BT-Enchantment

Not a typical Card book, but then, what exactly is a "typical Card book"? It starts with a beautiful portrayal of a Jewish Boy growing up in Russia, moves to some gritty "it-sounded-good-in-theory" fantasy, which in turns alternates with fairy-tale fantasy. The fairy-tales are appropriately Russian, and along the way the truth behind many classical Russian folklore stories is revealed.Yes, it's as funny as it sounds.Add to that great Orson Card characters, and the strength his moral believes often lend to his books, and you get what would have been considered a masterpiece if written by anyone else. I haven't read his biblical series, but it compares well to his terrific "Hart's Hope" fantasy, blows his horror books out of the water, and is at least on par with his SF.I can't believe no one noticed this book, maybe because it's mostly fantasy. Highly recommended, even to those who think they only like Card for his SF.

I am probably the only sci-fi/fantasy reader in the United States who read "Enchantment" as her introduction to Orson Scott Card's fiction. As unbelievable as it may sound, I avoided reading every OSC book, despite the fact that my sister and best friend did everything but read "Ender's Game" to me. You see, "EG" was once a class assignment (I chose to read Dickens' "David Copperfield" instead -- talk about your opposite book!), and after that, I refused to read it more out of obstinance than anything else. But I'm glad I read "Enchantment."Coming right off the heels of Robin McKinley's "Spindle's End," I wasn't sure "Enchantment" would be different enough to hold my attention. I was, fortunately, wrong! The best part about this book, aside from complete characters, effortless narration, and a compelling plot -- no small asides! -- was the fact that it had much more to do with what happened AFTER Ivan kissed and awoke the princess. We learned about her village, ancient Slavic culture and religion, magic (both ancient and modern) and the inner workings of an enchanted princess. Card handled 8 viewpoints with ease, though of course the dominant ones were Ivan, Princess Katerina, and the witch, Baba Yaga. As I am completely unfamiliar with Russian culture and folklore, I found OSC's version of Baba Yaga a completely hideous and believable villain; I was glad to get her viewpoint throughout the story. I also appreciated OSC's depiction of modern and ancient Russia, which to me are now familiar in my head. He conveys incredible amounts of information in few words, and the plot never lags; though this is a long book, it is a quick read. We also feel like we get to know the characters right away, and he writes with equal believability about women and men (I guess it helps to have a wife who proofreads your work :-) ).If you ever wanted to read an excellent story, get to know many interesting characters, and find out what happened after Sleeping Beauty woke up, read "Enchantment"!

I'm a tough critic, and I don't throw around sentences like "this is the best work of fantasy I've read in a year" without giving the matter some thought. But this is a really superb story. I cannot see where it could have been done better, and I don't say that often.It's superb because it is told vigorously and plausibly. Assume for a few hours that gods and magic have been real, and that there can be magic bridges across time, and the actions of the characters make perfect sense. They are all intelligent problem-solvers - not only Ivan and his parents and Princess Katarina, but the witch-queen Baba Yaga and her captive Bear-god. At no point does Card feel the need to make a leading character into a dunce or a lunatic to shove the plot along.Card also avoids many pitfalls which you might be afraid that he fell into, given the subject matter and the fact that he really succumbed to some of them in the "Alvin Maker" series. For example, he does not bog the story down in discussing contemporary post-Soviet politics, or in the fine points of culture and technology in tenth-century Ukraine, nor in determining who the real heroes and villains were in Eastern Europe then, nor does he clutter the volume with every Russian folk tale element ever recorded. Nor, although this book does elaborate on the "Sleeping Beauty" story, is it merely a self-conscious "retelling" of the kind that we fantasy readers have come to dread, often in connection with Arthurian legend. The present and the past are nicely balanced and interwoven, and the center of attention throughout is on the story rather than on its setting and provenance.Furthermore, he manages to throw in a few surprising plot twists, which is difficult to do in a story like this, considering that you mostly expect that the hero and heroine are not going to get killed by Baba Yaga and it's mainly a question of how they will win. Nothing here is trite. Furthermore Card avoids the temptation to explain "everything" at the end or to develop a textbook on the laws of magic. He recognizes that some things have to be explained, but other things just work because that's how they work in fairy tales, and he draws the line between the two sets of things quite well.You know how you know that a book has really worked? After you are done with the book - you find that you aren't really done with it. You leaf back through it and re-read some of the nicely done parts and recapture how you felt at the first read-through. Then you put it on your shelf along with your other favorite books, where you can pick it up in a few months or a year and read it again. Not all that much stuff by Card has made it onto that shelf of mine, but this one has.

Once again, Orson Scott Card has done a masterful job of making fantastical situations seem realistic -- even the relationship between the malevolent witch, Baba Yaga, and her kidnapped Bear-god husband. This is a well written story of clashing cultures, modern and ancient, as well as clashing spiritualities: Christian, Jewish, Pagan. The novel is respectful of them all. It's also a romance with a happy ending that bridges both worlds. And contrary to what one reviewer wrote, Bruce Cockburn (whose lyrics are quoted in the novel) IS cool!

I also have "The Fantastic Art of Boris Vallejo" but this one is most beautiful, it shows the flights of the imagination of two artists into worlds of beauty and seduction.This book shows new beautiful full-color paintings of Boris Vallejo, and also gives us the oportunity of exercise our imagination trying to discover the secrets that make an artist creates his own private and fantastic world with his paintings.