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annathepiperSo here I am having skipped the Masquerade at Worldcon, though I am sitting within audible range of the auditorium where it's being held. I started with the intention of waiting for ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
solarbird to get done with her work on the daily newsletter, but she has apparently had more work to do than she had expected, because she's still over there working. This isn't the part that makes me go argh, though. What makes me go "argh" is that I've just finished Kristen Britain's First Rider's Call, the sequel to Green Rider that I've been awaiting for some time, and I really, really want to go find Ms. Britain now and tell her that she is a wicked, cruel author.
One of the big reasons I liked Green Rider so much was because of the glimmers of potential romantic interest between her heroine, Karigan G'ladheon, and Karigan's sovreign, Zachary Hillander. She set it up with the subtle, light touch that I particularly like, just enough signs of deeper feelings to make you hope they will go somewhere even while the actual main plot is going on. It didn't hurt in the slightest that Zachary was quite swoonalicious, all noble and stern as a king, but with a warm humanity in his scenes where he is just a man.
This trend continues in First Rider's Call. I liked the overall plot better than the first one, I will happily say, just because she did a lot of really nifty expanding upon the backstory of what in the first novel had come across as a fairly typical 'evil sorceror was defeated ages ago' kind of history. And she tied that in very nicely with Karigan's own history as well.
But what really kept me reading was the interaction between Karigan and Zachary. Having re-read the first book to prepare for this one, I was struck at how well their interactions in the new book followed up on the ones in the first. In the first story Karigan is emotionally barely past the schoolgirl stage, not comprehending the nature of her reactions to her king. But in the new book she's had some time to gain maturity... and Zachary's affection for her has had time to mature as well.
Every single scene between them beautifully sets up the budding love between them. And in every single scene, I continue to find Zachary a wonderful character.
Right up until the point where he decides that he has to make a marriage alliance with the noble Lady Estora... and even though he tells Karigan he loves her, he's going to marry Estora anyway. He tries to give her a special gift, calling it a queen's gift from a king, but she refuses it--knowing that he is marrying Estora and staunchly refusing to give in to the temptation to be Zachary's paramour, though he never asks anything of the sort (which would have been unworthy of the character anyway, so I am glad he didn't).
This was the second to the last scene in the entire book, and it was NOT A HAPPY ENDING! Argh! ARGH, I say! Cruel Ms. Britain, to make string her sucker-for-a-good-romance reader (read: me) along for an ENTIRE BOOK and then go NO SMOOCHIES FOR YOU!
Granted, okay, fine, it makes perfect sense for the situation that she has set up. Karigan IS a commoner and Zachary is her king. Moreover, she is specifically in the king's service and it would be an Extremely Bad Idea for her to become illicitly involved with him. But I DON'T CARE. If you're going to go and have the plucky young heroine go and fall in love with the king, she should damn well get to smooch him!
I have two grains of hope: Estora seems to have clued in that Karigan and Zachary have fallen for one another, so I am hoping she will perhaps intervene somehow, especially since she has been set up to feel entrapped by her noble station to begin with. And there are also Zachary's final words about the brush and mirror... a queen's gift from a king, which he tells Karigan will be waiting for her if she ever wishes to accept them.
I'm really really hoping Zachary's dropping a huge stone hint that he'd marry her in a heartbeat if she'd have him.
But I can't know till the third book. Argh! ARGH!
solarbird to get done with her work on the daily newsletter, but she has apparently had more work to do than she had expected, because she's still over there working. This isn't the part that makes me go argh, though. What makes me go "argh" is that I've just finished Kristen Britain's First Rider's Call, the sequel to Green Rider that I've been awaiting for some time, and I really, really want to go find Ms. Britain now and tell her that she is a wicked, cruel author.One of the big reasons I liked Green Rider so much was because of the glimmers of potential romantic interest between her heroine, Karigan G'ladheon, and Karigan's sovreign, Zachary Hillander. She set it up with the subtle, light touch that I particularly like, just enough signs of deeper feelings to make you hope they will go somewhere even while the actual main plot is going on. It didn't hurt in the slightest that Zachary was quite swoonalicious, all noble and stern as a king, but with a warm humanity in his scenes where he is just a man.
This trend continues in First Rider's Call. I liked the overall plot better than the first one, I will happily say, just because she did a lot of really nifty expanding upon the backstory of what in the first novel had come across as a fairly typical 'evil sorceror was defeated ages ago' kind of history. And she tied that in very nicely with Karigan's own history as well.
But what really kept me reading was the interaction between Karigan and Zachary. Having re-read the first book to prepare for this one, I was struck at how well their interactions in the new book followed up on the ones in the first. In the first story Karigan is emotionally barely past the schoolgirl stage, not comprehending the nature of her reactions to her king. But in the new book she's had some time to gain maturity... and Zachary's affection for her has had time to mature as well.
Every single scene between them beautifully sets up the budding love between them. And in every single scene, I continue to find Zachary a wonderful character.
Right up until the point where he decides that he has to make a marriage alliance with the noble Lady Estora... and even though he tells Karigan he loves her, he's going to marry Estora anyway. He tries to give her a special gift, calling it a queen's gift from a king, but she refuses it--knowing that he is marrying Estora and staunchly refusing to give in to the temptation to be Zachary's paramour, though he never asks anything of the sort (which would have been unworthy of the character anyway, so I am glad he didn't).
This was the second to the last scene in the entire book, and it was NOT A HAPPY ENDING! Argh! ARGH, I say! Cruel Ms. Britain, to make string her sucker-for-a-good-romance reader (read: me) along for an ENTIRE BOOK and then go NO SMOOCHIES FOR YOU!
Granted, okay, fine, it makes perfect sense for the situation that she has set up. Karigan IS a commoner and Zachary is her king. Moreover, she is specifically in the king's service and it would be an Extremely Bad Idea for her to become illicitly involved with him. But I DON'T CARE. If you're going to go and have the plucky young heroine go and fall in love with the king, she should damn well get to smooch him!
I have two grains of hope: Estora seems to have clued in that Karigan and Zachary have fallen for one another, so I am hoping she will perhaps intervene somehow, especially since she has been set up to feel entrapped by her noble station to begin with. And there are also Zachary's final words about the brush and mirror... a queen's gift from a king, which he tells Karigan will be waiting for her if she ever wishes to accept them.
I'm really really hoping Zachary's dropping a huge stone hint that he'd marry her in a heartbeat if she'd have him.
But I can't know till the third book. Argh! ARGH!
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no subject
Date: 2004-09-12 09:07 am (UTC)Got to admit though... Seems Ms. Britain did her best in "First Rider"s Call'" so that we would all run to buy the 3rd book! Bet she already thinks -- heehee..buy the next book and you 'll all see me go SMOOCHIES FOR YOU! Hmm.. I also think we will see a HAPPY ENDING too except if she has a fourth book in mind.. geez, that would be something to really argh about a lot, don't you agree?
p.s. btw.. Anna, is there a problem with livejournal or a problem with you site? Takes ages to open a page.. but then again might be my connection.. Sometimes it takes me ages to see the sites in USA (my isp has some problem with that but good news is they are working on it)
R.
no subject
Date: 2004-09-12 11:47 am (UTC)And like I said, the rest of the story was very fine indeed, and was one of those rare stories where not only the good guys but ALSO the BAD GUYS are extremely well-developed characters. I was particularly pleased with how she set up the villain in the story--who is the same ancient villain referenced in the first book. She does a magnificent job of filling in this guy's backstory and making him a three-dimensional character in the process.
As to your loading issues--well, my Livejournal my personal site are on two different machines, so if you are having trouble loading both of them as well as sites in general which live in the U.S., this tells me that it's very possibly an issue with your ISP. Or maybe even just an issue with your computer, if you have an old machine or one which doesn't have enough memory it in. Loading pages can take a very long time if your computer isn't sufficiently powerful.
no subject
Date: 2004-09-22 09:31 am (UTC)And Anna, sorry for being that late to reply to you but I really do no visit LJ often (lack of time is usually the cause) As for the loading of pages, truth is I have a memory deficiency problem here but as far as I can tell there was some temporary problem that day with all the USA sites but it got fixed.
Thanks for the comments on the book again! Now it's just a matter of when I 'll have sufficient funds to buy it. :)
no subject
Date: 2004-09-22 11:48 am (UTC)Ghost Rider does not sound familiar to me offhand, so it was probably someone else on the Gruntland board, yeah. I've got a lot of books on my To Read shelves right now, but if I remember that one, perhaps I will check it out. :)
And if you can set aside the appropriate funds, I do heartily recommend Ms. Britain's books!