Book Review: Hild by Nicola Griffith

I mentioned in a recent meta-post that I’m having trouble these days with evaluating books separate from the buzz I hear about those books in advance of reading them. So this is a review in two (or more) parts: a review of the book itself, and a review of my reaction and response to the book buzz (which, of course, the author is not at all responsible for).

For those not familiar with it, Hild is a fictionalized treatment of the life of the girl who would become the 7th century Saint Hilda of Whitby, written by SFF author Nicola Griffith. It’s a very heavily fictionalized treatment because the facts about Saint Hilda’s life are scanty and distorted by hagiography, and the facts about the culture she lived in are rather skeletal as well. Yet the subject is no more heavily fictionalized than a novel about, say, King Arthur would be (and there have been no end of those). The story covers Hild's girlhood up through coming of age and there are plans for one or more sequels to cover her adulthood.

The fractal detail of the setting (7th century north of Britain, with the complex mixture of ethnicities, cultures, and religions inherent in that time and place) is like a long slow walk through a landscape when you have no particular place you need to be. The everyday details of life and the complex maneuverings of both the micro- and macro-politics of the time are painted in vivid detail with carefully researched accuracy. I suspect I'm reading a different book than most people are. A lot of the reviews I've read keep talking about the setting as the equivalent of an entirely invented secondary-world fantasy, but because of my own research interests it’s a setting I find familiar and comfortable. (“Comfortable” as a reader – not as a potential time to live!) When a character quotes from the heroic verses of the Gododdin…I’ve read those, in the oldest surviving versions. When the characters interact over the never-ending work of textile production…I’ve made those things; I know how long you have to spin and weave to create a single garment. When the unfamiliar names fly thick and fast…I’ve researched those names, written articles on them, and don’t stumble over the difference between Aethelfrith, Eanfrith, and Eanflaed. I don’t find all this exotic is what I’m trying to say, I guess. That could be a hazard, in terms of enjoying the story, but because of how well the setting was handled, it was an enhancement. It made me strongly appreciative of exactly how much work Griffith has done to create this world, and to elaborate the bare skeleton in a way that is both not-inconsistent-with-known-fact and fascinating to read. (No “researcher’s disease” here – the details are integrated seamlessly into the story.)

Reading Hild is like a long slow walk through a gorgeous richly-detailed landscape…but it’s a winding, rambling path that is much more about the journey than the destination. While many events occur along the way, there isn’t really a big over-arching plot-structure. There are very long stretches where it feels like nothing much happens. This is, of course, the nature of biographic writing. (Except when the biographer decides to impose teleology on the subject.) And Hild is, in the final analysis, a fictionalized biography of a woman whose most memorable life events are yet to occur.

In meta-analysis, it’s fascinating that the book is being framed and marketed as a work of speculative fiction when there are no fantastic elements at all. I was going to speculate on this feature, but fortunately the need to do so is eliminated by Griffith herself explaining exactly what my speculations had been:

* * *

My most recent novel, Hild, has no fantastical elements whatsoever. It's not set in a secondary world, there are no dragons, no wizards casting spells, no special swords or magic rings. Yet the book has been nominated for three SF awards. Why?

Perhaps it's because I'm a native of SF and it shows: Hild might be a literary novel but it speaks with a fantasy accent and uses the grammar of science fiction. It relies on world-building, the grand "What if...?" learnt reading and writing SF. More than that, it relies on readers being willing to take that leap of faith into the unknown—the ability to take odd spellings, strange names, unfamiliar concepts in stride, to risk just going with the flow and trust it'll make sense eventually—that is one of the mainstays of our genre.

* * *

That takes care of the first item on my “review of the buzz” list. The second item is the promotion of Hild as some sort of ground-breaking queer character. To be sure, the not-quite-yet-Christian culture that Hild is living in doesn’t yet have some of the odd hang-ups about sex that would later develop, and Hild doesn’t only have a wealth of strong, supportive emotional relationships with the women around her, but also has sexual encounters with women as well as men, and experiences desire for both. This is, however, a relatively minor aspect of the text (given that she’s pre-pubescent for the majority of the book!) and her sexual experiences with women are presented as more of the hormone-driven itch-scratching sort than as something deep and lasting. So to me the elevation of Hild as a paragon of queer fiction (as evidence I note it was the subject of one of Tor.com’s Queering SFF Pride Month reviews, and features heavily in Worlds Without End’s Roll-Your-Own LGBT Speculative Fiction Challenge, and so forth) is a bit jarring. For me, wanting LGBTQ fiction and being handed Hild is like showing up for a banquet and being handed a crust. Now, this isn’t the fault of the book or the author. The book is what it is and the amount and nature of sexual content is, in my opinion, exactly appropriate for the story. And it is nice to see historic sexuality treated in a way that doesn’t simply reflect later prejudices. But the buzz had built it up in my expectation that this was going to be a banquet, and it was a crust. And that’s one of the examples of why I’m having this love-hate relationship with reading books based on buzz, even the buzz of people I trust.

Reading The Adventures of Mademoiselle de Richelieu (Part 4)

When last we saw our heroines, Alithea was teasing Arabella's unwanted suitors while Arabella was getting her affairs in order in preparation for hitting the road with her. Alithea plays cat and mouse with a couple of challenges to duels then heads to Lyons so that the two of them aren't observed leaving town together. While in Lyons she is on hand for a couple of spots of excitement. A young lady jilted by her fiance when she had the bad luck to get pregnant in advance of the wedding challenges the cad to a duel while in disguise and fatally wounds him, though he manages to repent and marry her after all before expiring. (Cue music: He Had It Coming.) And the man who became Alithea's bff on arriving in town is unmasked as a fugitive felon, leaving her relieved at having escaped robbery or worse.

She then receives a letter from Arabella filling her in on all the gossip and pledging to join her soon at Lyons. Arabella concludes her letter, "I hope to see you in eight days at the farthest. My steward is to accompany me to Lyons, where I will appear in short coat and breeches, and then set out with you whenever you please upon our adventures. In the mean time, be assured that every minute is an age till I have the pleasure of embracing my dear Alithea, who is husband, lover and friend to Arabella."

::fans self:: My, is it warm in here?

Back at the very beginning of the story, Alithea had struck up a friendship with the Count of Saluce and his wife and had been planning to travel in company with them, but they had to separate for a while to take care of some unexpected business. Alithea now writes to the Count to let them know that her plans have changed and won't be able to join up with them again, alas. Since she doesn't expect Arabella to arrive for over a week, Alithea decides to make a side trip to Geneva and we get more travelogue. Then back to Lyons.

Arabella finally arrives and is very very fetching in men's clothing. The two women have a very coy conversation each declaring that if one or the other of them were truly what they appeared to be (a man) that they would overcome their distaste for marriage in an instant. Alithea predicts that Arabella is going to break many ladies' hearts on their travels (and perhaps those of a few men with unusual tastes). Arabella then proceeds to cut a swathe through several local hearts, just for practice. Volume 2 then concludes with Alithea pledging to cut back on the travelogue, as Arabella isn't as into sight-seeing as she is. (I'd have to do some page-counting to determine if she makes good on this plege.)

In Volume 3, they travel first to Genoa and then to Milan, where they take advantage of some good deals on velvet and brocade to enlarge their masculine wardrobes. Arabella is soon approached by the messenger of a lady with romantic interests, but when she plays along (at Alithea's urging) it turns out the lady takes pledges of courtly love rather to extremes and -- rather than an immediate dalliance -- sets out a 6-year plan of demonstrations of chastity and devotion in order to win her heart. This provides an excellent excuse for foregoing the intrigue. The two leave town, barely ahead of yet another importunate lady paying addresses to Arabella.

Next, to Verona and Padua, with renewed travelogue (Alithea isn't doing very well at her pledge here), and then to Venice. Immediately on arriving in Venice, they're approached by an eager local guide who offers to arrange for the company of courtesans or "temporary wives" for them, without which (he says) they have no hope of being received into polite society. After some attempts to demur, they accept his offer to identify some likely prospects. When one of those prospects turns out to be the daughter of a poor widow, who has determined to sell her oldest daughter in order to provide for her other children, our heroines are horrified and determine to go along with the charade simply in order to save the girl from such a fate. This fails to go smoothly, as there is much wailing and protestations of shame on the girl's part (as well as a certain reluctance on the mother's part, when it comes to the point). An overwhelming impulse to charity is stirred, and Alithea and Arabella connive to trick the procurer into giving up on the deal so that the two of them can then offer double the original price to the family in order to allow the girl to either marry or go into a convent as she chooses, and to allow the mother to set herself up in some trade that will provide for the other children. The girl, somewhat sensibly, decides not to take either path, but rather to combine her sum with her mother's and set the both of them up as milliners.

[I confess I was somewhat expecting the whole thing to be a scam and to have them discover, after handing over the charity to the family, that it had all been play-acting in league with the procurer. I suppose I'm glad to have been wrong.]

However after concluding this charitable transaction (and determining to leave Venice as soon as possible), Alithea gets a little snitty with Arabella, saying that it was clear the girl was actually quite attracted to her (Arabella) and that they ought to test her to see if it were the case. Arabella is somewhat taken aback at this fit of jealousy, and says that if there were any truth to it, she would be glad to disabuse the girl of her attraction by disclosing her true sex to her. Arabella goes off to do just that while Alithea takes several pages to describe the sights of Venice.

And this is as far as I've gotten today. The whole Venice episode takes up a great deal of page-count. I've somehow left out the little bit about the two women socializing with their local banker's family in Venice--the banker having two lovely daughters, both of whom immediately begin pining after Arabella. It's quite reasonable that Alithea is starting to get her nose rather out of joint about the whole thing!