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Returning to Tortall
Oct. 10th, 2017 10:35 amAhhh, the excitement of an old favourite becoming a new one.
I think I was about 8. My parents had taken my brother and I to the library (a weekly ritual - I'm sure it was the same for a lot of people), which was always one of my favourite parts of the week. By that point, I was pretty much out of the children's section in books, and was spending a lot of my time reading 'Point' books, which would later be described as YA books: Point Horror, Point Romance (although I tended to find these pretty boring) and Point Fantasy (my favourites!).
It was while I was perusing my usual shelves in search of some Point books I hadn't read, that I stumbled across this beauty:
This was a classic instance of judging a book by it's cover. I was strangely fascinated by the esoteric looking bookshelves in the background, and although I was interested by the blurb, I borrowed it based on the front cover.
I took it home and pretty much inhaled it. My 8-year-old self was enchanted. Honestly, I wondered where Tamora Pierce had been all my (short) life. Here were fully-rounded, well-realised, believable female characters whose motivations had nothing to do with romance. They had agency, they had poise, they were treated with respect. They were badass. They ran the full gamut of emotion. They were far more than decorative. One of them was a freaking KNIGHT. Daine had backstory, she had pathos. She was the hero, but she wasn't perfect. She could be stubborn and scared and secretive. In some ways, she was just like me!
I LOVED it. I think I read it twice before I had to take it back.
The next time we went shopping in the city centre, I took my pocket money with me into WHSmiths, and went about searching for my own copy of the book. I found it, along with the next in the series, Wolf-Speaker. Well. I was pretty much in paroxysms of delight. There was another book, and it had wolves (my favourite animal, then and now!) in it. It was like these books were meant for me. Over the next year or two, I would diligently check the bookshops to see whether the next book was out, and snap it up as soon as I could.
Although I felt that the last book of the quartet didn't resonate with me as strongly as the first three, this was, without a doubt, one of the book series of my childhood that made the most lasting impression. The idea that you could be female and still be the hero, that you could be ANYTHING you wanted if you worked hard enough, regardless of your gender, was amazing to me.
When I heard that another book written by Tamora Pierce was out, I hot-footed it the the library and borrowed it - The Magic in the Weaving. It might have been really good, but I was so disappointed that there was no mention of Tortall, which I was desperate to get back to, that I put it down and never finished it. After that, I moved on to some other books. Although I was still interested in the idea of Tamora Pierce books, it wasn't until quite a few years later that I discovered that there were more books set in Tortall, and by that time, I didn't have the same drive to search them out and read them, although I still had the Immortals Quartet and re-read them at least four or five times.
Fast-forward MANY years, and I started seeing mention of Tamora Pierce books again on tumblr and Pinterest. This made me start reminiscing about how much I loved Tortall and it's characters. Then, I came back from honeymoon to an autumnal England, which instantly makes me feel wistful for earlier years and that 'back to school' time and so I got hold of the Lioness books and yesterday I jumped in.
It was like receiving a massive hug from an old friend. I can't tell you how happy I am to be back in Tortall (albeit an earlier time than my first visit) and I'm so pleased to meet a young Alanna, before she was ever a knight. If I had more than three days annual leave to take after my honeymoon, I would probably take a day and mainline the series, but I don't - and I'm the only one in work until next Tuesday, so I'll just soldier on at work, trying not to count the hours down until I can snuggle up with my book again.
At least this bloody cold is starting to improve!
I think I was about 8. My parents had taken my brother and I to the library (a weekly ritual - I'm sure it was the same for a lot of people), which was always one of my favourite parts of the week. By that point, I was pretty much out of the children's section in books, and was spending a lot of my time reading 'Point' books, which would later be described as YA books: Point Horror, Point Romance (although I tended to find these pretty boring) and Point Fantasy (my favourites!).
It was while I was perusing my usual shelves in search of some Point books I hadn't read, that I stumbled across this beauty:
This was a classic instance of judging a book by it's cover. I was strangely fascinated by the esoteric looking bookshelves in the background, and although I was interested by the blurb, I borrowed it based on the front cover.
I took it home and pretty much inhaled it. My 8-year-old self was enchanted. Honestly, I wondered where Tamora Pierce had been all my (short) life. Here were fully-rounded, well-realised, believable female characters whose motivations had nothing to do with romance. They had agency, they had poise, they were treated with respect. They were badass. They ran the full gamut of emotion. They were far more than decorative. One of them was a freaking KNIGHT. Daine had backstory, she had pathos. She was the hero, but she wasn't perfect. She could be stubborn and scared and secretive. In some ways, she was just like me!
I LOVED it. I think I read it twice before I had to take it back.
The next time we went shopping in the city centre, I took my pocket money with me into WHSmiths, and went about searching for my own copy of the book. I found it, along with the next in the series, Wolf-Speaker. Well. I was pretty much in paroxysms of delight. There was another book, and it had wolves (my favourite animal, then and now!) in it. It was like these books were meant for me. Over the next year or two, I would diligently check the bookshops to see whether the next book was out, and snap it up as soon as I could.
Although I felt that the last book of the quartet didn't resonate with me as strongly as the first three, this was, without a doubt, one of the book series of my childhood that made the most lasting impression. The idea that you could be female and still be the hero, that you could be ANYTHING you wanted if you worked hard enough, regardless of your gender, was amazing to me.
When I heard that another book written by Tamora Pierce was out, I hot-footed it the the library and borrowed it - The Magic in the Weaving. It might have been really good, but I was so disappointed that there was no mention of Tortall, which I was desperate to get back to, that I put it down and never finished it. After that, I moved on to some other books. Although I was still interested in the idea of Tamora Pierce books, it wasn't until quite a few years later that I discovered that there were more books set in Tortall, and by that time, I didn't have the same drive to search them out and read them, although I still had the Immortals Quartet and re-read them at least four or five times.
Fast-forward MANY years, and I started seeing mention of Tamora Pierce books again on tumblr and Pinterest. This made me start reminiscing about how much I loved Tortall and it's characters. Then, I came back from honeymoon to an autumnal England, which instantly makes me feel wistful for earlier years and that 'back to school' time and so I got hold of the Lioness books and yesterday I jumped in.
It was like receiving a massive hug from an old friend. I can't tell you how happy I am to be back in Tortall (albeit an earlier time than my first visit) and I'm so pleased to meet a young Alanna, before she was ever a knight. If I had more than three days annual leave to take after my honeymoon, I would probably take a day and mainline the series, but I don't - and I'm the only one in work until next Tuesday, so I'll just soldier on at work, trying not to count the hours down until I can snuggle up with my book again.
At least this bloody cold is starting to improve!
