Dragonsinger - Chapter Two
Mar. 11th, 2020 01:22 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
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i_read_whatSo last time on Dragonsinger, a lot of people told us how great Menolly is and I got a little cranky. Truth to be told, after reading Streams of Silver, I'm realizing that the shilling could definitely be a lot worse. Besides, that was a recap chapter. Now we have an actual story.
We start out with another verse, and Menolly waking up in the middle of the night. She's reacting to some kind of "inner call" that she doesn't think has anything to do with the sun rise. She sees the dark night and stars, feels the fire lizards and goes back to sleep.
...okay? That seemed kind of pointless.
The sun rises and shines into her windows, so now Menolly is waking up properly. She's not really sure what she's supposed to do now and is worried she missed a wakeup call. She hears voices chanting in the distance: apprentices being taught the complicated timing of one of the long Sagas, just as she taught the youngsters when Petiron was sick.
Her feet are stiff rather than painful this morning which is something of a relief. She also realizes that she got six hours more rest than usual: she's halfway across the world from Benden Weyr and Half Circle Hold.
We go through her morning ritual: washing with soapsand, brushing her hair. The fire lizards are starting to get hungry. Menolly thinks to herself that she has to find them soon, because having fire lizards would prejudice enough people against her, without having unmanageably hungry ones who would irritate even the most tolerant of people."
...sigh.
Look, Menolly's got a long way to go before she's Drizzt Do'Urden annoying, but this is a little ridiculous. I know Menolly has confidence issues, but there has been nothing in her experience that would translate to the idea that nine fire lizards = bad. Before she'd bonded with them, she hadn't even known it was possible. Every single person she meets is in awe of her ability to bond and control these creatures. The only person who was moderately less than pleased was Lessa, and even then, she was happy to send Menolly out with T'gellan to find more. Menolly hasn't even met anyone who expressed childish jealousy at her for her lizards.
So this doesn't read like a teenaged girl having confidence issues. This reads like an author who wants to pretend that her heroine is actually self conscious about this incredibly cool thing that she has. It's a literary humble brag. It's annoying.
So Menolly goes out to find some food. We get some interesting description of the Halll's entryway:
On either side of the wide corridor were doors; those on the outside of the Hall were open to let sun and air flood the inside. She descended from the uppermost level into the large entranceway. Directly in front of the staircase were dragon-high metal doors with the most curious closings she’d ever seen: on the back of the doors were wheels, which evidently turned the heavy bars into floor and ceiling, At Half-Circle Sea Hold there had been the heavy horizontal bars, but this arrangement would be easier to lock and looked much more secure.
I'm not sure I'm picturing this very well, but that's more a "me" problem than a problem with the book. Anyway, Menolly finds the dining hall. Her fire lizards are all hungry, but she knows they can't all invade the kitchen. She orders them to perch above the door and she'll bring food, but they have to behave. Beauty stays with her.
At the kitchen, Menolly remembers happier days at Half-Circle, and I'm surprised for a moment that the narrative is actually allowing her to do that. But I spoke too soon, because Silvina is inside and smiles as she notices Menolly, as Menolly's mother never would have done.
Jesus Christ, McCaffrey, you really won't let any of these people have any nuance will you. Silvina immediately fusses over Menolly, ordering a "slack-featured, clumsy-looking man" to fetch some klah for her.
Menolly manages to articulate, through Silvina's fussing, that she needs to feed her lizards. Silvina tells her that she's a thoughtful child, and then orders Camo (the aforementioned man) to get a blue bowl for her. She gives him a gentle shove in the proper direction and I am already bristling. She orders another servant to dish up some cereal with plenty of sweetening for Menolly, who is all skin and bones. She discloses that she'd saved meat for the fire lizards when they'd trussed up the roast.
Menolly asks her if she'd disturb anyone if she went to the courtyard, and gets more praise (as a considerate child) for it. Silvina sends Camo, who the narrative calls a "half-wit", hey fuck you, McCaffrey, out with her. (Camo beams with the pleasure of a job properly done and rewarded.)
So Menolly and Camo go out to the courtyard. Camo seems taken with Beauty, loudly calling her pretty. Menolly initially tries to get the bowl away from him, but the lizards all come at this point to swarm. Camo isn't bothered and Menolly is able to get everyone fed, though she's self conscious because she can hear that the kitchen activity's stopped. Of course, there's an exchange where someone clearly asks how many she has, so Silvina can answer nine. Silvina also notes when the new eggs hatch, there'll be eleven.
Once the meat's gone, Menolly reassures Camo that the fire lizards aren't hungry anymore, and gives him a gentle shove back to Silvina. Hey, stop that.
Look, I get that we're dealing with a less than enlightened society, but do we have to have our heroes manhandling a disabled person? Do we really need the narrative calling him names and repeatedly talking about his size and clumsiness?
Oh and in case this wasn't offensive enough, Menolly starts thinking about Silvina. She's not sure if Silvina's kindness toward her is deliberate, because she's so patient with "dull-witted Camo" and his inadequacy.
Hey, Menolly, knock it off.
So Menolly hears some young voices in a "lusty rendition" of the Saga they were chanting before. The lizards start singing along because of course they do. I am amused that the fire lizards seem to have different attitudes toward singing: Beauty, the bronzes, and two of the browns seem to be enthusiastic about it. The third brown (Lazybones), and blue and greens are more indifferent. Menolly starts singing with them, only eventually realizing that they're the only ones singing. Everyone else is (of course) staring.
We get the first hint of a possible conflict for Menolly! An adult man (Brudegan) demands to know who's been singing. But immediately Robinton appears, saying that the music was a grand way to wake up. I'm a little disgruntled by this actually. This Brudegan fellow seems to be the first person we meet not immediately awed by Menolly. It would have been interesting to see how Menolly dealt with the situation, and whether or not she could have diffused his irritation. Instead, because Robinton showed up, the situation is immediately resolved.
Robinton runs off to check on his egg, while Silvina and Menolly talk more. Menolly urges Beauty not to sing along with Brudegan's students this time, while the other lizards teleport to a nearby roof to sleep off their meals. Silvina decides that Menolly should take Robinton his klah, check the egg, and then go see Master Oldive, the healer, for her feet. She also notices Menolly's hand, and asks who bungled the healing of it.
Ah, of course, here starts the demonization of Mavi. I remember this bit and it already annoys me.
Anyway, Menolly muses that Robinton hadn't sounded annoyed about the singing. She'll apologize to Journeyman Brudegan when she gets a chance. (There's another mention of Brudegan's pupils singing "lustily" which strikes me as a strange description for a choir of young people. When I think about "lusty singing" I think of like lounge singers or solo entertainers, altos or baritones. I don't think of kids' choirs. But McCaffrey does, admittedly, know a lot more about music than I do.)
So she goes to see Robinton, who is very glad to see her. She indeed checks out the egg. And it occurs to me that while Menolly is the closest thing they have to a fire lizard scholar, she actually doesn't have that much experience with eggs. She moved a batch once. But she found her own swarm mid hatching. Menolly had listened to Lessa though, who thought the eggs would take "a sevenday" to hatch two days prior.
Robinton asks how Menolly rested, and then reassures her that Brudegan was only gruff from surprise. He asks if she's noticed the difference now that the apprentices have resumed their chorus: the lizards challenged them. And he asks her if the lizards can improvise descants to any tune. She doesn't know.
Robinton expresses fatherly concern over Menolly: “Still not sure, are you, young Menolly?” He didn’t mean the fire lizards’ abilities. There was such kindness in his voice and eyes that Menolly felt unexpected tears behind her eyes.
I think maybe I'm just not the target audience for this. I can see why, as a kid, I would have really enjoyed seeing someone previously neglected and unappreciated, as Menolly was, getting showered with praise and fussed over. But at this point, I'm just waiting for the actual story to start.
Anyway, Robinton leads her into his very cluttered study, which includes his rape metaphor sand, and eats his cereal. He lectures Menolly about them being in a period of change and readjustment. He thinks Menolly is likely to be a vital part of that change. He acknowledges he used unfair pressure to get her there, but she belongs there. Now they need to find out how much she knows, and see about doing what they can to fix the scar damage of her hand. Robinton thinks they need her, and the songs she can craft.
This is admittedly more interesting, but I'm a bit annoyed that Menolly's gender doesn't seem to be a factor at all. I was sold on this story because of the promise of seeing Menolly become the first female Harper. But chapter one has basically handwaved that away entirely. No one, not even cranky Brudegan, has indicated that Menolly's gender is even noteworthy.
But it IS. Because otherwise: where are the female Harpers? Are we supposed to believe that no woman aside from Menolly has ever wanted to be a Harper? Eventually Masterharper of Pern will make this situation even more aggravating.
Ultimately, I think the problem is that McCaffrey set out, in Dragonsong, with the idea that there are no female Harpers and Menolly would be the first. But then realized that this would make Robinton, one of her pet favorites, part of a sexist institution. Worse, he's in charge of it. We can't possibly perceive Robinton as being a flawed man, so the Harpers can't be sexist. Petiron was...mistaken, I guess.
Of course the question as to why there are no female Harpers still lingers. But now that's clearly the women's fault. Robinton would totally accept a talented female apprentice, so clearly there simply aren't women with the ability or inclination until Menolly, who joins up with no obstacle.
This frustrates me.
Okay, anyway, Robinton explains to her how he found the fire lizard song that he'd ambushed her with: Elgion had actually found it where she'd stashed it and sent it on to Robinton. Apparently since he couldn't find her (as she was in the cave, with a damaged hand, "not allowed to finish that charming song") he finished it for her. Robinton has political reasons for needing a song about fire lizards, so he did some refining of the harmonics and lyrics, though he kept the melody in tact.
Menolly is overwhelmed by the praise, thinking about how she'd never had a chance to play it. She wasn't supposed to play her own tunes, after all. (A restriction that, to this day, makes no sense to me.) Robinton makes her promise to write down any tune that comes into her mind and play it as often as she needs to get it right. He needs good songs in order to effect change in people's minds.
There is a hint of potential challenge, when Robinton notes that he has to consider Craft Principles and Standards, and that, especially in Menolly's "unusual situation, the conventional procedure must be observed." I'd like to know a bit more about that that means, but we're interrupted by Silvina and Oldive.
Robinton and Silvina talk shop a bit as Oldive leads her out of the room. She realizes as they go that Oldive has a spinal issue affecting his stature, and there's a "comic" moment where Oldive said he thought she had the same thing, but it was just Beauty on her shoulder.
Oldive praises the fire lizard song, but Menolly denies it as hers, since Robinton rewrote it. Oldive tells her that's not unusual, then gets distracted by Menolly's feet. They're still tender, and I do appreciate that McCaffrey hasn't just forgotten about it.
And now the hand:
Oldive notes that the scarring isn't as bad as he was led to believe. The tissue can be stretched, though a few months later, they might not have been able to help her. He also gives her a salve.
Afterward, Menolly meets back up with Silvina, who will get her settled into Dunca's cottage. They discuss instruments, since Robinton wants her to borrow a gitar. Silvina asks if Petiron had brought his, and Menolly remembers getting beaten for her "tuning". She shows Silvina the pipes she made, and Silvina is impressed.
They discuss Petiron. Silvina asks if he'd discussed Harper Hall with Menolly: he hadn't, even though he sent the songs to Robinton. This puzzles Silvina, and I'm puzzled too. Why WOULDN'T Petiron have talked to her? Why did he let her think women couldn't be Harpers?
Menolly gets to see Fort Hold, which is VERY grand:
Menolly’s steps slowed as she stared at the wide ramp leading to the courtyard and main entrance of Fort Hold, higher in the cliff face than the Harper Graft Hall, and with rows of windows extending upward in sheer stone, almost to the fire heights themselves. In Half-Circle Sea Hold, everyone had been in the cliff, but at Fort Hold, stone buildings had been built out in wings from the cliff, forming a quadrangle similar to the Harper Craft Hall, Smaller cottages had been added onto the original wings, on either side of the ramp. There were dwellings bordering the sides of the broad paved road that led in several well-traveled directions; south to the fields and pastures, east down the valley toward the low foothills and west around to the pass in the cliff that would lead to the higher mountains of the Central Fort Range.
Menolly is taken to one of the cottages: where the girls who study at Harper Hall live. This is another aggravating part to me, because if there are girls who study at Harper Hall, just like Menolly, why are none of them potential Harpers themselves?
Anyway, Dunca, the cottage head, and Silvina do not get along. Given McCaffrey's general level of nuance, we can already tell this means Dunca is going to be an awful person. Menolly will be given a windowed room, which is a big deal because apparently holder girls tend to panic when they can see the outside and think they're exposed to Thread or something.
This actually really interests me. I want to know more about the customs and phobias that develop because of Pern's unique situation. But instead, we're going to see Dunca being awful. She asks if Menolly knew Petiron and gives a disgusted snort when Menolly says yes. She calls someone or other a lazy slut when she notices the "glow basket" is empty. She shouts at Silvina, for opening a window to let some light in, and shrieks at the entrance of the fire lizards.
I do think Dunca's dismay at having nine lizards around is fair though. As much as I complained when Menolly suddenly acted like having nine lizards would be considered a bad thing (clumsy foreshadowing for Dunca of course), I can see how they'd be a pain in the ass. They're noisy and there are a lot of them. Not everyone wants to live with a bunch of cats or dogs either.
We get a hint of more trouble when Silvina notes that Menolly will need to be more involved with the Hall than the other girls (because none of them have the skill or inclination to be a Harper of course), and Dunca insists she'll be back at shutter time or stay in the Hall.
Why have Menolly stay out here at all? The hostess clearly dislikes her and ESPECIALLY hates her lizards. The girls who live here have a very different curriculum. But I shouldn't complain because this is the first legitimate obstacle that Menolly's actually encountered.
As they head back, Silvina fills Menolly in on some gossip: Dunca apparently had wanted to marry Petiron after his wife died. Silvina thinks that Petiron going halfway across the world was as much to get away from Dunca as to clear the way for Robinton, who he's very proud of. (I can't recall if it was mentioned before, probably, but Petiron is Robinton's father.) Here's the thing, while I love getting background info, I don't really think this is an appropriate conversation to have with a fifteen year old girl who will be living under Dunca's authority.
We close out the chapter with an apprentice bumping into Menolly, and Silvina insisting yet again that Menolly has nothing to apologize about and everyone already loves her.
So as I mentioned in the review, I think maybe my big issue is that I'm not really the target audience for this book. At this point (so far anyway), Menolly hasn't really had any real obstacle. It's basically just two chapters of adoration and fussing. And honestly, Menolly doesn't feel as authentic here as she did in Dragonsong. In Dragonsong, I praised her self-consciousness and anxiety as feeling very genuinely teenaged. In this book, it feels more forced. It's not that I expect Menolly's problems to immediately go away now that she's in a safe place, but the way it's coming across isn't quite working for me.
I'm very annoyed by the treatment of Camo already, and I know it's going to get worse. (And while we don't yet know the relationship between Robinton and Camo, I remember it from the first time I read this book, and I ask now what I remember asking then: Robinton really couldn't do any better by his disabled son than to make him a kitchen drudge? Really?)
We start out with another verse, and Menolly waking up in the middle of the night. She's reacting to some kind of "inner call" that she doesn't think has anything to do with the sun rise. She sees the dark night and stars, feels the fire lizards and goes back to sleep.
...okay? That seemed kind of pointless.
The sun rises and shines into her windows, so now Menolly is waking up properly. She's not really sure what she's supposed to do now and is worried she missed a wakeup call. She hears voices chanting in the distance: apprentices being taught the complicated timing of one of the long Sagas, just as she taught the youngsters when Petiron was sick.
Her feet are stiff rather than painful this morning which is something of a relief. She also realizes that she got six hours more rest than usual: she's halfway across the world from Benden Weyr and Half Circle Hold.
We go through her morning ritual: washing with soapsand, brushing her hair. The fire lizards are starting to get hungry. Menolly thinks to herself that she has to find them soon, because having fire lizards would prejudice enough people against her, without having unmanageably hungry ones who would irritate even the most tolerant of people."
...sigh.
Look, Menolly's got a long way to go before she's Drizzt Do'Urden annoying, but this is a little ridiculous. I know Menolly has confidence issues, but there has been nothing in her experience that would translate to the idea that nine fire lizards = bad. Before she'd bonded with them, she hadn't even known it was possible. Every single person she meets is in awe of her ability to bond and control these creatures. The only person who was moderately less than pleased was Lessa, and even then, she was happy to send Menolly out with T'gellan to find more. Menolly hasn't even met anyone who expressed childish jealousy at her for her lizards.
So this doesn't read like a teenaged girl having confidence issues. This reads like an author who wants to pretend that her heroine is actually self conscious about this incredibly cool thing that she has. It's a literary humble brag. It's annoying.
So Menolly goes out to find some food. We get some interesting description of the Halll's entryway:
On either side of the wide corridor were doors; those on the outside of the Hall were open to let sun and air flood the inside. She descended from the uppermost level into the large entranceway. Directly in front of the staircase were dragon-high metal doors with the most curious closings she’d ever seen: on the back of the doors were wheels, which evidently turned the heavy bars into floor and ceiling, At Half-Circle Sea Hold there had been the heavy horizontal bars, but this arrangement would be easier to lock and looked much more secure.
I'm not sure I'm picturing this very well, but that's more a "me" problem than a problem with the book. Anyway, Menolly finds the dining hall. Her fire lizards are all hungry, but she knows they can't all invade the kitchen. She orders them to perch above the door and she'll bring food, but they have to behave. Beauty stays with her.
At the kitchen, Menolly remembers happier days at Half-Circle, and I'm surprised for a moment that the narrative is actually allowing her to do that. But I spoke too soon, because Silvina is inside and smiles as she notices Menolly, as Menolly's mother never would have done.
Jesus Christ, McCaffrey, you really won't let any of these people have any nuance will you. Silvina immediately fusses over Menolly, ordering a "slack-featured, clumsy-looking man" to fetch some klah for her.
Menolly manages to articulate, through Silvina's fussing, that she needs to feed her lizards. Silvina tells her that she's a thoughtful child, and then orders Camo (the aforementioned man) to get a blue bowl for her. She gives him a gentle shove in the proper direction and I am already bristling. She orders another servant to dish up some cereal with plenty of sweetening for Menolly, who is all skin and bones. She discloses that she'd saved meat for the fire lizards when they'd trussed up the roast.
Menolly asks her if she'd disturb anyone if she went to the courtyard, and gets more praise (as a considerate child) for it. Silvina sends Camo, who the narrative calls a "half-wit", hey fuck you, McCaffrey, out with her. (Camo beams with the pleasure of a job properly done and rewarded.)
So Menolly and Camo go out to the courtyard. Camo seems taken with Beauty, loudly calling her pretty. Menolly initially tries to get the bowl away from him, but the lizards all come at this point to swarm. Camo isn't bothered and Menolly is able to get everyone fed, though she's self conscious because she can hear that the kitchen activity's stopped. Of course, there's an exchange where someone clearly asks how many she has, so Silvina can answer nine. Silvina also notes when the new eggs hatch, there'll be eleven.
Once the meat's gone, Menolly reassures Camo that the fire lizards aren't hungry anymore, and gives him a gentle shove back to Silvina. Hey, stop that.
Look, I get that we're dealing with a less than enlightened society, but do we have to have our heroes manhandling a disabled person? Do we really need the narrative calling him names and repeatedly talking about his size and clumsiness?
Oh and in case this wasn't offensive enough, Menolly starts thinking about Silvina. She's not sure if Silvina's kindness toward her is deliberate, because she's so patient with "dull-witted Camo" and his inadequacy.
Hey, Menolly, knock it off.
So Menolly hears some young voices in a "lusty rendition" of the Saga they were chanting before. The lizards start singing along because of course they do. I am amused that the fire lizards seem to have different attitudes toward singing: Beauty, the bronzes, and two of the browns seem to be enthusiastic about it. The third brown (Lazybones), and blue and greens are more indifferent. Menolly starts singing with them, only eventually realizing that they're the only ones singing. Everyone else is (of course) staring.
We get the first hint of a possible conflict for Menolly! An adult man (Brudegan) demands to know who's been singing. But immediately Robinton appears, saying that the music was a grand way to wake up. I'm a little disgruntled by this actually. This Brudegan fellow seems to be the first person we meet not immediately awed by Menolly. It would have been interesting to see how Menolly dealt with the situation, and whether or not she could have diffused his irritation. Instead, because Robinton showed up, the situation is immediately resolved.
Robinton runs off to check on his egg, while Silvina and Menolly talk more. Menolly urges Beauty not to sing along with Brudegan's students this time, while the other lizards teleport to a nearby roof to sleep off their meals. Silvina decides that Menolly should take Robinton his klah, check the egg, and then go see Master Oldive, the healer, for her feet. She also notices Menolly's hand, and asks who bungled the healing of it.
Ah, of course, here starts the demonization of Mavi. I remember this bit and it already annoys me.
Anyway, Menolly muses that Robinton hadn't sounded annoyed about the singing. She'll apologize to Journeyman Brudegan when she gets a chance. (There's another mention of Brudegan's pupils singing "lustily" which strikes me as a strange description for a choir of young people. When I think about "lusty singing" I think of like lounge singers or solo entertainers, altos or baritones. I don't think of kids' choirs. But McCaffrey does, admittedly, know a lot more about music than I do.)
So she goes to see Robinton, who is very glad to see her. She indeed checks out the egg. And it occurs to me that while Menolly is the closest thing they have to a fire lizard scholar, she actually doesn't have that much experience with eggs. She moved a batch once. But she found her own swarm mid hatching. Menolly had listened to Lessa though, who thought the eggs would take "a sevenday" to hatch two days prior.
Robinton asks how Menolly rested, and then reassures her that Brudegan was only gruff from surprise. He asks if she's noticed the difference now that the apprentices have resumed their chorus: the lizards challenged them. And he asks her if the lizards can improvise descants to any tune. She doesn't know.
Robinton expresses fatherly concern over Menolly: “Still not sure, are you, young Menolly?” He didn’t mean the fire lizards’ abilities. There was such kindness in his voice and eyes that Menolly felt unexpected tears behind her eyes.
I think maybe I'm just not the target audience for this. I can see why, as a kid, I would have really enjoyed seeing someone previously neglected and unappreciated, as Menolly was, getting showered with praise and fussed over. But at this point, I'm just waiting for the actual story to start.
Anyway, Robinton leads her into his very cluttered study, which includes his rape metaphor sand, and eats his cereal. He lectures Menolly about them being in a period of change and readjustment. He thinks Menolly is likely to be a vital part of that change. He acknowledges he used unfair pressure to get her there, but she belongs there. Now they need to find out how much she knows, and see about doing what they can to fix the scar damage of her hand. Robinton thinks they need her, and the songs she can craft.
This is admittedly more interesting, but I'm a bit annoyed that Menolly's gender doesn't seem to be a factor at all. I was sold on this story because of the promise of seeing Menolly become the first female Harper. But chapter one has basically handwaved that away entirely. No one, not even cranky Brudegan, has indicated that Menolly's gender is even noteworthy.
But it IS. Because otherwise: where are the female Harpers? Are we supposed to believe that no woman aside from Menolly has ever wanted to be a Harper? Eventually Masterharper of Pern will make this situation even more aggravating.
Ultimately, I think the problem is that McCaffrey set out, in Dragonsong, with the idea that there are no female Harpers and Menolly would be the first. But then realized that this would make Robinton, one of her pet favorites, part of a sexist institution. Worse, he's in charge of it. We can't possibly perceive Robinton as being a flawed man, so the Harpers can't be sexist. Petiron was...mistaken, I guess.
Of course the question as to why there are no female Harpers still lingers. But now that's clearly the women's fault. Robinton would totally accept a talented female apprentice, so clearly there simply aren't women with the ability or inclination until Menolly, who joins up with no obstacle.
This frustrates me.
Okay, anyway, Robinton explains to her how he found the fire lizard song that he'd ambushed her with: Elgion had actually found it where she'd stashed it and sent it on to Robinton. Apparently since he couldn't find her (as she was in the cave, with a damaged hand, "not allowed to finish that charming song") he finished it for her. Robinton has political reasons for needing a song about fire lizards, so he did some refining of the harmonics and lyrics, though he kept the melody in tact.
Menolly is overwhelmed by the praise, thinking about how she'd never had a chance to play it. She wasn't supposed to play her own tunes, after all. (A restriction that, to this day, makes no sense to me.) Robinton makes her promise to write down any tune that comes into her mind and play it as often as she needs to get it right. He needs good songs in order to effect change in people's minds.
There is a hint of potential challenge, when Robinton notes that he has to consider Craft Principles and Standards, and that, especially in Menolly's "unusual situation, the conventional procedure must be observed." I'd like to know a bit more about that that means, but we're interrupted by Silvina and Oldive.
Robinton and Silvina talk shop a bit as Oldive leads her out of the room. She realizes as they go that Oldive has a spinal issue affecting his stature, and there's a "comic" moment where Oldive said he thought she had the same thing, but it was just Beauty on her shoulder.
Oldive praises the fire lizard song, but Menolly denies it as hers, since Robinton rewrote it. Oldive tells her that's not unusual, then gets distracted by Menolly's feet. They're still tender, and I do appreciate that McCaffrey hasn't just forgotten about it.
And now the hand:
Oldive notes that the scarring isn't as bad as he was led to believe. The tissue can be stretched, though a few months later, they might not have been able to help her. He also gives her a salve.
Afterward, Menolly meets back up with Silvina, who will get her settled into Dunca's cottage. They discuss instruments, since Robinton wants her to borrow a gitar. Silvina asks if Petiron had brought his, and Menolly remembers getting beaten for her "tuning". She shows Silvina the pipes she made, and Silvina is impressed.
They discuss Petiron. Silvina asks if he'd discussed Harper Hall with Menolly: he hadn't, even though he sent the songs to Robinton. This puzzles Silvina, and I'm puzzled too. Why WOULDN'T Petiron have talked to her? Why did he let her think women couldn't be Harpers?
Menolly gets to see Fort Hold, which is VERY grand:
Menolly’s steps slowed as she stared at the wide ramp leading to the courtyard and main entrance of Fort Hold, higher in the cliff face than the Harper Graft Hall, and with rows of windows extending upward in sheer stone, almost to the fire heights themselves. In Half-Circle Sea Hold, everyone had been in the cliff, but at Fort Hold, stone buildings had been built out in wings from the cliff, forming a quadrangle similar to the Harper Craft Hall, Smaller cottages had been added onto the original wings, on either side of the ramp. There were dwellings bordering the sides of the broad paved road that led in several well-traveled directions; south to the fields and pastures, east down the valley toward the low foothills and west around to the pass in the cliff that would lead to the higher mountains of the Central Fort Range.
Menolly is taken to one of the cottages: where the girls who study at Harper Hall live. This is another aggravating part to me, because if there are girls who study at Harper Hall, just like Menolly, why are none of them potential Harpers themselves?
Anyway, Dunca, the cottage head, and Silvina do not get along. Given McCaffrey's general level of nuance, we can already tell this means Dunca is going to be an awful person. Menolly will be given a windowed room, which is a big deal because apparently holder girls tend to panic when they can see the outside and think they're exposed to Thread or something.
This actually really interests me. I want to know more about the customs and phobias that develop because of Pern's unique situation. But instead, we're going to see Dunca being awful. She asks if Menolly knew Petiron and gives a disgusted snort when Menolly says yes. She calls someone or other a lazy slut when she notices the "glow basket" is empty. She shouts at Silvina, for opening a window to let some light in, and shrieks at the entrance of the fire lizards.
I do think Dunca's dismay at having nine lizards around is fair though. As much as I complained when Menolly suddenly acted like having nine lizards would be considered a bad thing (clumsy foreshadowing for Dunca of course), I can see how they'd be a pain in the ass. They're noisy and there are a lot of them. Not everyone wants to live with a bunch of cats or dogs either.
We get a hint of more trouble when Silvina notes that Menolly will need to be more involved with the Hall than the other girls (because none of them have the skill or inclination to be a Harper of course), and Dunca insists she'll be back at shutter time or stay in the Hall.
Why have Menolly stay out here at all? The hostess clearly dislikes her and ESPECIALLY hates her lizards. The girls who live here have a very different curriculum. But I shouldn't complain because this is the first legitimate obstacle that Menolly's actually encountered.
As they head back, Silvina fills Menolly in on some gossip: Dunca apparently had wanted to marry Petiron after his wife died. Silvina thinks that Petiron going halfway across the world was as much to get away from Dunca as to clear the way for Robinton, who he's very proud of. (I can't recall if it was mentioned before, probably, but Petiron is Robinton's father.) Here's the thing, while I love getting background info, I don't really think this is an appropriate conversation to have with a fifteen year old girl who will be living under Dunca's authority.
We close out the chapter with an apprentice bumping into Menolly, and Silvina insisting yet again that Menolly has nothing to apologize about and everyone already loves her.
So as I mentioned in the review, I think maybe my big issue is that I'm not really the target audience for this book. At this point (so far anyway), Menolly hasn't really had any real obstacle. It's basically just two chapters of adoration and fussing. And honestly, Menolly doesn't feel as authentic here as she did in Dragonsong. In Dragonsong, I praised her self-consciousness and anxiety as feeling very genuinely teenaged. In this book, it feels more forced. It's not that I expect Menolly's problems to immediately go away now that she's in a safe place, but the way it's coming across isn't quite working for me.
I'm very annoyed by the treatment of Camo already, and I know it's going to get worse. (And while we don't yet know the relationship between Robinton and Camo, I remember it from the first time I read this book, and I ask now what I remember asking then: Robinton really couldn't do any better by his disabled son than to make him a kitchen drudge? Really?)
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Date: 2020-03-13 01:03 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2020-03-13 08:05 pm (UTC)