It's interesting that you mention Doris Egan. Her Ivory books are sf, but they could easily be told without the sf aspects. Have the heroine stranded in another country rather than another planet, and you have essentially the same story. The sf elements are really minimal; what makes it sf is that it's a different culture.
"Why elves and goblins" is probably because it's in conversation with all the other fantasy novels about a young man raised in humble circumstances who ascends the throne. Typically in fantasy, that's the end of the story. TGE explores what happens afterward. I suspect a second conversation with a slightly different sub genre of fantasy, the ones in which there's lots of court intrigue and kind people are stupid and meet terrible fates. I don't know Monette's actual intention, but to me, elves and goblins and the minimal but present existence of magic functioned as a reminder of all those other books, that TGE not just in conversation with real history but also with the literature of fantasy.
That being said, I'm not sure that it was the best book in sff this year. I haven't read the others on the ballot, but I'm getting the impression that it wasn't a particularly strong year. The books I'v seen get the most press as artistically best, Station Eleven and The Girl With All The Gifts, were not on the ballot.
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baggyeyes
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Date: 2015-08-01 04:12 am (UTC)"Why elves and goblins" is probably because it's in conversation with all the other fantasy novels about a young man raised in humble circumstances who ascends the throne. Typically in fantasy, that's the end of the story. TGE explores what happens afterward. I suspect a second conversation with a slightly different sub genre of fantasy, the ones in which there's lots of court intrigue and kind people are stupid and meet terrible fates. I don't know Monette's actual intention, but to me, elves and goblins and the minimal but present existence of magic functioned as a reminder of all those other books, that TGE not just in conversation with real history but also with the literature of fantasy.
That being said, I'm not sure that it was the best book in sff this year. I haven't read the others on the ballot, but I'm getting the impression that it wasn't a particularly strong year. The books I'v seen get the most press as artistically best, Station Eleven and The Girl With All The Gifts, were not on the ballot.