Wyrd Gods (Susana Imaginário)
book review
EDIT: i was an idiot and forgot to add a link to the author’s website.
EDIT 2: my wife read this and thought it was best to warn about spoilers (i think mild ones, but still).
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i am not really the target audience for fantasy, nor for book series. in fact, i think this is the first series i am reading, if LOTR doesn’t count. much like that famous book, the author makes the disclaimer that, originally, it was all going to be one book. it’s one story, but it was too long, so it had to be divided. it ended up being a tetralogy.
i had (and i still have, actually) a sort of prejudice against both of those things, but i read everything else by the author, standalone novels and novellas related to the main Timelessness series and within the same universe, and not just enjoyed them but thought they were brilliant (especially Asterius and Oublié; i’ve written about them too before). so, finally, i had to pick up the series. i got the complete Timelessness edition and went for it. (it’s a beautiful and well made book, just from a purely technical and physical perspective).
i will quote two passages. one from the opening interlude (yes, interlude, because it happens outside of time, and thus it can’t really be a prelude), and another from chapter seven. i think they give a feel for the author’s style, the kind of preoccupations she has in her prose, and also the persistent wit that flavors it throughout:
«The vibrant goddess paced in emptiness while she waited for the God of Time. One would think Chronos, of all creatures, would respect a scheduled appointment. That wasn’t the case, and so she waited. She just couldn’t wait standing still.
“Welcome,” the God of Time said after what felt like an eternity.»
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«Relicum stretches alongside a wide, slow moving river. Shelters of disparate sizes, shapes and materials spill out from the main square in an outlandish contrast of streets in parallel rows and mazes of allotments with no apparent order or design. The huge plaza itself accommodates a busy market and what looks like the entire population of the land times two.
I’ve never seen so many people gathered in such a small area. Illeana had never seen that many people in her entire lifetime! Lucky her.”
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the premise is unusual: there is a shady deal between Olympian and Norse gods to merge their respective underworlds. that causes a lot of problems. one of them is that certain gods (not all of them minor) get trapped in this new joined underworld and in mortal bodies that do not belong to them (and that in some senses seem to reject them). they are the Wyrd Gods. this is the case with the main character, Psyche (who i already knew from a prequel; a very meta aspect of which is that the prequel exists as a book within the timelessness universe; i loved this detail). one of the interesting things that happened as a result of reading the other books before the series is that, reading it now, i can start to connect the dots; like putting together a puzzle; i now think the right order to start reading Susana is, first Asterius, and then jumping into the series, and probably leaving Oublié for last.
the book is more fantastic than it is fantasy. there are fantastical elements. (it’s about gods, and there are magical powers, though always limited and with caveats, no deus ex machinas), but it’s not sword and sorcery. if anything, i would say it is something of a parody of those typical tropes. but it’s fantastic in the colloquial sense too. i was consistently impressed (even though i already knew the quality of the author’s prose and ideas): with the plot, the wit, and especially the insight into the psyche of the characters (pun; given the main character is Psyche, former human turned goddess of the soul, now a fated god trapped in the body of a dryad in a sort of ‘no good deed goes unpunished’ sort of deal).
the author herself introduced me to the genre in which all the books in the Timelessness universe fit: slipstream. it’s rather hard to define, but if i had to boil it down it’s fiction that has fantastical or sci fi elements but it’s not superficial. the story is about people, not world building. and it makes the reader work. it happened a couple of times that i had to go back a page or two because the story gets too intricate and you really have to be paying full attention, otherwise you’ll miss what’s really happening. it really is a complex and multidimensional story.
and the intricacy is not limited to the basic plot either. the texture of the world, while not overbearing in detail, also keeps expanding and getting more real as the story unfolds. (also the whole question of what Time actually is, and how creatures exist within it, or without it, and how, and… uh… when; unsurprisingly given the title of the series; i suspect this will become more and more a major theme, even if it is in the background). but most of all the author shines in character studies, in understanding motivations and desires. that’s the centerpiece in my opinion, especially with regards to the main character, Psyche.
she is inhabiting a body that is not hers, but not only that, she has the original owner of the body inside her head. it gets surprisingly schizophrenic at times. i had read (and even tried to write) this sort of story (two minds, one body), but it’s much more complicated here. as much as Psyche is possessing Illeana’s body, the latter is in some sense also squatting inside Psyche’s mind as well. so it’s almost a double possession. this is the most interesting aspect of this book, in my opinion, and treated not only with originality but profundity (yet also, always, humor and wit).
the book is entertaining, but for attentive and intelligent readers it is much more than that. in fact, it will no doubt require more than one reading to really get everything out of it. it’s actually rather compact, considering everything. fans of mythology will also find plenty to reflect upon, and while i don’t know much about it, it’s clear to me that the author knows these mythologies in and out (especially Greek and Norse), and plays with them with ease and confidence.
most of the book is in the first person (Psyche), but the interludes in third person were plugged in at just the right moments. they cut away from the main action just as you are getting lost and provide extra context, just before they throw you more curve balls to contend with. in this sense, it is also a sort of thriller (i was also surprised, towards the end, that it had more than a bit of erotism; but it’s not gratuitous, since it contributes to the plot and more importantly to the character building, the dual mind inhabiting the one body here especially discombobulating).
to sum up: an original and thought provoking premise, written in an intelligent way, full of humor and insight (into psychology, yes, but also theology and metaphysics), yet always entertaining. the most intriguing characters for me were Psyche (of course), Seshat (which i knew from Oublié), and, more surprisingly to me, the Dharkan. this is perfect, since that’s the title of book two. and maybe that’s the best recommendation: once i finished Wyrd Gods, i started the next in the series.