I Am Mordred by Nancy Springer
Sep. 17th, 2009 01:41 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
meganbmooreThis book begins with a teenaged King Arthur placing 40 babies in a boat so that they will die at sea in order to ward off Mordred’s causing The Doom of Camelot. For greatest dramatic effect, he does this himself because he can’t make his men condemn babies to death. The next scene begins with an angsty Mordred thinking about centuries trapped in the body of a raven. The first thing he says is “When I was a baby, my father tried to kill me." On page 18, he was given a puppy. A couple paragraphs later, his half brother picked it up, and I was utterly convinced that he was going to bash her against the castle wall.
It’s that kind of book. The awesomely depressing kind, that is. Naturally, I was deeply concerned about the dog every time she was mentioned after that.
The book is similar to Springer’s book about Morgan, and devoted to showing that Mordred as not having been evil since birth, but trapped by a horrible cruel terrible fate. Of course, it still has to end with him causing a war and killing his father. So. You know.
No one understands Mordred. His brothers think he’s a coward. His mother doesn’t love him. His father can’t acknowledge him. Woes! And yet, he manages to not be too whiny or irritating! For the most part, it’s pretty decently done, and it’s interesting to see Mordred treated as something other than an evil destroyer.
Then at abut ¾ of the way through, a raven looks at him and says “Dread! More dread!” and the book descends (ascends?) into pure, undiluted Angst and Woes and Drama and Trauma. It’s rather amazing. Later, the same raven says “Mordred! More dread, more dead, murderer, Mordred!” I feel like I should applaud Springer, somehow.
It’s that kind of book. The awesomely depressing kind, that is. Naturally, I was deeply concerned about the dog every time she was mentioned after that.
The book is similar to Springer’s book about Morgan, and devoted to showing that Mordred as not having been evil since birth, but trapped by a horrible cruel terrible fate. Of course, it still has to end with him causing a war and killing his father. So. You know.
No one understands Mordred. His brothers think he’s a coward. His mother doesn’t love him. His father can’t acknowledge him. Woes! And yet, he manages to not be too whiny or irritating! For the most part, it’s pretty decently done, and it’s interesting to see Mordred treated as something other than an evil destroyer.
Then at abut ¾ of the way through, a raven looks at him and says “Dread! More dread!” and the book descends (ascends?) into pure, undiluted Angst and Woes and Drama and Trauma. It’s rather amazing. Later, the same raven says “Mordred! More dread, more dead, murderer, Mordred!” I feel like I should applaud Springer, somehow.
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Date: 2009-09-17 09:03 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-09-17 02:02 pm (UTC)