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Majyk By Design (1994)

door Esther M. Friesner

Reeksen: Majyk (3)

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review of
Esther Friesner's Majyk by Design
by tENTATIVELY, a cONVENIENCE - September 10, 2016

Having already read the 1st 2 bks of this trilogy I wasn't really in any hurry to read this last one. You can read my review of Majyk By Accident here:
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/2025402.Majyk_By_Accident & of Majyk by Hook or Crook here: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/1652098219 . As I wrote at the beginning of my review of the latter:

"In my 55 or so yrs of reading SF & Fantasy I've more or less never gotten into series. I've thought of series as just cheap marketing tricks, a way of sucking the reader into repeat purchases that're based more on soap opera continuity than on solid writing around new ideas."

Nonetheless, Friesner is funny & I certainly don't want to dismiss writing that makes me laugh. Friesner spoofs a patriarchy in wch women whdn't even read let alone write & has one of her female characters secretly write torrid romance novels (are there any other kind?):

"SLOWLY, INSOLENTLY, MASTER TANCRED ALLOWED his eyes to caress every voluptuous curve of his defiant captive. "So, my lady," he breathed in a voice like molten wine. "You think that your beauty and spirit are shield enough against a wizard of my powers?"" - p 1

Intertwining the romance novel & the models for their covers in with fantasy & having it all pushed ad absurdum is gimmicky but it works for me.

""Mysti said I should introduce him to Milkum. Milkum liked his looks and was willing to give him a try—not as a client, just as a model. Milkum never does business with nobodies. We put him on the cover of Tempt Not the Troll."

""Boffin as a troll?" I had to laugh.

""He wasn't really a troll. He was adopted and raised by trolls and he always thought he was a troll until he was rejected from the tribe after his foster-mother died and he went wandering through the mountains, amassing a fortune in gold, until he saved the life of Hyalina, the beautiful orphan whose wicked uncle had suppressed her father's will and cheated her out of the diamond mining empire which was hers by right and offered her shameful insults, forcing her to flee his loathsome and unnatural lusts until she hid in the mine and the roof fell in on her. Then in Chapter Two—"" - p 28

It's common for me to read things & to catch references to things that I figure other readers won't recognize. In this case, I catch a reference that I figure many people must be able to recognize or it wdn't make it into such populist writing:

""I've got to agree with Scandal," I said. "Even if I don't know what he's talking about all the way. I mean, he must have been murdered. He's gone. Vanished. Poof."

""Poof," Lucy repeated. "Nut how poof? When poof? Who poof?"

""Colonel Mustard in the library with the lead pipe." Scandal declared. "Now can we go back downstairs and eat some more?"" - p 30

This bk was published in 1994. I played the board game Clue when I was a kid in the early 1960s. I see from some cursory online research that the game was created in 1949 & that there's a 2013 edition AND a Clue: Harry Potter Edition. Does the latter have a Wizard Mustard & a Professor Plumb-Crazy? Wizard Mustard in the alternate universe with a magic wand.

Friesner is a truly inspired comic writer. One of my favorite touches is her description of the talking "grackwassel wood":

"["]Now pull! Ohhhhhh! Ummmmm! Wait! Waitwaitwait, not so fast, you beast! Open me slooooowly. Make it last, baby. Oh my god, my hinges are starting to turn! I'm feeling it all the way down to my mothproofing! Ahhhh, ooooooooh, ohhhhhh—!"

"Etcetera. The thing about grackwassel wood isn't just that it talks—we've got lots of trees that can do that; no really classy funeral is complete without a weeping willow coffin to save the price of professional mourners—it's the way it talks. It's the things it says. If you put something valuable in a grackwassel wood chest or cupboard or box, it's safe. When a thief shows up, either the wood makes so much noise it rouses the whole house, or else it keeps saying those things and embarrasses the thief to death." - p 38

Friesner distinguishes between witches & wizards, a distinction that I doubt is distinct to her but one that I found interesting enuf to quote regarding in my review of the 1st bk of this series:

""I am a witch, not a wizard. Wizardry's the art of making something out of nothing; witchery's the art of making do with what you've got. I can make a pine cone sprout into a lovely set of pinewood furniture. I can capture the image of a cat in the reflective surface of a soap bubble, I can make a rock into a rocking chair, but I can not make a mop out of thin air."" - p 142, Majyk By Accident

& then in Majyk by Design there's this:

"She looked at me as if I'd asked why zombies make the best university professors. "This is not a healing salve unless I add certain herbs to the basic ointment. It must be adjusted to combat the specific illness. Didn't Master Thengor teach you anything about medicine?"

"Master Thengor had tried to teach me lots of things, with no luck. Still . . . "To tell the truth, I don't remember him ever giving a class on healing magic."

""Good. At least you're honest. Wizards never bother teaching or learning any enchantments that might cure people. They leave that to us witches. It's so much more spectacular to fling spells that harm instead of heal."" - p 95

Being a person who's, ahem, less than enthusiastic about weapons & the utter paranoid consumerist mania for them in the country I live in, I was amused by the following bit of talking-cat sarcasm:

""Quite rude," Aunt Glucosia agreed, absent-mindedly running a whetstone over the blade of her dagger. "Maybe they didn't know he was going to use their product for evil purposes."

""Oh, riiiiight," Scandal said. " 'Honest, Officer, when he came in here and bought that AK-47 I thought he was only gonna use it for a paperweight!' "" - p 99

I'm not totally against guns, I just think that everytime someone kills someone w/ one the arms dealer who sold the weapon shd be held accountable. That might stifle the greed a little. Or the arms dealers might just switch to other lucrative businesses of similar ethical dubiousness like heroin dealer or pimp (assuming they're not already in those businesses to begin w/).

One of the primary gimmicks of Friesner's Majyk stories is to have something common on Earth be described from the POV of the story's alternate world:

"Our lovely guide paused before a tall, shining red and white box the size of a coffin. I touched it, expecting something so bright to be metal, but it was made of a strange, hard substance that felt like a beetle's back. She pressed one of the many small panels decorating the front of the box. A terrifying rumble shook it, followed by a loud clunk. She stooped to retrieve a cylinder from the compartment at the bottom of the mysterious box.

""Thirsty?"

"It took me a few moments before I realized she was offering it to me. I forced my hand not to tremble as I accepted it. It was cold and damp, but at least it had the recognizable feel of metal, even if it was garishly swirled with red and white. I stared at it, not knowing what to do.

"She laughed. "Allow me." She took it back and made a sign of power over the top of the cylinder. I heard a pop and a fierce hiss before she handed it back. A hole had opened in the metal, releasing weird sounds and smells." - p 107

Marvelous. Do you ever think like this? Do you ever imagine some activity of your own from a different perspective than your own? I find it an interesting exercise. EG: I often scoop a piece of paper under insects inside my house & take them to a convenient window that I can open slightly & stick the paper out of & then blow on to evict the bug from the paper in order to loose it in the outside world.

Now, imagine that scenario from the bug's perspective: a moving surface forces its way under you, this surface then carries you thru darkness & light & eventually thru a gap in an obstacle that you might very well have been batting against trying unsuccessfully to find a breech in.. &, then, Voila! you're out where there's much more space & more plants to be eaten, a veritable paradise of for your little insect tummy. Alas, you're eaten by a bat a few seconds later. Life is short, art is non-existent.

This interworld misunderstanding, this lack of correct translation between Earth & Orbix has plenty of potential wch Friesner uses well:

"I remembered Master Thengor's teachings about Word of Power: the more complicated they are, the stronger the enchantment. It wouldn't do if just anyone could say them and command all that sorcerous strength.

""Hexlresorcinol," the sorcereess intoned. "Mono- and dislycerides. Polyabscorbate. Hydroxypropylcellulose." She reached the last one. "And just a dash of sodium benozoate to retard spoilage and reduce flavor loss."" - p 124

Since this is, after all, the concluding volume of the Majyk series, our hero, Kendar, finally communes w/ his accidentally acquired power & it tells him:

"Sonny, don't get started on who's got the right to do what to whom on this world. Think back to the last piece of meat you ate. Did you worry about the cow's rights or did you just ask your mama to pass the salt? How about the last time you walked on the grass or chomped into an apple? Plants are alive too, you know." - p 147

Friesner does another thing I love to do, she mutates old sayings or creates them anew & acts like nothing's odd:

""You know the old saying, Glucosia dear," her sister reminded her. " 'The heart has its reasons that Reason does not know, or want to know, and will throw you out of the house if you try to explain them, so save your breath to cool your porridge.' "" - pp 178-179

Hip-Knee-Hooray! A similar strategy for producing humor is to take religious illogic from this world & apply it to the religion of Orbix:

""I've always had one question about your God Wedwel," Mysti said.

""Yes, dear?"

""If Wedwel can do anything, can he create a rock so heavy he can't lift it?"

""Yes, and as soon as he does, the prophecies say that he's going to drop that rock right smack on top of Welfies who think they're so clever for coming up with that old chestnut."" - p 198

A benevolent God wd drop the rock on the chestnut itself to make chestnut paste for the Welfie to eat IF the Welfie cd move the rock off the squashed foodstuff.

Why is everyone always picking on the demons?:

"Aunt Carageena took the first point as she brought her sword down on the demon's ear and slice it clean off. He threw his head up, his jaws parted in a howl, smoking brown blood flowing down his neck. Aunt Carageena seized her trophy and used the leathery relic for a shield.

""Showoff," Aunt Glucosia sniffed.

""Jealous," her sister shot back." - p 238

The demon popped my friend & I in its mouth & swallowed us whole. We managed to anchor ourselves in its upper stomach with our pocket knives before we fell in to the foul-smelling pool of stomach acid below. Digging in further, we started ripping open the lining to try to carve our way out of the predicament. The demon howled with indigestion. It decided to never eat human snacks again.

Those of you who've read Rabelais will recognize the following twist: "["]Meanwhile you've been making the beast with two bank accounts with this—this—bimbo!"" Does that make a bank an orgy? ( )
  tENTATIVELY | Apr 3, 2022 |
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