Review of Brust's Sethra Lavode
Jun. 6th, 2004 08:42 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
zdashamberBack in April, I mentioned a spate of reading. The best of that, and still on track for "best book all year" is Steven Brust's Sethra Lavode.
Sethra Lavode had the best climax I can, off the top of my head, think of. In a few spare lines, possible to miss, Brust instantly shifts everything that went before into a different light. The climax sets up the denouement; not just an action scene at an appropriate moment, but the answer to the problem of The Viscount of Adrilhanka's plot. I was wondering how he'd pull it off; he did it without a hint of cheapness, in a way that deepened his characters immensely. It's just beautiful.
I enjoyed the philosophical aspects of Sethra Lavode. Brust grasps honor, and romance and duty and love and decency, and he knits his books through with them. Sethra had more of this, and more satisfying, than I remember from the first two books of the Viscount. A bit that particularly resonated with me:
I think back to people eager to invent and cling to faults in Brust's character, and I shouldn't wonder if it was because he made them uncomfortable.
I hadn't really liked the first two books of The Viscount of Adrilhanka as much as the previous books in the Khaavren series... They covered more with less plot, so I didn't care about the newer generation of characters as much; and for the older generation, I felt so bad for Khaavren. The final book resolves that last issue, and it has more plot than the previous two books. While still not, perhaps, as good as The Phoenix Guards or Five Hundred Years After, Sethra Lavode is a fitting cap to the Khaavren series.
Sethra Lavode had the best climax I can, off the top of my head, think of. In a few spare lines, possible to miss, Brust instantly shifts everything that went before into a different light. The climax sets up the denouement; not just an action scene at an appropriate moment, but the answer to the problem of The Viscount of Adrilhanka's plot. I was wondering how he'd pull it off; he did it without a hint of cheapness, in a way that deepened his characters immensely. It's just beautiful.
I enjoyed the philosophical aspects of Sethra Lavode. Brust grasps honor, and romance and duty and love and decency, and he knits his books through with them. Sethra had more of this, and more satisfying, than I remember from the first two books of the Viscount. A bit that particularly resonated with me:
"This is insupportable."
"Not in the least."
"I believe you are doing yourself the honor of disputing with me, Captain."
"Your Majesty has accused my friend of an action that is manifestly impossible for him to have committed, and moreover, have expelled him from beneath my roof. Does Your Majesty truly believe that a gentleman can be expected to countenance such behavior? If so, I fear for the Empire under Your Majesty's hand, because it will be a poor sort of court and a poor sort of Empire that it governs."
In an instant, the Empress was on her feet. "Captain! How dare you!". . .
"Now you give me the lie?" cried Zerika, quite nearly hysterical.
"Not in the least; Your Majesty is mistaken, that is all."
Zerika took two deep breaths in a failed effort to overcome her wrath, and said, "Tell me, Sir Khaavren; did you speak to your last master in this fashion?"
"His Majesty Tortaalik? No, Your Majesty. Never."
"And why do I receive such treatment when he did not?"
"Because he was small, and weak, and mean. I do him honor for having done his best, but he could never become more than he was, so it was useless to treat him with respect."
"You call this treating me with respect?". . .
"Cracks and shards! If I were my illustrious ancestor, Zerika the First, who founded the Empire, why, what would you do then? Pull your ear at me?"
"I should have treated her with the same respect I show Your Majesty, and for the same reason."
"What reason is that?"
"Because Your Majesty has the potential for greatness—for real greatness. I have seen it in your managing of diplomacies, and in your conversations with subordinates, and, even now, when Your Majesty feels she has been treated in a way no person, much less an Empress, ought to be treated, Your Majesty attempts to control her temper and be just and fair, looking past the extraordinary provocation."
I think back to people eager to invent and cling to faults in Brust's character, and I shouldn't wonder if it was because he made them uncomfortable.
I hadn't really liked the first two books of The Viscount of Adrilhanka as much as the previous books in the Khaavren series... They covered more with less plot, so I didn't care about the newer generation of characters as much; and for the older generation, I felt so bad for Khaavren. The final book resolves that last issue, and it has more plot than the previous two books. While still not, perhaps, as good as The Phoenix Guards or Five Hundred Years After, Sethra Lavode is a fitting cap to the Khaavren series.