Adrienne Martine-Barnes (1942–2015)

The Fire Sword, The Crystal Sword, The Rainbow Sword, and The Sea Sword are magical swords representing the four elements. Classic high fantasy about our heroes on a quest to save the land right out of Campbell. However, these books are from the 1980s and are also clearly second-wave feminist speculative fiction centered around gender dynamics grounded in mythology. Each stands alone, but they function best as a set. So Light vs Dark and battle of the sexes and Freudian issues with parents and journeys of self-discovery.

Each magic sword has a magic sheath made from the skin of the Earth Serpent, the only thing strong enough to contain the power of the swords. And sword and sheath are used as literal metaphors (is that an oxymoron?) for mystical union of man and woman. So each book is about bringing magical artifacts and magical people together into unbreakable union. Yadda yadda. All very heteronormative and reifying plenty of gender stereotypes.

In comparison to The Rainbow Sword (book 3), The Sea Sword isn't quite as virulently racist, but it's even more white savior. This time, it's Geoffrey and Helen's daughter Claire. She's learned the arts of war from her mother and the arts of magic and general scholarship from her father, seeking her parent's love and approval yet not gifted in any of these things nor in a traditional domestic gender role. She knows about her parent's adventures but never thought she'd be called to find a sword. Everyone knew that would be her twin brother. But lo, of the 4 children, two are sent west (her brother and a sister), and she's sent east, and one remains home as solace to the parents.

I wondered whether all of the siblings' quests would be presented, but no, the whole book was Clair's POV with rare references to her brother and sister and parents. The family grew up traveling throughout the Mediterranean, and Clair is a polyglot who has lived in a lot of places and tried a lot of things. So when an Indian fakir shows up at the bazaar saying he was sent to find her, she's prepared to venture into the unknown. The book opens with a convocation of the goddesses, all of them, from all mythologies. Darkness is still in the world, and due to the events in the preceding books (The Fire Sword, The Crystal Sword, and The Rainbow Sword), the goddesses no longer can godphone directly with humanity. So it's a lot harder to send people on quests through direct dialogue.

Clair and her mentor Djurjati take a sea voyage back to India, while he tries to teach her Hinduism and Buddhism and does teach her meditation and Hindi. While all the time telling her that women can't ascend because they're impure. So again, brown people with cultural misogyny, not like those Europeans amirite?

Clair knows her family's history. She knows about connections with the goddesses, and how they have acted as loving mothers and patronesses to the generations before her, yet what she experiences are terrifying wordless visions of her death. On visiting Kali's temple she is possessed with the divine dance, which turns into a sword match with the goddess whose idol steps down from the altar, resulting in her taking the fateful sea sword and also losing a hand, leaving her disabled and despairing and very confused. This isn't the script. Clair is claimed by Kali, and dance is her connection to the divine, while Darkness-fueled mobs destroy temples, and the Indian pantheon fights back. She travels through India to the Himalayas through Tibet and Nepal and ultimately into China, encountering yetis, guardian lion-dogs, and various peoples.

She also knows about the sword and the sheath and the mystical union of lovers. But then she kills a Chinese dragon and finds in its wake the sheath along with a few other magical artifacts. So then she maunders on about how she's doomed to eternal loneliness because the dragon ate the man who was destined to give her the sheath and be joined as soulmates. Yadda yadda. We can all see the plot twist a mile away.

The dalai llama of that time and place tells her that her coming was prophesied and she is there to heal someone. Turns out his spirit has gotten lost, and she needs to reel it back to the body, which requires blending their essences. And we can see where this is going too. Guess who this is? The exiled Son of Heaven who was banished by his Empress mother 20 years ago after she married the leader of the invaders (I assume these are intended to be Mongols).

The magical sword was hardly used in this book and was seen as far more threat than salvation. Too powerful, the sword of waters could drown the world if fully unleashed. Without the mystical union of fated man and woman it is an uncontrolled artifact. Plus other magical artifacts play a role, including the jade rod of imperial power and heavenly mandate. Insert phallic joke here. In addition to Kali, Tara and Kuanyin make divine appearances not just to Clair but as public manifestations at times.

So white savior king-maker is the entire plotline. The true Emperor of China needs essentially his culturally appropriate foreign Joan of Arc to get him on the throne. Cultural appropriation, maybe, long before that was a concept that entered public awareness. And certain plenty of cultural/racial stereotyping when describing India and other regions of East Asia. Very dismissive of the Hindu caste system, and Clair is appalled by the entire concept of untouchables (which, fair point), yet she falls in love with Han China and doesn't seem to recognize the vast inequities and class system there. Again, might be authorial racism because Indians tend to be much darker than Han Chinese.

I liked this book best of the four because it was a lot more philosophical, exploring the nature of reality and life and death from various religious and cultural perspectives. And Clair's growth and self-revelation went deeper than earlier characters as she struggled with disability along with the inevitable parental issues and childhood traumas and her connections with a fearsome aspect of divinity. She found a spiritual home and an adopted land, far more so than previous generations who settled elsewhere. She did retire at the end of the book, but no making babies--this book was far to metaphysical for that. Plus I liked that this book was far more travelogue giving a sense of the flavors and sights and sounds of these cultures. The heroine thought logically in Greek and poetically in Arabic and was ambidextrous. She wrote home in Arabic and learned the Chinese writing system. This book was not at all about centering northern European culture and its presumed superiority.… (mer)

The Fire Sword, The Crystal Sword, The Rainbow Sword, and The Sea Sword are magical swords representing the four elements. Classic high fantasy about our heroes on a quest to save the land right out of Campbell. However, these books are from the 1980s and are also clearly second-wave feminist speculative fiction centered around gender dynamics grounded in mythology. Each stands alone, but they function best as a set. So Light vs Dark and battle of the sexes and Freudian issues with parents and journeys of self-discovery.

Each magic sword has a magic sheath made from the skin of the Earth Serpent, the only thing strong enough to contain the power of the swords. And sword and sheath are used as literal metaphors (is that an oxymoron?) for mystical union of man and woman. So each book is about bringing magical artifacts and magical people together into unbreakable union. Yadda yadda. All very heteronormative and reifying plenty of gender stereotypes.

The Rainbow Sword features Geoffrey, son of Dylan and Aenor (The Crystal Sword). He's a student in Venice who races home to find his mother dying and father grief-stricken and meets his aunt Rowena, who has written a history of their family's exploits. His parents didn't really talk about their deeds or their contact with the divine, so he is unprepared for the goddess of poppies to appear and send him on a quest to Byzantium in search of a healing elixir. He doesn't quite realize she's a goddess, and he's overcome with grief and envy of his parents' closeness (very Freudian), so he steals a horse, food, money, and his aunt's book (how else is he going to understand what the hell is going on) to seek adventure and save his mother (he thinks).

This time it's the Holy Land, the Levant, that is the scene for immortal struggle. Geoffrey spends the whole time maundering about what a coward he is, how unlike his dad he is, how he's relied on logic and reason yet divine visitations are challenging his understanding of the world. He's not a warrior like his father, nor a singer like his mother. But he plays a mean flute and can feel the music of his lineage in his bones. Geoffrey doesn't make it to Byzantium because he returns to Venice to arrange transportation and gets stuck when the Doge shuts down maritime travel. He befriends Hermes (though of course at first he doesn't realize he's had another encounter with the divine), who helps him get out of the city and on the road. He eventually figures out the goddess of poppies is Persephone, and it's all about Hellenic myths this time.

But what about the sword, and the girl? The scenes alternate primarily between Geoffrey and Helene, the daughter of Hiram, one of the powerful Byzantine mages whose magics have kept the city safe for centuries. She's got a massive inferiority complex and a lot of rage because her father hates her for not being a boy, even though she does her best to be a boy, pursuing the arts of war and studying magic. Byzantium is under attack by an invading army, and Helene flees in the chaos with an artifact from her father that turns out to be effectively a light saber. Just some sort of cross shape until she empowers it (there's a sexual component to this--the book is not subtle), and then it develops an ethereal and ultimately material blade. Turns out she's had a relationship with an unnamed goddess since she was a child who guides and aids her on her journey.

Helene hates and fears men, not surprising given how many violent encounters she has: her father wants to use her as a blood sacrifice, then a shapechanging mage captures her, then an Arab mage attempts to seduce/rape her. And Geoffrey thinks he's not man enough for women besides being raped by Maenads and wants nothing to do with sex or women. So here they are, traveling companions who sleep with the sword between them while they build trust and understanding. In addition to Persephone and Hermes, we get Artemis, Aphrodite, Ares, and Dionysius at least mentioned if not all showing up in scenes.

But wait, there's more. Other chapters feature the viewpoint of Michael ben Avi and his twin brother Jacob, who are rivals in leading their people under siege and as refugees from the fall of Jerusalem (called Salem in this book). Is one of them destined to be the king who ultimately receives the magic sword and defeats Darkness?

So this third book is unlike the previous two (The Fire Sword and The Crystal Sword). It moves out of northern Europe into the eastern Mediterranean. And the book opens with a disclaimer that this alternate timeline had no Mohammed, no Islam, no Crusades, no religious schism and hence no Greek Orthodox church. That's a little bit of a red flag for me. Like, this is book 3 in a series already well established as an alternate historical fantasy. Why signpost No Muslims Here so loudly? Islamophobia maybe?

And then we get to these Jewish potential kings. Not that they're ever called that. But the chapter that introduces Michael ben Avi shows him abandoning his extremely pregnant wife Rebecca to pursue his holy mission as the Messiah, and thinking of her as nagging and complaining. And focused on the adulation of his followers and the power struggle with his twin brother. When Geoffrey and Helene see him, he's described as having "huge doe-like eyes rimmed with ebony lashes, wavy black hair, pronounced nose, and a square black beard" and is later described him as rubbing his hands together. The anti-semitism is not subtle. That along with his greed for the sword and attempted coercion and general zealotry.

Adrienne Martine-Barnes shifts her setting but makes it a misogynistic, violent place full of dangerous dark men, unnamed nomadic peoples, invasions from the east, some of which is Darkness, and some apparently just brown people on a rampage. The racism is strong in this book. Not like those things aren't present in Albion and Franconia (the settings of the earlier books), but she really kicked it up a lot more notches and made it clear she thought it was a cultural problem, not just an asshole/Darkness problem.… (mer)

The Fire Sword, The Crystal Sword, The Rainbow Sword, and The Sea Sword are magical swords representing the four elements. Classic high fantasy about our heroes on a quest to save the land right out of Campbell. However, these books are from the 1980s and are also clearly second-wave feminist speculative fiction centered around gender dynamics grounded in mythology. Each stands alone, but they function best as a set. So Light vs Dark and battle of the sexes and Freudian issues with parents and journeys of self-discovery.

Each magic sword has a magic sheath made from the skin of the Earth Serpent, the only thing strong enough to contain the power of the swords. And sword and sheath are used as literal metaphors (is that an oxymoron?) for mystical union of man and woman. So each book is about bringing magical artifacts and magical people together into unbreakable union. Yadda yadda. All very heteronormative and reifying plenty of gender stereotypes.

The Crystal Sword opens with the legend of the forging of the 4 magical swords that smacks of Norse myth, Odin, and the worldtree. The story features Eleanor and Doyle's son Dylan, who must travel to Franconia (not France), which is covered in Darkness, to find the woman who holds the sword of the earth element. Sal, his mother's divine friend and his own, shows him a vision of Aenor, trapped underground under a spell of amnesia for unknown years, captive of the fae (known as White Folk here). Eleanor is having none of it. After all, she did all that work in service to the divine, why should one of her kids have to do the same. The goddess wins, of course. Dylan is ready for his own adventure and starts off on his quest having known the minstrels' tales told about his parents and having heard them tell their stories growing up.

The chapters alternate between Dylan's viewpoint and Aenor's. Like his father, Dylan has shapechanging ability and becomes Lord of the Beasts with mystical antlers that sometimes manifest. Aenor has at least one White Folk ancestor, and after years in their underground kingdom has absorbed their magical skills, manifested through song. This book features such creatures as licornes (referenced as unicorns in The Fire Sword) and salamanders that can move through solid rock. No king-making as such in this book, but it does feature royal St Louis who is effectively on crusade to rid Franconia of Dark-infested people. Which takes a lot of killing. Helped along by the crystal sword, once Dylan finds the sheath, rescues Aenor, they get it on, and each wield the magical weapon to save the day. Then exit stage right (to Italy) to make babies and breed horses.… (mer)

The Fire Sword, The Crystal Sword, The Rainbow Sword, and The Sea Sword are magical swords representing the four elements. Classic high fantasy about our heroes on a quest to save the land right out of Campbell. However, these books are from the 1980s and are also clearly second-wave feminist speculative fiction centered around gender dynamics grounded in mythology. Each stands alone, but they function best as a set. So Light vs Dark and battle of the sexes and Freudian issues with parents and journeys of self-discovery.

Each magic sword has a magic sheath made from the skin of the Earth Serpent, the only thing strong enough to contain the power of the swords. And sword and sheath are used as literal metaphors (is that an oxymoron?) for mystical union of man and woman. So each book is about bringing magical artifacts and magical people together into unbreakable union. Yadda yadda. All very heteronormative and reifying plenty of gender stereotypes.

The Fire Sword begins with Eleanor, a modern women who wakes to find herself in 1220 England. Again, it was the 1980s and modern person yanked to an earlier time was a common trope. I remember reading a lot of stories along those lines, though only The Gandalara Cycle comes to mind right now. And of course, these days Outlander is the obvious example. The narrative is third person personal, mostly from Eleanor's perspective with the occasional paragraph from the hero's perspective.

Anyway, Eleanor wakes up in 1220 just a little confused as to what's going on. Turns out the Darkness is taking over Albion (not England), including the current King Henry on the throne, and the Irish goddess Bridget has brought Eleanor back to carry the fire sword into battle to defeat the Darkness, possibly an evil from another universe, that first appeared in Iberia in 1169. Actually, Eleanor has been dropped into an alternate timeline, where Pope Adrian IV declared the multiverse part of church doctrine, Guillaume the Strong (not William the Conqueror) is the Savior of Albion, Islam never emerged, the Crusades never happened, and Jerusalem is an unconquered Jewish city.

After getting her marching orders and the magic sword from Bridget and being brought up to speed by Brother Ambrosius (such interlocutors are handy for dropping lots of context for the readers), Eleanor finds a wolf companion and is soon underway to Hibernia (Irish legends, remember?). Along the way, she also meets Saille, goddess of willows, Orphiana, the Earth Serpent, and her twin sons Doyle and Baird ever struggling for dominance (and recalling other divine twins or battling brothers including Cain and Abel). Turns out Eleanor has a lot of magical gifts (bestowed by goddesses), and Doyle is a shapechanger. Having special powers certainly helps to defeat evil.

A lot of the dialogue and the emotional heart of the story is very much about intimacy and love, and not necessarily just sexual relationship. This is true for all of the books. They all very much emphasize consent (at least when the female protagonists are dealing with the heroes) and also the omnipresent threat of sexual violence. All about the power and mystery and complexity of woman. Plus king-making and passing the magical artifacts onto the ruler of the land. Then exit stage left to retire and make babies.… (mer)