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Finding Deaglan
A coterie of inheritors of Denver's old money, including twenty-four year old Stephen Thaxton, find themselves inextricably entwined in an imperative to close a hoary circle left open in the other world, the other side where retribution is sought for wrongs committed by their progenitors a century before; wrongs that eradicated wolves from Colorado, and saw the indigenous Indian tribes of Colorado robbed of their lands, all to enhance the wealth and privilege of those who now find themselves the last of their family lines.
- GenresM M RomanceParanormal
457 pages, ebook
First published April 1, 2011
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July 2, 2011Even if the book starts and ends with Tom and Stephen, I found that this is really a “shared” novel, shared by the many descendents of some old money Denver families, among which we distinguish Merriweather, Marty and Elizabeth. Marty and Elizabeth, being a lesbian couple, and having a really important role in the story, makes this really a LGBT novel.
More than a romance, Finding Deaglan is a gothic novel. It’s strange since usually Colorado, Denver, or the ancient Native American legends are not the stuff of gothic novels, but that is the feeling this novel left me, and I think the author wanted to pay an homage to those novel naming the old family home of Stephen, Gaylord. Gaylord was the title of the main character of Gaywick, which is believed to be the first gay gothic romance, by Vincent Virga.
Stephen, Merriweather, Marty, and all the others, are the descendents of men who did great wrong to the Native Americans and above all to their sacred wolves. One of them in particular was a mystical animal, with great power, and the removing of its earthly body (and that of his pack) was not enough to defeat its power. Wolf is still searching vengeance, and the vengeance has to be taken upon these descendants, even if they are innocents, even when they are still babies, like Deaglan, the baby that Marty and Elizabeth finds on a lake shore, a little, wonderful, intelligent baby. If you think, like me, that is cruel, you have also to consider that Mother Nature is cruel too. I think there is an hidden message here, that if we think that we can do everything to Mother Nature and that she will not be harsh with us since we are her sons, then we are sorely mistaking. Everything we do of bad against the earth, the earth will slash back to use double, in the end.
I had really great difficult to accept the sad fate that was falling upon Stephen and Tom, or Marty, Elizabeth and Deaglan, since they seemed not guilty of the same sins of their ancestors. Stephen and Tom are young and kind, with Oscar, their dog, they have everything that can be reconduct to an ordinary family (and Oscar, being a dog, put them in that share of population believing that also animals have soul); Marty and Elizabeth instead are middle age, again a more than ordinary couple, and Deaglan is their chance to add to that family a child. Both these couples don’t deserve the vengeance of Wolf, but that is, they will suffer it.
Finding Deaglan is very long, like the other book by George Seaton I read, Big Diehl. Apparently George Seaton shares yet another thing in common with those old fashioned novels, the number of pages. But actually for this novel it’s the right length, since, as I said, this is not only the story of two men, Stephen and Tom, but that of many, many characters. All of them would be probably worthy of more words, but in the end, if I have to do my pick, surprisingly enough, my choice would be Marty and Elizabeth, and the beautiful, big eyed Deaglan.
http://www.amazon.com/dp/1608202976/?...
More than a romance, Finding Deaglan is a gothic novel. It’s strange since usually Colorado, Denver, or the ancient Native American legends are not the stuff of gothic novels, but that is the feeling this novel left me, and I think the author wanted to pay an homage to those novel naming the old family home of Stephen, Gaylord. Gaylord was the title of the main character of Gaywick, which is believed to be the first gay gothic romance, by Vincent Virga.
Stephen, Merriweather, Marty, and all the others, are the descendents of men who did great wrong to the Native Americans and above all to their sacred wolves. One of them in particular was a mystical animal, with great power, and the removing of its earthly body (and that of his pack) was not enough to defeat its power. Wolf is still searching vengeance, and the vengeance has to be taken upon these descendants, even if they are innocents, even when they are still babies, like Deaglan, the baby that Marty and Elizabeth finds on a lake shore, a little, wonderful, intelligent baby. If you think, like me, that is cruel, you have also to consider that Mother Nature is cruel too. I think there is an hidden message here, that if we think that we can do everything to Mother Nature and that she will not be harsh with us since we are her sons, then we are sorely mistaking. Everything we do of bad against the earth, the earth will slash back to use double, in the end.
I had really great difficult to accept the sad fate that was falling upon Stephen and Tom, or Marty, Elizabeth and Deaglan, since they seemed not guilty of the same sins of their ancestors. Stephen and Tom are young and kind, with Oscar, their dog, they have everything that can be reconduct to an ordinary family (and Oscar, being a dog, put them in that share of population believing that also animals have soul); Marty and Elizabeth instead are middle age, again a more than ordinary couple, and Deaglan is their chance to add to that family a child. Both these couples don’t deserve the vengeance of Wolf, but that is, they will suffer it.
Finding Deaglan is very long, like the other book by George Seaton I read, Big Diehl. Apparently George Seaton shares yet another thing in common with those old fashioned novels, the number of pages. But actually for this novel it’s the right length, since, as I said, this is not only the story of two men, Stephen and Tom, but that of many, many characters. All of them would be probably worthy of more words, but in the end, if I have to do my pick, surprisingly enough, my choice would be Marty and Elizabeth, and the beautiful, big eyed Deaglan.
http://www.amazon.com/dp/1608202976/?...
October 21, 2011
Finding Deaglan is a big, sweeping novel, ranging a hundred and more years through time, involving many of the leading families of Denver. Fortunes were dragged out of the mountains, grave injustices done, and now George Seaton spins a Gothic yarn to right some part of the damage.
The ensemble cast features the last scions of many of Denver's leading families, which made their fortunes in ways both fair and foul. A hundred years removed from the original crimes, the author makes sure we know these are much nicer people, who right wrongs, do business honestly, and bounce small children on their knees, but they are still expected to pay for crimes that echo through time. What happened in the historical massacre Seaton invokes and in the deliberate slaughter of the wolves was awful, but horror on horror has to be added to the ancestral crimes, until we are sure their hearts were so evil that their sins ought to be visited unto the seventh generation, except that the families are ending a few generations short.
The most interesting characters are Merriweather, the psychic who interprets the paranormal goings on, Tasha, the young Native American woman who has been trained by her grandfather, Two Looks, in the old ways, Two Looks, who is still quite spry for being a hundred years old, and Mobley, the irascible lawyer who is unfortunately not given his worthy opponent. The other voices tend to blend together. They, with Deaglan, the mysterious baby, have a task to complete on behalf of the spirits: wolf, human, and Wolf. The paranormal elements are only understood by a few; it remains an open question precisely what they accomplish.
This story was a learning experience – I hit the dictionary several times. Some of the text is luminous:
Trummel looked up, smiled into the exquisite blue of the April sky that hovered just above the tops of the tallest of those Seventeenth Street edifices where the rich, no, the extremely wealthy did their deals and perhaps cavorted with the devil as they counted their millions.
Some is just long: sentences with four actions and two descriptions each aren't uncommon, and every single motion is important enough to mention. Every small step of preparing a cup of coffee, for example, isn't that fascinating. A stronger editorial hand could have trimmed the irrelevant, redirected an off-the-wall subplot with Finster and Mobley into something that connected better with the main story, and softened some black-and-white ancestral issues into less heavy-handed and more interesting shades of gray.
Finding Deaglan has some wonderful scenes and some true horror; readers looking for a pure romance story will not be happy here, but those who want a paranormal with gay characters will find something to enjoy.
The ensemble cast features the last scions of many of Denver's leading families, which made their fortunes in ways both fair and foul. A hundred years removed from the original crimes, the author makes sure we know these are much nicer people, who right wrongs, do business honestly, and bounce small children on their knees, but they are still expected to pay for crimes that echo through time. What happened in the historical massacre Seaton invokes and in the deliberate slaughter of the wolves was awful, but horror on horror has to be added to the ancestral crimes, until we are sure their hearts were so evil that their sins ought to be visited unto the seventh generation, except that the families are ending a few generations short.
The most interesting characters are Merriweather, the psychic who interprets the paranormal goings on, Tasha, the young Native American woman who has been trained by her grandfather, Two Looks, in the old ways, Two Looks, who is still quite spry for being a hundred years old, and Mobley, the irascible lawyer who is unfortunately not given his worthy opponent. The other voices tend to blend together. They, with Deaglan, the mysterious baby, have a task to complete on behalf of the spirits: wolf, human, and Wolf. The paranormal elements are only understood by a few; it remains an open question precisely what they accomplish.
This story was a learning experience – I hit the dictionary several times. Some of the text is luminous:
Trummel looked up, smiled into the exquisite blue of the April sky that hovered just above the tops of the tallest of those Seventeenth Street edifices where the rich, no, the extremely wealthy did their deals and perhaps cavorted with the devil as they counted their millions.
Some is just long: sentences with four actions and two descriptions each aren't uncommon, and every single motion is important enough to mention. Every small step of preparing a cup of coffee, for example, isn't that fascinating. A stronger editorial hand could have trimmed the irrelevant, redirected an off-the-wall subplot with Finster and Mobley into something that connected better with the main story, and softened some black-and-white ancestral issues into less heavy-handed and more interesting shades of gray.
Finding Deaglan has some wonderful scenes and some true horror; readers looking for a pure romance story will not be happy here, but those who want a paranormal with gay characters will find something to enjoy.
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews