Star Trek: The Rihannsu novels

Diane Duane has finally completed her Star Trek alternate universe Rihannsu series, with the publication last year of The Empty Chair (unless, of course, she has some more ideas about what to do with her characters in, oh, another five or ten years). The first Rihannsu book, My Enemy, My Ally was written way back in 1984, more than 20 years ago. The only problem with a series – or in this case, more of a sequence of three related books, one of which was divided up into three volumes – that is written over such a long period of time is that every time a new volume comes out, you pretty much need to go back and re-read everything that’s gone before so that you don’t miss any nuances.

So over the past week I’ve read the whole series, including the final volume:

My Enemy, My Ally
The Romulan Way
Swordhunt
Honour Blade
The Empty Chair

At one time, I read all the Star Trek books that were being published, starting with the James Blish episode adaptations, his original Star Trek novel Spock Must Die!, and the Marshak-Culbreath anthologies. Somewhere around the 50th Pocket Books novel, I stopped reading them all, and only bought the ones that really drew me – primarily those that were about Spock or the history of Vulcan, and those written by a very small handful of “Star Trek authors” whose work I’d come to anticipate, whether it was Star trek related or not. One of those authors is Diane Duane.

In terms of plot, there’s nothing all that spectacular or unusual (as Star Trek novels go) about the Rihannsu books, although they’re certainly well-conceived and interesting, and considerably more complex than most: but when all's said and done, what it all boils down to is Kirk, Spock and McCoy save the Federation from the aliens and the aliens from themselves, on an ever increasing scale, with lots of action and intrigue and phasers in space and on the ground. What’s special about these books is Duane’s world-building. The Rihannsu are not the cardboard Romulans of ST:TOS (or even the slightly more developed Romulans of ST:TNG and ST:DS9). Star Trek’s Romulans are aliens who hate us, er, the Federation because they hate the Federation, who are sneaky because they are sneaky, and who are villains because they hate the Federation and are sneaky.

Duane’s Rihannsu are a people with a highly developed culture, religion, and history who have very good reasons for mistrusting the Other and whose ways of acting and reacting are perfectly appropriate within their cultural context. Of course, like any civilisation, they have good leaders and corrupt leaders, and in Duane’s ST universe, this is a time when the leaders of the Rihannsu have become corrupt. But Duane’s Rihannsu are not inherently evil or treacherous, and that’s part of what makes the Rihannsu books so interesting.

Duane also writes for an audience composed of Star Trek/science fiction fans reading something they love but don’t take seriously as “great literature,” which means there’s a wealth of in-jokes and ironic commentary on all sorts of subjects. Just as examples, there’s a metareference to the growing popularity of slash fanfiction made by McCoy in My Enemy, My Ally: “People start the damnedest rumours about this ship’s crew, even without provocation…” and Duane’s agent, Donald Maass, is listed among the crew members taking part in a particular mission. And in the final volume, there's a lovely comment about how the English language doesn't just steal from other languages, it drags them off into dark alleys and rifles their pockets for spare change.

Overall, I’ve enjoyed these books. The “guest protagonist” of the series – Rihannsu commander Ael i-Mhiessan t'Rllaillieu of the starship Bloodwing, and aunt of the unnamed “Romulan Commander” from the ST:TOS episode “The Enterprise Incident” – is a marvellous character. We see Ael first in My Enemy, My Ally where, finding corruption and a deep violation of the traditional Rihannsu code of honour (mnhei’sahe, which is of course untranslatable and means much more than “honour”) at the heart of her own Empire, she turns to her bitterest enemies, the crew of the Enterprise, to help her destroy a Rihannsu military/scientific installation where captured Vulcans are being used as experimental research subjects to find a way to give Rihannsu leaders the dangerous mental abilities of Vulcan adepts without the necessity of years of personal discipline and adherence to logic. Ael fears that to give the corrupt and dishonourable leaders of her Empire such power without any restraint would be a disaster for her own people, and sees Kirk and the Enterprise as the only way to stop it, even if it means that she and her crew will be at best exiles from the Empire they are trying to save.

Ael plays a much smaller role in the second novel, The Romulan Way. This book is primarily an exploration of Rihannsu society and politics; plot is secondary – although it does very nicely set up a major character, Arrhae ir-Mnaeha t’Khellian, born Terise Haleakala LoBrutto, and later known as Arrhae i-Khellian t’Llhweiir – for the final three-volumes. In this novel, Arrhae/Terise is a deep cover agent gone “native” and the Federation picks none other than Doctor McCoy to go in after her to see whether she’s still a Federation asset or has been assimilated into Rihannsu society to the point that her allegance is compromised. McCoy eventually discovers that the answer is “both,” and Ael shows up at the very end to yank McCoy’s chestnuts – and an emblematic sword – out of the fire.

The final three volumes deal with the consequences of the events of the first two books, political intrigue and civil unrest within the Rihannsu Empire, the threat of war on a galactic scale involving the Federation, the Rihannsu and the Klingon Empire, secret orders, plausible deniability, the demands of honour and the possibility that one man – or woman – can change the future. Duane makes good use of both the Canon enterprise crew and her own additions (including the young Horta, ensign Nahraht), she draws together all the loose ends from My Enemy, My Ally and The Romulan Way, and brings in as a major character the physicist K's't'lk from one of her other ST novels, The Wounded Sky. The pace suffers from having been released as three separate volumes, but it’s a highly satisfying conclusion, with two minor exceptions. First, I’d been enjoying the idea that Kirk and Ael shared loyalty, honour, respect and friendship, and nothing more; Duane chooses to change that – although in a restrained fashion – at the very end of the final volume. Second, just before the final events of the book, when Ael makes a necessary and honourable choice, it takes Kirk to finally convince her that this is indeed what she must do; the Ael I came to know though these five volumes wouldn’t have needed Kirk to show her what mnhei’sahe requires.

As with almost all Star Trek fictions, this series is marred by the inherent assumptions of the inherent rightness of Federation intervention in the politics and cultures of other peoples (the First Directive is only honoured when the Federation has no vested interest in doing otherwise, and so it has always been), but then we always knew that the Federation was constructed as being intrinsically good. But anyone who is still reading Star Trek fictions at this point in the game has learned to live with that in their own fashion. And within that set of assumptions, Duane’s Rihannsu series is among the best fictions created in the Star Trek universe.

Fitzwilliam Darcy, Gentleman

A long time ago, cynthia1960 recommended Pamela Aidan's “Fitzwilliam Darcy, Gentleman” trilogy - a retelling of Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice from the perspective of Elizabeth Bennet's counterpart and eventual partner in life, the enigmatic Darcy. I have finally acquired and read the books, and am most grateful to cynthia1960 for the recommendation.

An Assembly Such as This
Duty and Desire
These Three Remain

Aidan writes in a style that is part pastiche of Austen's own writing and part the conventional style of modern writers of Regency romance - a little more modern than Austen herself, but not so modern as to jar the sensibilities of modern Austenites. She follows the events covered in Pride and Prejudice faithfully, but goes on to show us what is going on in Darcy's life (and to a lesser extent, the lives of his sister Georgiana, his cousin Colonel Fitzwilliam, and of course the Bingleys) when Elizabeth isn't watching.

Austen was restricted in her own writing by the limitations placed on the behaviour of respectable women of her time and place. There is much that she could not write about because it was not something that women should know anything about. There was much that she had no direct experience of, particularly the way men talked and behaved among other men in a society in which men and women of her general social class in which men and women spent a great deal of time segregated by gender. Aidan can write what Austen could not write, and she has done so quite well.

Darcy runs a large estate and manages his financial interests, he hunts and fences and hangs out at his clubs. He gambles and talks politics and ventures into social engagements with the "faster set" that no respectable women, the kind that Jane Austen would write about, would ever have social dealings with. And we see him doing all of these things in between his encounters with Elizabeth Bennet.

The first book, An Assembly Such as This, is quite wonderful in all respects. It covers the period between the arrival of the Bingleys, with Darcy, at Netherfield, and ends with their departure after the Netherfield ball. Aidan shows us all of these events from Darcy's point of view, showing us a Darcy who is essentially a good man, but one who is in many ways quite rigid and overly concerned with propriety and social conventions. He is attracted to Elizabeth, but sees his attempts to converse with her as a kind of game, not unlike the fencing we will later see him to be most proficient at. And he is horrified at the thought that his good friend and protege Charles Bingley should lower himself to marry someone so out of his own social and financial orbit as Elizabeth's sister Jane.

Aidan's task in the second book, Duty and Desire, is to fill in the long stretch of time between the Netherfield ball, where Elizabeth and Darcy part on very poor terms, and their next encounter at Rosings. Because Austen gives us nothing of Darcy's life in this time period, other than the knowledge that he spends a small part of it persuading Bingley that Jane Bennet does not love him and that he should not pursue that connection, Aidan is on her own. Her choices made this book seem less appropriate - although still quite interesting - to me, as she decides to have Darcy, resisting his growing desire for Elizabeth, go off in search of a suitable wife to bring home to Pemberly and end up in a melodramatic plotline that blends many of the gothic elements that Austen satirised in Northanger Abbey with the Romantic fascination for Irish and Scottish folklore and weird doings. I found these elements out of place in a work based on Pride and Prejudice, although I acknowledge that they are very much a part of a common literary genre of Austen's time and would have enjoyed the story quite completely in a wholly original Regency setting.

These Three Remain brings us back, for the most part, to Austen's story about Elizabeth and Darcy, covering the meeting at Rosings and the disastrous proposal, the fortuitous encounter at Pemberly, the events that follow upon Lydia's fall from grace, the reconciliation of Bingley and Jane, the intervention of Lady Catherine and the final happy-ever-after ending. Aidan handles the character growth that brings Darcy from a proud and arrogant suitor to a man who know the true worth of people and things with some skill, although the use of the espionage subplot (and be honest now, what reader of Regency romances didn't see Dyfed's reveal coming all the way back in volume one?) seemed, again, un-Austenish.

Bottom line, though - fun to read, and full of good and interesting detail about the politics, social issues, and general habits, gossip, conventions and customs of Austen's time, with some wonderful tidbits tossed in, most particularly a reference to a new novel called Sense and Sensibility, about an impoverished widow and her three daughters, by an unknown author.

The Pleasures of Terre D'Ange

Kushiel’s Dart
Kushiel’s Chosen
Kushiel’s Avatar

In case no one had noticed, let me say this - I'm a real sucker for, among other things, in-depth worldbuilding, intricate plotting involving complex and interlocking political intrigues, and explorations of the roles of sexuality, spirituality and divinity in the development of societies and individuals. Strong female protagonists don't hurt either.

So of course I had to eventually find Jacqueline Carey's Kushiel novels, and read them, and love them. So far, I have read the first three, which focus on the unforgettable character of Phèdre nó Delaunay.

The setting is an alternate Earth, where gods and angels - at least some of them - are real and history has taken some very different paths, but the geography and basic cultures are recognisable as cognates of our own. The basic premise of Carey's alternate history - and theology - is that at the death by crucifixion of Yeshua ben Yosef (called by some the son of God and others Meshiach), his blood mingled with the tears of his disciple the Magdalene in the womb of Earth, creating a holy child known as the Blessed Elua. Accompanied by angelic companions, Elua wandered the face of the earth before settling for a while in what we would call northern Europe, and interbreeding with the human inhabitants of the area before leaving this world for a kind of paradise. Elua leaves the people of Terre D'Ange a single commandment: Love as thou wilt.

In Terre D'ange, people worship their divine and angelic ancestors. One of these, Naamah, is known for having celebrated sexuality in multiple and diverse ways and "had lain down with kings and peasants alike for [Elua's] sake." Another, Kushiel, represents justice and retribution.

The lead character, Phèdre nó Delaunay, is a Servant of Naamah, whose work is also a sacred calling, to provide pleasure in the ways that she is suited and trained for, to patrons who desire her services. Phèdre is also the chosen of Kushiel, and the rare combination of these angelic influences makes her an anguissette, one who experiences pain as pleasure and pleasure as pain, and ultimately finds in both a form of religious ecstasy. She is raised to be both courtesan and spy, and in the end becomes very much more - the avatar of her angels.

Carey's world contains many of the peoples of medieval to Renaissance Europe (and beyond): the civilised D'Angelines, the mercantile city-state of La Serenissima, the barbarian Scaldi, the fey and free-spirited Albans, the ancient people of Menekhet, the wandering Tsingani, the deeply religious Yeshuites, and many others.

There is so much to revel in, in these books. Phèdre's personal journey, and particularly her coming to terms with her nature - alternately gift and curse - and her role as the hand of the angels, if not the gods themselves, is compelling reading. The plots take full advantage of the possibilities for travel, adventure, danger, intrigue, despair, victory, love, sorrow - all good stuff well worth reading about. History buffs will love the subtlety with which Carey plays on, incorporates and modifies elements of cultural, political and religious history of our own world.

I'm looking forward to reading more pleasures of Terre D'ange.

Fire and Water

In Legend Born
In Fire Forged: The White Dragon
In Fire Forged: The Destroyer Goddess

Laura Resnick presents a well-written, well-paced and original fantasy trilogy focused on the struggles of a people to free themselves, not only from the tyranny of an occupying empire, but also from the deeper-rooted domination of their society by a caste of mages who control water and command assassins to enforce their position of power.

The story begins with three people: a woman born with the mark of flame, one of the ancient opponents of the water mages, an order of priests and prophets who draw their power from fire; a young man chosen by the Fire Goddess herself to set his people on the first steps toward rebellion; and a warrior with dark secrets he must face before he can play his part in the creation of a new and better life for his people.

There is intrigue. There is betrayal. There is love. There is suffering. There is sacrifice. There is death, for the chosen do not always enter the promised land. There is mystery and magic and prophesy and faith and the hand of the divine. And in the end there is rebirth, on many levels.