Bright Smoke, Cold Fire by Rosamund Hodge

Short Review: Brilliant fantasy from a world class writer. Super, super, super good. This book comes out in a week and is part one of two. (Because I realize my super-long review ... which you should read anyway ... might be a TLDR for some.) 

The world was made from the blood of gods. The blood of men sustains it now. So said the Sisters of Thorn. Runajo did not believe in the gods, but she didn't doubt the power of spilled blood.

Nobody in Viyara did.

Rosamund Hodge retold Beauty and the Beast in Cruel Beauty and she retold Little Red Riding Hood in Crimson Bound. Not that you'd necessarily know that if you weren't told before you began reading.  Hodge weaves complex tales in completely unique worlds of her own imagining, with heroes and villains whose imperfections make them fascinating and compelling.

Now Romeo and Juliet serve as a springboard into a dystopian fantasy world where there is one city left standing. Without blood the magic will fail and the walls will fall. And when that happens ... the zombies will get in.

This book shows the originating tale a little more clearly than her previous books. There are feuding clans following entrenched beliefs, there are Shakespearean quotes and poetry, there are masked balls, there is forbidden love, and even an apothecary. Romeo and Juliet can never acknowledge their love publicly. However, these elements come in a tale where Romeo and Juliet are side characters compared to the the two narrators.

The righteous atheist Runajo has joined the religious order who maintains the walls because she knows the magic is failing. Seeking long-forgotten spells means finding a way into the Sunken Library, awash in the living dead. When she encounters Juliet, they must offset each other's weaknesses if they are to succeed in averting disaster.

Paris is a pure-hearted true believer in his clan's destiny to help save their people. When his life becomes inextricably bound with Romeo's, his world turns topsy-turvey in a quest that takes them through the lawless underworld of the Lower City.

Paris and Runajo are fully realized, fully complicated human beings with faults, hopes, and internal struggles. We can recognize something of ourselves in them, even as their flaws drive us crazy.  We want them to succeed, even as we wince at some of their assumptions and decisions.

This is told against the backdrop of a culture that can never forget tragedy and death are inevitable, and that the price of life is someone else's blood. The themes are big and the devices, such as doubling, work to give the story depth and complexity beyond the usual dystopian story.

Juliet shook her head. "The word for justice is … I can feel it. Not just as an idea in my head, something I was told or that I made up. It's like the way the sun rises, or stones fall to the ground. It's infinite and eternal and closer than my heartbeat. And when people are hurt—even people who die and are gone and become nothing in the darkness—people my family would say I should care nothing about—I can feel justice scream against it. Nobody in my family understands that. They all think justice is just for use, some kind of—of instructions on how to keep us safe and headed toward the Paths of Light. It's not. It is real and it wants. It wants to reach into every corner of the world, and I was to make that happen. That's what I wanted. To bring justice to the whole city, and not just my people" She drew a ragged breath and fell silent.

Oh, thought Runjo. Her too.

She hadn't known there was anyone else.

A third of the way into this book I realized I was reading a major work of fantasy by an author of immense talent. Is this how people read when Dune was being serialized in Analog magazine? When the Lord of the Rings only had The Fellowship of the Ring published? That they were witnessing something extraordinary?

I can't tell if this book will measure up to those standards yet because it is, unfortunately, being published in two parts. That's annoying. So very annoying. I don't know who planned it that way but whoever did it was wrong to chop it in half. Chop being the operative word.

Nevertheless, my gut feeling remains. This is an incredible book that I cannot wait to finish.

NOTE: The most unfortunate part of the review galley is that it didn't mention that this was the first of two parts. The end was incredibly confusing until I wrote the author to find out what was going on. So if they haven't had the courtesy to make it obvious in the final book, I'm mentioning it here.

Oh yes - Got a review copy. Didn't affect my opinions.

Worth a Thousand Words: Dezertiri Market

Dezertiri Market
from Eating Asia

Well Said: Belief and the Gospels

If you believe what you like in the gospels, and reject what you don't like, it is not the gospel you believe but yourself.

St. Augustine

From an old pal of mine, St. Augustine. As is often the case with his observations, nothing could be truer.

Blogging Around: If the mainstream media covered Jesus the way it covered Mother Teresa

“Why didn’t he heal everyone in Capernaum?” asked Rachel, echoing a question found in the new book The Ridiculous Messiah, a lacerating critique of Jesus by Cyrus of Caesaria, the popular Cynic. One of the most damaging charges from the bestselling book is what the author calls the “selectivity” of Jesus’s healing.

Rachel noted, accurately, that many others in Capernaum were known to be ill that day. “My mother has dropsy. My brother has a bad back. And I had a migraine. Jesus didn’t bother to ask if we wanted to be healed.”

Also, say critics, if Jesus was concerned about the sick, why would he not build a proper hospital or shelter?

“He’s a carpenter, isn’t he?” said Rachel. “Build us a hospital!”

Matthew, a former tax collector from Capernaum who follows Jesus as an “apostle” grew animated when he heard that criticism.

“That’s not what he’s here for!” he said. “Others do that. He simply helps people as he meets them.”

“That’s a common defense of him,” says Cyrus, contacted by this reporter through a messenger. “And it’s absurd.”

A classic piece from America magazine. Definitely go read the whole thing. Via Brandon Vogt.

Well Said: Our Will

We have nothing of our own but our will. It is the only thing that God has so placed in our own power that we can make an offering of it to him.

St. John Vianney

Worth a Thousand Words: A Passionate Kiss

Richard Mauch, A passionate kiss, circa 1900

Genesis Notes: A Lesson in Contrasts

GENESIS 4:1-26
Did I ever pay attention to Lamech before? I'm sure you won't be surprised to hear the answer to that is no. He's the perfect example of how sin can increase when not fought at all by the individual.

Lamech and his two wives from The Phillip Medhurst Picture Torah

Lamech, who is the Bible's first polygamist, appears to be a violent, arrogant man. He boasts to his wives that even though he has killed a man, anyone who tries to take his life will be avenged "seventy-sevenfold." He reckons himself to be even greater and more important to God than his forefather, Cain. Something has gone very wrong among these people. They appear to know the details of their family history (how else would Lamech know to compare his deed with that of Cain?), but they have no knowledge of what the details mean. Because Cain was cut off from his family and the presence of the Lord, his spiritual blindness was not only perpetuated among his descendants, but it intensified. The father always teaches the son, either for good or for evil. This is how it is in families. See how Cain's sin of pride has progressed in Lamech to proud presumption. He presumes upon God's mercy in saving Cain from death, having no apparent understanding of what God's mercy was meant to produce humility, repentance, reconciliation. Through the rest of Scripture we see, over and over, what traits develop among men who, for whatever reason, have shut their hearts away from the presence of the Lord. This is our first example of it.

God Took Enoch, By illustrators of the 1728 Figures de la Bible,
Gerard Hoet (1648–1733) and others

Again, Enoch never made much impression on me either but now I can see the contrast he provides with Lamech. I don't think I realized that another prophet besides Elijah was ever "taken up" either. There's a definite lesson in those contrasts. Another lesson lies in the fact that two such minor characters can have such big stories to tell about themselves and about the human condition. Not a word is wasted in Scripture. It is all there for a definite purpose.

Enoch is the first man described as a "prophet" in Scripture. Hebrews tells us that he prophesied judgment on ungodliness. We learn from Old and New Testaments that Enoch did not see death. He was such a friend of God's that he was "taken up." It is amazing to see the difference between Enoch and Lamech. By it we are meant to comprehend that although sin entered the human race through Adam and Eve, bringing with it great spiritual and physical consequences, men are still able to respond to God's grace. By no means has God given up on all humanity!

Enoch was distinguished in his family by God's remarkable favor upon him. He represents the power that acknowledging God in family life can have on family members, as they pass on their tradition from generation to generation.

All quoted material is from Genesis: God and His Creation. This series first ran in 2004 and 2005. I'm refreshing it as I go. For links to the whole study, go to the Genesis Index. For more about the resources used, go here.

Well Said: Whatever Captivates Your Mind During Prayer

A person worships whatever captivates his mind during prayer. Whoever in his prayers thinks of public affairs, or the house he is building, worships them rather than God.

Caesarius of Arles

Worth a Thousand Words: The Wave Breaker

The Wave Breaker
by the incomparable Remo Savisaar

Worth a Thousand Words: Beach at Fecamp

Claude Monet, Beach at Fecamp, 1881
via Arts Everyday Living

This painting with a coming storm seems to reflect the continual news of hurricanes, tropical storms, and tropical depressions heading for Florida and Hawaii.

Lagniappe: Nuance

Reese glanced over her shoulder at the two Eldritch at the door. "You are Liolesa's bodyguards?"

"You have the right of it, if not the nuance," one of them replied …

"What's the nuance?" she asked.

"We are bodyguards who have trained to work together as soldiers, and we are fifty in number."

"Oh!" Reese said. "Well. That's a lot of nuance."

M.C.A. Hogarth, Rose Point

Mother Teresa and Her Miracles

By Manfredo Ferrari, CC BY-SA 4.0

Mother Teresa, which is how I will always think of her, is going to be canonized by Pope Francis on Sunday. This inevitably brings up a lot of articles. Here are a couple of good ones, both about the miracles whose documentation led the way to sainthood.

This NPR piece, How the Catholic Church Documented Mother Teresa's 2 Miracles, features Bishop Robert Barron and Father James Martin.

In Mother Teresa's case, a woman in India whose stomach tumor disappeared and a man in Brazil with brain abscesses who awoke from a coma both credited their dramatic recovery to prayers offered to the nun after her death in 1997.

"A saint is someone who has lived a life of great virtue, whom we look to and admire," says Bishop Barron, a frequent commentator on Catholicism and spirituality. "But if that's all we emphasize, we flatten out sanctity. The saint is also someone who's now in heaven, living in this fullness of life with God. And the miracle, to put it bluntly, is the proof of it."

As the report points out, we want proof and will be happy with atheists examining the evidence. Because we want the real deal or nothing!

NCR's article, The Miracles That Made Mother Teresa a Saint, goes into more details about the miracles and investigations. I myself liked the additional story that no one thought to mention the second miracle for 7 years. What with the doctor not being Catholic and all.

How the healing was actually reported was also rather miraculous.

In an interview with the Register in December 2015, Father Kolodiejchuk explained why there was a delay between 2008 and 2015. “The miracle happened in 2008,” he said, “but we didn’t hear about it till 2013. The doctor [neurosurgeon] was not Catholic. Somehow, after the Pope’s [Pope Francis] visit there [to Brazil], it triggered him to say something to one of the priests of Santos, and that news eventually made its way to myself and the postulation office. That started the chain of events.”

Anyway, go read both pieces. They're fascinating.

Well Said: Living in the Past

"I still react to attack with too extreme a response," Hirianthial said. "Even against people I know to be safe."

"You are living in the past," Urise said. "We shall have to remedy that."

Hirianthial glanced at him. "Is that my problem?"

"It's everyone's problem," the priest said with that blend of humor and resignation common to the elderly. "Why should it not be yours?"

M.C.A. Hogarth, Rose Point

Not the sort of insight I expect to find in an entertaining space opera, but welcome no matter where it shows up. Yes, living in the past ... a problem and we all do it.

Worth a Thousand Words: The Dovecot

The Dovecot, Holman Hunt

Via Lines and Colors which has a nice bit of history about the painting.

Well Said: O my God, Trinity whom I adore ...

O my God, Trinity whom I adore, help me forget myself entirely so to establish myself in you, unmovable and peaceful as if my soul were already in eternity. May nothing be able to trouble my peace or make me leave you, O my unchanging God, but may each minute bring me more deeply into your mystery! Grant my soul peace. Make it your heaven, your beloved dwelling and the place of your rest. May I never abandon you there, but may I be there, whole and entire, completely vigilant in my faith, entirely adoring, and wholly given over to your creative action.

Prayer of Blessed Elizabeth of the Trinity

This is at the end of the section of the Catechism about the Trinity. The entire section kept astounding me with the mystery of it all, but this prayer keeps drawing me back again and again. It is so perfect.

Green Onion Pancakes

This recipe isn't from the Chinese cookbook I reviewed today, but you can see why I'm giving a copy of the book to Hannah.

Whenever she makes these Green Onion Pancakes for us, we are in heaven!

Worth a Thousand Words: Portrait of John Singer Sargent

Giovanni Boldini, Portrait of John Singer Sargent
circa 1890
via Wikipedia

Not a portrait by Sargent. A portrait of Sargent. For a change.

Lagniappe: Sam Spade

Spade set the edges of his teeth together and said through them: "I won't play the sap for you."

Dashiell Hammett, The Maltese Falcon

Maybe you had to be there, but there is something about Hammett's writing that just grabs me. And this was one of those moments. I much prefer the book to the movie by the way, wonderful as all the acting was.

All Under Heaven: Recipes from the 35 Cuisines of China by Carolyn Phillips

I was 12% into this book when I knew I wanted a copy for myself. I was 20% into it when I realized I needed to preorder multiple copies for those I know who cook Chinese food.

I've got several Chinese cookbooks and had sworn off ever buying any more. My favorite, The Key to Chinese Cooking by Irene Kuo, never lets me down and has a lot of variety packed into it.

However, All Under Heaven was written with the same sort of clear instructions and approachable style. Additionally, it looked at the usual Chinese regional cuisine divisions (Sichuan, Hunan, Cantonese, etc.) more closely than I'd ever seen.

This means than you don't just read about Cantonese or Southern Chinese cooking, but also get to try typical Hakka dishes or try that of Taiwan's military families who came from different provinces and then gave everything a big stir to create their own distinctive cuisine. Some of the dishes sound like a familiar twist on our favorites like Silk Road Fajitas, until you realize that this was a traditional Northwestern Chinese dish. Some had a technique that I can't wait to try, like Shaved Noodles with Meat Sauce where you use an ultra-sharp knife to shave noodles off a block of pasta dough.

I loved Carolyn Phillips' writing, especially the accessible headnotes to each recipe. Her explanation of the different regions was always personalized at the end so that we got to share a little of her life in China too.

This book was provided in a terrible Kindle version by NetGalley. I assume the garbling of the recipes is because of NetGalley's conversion. My review is my own.

Well Said: Christ and a Pinch of Salt

To become new men means losing what we now call ‘ourselves’. Out of our selves, into Christ, we must go. His will is to become ours and we are to think His thoughts, to ‘have the mind of Christ’ as the Bible says. And if Christ is one, and if He is thus to be ‘in’ us all, shall we not be exactly the same? It certainly sounds like it; but in fact it is not so.

... suppose a person who knew nothing about salt. You give him a pinch to taste and he experiences a particular strong, sharp taste. You then tell him that in your country people use salt in all their cookery. Might he not reply ‘In that case I suppose all your dishes taste exactly the same: because the taste of that stuff you have just given me is so strong that it will kill the taste of everything else.’ But you and I know that the real effect of salt is exactly the opposite. So far from killing the taste of the egg and the tripe and the cabbage, it actually brings it out. They do not show their real taste till you have added the salt.

C.S. Lewis, Mere Christianity

This seems to me to be the perfect analogy. I myself, while living as a Christian, still sometimes have trouble visualizing things like "putting on Christ." This idea of "salt" has really sunk in and I think of it often.