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Feather Stroke
Dara, an outcast girl of the mountains with magical powers and the ability to commune with birds, returns to her village where she must fight to save her people from tyrannical rule and herself from a loveless, arranged marriage.
272 pages, Mass Market Paperback
First published February 1, 1989
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Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews
April 7, 2013
Thematically very similar to some of van Scyoc's other novels, and not quite as excellent as the Sunstone trilogy - but still an enjoyable coming-of-age story.
In a new land, some wish to form new and better ways of living. But others wish to bring the old ways with them. Dara's sister makes a drastic choice to avoid submitting to old customs - but Dara herself tries to forge a bridge between different cultures, as she herself learns about her unknown heritage - a heritage which includes communing with wild birds.
A sensitivity and effort to compassionately portray differing points of view lend depth to a simple story.
In a new land, some wish to form new and better ways of living. But others wish to bring the old ways with them. Dara's sister makes a drastic choice to avoid submitting to old customs - but Dara herself tries to forge a bridge between different cultures, as she herself learns about her unknown heritage - a heritage which includes communing with wild birds.
A sensitivity and effort to compassionately portray differing points of view lend depth to a simple story.
March 7, 2021
I don't know what I expected; I was pleasantly surprised. Ms. Van Scyoc's fantasy is as good as her science fiction. The heroine is able to fly with her birds and doesn't realize she was adopted. The old country is trying to take over her world and she is reluctantly thrown into the forefront of the fight. Nothing I say can match the depth of feeling and wonder that I felt when reading this book. Recommended.
May 21, 2022
Dara is the daughter of a headsman of a village of smallpeople in a society where a generation or so ago people emigrated to a different continent to escape both the influence and domination of the powerful priesthood of the Sun God Tith and the associated suffocating social hierarchies. Local indigenous inhabitants called Ilijhari make occasional trading visits in the form of a man called Te-kia who is always closely accompanied by an eagle-like bird known as a quirri. Since Dara has strange dreams in which she inhabits the bodies of birds we know this to be significant.
Dara’s life is changed when Kels Rinari, an important, self-made trader from the city of Port Calibe, comes mob-handed with uniformed, armed men and a damen-kest to demand the hand in marriage of her sister Mirina in return for “protection.” This assertion of the renounced continent’s privileges is an unwanted harbinger of the old ways coming to the new home. Mirina can either accept the offer, refuse it, or take the third traditional option, suicide, which last would leave Dara to become the object of Rinari’s designs.
Mirina’s suicide leaves their father to take the news of her death to Rinari. On the way he persuades Dara to go to the Ilijhari for safety. Her journey is fraught but she meets and is befriended by Kentith, a renegade priest from the other continent.
Among the Ilijhari she finds she is descended from them, her true mother died in child-birth and she was given to the smallpeople to bring up since one of the village mothers had had a stillbirth around the time. It is with the Ilijhari that Dara’s affinity with birds is confirmed, her ability to inhabit their consciousnesses.
In a sequence which resonates with the history of the Americas in our world, Te-kia tells her, “The land was here, sweet and rich. And there were men and women appointed to guard the land. Wisely, they treated it as a thing of soul, living and aware, to be respected, to be preserved. …. They called themselves its children, but they understood they were its guardians as well. But after a while, others came from far shores who were stronger than the guarding peoples. The intruders were greedy and full of destructive powers. They had stolen from the earth itself and from its surrounding sphere, and they thought that whatever they chose to inflict upon the living earth and its creatures was only their right.”
On finding her father has not returned from Port Calibe Dara resolves to go there and confront Kels Rinari, relying on her Ilijhari nature to put him off marrying her. Kentith, despite the dangers involved for him demands to accompany her. The priests of Tith are anxious to capture him but in any case can bring down fire from the sun and use him as a vessel for that. Mpreover his distinctive priestly eyes make him a target for suspicious locals .
Once in Port Calibe, Dara finds Rinari to be a more complicated character than she had initially assumed and all three determine to undertake the business of combating the influence of Tith’s priests.
Feather Stroke is a pleasing enough fantasy not too demanding on the reader.
Dara’s life is changed when Kels Rinari, an important, self-made trader from the city of Port Calibe, comes mob-handed with uniformed, armed men and a damen-kest to demand the hand in marriage of her sister Mirina in return for “protection.” This assertion of the renounced continent’s privileges is an unwanted harbinger of the old ways coming to the new home. Mirina can either accept the offer, refuse it, or take the third traditional option, suicide, which last would leave Dara to become the object of Rinari’s designs.
Mirina’s suicide leaves their father to take the news of her death to Rinari. On the way he persuades Dara to go to the Ilijhari for safety. Her journey is fraught but she meets and is befriended by Kentith, a renegade priest from the other continent.
Among the Ilijhari she finds she is descended from them, her true mother died in child-birth and she was given to the smallpeople to bring up since one of the village mothers had had a stillbirth around the time. It is with the Ilijhari that Dara’s affinity with birds is confirmed, her ability to inhabit their consciousnesses.
In a sequence which resonates with the history of the Americas in our world, Te-kia tells her, “The land was here, sweet and rich. And there were men and women appointed to guard the land. Wisely, they treated it as a thing of soul, living and aware, to be respected, to be preserved. …. They called themselves its children, but they understood they were its guardians as well. But after a while, others came from far shores who were stronger than the guarding peoples. The intruders were greedy and full of destructive powers. They had stolen from the earth itself and from its surrounding sphere, and they thought that whatever they chose to inflict upon the living earth and its creatures was only their right.”
On finding her father has not returned from Port Calibe Dara resolves to go there and confront Kels Rinari, relying on her Ilijhari nature to put him off marrying her. Kentith, despite the dangers involved for him demands to accompany her. The priests of Tith are anxious to capture him but in any case can bring down fire from the sun and use him as a vessel for that. Mpreover his distinctive priestly eyes make him a target for suspicious locals .
Once in Port Calibe, Dara finds Rinari to be a more complicated character than she had initially assumed and all three determine to undertake the business of combating the influence of Tith’s priests.
Feather Stroke is a pleasing enough fantasy not too demanding on the reader.
January 30, 2022
Another pulled from storage after 3 decades. Entirely satisfactory, but I wouldn't urge seeking it out--unless the flight of bird flocks resonates with you deeply.
August 6, 2022
Dara had always lived with the simple folk and it wasn't until after the death of her sister that she became wind-touched and discovered that she was an orphan. She must go to the Ilijhari in the mountains and take a quirri - Ti-ki-Ra. She obtains flocks of wild birds. Although I had hoped she would stay with Kentith - a sun, Tith's priest - she must and chooses to marry Kels Rinari so that her childhood land - Wahonin - is not destroyed. An excellent novel.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
December 9, 2009
I found and read this on one of my mom's bookshelves a long time ago and just loved it!
Unfortunately, I thought it'd be cool to hold my breath like the woman in the book does, and I almost passed out. So kids, don't try that at home...
Unfortunately, I thought it'd be cool to hold my breath like the woman in the book does, and I almost passed out. So kids, don't try that at home...
November 17, 2010
Again, the storyline reminds me of other books by the same author. And again a girl is struggling to find her roots between different races. Same old, same old.
November 14, 2011
For a smaller novel, this book wasn't lacking in breadth, characters and story.
An enjoyable read, and a world I would like to see more wrote about.
An enjoyable read, and a world I would like to see more wrote about.
Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews