Ryn's Reviews > Graceling

This was pretty much one of the most irritating books of all time - and consistent with my idea of YA fantasy. But I fought my way through it because, goshdarnit, I picked it up at the library, dragged it home with a load of other books and groceries, and renewed it the max number of times - I was gonna finish it.

You know the kickbutt heroine who is just totally kickbutt and doesn't need no one, no way, no how, and yet loves and feels and hurts deeply and yet keeps everyone away because she is baaaaaad? Yeah, that one. I hate her.

You know the quiet, loving hero who worships the ground his heroine walks on and yet is reasonably kickbutt himself, while at the same time deferring to the heroine's wishes and not fulfilling any of his own? I hate him, too.

Katsa was a child, and I hated that she and Po meandered their way into a sexual relationship because of 'twu wuv' and the fact that she would be tied down if she married. By golly, dontcha know you don't have to be married to have sex and lead a wonderful, fulfilling life? Now imagine the situation reversed - if Po had fallen in 'twu wuv' with Katsa, but would never contemplate marriage because he thought it would tie him down and keep him from true freedom... Wow, that would be really, really sexist. And lame. But if a woman does it to the man whom she loves (and who loves her in return), it's a point for us rockin' feminists.

Please. Please. For the love of good fantasy fiction, let's write and read about realistic characters and remember that what's good for the goose is good for the gander. I would have hated it if Po had refused to marry Katsa for the reasons stated above, but neither do I enjoy it when the poor guy's just supposed to be some worthless blob waiting for her to come home from her adventures, beat him at fights, and then run off into the wild blue yonder again. Isn't marriage/love supposed to be a give-and-take between equals? If Katsa had scorned marriage in the beginning and rethought her view after learning that Po's love would never keep her bound, there would have been something to say in defense of this novel.

I suppose the idea of the Grace and the Kingdoms, etc. was good, but the childish, flat chracters and overdone prose made it a difficult, boring read that could have been halved and still felt too long. And best wishes to the youth who read this and decide that sex isn't a big deal, that it can happen as long as you KNOW you're in love (because, obviously, it's easy to know when you're that age), and that 'marriage' is a synonym for 'slavery'.