Subject: Mary Gentle

From: [email-masked] (Joan Frankel)
Date: 1 Jun 90 23:24:45 GMT

I'd like to recommend 2 books by the above author; the first,
"Golden Witchbreed", is best described as thoughtful & well-crafted
but owing a lot in inspiration & features of cultural
description to Ursula LeGuin's ""Left Hand of Darkness"; 
the 2nd, "Ancient Light", while being technically a sequel to the first,
owes nothing to anything except perhaps first-hand-seeming experience of
a conflict like the current middle-east situation, and is best described as
frighteningly realistic, hauntingly memorable & exceptionally well-written.
I haven't read that it was even nominated for any awards; in my
opinion it should have received them.

Golden Witchbreed

Ignore the misleading title; no witchy-magicky stuff in the book at 
all; title could more accurately be "Ambassador to the Planet of the
Technophobes", but as that's not very catchy, I can see why they wound up
with Witchbreed. Witchbreed is the term the predominant culture on said planet
uses to refer to suspected genetic descendants of the technologically superior
race that enslaved & genetically manipulated them several thousand years
previous to the period in which the novel is set.

The features of the planetary inhabitants which are reminiscent of "Left Hand"
are not direct borrowing but rather, skilled variation on a theme;
the features of the plot which are reminiscent of "Left Hand", such as having
the protagonist be a human ambassador & having a long trek across a vast
wasteland occur mid-novel, were hardly coined by LeGuin; however,
having similarities to "Left Hand" in so many areas gives "Witchbreed" a
derivative feel at first.

In my opinion, "Witchbreed" is far more thoughful, more carefully written
& better plotted than "Left Hand" & is the better novel of the two, but
"Left Hand" did come first.

Ancient Light

The planet of "Witchbreed" revisited 10 years (or 8 native years) later;
the ambassador of the former book is now a cultural liason officer for one
of those large-multiplanetary-conglomerates we all know & loathe.  This
change-of-job is a necessary plot device, not a change-of-heart, but everyone
else in said conglomerate is doing their level best to sell technology to
the technophobes while simultaneously prying into what they're so phobic
about, for its potential resale value.

The novel has a lot to show about the expediency of using "the enemy of my
enemy is my friend" as a viable tactic in economic & political gamesmanship,
and about the advisability of ignoring inconvenient populations.
I may be reading the middle-east analogy in where it doesn't belong,
but as the book early-on takes on a similarity to 
"every-day life in East Beirut", its hard not to do so.

A quite admirable aspect of "Ancient Light" is that scenes from
"Witchbreed" are referred to for appropriate wistful reminiscence but never
re-created in situ. This is difficult for an author in love with the world
they've created to avoid, judging from the many books I've read which are in
whole or in large part clones of their prequels in not only atmospheric stuff
but plot itself.  Gentle avoids that trap remarkably well. 
In fact, she effectively re-casts some of "Witchbreed"'s major atmospheric stuff
& some essential background detail to give it the power it must have
for its use in "Ancient Light".

"Ancient Light" suffers in its early segments from some obvious plot
 manipulations, but they're forgiveable (& forgotten) by the end.
I'm still thinking about this book months after ending it; rare for any book.