Tomoe Goezen: wow.

[James_Nostack]

There was a thread about a year ago on David Mason's The Sorcerer's Skull, so I hope this thread isn't inappropriate.

I just finished it, and the sequels I ordered from the used book site cannot arrive fast enough.  Man alive!  Jessica Salmonson kicks ASS. 

For those who don't know, Tomoe Goezen is a collection of novellas by Salmonson detailing the sorcerous adventures of the eponymous samurai in Mythic Japan.  It's got all the Sword & Sorcery trappings--twisted little demons, perverted wizards, magician-ninjas, the whole nine yards.  Salmonson writes gracefully, the action scenes manage to be gruesome without being sadistic, and this book has some of the best pacing I've seen in a long, long time.  The first novella, "The Way of the Warrior," in particular has an insane new development on every page.  (The book might be worth studying to see how to frame scenes.)  You can probably find it on-line for under $5, and it's a steal.

Yeesh, the scene with the raft!  I was telling my girlfriend about how dreadful it was, and she's like, "Is it like in that one comic, where the guy makes a raft out of corpses?"  "No.  It's worse."  And it is.  And then the story keeps going.

Poor rokubo!  I like that guy!  If I had magic powers, I'd get all fat and stinky too.  I sort of wish the author had kept him more mysterious; knowing his plans made him seem smaller, in a way.  But hopefully he'll show up again...

I also think Raski the Horse ought to count as a demon.  He doesn't show up very much, but he eats peoples' faces.  Damn.

What was up with the haniwa samurai in the second story?  I couldn't figure them out.  I should probably re-read it to make sure.

Oh, one last thing--there's a minor, but very well done, scene where two characters discuss religion.  First, such discussions don't often show up in fantasy novels.  Second, it's funny what the two characters choose to talk about, reflecting their theological understandings.  It's not flashy, it's not super-funny; it just shows a highly competent writer in her stride, which I enjoy seeing.

[Ron Edwards]

Hi there,

Yup. Plus solid, hard-core lesbian politics that are neither strident, unreasonable, nor un-self-critical. Salmonson's class all the way. I have always wanted to meet her.

The haniwa samurai section is very difficult in some ways, easy in others. The point is that you can have a spiritual or mystic version of an adventure, then have a physical version of it and make use of what you learned. It's a lot like Heroquesting in Glorantha, actually. Or rather, that game's content and this book's content draw upon the same shamanistic traditions.

A word to the wise: don't think of the three books as a trilogy in the latter-day fantasy sense. Basically, Salmonson just kept on writing, and she pushed her own craft to its current limits with each step. Those books played huge role in my concept of how "scenario" relates to "character" in Sorcerer & Sword.

Best, Ron

P.S. This forum also is dedicated to geeking out about awesome fantasy fiction. Totally OK.

[James_Nostack]

If you poke around on her website you can find her e-mail address.  I've been trying to figure out how to write a fan letter that isn't fanboyish for the past day.  I wonder why she stopped publishing?  There's traces here and there--short story collections in the mid 90's, small-print materials, a story for Wired's website that's maybe 500 words long. 

It's interesting that a lot of Tomoe's adventures involve traipsing around the Land of the Dead.  It's just about the only thing she does, aside from killin d00dz like a maniac.

Salmonson mentions that she owes a debt to Kurosawa.  I don't really see it, aside from the superficial bad-ass samurai elements.  Kurosawa's work was very strongly political; all of his samurai stuff seems a thinly veiled criticism of Japan's martial traditions in the aftermath of WWII.  (Are there any heroic Kurosawa samurai?  All the ones I can think of are anti-heroes.)  If Salmonson is making similar socio-political comments, they're more abstract and harder to spot. 

[Ron Edwards]

Hi James,

I think you ought to put aside the alleged political content and focus on the delivery and the motion of both scenes and characters, for the comparison to work. Stylistically, Salmonson's violence-prose is Kurosawa, in those terms. Think "lyrical" as applied to carnage.

I'm disinclined to email an author out of the blue just to tell her I like her stuff or wanted to meet her. "Hi! I'm your biggest fan! Wanna have lunch? We can be best friends!" Writers live in fear of such things. The desire on my part needs to remain entirely separate from reality in order to maintain any virtue.

I'm not entirely sure you'll like this recommendation ... but given your enjoyment of Shea, your enjoyment of the raft in this book ... I suggest reading Terry Bisson's Wyrldmaker. That's a book that's grown on me greatly over the years, to the current point where picking it up again is like picking up a favorite volume of verses which one has almost memorized. And I actually think it includes the grossest "vehicle" among any books I've read, so it might suit.

Best, Ron

[greyorm]

Ron,

I never had a chance to ask this when we were on the phone the other night, but have you read the revised version of "Tomoe Gozen" that Salmonson released (titled: "The Disfavored Hero"), and if so, what are your thoughts on reading that version as opposed to the original version? What are the differences, if anything noteworthy or that would affect a choice between versions?

[James_Nostack]

I'm disinclined to email an author out of the blue just to tell her I like her stuff

And rightly so.  On the one hand, I'd like a somewhat forgotten author to feel good that she's still being read and appreciated; on the other hand, it's generally a bad idea. 

Terry Bisson's Wyrldmaker

Queued.  Behind Salmonson, Wagner, 'Virconium,' and the Crown of Conan.  And, if I can find 'em, the 1940's Fafhrd and Mouser stories.  And C.A. Smith.  But first, classy samurai chicks.

I've been mulling over the first-generation S&S stories.  I wish I knew more of the fantasy stuff from the 1910's and early '20s, before the pulps took over.  It seems like a lot of the early S&S material is a manifestation of "pop culture Nietzsche," but it's a little off topic for the thread and possibly the forum.  Plus I haven't done the research to back it up.

[greyorm]

I'm disinclined to email an author out of the blue just to tell her I like her stuff

And rightly so.  On the one hand, I'd like a somewhat forgotten author to feel good that she's still being read and appreciated; on the other hand, it's generally a bad idea.

I'm not certain I understand the logic here, guys: telling an author you like their work is a bad idea? After all, how else is an author supposed to know someone enjoys their work -- go out pan-handling in the street for praise?

Really, though, I'm not aware specifically of any author who isn't thrilled by a letter of appreciation from a fan, at least as long as you're not trying to set up a dinner date so you can become friends, or exchange e-mail addresses so you can talk to them every day, or get them to read and recommend for publishing this story you wrote...

So unless one of those things is what you were thinking of doing, you really have no reason not to write a letter of appreciation.

(And keep in mind: if doing so is a bad thing, Ron, then you and I would never have met. Gods, I e-mailed you out of the blue with a book cover...)

[James_Nostack]

Don't worry, I found a 25-word mixture of appreciation and distance that works for me, and don't expect a reply.  My issue was trying to avoid coming across as an illiterate jackass ("I really like them thar Tomoe Goezen books"), because that would reflect poorly on the author.  Vonnegut has some scene where Kilgore Trout meets his biggest fan, who has brain damage, and it's humiliating for both parties.