Book 3: Hart's Hope

I read Drowned Ammet on the flight to the conference, and then started this one and read it on the way home.

Hart's Hope by Orson Scott Card


I'm something of an Orson Scott Card junkie. I read his online column (www.hatrack.com if you're interested), and I did a thesis paper on his works in high school. If you're unfamiliar with him, he's one of the best sci-fi writers today, probably ever. His first novel was Ender's Game, which is still ridiculously popular. He's written about 30 or so full length novels, and a few volumes of short stories, and I've read pretty much all of it.

I really liked this book because of how raw it is. It's really easy to tell OSC's early books from his later ones, because the earlier ones are so much more gruesome. In Ender's Game, children kill each other. In Treason, mutants grow extra limbs, and will cut off their own arms to avoid being harvested by their peers for body parts. Not to be outdone, Hart's Hope starts out with the rape of a young teenage girl. This makes her so bitter that she hoards all the magical power she can to kill the man that raped her and stole the throne that was rightfully hers. Although this little summary might not show it, the man that raped her, Palicrovol, is actually the "good guy" and his son by another woman eventually grows to overthrow the evil queen.

There's only one thing I have to say about this book that isn't absolutely glowing praise: the style of this one takes a while to get into, but once you do get into it, it absolutely works for this story. It's told in the style of a folktale, very matter-of-factly, with the narrator not delving into the deeper emotions and motivations of the main characters. It reminded me a little of the Bible, but I think you'd have to read it to really understand why since I can't explain that association.

This book does raise some questions that aren't so easily answered. By Palicrovol's "act of mercy" in not killing the child he had to rape, he created a monster that was out for revenge. But he thought he was doing right by overthrowing the child's father, and evil monarch. Who is worse? Palicrovol, for his single deliberate but evil act? Or Asineth, driven mad with revenge, who was broken as a child but will now stop at nothing to get back at Palicrovol? This book is a beautiful example of how there are two very different sides to every story.