Heaven's Net is Wide by Lian Hearn

[meganbmoore]

Heaven’s Net is Wide is a prequel to Lian Hearn’s Tales of the Otori series. TotO is set in an alternate Japan whose world and society only have one real change to being part of any unspecified part of ancient Japan: ninja magic skills exist and are pretty darn cool. The first three books cover the life of Tomasu, later Takeo, the son of a man of the Tribe(the magic ninja guys) and a woman of the Hidden(the not-even-minimally-disguised version of Christianity in this world.) As a teen, Takeo is taken in and adopted by Otori Shigeru, a man who plans to overthrow Iida Sadamu, the corrupt Lord of the land. We follow Takeo’s life as he fulfills Shigeru’s dreams and carves his own destiny and loves, setting the stage for his children. For, we learn, it is not so much Takeo himself that is important(though, of course, he is) but rather, the world he creates and the legacy he leaves for his children, and what they do with it. I should go on the record now as saying that I view The Harsh Cry of the Heron as the best book, and that as far as I’m concerned, the entire point of the first three books. It is, very simply, including Heaven’s Net is Wide, the best written, crafted, and executed of the books.

Heaven’s Net is Wide serves as a prequel to the series, telling the life of Shigeru much the same as the first three books followed Takeo’s life, detailing how he got to the personal and political stage he was at in Across the Nightingale Floor, as well as showing the emergence of his enmity with Iida Sadamu, and the earlier lives of main of the supporting characters of the series. Like all the books, it’s good. Very, very good. And yet…for most of it, while I liked it, while I thought it was good, while I found it interesting…I just wasn’t involved. I had my suspicions of why throughout, but they solidified once I got to the last 150 pages, when it started to include other perspectives and get into the events that directly led to AtNF.

The thing is this: Takeo’s role is to leave a legacy and create the world for his children to guide. Shigeru’s role is to train and guide Takeo and put him on that path. Everything we needed to know about Shigeru, we got into in great detail in Takeo’s books. Most of the rest is…extra. Good extra, but extra. Once we got to the events leading to Shigeru’s finding and adopting Takeo, there was a feeling of bittersweetness because you know what’s coming, and anticipation to get to see it in a new way, but for the most part, while good, there was just this anti-climatic feeling to it. It’s like I used up all my anticipation and energy with the other books, and this one was only filling in the holes for me.

Don’t get me wrong, I unconditionally recommend it, whether you’ve read the others or not, but if you haven’t read the rest, I suggest starting with this one, as I suspect it’ll make a much bigger impact that way.

Comments

[sanada.livejournal.com]

hmm, I probably ought to finish reading that series. I read the first two or three and got frustrated with the historical inaccuracies an mysticism. I *want* to like historical Japanese-themed fiction... but after reading Matsuoka's "Cloud of Sparrows" and Rowland's Sano Ichiro mysteries (both of which contain massive amounts of historical brain hurt, painfully cheesy romance, and really awful sex... don't even ask how I've managed to read all of them), I'm wary of any English-language fiction involving Japan... but then again, I love I.J. Parker's 11th-century Japan novels and Jessica Amanda Salmonson's freakishly mythic alternate universe "Tomoe Gozen" books... so maybe if I hadn't read the Otori series at the same time I was reading every piece of Wapanese drivel in the local library, I would have liked it.

[meganbmoore.livejournal.com]

i...ah...concede to being somewhat fond of the Sano Ichiro mysteries.

*cough*

But yes...very cheesy romance(though after that silly ninja chick, his wife was pretty much a relief.)

It's telling, though, that my favorite character is the one who's the villain the first 7 or so books. The most annoying thing, though, is the homophobia she tends to indulge in. I wish she'd avoid the subject altogether, or not be so jumpy about it.

[smillaraaq.livejournal.com]

It's telling, though, that my favorite character is the one who's the villain the first 7 or so books.

Yanagisawa? Heh, we appear to be reading those for the same reason. (Well, that, and historical mysteries, no matter how cheesy, now fill the sort of brain-candy niche for me that fantasy novels did before I got so hypercritical with that genre; they keep me turning pages just to see how the plot spins out.

_{Also I derive extra deranged amusement value from them because my brain is full of deranged crossover theories involving the fundamental similarity of Yanagisawa and the new Beeb version of Guy of Gisburne.}

[meganbmoore.livejournal.com]

Heh...normally, I wouldn't care for Yanagisawa, except for the "good villain, interesting character" part, but sometimes, Sano and his wife are JUST SO STUPID that I glory in him.

But yeah, I have a major weakness for historical mystery series, too.

[sanada.livejournal.com]

I... I can't stop reading them... x___x Yanagisawa is my favorite character too! He almost makes up for me wanting to throttle almost all of the female characters to a messy death. If she'd just stick to writing historical fiction, I could forgive the little burps in accuracy (because let's face it, it's no fun if the main character has to kill himself in the middle of the book, and in theory I like the idea of the women playing a larger role than in most Japanese historical novels) but the romance aspect makes me gag. Especially the sex cult (wtf). And the homophobia grates and grates on my nerves. It's like... the setting of the books is Japanese and there are plenty of really interesting cultural tidbits but the author's voice comes through as very Western, or something like that. And it's annoying when the author interrupts my enjoyment of the story!

[meganbmoore.livejournal.com]

Yes, Yanagisawa...I'm at least a book or two behind, and he's kinda been shuffled off to the background, so I forgot his name.

The approach to homosexuality is very stereotypically western...Sano is 1001% hetero, and therefore good and the hero. The men who are homosexual are weak or evil. No middle ground. She also approaches the subject in general as if it were bad.

The sex cult...I barely remember it, to be honest. I think it involved attempted seduction of Sano and his being strong against it and then pondering that he was drawn to dangerous women and that was why he kept being tempted to stray...mostly, I was "WTF?"-ing at the implication that he desired women besides his wife because they wanted to kill them.

Hearn is actually the polar opposite when it comes to sexuality, though.

[sanada.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I was disappointed that he seems to have been shoved aside lately. I like him because he's a total jerk, but not really evil... and he becomes much more sympathetic as the series goes on.

LOL, 1001% hetero is right! As common as homosexual relationships were back then, you'd think there'd be a nice, competent gay guy here and there? Some mention of shudou in a positive context? (well, I guess Yanagisawa's young lover sort of counts.)

I think it was the Black Lotus book... It was stupid and it hurt my brain to read it, so I tried to erase the memory. His wife and her maid got brainwashed into having wild crazy sex, or something like that. And I was just "wahwahwahwait what?" at the quasi-religious explanation for it all. lol, but haven't those supernatural detective lady novels taught you that the otherwise intelligent main character will be inexplicably drawn to the worst possible love interest? It's instant drama!! (cheap storytelling, if you ask me...)

Hmm, maybe I'll read the prequel, then. I liked Shigeru more than I liked Takeo. ^_^

[meganbmoore.livejournal.com]

Yanagisawa's younger lover counts...but IIRC, he counts because he died young or some such.

I suspect Yanagisawa got shoved aside because he was becoming a more positive character.

Takeo grew up me. It was Kaede I always had troubles with. Shigeru was my favorite, though. Still, I view the book about Takeo's kids as being the best in the series, and you cant' read it without reading all of Takeo's story.

[sanada.livejournal.com]

Yeah, he had a typical tragic shudou death~ (The japanese aesthetic of pretty boys = death is rather interesting~)

And oh noes, people might actually like the bad guy!

Yeah, I didn't like Kaede at all. Hmm, well, I guess I'll have to read it all, then!

[meganbmoore.livejournal.com]

I'm more interested in Japan's "loss of body part(usually eye or arm)=love" and China's "loss of body part=heroism and nobility."

Kaede...gets better...then gets worse again. She's by far the weakest of the major female characters.

[smillaraaq.livejournal.com]

Yeah, Shichisaburou was a really sweet, obsessively devoted kid; about the only way you could count him as even close to evil is that he was doing Yanagisawa's bidding against the nominal good guys. And Yanagisawa himself was just generally so much smarter and more competent and interesting, and even the nastier sides of his personality were somewhat understandable given his mistreatment as a child, that it's really hard to root against him the way the author probably wanted you to. But the series in general suffers from the common flaw of historical novels in many genres, wherein the good guys are telegraphed from miles away by their having anachronistically "enlightened" values that make their attitudes towards sex/class/gender/etc. much more friendly and palatable to a modern western audience.

...but wha, sex cult? I've only read a couple of the very earliest books, going out of sequence as I've managed to scavenge freebies on BookMooch -- clearly I haven't yet made it to any of the titles with the SERIOUS crack. *blinks*

_{I wonder if anyone out there is writing nice dark angsty Yanagisawa/Shichisaburou fic that doesn't suck? Hmmmmm....}

[sanada.livejournal.com]

I wonder if anyone out there is writing nice dark angsty Yanagisawa/Shichisaburou fic that doesn't suck? Hmmmmm....

...If you find it, I want it!! I don't think I've ever seen fic for that series, though.

I guess I'm a lot more tolerant of anachronistic attitudes in manga (not to mention the demons, naked ladies and carefree disregard for physics that one usually finds in historical manga...) because they're serial comics usually targeted towards a younger audience and most only get 30 pages a month. A novelist has so much more room to expand on the time period! Ever read any of Eiji Yoshikawa's huge historical epics? He doesn't bother to update his 16th-century characters to 21st-century western tastes at all so you can really feel the difference! (And the dramatic speeches about honor and justice totally make me cry...) Not that I think anyone should try to emulate Yoshikawa's style or anything, but you're totally right that Sano and most other historical heros have more in common with the ideal 21st-century man than the ideal 16th-century man...

Oh yes. Crazy Buddhist sex cult. Not that there wasn't some historically accurate crazy Buddhist sex going on, but the book just screamed "look, exotic softcore porn to titilate the lady readers!" And then there was one book where Reiko got kidnapped... that was pretty painful too. Or maybe it was the same book. Either way, WTF?!

[madame-manga.livejournal.com]

Oh boy, I identify -- I would also like to enjoy some fun Japan-based genre fiction and haven't yet found my personal niche. I've got a very similar problem with those particular series -- I couldn't even finish the first Otori book (I think I was spoiled by 1980s Frank Miller ninjas ad nauseum) and when you start keeping a running tally of probable errors in the Rowland mysteries, it's past time to quit. *sigh* So I'll have to try the 11th century and Tomoe Gozen -- sounds intriguing...

[sanada.livejournal.com]

I liked Parker's 11th-century mysteries because the hero is more the scholarly, bookish nerd civil servant type than a Dashing Romantic Samurai. It's about as accurate to the time period as the "Onmyouji" movies, but in both cases I can forgive a little laxness in class structure for a fun story~ And Tomoe Gozen... well, it's more heroic fantasy with a feminist slant than historical fiction, but even so it's one of the most original fantasy stories I've read! Too bad there's not much in the swords-n-sorcery genre that I can really enjoy...