the books themselves? I don't really know, it's kinda hard to recommend them without caveats. I read these suckers when I was sixteen, buying them with gas station credit cards and reading them on my phone at church while my parents were in the choir (it sounds so much more dramatic than it felt, looking back on it) and they were a bright spot in my teenhood that I thought about a lot, with the teenage point of view being pretty much pitch-perfect teen writing. But like, can I recommend them easily, nowadays? It's hard to say - I can't really give a hard answer on how it'd be to read them as an adult, since my first exposure to them was when I was still in high school, but at the same time it's hard to say "go buy this" to modern teens since, uh, they have a lot more cool, great LGBT fiction on hand than I did. (like a LOT more, I rag on adults who consume nothing but YA a lot but the modern explosion of rad gay and trans YA is an unambiguous good for kids)
Valdemar is kind of a comfort setting for me, full of people fundamentally kinda trying their best to make the world a better place and fighting against shadowy villains in grand battles. I think it'll always have a place in my heart. Even if I can't readily recommend it to people, this trilogy is special to me and a bunch of guys like me, and maybe that's enough.
Like, yes, Tylendel kills himself, which traumatizes the shit out of Vanyel, who then spends the next several years in mourning, but also the two do wrap around to being reunited (first through reincarnation, then through becoming basically guardian deities). Yes, Vanyel has to deal with a shitload of homophobia, but the way later books play out implies that because Vanyel was such a larger-than-life hero to Valdemar (one whose gayness was both crucial and undeniable), homophobia in modern-day Valdemar is considered by most modern main characters to be somewhere between stupid and softly treasonous/un-Valdemaran. So like, yes, the road there isn't GREAT necessarily, but Lackey's determination to write LGBT characters with pathos and compassion PLUS the fact that we end up with a setting where one of the country's biggest national heroes was undeniably unambiguously gay means it's a pretty fuckin' small price to pay tbqh.
As for the books themselves? I don't really know, it's kinda hard to recommend them without caveats. I read these suckers when I was sixteen, buying them with gas station credit cards and reading them on my phone at church while my parents were in the choir (it sounds so much more dramatic than it felt, looking back on it) and they were a bright spot in my teenhood that I thought about a lot, with the teenage point of view being pretty much pitch-perfect teen writing. But like, can I recommend them easily, nowadays? It's hard to say - I can't really give a hard answer on how it'd be to read them as an adult, since my first exposure to them was when I was still in high school, but at the same time it's hard to say "go buy this" to modern teens since, uh, they have a lot more cool, great LGBT fiction on hand than I did. (like a LOT more, I rag on adults who consume nothing but YA a lot but the modern explosion of rad gay and trans YA is an unambiguous good for kids)
Valdemar is kind of a comfort setting for me, full of people fundamentally kinda trying their best to make the world a better place and fighting against shadowy villains in grand battles. I think it'll always have a place in my heart. Even if I can't readily recommend it to people, this trilogy is special to me and a bunch of guys like me, and maybe that's enough.