Sunder, Eclipse & Seed

by Elyse Guttenberg

Shortlisted for the prestigious Crawford Award for BEST FIRST FANTASY novel by the INTERNATIONAL ASSOCIATION FOR THE FANTASTIC IN THE ARTS, Elyse Guttenberg’s high fantasy novel of myth and magic, gods and desire pulls the reader to the edge of nightmare. Born of the gods, she is the Waking Dreamer. World Walker.When Calyx's father banishes her to the dream temple at Aster, it’s an answer to her prayers for now she will be trained to watch and speak the dreams of others.It’s a world she longs to join. As the youngest daughter of the lord of Briana, she is nothing like her vain sister or older brother who is too busy learning to be a soldier to notice his plain and frankly wild sister. But Calyx alone is a jarak dreamer and until now it’s a secret she preferred to keep. Like the priests in the temples, she has dreams--true jarak dreams--and they are growing stronger all the timeBut learning the ways of the Sumedaro priests is more difficult than she imagined and the world is changing. Time is short. People everywhere are having the same shared dream and the north is growing cold. While priests scheme and a jealous queen stands in her way Edishu, the gods own nightmare, longs to escape his prison and conquer Calyx through her dreams.Now one woman stands alone to protect her people from the living death of a dread rule.

Genres: Fantasy

Mass Market Paperback

First published December 4, 1990

About the author

Elyse Guttenberg took to the highway and headed north from New York to Fairbanks, Alaska when she was in her 20's, and has been living and writing there ever since.

She received a Fellowship in Literature from the Alaska State Council on the Arts, and her first novel SUNDER, ECLIPSE AND SEED was shortlisted for Best First Fantasy from the International Association for the Fantastic in the Arts. SUMMER LIGHT and its sequel DAUGHTER OF THE SHAMAN are prehistories set in Alaska, 2000 years ago.

Visit her website, contact her, and learn more about writing and life in Alaska at www.elyseguttenberg.com.

Watch for her newest book THE POWER WE SHARE. It’s the story of Molly Sinclair. She’s a pirate and a craftborn witch in a world where magic is bought, packaged and sold. Stronger than most, she longs to be free. But when the world is on a fire, freedom comes with a price, and will she be willing to pay?

Reviews

[Metaphorosis · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5 stars, Metaphorosis reviews

Summary
Calyx may be her father's daughter (and she certainly doesn't look it) or she may be the daughter of a god. Either way, she has an unusual ability to dream true dreams - a power she's afraid to let her power-hungry family know about, and one that almost immediately brings her into danger. Even when she embarrasses her father and is sent to the far north to get her out of the way, she finds…

Review
Sunder, Eclipse, & Seed has a rocky start and a rocky ending, and honestly some rocky bits in the middle. But it also has an interesting concept that I would have loved to see further explored in the intended two sequels that never arrived. I originally read this around when it came out – 1991 or so – and despite its flaws, it stuck in my mind. Enough so that when I unexpectedly ran into the author at a convention, I immediately asked her about it. She confirmed (and I now see that the end note states) that it was intended as a trilogy.

It takes a while to get into the book. The prose feels stiff, it’s exposition-heavy but we don’t really understand the world, and we don’t really engage with the narrator for some time. I’d forgotten all of that, and frankly wondered why I had fond memories of the book. But a few chapters (40 pp or so) in, the story had begun to find its flow.

The narrator is a fairly standard misunderstood teen (who I fear shows some signs of ugly duckling syndrome, though that’s not conclusive in this volume), but appealing once she’s become a little established. There’s quite a lot of vagueness about why she doesn’t speak out more – I’m not a big fan of the ‘everything is going wrong because I won’t tell anyone anything’ model – but the story returns to clarity often enough that it’s more occasionally irritating than truly frustrating. The supporting cast are familiar archetypes and the central tropes are familiar.

What raises the story above all this for me is its approach to magic – a hazy dream interpretation/true dreaming theory that captured my imagination – along with an intriguing mythic backstory that has many of the things I enjoy, such as a legendary past, lost resources, etc.

As the adventure got going, I quite enjoyed the core of the book, up until the concluding chapters (30 pp or so). Then, everything began to feel rushed. Rather than really explore the emotional changes in the maturing narrator, that’s pushed to the side and instead we get a dramatic action sequence that feels like it should have another several chapters of resolution. Instead, the story ends quite suddenly. And I can see why I had it so clearly in mind that there was more – the story barely concludes, and lays out several clear directions for the rest of the trilogy.

It’s not a perfect book. Key parts of it are muddy and the components are familiar. But it has a strong enough core that I would really have liked to go on and see the rest of the story. If you want an unusual approach to magic, and don’t mind a partial resolution, I can recommend this. If you want original characters or need a truly complete story, I’d stay away.

[Suz · Rating 5 out of 5]

I first read/bought this book shortly after it came out in '90 or '91 and I still own that original paperback. It's one of my favorite books and I've re-read it over the years. It's clearly meant to have a sequel (which the author has indicated is actually coming, yay!), which is the only real shortcoming with this book (for me).

Re-reading it (it was just released on Kindle, I haven't read it again since I moved to NC) made me happy, because many books that I loved as a kid don't really stand up to adulthood. The SuckFairy and her friends have a tendency to go mucking about in old favorite, but I'm happy to say that did not happen here.

This is the story of a young woman who comes into some peculiar powers and adulthood at about the same time. Calyx is the proverbial black sheep from an aristocratic/power family. While being young, and not particularly suave, she acts afool and gets sent away from her father's "court" to a temple. She desperately wants to learn the ways of the priests, but is treated as they think a pet-daughter-of-a-lord should be (until, of course, she's fetched home for marriage or something). While there, she discovers more about an adversary that has contacted her and learns more about dreams and their powers.

I like the journey she undergoes while learning about herself, her family, politics, her powers, etc. At no point is she entirely on her own, but she's capable of finding the help she needs, herself - not relying on some special person or man. She just needs support, friends (and not romance!, though there is some present in the book - it's not crucial) to progress on her path. I just really enjoy it. She's not perfect, neither is she horribly flawed. She feels very real.

It's not the greatest fantasy ever, but it's very good, and very solid, without falling into many of the foolish traps that fantasy can have. The world building is pretty good, it's a relatively small canvas, so it's not a 1000 page tome describing everything in the world, just what the area we're dealing with is like. Very good, and I so look forward to seeing the rest of the series or at least a sequel.

[Naomi · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book was written by a good friend! She has a glorious world prepared for you all!!