Book Review: Carry On
Mar. 22nd, 2016 05:56 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
osprey_archerI finished Rainbow Rowell’s Carry On, which I very much enjoyed! It starts off a bit slowly - not in that it’s boring; it’s interesting all the way through, but in that the plot slowly gathers propulsive force until it takes off about halfway through (I think about the time that Simon goes to Baz’s house for Christmas), and I was reading along and reading along and the big confrontation was coming AND THEN I HAD TO GO TO WORK NOOOOOOOOO. I wanted so much to finish that I almost convinced myself to go in late, but I couldn’t quite manage it.
Anyway, I liked the book a lot. I’m particularly partial to the world-building - and I think upon reflection that it is mostly criticisms of Harry Potter’s world-building that Carry On is building on, not specifically criticisms of the seventh book; it’s just that I saw many of these criticisms after book seven came out, I think because the release of the final book made it clear that, say, the Problem of Slytherin was not going to be addressed in the text.
I think it’s doing something different with it’s world-building than Harry Potter is, so it’s not quite fair to say one is better than the other. Rather, they’re going to appeal to different people (or to the same people but for different reasons; I love the first few Harry Potter books, after all).
Harry Potter is much heavier on whimsy and sense of wonder: the magical world is clearly very dangerous, but it’s almost impossible to imagine anyone wanting to opt out on that basis, because the magical world is just so awesome and the danger, generally speaking, feels like boys’ own adventure danger: more exciting than scary. It may be deadly, but it’s not traumatizing. (This is the general tendency in the worldbuilding, not an absolute, because there are moments of genuine pathos: the scene when Harry sees Neville’s parents in St. Mungo’s comes to mind.)
Incidentally, I think this is the reason why the “but he’s a trauma victim! Of course he’s cranky!” defense of Capslock!Harry in book 5 has always fallen flat to me. Previously Harry bounced back from everything like a rubber ball, and just in general, realistic trauma reactions aren’t a high priority in Hogwarts world-building.
They are a priority in Carry On (at least in comparison to Harry Potter). Simon Snow and his friends Penelope and Agatha (and his nemesis Baz) are starting their final year at Watford, and after nearly a decade of magical brushes with death, they’re all fraying and frazzled, bitterly aware that they’re not likely to survive to the end of their schooling.
And the darkness is much closer to the surface than it is in Harry Potter - although the darkness is definitely there is Harry Potter once you start looking. Carry On simply makes it explicit. The tensions between mages and magical creatures are obvious from the beginning; the fact that the political system is corrupt to the core is obvious, if not from the first pages, then quite quickly as soon as we get out of Simon’s POV. (Simon is almost tragically naive, but it’s fairly clear that this is the result of careening from one crisis to another so swiftly that he doesn’t really have a chance to think through the larger situation.)
The magical world doesn’t feel as insular as Harry Potter’s: the students are aware of and use modern technology - and this despite the fact that, except for Simon Snow, all the mages in this world are to the magic born.
(I think one of my favorite examples of this is the time that Agatha starts complaining about people making up a spell to make stuff stick to the walls. “This is exactly the sort of thing I’m sick of,” she complains to herself. “Like, just use some tape. Why come up with a spell for sticking paper to the wall. Tape. Exists.”)
I did not expect to like Agatha as much as I did. She’s the character who would really rather not be having adventures at all, thank you very much, and usually I don’t like that character at all (they tend to gum up the narrative). But with Agatha I could totally feel it; their adventures did not sound fun and if I were Agatha I too would probably be gloomily moping about the magical ramparts thinking about how I’m probably going to have to fight yet another fucking dragon when really I’d rather be reading. (Or riding horses, in Agatha’s case.)
And I think one of the things that I find most interesting about the world-building in Carry On is that the narrative allows space for this reaction - the rejection of the magical world - without trying to force it on you. It just presents its world and presents different characters having different reactions to it and lets the characters have their feelings without signposting any particular reaction as right, and I think that’s really nice.
***
And I also think that Carry On is a sign that I should start that Harry Potter reread I've been thinking about for a while. Perhaps once I've finished the Betsy-Tacy books? I think that a reread of Harry Potter could fill a similar bedtime reading space in my life.
Anyway, I liked the book a lot. I’m particularly partial to the world-building - and I think upon reflection that it is mostly criticisms of Harry Potter’s world-building that Carry On is building on, not specifically criticisms of the seventh book; it’s just that I saw many of these criticisms after book seven came out, I think because the release of the final book made it clear that, say, the Problem of Slytherin was not going to be addressed in the text.
I think it’s doing something different with it’s world-building than Harry Potter is, so it’s not quite fair to say one is better than the other. Rather, they’re going to appeal to different people (or to the same people but for different reasons; I love the first few Harry Potter books, after all).
Harry Potter is much heavier on whimsy and sense of wonder: the magical world is clearly very dangerous, but it’s almost impossible to imagine anyone wanting to opt out on that basis, because the magical world is just so awesome and the danger, generally speaking, feels like boys’ own adventure danger: more exciting than scary. It may be deadly, but it’s not traumatizing. (This is the general tendency in the worldbuilding, not an absolute, because there are moments of genuine pathos: the scene when Harry sees Neville’s parents in St. Mungo’s comes to mind.)
Incidentally, I think this is the reason why the “but he’s a trauma victim! Of course he’s cranky!” defense of Capslock!Harry in book 5 has always fallen flat to me. Previously Harry bounced back from everything like a rubber ball, and just in general, realistic trauma reactions aren’t a high priority in Hogwarts world-building.
They are a priority in Carry On (at least in comparison to Harry Potter). Simon Snow and his friends Penelope and Agatha (and his nemesis Baz) are starting their final year at Watford, and after nearly a decade of magical brushes with death, they’re all fraying and frazzled, bitterly aware that they’re not likely to survive to the end of their schooling.
And the darkness is much closer to the surface than it is in Harry Potter - although the darkness is definitely there is Harry Potter once you start looking. Carry On simply makes it explicit. The tensions between mages and magical creatures are obvious from the beginning; the fact that the political system is corrupt to the core is obvious, if not from the first pages, then quite quickly as soon as we get out of Simon’s POV. (Simon is almost tragically naive, but it’s fairly clear that this is the result of careening from one crisis to another so swiftly that he doesn’t really have a chance to think through the larger situation.)
The magical world doesn’t feel as insular as Harry Potter’s: the students are aware of and use modern technology - and this despite the fact that, except for Simon Snow, all the mages in this world are to the magic born.
(I think one of my favorite examples of this is the time that Agatha starts complaining about people making up a spell to make stuff stick to the walls. “This is exactly the sort of thing I’m sick of,” she complains to herself. “Like, just use some tape. Why come up with a spell for sticking paper to the wall. Tape. Exists.”)
I did not expect to like Agatha as much as I did. She’s the character who would really rather not be having adventures at all, thank you very much, and usually I don’t like that character at all (they tend to gum up the narrative). But with Agatha I could totally feel it; their adventures did not sound fun and if I were Agatha I too would probably be gloomily moping about the magical ramparts thinking about how I’m probably going to have to fight yet another fucking dragon when really I’d rather be reading. (Or riding horses, in Agatha’s case.)
And I think one of the things that I find most interesting about the world-building in Carry On is that the narrative allows space for this reaction - the rejection of the magical world - without trying to force it on you. It just presents its world and presents different characters having different reactions to it and lets the characters have their feelings without signposting any particular reaction as right, and I think that’s really nice.
***
And I also think that Carry On is a sign that I should start that Harry Potter reread I've been thinking about for a while. Perhaps once I've finished the Betsy-Tacy books? I think that a reread of Harry Potter could fill a similar bedtime reading space in my life.
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no subject
Date: 2016-03-23 04:56 am (UTC)Carry On also does for Simon and Baz what only a select few Harry/Draco fics do for me, which is show that Baz, almost as much as Simon, has been shaped as a weapon by the people who raised him, and that's left him profoundly damaged. His father shows a lot of care and concern for him, but only in the sense of adequately servicing a tool; although he's as indulgent as the Mage is neglectful, they're both willing to throw away their weapon on a target they consider worthwhile enough.
I also enjoyed that first we see the Mage as this comic-book figure from Simon's perspective, but then Lucy peels back the layers one by one until our feet are back on reality and Rowell is asking us: Think of the people you know who actually formed paramilitary cults with fancy costumes and elite inner circles with fanatical devotion to a charismatic leader. What are they like? What is living with them like? Oh, yeah.
no subject
Date: 2016-03-23 05:30 am (UTC)I am always interested in a HP re-read. And I have thoughts on JKR's worldbuilding difficulties but they should probably wait until I have less of a headache.
no subject
Date: 2016-03-23 11:01 am (UTC)I really liked the relatively porousness of the divide between the human and magical worlds, that worked very well; and it felt like another aspect of its meta commentary on the relationship between fans and canon.
no subject
Date: 2016-03-23 12:30 pm (UTC)I think some people are just so used to characters like Agatha being dismissed that they tend to see the existence of an Agatha as a sign of authorial disapproval.
And yeah, the porousness of the divide between the human and magical worlds was great. I loved the way the spells worked, too, the words gaining power from being said over and over again.
no subject
Date: 2016-03-23 12:35 pm (UTC)I think some of HP's world-building difficulties stem from the fact that the books get darker as they go along, which meant that some of the whimsy-based world-building seemed increasingly out of step with the story. Also, while the presentation of Slytherin did get more complicated over time, it never got complicated enough to really work in a book that had some aspirations to say important things about good and evil.
no subject
Date: 2016-03-23 06:08 pm (UTC)At least Baz's people treat him like a valuable tool. The Mage knows Simon's a valuable tool, but he basically leaves him out to rust in the rain. He conceives a child as a weapon, possibly murders the child's mother (unless Lucy died because giving birth - unattended! - to the greatest magician ever killed her, but even in that case I rather think it's murder, because I'm sure the Mage would have gone ahead with the ritual even if he knew it would probably kill her), and then, well, the kid's going to be useless for a decade, so the Mage just abandons him in foster care.
He couldn't even be bothered to arrange to have Simon adopted by some nice Normals. He's so lucky that Simon turned out to be a decent, thoughtful kid and not a juvenile delinquent who thinks exploding things with magic at every opportunity sounds like a jolly good time.
And of course Simon has painful "Are you my father figure?" feelings about him nonetheless. OH SIMON, YOU NEED A HUG SO MUCH. Honestly it's probably a good thing that Simon never learns the Mage really was his father: like he needs more baggage just at this moment.
no subject
Date: 2016-03-23 07:53 pm (UTC)Of course, the therapist in me knows that childhood trauma is often something people wrangle into quiescence in their teens and twenties and thirties, and then in middle age, juuust around the time they reach the age their abuser was when the abuse happened/their child reaches the age they were when the abuse happened/their abuser dies, it all comes roaring back to life and they end up in therapy like "wtf please this is UNFAIR, I already DEALT with this." So I kind of want a story where the next time the Veil opens, Lucy's story actually reaches Simon?
no subject
Date: 2016-03-23 08:16 pm (UTC)Just in case Simon needed some new horrible revelations to cope with on top of his old childhood trauma.