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Clarimonde
storyteller
Username: Clarimonde
Post Number: 1
Registered: 5-2003
| | Posted on Saturday, August 09, 2003 - 6:23 am: |     |
This woman is a big, big dork. /hangs head in shame Not showing up on a thread she co'mods! Well, to rectify my dorkitude...
I'm wondering if anyone here has read any of the Mary Mackey novels, "The Year the Horses Came," "Horses at the Gate" and "Fires of Spring?"
I enjoyed the first two. I would say that Mackey is a better writer than Auel (heresy!) in some ways and far worse in others. The books, by the way, are based heavily on the research of Marija Gimbutas and are about a priestess in a Neolithic horticultural society, Marrah, and her SO Stavan who is one of the Big, Bad Nomads who are out to Crush Goddess Civilization As We Know It.
I like Mackey's writing style. BUT...the whole setup reads like some sort of cowboy western. It's disappointingly clear which ones wear the White Hats and which the Black Hats. The horticultural Goddess-worshippers are so nauseatingly perfect that they seem unreal to me. I've heard the Mamutoi in TMH accused of being "utopian" but I do not agree. Mackey's Goddess people, however, never have so much as a bad hair day. Even living in communal longhouses!
"The Year the Horses Came" and "Horses at the Gate" were enjoyable. I can't say the same for "Fires of Spring," though - it was awful. Maybe because the central character, Keshna, was so darn bratty, it was like reading a book with Marona as the main character. |
Annie
storyteller
Username: Annie
Post Number: 142
Registered: 5-2003
| | Posted on Saturday, August 09, 2003 - 1:32 pm: | |
-- This woman is a big, big dork. --
For a moment there I thought you were referring to Mary Mackey! 
One of these days I'll have to start reading other Prehistoric fiction... 
Meanwhile, I'm glad that part of the forum is in the best hands possible. Welcome, Clari!  |
Anndee
storyteller
Username: Anndee
Post Number: 20
Registered: 5-2003
| | Posted on Sunday, August 10, 2003 - 1:44 am: | |
I've read the first two, but not the third. I thought the Goddess culture lived in plastered "beehive" huts.
I agree that it was pretty obvious who was good and who was bad. I liked the way Stavan took it when Marrah fought him off. I didn't care for the drug-induced out-of-body kind of experience when Stavan's people were burying whoever. Finally, I did like the sneaky way the Goddess-people beat the Sun Worshipers. |
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Prehistorical Fiction, SF and Fantasy