Great news! We have another guest reviewer on Friday Fiction to share a book from off the beaten track. Meet my friend Arthur:
I prefer being anonymous here so… no name, and no pic. (I’m too ugly to want you to see my picture). Just call me Arthur. I have been reading, writing, and reviewing books of many genres since about 1970. I love high fantasy, hard science fiction, and writers that bring out and solve moral dilemmas with strong moral courage. I love books that explore different cultures and different languages. I hate books that transplant modern Americans and modern American values into cultures and times where they do not fit and characters that are moral wimps. I have lived around the world, speak several languages (one of them well 🙂 ), eaten all sorts of food, and have worked in several fields, from medicine to missionary literacy.
Arthur sent me this pic of himself 🙂
Local Custom by Sharon Lee and Steve Miller. A clash of cultures…
What happens when a woman from a planet where children belong exclusively to their mothers and men are treated as simple-minded playthings; decides to have a child by a man who comes from a planet where children belong to the clan; and also decides not to tell him?
What happens is Local Custom by Lee and Miller, one book in the Liaden universe. She is sure that he intends to kidnap her child and he knows that she has stolen a child that belongs to his clan. And, oh, they are in love with each other.
Meanwhile, the child learns about both cultures, both languages, and both of his parents, even as they struggle to resolve the irreconcilable situation they find themselves in. Luckily before they can come to fatal blows an enemy presents itself: someone from his culture that hates her and her culture, and drives them together.
The background for this book, the Liaden universe, is a complex, rich, science fiction/fantasy universe that combines space ships and lasers with a vague form of magic. But what interests me are the rich characters and the cultures they inhabit. Warning: it is difficult to read just one book in the Liaden universe. This isn’t the first book, but it is certainly readable as your first book.
Each person shall provide his clan of origin with a child of his blood, who will be raised by the clan and belong to the clan. And this shall be Law for every person of every clan . . .
Master trader Er Thorn knows the local custom of Liaden is to be matched with a proper bride and provide his prominent clan Korval with an heir. Yet his heart is immersed in another universe, influenced by another culture, and lost to a woman, not of his world. And to take a Terran wife such as scholar Anne Davis is to risk his honor and reputation. But when he discovers that their brief encounter years before has resulted in the birth of a child, even more, is at stake than anyone imagined. Now, an interstellar scandal has erupted, a bitter war between two families—galaxies apart—has begun, and the only hope for Er Thorn and Anne is a sacrifice neither is prepared to make.
Arthur Author is fun.