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review 2015-03-09 00:10
Field Research (short story) by M.C.A. Hogarth
The Furry Future - M.C.A. Hogarth,Bryan Feir,Yannarra Cheena,MikasiWolf,Tony Greyfox,Alice Dryden,Nighteyes Dayspring,Ocean Tigrox,Mary E Lowd,Dwale,T.S. McNally,Ronald W Klemp,David Hopkins,Michael H Payne,Watts Martin,J.F.R. Coates,Nathanael Gass,Samuel C Conway,Fred Patt

[This is only a review of Hogarth's short story, not the entire anthology - I couldn't figure out how to add the story to BL's database without including a URL, and this individual short story isn't available for download anywhere that I can see. Hogarth distributed her story, "Field Research," for free to her newsletter subscribers and Patreon supporters. I subscribe to her newsletter.]

 

This very short story gives some of the background of Kis'eh't, a Glaseah who later becomes a crew member of the Earthrise.
 
Kis'eh't is a brilliant chemist who had her pick of high-paying jobs but chose one that offered more interesting and flexible research opportunities. For her, doing research and practicing her religion are the same thing. It's all she wants to do, so it shakes her to her core when she learns that one of her research assistants has been terminated, and why.
 
This is a nice little extra for fans of Hogarth's Pelted Universe, although I wouldn't recommend it to Pelted Universe newbies. Kis'eh't's issues with academia and her internal struggle with the ethical issues surrounding her research's funding wouldn't be all that unfamiliar. However, there were other bits that would make more sense to those with a better grounding in the overall Pelted Universe.
 
I don't know that I'll ever reread this, but it was still nice seeing the Glaseahn religion through the perspective of a Glaseah whose area of study was a hard science, rather than soft.
 
(Original review posted on A Library Girl's Familiar Diversions.)
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review 2013-12-16 16:18
Rose Point by M.C.A. Hogarth
Rose Point: Her Instruments, Book 2 - M.C.A. Hogarth

Yes, I'm still on a Hogarth glom. Rose Point is the second book in Hogarth's Her Instruments trilogy. Although it has its problems, I think it's even better than the first, and I will snatch up the third book when it comes out.

While visiting a horse-crazy colony on Kerayle, Hirianthial learns that he has a terrifying new power: he can kill people with his mind. He heads back to his homeworld for what help his people can give him, and Reese and the rest of the crew of the Earthrise accompany him, determined to support him in any way possible. However, the Eldritch homeworld has problems of its own. Liolesa, the Eldritch queen, has been scheming for centuries in an effort to keep her people's own xenophobia from killing them, and she had decided that the crew of the Earthrise will be perfect for her next move.

For much of the Kerayle portion of the book, Reese was, disappointingly, the same distrustful woman she was at the end of Earthrise. Her transformation into a more accepting character seemed very sudden and was so complete that even her own crew members were shocked. I'd have preferred it if the shift had been more gradual and had featured more attempts on Reese's part to recognize she was being an idiot and to talk to Hirianthial about what it was that was bothering her.

That said, I was glad for the shift in her behavior. Hirianthial was already damaged enough from the treatment he received while he was a captive on Kerayle. Had Reese further abused him, I might never have been able to forgive her. Her behavior was perfect. Instead of freaking out that his condition was probably making it impossible for him not to read her mind, she focused on making sure that the thoughts he received were happy ones. For the first time, she did good things for him without having to be told to do them. She was the one who asked the twins to talk to him, and she spearheaded the plans to keep him from leaving for his homeworld without them.

And can I just say this? I'm so very glad that, when Reese found Hirianthial naked and nearly in shock (one of his captors had been about to rape him), there was not one moment when she had to struggle with thoughts of how hot he was. I have read way too many books and stories in which some male character sees an unconscious and naked woman and notices her lovely face, beautiful breasts, or some other such nonsense (the best example I can think of right now: Allie Ritch's Mating Season). Reese's biggest concerns were getting him to safety and making sure she didn't hurt him any more than he'd already been hurt. Yay for not being creepy.

It was nice to revisit the Eldritch homeworld, after getting to see it once in Hogarth's Family. On the one hand, the Eldritch were these beautiful, courtly beings (with dialogue to match, so expect to see things like “prithee,” “for sooth,” and “verily”). On the other hand, all that beauty was a gloss over the truth: the Eldritch are dying out. The horses they depend upon are badly inbred, they have no medical technology to speak of, and many of the Houses are unable to feed their tenants. The Alliance and other colonies have everything necessary to save them, but first they have to overcome their own xenophobia.

It's not necessary to have read Family in order to understand the problems the Eldritch are facing – in fact, I think Rose Point did a better job of explaining what was going on and how the Eldritch had managed to survive so far. Reese and her crew knew even less about how the Eldritch lived than Vasiht'h did, but, working together, they figured out an awful lot in a short amount of time. Their theories, along with Liolesa's talks with Hirianthial, laid everything out pretty nicely and did a good job of communicating just how dire the situation was for the Eldritch.

Unfortunately, there is a lot of talking and not a lot of showing. I still don't entirely understand how commoner Eldritch live, and I'm still left with the feeling that the Eldritch are composed mostly of nobles and their servants. Even so, the stuff about Eldritch noble life was interesting. Reese had to learn a little about how to behave in order to be officially presented in court, and the rules about who could touch each other and how were fascinating. Plus, those details provided an opening for Moments between Reese and Hirianthial.

I got the feeling, in the previous book, that Hogarth was working towards romance between the two of them. I was not entirely on board with this. One, Hirianthial got along with just about every other Earthrise crew member better than he did with Reese. Two, Reese seemed determined to insult Hirianthial at every opportunity. She complained about the number of times he had to be saved (even during a scene in which she was being saved by him), and she accused him of reading her thoughts, on purpose, without her permission.

This was still the state of their relationship at the beginning of Rose Point. It changed, like flipping a light switch, to something lighter and more friendly, after Hirianthial's kidnapping. Hirianthial and this new Reese fit together much better, and I enjoyed the little signs that romance was developing between them (I loved the “Hirianthial is a single-dagger man” scene and the part where Hirianthial meets Reese after she's been dressed for court). However, this brings me back to my wish that Reese's...growth? maturation? mellowing?...had happened more gradually. I kept expecting the old Reese to reappear and flinch away from Hirianthial on the assumption that he was reading her private thoughts.

Reese's thoughts and behavior didn't always seem consistent, and I groaned when she made a few incredibly reckless promises near the end.

As much as she likes the Eldritch homeworld, she knows absolutely nothing about horses. Also, for all she knew, Kerayle had been overrun by pirates and all its horses had been killed. It didn't very smart for her to be promising to breed horses for the Eldritch. Unless one assumes she's going to end up with Hirianthial, who has hundreds of years of horse-breeding experience...

(spoiler show)


You know, I feel like every time I review something that I enjoyed but still had problems with, I end up sounding like I hated it. I'm not sure how to fix that without still noting the things that didn't work for me quite as well, so I'm just going to say this: I did enjoy this, and I think it's probably one of the best books by Hogarth I've read so far (although I'm still more of a Jahir/Vasiht'h fangirl!). I'm crossing my fingers that the conclusion to the trilogy will be satisfying.

 

(Original review, with read-alikes, posted on A Library Girl's Familiar Diversions.)

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review 2013-12-07 21:44
Family by M.C.A. Hogarth
Family - M.C.A. Hogarth

After reading several Jahir and Vasiht'h short stories and vignettes, I was happy to see that this was novella-length – I seem to like Hogarth's longer works more.

Jahir and Vasiht'h have now been working together for 10 years or so. Their partnership is a comfortable one, but, because of the Veil and Eldritch xenophobia, there are lots of things Jahir has never been able to tell Vasiht'h. In Family, this changes. One of Jahir's cousins is getting married, and Jahir's mother specifically asked that Vasiht'h come with him as a guest. Aliens are not welcome on the Eldritch homeworld, but Jahir figures his mother has her reasons, so he and Vasiht'h set off to attend the wedding.

Like Vasiht'h, I was excited at the thought of finally getting to see the Eldritch homeworld. All I knew for sure was that it would be technologically backward – no showers, horses used for transportation, no medical technology to speak of. I figured that meant it'd be some kind of pseudo-Middle Ages Europe.

Life in the Galare manor was much like I expected it to be. There were a few mentions here and there of servants, although I never got to learn as much about them as I would have liked. The real surprises came when Vasiht'h visited a town near the manor. It was...worse that I expected. While this new information certainly put Jahir's desperation to leave his homeworld and learn something that might help his people in a new, starker light, my suspension of disbelief was strained. I honestly don't understand how Eldritch civilization has survived for as long as it has, and I'm still not sure I can wrap my brain around what an Eldritch commoner's life must be like.

The primary reason I picked Family up was because of Jahir and Vasiht'h and, in that area, I was rewarded. Their relationship in Mindtouch was, for the most part, amazingly smooth and easy. The events in this novella put more strain on their relationship than I've seen in any other work they've been in.

First, there were Vasiht'h feelings of awkwardness and embarrassment around most of the other Eldritch. He didn't know how to act, he didn't know what they were saying unless he was near enough to Jahir to make use of their mindline, he was under-dressed compared to them, and his very existence was looked down upon. Second, Jahir himself made Vasiht'h feel awkward. He was painfully aware of Jahir's wealth and status, in a way he'd never been before. Third, there was a lot going on that Jahir hadn't given Vasiht'h any warning about, and Vasiht'h being there made some of it worse. And fourth, there were repeated reminders that Jahir would likely outlive Vasiht'h by hundreds of years. Vasiht'h was forced to think about their partnership in the long term and how he wanted things to go past the point of his own death.

Some of this was stuff that had occurred to Vasiht'h before, but that he hadn't sat down and really thought about, and some of it came as a shock. In any case, all of it kept Vasiht'h unsteady, and Jahir couldn't do much to help him and comfort him, because he was busy being an Eldritch noble about to attend a wedding scattered with political eggshells. They spent more time separated than I expected, although it did make the “you and me, we're still okay” moments even sweeter.

While it was nice to recognize bits and pieces of other Jahir and Vasiht'h works in this one, it was also distracting. My brain kept looking for inconsistencies and continuity errors. The most jarring moment was when it was revealed that Sediryl, Jahir's cousin, probably played a part in Jahir's decision to leave his homeworld, because of his intense, secret, and forbidden feelings for her. She was passionate, fierce, and fun to read about, but Jahir's reaction to her inspired vague continuity unease in me. I remembered Jahir desperately wanting to get away from his homeworld's stagnation, but that was it. I did a quick keyword search of Mindtouch and found several mentions of Sediryl that I had forgotten, but none of the depth of emotion I would have expected the name to conjure up in Jahir, considering his reaction to her in this novella. I'm not sure if this is some kind of character continuity issue or not – I'd have to reread Mindtouch to be sure – but it bugged me.

Although I felt it had some issues, I still really liked Family. It had several of the elements I've come to love in Hogarth's works: fascinating details about alien cultures, characters I care about, and great conversations.

 

Rating Note: I struggled with choosing a rating for this. I wanted to give it 4 stars, because it was so nice to see Jahir and Vasiht'h having to deal with their own relationship, personal, and family issues again. At the same time, 3.5 stars seemed more appropriate for the overall story. I decided to give the characters more weight and give it 4 stars. Booklikes and LibraryThing's half stars are making me greedy - now I'm beginning to want quarter stars.

 

(Original review, with read-alikes and watch-alikes, posted on A Library Girl's Familiar Diversions.)

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review 2013-12-02 05:44
The Snow Maiden, or The Case with the Holiday Blues by M.C.A. Hogarth
The Snow Maiden, or the Case with the Holiday Blues (Jahir and Vasiht'h) - M.C.A. Hogarth

This was more along the lines of what I was hoping for when I read The Case of the Poisoned House and Other Xenopsychiatric Studies. Whereas that collection was nice but ultimately unsatisfying, this felt like a full a complete offering. What can I say, vignettes just don't do it for me.

The word count is skimpy, but at least it's all devoted to a single story. In this case, Jahir and Vasiht'h have been hired to help Lieutenant Commander Nisia Baker, a Seersa who's in charge of the environmental control for an entire starbase. Unfortunately, she may be buckling under the pressure. She's having trouble staying motivated, and depression is setting in. Jahir and Vasiht'h are limited in what they can do for her, because, for security reasons, no one can know what her job is unless they have the proper clearance.

Jahir and Vasiht'h do almost none of the things they usually do when working with clients. Although they spend some time talking to Nisia in order to figure out what's bothering her, they don't use their dream therapy technique at all. Instead, they get creative. They manage to involve the entire starbase in Nisia's treatment and, at the same time, avoid revealing her job and responsibilities to anyone who's not supposed to know.

The way they did it seemed a little far-fetched – I'm not sure it'd be possible for something like that to work that quickly and effectively. Then again, who knows? People latch onto stuff that sounds good all the time. At any rate, it was a nice little holiday story – probably the closest thing to a Christmas story I'll read for a while, since I'm one of those people who burns out on Christmas quickly, due to it appearing everywhere earlier and earlier in the year.

While I still think Mindtouch is the best of the Jahir and Vasiht'h works I've read so far, this was still a good story. Also, unlike The Case of the Poisoned House (etc.), I think it could potentially work for newbies to Hogarth's Pelted Universe. It barely touches on information about the Pelted or Eldritch and, for the most part, doesn’t really need to.

 

(Original review, with read-alikes, posted on A Library Girl's Familiar Diversions.)

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