Tor, copyright 2003, printed 2004, 292
pages
ISBN 0-765-34909-4
Edited by Patrick Nielsen Hayden
Read January 2011 (age 32)
First time read
What to expect:
This is a short, standalone (for now?)
book. The quick research I’ve done has
Ms. Walton reporting that she isn’t doing a sequel, and also that she is, but it’ll
be very different than this one.
Basically, this is a Victorian novel, with
all of the associated conventions, except that there are physiological reasons
for many of the ideals shown in Victorian literature, because everyone is a
dragon. It sounds odd, and it is odd,
but it works.
From the back cover:
A
tale of contention over love and money – among dragons.
A
family deals with the death of their father.
A son goes to court for his inheritance.
Another son agonized over his father’s deathbed confession. One daughter becomes involved in the
abolition movement, while another sacrifices herself for her husband.
And
everyone in the tale is a dragon, red in tooth and claw. Here is a world of politics and train
stations, of churchmen and family retainers, of courtship and country houses…in
which, on the death of an elder, family members gather to eat the body of the
deceased. In which the great and the
good avail themselves of the privilege of killing and eating the weaker
children, which they do with ceremony and relish, growing stronger
thereby.
You
have never read a novel like Tooth and Claw.
The last line pretty much nails it. This is a unique book. My reactions after the jump.
Overall:
This was a short book. It didn’t take long to read, and felt almost
like the introduction to the real story – which I would expect to be the emancipation
of slaves, and a fight to support official reversion to the outmoded/outlawed
‘old religion’, based on the loose ends of plot left dangling at the end of the
book. It was certainly not a typical
read for me, and was really quite refreshing.
That said, it was a bit too cute for my tastes, and it could have been a
bit longer, especially at the end. A lot
happened in just a few pages, and it felt rushed.
Rating: 4
Premise:
The premise is completely ordinary, and
kind of tired, on one hand, (Disputed inheritance. Can’t fight’em, so take’em to court) and
completely ridiculous on the other (Victorian dragons? Really?).
And it works. I’ve heard a few
times on Writing Excuses
that a successful story often takes two concepts, one ordinary, and one unusual,
and in blending them, a interesting story hook is developed. In this case, this was done very well.
Plot:
The plot was unsatisfying to my tastes – It
seemed a bit too cute how everything all lined up. It was generally straightforward plot, with the
several different storylines meshing nicely to a finish. A couple of threads were clearly left untied ,
which may indicate a sequel.
Setting:
The setting is basically Victorian England,
but with well thought out changes to accommodate flying dragons. I have a bit of a quibble with the economics
of a whole society of people where a family eats a side of beef for breakfast –
that’s a herd of something like 450 head of cattle (the crude math is below, if
you care), just for breakfasts, just for one family. That’s a LOT
of acres of pastureland, and a whole lot more land for grain and hay for
finishing the animals, and feeding through the winter. That also doesn’t sound like a recipe for big
cities, but they’re there.
Characters:
The characters were all right, I guess. They were sketched with broad strokes, not
too detailed or “real-person feeling”, which seems to be a stylistic choice. The characters were certainly adequate for
the story being told. I didn’t often get
an idea of the relative sizes of the dragons, and that was pretty important to
the characters, I thought. (i.e. He had a few feet on the other dragon, and so
he thought he would win a fight). I
would have liked to see a bit more emphasis on it. It’s pretty important for humans – and we’re
only ever different by a few inches.
There’s an opinionated narrator, who does a
lot of describing the characters – a lot of telling, not so much showing. That also seems to be a stylistic choice, and
isn’t wrong in this case.
Readability:
The writing style was not something that
I’m very familiar with – I haven’t read many Victorian novels. A very little bit of Dickens, some Kipling a
long time ago, Dracula, maybe a few others.
This one plays on the conventions of the style, makes them more
believable than the original style (we *know* women aren’t like that, whereas,
it could be completely reasonable for dragons to be ‘like that’.) and stays
fun. After a couple of pages to get into
the flow of the writing, it went well.
Some minor quibbles – I had trouble remembering the ranking of the
levels of nobility – Respectable was
obviously at the lower end, but was Exalted
above or below Illustrious? While reading, it wasn’t too obvious or
intuitive.
Not a fan. I imagine he hasn't read much in the style.
Birdbrain(ed) Book Blog
...I didn't actually think twice about the cannibalism inherent in the system.
Things Mean a Lot
Very detailed, nice positive review.
Fyrefly's Book Blog
Another nice positive review.
(Ok –
here’s the math for that herd of 450 cows:
365 days/year, 2 breakfasts per beef animal, so 183 animals needed per
year. Cows only calve once per
year. Assume that the servants eat the
tough old cows, and that bull calves make beef, and heifer calves make more
cows. So we need about 365 calves per
year to get enough bull calves. Say 400
cows, because some of them will either lose a calf, or won’t get pregnant. A few will also have twins, but let’s ignore
that. Modern farms do about 1 mature
bull to 30 cows or so – so that would be about 14 bulls. That may be a bit too efficient for the
Victorians. Add a little bit here and
there for that, deaths and loss of productivity from diseases, injuries, and
such, and you’re at, say, 425 cows and 25 bulls for 450 cattle. Yes, I'm an engineer.)
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