43. Lian Hearn Discussion

[Philip Overby]

Lian Hearn's name stood out to me a while back because I thought she was related to the legendary Lafcadio Hearn, but apparently it's just inspired by him. Her most famous series are the Tales of the Otori, which deals with a Japanese style fantasy world. She also has lots of other books spanning a long career.

Anyone read Hearn's work?

 

[Feo Takahari]

I remember really liking Galax-Arena when I was around eight or nine. I still remember my bafflement when I got to the twist--it made perfect sense in retrospect, but I've read hardly anything before or since that had the guts to pull something like that.

 

[Philip Overby]

Have you read Tales of the Otori? That's the one I'm most interested in myself.

 

[Ophiucha]

I never knew Hearn was a woman - the only 'Lian' I've known in real life was a boy.

I've read the first Otori book. It was okay. The writing was quite atmospheric and captured a lot of feeling and sensory stuff that is often ignored. The characters were fine, young with an overly simple romance and some 'straight from the Hero's Journey' mentors and villains, but they could carry a story. The world was... eh. Loosely based on Japan. The names were Japanese, the window dressings were Japanese, but... alternate history would be too generous. I'm pretty sure the country was Christian, or at least a religion based off of it. And the finer details are lazily researched at best.

It's something different from the usual vaguely European hero's journey, insofar as it's a vaguely Japanese hero's journey. And it had interesting weather/climate descriptions. Weather is often ignored in fantasy, so that's a nice change.

 

[Philip Overby]

Thanks Ophiucha. Sounds like something that probably wouldn't interest me actually. If it's just a pretty typical fantasy story in any case.