The Silk Road is a book with terrific promise and, unfortunately, poor follow through to the end.
The author evokes many different sources, from the Chinese novel THE STORY OF THE STONE to such fantasy authors as Lord Dunsany and James Branch Cabell.
Not to mention Fritz Leiber's Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser stories.
She mixes history, fantasy, human events and narratives of the various gods.
The first half of the book is delightful.
Unfortunately, somewhere along the way she becomes so busy illustrating myth-making and storytelling that she forgets a fundamental aspect of storytelling -- narrative drive.
Creating characters we care about, who have important goals, and who must defeat great obstacles to their attainment of those goals.
By the ending, I must confess I could not care less whether Greenpearl ever discovered her mother.
We know that nothing earthshaking seemed to rest on that.
Seagem was having a good time as wife to an underwater dragon.
And the political correctness was becoming too blatant -- Greenpearl and Second Daughter finding their identity as women through working as silk weavers run by a matriarchal family and learning these women had their own language.
The memory is vague, but I know that I recall reading some feminist article about how silk weaving in China was a society of women within the overall patriarchal culture.
So I suppose the author read the same article.
Not surprising, since it's obvious she's done a lot of homework on China.
On the plus side, she keeps the political correctness fairly light.
We're reminded of the patriarchy, but not beaten over the head with it.
Yet, and perhaps it's because I'm a man, I found the earlier chapters detailing Greenpearl's adventures as a slave and a musician/courtesan more interesting than the rambling events supposedly leading to her finding her strength as a woman.
First of all, I believe such a book must contain some adventure.
This one days, in the early chapters.
But once they leave Chang-an, they're confined to boring self-discovery.
And part of it is not even credible.
She's described as slim with small breasts, and spends time passing as a man.
If she is meant to be seen as a lesbian, it's impossible that would not have been noticed while she was a courtesan.
Any competent mama-san would have noticed her lesbianism.
The author probably wanted to make the point that as a courtesan she was not allowed her real sexual choice because of the patriarchal culture, but it would have been seen.
During their trek to Cavegarden Lake, they have to get around an overzealous official.
How? The incident is referred to several times, but I didn't see its solution, unless I was dozing off by then.
That's indicative of the author's lack of concern with the narrative, because by then she's too busy being cute and philosophical.
Same with the transformation of Sparker into rock and then a hermit.
I don't recall reading anything to indicate he really wanted to renounce the world, but suddenly it's a given.
There's a lot of fascinating pieces to this novel, and in the beginning while they're unfolding it's quite interesting.
If, in the middle, you get bored, you can stop reading with no real loss.
If you're more interested than ever, you're probably a woman who loves to read about women getting empowered against the patriarchy etc much more than ordinary historical or fantasy adventures -- so keep on reading.
This book's for you.