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Lädt ... Gullstruck Island (2009)von Frances Hardinge
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I love Frances Hardinge. Her books are consistently well-written, meaningful, and a pleasure to read. The Lost Conspiracy might be my favorite of all (though I still need to read The Lie Tree). Hardinge's world-building is always top-notch, and Gullstruck is no exception. There's a lot of history to get through before we truly understand the position of the Lace, the Lost, and the dead in society, but it's never a chore. The characters are well-rounded and understandable, if not always sympathetic. (I loved the Superior!) I'll admit I came into this predisposed to feel righteous fury for Hathin, having to devote her life to Arilou, who would never thank her, but was pleasantly surprised to find the complexity of Hathin's emotions regarding that very topic. She loves her and pities her, but is sometimes filled with anger that she'll be constantly shackled to her, and then feels incredible guilt for that anger. And the fact that she bears the burden of being Arliou to outsiders but receives no real recognition for it is heartbreaking, infuriating, and sadly too realistic. The plot of the book is an unfortunately important message about how easily prejudiced can be born and genocide/slavery can be justified, even by men who think they're doing the right thing. The Lace are killed in mobs and rounded up and sent to labor camps, and everyone believes that there's some kind of innate justification in this, and so they don't think about it too hard. Hathin's entire village is killed in a terrible manner, and while she mourns, she understands there's not really time to fully do so. And while she seeks revenge, she eventually understand that there's a point where revenge has to stop, otherwise you're constantly seeking it. A FEW minor quibbles: I wish the cover had shown Hathin smiling, and I wish What can I say? I was expecting a fantasy novel, not a gripping exploration of the mechanics of genocide. This is an exhilarating and excoriating tale of rivalry and revenge, treachery and faithfulness, in a context of colonialism and inter-ethnic violence. It is the nearest thing I have ever encountered to an imaginative match for Mervyn Peake's Gormenghast trilogy, placing believable if exotic characters into a setting of baroque and byzantine complexity. It probes the reasonableness and irrationality of evil, the subtle truths and untruths of myth and unquestioned tradition, in a subtropical and volcanic world whose splintered facets seem to reflect a nightmare vision of the Pitt Rivers Museum in Oxford. The book is stunning. MB 13-viii-2021 [I wrote this review in 2010] ** A very good fantasy adventure story for older children and young adults.** The story is of two sisters, Avrilou and Hathin, and their search to solve the mystery of what happened one fateful day in their village of the Hollow Beasts, a village of people of 'Lace' descent. Avrilou is believed to be a Lost - a revered status - she is believed to have the power that all Lost lay claim to, the ability to leave their bodies and fly with their minds to any location. The Lost are treasured for their abilities to see events, predict incoming weather fronts, solve mysteries and more. Hathin is Avrilou's 'invisible' younger sister - invisible because she has an uncanny ability to go unnoticed. She is Avrilou's helper, or minder, as Avrilou does not have speech and appears often 'away with the fairies' or away from her body. She is so vacant at times that her family and villagers are not completely sure of her Lost status. One day as Avrilou is being tested for her abilities a series of strange events is set in motion which will alter the fate of the village, the Lace, and particularly Avrilou and Hathin as they struggle to make sense of it all and find the culprit responsible for turning their world upside down. I think Frances Hardinge borrows a little bit from volcano mythology (particularly New Zealand Maori legend) which adds a certain folklore-ish feel to the story. This works well in the story if you understand the basis, but I'm not sure that young readers will necessarily 'get' the personification of the volcanoes and their rivalry, and their tightrope relationship with humans. My only other 'gripe' is more personal - one of the major characters Jimboly is a dentist of sorts, and the Lace people mark themselves by intricate tooth decoration - as someone with a dentistry phobia the descriptions didn't appeal much - and I know there are many others out there squeamish about teeth! Otherwise, it's a very well-written and pacy story, long but not wordy, and after a slow-ish beginning the pages just seem to turn all by themselves. Recommended for ages 10+. **** 4 stars.
There are wonderful creations here, in characters such as Jimboly, a "crowdwitch" whose speciality is stirring terrifying mobs into action. If the "blissing beetles" - which make a sound so beautiful everyone who hears it dies of pleasure - are a little too Hogwartian, then there is more than enough else to engulf young readers, holding them captive for the long haul. This dense, imaginative fantasy, involving a tribe of outcasts and a landscape that seems to have a mind of its own, is distinguished, as is all of Hardinge's fiction, by her writerly precision and phrase-making: children picking up a local patois, for instance, bring it home “like mud on their shoes”. AuszeichnungenPrestigeträchtige AuswahlenBemerkenswerte Listen
When a lie is exposed and their tribe turns against them, Hathin must find a way to save her sister Arilou--once considered the tribe's oracle--and herself. Keine Bibliotheksbeschreibungen gefunden. |
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Google Books — Lädt ... GenresMelvil Decimal System (DDC)823.92Literature English & Old English literatures English fiction Modern Period 2000-Klassifikation der Library of Congress [LCC] (USA)BewertungDurchschnitt:
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Now for the story. The Lost Conspiracy was originally titled Gullstruck Island in the UK, which is name of the setting, an island whose native populations live alongside their imperial conquerors. At the center of the story is a native tribe called the Lace. Our two main characters are Lace and they're sisters. They younger is Hathin whose sole purpose in life is to watch over her older sister Arilou. Arilou is a not a normal human being, but a member of a small race known as the Lost. The Lost can send their senses out of their bodies to see, hear, smell, taste, and touch anything anywhere on Gullstruck Island or beyond. So obviously, they're revered and considered very powerful. The thing is, Hathin isn't 100% sure her sister is really Lost, but her whole village is counting on her to "translate" Airlou's slurred speech and prove to government inspectors that she really is one of the Lost.
And that's just the first few pages. What follows is no less than the entire history of the struggle between the Lace and the Cavalcaste nation. I told you this was epic, right? It has shades of many powerful stories: The Lord of the Rings, Harry Potter, Schindler's List, Robin Hood. It also feels anthropological. Like Hardinge studied and then blended together hundreds of details about ancient civilizations, religions, folklore, and the history of colonial conflict. Overall, it's a pretty amazing accomplishment. And did I mention the writing? Beautiful writing. Highly recommended for all fantasy buffs. ( )