larryhammer | Getting out my ranty reader pants

WFC is, of course, about the freebies. Half of which you trade away, because they look bad or not your thing. This year I kept one, Dexta by C.J. Ryan, because it looked bad: the back cover makes the heroine sound like such the Mary Sue.

Oh my yes. She so is.

We will pass over without comment the clunky opening chapter, which exists purely to put infodump in the mouths of characters who then die, and jump to the scene in which Our Heroine first appears from outside. The story, which had been bouncing along (if somewhat erratically), suddenly stops in its tracks to admire her with over a page of description. Her OMT, btw, is "perfectly formed." Smart, sexy, gorgeous, ruthless, angsty over piddly stuff -- she's all that and a cherry on top (probably with stem tied in a knot by her tongue). Her business suit sounds more suitable for a porn movie than an office, and indeed, two pages later, she flashes a "perfectly formed" nipple at a (female) subordinate.

I am in admiration of the author, though not in a positive way.

What particularly interests me is how the author goes out of his* way to make Our Heroine both average and extraordinary at the same time. She's a mid-level bureaucrat AND she's the Galactic Emperor's ex-wife. Everyone who's anyone in the Empire is beautiful (so we're told, though we're shown otherwise) AND she's gorgeous even compared to the rest. Casual provocative nudity is normal AND bends men around her ~~nipples~~ finger. That having it both ways at once is a very Sue trait: she's at your level but you both can soar. But then, the author has doublethink down pat: witness the simultaneous approval and condemnation of institutionalized sexual harassment in Our Heroine's workplace. No, you did not read that wrong.

In true Suethor form, in the end, Our Heroine was wrong about exactly nothing of importance** but thinks she made too many mistakes. She and her ~~worshippers~~ team are occasionally stupid, and by "occasionally" I mean often, but never actually wrong, even in their wild-assed guesses. And every time she opens her mouth, she convinces her audience of what she wanted -- except, of course, the villains, who are, of course, self-conscious hypocrites (they know she's right, and it doesn't matter). Um, yes, I finished it -- I wanted to pick apart what the book does that's enough right, that it got published.

This is a book to hand to those who claim a Mary Sue can only appear in fanfic, not original works.*** Even so, if it'd been a good yarn, I wouldn't have minded quite so much, but I've read better adventure tales in alt.sex.stories. Also, better dialog.

* The book packaging carefully hides the author's gender, but there are reasons to think the author is male: only two men, both Designated Love Interests,**** are described as attractive, while several women are; men are never skimpily (un)dressed, but women frequently are; and it's repeatedly mentioned that several women never wear underwear -- one wonders about their office chairs. Also, the nipple exposure fetish.

** I counted. Twice.

*** You could argue this is fic, the fandom being the early 21th century, tarted and tech'd up -- the calendars may say "33rd century," but it's window dressing. But that'd be as silly as footnoting a footnote.

**** Her ex counts as a DLI, insofar as she does has sex with him. Five years after their divorce. Which, btw, was when she was eighteen, after three years of marriage.

...

It is conceivably possible the author is convinced that her marrying at fifteen shows us she lives in a decadent society. Conceivably.

ETA: Per Amazon, "C.J. Ryan is the pseudonym of an author who lives and works in Philadelphia. This is his first science fiction novel." I was right about the gender, at least.

ETA2: Yes, there are elements of male fantasy object in our heroine. (Ya think?) However, when I wrote this I was more interested in her Sueish aspects. Which she has in (perfectly formed) abundance.

---L.

Current Music: All the Fishes Come Home to Roost, Rachel M. Brown

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