Kevin's Watch

This is your thread to discuss the book club's pick for January, Seized.

I haven't finished reading yet, so play nice while I keep a minimal eye on discussion.

Note: As you should already be aware, Lynne Cantwell is our very own Aliantha; as a result, she is not able to take part of discussion as a reader this month, but she has kindly agreed to take questions about the novel later on. A new thread will be created at that time - for now, the discussion here is among ourselves as readers.

Seized is certainly Lynne's most "popular" offering to date-- that can be a very good thing. The pacing, the voice- distinct but not intrusive-, the style, so very readable. Since I like legal fiction as well as paranormal, it was not a stretch for me and I really admired the way she handled bringing them together in the climactic scene.

I was privileged many years ago to have been invited to participate in some Native American Church ceremonies (all-nighters). It's been almost 30 years but the sound of the water drum and the chanting came back to me. It didn't end up being for me, but I still felt very humbled that I was invited into their world (peyote use being illegal and all, they were certainly very trusting).

I admit to having stumbled over White Buffalo Calf Pipe Woman's gripe against Jehovah and the depiction of him as just one of the pantheon of pagan gods and goddesses. In Judaism and Christianity, Jehovah is the Creator of all things, gods and spirits and goddesses included. But for one thing, I trusted Lynne to do something interesting with it; and for another, the fact that Naomi doesn't trust Pipe Woman yet makes me curious. I was willing to go on in spite of (I admit it) feeling a bit offended that Jehovah-- the God who is love-- was depicted as self-serving and narcissistic. (I also remembered that this is, after all, fiction! )

I don't want to get too far into the plot because I don't know who has finished and who is still reading. So who's next?

...And now I'm done.

I have to admit, talking about a book when I know the author will read the comments is a little daunting. I want to be honest about it, though.

I had a little trouble getting into the book in the beginning. In the first couple of chapters I kept getting distracted by the writing, though maybe I was just more primed to think about it with this book. The opening line itself was a bit of a groaner for me, to be honest:

You know how they say you should be careful what you wish for? Well, I’m living proof.

It's a cliche, simple as that, and I'm not a fan of them; I'm not entirely certain what this particular line has to do with what follows.

The opening wasn't really structured in a way that drew me in: After the first few lines, the whole first page is details of Naomi's law career to date. I think perhaps we could've been eased into that information a little better, sticking to the night of the proposal a bit more closely after that "let's start with the night...".

The pacing in the early chapters was overall a little uneven, with things suddenly jumping along when Naomi remembers about the buffalo (and suddenly that event she had completely forgotten is said to have defined a significant chunk of her childhood), or the way she realises her power quite suddenly with little evidence to provoke her conclusion.

However, as the book went on it settles in better, the pace evens out, and it wound up fairly satisfying. The story's a bit conventional for my tastes, but is handled well.

The use of supernatural elements in a story about Native Americans fighting a legal battle for sacred land isn't novel, but the context of a larger battle between gods, and the inclusion of gods from other pantheons, changes it to something more interesting than the usual white-man's-guilt and cultural appropriation that you find in those stories. There's always a lot of potential to mess up depictions of other cultures like this but the book avoids that trap, I think.

I liked the trick they pulled at the end, and I like the way the supernatural storyline was tied up into the conclusion of the legal troubles. The romance didn't really do much for me, but it also didn't really take front seat in the novel, so it wasn't an issue.

[As an aside, there was a moment in the book - specifically, when Joseph says he used to live with his grandfather but moved in with George - where I actually thought Joseph was going to be gay. Of course it was immediately dispelled, and I couldn't help being a little disappointed: it would have made a refreshing difference to the story, and provided an interesting dynamic for the relationships.]

My overall impression, then, is that Seized was a little rough in the beginning, but found its feet later on. It's not really to my taste, sticking as it does to fairly safe and conventional tropes, but it was an enjoyable read.

And I thought I'd respond to something Frostheart posted in the other thread:

Frostheart wrote:A small nitpick about foreign language usage:

I know this is fantasy and all, but seeing the word hrafn in a company name and then concluding that Óðinn owns it a second later... A bit too brusque, considering that the word's as common in modern Icelandic as krauka or lundi or kría, and an existing male forename besides. A bit like spotting the Finnish kantele somewhere and drawing a direct beeline to Väinämöinen.

Having noticed that bit on reading, I didn't feel like it was unreasonable. Firstly, Odin was already known/believed to be involved by the characters, so they were primed to make that conclusion. Second, the book doesn't claim any knowledge of Norse languages on the characters' part to reach that conclusion: the word sounds like "raven" to one of them, and when Naomi looks it up, there it is, "raven".

I'm Murrin wrote: I had a little trouble getting into the book in the beginning. In the first couple of chapters I kept getting distracted by the writing, though maybe I was just more primed to think about it with this book. The opening line itself was a bit of a groaner for me, to be honest:

You know how they say you should be careful what you wish for? Well, I’m living proof.

It's a cliche, simple as that, and I'm not a fan of them; I'm not entirely certain what this particular line has to do with what follows.

The opening wasn't really structured in a way that drew me in: After the first few lines, the whole first page is details of Naomi's law career to date. I think perhaps we could've been eased into that information a little better, sticking to the night of the proposal a bit more closely after that "let's start with the night...".

The pacing in the early chapters was overall a little uneven, with things suddenly jumping along when Naomi remembers about the buffalo (and suddenly that event she had completely forgotten is said to have defined a significant chunk of her childhood), or the way she realises her power quite suddenly with little evidence to provoke her conclusion.

However, as the book went on it settles in better, the pace evens out, and it wound up fairly satisfying...

Murfin, I just find that really interesting. I liked the opening and kind of missed the freshness of that voice as the story developed. It didn't strike me as a poor use of "Cliche", after all, there is actually a beloved classic that begins "It was a dark and stormy night." (A Wrinkle In Time)

As I said, this is Lynne's most popular (you can read that "commercial" if you wish) offering yet; but I applaud her if it claims her a wider readership. Swan Song isn't for everyone.

I'm feeling particularly lobotomized today, so don't know how coherent anything I write sounds... But to contribute to the discussion...

It wasn't bad, although I'm not sure whether it was precisely my type of book or series. I noticed some pacing problems also: the beginning did feel rushed and Naomi appeared to accept all this woo-woo faster than what felt realistic.... Then again, I'm so used to ponderous, three-bricks-thick epics where the characters angst for hundreds and hundreds of pages on end that I might be suffering from a culture shock before an abrupt emergence of brevity. I'm not particularly fond of the first-person perspective and overall prefer more complex language, but these are subjective matters.

I've started the next installment to see what happens; I was happy to read about a non-conventional female lead (overweight, past her prime, regular-looking rather than a femme fatale puma), and noticed that the pacing improved towards the end and into the sequel. Also the fact that it soon veered off from the initial setting of successful modern American business world into Native American premises and culture sparked my interest to the point that I wandered off to Wikipedia to read about the differences between Indian and Finnish sauna customs. The sauna was also a sacred place to the ancient Finns. But whereas someone wearing a swimming suit or other clothing in the sauna would here receive disapproving scowls and cause great offense to the host, it's apparently the opposite in NA customs. I presume people don't go walking naked/barefoot outdoors in the snow or ice-hole swimming afterwards either? (While this won't work in the city or larger suburbs full of apartment buildings, elsewhere it's common in the winter.)

(Also new word: wickiup. I know about teepees, but still it was interesting to compare this to the Saami goahti.)

Muffy wrote:And I thought I'd respond to something Frostheart posted in the other thread:

Frostheart wrote:A small nitpick about foreign language usage:

I know this is fantasy and all, but seeing the word hrafn in a company name and then concluding that Óðinn owns it a second later... A bit too brusque, considering that the word's as common in modern Icelandic as krauka or lundi or kría, and an existing male forename besides. A bit like spotting the Finnish kantele somewhere and drawing a direct beeline to Väinämöinen.

Having noticed that bit on reading, I didn't feel like it was unreasonable. Firstly, Odin was already known/believed to be involved by the characters, so they were primed to make that conclusion. Second, the book doesn't claim any knowledge of Norse languages on the characters' part to reach that conclusion: the word sounds like "raven" to one of them, and when Naomi looks it up, there it is, "raven".

Maybe it's just me. When you know the meaning of a foreign word beforehand, you tend to adopt a different point of view. Wikipedia forgets to mention that it's not only an Old Norse word. For a while, when I heard hrafn in the odd context, I was reminded of Hrafna-Flóki Vilgerðarson, not Óðinn.

This, though? A typo or an error? Hel's a freezing place, so snowballs ought to gather crust and prosper within.

Not a snowball’s chance in Hel, I thought.

Also, rather liked Loki. This is fiction and all, but I prefer seeing him as a jötunn and not an Americanized comic book hero little to do with his original character. It was kind of funny to notice that Óðinn, whether impersonated by the trickster or not, had not changed his wardrobe since the Saga Era.


So, overall, an OK, fast read, certainly not a bad beginning to a series.

A small thing that's been on my mind: The title, "Seized" - I'm not entirely clear what this refers to. Any of you have a stronger grasp, from reading the book, of why it was named that?

I'm Murrin wrote:A small thing that's been on my mind: The title, "Seized" - I'm not entirely clear what this refers to. Any of you have a stronger grasp, from reading the book, of why it was named that?

My sense of this was that Naomi's life was seized when the powers she has as the Chosen* begin to manifest themselves.

I've just finished the book and I basically read it in three sittings. This tells me that the writing and the story flow along easily, which is a clear indication of their quality. The effortlessness of my reading experience speaks volumes for the hard work that most likely went into the writing, editing and redrafting (unless ali is blessed with being able to produce a clean draft first time round ). I enjoyed the characters in the story both large and small and found the city itself to be important in this regard.

I don't know if I would describe Seized as fantasy. The feeling I got (as mentioned above) was (in spite of the gods being involved) of it being quite conventional (definitely much more conventional than what I normally would read). The effect of this is that, for me, the more conventional elements: romance, work, friendship etc. actually outweighed the 'bigger' stuff that drove the story. In fact, the strongest impression that I was left with was of the romance. (That Naomi would be involved with such a shallow, venial person as Brock became less and less believable as the story went on.)

I also found that by the end of the story there didn't seem to be a villain. I know that Brock is corrupt and empty but he doesn't feel evil. Similarly Durant and also Loki. This may be a facet of the story that is unfolding, but for me it's a bit of a problem because I don't know if it's possible to tell this sort of a story without there being a truly bad/evil character involved. If there isn't then the stakes don't feel as high as they are being presented (and if the real baddy is Jehovah then ali is going to have Deer to deal with ).

I agree with most of what the larger issues dealt with: greed, destruction of the natural world, moral corruption etc. and it is unusual and interesting to see this mapped onto the plane of the gods, and the inversions that that highlights. An enjoyable experience overall. Lynn Cantwell is awesome!

u.

*[(I wanted to shout 'THOOLAH!', but I restrained myself ]

I actually left it to the last minute and read the book in one night. What this tells me is that the book is short.

Anyhow, lets talk about some of the characters. Since you mentioned Brock, I'll start with him.

Of course, Brock is the stereotypical bad boyfriend. Cheats, lies, isn't really as interested in Naomi as he claims to be. There are a couple of things that make Brock interesting here: First, that he's presented not only as evil, but as more evil than any other character that appears; second, that he's actually totally incompetant at his job, which is unusual for the career-obsessed type.

For the first, we're given several reasons for his being labelled objectively bad - his obsession with his own money and power is one part; his possession by Loki another. But in reality what the book is telling us here is that he's evil because he cheats on Naomi. From the perspective of this novel - which is, in part, a romance - cheating is the worst thing a person can do, leading to Brock being presented as a worse villain than the extremely racist businessman who wants to buy the sacred land for no reason other than to spite the Native Americans.

As for his competance, it seemed a bit unusual that in the course of this legal case, no one ever bothered to find out who owned the land, and no one noticed that the casino Durant was proposing to build wouldn't even be allowed. Perhaps we are supposed to believe that Brock didn't care about any of it because he was assured of success by Loki? It seemed in the end that the entire big legal case that the book centred around was an extremely flimsy one that no one involved had even attempted to make look genuine.

Brock is an interesting character who seems to have lots of excuses for his bad behaviour. For me, this can weaken a character because it elicits our sympathy for them. The best example that I can think for this is Hannibal Lecter (not that Brock is as extreme as this ). When I read Hannibal much of the elemental power that had inhered in Lecter in Silence of the Lambs drained away. Instead of a monster I began to see a human being.

In Brock's case he doesn't actually do anything bad, he doesn't actually enact evil. (Now part of this may be that positive evil doesn't exist in the world ali has created, it may simply be that the opposite of good is the absence of good. That'll be one of my questions for her later ) The worst thing that Brock does in the book (apart from cheating) is send Naomi's documents to be shredded. Now that may be a big deal to a lawyer, to me it's more of an inconvenience rather than tragedy.

Even the cheating is not a direct act of evil (in the gotcha scene he is receiving rather doing). As I write about him I am beginning to think that this may be an underlying factor in his corruption. It may be that his inability to be effective in his actions is what allows him to be so easily corrupted.

u.

I'm already composing nasty IM to ali to get the 4th book done. The characters and locations seem so familiar. It's different type of reading, almost like looking into someone's private diary or hearing a long folktale at a coffee shop. Different, refreshing almost like talking to someone you've barely known off the street about pressing current events and getting intelligent answers. I've been so lost in archaic Fantasy-speak or so far out in the future that it's totally different to have an author speak through her character: urban-contemporary...

Feel lousy for not posting in here yet. I read and enjoyed Seized but have been too flat out at work to discuss it properly. And I didn't want to discuss it improperly!

I found this book to be a very engaging read. You can tell the author has a background in broadcasting and journalism. The writing is crisp and moves along at a rocking pace. I was never bored and found myself looking forward to picking it up again when I did have to put it down. That said though, I wanted Lynne to slow down at times. I felt like she was in too much of a hurry to get through the story and parts of it, imho, could have done with fleshing out a little. There were ideas here that I was really enjoying reading about - the trap people find themselves in re: a disconnect between their souls, their beliefs and how they make money for instance. I wanted this, along with some of the other ideas in the book, explored in more depth, both to add to the characters, and to my reading experience.

I loved the sense of humour in Seized; plenty of laugh-out-loud dialogue lines and a nice mix of, for want of a better word, 'bitterness' and sarcasm .

I did struggle a little with cliche at some points in the book. The 'Shut up kiss me' end line and some others felt out of place with the originality of the novel on the whole. And I did feel myself wanting a bit more gray in the characters. Durant, for instance, felt too 'cardboard cutout' evil, and some of his actions, even if he was possessed by a God, were not believable for me.

But I'm definitely going to read more in the series and have Swansong on my to-read list. Also, as someone who has several UNFINISHED manuscripts on her computer, I have the utmost respect for writers who get off their arses and do things, who finish and publish and put them out there, especially those who do this whilst working full-time and balancing families! It's so much easier to sit back and critique.

Congrats aliantha and thanks for the read.

Shaun das Schaf wrote: Congrats aliantha and thanks for the read.

I second that!