(no subject)

[white_hart]

Having just finished Pawn in Frankincense I am now flailing about incoherently. So many twists and turns and doublings-back of plot! So many things that seemed to so obviously be one thing, only to turn out to be something completely different!

OK, this was not my first Dorothy Dunnett so I wasn't exactly surprised. Just a bit breathtaken at the sheer extent of it.

Also, the chess game managed to be even more nailbiting than the courtroom scene/card game in The Game of Kings, and I didn't even think that was possible. And more emotionally devastating than the deaths of Christian Stewart in The Game of Kings and Will and Wat Scott in The Disorderly Knights, and those had me staring at the page in disbelief. And, obviously, I am left with far more questions than answers. With only two more Lymond books to go (admittedly, two very substantial books) I do wonder whether it's even possible to tie everything up neatly.

In any case, although I have all the books on my Kindle already, I think I need to read something easier and much, much fluffier next. Something where the protagonists aren't enmeshed in betrayal and torture and forced to make heartbreaking, impossible choices. Possibly Wodehouse, though I'm not sure that's quite it; something along those lines, anyway.

I did actually find a copy of the next book in the Oxfam bookshop yesterday lunchtime, but given the utter atrociousness of its cover I'm very glad I already have them all on Kindle...

Comments

[lilliburlero]

Blimey: Cover Illustrator--Human Anatomy. Anatomy--Illustrator. I don't believe you've met. His... HEAD. Her... COLLARBONES.

[white_hart]

It is truly shocking, isn't it? Hence the need I felt to pull out my phone and take a picture of it!

[aella_irene]

Dunnett apparently had a series of really awful covers. There is also a group of inexplicable mullets, and one where the hero is approx 40 years older than his actual age.

[white_hart]

I think that Lymond in this one looks a lot older than 26 (hurrah for actually finding out how old he is!). And it just makes it look like some kind of bonkbuster which is so very much not what it is.

[perennialanna]

Francis' age is one of the things you then have to map backwards - because in Game of Kings he's so very very much younger than one first supposes (or at least as I first supposed). So setting fire to the castle with his mother inside is really an outbreak of extended adolescence - and all the things that were done to him before the series starts were done to a child. A very self-possessed and intelligent child, but a child. And I have only just realised that in many ways Philippa's arc is a mirroring of that (this is why Dunnett fans tend to be devoted re-readers. One reading is never enough).

[white_hart]

Yes, I don't think I'd have guessed at him being barely twenty, if not still in his teens; I wouldn't have thought he was more than thirty but not that young.

There are so many things in the books which simply don't make sense on first reading, because you need information that doesn't come until later. All of Game of Kings, just for starters. I'm looking forward to getting to the end and being able to re-read and see the patterns that are still hidden now.

[perennialanna]

Now you know why I couldn't say anything!

I always think I need a break after Pawn in Frankincense, because my brain cannot take any more. But any other book seems wrong, so I generally end up carrying straight on. There is a lot more Philippa to come, which I hope you think is a good thing.

[white_hart]

I do quite see! It's an incredible scene, but my goodness is it harrowing.

I am very pleased to hear that there is a lot more Philippa to come, I like her immensely :-)

[aella_irene]

My adoration for Philippa is immense.

[white_hart]

She is wonderful. I only wish that at almost three times her age I could manage to have half her courage and general gumption.

[aella_irene]

Hurrah! I am so glad you are enjoying them!

[white_hart]

They are wonderful!

[oursin]

Hah - I picked up the entire set, except for Game of Kings, in that edition, secondhand, very cheaply (I have no shame).

[white_hart]

If I was buying paper copies, rather than having got them all on Kindle, I'm sure I would have bought it, dreadful cover or no dreadful cover. (Actually, possibly I should keep an eye out for paper copies as well - so much easier to flip back and check things when they suddenly become significant that way!). Are all the others as bad?

[oursin]

Pretty much the same kind of thing. But really cheap!

[caulkhead]

Mine are a series of reasonably tasteful watercolours by someone who seems to have actually read the books, and prefers landscapes to people - that edition is about 20 years old, I think.

[aunty_marion]

I'd have to get mine (all paperbacks) off the shelf to check them, but I got Game of Kings, Queen's Play, and The Disorderly Knights as a present for passing my A-levels (I think), so in 1972. I'd had QP & DK from the library before then, but they didn't have GoK!! So I dived in for about five hours, emerging only to go to the loo and (reluctantly) eat. I bought the rest as and when they came out...

ETA: I've just checked, and it looks as if my copy of Checkmate had the same cover artist - it's the same face on the man! Three of them, for some reason, have a dark-haired bearded man on the covers, and GoK, though possibly a different artist, has a rather-too-old blond and a girl who I suppose could be meant to be Christian Stewart, in a frankly 'historical bonkbuster' pose... Ah well. I didn't buy them for the covers. (The only time I've ever bought a book in spite of the ghastly cover was when I bought a replacement for one of my Darkover novels, which had got lost in the post when I lent it to my sister (!!!!), and the only copy I could find was one with the ghastly bald white aliens on it. So I covered it in red shiny paper so that I didn't have to look at it.)

[white_hart]

The one above is definitely a bit bonkbusterish. And the woman's hair is basically straight out of Dallas (apparently historical illustrations share with historical dramas the tendency for the women's hair and make-up to be far more typical of the time they were made than the time they are set in).

In my head, Francis looks like Wesley in The Princess Bride, more or less. The picture is definitely not him!