Longtime readers know that Nathaniel has a wee problem with addiction to fantasy literature. This proclivity is more masochistic curse than pleasureable blessing since fantasy literature is allergic to endings and there are few things Nathaniel likes more in storytelling than a brilliant finale.
So last night I finished the first book of the The Runelords series "The Sum of All Men" by David Farland. I had heard that it would eventually be a movie so when my brother suggested I read it last month on my vacation, I gladly grabbed it for the airplane time. [Note: turns out the movie option ran out last year and Farland has the rights again.] The book concerns the young naive prince Gaborn whose quest to win the heart of a neighboring kingdom's progressive idealistic princess Iome is interrupted by an invading army of the Runelord Raj Athan who seeks to become "The Sum of All Men".
The conceit of The Runelords world is that, through magic rituals, people can gift their best attributes to others creating a stratified world where those in power are granted more and more of it as people sell their most economically viable asset to them be that beauty, strength, vision, intelligence, stamina (and everything else). It's sort of like the vampire economy that the USA is dealing with now as the rich and powerful decimate the weaker middle class in order to gain more and more and more (to infinity and beyond) for themselves to feed their insatiable greed and misplaced sense of entitlement. Never mind that once a Runelord has the strength of 1000 men, it hardly makes a difference to him if he has the strength of 1001... but it sure as hell matters to the weakling 1,001st man he's left behind in his greedy conquest.
But let's not get into the ever-miserable discussion of the downward spiral of the actual world we live in. We're talking books and movies, the fake world we prefer to dream of!
Gandalf the Grey... no, WHITE. Most of the major characters in the book are those who have received "endowments" from others so they're all amazingly beautiful or super strong or what not; superheroes in medieval frocks and cloaks if you will. If they're not runelords they're wizards. The major wizard Binneman is basically Gandalf since he's very powerful, very wise, very old and his hair and wardrobe changes colors once he moves to the next stage of his power. But then, what wizard isn't Gandalf? He casts a long long shadow on fantasy literature.
As I was reading The Runelords I was actually thinking it would make a spectacular movie as it's quite visual and breathlessly paced with interesting but organic plot twists. There's also enough meat for subtext and acting (the socioeconomic imbalances of the world are not invisible to the heroes even as they benefit from it) to suggest that some sly filmmaker or television creator could really play with it, provided they had the stones. The biggest problem in adaptation, beyond the visual effects challenge or increasing or decreasing someone's beauty, musculature and vocal power or whatever both exponentially or incrementally from time to time throughout the narrative, would be the danger of exposition. The book is filled with it as the conceit is actually rather complicated and occassionally The Runelords errs on the side of feeling like a roleplaying character building game 'this person has two endowments of wit, this person has four of brawn, and only two of metabolism after losing a dedicate' etcetera.
But I fear in our post Harry Potter fan-based world, people who choose to adapt bestsellers are no longer brave enough to make their own decisions about what would suit the material and characters in a new medium.
So I'm reading and enjoying and totally caught up in it until I realize I'm about 75-100 pages from the end. And there will be no ending. It was a crushing blow. I'm so tired of books (and movies) without endings. While it doesn't exactly end on a cliffhanger, the hero's nemesis retreats and a quick internet search tells me that they keep battling out for the next few volumes of the series before new characters take over. As I was ranting to The Boyfriend about this "I can't believe I read 600 pages and I don't even get a resolution and I won't get one even if I read another 600!!!" he brings up Game of Thrones again.
He was frustrated about the Arya storyline -- he says it's on a loop, treading water (which it was already doing when I quit reading) -- in the George RR Martin's insanely popular Game of Thrones series. He'd just finished reading A Dance With Dragons. The Boyfriend knows how I feel about Game of Thrones as do readers (I get complaints about not joining the worshipful throngs) and he tells me I was very wise to quit when I did 2 ½ books in because the things I was angry about (the death of major characters which hurt my heart and the constantly busy but actually static plot which hurt my brain: how can that much happen but nothing ever actually happens?) only become more prominent as the series continues.
And then I asked what I thought was a casual silly question 'what's going on with Daenerys?' assuming that she would have attacked the Seven Kingdoms by now, that being her driving goal from the first pages of the first book and now Martin is FIVE BOOKS INTO THE SERIES.
Nope. Turns out she still has not crossed the ocean, she still has never faced off against the Houses Barantheon, Lannister or Stark who are constantly worrrying about her. Can you fucking believe that? So if the HBO show doesn't dare do their own thing Daenerys, a major major character to those of you watching the show that haven't read the books she will remain the red herring that George R R Martin has essentially written her to be FOR FIVE YEARS ON TELEVISION. I'm sorry but that is gross misconduct on the part of the author. Red herrings can be fun but RED HERRINGS FOR THOUSANDS AND THOUSANDS OF PAGES... FOR YEARS? That's just sloppy and, well, unkind.
Writers... FINISH YOUR STORIES! The absence of endings is getting worse and worse and worse in popular culture as if all genres would rather be a daytime soap than a well crafted STORY. Whether it's the superhero movies with their ellipses beginnings as endings or fantasy books without end or movies that don't even pretend to be anything other than filler, it's getting worse and worse.
At this point I would like to beg any of you who enjoy genre fiction to clue me in to some books I might enjoy that actually wrap themselves up. I don't need "Happily Ever After" or pretty all inclusive plot string bows but I sure as hell need "The End."