SH Comments
Reged: Feb 16 2004
Posts: 1056
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This thread is for comments about Illuminating Sensuality's Shadow: The Kushiel Trilogy by Jacqueline Carey, reviewed by J.G. Stinson.
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jans
New user
Reged: Mar 08 2004
Posts: 4
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It's interesting to me that there have been over 500 views of this topic, but not one post beyond the introductory one and this one. I'm only responsible for a few of those views, so what's up with the rest of you folks?
I'd like to know if anyone has specific comments on the review, since I wrote it. ;)
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Dawn B
Regular reader
Reged: Mar 31 2004
Posts: 32
Loc: Bay Area, California
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Well, I just clicked through for the first time having seen there was a comment other than the orignal post.
Zhaneel
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Anonymous
Unregistered
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Okay, I'll comment.
I got through about 600 pages of the first paperback. Though I was drawn in by the sumptuousness of the language, I had trouble getting around the ethnocentricity. Sure, the character would be rather ethnocentric when faced with the northern tribes. However, the ethnocentrism (of the first book anyway) is not limited to character perspective. Beauty is cultural. That all the men look at her with hunger and all the women with envy seems a stretch. I'm reminded of the scene in "The Gods Must Be Crazy" where the white woman was certain that the natives wanted her (don't all natives want the lovely white women?), but the narration reveals that the men are repulsed by this white pasty creature with skin like "something that lives under a rock."
To be honest, I was looking for more to differentiate it from erotic fiction. More magical elements, perhaps? The Master of the Straits is the closest it gets. It's a wonderful, luscious, imaginative example of erotic fiction with a few fantastical elements. I was hoping for imaginative fiction with erotic elements.
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Auros
Reviews Editor
Reged: Oct 15 2003
Posts: 8
Loc: Palo Alto, CA
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Just so you know, you get a lot more of the Master, as well as other magical elements, in the final book.
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R Michael "Auros" Harman
Senior Reviews Editor
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alyse
New user
Reged: Dec 09 2007
Posts: 1
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Quote:
However, the ethnocentrism (of the first book anyway) is not limited to character perspective. Beauty is cultural. That all the men look at her with hunger and all the women with envy seems a stretch.
The beauty of the d'Angelines comes from their angelic ancestry (which, if you noticed, is a fantasy element itself), and since divinity is supposed to be universal, it seems that the beauty of the d'Angelines is as well. In the book you mentioned, it makes sense that the men would find a white woman too strange to be attractive, but the Norse-like Skaldics in the book are also white, and look similar to the d'Angelines. The difference is that the d'Angelines tend to have symmetrical faces, particularly lustrous hair, bright eyes, etc; all of which are, even in our own culture, considered markings of attractiveness.
So...if her own compatriots find her beautiful, I don't see why the Skaldics wouldn't, especially as their nation's identifying factor is exceptional divine beauty.
Oh and...Phedre (the narrator) mentions that she herself finds the Skaldic man, Selig, attractive, and some of the women as well. Melisande's son marries a beautiful Alban woman, has affairs with beautiful women in Tiberium, an Alban prince marries a Skaldic woman, etc. So it goes both ways.
Also, if you read the whole series, there's more fantasy incorporated; dark priests about to take over the world through human sacrifice, much more of the Master of the Straits, the Albans who also have precognition, a certain Alban tribe who can transform into bears, etc etc.
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