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The Moon and the Sun
In seventeenth-century France, Louis XIV rules with flamboyant ambition. In his domain, wealth and beauty take all; frivolity begets cruelty; science and alchemy collide. From the Hall of Mirrors to the vermin-infested attics of the Chateau at Versailles, courtiers compete to please the king, sacrificing fortune, principles, and even the sacred bond between brother and sister. By the fiftieth year of his reign, Louis XIV has made France the most powerful state in the western world. Yet the Sun King's appetite for glory knows no bounds. In a bold stroke, he sends his natural philosopher on an expedition to seek the source of immortality -- the rare, perhaps mythical, sea monsters. For the glory, of his God, his country, and his king, Father Yves de la Croix returns with his treasures: one heavy shroud packed in ice...and a covered basin that imprisons a shrieking creature.
432 pages, Hardcover
First published September 1, 1997
About the author
Vonda N. McIntyre
149 books354 followersVonda Neel McIntyre was a U.S. science fiction author. She was one of the first successful graduates of the Clarion Science fiction writers workshop. She attended the workshop in 1970. By 1973 she had won her first Nebula Award, for the novelette "Of Mist, and Grass and Sand." This later became part of the novel Dreamsnake, which won both the Hugo and Nebula Awards. The novelette and novel both concern a female healer in a desolate primitivized venue. McIntyre's debut novel was The Exile Waiting which was published in 1975. Her novel Dreamsnake won the Nebula Award and Hugo Award for best novel in 1978 and her novel The Moon and the Sun won the Nebula in 1997. She has also written a number of Star Trek and Star Wars novels, including Enterprise: The First Adventure and The Entropy Effect. She wrote the novelizations of the films Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan, Star Trek III: The Search for Spock, and Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 269 reviews
July 15, 2022
Boring and predictable story of a naive girl, who befriends with a mermaid and through that friendship unravels the injustice and cruelty of the world and people she admired. At first I couldn't understand what this book resembles until I've read that it was made into a lousy movie (which only took some parts of the book). It has very little fantasy and way more French court description - you'll find a lot of political intrigues and rivalry rather than magic. So it may be of interest for those who like historical novels, but will have a feeling like you've already read something like it before many times.
February 20, 2022
3 and a half stars. A charming alternate history fantasy that unfortunately, lacks focus.
Apparently, "The Moon and the Sun" won the Nebula in 1997, beating "Game of Thrones" for the title! This puzzles me a bit: I enjoyed Martin's over the top high fantasy, but was it better than this slightly confused novel? I don't know.
Near the end of the Sun King's reign, a Jesuit priest is dispatched on a scientific mission for his majesty: there have been rumours of sea monsters, and Louis XIV wants one for his menagerie. Father Yves de la Croix brings back two of those creatures to Versaille, one dead for dissection, and one living, who is put in Apollo's Fountain, to entertain the nobles and for him to study. In this task, he is aided by his sister, Marie-Josèphe, who after living in a convent for many years, is getting her first taste of the luxurious but confusing and complicated life at court. It eventually becomes apparent to Marie-Josèphe, that the sea monster they have captured is no animal, but an intelligent being, a sea-woman who had a family and a life before she was captured. It will also become apparent that curiosity is not the King's only motivation...
The plot is interesting, and there are some very powerful moments in this novel, but the themes are all over the place, and there is enough of a historical romance underlying the mermaid's story that it felt occasionally cliched and predictable. The prose was good, but it lacked atmosphere; there were numerous descriptions of the court and the palace, and yet I never felt dazzled by what I read - and yet the Sun King's court magnificence is not exactly a secret.
Marie-Josèphe's excess of naive innocence drove me totally insane: the Daphne Bridgertons of this world make me want to smack them across the face. I think I would have preferred her if she had been a libertine. Lucien was my favourite character, but I am starting to wonder when the stereotype of the disabled bon-vivant started, because I feel like there have been variations on that ad nauseum over the past 20 years. Given that Peter Dinklage is currently playing Cyrano de Bergerac, guess who I pictured as I read?
Overall, an entertaining little book that fails to live up to it's reputation. A movie adaptation came out in 2022, but from what I read, they changed so many details that it's more like "vaguely inspired by" than "adapted from". I'll still probably check it out because I am curious to see Pierce Brosnan as Louis.
Apparently, "The Moon and the Sun" won the Nebula in 1997, beating "Game of Thrones" for the title! This puzzles me a bit: I enjoyed Martin's over the top high fantasy, but was it better than this slightly confused novel? I don't know.
Near the end of the Sun King's reign, a Jesuit priest is dispatched on a scientific mission for his majesty: there have been rumours of sea monsters, and Louis XIV wants one for his menagerie. Father Yves de la Croix brings back two of those creatures to Versaille, one dead for dissection, and one living, who is put in Apollo's Fountain, to entertain the nobles and for him to study. In this task, he is aided by his sister, Marie-Josèphe, who after living in a convent for many years, is getting her first taste of the luxurious but confusing and complicated life at court. It eventually becomes apparent to Marie-Josèphe, that the sea monster they have captured is no animal, but an intelligent being, a sea-woman who had a family and a life before she was captured. It will also become apparent that curiosity is not the King's only motivation...
The plot is interesting, and there are some very powerful moments in this novel, but the themes are all over the place, and there is enough of a historical romance underlying the mermaid's story that it felt occasionally cliched and predictable. The prose was good, but it lacked atmosphere; there were numerous descriptions of the court and the palace, and yet I never felt dazzled by what I read - and yet the Sun King's court magnificence is not exactly a secret.
Marie-Josèphe's excess of naive innocence drove me totally insane: the Daphne Bridgertons of this world make me want to smack them across the face. I think I would have preferred her if she had been a libertine. Lucien was my favourite character, but I am starting to wonder when the stereotype of the disabled bon-vivant started, because I feel like there have been variations on that ad nauseum over the past 20 years. Given that Peter Dinklage is currently playing Cyrano de Bergerac, guess who I pictured as I read?
Overall, an entertaining little book that fails to live up to it's reputation. A movie adaptation came out in 2022, but from what I read, they changed so many details that it's more like "vaguely inspired by" than "adapted from". I'll still probably check it out because I am curious to see Pierce Brosnan as Louis.
September 7, 2014
For quite a while, I was convinced I'd already read this book - but then I realized I'd confused it title-wise, with Patricia McKillip's "The Moon and the Face." Not the same book at all.
Here, we are thrown into the court of Louis XIV. Our protagonist, Marie-Josephe, is a very low-ranking member of this court, an absurdly sheltered girl, straight from a hellish stint in a convent. However, she's scholarly and intelligent by nature, and is more than enthusiastic to assist her brother, a priest and naturalist, in the task sponsored by the King himself: an expedition to capture, display and dissect sea monsters. Sea monsters are rare, already hunted nigh to extinction, as legend has it that eating their flesh will confer immortality.
The priest has succeeded in capturing two of the monsters - one dead, one alive. Marie-Josephe is given the task of feeding the living monster, a female. She balances these duties with the demands of the court, and her growing moral discomfort regarding her slave and childhood companion, the Turkish woman known as Odelette. As she becomes familiar with the captive 'monster,' she begins to realize that the mermaid is just as human as herself.
The book starts rather slowly and confusingly. I rarely have to refer to a list of 'dramatis personae,' but I did find myself consulting the one provided here. However, it really picked up as it went on, and the novel's themes emerged. The narrative grew into a powerful and complex musing on freedom, oppression, and the nature of humanity.
* It reminded me quite a bit of the short story I read recently: Miss Carstairs and the Merman - Delia Sherman.
* It also features a much-shorter-than-average noble who excels at court politics, for the Tyrion Lannister fans. (Lucien's a bit nicer than Tyrion, though.)
[note 9/7/14 - I just found out a movie is in production, based on this novel. I very much doubt they'll capture either the atmosphere or the complexities... but, we shall see! http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2328678/ ]
Here, we are thrown into the court of Louis XIV. Our protagonist, Marie-Josephe, is a very low-ranking member of this court, an absurdly sheltered girl, straight from a hellish stint in a convent. However, she's scholarly and intelligent by nature, and is more than enthusiastic to assist her brother, a priest and naturalist, in the task sponsored by the King himself: an expedition to capture, display and dissect sea monsters. Sea monsters are rare, already hunted nigh to extinction, as legend has it that eating their flesh will confer immortality.
The priest has succeeded in capturing two of the monsters - one dead, one alive. Marie-Josephe is given the task of feeding the living monster, a female. She balances these duties with the demands of the court, and her growing moral discomfort regarding her slave and childhood companion, the Turkish woman known as Odelette. As she becomes familiar with the captive 'monster,' she begins to realize that the mermaid is just as human as herself.
The book starts rather slowly and confusingly. I rarely have to refer to a list of 'dramatis personae,' but I did find myself consulting the one provided here. However, it really picked up as it went on, and the novel's themes emerged. The narrative grew into a powerful and complex musing on freedom, oppression, and the nature of humanity.
* It reminded me quite a bit of the short story I read recently: Miss Carstairs and the Merman - Delia Sherman.
* It also features a much-shorter-than-average noble who excels at court politics, for the Tyrion Lannister fans. (Lucien's a bit nicer than Tyrion, though.)
[note 9/7/14 - I just found out a movie is in production, based on this novel. I very much doubt they'll capture either the atmosphere or the complexities... but, we shall see! http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2328678/ ]
August 1, 2019
I'm sorry to damn with faint praise, but this was a perfectly fine book.
It's the sort of thing that I'm might've found much more interesting as a teenager, but alas, I have aged out of the bracket. I suppose I'm surprised by how middling this book was because it won the Nebula Award in 1998. It's hard to believe that this was the best that fantasy had to offer for the whole year (although, to be fair, it was up against Game of Thrones, which I also found to be a perfectly enjoyable beach read. So maybe that really was the standard for the year).
Read it if you enjoy these sorts of things:
-Beautiful, talented, idealistic, under-appreciated, low social status, teenage heroine
-Historical fiction with a fair amount of description of dresses
-Evil Churchmen; noble atheists
-Evil, but devilishly attractive, aristocrats with a sexual interest in the heroine
-In fact, an awful lot of aristocrats, all having at least two names and one title
-Mythical seamonsters and enlightenment science
-Various moral dilemmas over slavery, sexism, organised religion that are all resolved with the characters we love reaching the correct moral conclusions (spoiler: they are bad)
-Mysterious parentage
It's the sort of thing that I'm might've found much more interesting as a teenager, but alas, I have aged out of the bracket. I suppose I'm surprised by how middling this book was because it won the Nebula Award in 1998. It's hard to believe that this was the best that fantasy had to offer for the whole year (although, to be fair, it was up against Game of Thrones, which I also found to be a perfectly enjoyable beach read. So maybe that really was the standard for the year).
Read it if you enjoy these sorts of things:
-Beautiful, talented, idealistic, under-appreciated, low social status, teenage heroine
-Historical fiction with a fair amount of description of dresses
-Evil Churchmen; noble atheists
-Evil, but devilishly attractive, aristocrats with a sexual interest in the heroine
-In fact, an awful lot of aristocrats, all having at least two names and one title
-Mythical seamonsters and enlightenment science
-Various moral dilemmas over slavery, sexism, organised religion that are all resolved with the characters we love reaching the correct moral conclusions (spoiler: they are bad)
-Mysterious parentage
August 23, 2021
2.5 stars
Interestingly, when this book was published in 1997, it won the Nebula, over such contenders as King's Dragon and A Game of Thrones. While I didn’t think much of this book, I also don’t necessarily disapprove: a literary award shouldn’t be a popularity contest, and this book—about the Enlightenment as seen through the plight of a captured “sea monster” (mermaid) at the court of Louis XIV—definitely broke the mold of most fantasy published at the time, and perhaps also has more to say than its competitors. Or maybe it just feels like it does because it declares all its opinions with such simplistic boldness.
But certainly, The Moon and the Sun is chock-full of themes, from the way humans treat other creatures, to the cult of the king (which gets a lot of play here in all its bizarre weirdness, people genuflecting to his portrait and so on), to the perfidy of organized religion (I’d have found this more meaningful in 1997—when making one of your most moral characters an atheist was a striking statement—than in 2021), to the ways women’s talents in early modern Europe were suppressed, to the falseness of appearances.
In 1693, a young lady-in-waiting new to Versailles, Marie-Josèphe, is thrilled when her Jesuit brother arrives, having successfully captured one live sea monster and brought one dead one for dissection and study. Marie-Josèphe takes responsibility for feeding and training the sea monster, which she assumes to be akin to a dolphin. But when she suddenly starts understanding its songs, she is on a mission to save it from the king, who believes eating it will assure him immortality.
A couple of positives. First, the author has clearly done her research into her setting. Second, she can keep a scene moving even when there isn’t a lot of action. The first half of this book is basically all setup, with Marie-Josèphe going about her business interacting with various people, but I did at least keep reading, if sometimes reluctantly. The second half, with its higher stakes, is more entertaining. On the other hand, it’s rather melodramatic; as a couple other reviewers have noted, the characters sometimes feel as if they’re over-acting. Marie-Josèphe’s sudden magical ability to understand another language (in a book without magic) is better glossed over entirely, and the flurry of mysterious-parentage revelations, none of them crucial to the plot, is bizarre.
Marie-Josèphe, in particular, is a heroine that does very little for me. She’s your typical naïve, idealistic, beautiful, multi-talented, yet bland young woman, who combines blushing shyness with a propensity to loudly declare her convictions without a thought for strategy or consequences. This being a default heroine type in historical fiction, with spillover into fantasy, obviously many readers do enjoy it. But defaults bore me, and this character is no exception. If she must heedlessly speak truth to power, she’d be more interesting if she were generally bold and daring, well-acquainted with the birds and the bees, the one introducing the young ladies of Versailles to tobacco rather than the one silently hoping they’ll offer her a puff (they don’t). Or if she must be a naïve people-pleaser, then how about having her work to convince the king of the sea woman’s humanity through a subtler strategy that a shy young woman might actually use? Publicly challenging him is actually a terrible plan, though I suppose readers tend to value that sort of thoughtless boldness.
Also unhelpfully, while we’re told Marie-Josèphe wants a wide variety of things (a brilliant marriage, a career as a scientist or mathematician, brand-new fancy dresses, children of her own, recognition for her artistic skills), I didn’t really feel her yearning for any of it. While the idea of a woman “having it all” is much-discussed, this probably makes more sense as a goal for a character who’s on her way to at least having some of it. Marie-Josèphe has nothing and references to these various, disparate goals and dreams mostly left me confused about her real priorities. But then, prioritizing some goals over others would perhaps work against the point of a default character, which is that everyone relates to her (I’ve never really understood this one. I don’t relate to boring people).
Back to the simplistic treatment of themes, there’s also a bizarre subplot dealing with Marie-Josèphe’s family’s slave girl, Odelette, with whom Marie-Josèphe is close. Odelette reappears in Marie-Josèphe’s life at the beginning of the novel for the first time in several years (they were in a convent and kept apart from ages 15 to 20). Despite their purported closeness, they don’t seem to feel any need to actually catch up with one another. Odelette, who seems awfully self-actualized and full of righteous indignation for a slave in 1693, eventually confronts Marie-Josèphe about her status. Marie-Josèphe suggests for approximately 30 seconds that Odelette might be better off as her slave than on her own, but when Odelette scorns that idea, Marie-Josèphe promptly agrees to free her. Her brother’s later argument that this girl is their only asset spurs no regrets or second thoughts. Well, I’m glad to know that slavery is such an easy and simple matter that it can be resolved in a conversation. Odelette then decides to stick around for the moment anyway, but in her next scene, announces that she’s now a Muslim and her new name is Haleed. Marie-Josèphe accepts this without any reaction whatsoever, never messes up the name even in her own thoughts, and has no feelings or reservations about the Muslim thing even though she’s a sheltered young Catholic woman in 1693 who’s presumably never met a Muslim (for that matter, has Haleed?). I think Marie-Josèphe must be intended as an avatar of wokeness (from before that was a word), but it mostly comes across like Odelette/Haleed is just a childhood friend she wants to do right by but doesn’t actually have the bandwidth to spend any emotion on. The book would’ve been fine without this weird subplot.
For that matter, it also would’ve been better without the Pope appearing in person, officially visiting Versailles to confirm a treaty, but in plot function, to repeatedly denounce Marie-Josèphe’s unwomanly ways. I don’t buy an innocent young convent-bred girl backtalking the Pope, publicly and repeatedly, after he’s already shot her down.
At any rate, I don’t exactly recommend this, but if you’re looking for a work of plot-driven if leisurely-paced historical fantasy that wears its heart and its opinions on its sleeves, it might be what you’re looking for.
Interestingly, when this book was published in 1997, it won the Nebula, over such contenders as King's Dragon and A Game of Thrones. While I didn’t think much of this book, I also don’t necessarily disapprove: a literary award shouldn’t be a popularity contest, and this book—about the Enlightenment as seen through the plight of a captured “sea monster” (mermaid) at the court of Louis XIV—definitely broke the mold of most fantasy published at the time, and perhaps also has more to say than its competitors. Or maybe it just feels like it does because it declares all its opinions with such simplistic boldness.
But certainly, The Moon and the Sun is chock-full of themes, from the way humans treat other creatures, to the cult of the king (which gets a lot of play here in all its bizarre weirdness, people genuflecting to his portrait and so on), to the perfidy of organized religion (I’d have found this more meaningful in 1997—when making one of your most moral characters an atheist was a striking statement—than in 2021), to the ways women’s talents in early modern Europe were suppressed, to the falseness of appearances.
In 1693, a young lady-in-waiting new to Versailles, Marie-Josèphe, is thrilled when her Jesuit brother arrives, having successfully captured one live sea monster and brought one dead one for dissection and study. Marie-Josèphe takes responsibility for feeding and training the sea monster, which she assumes to be akin to a dolphin. But when she suddenly starts understanding its songs, she is on a mission to save it from the king, who believes eating it will assure him immortality.
A couple of positives. First, the author has clearly done her research into her setting. Second, she can keep a scene moving even when there isn’t a lot of action. The first half of this book is basically all setup, with Marie-Josèphe going about her business interacting with various people, but I did at least keep reading, if sometimes reluctantly. The second half, with its higher stakes, is more entertaining. On the other hand, it’s rather melodramatic; as a couple other reviewers have noted, the characters sometimes feel as if they’re over-acting. Marie-Josèphe’s sudden magical ability to understand another language (in a book without magic) is better glossed over entirely, and the flurry of mysterious-parentage revelations, none of them crucial to the plot, is bizarre.
Marie-Josèphe, in particular, is a heroine that does very little for me. She’s your typical naïve, idealistic, beautiful, multi-talented, yet bland young woman, who combines blushing shyness with a propensity to loudly declare her convictions without a thought for strategy or consequences. This being a default heroine type in historical fiction, with spillover into fantasy, obviously many readers do enjoy it. But defaults bore me, and this character is no exception. If she must heedlessly speak truth to power, she’d be more interesting if she were generally bold and daring, well-acquainted with the birds and the bees, the one introducing the young ladies of Versailles to tobacco rather than the one silently hoping they’ll offer her a puff (they don’t). Or if she must be a naïve people-pleaser, then how about having her work to convince the king of the sea woman’s humanity through a subtler strategy that a shy young woman might actually use? Publicly challenging him is actually a terrible plan, though I suppose readers tend to value that sort of thoughtless boldness.
Also unhelpfully, while we’re told Marie-Josèphe wants a wide variety of things (a brilliant marriage, a career as a scientist or mathematician, brand-new fancy dresses, children of her own, recognition for her artistic skills), I didn’t really feel her yearning for any of it. While the idea of a woman “having it all” is much-discussed, this probably makes more sense as a goal for a character who’s on her way to at least having some of it. Marie-Josèphe has nothing and references to these various, disparate goals and dreams mostly left me confused about her real priorities. But then, prioritizing some goals over others would perhaps work against the point of a default character, which is that everyone relates to her (I’ve never really understood this one. I don’t relate to boring people).
Back to the simplistic treatment of themes, there’s also a bizarre subplot dealing with Marie-Josèphe’s family’s slave girl, Odelette, with whom Marie-Josèphe is close. Odelette reappears in Marie-Josèphe’s life at the beginning of the novel for the first time in several years (they were in a convent and kept apart from ages 15 to 20). Despite their purported closeness, they don’t seem to feel any need to actually catch up with one another. Odelette, who seems awfully self-actualized and full of righteous indignation for a slave in 1693, eventually confronts Marie-Josèphe about her status. Marie-Josèphe suggests for approximately 30 seconds that Odelette might be better off as her slave than on her own, but when Odelette scorns that idea, Marie-Josèphe promptly agrees to free her. Her brother’s later argument that this girl is their only asset spurs no regrets or second thoughts. Well, I’m glad to know that slavery is such an easy and simple matter that it can be resolved in a conversation. Odelette then decides to stick around for the moment anyway, but in her next scene, announces that she’s now a Muslim and her new name is Haleed. Marie-Josèphe accepts this without any reaction whatsoever, never messes up the name even in her own thoughts, and has no feelings or reservations about the Muslim thing even though she’s a sheltered young Catholic woman in 1693 who’s presumably never met a Muslim (for that matter, has Haleed?). I think Marie-Josèphe must be intended as an avatar of wokeness (from before that was a word), but it mostly comes across like Odelette/Haleed is just a childhood friend she wants to do right by but doesn’t actually have the bandwidth to spend any emotion on. The book would’ve been fine without this weird subplot.
For that matter, it also would’ve been better without the Pope appearing in person, officially visiting Versailles to confirm a treaty, but in plot function, to repeatedly denounce Marie-Josèphe’s unwomanly ways. I don’t buy an innocent young convent-bred girl backtalking the Pope, publicly and repeatedly, after he’s already shot her down.
At any rate, I don’t exactly recommend this, but if you’re looking for a work of plot-driven if leisurely-paced historical fantasy that wears its heart and its opinions on its sleeves, it might be what you’re looking for.
January 6, 2022
It's a little bit specious to quibble with a historical fantasy novel, where they keep a sea monster in the Fountain of Apollo at Versailles, for not being realistic enough. (UPDATE: It turns out I was wrong on all counts. See below for details.)
But that's exactly what I'm going to do.
I want to state first of all, though, that I loved this book. The characters were well done and, despite warnings in other reviews, I had no trouble keeping all the characters and their names straight. McIntyre did a stupendous job. I loved all the historical detail, and enjoyed the arc of the book. I very much appreciated her "what if sea monsters really were real" and logical extrapolation from there.
The way she portrayed the "monsters" and their culture, biology, and behavior, did not challenge my suspension of belief in the slightest.
What did were two small, but niggling, implausibilities. First, I can't find any dimensions online for how big the basin of the Fountain of Apollo is, but I sincerely doubt it is large enough for a sea monster of the described size to both "lurk" and to charge up out of the water in a full-body leap. Sea could be launching off the bottom, but that would make the "lurking" challenging, no matter how murky the water is.
I was also about to call nonsense on the idea of zebras pulling a carriage. I have known several zebras--one of whom nearly savaged a keeper--and felt that it was ludicrous to imagine them docilely pulling a carriage. However, it appears I was wrong on that point. So I learned something! That's cool. (But I bet those were geldings or mares. The zebra who bit off a finger was a stallion. And a young one, at that.)
I stand by the depth of the pool thing, though, unless someone has some alternative arguments.
But all that aside, this was a wonderful, engrossing book, and you should read it.
EDITED to ADD: I was wrong about the depth of the pool. Having just been to Versailles and taken a good look at the Fountain of Apollo, I think you could keep a sea monster in there easily, and that said monster could both "lurk" and leap.
But that's exactly what I'm going to do.
I want to state first of all, though, that I loved this book. The characters were well done and, despite warnings in other reviews, I had no trouble keeping all the characters and their names straight. McIntyre did a stupendous job. I loved all the historical detail, and enjoyed the arc of the book. I very much appreciated her "what if sea monsters really were real" and logical extrapolation from there.
The way she portrayed the "monsters" and their culture, biology, and behavior, did not challenge my suspension of belief in the slightest.
What did were two small, but niggling, implausibilities. First, I can't find any dimensions online for how big the basin of the Fountain of Apollo is, but I sincerely doubt it is large enough for a sea monster of the described size to both "lurk" and to charge up out of the water in a full-body leap. Sea could be launching off the bottom, but that would make the "lurking" challenging, no matter how murky the water is.
I was also about to call nonsense on the idea of zebras pulling a carriage. I have known several zebras--one of whom nearly savaged a keeper--and felt that it was ludicrous to imagine them docilely pulling a carriage. However, it appears I was wrong on that point. So I learned something! That's cool. (But I bet those were geldings or mares. The zebra who bit off a finger was a stallion. And a young one, at that.)
I stand by the depth of the pool thing, though, unless someone has some alternative arguments.
But all that aside, this was a wonderful, engrossing book, and you should read it.
EDITED to ADD: I was wrong about the depth of the pool. Having just been to Versailles and taken a good look at the Fountain of Apollo, I think you could keep a sea monster in there easily, and that said monster could both "lurk" and leap.
January 8, 2012
Vonda N. McIntyre's thrilling historical fantasy introduces an entirely unexpected hero: Lucien, Count de Chrétien, war hero, personal advisor to King Louis XIV of France, second most powerful man at court, and well-schooled in the arts of love. Lucien is also a dwarf. But as the only character moral enough to assist the heroine at her impossible task, he sets a standard by which more conventional fictional heroes shrink in comparison. A "sea monster" is captured and delivered into the decadent court of the "Sun King." Young Marie-Josèphe, newly arrived at court, discovers that despite its leathery skin and twin fishtails, the creature is a variety of human — a "sea woman," telling stories of her people in haunting songs that only Marie-Josèphe understands. Marie-Josèphe plots to win the sea woman her freedom before the creature winds up an entrée on Louis' dinner plate. Her only ally is Lucien. What they risk for each other, and what they gain, gives the story resonance, while shifting perceptions of beauty, monstrosity and morality glimmer like phosphorescence on a moonlit sea.
November 6, 2012
This is not at all a bad novel--the fact it won a Nebula attests to that--but somehow I never really warmed to it.
The history is lavishly researched and beautifully depicted--Versailles at its height makes a fantastic backdrop. The maybe-alt-history works very nicely as well. Marie-Josephe, the protagonist, gets an increasingly sweet love story, and the ending comes together nicely with everyone getting what's coming to them.
But I never really warmed to any of the characters. Part of the problem, which the author confesses in an afterword, is that the sheer number of names that each courtier (most of them real life historical personages) answers to makes it really difficult to keep them all straight at the beginning. She tries, but I had enormous difficulties keeping Chartres, Lorraine, and Lucien straight for the first several chapters, which caused a lot of trouble in sorting out various motivations. Marie-Josephe's brother, Yves, is entirely unlikeable until the very end.
And the protagonist herself is just too Mary Sue-ish for my taste. She can do everything better than anyone else--draw, compose, do math, ride, talk to sea monsters--but she spends the vast majority of the novel passionately and carelessly acting in ways that make others condemn her. I think we're supposed to feel sorry for her that no matter how hard she tries, people take it the wrong way, but I just kind of felt like she was an idiot. She seems to warp people's characters as she approaches so that they will alternately fawn over her and persecute her in the way calculated to most tug our heartstrings at any given second.
The flurry of revelations of the parentages of not one but two characters near the end also strains the bounds of credulity.
These are sins I've happily forgiven in other books, and will not fully condemn even here. But the sum total resulted me in feeling rather cold about the whole thing. The flaws are not egregious, but despite the fact that I love fantasy and well-researched history, this ended up just not being my thing.
The history is lavishly researched and beautifully depicted--Versailles at its height makes a fantastic backdrop. The maybe-alt-history works very nicely as well. Marie-Josephe, the protagonist, gets an increasingly sweet love story, and the ending comes together nicely with everyone getting what's coming to them.
But I never really warmed to any of the characters. Part of the problem, which the author confesses in an afterword, is that the sheer number of names that each courtier (most of them real life historical personages) answers to makes it really difficult to keep them all straight at the beginning. She tries, but I had enormous difficulties keeping Chartres, Lorraine, and Lucien straight for the first several chapters, which caused a lot of trouble in sorting out various motivations. Marie-Josephe's brother, Yves, is entirely unlikeable until the very end.
And the protagonist herself is just too Mary Sue-ish for my taste. She can do everything better than anyone else--draw, compose, do math, ride, talk to sea monsters--but she spends the vast majority of the novel passionately and carelessly acting in ways that make others condemn her. I think we're supposed to feel sorry for her that no matter how hard she tries, people take it the wrong way, but I just kind of felt like she was an idiot. She seems to warp people's characters as she approaches so that they will alternately fawn over her and persecute her in the way calculated to most tug our heartstrings at any given second.
The flurry of revelations of the parentages of not one but two characters near the end also strains the bounds of credulity.
These are sins I've happily forgiven in other books, and will not fully condemn even here. But the sum total resulted me in feeling rather cold about the whole thing. The flaws are not egregious, but despite the fact that I love fantasy and well-researched history, this ended up just not being my thing.
July 6, 2023
Check out my full, spoiler lite, video review HERE.
Historical fiction/fantasy story set in 17th century France. Great writing, interesting story, nice finish.
Historical fiction/fantasy story set in 17th century France. Great writing, interesting story, nice finish.
Read
December 5, 2018a pretty good time! thinking about starting a goodreads shelf called "books where the fact that the protag isn't a lesbian should literally be a crime".
premise in short: Marie-Josephe is a young court lady. Her brother is the king's scientist, and captures a sea monster. Marie-Josephe can understand the sea monster and realizes that she's not an animal, but a full person. Spends the rest of the novel trying to save the sea monster by proving her humanity, while king wants to like, eat her because he thinks it'll make him immortal.
I was a little startled by this book; it feels like such a different beast from Dreamsnake, which I enjoyed very much for its rich world-building and soothingly sturdy, matter of fact, mature protag. I guess the setting of The Moon and the Sun (alt history 17th century France) belies the rich world-building component. The protag was a less of a power fantasy than the gender-equal future of Dreamsnake; Marie-Josephe's character is a gender neurotic in the classic period drama way. She's a deeply repressed 20 year old who doesn't realize like, sex isn't Sin and shit, and comes of age by a series of betrayals from her King and her Pope and her brother to realize that feeling good is okay, and patriotism isn't everything, and men are terrible, etc etc. I'm less comfortable in this setting, it feels like treading Known Ground. And I think reading Nebula novels this year has turned me into a bit of a utopian, so I found myself skimming the bits where her brother and the Pope like, yell at her for being a vain harlot and shit.
Marie-Josephe herself is great though. I think the move to pair her moral/social naiveté with a natural scientific curiosity was quite winning, though I can imagine someone else finding it a little Marie-Sue-y. i found it lovable that she was writing to Newton and trying idly between her court lady duties to define the fall of a leaf with a physics function. I think my standard is still "this coming of age novel doesn't make me want to scream", but hey, this coming of age novel didn't make me want to scream! McIntyre did a great job making her suffering and angst quite real, and her position - esp. as a woman facing down the King, her brother, predatory men of court, and the Pope - made her rebellion feel like true bravery. She's naive, but has bravery and constitution and a moral backbone beyond her years, and McIntyre is convincing in this depiction.
The ultimate love interest, Chretien, is also very good. He's truly devoted to the King, and I think McIntyre spooled the tension between picking morality and picking loyalty/love very well. It was a good character build. He is also a dwarf and suffers spinal pain for it, and I think that comes into play as part of his character, his discipline of self to be impenetrable to courtly laughter, or self-doubt. Glad McIntyre didn't have derision towards people with dwarfism be part of courtly drama. However, it does get weird because she draws a connection between how ppl with dwarfism were also derided as inhuman by the Church in this alt history and the sea monster's plight. In general, there's a lot of spooling out about humanity, and who gets to be human, that plays out in ways I did't totally jive with.
Take Haleed, who is just straight up Marie Josephe's slave. Marie-Josephe grew up in Martinique, and in France slavery has already been abolished, so there's at least a few conversations about that on the outset. Marie-Josephe considers Haleed her sister, and doesn't order her about or beat her, so she thinks its fine, which is relievedly obviously a blind spot on her part. Marie-Josephe spends half the book not freeing Haleed "for her protection" (since Haleed doesn't need to pay for anything I guess? doesn't have resources in France, etc.) There's a pretty satisfying confrontation where Haleed calls her out on how much bullshit that is, calling Marie-Josephe's attention to her privilege and how she's just been making excuses, etc. and Marie-Josephe frees her in response. It wasn't the best, but it definitely wasn't the worst. I think I'm not sure how to make of the slave subplot in parallel to the main plot being Marie Josephe trying to get the king to recognize the humanity of a fantasy species. An allegory between actual historical atrocity and fantasy doesn't sit super great for me, I think. Feels frivolous, making light, I suppose.
This is also very much a historical romance. Marie-Josephe goes through the normal track: starts out in love with Lorraine who turns out to be an abusive asshole, realizes the unlikely (dwarfism, serial monogamist, sworn to never marry, atheism) Count de Chretien is the one for her by the end. Didn't buy the romance too much. Count de Chretien is a little too much of a savior, a make-her-realize-her-worth-er - he even has like the whole bit where he tells Marie-Josephe she's the bravest ever and that sex is good and the Pope is a fraud, etc etc. The power imbalance (he the king's right hand man, her a lowly court lady) just made the whole thing a little flat. Lorraine was troublesome for me in that he plays sort of the, sadistic elegant gay, enjoying stirring up drama and flirting with women to torture his closeted male lover, etc etc etc.
Also, Marie Josephe very clearly should have ended up with the sea monster. There's a lot of female physicality in this book, to the point that I very much was convinced this was supposed to be a lesbian romance up until almost the very end. Marie Josephe spends a lot of her time touching and loving women - her sister-slave, the lady she waits on, and the sea monster. When she is bled by doctors, the sea monster literally tongues the wound to help heal it? I mean. Come on. This book is very much about womanhood, by the way. Marie-Josephe is constantly like, trying to be a proper woman, trying to navigate being a good woman vs a loud woman or a curious woman or a contrarian woman. it was written very well, but i didn't find anything too new about it. though I think McIntyre does excel in not nerfing her women too hard, which is just a good example to follow, as I discussed above.
i think the most compelling part of this book was the Scientific Question of the Humanity of the Sea Monster. It was a fun slice of like, the history of the philosophy of science. The Pope weighs in on the question. Scientists dissect a dead sea monster and its bone similarities to humans are called up. Marie-Josephe goes with appeal to emotion (she can translate the sea monster's songs, and communicates her very human memories of growing up, her family, being captured, etc. to the King, to no avail). Marie-Josephe's brother Yves is fascinating and a locus of this debate. He's a Jesuit and the king's philosopher, and devoted to both alike. He tries to consolidate his research as "revealing god's truth", but when neither the Pope nor the King believe the sea monster is sentient, and he knows she is, he's flying blind. The proof he needs is interesting, too -- Marie-Josephe keeps telling her brother stuff the sea monster tells her about her capture, to prove to him that the sea monster is capable of speech/thought. He keeps rebuffing her and making excuses for why Marie Josephe would know these facts without the sea monster's help, before finally realizing he's just been denying the truth for selfish reasons. 'physical/scientific' proof is part of it, but with that human element, that denial and twisting of the truth, that final emotional concession. Yves is pulled like four ways about scientific knowledge and scientific import: this nebulous emotional element, the religious way (Pope's word), the scientific method he was trained on, and pragmatism (the King's will; he lies to the King about the sea monster's humanity to gain further favor and position in court). It's an interesting problem.
anyway it's a fine time, it could be a little deeper and subtler, but it's very fun.
premise in short: Marie-Josephe is a young court lady. Her brother is the king's scientist, and captures a sea monster. Marie-Josephe can understand the sea monster and realizes that she's not an animal, but a full person. Spends the rest of the novel trying to save the sea monster by proving her humanity, while king wants to like, eat her because he thinks it'll make him immortal.
I was a little startled by this book; it feels like such a different beast from Dreamsnake, which I enjoyed very much for its rich world-building and soothingly sturdy, matter of fact, mature protag. I guess the setting of The Moon and the Sun (alt history 17th century France) belies the rich world-building component. The protag was a less of a power fantasy than the gender-equal future of Dreamsnake; Marie-Josephe's character is a gender neurotic in the classic period drama way. She's a deeply repressed 20 year old who doesn't realize like, sex isn't Sin and shit, and comes of age by a series of betrayals from her King and her Pope and her brother to realize that feeling good is okay, and patriotism isn't everything, and men are terrible, etc etc. I'm less comfortable in this setting, it feels like treading Known Ground. And I think reading Nebula novels this year has turned me into a bit of a utopian, so I found myself skimming the bits where her brother and the Pope like, yell at her for being a vain harlot and shit.
Marie-Josephe herself is great though. I think the move to pair her moral/social naiveté with a natural scientific curiosity was quite winning, though I can imagine someone else finding it a little Marie-Sue-y. i found it lovable that she was writing to Newton and trying idly between her court lady duties to define the fall of a leaf with a physics function. I think my standard is still "this coming of age novel doesn't make me want to scream", but hey, this coming of age novel didn't make me want to scream! McIntyre did a great job making her suffering and angst quite real, and her position - esp. as a woman facing down the King, her brother, predatory men of court, and the Pope - made her rebellion feel like true bravery. She's naive, but has bravery and constitution and a moral backbone beyond her years, and McIntyre is convincing in this depiction.
The ultimate love interest, Chretien, is also very good. He's truly devoted to the King, and I think McIntyre spooled the tension between picking morality and picking loyalty/love very well. It was a good character build. He is also a dwarf and suffers spinal pain for it, and I think that comes into play as part of his character, his discipline of self to be impenetrable to courtly laughter, or self-doubt. Glad McIntyre didn't have derision towards people with dwarfism be part of courtly drama. However, it does get weird because she draws a connection between how ppl with dwarfism were also derided as inhuman by the Church in this alt history and the sea monster's plight. In general, there's a lot of spooling out about humanity, and who gets to be human, that plays out in ways I did't totally jive with.
Take Haleed, who is just straight up Marie Josephe's slave. Marie-Josephe grew up in Martinique, and in France slavery has already been abolished, so there's at least a few conversations about that on the outset. Marie-Josephe considers Haleed her sister, and doesn't order her about or beat her, so she thinks its fine, which is relievedly obviously a blind spot on her part. Marie-Josephe spends half the book not freeing Haleed "for her protection" (since Haleed doesn't need to pay for anything I guess? doesn't have resources in France, etc.) There's a pretty satisfying confrontation where Haleed calls her out on how much bullshit that is, calling Marie-Josephe's attention to her privilege and how she's just been making excuses, etc. and Marie-Josephe frees her in response. It wasn't the best, but it definitely wasn't the worst. I think I'm not sure how to make of the slave subplot in parallel to the main plot being Marie Josephe trying to get the king to recognize the humanity of a fantasy species. An allegory between actual historical atrocity and fantasy doesn't sit super great for me, I think. Feels frivolous, making light, I suppose.
This is also very much a historical romance. Marie-Josephe goes through the normal track: starts out in love with Lorraine who turns out to be an abusive asshole, realizes the unlikely (dwarfism, serial monogamist, sworn to never marry, atheism) Count de Chretien is the one for her by the end. Didn't buy the romance too much. Count de Chretien is a little too much of a savior, a make-her-realize-her-worth-er - he even has like the whole bit where he tells Marie-Josephe she's the bravest ever and that sex is good and the Pope is a fraud, etc etc. The power imbalance (he the king's right hand man, her a lowly court lady) just made the whole thing a little flat. Lorraine was troublesome for me in that he plays sort of the, sadistic elegant gay, enjoying stirring up drama and flirting with women to torture his closeted male lover, etc etc etc.
Also, Marie Josephe very clearly should have ended up with the sea monster. There's a lot of female physicality in this book, to the point that I very much was convinced this was supposed to be a lesbian romance up until almost the very end. Marie Josephe spends a lot of her time touching and loving women - her sister-slave, the lady she waits on, and the sea monster. When she is bled by doctors, the sea monster literally tongues the wound to help heal it? I mean. Come on. This book is very much about womanhood, by the way. Marie-Josephe is constantly like, trying to be a proper woman, trying to navigate being a good woman vs a loud woman or a curious woman or a contrarian woman. it was written very well, but i didn't find anything too new about it. though I think McIntyre does excel in not nerfing her women too hard, which is just a good example to follow, as I discussed above.
i think the most compelling part of this book was the Scientific Question of the Humanity of the Sea Monster. It was a fun slice of like, the history of the philosophy of science. The Pope weighs in on the question. Scientists dissect a dead sea monster and its bone similarities to humans are called up. Marie-Josephe goes with appeal to emotion (she can translate the sea monster's songs, and communicates her very human memories of growing up, her family, being captured, etc. to the King, to no avail). Marie-Josephe's brother Yves is fascinating and a locus of this debate. He's a Jesuit and the king's philosopher, and devoted to both alike. He tries to consolidate his research as "revealing god's truth", but when neither the Pope nor the King believe the sea monster is sentient, and he knows she is, he's flying blind. The proof he needs is interesting, too -- Marie-Josephe keeps telling her brother stuff the sea monster tells her about her capture, to prove to him that the sea monster is capable of speech/thought. He keeps rebuffing her and making excuses for why Marie Josephe would know these facts without the sea monster's help, before finally realizing he's just been denying the truth for selfish reasons. 'physical/scientific' proof is part of it, but with that human element, that denial and twisting of the truth, that final emotional concession. Yves is pulled like four ways about scientific knowledge and scientific import: this nebulous emotional element, the religious way (Pope's word), the scientific method he was trained on, and pragmatism (the King's will; he lies to the King about the sea monster's humanity to gain further favor and position in court). It's an interesting problem.
anyway it's a fine time, it could be a little deeper and subtler, but it's very fun.
July 30, 2015
Deniz seferinden dönen Rahip Yves de la Croix'in gemisinde türleri tükenmekte olan ve zor bulunan iki deniz canavarı vardır. Ölü olan deniz canavarı Yves'in incelemelerini aydınlatması için diğer deniz canavarı ise Fransa Kralı XIV Louis içindir.
Yaşayan deniz canavarının bakımını Kralın yeğenine hizmet etmek için manastırdan ayrılan Yves'in kız kardeşi Marie-Josèphe üstlenmektedir. Marie-Josèphe dönemin kadınlarına göre çok daha zeki ve bilimden anlamasının yanı sıra araştırmalarda sürdürmektedir. Yazar Marie-Josèphe karakterini daha en başından ayırmış ona büyük bir güç vermiştir. Bilgi!
Marie-Josèphe deniz canavarıyla ilgilenirken gün geçtikçe aralarında bir bağ oluşmaya başlar. Deniz canavarı bir tek bu 'kara kadınına' güvenmektedir. Doğduğu sulara geri dönmek isteyen Şehrzad 'kara kadınından' yardım ister.
Kral XIV Louis ise deniz canavarlarının kendisini ölümsüzlük verebileceğini inanmaktadır. Ve rahibin araştırmalarını bu yönde ilerletmesini ister. Zira bu hayvanlarda kendisine ölümsüzlük bahşedebilecek bir organ varsa onu kullanmak pekâlâda hakkıdır. Çünkü Tanrı insanların hayvanları istedikleri gibi kullanmalarını emretmiştir. İnsanlardan da üstün olan birisi varda oda şüphesiz Kraldır. Bu doğrultuda canlı deniz canavarı Kral için ölümsüzlüğün kapısını aralayan yaratıktan başka bir şey değildir.
Öte yandan deniz canavarının aslında konuşabilen, düşünebilen, anlayabilen, ruhu olan bir kadın olduğunu öğrenen Marie-Josèphe ise Şehrzad'ı kurtarmak için planlar yapar. Kendisini inandırmak ve Kral'ın ruhunu korumak adına Şehrzad'dan hikâyeler anlatmasını ister.
Ay ve Güneş'te tüm bu hikâyenin yanında saray hayatına da yer veriyor yazar. Her ne kadar dönemi tüm ihtişamıyla aktarmış olsa da saray hayatı beni ufakta olsa hayal kırıklığına uğrattı. Bunun en büyük sebebi ise yazarın tarih atlamalarını aktarırken yetersiz kalmasıydı. Fazla yer verildiğini düşündüğüm saray hayatıyla konu uzatılmış ve asıl mesele için çok az bir alan bırakılmıştı kitapta.
Konuya girebilmek için 300 sayfa devirmeniz gerekiyor ki sonrası da kitabın heyecanıyla bir anda bitiveriyor. Benim için en güzel yerler, kitabın son sayfaları ve Marie-Josèphe ile Şehrzad arasındaki iletişimdi. Kont Lucien’i de unutmamak gerek. Şehrzad'ın hikayesi Marie-Josèphe'i kendine çektikçe beni de büyüledi. Kont Lucien, Marie-Josèphe ve Şehrzad'ın verdikleri mücadele ve birbirlerine duydukları güven ve bağlılık beni resmen hikâyenin içine hapsetti.
Bu büyüleyici Tarihi Kurgunun tüm ihtişamıyla beyaz perdeye aktarılacak olması da beni ayrı mutlu ediyor. Kitabı, film çıkmadan önce herkesin okumasını tavsiye ederim. Böylece filmde kesilecek olan sahnelerden de mahrum kalmamış olursunuz.
Yaşayan deniz canavarının bakımını Kralın yeğenine hizmet etmek için manastırdan ayrılan Yves'in kız kardeşi Marie-Josèphe üstlenmektedir. Marie-Josèphe dönemin kadınlarına göre çok daha zeki ve bilimden anlamasının yanı sıra araştırmalarda sürdürmektedir. Yazar Marie-Josèphe karakterini daha en başından ayırmış ona büyük bir güç vermiştir. Bilgi!
Marie-Josèphe deniz canavarıyla ilgilenirken gün geçtikçe aralarında bir bağ oluşmaya başlar. Deniz canavarı bir tek bu 'kara kadınına' güvenmektedir. Doğduğu sulara geri dönmek isteyen Şehrzad 'kara kadınından' yardım ister.
Kral XIV Louis ise deniz canavarlarının kendisini ölümsüzlük verebileceğini inanmaktadır. Ve rahibin araştırmalarını bu yönde ilerletmesini ister. Zira bu hayvanlarda kendisine ölümsüzlük bahşedebilecek bir organ varsa onu kullanmak pekâlâda hakkıdır. Çünkü Tanrı insanların hayvanları istedikleri gibi kullanmalarını emretmiştir. İnsanlardan da üstün olan birisi varda oda şüphesiz Kraldır. Bu doğrultuda canlı deniz canavarı Kral için ölümsüzlüğün kapısını aralayan yaratıktan başka bir şey değildir.
Öte yandan deniz canavarının aslında konuşabilen, düşünebilen, anlayabilen, ruhu olan bir kadın olduğunu öğrenen Marie-Josèphe ise Şehrzad'ı kurtarmak için planlar yapar. Kendisini inandırmak ve Kral'ın ruhunu korumak adına Şehrzad'dan hikâyeler anlatmasını ister.
Ay ve Güneş'te tüm bu hikâyenin yanında saray hayatına da yer veriyor yazar. Her ne kadar dönemi tüm ihtişamıyla aktarmış olsa da saray hayatı beni ufakta olsa hayal kırıklığına uğrattı. Bunun en büyük sebebi ise yazarın tarih atlamalarını aktarırken yetersiz kalmasıydı. Fazla yer verildiğini düşündüğüm saray hayatıyla konu uzatılmış ve asıl mesele için çok az bir alan bırakılmıştı kitapta.
Konuya girebilmek için 300 sayfa devirmeniz gerekiyor ki sonrası da kitabın heyecanıyla bir anda bitiveriyor. Benim için en güzel yerler, kitabın son sayfaları ve Marie-Josèphe ile Şehrzad arasındaki iletişimdi. Kont Lucien’i de unutmamak gerek. Şehrzad'ın hikayesi Marie-Josèphe'i kendine çektikçe beni de büyüledi. Kont Lucien, Marie-Josèphe ve Şehrzad'ın verdikleri mücadele ve birbirlerine duydukları güven ve bağlılık beni resmen hikâyenin içine hapsetti.
Bu büyüleyici Tarihi Kurgunun tüm ihtişamıyla beyaz perdeye aktarılacak olması da beni ayrı mutlu ediyor. Kitabı, film çıkmadan önce herkesin okumasını tavsiye ederim. Böylece filmde kesilecek olan sahnelerden de mahrum kalmamış olursunuz.
November 19, 2020
An absolutely fantastic fantasy novel set in the court of Louis XIV. Marie-Josephe is a naive, relatively poor, convent-educated young woman working as lady-in-waiting to the king's niece. Her brother, Yves, is a Jesuit and natural philosopher, particularly interested in dissecting and studying a 'sea monster' he's just been the first to successfully capture. Louis XIV believes the legends that say sea monsters (perhaps more recognizable to us as 'mermaids') can grant immortality to the person who eats them, and is determined for Yves to prove this to be so and figure out how to make the king immortal. Lucien, a dwarf and a courtier, is the closest thing the Sun King has to a best friend and trusted advisor, but repeatedly finds himself called upon to protect these newcome siblings from the various troubles they get into as they try to maneuver through the court of Versailles. Meanwhile, Marie-Josephe is becoming increasingly convinced that the sea monster is in fact a sentient human, who needs to be protected from Yves's experiments, Louis's hunger, and, oh yes, the visiting Pope Innocent XI's determination to declare her a demon.
The novel's real strength is in its incredibly well-researched portrayal of life at Versailles, both in the good (jewels, dresses, the Hall of Mirrors, concerts), the bad (the constant threat of rape for women without status, drafty attic rooms, occasional slaves, zoos that would count as animal abuse by modern standards) and the downright weird (bowing to portraits of the king, the levee ceremony, the king's special gout carriage, the conclusion that being a Protestant is worse than being an atheist). Plus all the standard fun of any book with court politics (the incredibly complicated geometry of who's having an affair with who, arranged loveless marriages, legitimated bastards and secret bastards, how to figure out who's trustworthy and who would sell your soul for an invitation to that levee ceremony). It's captivating and marvelous historical fiction – even before you add in mermaids! I read the entire book in one big gulp, because I was just having too much fun with it to put it down. I've never heard many people talk about The Moon and the Sun, which is too bad because I absolutely loved it and wish it were better known. I mean, the Sun King plus mermaids! It's everything I've ever wanted out of a novel.
The novel's real strength is in its incredibly well-researched portrayal of life at Versailles, both in the good (jewels, dresses, the Hall of Mirrors, concerts), the bad (the constant threat of rape for women without status, drafty attic rooms, occasional slaves, zoos that would count as animal abuse by modern standards) and the downright weird (bowing to portraits of the king, the levee ceremony, the king's special gout carriage, the conclusion that being a Protestant is worse than being an atheist). Plus all the standard fun of any book with court politics (the incredibly complicated geometry of who's having an affair with who, arranged loveless marriages, legitimated bastards and secret bastards, how to figure out who's trustworthy and who would sell your soul for an invitation to that levee ceremony). It's captivating and marvelous historical fiction – even before you add in mermaids! I read the entire book in one big gulp, because I was just having too much fun with it to put it down. I've never heard many people talk about The Moon and the Sun, which is too bad because I absolutely loved it and wish it were better known. I mean, the Sun King plus mermaids! It's everything I've ever wanted out of a novel.
May 13, 2021
An entertaining, if overwrought, historical fantasy about an impecunious young lady-in-waiting trying to save the life of a mermaid-like creature who has been captured and put on display in Louis XIV’s exotic menagerie at Versailles. I’d recommend this if you’re interested in the setting, since there’s more court drama than fantasy.
The book does a good job depicting the glamour, as well as the cruelty and absurdity, of the Sun King’s Versailles, as Marie-Josephe, an intelligent but naive girl fresh out of an oppressive convent, frantically tries to convince the king that the “sea monster” is an intelligent creature. She alone (magically, inexplicably) is able to interpret the creature’s singing as language.
Other historical characters on display along with the aging Louis include his extended family consisting of wives, mistresses, children and grandchildren both legitimate and otherwise; the exiled English King James II and Mary of Modena; and Pope Innocent VII.
These real historical figures are supplemented by the gallant Lucien, Count de Chrétien, an accomplished soldier despite being a dwarf, whose absolute loyalty to the king is tested by Marie-Josephe’s revelations. I liked Lucien, although the romance wasn’t very convincing.
The book does a good job depicting the glamour, as well as the cruelty and absurdity, of the Sun King’s Versailles, as Marie-Josephe, an intelligent but naive girl fresh out of an oppressive convent, frantically tries to convince the king that the “sea monster” is an intelligent creature. She alone (magically, inexplicably) is able to interpret the creature’s singing as language.
Other historical characters on display along with the aging Louis include his extended family consisting of wives, mistresses, children and grandchildren both legitimate and otherwise; the exiled English King James II and Mary of Modena; and Pope Innocent VII.
These real historical figures are supplemented by the gallant Lucien, Count de Chrétien, an accomplished soldier despite being a dwarf, whose absolute loyalty to the king is tested by Marie-Josephe’s revelations. I liked Lucien, although the romance wasn’t very convincing.
April 19, 2023
I think this was maybe 3.5, but it's worth rounding up for the amazingly detailed description of the court of Louis XIV at Versailles and what is was like for a woman who was not rich (but at the same time not a servant) to live there. I read a lot of historical fiction, but it's usually mysteries and not in this era. There was a lot going on and the court politics sometimes got too much, mostly because a lot of the the people were awful. The sea "monster" was well done even though it took a while for her to really come into her own in the story.
December 28, 2016
Loved the expertly researched and written setting and time period. Great female protagonist, and the other supporting characters were just as well drawn. Only drawbacks? Slow pacing (perfect for the setting, less so for the plot) and a slightly jarring epilogue/ending that I don't think matched the preceding story.
Recommended for people who loved Kelly Robson's "Waters of Versailles" or enjoy the new Versailles TV series.
Recommended for people who loved Kelly Robson's "Waters of Versailles" or enjoy the new Versailles TV series.
April 13, 2015
So continues my crawl through Nebula award winners. This one was a bit surreal because I read it while suffering from one of my worst illnesses in years, so I keep reminding myself that it wasn't a fever dream.
The Moon and the Sun is a historical fantasy novel about the capture of a mermaid during the reign of Louis XIV. The premise is incredible and, unfortunately, the execution of the novel winnowed away a lot of my gumption to keep reading.
I did love learning more about the court of the Sun King. McIntyre described a fascinating microcosm revolving around the habits and fancy of one man in a way that no history nonfiction book had yet brought to life for me. The church's response to the question of the mermaid was also well-described if typical.
My main gripe with this book is that Marie-Josephe is the biggest Mary Sue this side of Ayla Cavebear. So that's an aggravation to power through.
Through googling, I have also found that The Moon and the Sun is set to announce its film release any day now. I must admit, that I'm very excited about the idea of Pierce Brosnan as Louis XIV.... His casting role is a stroke of brilliance.
However, what I've seen of the promotional images leaves a lot to be desired.
This is Louis and Marie-Josephe:
For contrast, this was actually what Louis wore:
And I did lots of googling: bosoms aplenty in Louis's time but nary a bare arm to be seen.
I must admit that I'm pretty disappointed! I mean, Louis XIV put the "holy wah" in bourgeoisie -- why dress him like a freshman who can't find a costume for a I <3 The 1690s party? And the protagonist's dress just looks like mildly attractive underwear. Disappointing.
The Moon and the Sun is a historical fantasy novel about the capture of a mermaid during the reign of Louis XIV. The premise is incredible and, unfortunately, the execution of the novel winnowed away a lot of my gumption to keep reading.
I did love learning more about the court of the Sun King. McIntyre described a fascinating microcosm revolving around the habits and fancy of one man in a way that no history nonfiction book had yet brought to life for me. The church's response to the question of the mermaid was also well-described if typical.
My main gripe with this book is that Marie-Josephe is the biggest Mary Sue this side of Ayla Cavebear. So that's an aggravation to power through.
Through googling, I have also found that The Moon and the Sun is set to announce its film release any day now. I must admit, that I'm very excited about the idea of Pierce Brosnan as Louis XIV.... His casting role is a stroke of brilliance.
However, what I've seen of the promotional images leaves a lot to be desired.
This is Louis and Marie-Josephe:
For contrast, this was actually what Louis wore:
And I did lots of googling: bosoms aplenty in Louis's time but nary a bare arm to be seen.
I must admit that I'm pretty disappointed! I mean, Louis XIV put the "holy wah" in bourgeoisie -- why dress him like a freshman who can't find a costume for a I <3 The 1690s party? And the protagonist's dress just looks like mildly attractive underwear. Disappointing.
May 26, 2008
English title: The Moon and the Sun (you can find it here on Goodreads, but it's not linked to this edition). I'm reviewing the present French edition.
This book is really great. I first read it a few years ago, in a week-end, almost didn't do anything else on the sunday. I reread it once since, and it had the same power. I will probably read it again in the future.
First, I love the place and time it takes place in. France, Versailles, during Louis XIV reign. I don't know why but that time fascinates me. And the author really recreates it for us, it's as if we were walking in Versaille with the characters. We can feel it. I don't know if it's an accurate description, but it's realistic.
Then, I found the characters really interesting. The main character, Marie-Josèphe, is not the common woman of her time. She was brought up far from the court and doesn't really fit in there. She's educated and intelligent. She's interested in science. I admire that kind of women. She does have prejudices due to her time, but she learns to think a little differently during the book.
I found the story and the relationships between the characters fascinating. When you start it you want to know what will happen, you can't stop reading. At least that's what happened to me. ^_^
I really recommend this book!!
This book is really great. I first read it a few years ago, in a week-end, almost didn't do anything else on the sunday. I reread it once since, and it had the same power. I will probably read it again in the future.
First, I love the place and time it takes place in. France, Versailles, during Louis XIV reign. I don't know why but that time fascinates me. And the author really recreates it for us, it's as if we were walking in Versaille with the characters. We can feel it. I don't know if it's an accurate description, but it's realistic.
Then, I found the characters really interesting. The main character, Marie-Josèphe, is not the common woman of her time. She was brought up far from the court and doesn't really fit in there. She's educated and intelligent. She's interested in science. I admire that kind of women. She does have prejudices due to her time, but she learns to think a little differently during the book.
I found the story and the relationships between the characters fascinating. When you start it you want to know what will happen, you can't stop reading. At least that's what happened to me. ^_^
I really recommend this book!!
August 10, 2016
The struggle of science versus religion is not a new one, especially with religion portrayed as being in the wrong (particularly Christianity, it seems), but bringing in the stories told by sailors as reality rather than superstition and fear is clever. The story is told almost entirely from Marie-Josèphe's point of view, and for much of the book she's caught between the two schools of thinking, although it's fairly clear to the reader that while the king may be unreasonable when someone threatens his perceived immortality, the church is even less forgiving.
And herein lies one of the most interesting parts of the novel. Marie-Josèphe is not entirely a reliable narrator, due to the extremely sheltered life she's led, and the reader is left to read a lot between the lines, particularly early in the book. Beneath the glittering surface of the court, there's a lot of corruption and hypocrisy, completely unnoticed by Marie-Josèphe until she's directly confronted with it. She seems to be the only character unaware of the nature of the relationship between Monsieur and the chevalier Lorraine, and unaware of what danger some of the court's more unscrupulous men present to her until nearly too late.
There's a keen attention to detail throughout The Moon and the Sun, from the manners at court to historical figures and covering everything in between. Everything is meticulously researched, and this gives the book a depth and energy often missing from period fiction. On the other hand, all the historical figures running around creates a huge cast of characters often difficult to keep straight. I understand the print version of the book has a who's who list to refer to, but the online and digital files don't (and it would be difficult to flip back and forth between the story and the list even if they did), and it took me a sizable portion of the book before I could keep everyone straight in my head.
The love story is sweet and straightforward, notably mostly for the hero, a self-proclaimed dwarf. Despite his "deformities" and the pain constantly plaguing him, Lucien is portrayed as loyal, intelligent, and popular with the ladies. He's also a favourite of the king and set up as the example to follow at court, and while his height is noticeable, it's never a barrier for Marie-Josèphe. The first declaration of love between them is a little out of left field ("But I love you!" says Marie-Josèphe. "Huh what? When did that happen?" says I), but the rest of it fitted together naturally.
The biggest issue I think most people will have with The Moon and the Sun is that the plot moves along with all the speed of a glacier. The intricacies of court politics and the attention to detail means the plot doesn't start moving until about 200 pages into the book, before which we hear a lot about the heights of fashion in the 17th century. It's all interesting stuff and I enjoyed the historical tidbits stuffed in there, but the pacing is very uneven and as a result the book took me forever to read through. Those who prefer a more action-oriented novel take note.
And herein lies one of the most interesting parts of the novel. Marie-Josèphe is not entirely a reliable narrator, due to the extremely sheltered life she's led, and the reader is left to read a lot between the lines, particularly early in the book. Beneath the glittering surface of the court, there's a lot of corruption and hypocrisy, completely unnoticed by Marie-Josèphe until she's directly confronted with it. She seems to be the only character unaware of the nature of the relationship between Monsieur and the chevalier Lorraine, and unaware of what danger some of the court's more unscrupulous men present to her until nearly too late.
There's a keen attention to detail throughout The Moon and the Sun, from the manners at court to historical figures and covering everything in between. Everything is meticulously researched, and this gives the book a depth and energy often missing from period fiction. On the other hand, all the historical figures running around creates a huge cast of characters often difficult to keep straight. I understand the print version of the book has a who's who list to refer to, but the online and digital files don't (and it would be difficult to flip back and forth between the story and the list even if they did), and it took me a sizable portion of the book before I could keep everyone straight in my head.
The love story is sweet and straightforward, notably mostly for the hero, a self-proclaimed dwarf. Despite his "deformities" and the pain constantly plaguing him, Lucien is portrayed as loyal, intelligent, and popular with the ladies. He's also a favourite of the king and set up as the example to follow at court, and while his height is noticeable, it's never a barrier for Marie-Josèphe. The first declaration of love between them is a little out of left field ("But I love you!" says Marie-Josèphe. "Huh what? When did that happen?" says I), but the rest of it fitted together naturally.
The biggest issue I think most people will have with The Moon and the Sun is that the plot moves along with all the speed of a glacier. The intricacies of court politics and the attention to detail means the plot doesn't start moving until about 200 pages into the book, before which we hear a lot about the heights of fashion in the 17th century. It's all interesting stuff and I enjoyed the historical tidbits stuffed in there, but the pacing is very uneven and as a result the book took me forever to read through. Those who prefer a more action-oriented novel take note.
March 28, 2020
Bu bilim kurgu değil. Buna bilim kurgu eserlerine verilen en önemli ödüllerden birini vermek janra yapılmış bir saygısızlıktır diye düşünüyorum. Peki, bu konudan bağımsız nasıl bir kitap olduğu hakkında bir kaç kelam edeyim. Sayfa sayısı ve kelime başı para almadıklarına emin oldukları için neden 200 sayfa fazladan hikayeye katmayan saray entrikaları yazdığını anlamıyorum. Saç modelleriyle alakalı söylenen kelamları toplasak 50 sayfayı kaplar. Ana karakterin yanına dönemin kölelik mantığını daha detaylı anlatmak için karakteri koyuyor ama tüm yaşantısı havada kalan anlatısının içinde kaybolup gidiyor.
Bunu bilim kurgu olduğunu düşündüren şey ise insan olmayan bir deniz ırkının hikayede karakter olarak yer tutması diyebilirim. Fakat koca insanlık tarihinde gemi yolculukları en önemli yerlerdedir. Bu kadar iç içe olmamız gerekn bir ırkı sadece bir birey üzerinden bu şekilde üstün körü, arkaplansız ve basite indirgemek kendi yaratınıza ihanet olmalıdır. Milenya boyunca sadece sevişip, yüzmüş olamazlar. Bir krallık, demokrasi, medeniyet kurmuş olmalılar. Okuyucuya saç modellerinden çok bunu anlatmak entellektüel birikimi yüksek insanların ilgisini daha çok çekerdi. Fakat tercih bu olmamış ve basite kaçarak fazla detaylandırmaktan kaçmak için yapıldığını düşündüğüm bu tercih ile yazık olmuş diyebilirim.
Ana karakterimizin ergen bir genç kız olması yer yer döneminde getirdiği kadın kimliğinin modern çağ ile olan zıtlığı bakımından klişelerle dolu olmaktan kurtulamıyor. Önce güçlü bir kadın karakter ile ağzımıza bir damla bal verirken peşinden gelen ucuz, karikatürize, aşırı dindar, aşırı havai karakterleri ile bir anda tüm bu yapıyı temelden dinamitleyen bir tercih yapmış. Oysa ergen kızımız Newton'la mektuplaşabilecek kadar bir matematik dehası ve aynı zamanda bir dönem için bilim denilebilecek Doğa Filozofu bile sayılabilecekken tek artısı yakışıklı olması olan bir adam ile olan münasebetini kitabın yarısı boyunca okumak sıkıcı ve hayal kırıcı oldu.
Kral, Papa, Versailles, Doğa Filozofu, saç modelleri, deniz yaratıkları, cizvitler ve entrikaların kiminin bol kimin nadir olduğu harcanmış bir potansiyeli olduğunu düşündüğüm "FANTASTİK" edebiyat örneği diyebilirim.
Bunu bilim kurgu olduğunu düşündüren şey ise insan olmayan bir deniz ırkının hikayede karakter olarak yer tutması diyebilirim. Fakat koca insanlık tarihinde gemi yolculukları en önemli yerlerdedir. Bu kadar iç içe olmamız gerekn bir ırkı sadece bir birey üzerinden bu şekilde üstün körü, arkaplansız ve basite indirgemek kendi yaratınıza ihanet olmalıdır. Milenya boyunca sadece sevişip, yüzmüş olamazlar. Bir krallık, demokrasi, medeniyet kurmuş olmalılar. Okuyucuya saç modellerinden çok bunu anlatmak entellektüel birikimi yüksek insanların ilgisini daha çok çekerdi. Fakat tercih bu olmamış ve basite kaçarak fazla detaylandırmaktan kaçmak için yapıldığını düşündüğüm bu tercih ile yazık olmuş diyebilirim.
Ana karakterimizin ergen bir genç kız olması yer yer döneminde getirdiği kadın kimliğinin modern çağ ile olan zıtlığı bakımından klişelerle dolu olmaktan kurtulamıyor. Önce güçlü bir kadın karakter ile ağzımıza bir damla bal verirken peşinden gelen ucuz, karikatürize, aşırı dindar, aşırı havai karakterleri ile bir anda tüm bu yapıyı temelden dinamitleyen bir tercih yapmış. Oysa ergen kızımız Newton'la mektuplaşabilecek kadar bir matematik dehası ve aynı zamanda bir dönem için bilim denilebilecek Doğa Filozofu bile sayılabilecekken tek artısı yakışıklı olması olan bir adam ile olan münasebetini kitabın yarısı boyunca okumak sıkıcı ve hayal kırıcı oldu.
Kral, Papa, Versailles, Doğa Filozofu, saç modelleri, deniz yaratıkları, cizvitler ve entrikaların kiminin bol kimin nadir olduğu harcanmış bir potansiyeli olduğunu düşündüğüm "FANTASTİK" edebiyat örneği diyebilirim.
July 2, 2018
Mermaids and Jesuits are two of my favourite things to read about so I was sure I’d like this.
Unfortunately, Mary Sues and Parisian court intrigue are two of my least favourite things to read about. I knew I was in trouble when, after a passable prologue, there were 35 pages—THIRTY FIVE PAGES—about the procession of King Louis’ court to the seaside. Who sat where, what order they walked in, some grumpy man complaining about the poor peeling gold leaf from his carriage...it was a trial.
Perhaps this is a lovely book, but to me there isn’t enough of the good stuff to make all the French Court nonsense worthwhile.
Unfortunately, Mary Sues and Parisian court intrigue are two of my least favourite things to read about. I knew I was in trouble when, after a passable prologue, there were 35 pages—THIRTY FIVE PAGES—about the procession of King Louis’ court to the seaside. Who sat where, what order they walked in, some grumpy man complaining about the poor peeling gold leaf from his carriage...it was a trial.
Perhaps this is a lovely book, but to me there isn’t enough of the good stuff to make all the French Court nonsense worthwhile.
December 21, 2018
Kitabı çok ama çok sevdim. İçindeki ne olacak? soruları benim bu kadar sevmeme sebep oldu çünkü sonuna kadar şimdi ne olacak, Marie-joseph istediğine ulasacak mi, Sehrazata yardım edebilecek mi, Lucien ile ne olacak diye diye okudum ve bitti. Sadece sonunda belki biraz hayal kırıklığına uğramış olabilirim. Çünkü Lucien için küçük bir iyilik yapabilirmiydi Şehrazat öğrenmek isterdim ;)
May 13, 2019
8/10 en 2005. Media de los 4 libros leídos de la autora : 5/10
La media de las notas de los cinco libros leídos de la autora es muy floja, y si logra subir hasta el 5/10 la media de sus obras fue gracias a esta novela, muy buena y la única suya que recomiendo.
Es una bella historia ambientada en la corte del Rey Sol. Sí, sí, la Francia del XVII-XVIII. Y ahí nos encontramos con una criaturas marinas traídas al Rey Sol y la joven Marie que se encarga de dibujarlas y cuidarlas.
Lo dicho, bella y conmovedora historia.
La media de las notas de los cinco libros leídos de la autora es muy floja, y si logra subir hasta el 5/10 la media de sus obras fue gracias a esta novela, muy buena y la única suya que recomiendo.
Es una bella historia ambientada en la corte del Rey Sol. Sí, sí, la Francia del XVII-XVIII. Y ahí nos encontramos con una criaturas marinas traídas al Rey Sol y la joven Marie que se encarga de dibujarlas y cuidarlas.
Lo dicho, bella y conmovedora historia.
June 4, 2023
Not one single character in this book behaves as a human being in a way I find believable.
March 2, 2012
I read some online reviews for this, and I was dismayed by how many people didn't seem to enjoy it. Since The Moon and the Sun is one of my all time favorites I feel the need to even up the reviews somewhat. I will not overview the plot, so many have done it much better than I could, but I will explain why it is a personal favorite.
There are some quibbles about which genre this novel belongs in: Science Fiction, Historical Fiction, Romance, Fantasy etc. The answer is simply that it belongs to all of them. There are so many elements to the story that it borrows from many genres; it involves fantastical mermaids that are studied scientifically by a Jesuit priest in the royal court of king Louis XIV's Versailles. See what I mean?
The Historical side of the novel is very well researched, and the detail of the fashion, etiquette and intrigue take up a good amount of the page space. Not only is Louis XIV realized credibly, but so are real life members of his court all brought to life by vivid and extreme detail. Some may find this tedious, but personally, these are the exact kind of things I enjoy in historical fiction.
This detail of the time is not limited to dress and setting, it extends to characters also. The reader is made aware of exactly who everyone is, where they come from, what their standing in court is and also why they do the things they do. This does take time, so the beginning of the novel is bogged down with the machinations of the court and a great deal of dialogue between the characters, but again, this is precisely the kind of unhurried and meticulous characterization that I enjoy.
While all the character's follow obvious archetypes, they are not one dimensional. Marie may be the Naive Beauty and her brother may be the Stoic and Moral Scholar, but they are both so much more than that. Marie is a woman of ideas who struggles with the belief of the time that women are not supposed to even have ideas. Her brother is also a man of ideas, but struggles with balancing the morals of his order and the strictures of society. In the court they are surrounded by the greedy, the immoral, the disillusioned and the spiteful and lusty lot that make up the Royal Court. Every character, even the minor ones, have some personal struggle.
There are some hokey or "cheesy" moments, and these are what appeal to the romantics and the dreamers, but I think these light hearted and fanciful moments are needed to balance out some equally morbid and dark parts of the novel. There is a love story but there is also a good deal of hate, prejudice, misogyny, deceit and plain viciousness. This is the main reason I enjoy the novel so much, that many of the characters and their issues bring up interesting ideas about ethics.
It really isn't that difficult to figure out where the plot is headed, but following the predictable plot is no less enjoyable simply because you know where its going. The story as a whole is represented by the mermaid itself, not a lovely siren but an ugly humanoid fish, a metaphorical symbol of all the characters in the court: creatures bound by the beliefs and expectations of others, forced to hide the things that truly make them happy.
There are some quibbles about which genre this novel belongs in: Science Fiction, Historical Fiction, Romance, Fantasy etc. The answer is simply that it belongs to all of them. There are so many elements to the story that it borrows from many genres; it involves fantastical mermaids that are studied scientifically by a Jesuit priest in the royal court of king Louis XIV's Versailles. See what I mean?
The Historical side of the novel is very well researched, and the detail of the fashion, etiquette and intrigue take up a good amount of the page space. Not only is Louis XIV realized credibly, but so are real life members of his court all brought to life by vivid and extreme detail. Some may find this tedious, but personally, these are the exact kind of things I enjoy in historical fiction.
This detail of the time is not limited to dress and setting, it extends to characters also. The reader is made aware of exactly who everyone is, where they come from, what their standing in court is and also why they do the things they do. This does take time, so the beginning of the novel is bogged down with the machinations of the court and a great deal of dialogue between the characters, but again, this is precisely the kind of unhurried and meticulous characterization that I enjoy.
While all the character's follow obvious archetypes, they are not one dimensional. Marie may be the Naive Beauty and her brother may be the Stoic and Moral Scholar, but they are both so much more than that. Marie is a woman of ideas who struggles with the belief of the time that women are not supposed to even have ideas. Her brother is also a man of ideas, but struggles with balancing the morals of his order and the strictures of society. In the court they are surrounded by the greedy, the immoral, the disillusioned and the spiteful and lusty lot that make up the Royal Court. Every character, even the minor ones, have some personal struggle.
There are some hokey or "cheesy" moments, and these are what appeal to the romantics and the dreamers, but I think these light hearted and fanciful moments are needed to balance out some equally morbid and dark parts of the novel. There is a love story but there is also a good deal of hate, prejudice, misogyny, deceit and plain viciousness. This is the main reason I enjoy the novel so much, that many of the characters and their issues bring up interesting ideas about ethics.
It really isn't that difficult to figure out where the plot is headed, but following the predictable plot is no less enjoyable simply because you know where its going. The story as a whole is represented by the mermaid itself, not a lovely siren but an ugly humanoid fish, a metaphorical symbol of all the characters in the court: creatures bound by the beliefs and expectations of others, forced to hide the things that truly make them happy.
June 16, 2022
I had been really looking forward to this one, but meh.
There were a lot of clever ideas, about the time period and sea monsters, and there was an unconventional love story which should have been good, but it just wasn't more than the sum of its parts.
The writing itself was of good quality, it's well written, so there's that.
I found it boring and kind of get, even if they went too far in kiddie-fying it, why they changed so much for the movie.
There were a lot of clever ideas, about the time period and sea monsters, and there was an unconventional love story which should have been good, but it just wasn't more than the sum of its parts.
The writing itself was of good quality, it's well written, so there's that.
I found it boring and kind of get, even if they went too far in kiddie-fying it, why they changed so much for the movie.
September 8, 2010
The story is about Marie-Josephe and her fight to save the life of a sea woman who her brother, Yves, caught and the king plans to eat. When Marie-Josephe finds out that the sea woman is intelligent she is willing to risk everything to save her. I liked the dual nature of Marie-Josephe’s character where one minute she is shy and blushing and the next she is standing up to the king. It makes her more complex but at times she is almost too complex. She is open minded, and accepting of everyone even if society isn’t, and proficient in so many skills and subjects, and she’s beautiful, and so reverent of the king and pope, and everything else that there is so much to her that it is hard to bring her into focus as a real person. And due to her wide eyed innocence every innuendo had to be explained bluntly to her and it got rather annoying. I was happy to see that the sea woman wasn’t always sweet, gentle, and loving, not the one dimensional, perfect, innocent, doe-eyed opposite of the big bad humans. Yves also has some interesting parts to his character because he is so conflicted unlike, it seemed to me, many of the other characters for whom everything was hard lines. But even with Yves, as with many of the characters, I felt he was taken to extremes. If it was a movie I would say everyone was overacting their part and they needed to tone it down a bit. I also found some of the plot rather hokey. When Marie-Josephe learns to understand the sea woman, even though no one else can, it reminded me of a children’s movie where some kid can understand all the barnyard animals when they ‘talk’. And there was something overly simplistic about the big run for freedom, something reminiscent of the Little Engine That Could repeating ‘I think I can, I think I can’ and thinking that if they believe hard enough it will all work out. There was also a lot of description of hair-dos and clothes and court splendor that got tedious after a while but it does help give you a very good picture of the setting. You can imagine the pomp and can get a good idea of the world in which these characters reside. The story was okay. It had a strong female lead, a little romance, a little fantasy, a little historical fiction. I liked the mix of genres and how it talked about Newton and emerging science of the period. But okay was as far as it got for me. There was nothing so extraordinary about the story or the characters that made this book special in my mind, nothing that made it stand out.
June 10, 2016
J'ai longtemps hésité avant de mettre cette note à ce livre. D'ailleurs, si goodreads le permettait, je mettrais plutôt un 3,5/5.
J'ai apprécié l'histoire, surtout qu'on sent bien que l'auteur a fait pas mal de recherches (et ca, c'est super agréable). J'ai absolument adoré les monstres marins dont ul est question, très loin des clichés que l'on rencontre habituellement. Leurs peuples, leur histoire, leur façon de communiquer, j'ai trouvé ça génial !
Mais je pense que ce qui m'a gâché ma lecture, c'est tout bonnement l'édition française que j'avais entre les mains. Je n'avais jamais vu autant de coquilles dans un livre avant... ! Certaines assez gênantes d'ailleurs puisqu'elles changeaient carrément le sens de la phrase. La traduction française est passable mais certains passageq deviennent vraiment incohérents. Je ne sais pas si c'est également le cas dans la VO ou si c'est un problème de traduction mais ca m'a pas mal fait sortir de ma lecture.
Idem, beaucoup de phrases très poétique, certes, mais sans aucun sens (ou alors je suis très très fatiguée).
Après, un autre problème mais cette fois ci venant du style de l'auteur lui même, c'est le fait qu'elle laisse le background des personnages totalement dans l'ombre. Du coup on a le droit régulièrement à des révélations qui tombent pile-poil au bon moment comme par magie, et... Bah perso je trouve ça un peu gros parfois. Mais bon, ce dernier point est ultra-subjectif et on se laisse quand même bien porter par l'histoire.
Bref, je recommande vivement aux anglophones que le livre intéresse de le lire dans sa version originale (si vous ne voulez pas perdre la vue).
J'ai apprécié l'histoire, surtout qu'on sent bien que l'auteur a fait pas mal de recherches (et ca, c'est super agréable). J'ai absolument adoré les monstres marins dont ul est question, très loin des clichés que l'on rencontre habituellement. Leurs peuples, leur histoire, leur façon de communiquer, j'ai trouvé ça génial !
Mais je pense que ce qui m'a gâché ma lecture, c'est tout bonnement l'édition française que j'avais entre les mains. Je n'avais jamais vu autant de coquilles dans un livre avant... ! Certaines assez gênantes d'ailleurs puisqu'elles changeaient carrément le sens de la phrase. La traduction française est passable mais certains passageq deviennent vraiment incohérents. Je ne sais pas si c'est également le cas dans la VO ou si c'est un problème de traduction mais ca m'a pas mal fait sortir de ma lecture.
Idem, beaucoup de phrases très poétique, certes, mais sans aucun sens (ou alors je suis très très fatiguée).
Après, un autre problème mais cette fois ci venant du style de l'auteur lui même, c'est le fait qu'elle laisse le background des personnages totalement dans l'ombre. Du coup on a le droit régulièrement à des révélations qui tombent pile-poil au bon moment comme par magie, et... Bah perso je trouve ça un peu gros parfois. Mais bon, ce dernier point est ultra-subjectif et on se laisse quand même bien porter par l'histoire.
Bref, je recommande vivement aux anglophones que le livre intéresse de le lire dans sa version originale (si vous ne voulez pas perdre la vue).
April 23, 2017
Set at the glamorous court of Versailles during the reign of Louis XIV, this dazzling and imaginative historical fantasy brings its magnificent historical setting beautifully to life, populating it with intriguing characters and adding to it an element of the supernatural that gives the story a unique flavour. On the orders of the King, Father Yves de la Croix has captured a sea monster, to be studied and then served at a banquet as the King is convinced that eating the creature's flesh can bestow immortality upon him. Yves's sister, Marie-Josèphe, a naive young woman shose sheltered upbringing and years spent locked away in a convent have left her unprepared for the realities of life at the opulent, decadent and worldly court, assists her brother in his scientific studies and is charged with taking care of the sea monster for the time being. As she spends time with the strange being, she discovers something unexpected: The "sea monsters" are not monsters but rather a previously unknown sea-dwelling humanoid species, communicating in song that Marie-Josèphe learns to understand. To save the sea woman's life, she must make others understand what she has discovered, but time is running out and her fantastical stories sound entirely too outlandish to be given credence.
Beautifully written with elaborately crafted and well researched settings, this stunning tale of innocence versus power, science versus religion, discovery, understanding, love and friendships that transcend boundaries quickly drew me in and ensnared me in all its enchanting glory. A wonderful read all around.
Beautifully written with elaborately crafted and well researched settings, this stunning tale of innocence versus power, science versus religion, discovery, understanding, love and friendships that transcend boundaries quickly drew me in and ensnared me in all its enchanting glory. A wonderful read all around.
January 9, 2011
Pageantry in the court of the Sun King, intertwining a brother and sister's fortune with a sea monster who turned out to be not so monstrous.
This isn't really a story about intricate court intrigues (alas! for I love those). The plot is fairly straightforward, and although there is a large cast of characters, only 5 really matters: Marie-Joseph -- wide-eyed, good-hearted, intelligent, yet incredibly naive re anything sex-related; Yves, her brother, aspiring to delve deep into scientific studies; Lucien -- hooray for an unusual yet still swoon-worthy hero -- the sea "monster" yearning for her freedom, and the Sun King himself, seeking to maintain power as he faced age and France's decline. Each has his own goals and wishes, and vie to have them met.
Strip the description of jewels and laces and court dalliances -- the novel verges on a dreamy fairy tale, in which one does not expect too much nuance or meticulous logic (i.e. WHY does Lucien always turn up at such opportune times? You'd think as the King's favourite courtier, he'd be much too busy to be on the lookout for a poor nobody like Marie-Joseph). A slow, elongated, stretched-out fairy tale. However, although I cursed the slow pacing for nigh on the entire first third of the book, this did not stop me from turning the pages and reading every single word (as opposed to, you know, merrily skimming along).
In its day, this novel won the Nebula Award. As such, it is a lighter novel than some of its compatriots, but quite worthy of a read!
This isn't really a story about intricate court intrigues (alas! for I love those). The plot is fairly straightforward, and although there is a large cast of characters, only 5 really matters: Marie-Joseph -- wide-eyed, good-hearted, intelligent, yet incredibly naive re anything sex-related; Yves, her brother, aspiring to delve deep into scientific studies; Lucien -- hooray for an unusual yet still swoon-worthy hero -- the sea "monster" yearning for her freedom, and the Sun King himself, seeking to maintain power as he faced age and France's decline. Each has his own goals and wishes, and vie to have them met.
Strip the description of jewels and laces and court dalliances -- the novel verges on a dreamy fairy tale, in which one does not expect too much nuance or meticulous logic (i.e. WHY does Lucien always turn up at such opportune times? You'd think as the King's favourite courtier, he'd be much too busy to be on the lookout for a poor nobody like Marie-Joseph). A slow, elongated, stretched-out fairy tale. However, although I cursed the slow pacing for nigh on the entire first third of the book, this did not stop me from turning the pages and reading every single word (as opposed to, you know, merrily skimming along).
In its day, this novel won the Nebula Award. As such, it is a lighter novel than some of its compatriots, but quite worthy of a read!
February 3, 2024
Well, I really got fed up with this one rather early. I don't see why the Nebula gave it the prize rather than Blue Mars which won the Hugo and the Locus that year. This story is a fanciful retelling of the Versailles years of Louis XIV seen through the improbably lense of a servant with mysterious origins and a "sea monster" (why didn't they just call it a siren or a mermaid? That was sooooo annoying!) I felt that the writing was kind of amateur and the characters rather one- or maybe two-dimensional but not fully fleshed out or truly charismatic either. I didn't have it, but having really enjoyed McIntyre's Dreamsnake, I came in expecting more and came away disappointed.
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