Book
Description:
“Ancient
Canada is a fantasy epic and a story of mythology for an alternate Canada. Because of her unique ability to see life and
death, Lavender is exiled from her home.
With the help of her sister Marigold, she survives in the wild using her
gift. The two encounter various
characters and creatures along their journey, not all human and not all
friendly. Each chapter is narrated by
one of these characters or creatures, sharing their personal story as well as
their encounter of the two sisters.
Together the chapters link to bring Lavender and Marigold’s epic, the
mythological story of Ancient Canada.”
This book is fascinating in many ways and the author has an
incredible imagination. Set in an ancient land of semi-medieval technology, it
resembles fantasy more than anything, while there are shreds of our world
there, especially in the names, the world is extremely different from ours.
From Lichen to the feathermen, there is a lot of creativity here.
We have a vast array of characters and creatures that largely dodge previous
stories and patterns we have seen over and over again in fantasy. Lavender’s
gift is also pretty unusual – not least of which because the power creep that
is so common was resisted. Yet, despite not expanding her powers to control
life and death, we still see a lot of very creative uses for it – from writing
their book about poisonous food, to using it as a guide for safety, avoiding
those paths where her death is imminent in favour of safer ones. It’s a unique
way to give someone the limited ability of a Seer.
This is also a book that analyses a lot of issues (albeit not in a
way that I found ideal). We have in depth discussions on the nature of evil, on
passive and aggressive personalities, on ways to negotiate a homogenous culture
when one is Other, on class, on welfare, on being fat, on sexism, on
privatisation vs nationalisation, on mental illness, on freedom, on selfishness
and self-perception, on self-worth, on the value of diversity and many more. Every
story had at least one intense debate or examination of one of these concepts
and more besides. There’s a lot of deep thinking in this book and a lot of
urges to think as well – it encourages the reader to explore these concepts and
follow the character’s paths.
Marigold and Lavender also work extremely well together. Lavender
is overly serious, but Marigold is fun and often hilariously funny, adding a
lightness to the book (albeit, also adding considerable, inappropriate
distractions as well).
The story is as much a story of the world as much as it is
Lavender and Marigold, with many of the chapters focused on the countries and
cultures and creatures within it rather than just their story. It was a sight
seeing tour in many ways – occasionally creating redundancies and distractions,
but serving to show case these lands and the debates that arise from them
The problem is that this book has a writing style I don’t care
for. It is over-written, it may be the most over-written book I’ve read – and I’ve
read Dickens. The most glaring of this is the descriptions – things are
described in incredible, and unnecessary, detail; people talk in extremely
over-wordy and stilted fashion, conversations more a series of speeches
delivered to each other. Frankly, the book is over 700 pages long and could
quite possibly be halved without loss.
