Must...write...about...something...besides...puppets.

So how about...books?

celticdragonfly introduced me to Chelsea Quinn Yarbro (well, not her, just her books), and I've now read the first three in her St. Germain series. Well, I read the third one first, since I picked it up free at a con; it had its ups and downs, but I liked it enough to give the first two a try.

Conclusions:

CQY wanted to write historical novels, and decided the best way to have a consistent viewpoint character thorughout widely disparate time periods was to make him a vampire. She does some nice things with her modified vampire lore, such as requiring St. Germain to wear shoes lined with his native earth so he can walk in sunlight and cross moving water. There are a few contradictions from book to book as to how the whole blood thing works, but I keep hoping they'll be resolved in future books.

St. Germain's a likeable character, but he has this habit of seducing one girl per book, even though he resists them strenuously. They're always unusually independent girls, of the sort once called "spirited," who nevertheless require rescuing from the clutches of the vile villain du jour (see below). The really fascinating thing is that St. Germain based on a real person--an 18th c alchemist at the French court, a mysterious figure said to have lived forever.

CQY cannot speak French. "Hotel Transylvania" was full of grating errors like "de les," and characters with plot-revealing names such as "Cielbleu" and "de la Tristesse de les Anges". Really, not every French person has a name that means something profound and symbolic. Not even 18th c French nobles. Her French errors leave me disinclined to trust her Italian in "The Palace," too, even though I don't speak enough Italian to find the mistakes.

CQY likes clothing. If her language research leaves something to be desired, she certainly knows her pourpoints from her gonelle. Sometimes the exhaustive detail reads like an SCA A&S competition submission.

The villains in these books are nasty pieces of work, as one-dimensionally vile as Weber's Cordelia Ransome, and in fact, the books suffer from one of the same problems as the Harrington series: while I am prepared to accept that there are such loathesome people in the world, why do these authors insist on giving us their villains' disgusting viewpoints? We're not talking Rob Pierre here, who isn't a bad guy in his own head--these are people who literally think to themselves, "W00t! I am teh eVOL! Just look how eVOL I am!" So far I've been treated to a Satanic torurer/serial rapist, and man who imports gladiators so he can watch them rape his wife. Ew. Ew. Ew. What is it with this author that she's so into rape? The villain in "The Palace" seems so far to be Donna Estasia, who, as celticdragonfly says, is not only creepy, but seems to be a full-blown psychotic. At least she's not a rapist, but still, why do I have to be inside her head?

So the jury is still out on CQY, and I've got the new Laurell Hamilton book on hand (speaking of interesting vampire lore), so I'll be switching to that once I've finished "The Palace." LKH's writing's been going steadily downhill since "Obsidian Butterfly," but I still keep reading in the hopes that she'll make a comeback. But I've borrowed her latest; I'm not risking any more cash on her.