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jeriendhalSummary: Seeker is a half-human agent of the Dianone [sp] Sidhe, which is locked in a thousands of years old war with the Prometheus Club, human mages who are trying bind and disable the Faerie and their preditations on the Earth. She's charged by Mebd, Queen of the Faerie, to find the next Merlin, a human who is not merely a mage, but is magic, much the way the original Merlin is, and bring her over to the Faerie side in order to finally gain the upper hand in the endless war which has devastated the Mebd's realm. Along the way she finds herself caught up in a tangled weave of magic and blood ties, as the tragedy and betrayal of the Arthurian Mythos begins to play itself out again.
To further summarize: Morally ambigious people do horrible things to each other in the name of Civilization and/or Survival. Oaths are taken and foresworn, blood is spilled, innocents slain, frigging Arthur Pendragon is woken up from his long sleep Underhill, dragons and unicorns appear in NYC there are thousand turns and counter turns and revelations of kinship between the main characters and...
...nothing changes. Not really, never mind that magic returns openly to the world and a fleeting chance for the cycle to be broken is presented. Nothing really changes in the end though, except that the dead are dead and won't come back, and the people who made them dead just walk away to plan for another day.
As the Merlin notes when the situation is laid out to her, "We're fucked."
I suppose![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
matociquala intended this to be a tragedy, but you know what? I don't particularly care for tragedies. The most sympathetic character in the book, Matthew Magus, is basically used as a pawn by his superior in the most horrid way and the revenge he gets for this is fleeting and hollow at best. Seeker, the other POV character, becomes less and less sympathetic as she literally gives away her soul for the sake of her people and especially her son. Bear's sympathy is, I think, with the Faerie, but their actions in the end are as equally dispicable as the Prometheans.
There's a certain type of storytelling that seems to elevate pain and suffering as noble things to be admired, and the people who endure them without truly overcoming them to be heroes. Frankly, I don't buy that. In the end, pain is pain. It isn't noble at all, it just hurts.
To further summarize: Morally ambigious people do horrible things to each other in the name of Civilization and/or Survival. Oaths are taken and foresworn, blood is spilled, innocents slain, frigging Arthur Pendragon is woken up from his long sleep Underhill, dragons and unicorns appear in NYC there are thousand turns and counter turns and revelations of kinship between the main characters and...
...nothing changes. Not really, never mind that magic returns openly to the world and a fleeting chance for the cycle to be broken is presented. Nothing really changes in the end though, except that the dead are dead and won't come back, and the people who made them dead just walk away to plan for another day.
As the Merlin notes when the situation is laid out to her, "We're fucked."
I suppose
matociquala intended this to be a tragedy, but you know what? I don't particularly care for tragedies. The most sympathetic character in the book, Matthew Magus, is basically used as a pawn by his superior in the most horrid way and the revenge he gets for this is fleeting and hollow at best. Seeker, the other POV character, becomes less and less sympathetic as she literally gives away her soul for the sake of her people and especially her son. Bear's sympathy is, I think, with the Faerie, but their actions in the end are as equally dispicable as the Prometheans.There's a certain type of storytelling that seems to elevate pain and suffering as noble things to be admired, and the people who endure them without truly overcoming them to be heroes. Frankly, I don't buy that. In the end, pain is pain. It isn't noble at all, it just hurts.
