Hamlet, the Vessel
The Raven Tower by Ann Leckie
Pages: 416 Genre: fantasy
Rating: 3 Star
The kingdom of Iraden has been protected by a god known as the Raven, who is facilitated by the Raven's Lease. The time is coming for the next Lease to take his place, but while he is on route, another man usurps the throne. When the heir to the former Lease, Mawat, arrives with his aid, Eolo, the city is in political unrest. There's dangerous powers at work amongst both the humans and the gods, and Eolo — working on behalf of Mawat — learns there are many secrets behind held within the tower.
This is a retelling of Hamlet, but it's really not about him (Mawat). This is Horatio's story. And Eolo is ... fine. I love Horatio, which helps this book a lot. Ultimately, The Raven Tower has a myriad of brilliant ideas but is lacking in execution.
The overall story had a clear divide: the first person POV of a god and the second person POV of Eolo living out the horrors of the Hamlet plot. And for the moments that were the latter, I was really into it. As far as retellings go, this was very strong. I liked the interpretations of the characters and drama dynamics within this context, even if I disagreed with some of the finer points. I found it to have a very strong personal identity while also showing a lot of respect to the original material.
What I didn't like was how limited the actual Eolo/Hamlet plot was. We got some sprinklings of context (Mawat and Eolo's arrival, the reveal of the betrayal of the "king," and the setup of Mawat's madness), but overall the first half of the book is exposition. It may as well have started with "In the beginning" before bringing us to modern day. I am not exaggerating. It was good worldbuilding that was well crafted and vaguely interesting, but it felt so disconnected from the main (defined by what is pitched in the description) story.
The worldbuilding wasn't the best, either. A lot of thought was put into the political and religious context of the world, but everything else felt more like an afterthought. It was best exhibited in the treatment of Eolo, a trans man. People in this world are super fluid about sexuality, with various characters unremarkably mentioning their own queer behavior and not at all stumbling over the implication in regards to others. But also, most people are transphobic. I understand that this is common in real life, where trans people are cast out by "LGB" exclusionists. But our world is also not baseline accepting of queer people as it is. I liked the way Eolo would talk about his experiences and feelings, but it felt out of place in the otherwise evolved world we were in.
As I said earlier, I like Horatio, so getting me to like Eolo was not hard. But when I think about these characters, all of my feelings come from the play, not this book. As a main character told from second person POV, Eolo is kept at a distance. This could've been an interesting way to frame a story given the narrator and the nature of it being a play's retelling, but that was never realized. It was a clever narrative framing, but not a particularly well-used one. This casual indifference towards the Hamlet characters primarily meant that we just didn't get to know the characters that well outside of what was absolutely required for the story. Mawat and Eolo are close and trust each other completely, but they also only interact within the confines of the Hamlet plot points. I just wish we could've gotten more of the interpersonal moments build out.
This issue was highlighted by the fact that the entire climax takes place in the span of maybe 10 pages. I know this is how it happens in the play, but this is a 400 page book, not a 5 act play. Characters die instantly and the narrative tells us to move on to greener pastures. I won't spoil it, but in Hamlet, you get a devastated Horatio begging Hamlet to let him die with him, and Hamlet makes Horatio live in order to tell the story as the only surviving main character. We miss an emotional payoff like that in this book, because there's no time when you have to wrap up generations-worth of political strife and familial betrayal in ten minutes.
The pieces of this book were amazing, but the overall work was not impressive. I think the story suffered from too many ideas that led to a lack of identity. Did I still enjoy it? Sure. But I'm also a reader who will routinely be shocked and horrified to read that Hamlet's uncle has usurped his father's place, even if I've already read it hundreds of times in lots of different worlds. Will every reader like The Raven Tower? Probably not, which is a shame.
Comments