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Title: The Scorpio RacesAuthor: Maggie Stiefvater
Published: Scholastic, 2011
Notes: Borrowed from the library // 482 pages // Fantasy // Paperback // Read 24/12/11-25/12/11
It happens at the start of every November: the Scorpio Races. Riders attempt to keep hold of their water horses long enough to make it to the finish line.
Some riders live. Others die.
At age nineteen, Sean Kendrick is the returning champion. He is a young man of few words, and if he has any fears, he keeps them buried deep, where no one else can see them.
Puck Connolly is different. She never meant to ride in the Scorpio Races. But fate hasn't given her much of a chance. So she enters the competition — the first girl ever to do so. She is in no way prepared for what is going to happen.
Judging a Book By Its Cover: I really like this cover. It's simple and eyecatching and detailed and effective, although I can't honestly say that I noticed the heart until um, now. (Dear publisher: are you trying to market this as a romance? Because if you are then I'm confused.) But yes, silhouettes and squiggles and a limited colour pallette is in fact the key to my heart, why do you ask?
The Review: I will be perfectly honest with you: this review was impossible for me to write. I mean, I'm sure writing "This book was incredible and I wanted it to never ever end" is not considered good reviewing technique!
I've never read anything by Maggie Stiefvater before - I have the vague understanding that her other series revolves around fairies and maybe werewolves? And one of those "all-consuming teen romances of DOOM!"? But I spotted this in the library and remember that one of the Book Smugglers quite enjoyed it - the rest is history, really.
I really enjoyed this book. It has brilliant, realistic characterisation, a detailed world setting, fantastic writing, relationships that make my heart ache, a touch of feminism, and killer horses that rise up from the sea. I don't know how else to sell it to you, and I don't know how else to review it other than to write up the notes I made after I read it. ... This got long, I'm afraid, so I've put it behind the cut.
THERE ARE UNMARKED SPOILERS BEHIND THE CUT, PROCEED WITH CARE.
The Writing
- The story is told in not-quite alternating chapters from both Puck and Sean's perspectives - I realise that this is something of a deal breaker for some people, which is why I mention it first. I think it's well handled - the voices are different enough that you can generally tell whose section you're reading without checking the chapter title, and she doesn't rigidly follow the format where it would be more logical and interesting to stay with the other character.1
- The writing itself is beautiful and evocative without ever touching on purple prose, in my opinion. I felt like I could see the story - the town, the countryside, the cliffs, the beach - everything.
- The romance is perfect. It's a subplot, taking a backbench to the characters' goals and priorities, and it's slow-burning and perfect. It's based on mutual respect and that couldn't push more of my buttons if it tried. Plus it amuses me that Puck makes the first move most of the time and Sean is really confused. ♥
- Puck snogging Sean in front of the cameras made my day. - The horror elements are amazingly well done and atmospheric - from hiding from a horse that wants to eat them2 to witnessing a man being killed by a horse to trying to save people and animals from killer horses - they're all brilliant. Puck's narration especially, and her complicated feelings about the horses and the deaths are fantastic.
- The only thing that niggles me is that sometimes the formatting is a little off, like missing spaces after full stops, but it's a minor niggle, it's nothing that takes away from the book.
- I think Maggie Stiefvater nailed the atmosphere of "this is a small village and everyone knows your business" without it being too overpowering or silly.
The Setting
- The modern touches, such as the Morris and the American tourists, were a little jarring at first because everything I had heard about this book had led me to expect a straight fantasy novel. Despite this, the book had a real sense of timelessness and... a lack of place? If that makes sense? There's reference to "the mainland", but never any specifics about where that mainland is or what country it's supposed to be. (That isn't a complaint, and I think it works well as a device - neither of the characters we follow cares about the mainland, really, because Thisby has everything they need. I know it is a convenient device, but I like it.)
- I love the quiet, understated magic of an in these books. Anticlockwise circles and bits of iron, circles drawn in dust, red thread and charms - they're never explained, but their use is so nicely done. People relying on them and being let down, people like Sean using them but refusing to rely on them, the fact that their success isn't guaranteed - I like it! Plus they're treated in such a mundane way - they're just part of what people do and know and I love it when things are presented like that.
- I feel like there is a point to be made about the island's mix of religions (Christianity and the islands original religion) and its magic - not in a sort of "one leading to the other" way, but in a "I wonder how people balance these" way. I'm not sure what the point would be, but I invite people to tell me!
- This book isn't explicitly feminist, but it has touches. The men consider women important to their rituals and races (Peg, the Mare Goddess), but they don't want them to take part. The sexism is unsurprising. Puck's reaction, as I'll go into below, is so realistic - she wants to be blazing and eloquent, but that's not in her nature so she's stubborn and sensible instead. It felt well-handled to me, although others' mileage may vary. I wish she could have forced them to accept her without Sean vouching for her, but I can see why it didn't happen that way.
The Characters
- The main characters are both prickly and not always nice people, but in different ways and for different reasons and I love them. I wanted both of them to win the race and be happy!
- Puck is perfectly, believably written.
- She misses her parents desperately, misses seeing them and talking to them and their views of her still matter even after their death. She loves her brothers and doesn't want them to leave her - but they drive her up the wall.
- I could identify with Puck and her reactions felt spot-on at every turn. The ones that get me are actually the negative ones. She is convincingly embarrassed and ashamed by some of the things that happen to her - I found her slinking out the back of the pub after her confrontation with Gabe to be full of true, ditto for her desire to blaze and stun everyone with skill, ditto for the scene where she is crowded by other racers during training and panics.
- I like her determination - she could drop out of the races at any time, but she doesn't. She could decide not to race on Dove, but she doesn't change her mind. She could let Gabe go without questioning it, but she doesn't. After the races, she could let everything go back to the way it was before, but she gets in Malvern's face and doesn't let it.
- I like that she says "I'll have to learn how to do that" about things like Peg's conversational gambits, and then she does! It's a nice little touch. - Sean Kendrick is played by Claire Stanfield in my brain. (He's... Nothing like Claire Stanfield.)
- Sean is made of quiet, competent badassery.
- I love his understanding of and skill with the horses. I love how confused he ends up being by people who treat him as a person rather than a miracle with the capal.
- I love the scenes where he is trying to save the horses, where he tries to save people, where he talks to the mare goddess, that he appreciates Puck's competence. That he puts everything he has and could have on the line for what he needs, that he understands the difference between wanting something and needing it. That he manages to be wary of the capal without being afraid of them.
- I love him in a sort of desperate, oh-god-you-need-a-hug way, much the same way that I love Puck. - I love pretty much the entirity of the supporting cast, especially Finn and Peg and the two sisters we actually see of the three Fatham & Sons.
- I like that their lives don't seem to revolve around the protagonists as can sometimes happen - there is a real sense of them doing things and living their lives just off screen (like the little details about people speaking about Puck while in bed with their spouse.). It feels - it feels real. Lives interconnect but remain separate, so when we don't see a character for a while, it's not "Oh, they disappeared on page 86 and never came back", it's... Organic.
- Hee, Finn being unsure as to what gambling would do to his immortal soul, and then betting everything on his big sister anyway. ♥
- I do like that characters react differently to Puck and Sean, or show different sides of themselves, or are noticed/described differently depending on which point of view we're in. This may seem a silly thing to be pleased about, but considering how many things I've read where the characters feel the same about everyone, or the same description is used regardless of point of view - it is a little touch that I appreciate.
- Corr, for being a bloodthirsty killing machine that happens to have a fondness for Sean, is lovely.3
- The Book Smugglers said that this book is more about the people around the race than the race itself, and they're exactly right. - I love George Holly. Every scene that involved him brightened my day. The way he's smarter than he first appears, the way he respects Sean and listens to him - forget the encouraging he does, I think the fact that he listens to Sean about subjects that aren't horses is awesome. On top of that, the sheer nosiness of him serves as a brilliant vehicle for the world building, and explanations, and Sean being made aware of his own character development - plus it feels natural. And he's a little bit hilarious (The scene in the bakery! Heeee.)
- PUCK AND SEAN ARE AMAZING TOGETHER, I CAN'T EVEN.
- Him promising to protect her in the race! Her refusal to let him lose for her! The way everything comes together at the end! - The passage about Sean Kendrick being the races -
... But because Sean Kendrick is the races, even if no race was run. A reminder of what the horses mean to the island - a bridge between what we are and that thing about Thisby that we all want but can't seem to touch.
- really struck me, especially considering Puck's love of the island. It seems right and logical that she'd think of him that way, that this is the person who isn't a Connolly that Puck can appreciate. (I kinda want to meta about how the women seem to be the island, or at least the ones who choose who its favourites are and pick out the ones who understand it, but that is a long and convoluted thought process that I need to examine more and possibly run past other people for a sanity check.)
YES. THAT. This book gives me ~feeeelings~ and suffice to say that I love it a lot. Kinda embarrassingly and to the point where I actually bought myself a copy after I returned the one I read to the library.
If you liked this...
... and can think of any other titles REMOTELY LIKE IT please for the love of sanity let me know. This is one of my (possibly even my absolute) favourite books of 2011, and I would love to read more like it.
1: ... Not that I've read any that do that. Nope. Ignore any occasion where I've bitched and moaned about switching to the boring character, or grumbled about Soon I Will Be Invincible not being as awesome as I expected.
2: No really, this one actually gave me chills.
3 Look, I have a trope that makes me feel warm and fuzzy on the inside, which I will elaborate on when I get to reviewing The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms or The Long Price. Suffice to say that inhuman overly-powerful god-like/supernatural beings who don't care about humanity but have an extremely dangerous soft spot for one particular human are an awesome thing that pleases me. It comes up more often than you'd think!
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