Reread: Children of Earth and Sky by Guy Gavriel Kay

This is, to the best of my recollection, the first book that I've reread that I read for the first time after I had started this blog. So here are my thoughts about it from 2016. 

I don't disagree with any of my thoughts or conclusions, although it took me longer this time around to vibe with the ensemble cast nature of the story. I have also actually been to some of the places that inspired this book now, namely Venice and Ravenna and Dubrovnik, as well as Greece, and that along with other books I've read about the region have deepened my appreciation of many of the themes of the book. I still cried, again mostly from relief, but also from recognition and the feeling of being home in this book. I don't think it will ever be my favorite GGK novel, but it's in conversation with so many of them that it exists within those books now, too. It enriches all that came before, and I expect it will do the same for those that come after. 

Grade: A

Reread: The Last Light of the Sun by Guy Gavriel Kay

Sometimes there's a book that does something intentionally and you know why it did it conceptually and you're still like yes but please give this to me???? And that is how I feel about this book and the lack of a map at the front. 

Every other book that GGK has written has a map at the start. It grounds you in this shared universe that he's created, which is essentially a fictional Europe and Middle East and North Africa that he can play with freely. And this book is about the version of Britain and the Vikings in 9th century or so, and I understand why the lack of a map reflects the mists and unknown glens and so on and so forth, but I would like to have my narrative bearing!!! 

Anyway. I love this book very much; many of Kay's books are about fathers and sons, and legacy, and above all else how chance encounters and timing changes the course of history, but this one has some of the most affecting scenes and develops those themes in ways that continue to stay with me. It's a book I reread hoping that I've misremembered some things about, so I don't have to experience that pain again, but by the end I'm so happy with where the story goes that I've accepted going through that pain. And there's a lot of hope in that. 

Grade: A 

Reread: Lord of Emperors by Guy Gavriel Kay

I got stalled in this reread about 75% of the way through - I got to the point when it all begins to fall apart in the way that it simply has to fall apart, and weirdly I found it tough to experience this time around!! But I finally did, and it was as devastating and ultimately satisfying as it ever is. 

This book was the reason I specifically traveled to Ravenna to see some mosaics in person, which was one of the greatest experiences of my life. It gave me some of the language to explain why art and storytelling matter so much, even when (especially when) the world around us feels like it's imploding. And I find it comforting to know that humans have always just been trying to live our ordinary lives while greater machinations happen around us, and that there's still joy to be found in moments even during so much cruelty and terror. 

Grade: A 

Reread: Sailing to Sarantium by Guy Gavriel Kay

There are some books that I'll always remember where and who I was when I first read it, and this one I read during the summer between my sophomore and junior years of college, while I was on campus for a arts festival. It made me convinced that I was actually going to become a historian, even though I had none of the background or really drive that would make that possible, because this version of the Byzantium empire was so captivating for me that I projected my love of this book onto the idea of studying the time period. I read both this and its sequel (which had just come out) in quick succession, and they've stayed with me on a deep level for the past 24 years. 

Grade: A

GGK Reread Continues! The Lions of Al-Rassan by Guy Gavriel Kay

It took me a long time to get back to this book, which doesn't entirely surprise me given the themes involved. 

Kay's sixth novel, and his first that is significantly less high fantasy and more historical fiction with the serial numbers filed off, is set in a world that draws heavily on the Iberian Peninsula in the time of El Cid and the reconquista. He is deeply interested in conflicts of faith and how people of different faiths and cultures either manage to bridge those divides or fail, and the consequences of those relationships can have for both individual lives and nation states and society as a whole.

The analogues for Christianity, Islam and Judaism are extremely clearly drawn, and there's a love triangle in the middle of this novel that in another author's hands could be extremely trite and obvious. But it's so beautifully developed and drawn out, and the tragedy of the end is the utter impossibility of a future that doesn't destroy something that will be mourned. I couldn't quite get through this book again in the fall of 2023, but I finally did this winter, and rediscovered all over again that I cannot read this book without crying, even 25 years after the first time I read it. 

Grade: A   

Revisiting Guy Gavriel Kay Part 1

So most years, in addition to however many new books I succeed in reading, I often reread a fair number of books. In the past I haven't logged those books on this blog, because they seemed outside the scope of this "project," but this year I've decided that I will! This is pretty easy because so far my main rereads have been of Guy Gavriel Kay's canon, leading up to his most recent release from last spring, which I still haven't read because I had wanted to do a reread of his books first.

Here are the books I've reread so far!  

The Fionavar Tapestry trilogy

Possibly the first proper high fantasy trilogy I ever read, which I did before seeing the Lord of the Rings movies and suddenly realized some of the source of his inspiration (which makes sense given the work he did with Christopher Tolkein in the 1970s). It's a portal fantasy that also brings to mind A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court, and after I read the Lymond Chronicles I discovered another big influence on his work (and a couple of key character types that reoccur throughout his writing). It is definitely a fantasy trilogy written in the 1980s, with some central plot arcs that I don't entirely love, but I also cry every single time I reread these books, because boy does he know what he's doing with these tropes. 

Ysabel

This one is out of publication order, but it also kind of exists on its own. It's the only novel other than the Fionavar Tapestry that takes place in our world, and I don't always buy his mid-2000s modern day POV, but it also brings together a number of his favorite themes in really effective and elegant ways. Also I desperately need to go to Aix-en-Provence. 

Tigana

The big one. His first standalone fantasy and the one he's probably still best known for in a lot of circles, the central conceit of this story is so emotionally resonant and tragically relevant. His character work in particular gets much stronger in later novels in my opinion, but this novel is plotted perfectly, even when you wish it could end in a different way. 

A Song for Arbonne

Boy this book fucked me up when I read it for the first time as a teenager. It's very much his bridge novel between high fantasy novels that are clearly set in worlds based on specific cultures and historical events, and his later novels that are historical fiction about fictionalized versions of cities and nations that also have some magical realism. This one really got to me; it's not as sweeping or just as big as either Tigana or the novel that follows it, but the central battle between a society that wants to have a public role (however flawed) possible for women and one that demonizes them and keeps them subjugated really resonated for me, and there are many scenes from this book that have stayed in my head for decades even if some of the other details had faded since my last reread. 

Next up is Lions of Al-Rassan, and let me tell you that's always a fraught read but it's not going to be easier this fall, sigh. But that's also of course one of its great strengths.

No official grade for any of these but honestly my view of all of his books is that they're just different shades of an A, so take that as read.