Heather Rose Jones: Mother of Souls
Jul. 11th, 2018 08:18 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
bibliogrammaThe third of Heather Rose Jones’ Alpenna novels, Mother of Souls, continues the story of Margerit Sovitre, wealthy thaumaturge and famed swordswoman Barbara, Countess of Savese.
Their circle of friends and associates has continued to expand, drawing more women from various professions and ways of life. Margerit’s extensive fortune has enabled her to continue being the patron of a number of women, both upper class and working class, who are expanding the scope of the female professions, women’s scholarship, and women’s engagement in the Mysteries - the very real forms of religious magic that can be seen, generated, shaped and directed by ritual, words and music.
The focus of the novel lies in one of the great mystery rituals which is supposed to bring safely to the small country of Alpenna. Margerit has already rewritten it, and yet the new version is not without flaws, a fact brought to her attention one of the new characters in Margerit’s circle, Serafina Talarico, an archivist, born in Rome but of Ethiopian ancestry, who has a rare gift for being able to see in detail the energy flows invoked by rituals. The flaw that reveals itself to Serafina’s vision may have some connection to rumours that have come to Barbara about mysterious, possibly unnatural storms in the mountains along part of Alpennia’s border. Amid the unfolding of this greater plotline lie a number personal stories: Serafina’s unhappy marriage, and her despair at being able to see the great mysteries but not evoke them; Barbara’s engagement in bringing order to a recently inherited title and lands that have been ignored for years by their previous lord; the revelation that Barbara’s armin, Tavit, is a trans man, deeply conflicted in a world that has no place or understanding of his nature; Luzie Valorin, an impoverished widow with a remarkable gift for musical composition and performance that evokes the energies associated with the Mysteries.
While I love the woman to woman relationships that are the backdrop to this series - Margerit and Barbara, Jeanne de Cherdillac and Antuniet - the most fascinating part of the culture in which Margerit’s adventures in ritual magic, and Barbara’s exercises in statecraft, take place is the feeling of watching a renaissance of women’s scholarship. In this novel, one of Margerit’s new projects is the creation of a college for women, with a print shop attached so that the works of the women Margerit has supported through her substantial fortune, and as well as more commercial projects, can be published without having to rely solely on subscriptions - which are harder for women scholars to generate. Interwoven in the major and minor plots are important stories about women struggling to be recognised for their work, intelligence, talent and skill, and the ways in which their efforts are undermined, blocked, trivialised, and even plagarised by men who cannot deal with women who think, and create, and do other such things with serious intent that have been by tradition reserved for men. Jones writes with a fiercely feminist vision, and an unabashed love for the hearts and souls of women making their own ways in the world.
Their circle of friends and associates has continued to expand, drawing more women from various professions and ways of life. Margerit’s extensive fortune has enabled her to continue being the patron of a number of women, both upper class and working class, who are expanding the scope of the female professions, women’s scholarship, and women’s engagement in the Mysteries - the very real forms of religious magic that can be seen, generated, shaped and directed by ritual, words and music.
The focus of the novel lies in one of the great mystery rituals which is supposed to bring safely to the small country of Alpenna. Margerit has already rewritten it, and yet the new version is not without flaws, a fact brought to her attention one of the new characters in Margerit’s circle, Serafina Talarico, an archivist, born in Rome but of Ethiopian ancestry, who has a rare gift for being able to see in detail the energy flows invoked by rituals. The flaw that reveals itself to Serafina’s vision may have some connection to rumours that have come to Barbara about mysterious, possibly unnatural storms in the mountains along part of Alpennia’s border. Amid the unfolding of this greater plotline lie a number personal stories: Serafina’s unhappy marriage, and her despair at being able to see the great mysteries but not evoke them; Barbara’s engagement in bringing order to a recently inherited title and lands that have been ignored for years by their previous lord; the revelation that Barbara’s armin, Tavit, is a trans man, deeply conflicted in a world that has no place or understanding of his nature; Luzie Valorin, an impoverished widow with a remarkable gift for musical composition and performance that evokes the energies associated with the Mysteries.
While I love the woman to woman relationships that are the backdrop to this series - Margerit and Barbara, Jeanne de Cherdillac and Antuniet - the most fascinating part of the culture in which Margerit’s adventures in ritual magic, and Barbara’s exercises in statecraft, take place is the feeling of watching a renaissance of women’s scholarship. In this novel, one of Margerit’s new projects is the creation of a college for women, with a print shop attached so that the works of the women Margerit has supported through her substantial fortune, and as well as more commercial projects, can be published without having to rely solely on subscriptions - which are harder for women scholars to generate. Interwoven in the major and minor plots are important stories about women struggling to be recognised for their work, intelligence, talent and skill, and the ways in which their efforts are undermined, blocked, trivialised, and even plagarised by men who cannot deal with women who think, and create, and do other such things with serious intent that have been by tradition reserved for men. Jones writes with a fiercely feminist vision, and an unabashed love for the hearts and souls of women making their own ways in the world.