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Princess of Roumania #2
The Tourmaline
The sequel to Park's stunning fantasy debut, A Princess of Roumania .
Teenager Miranda Popescu is at the fulcrum of a deadly political and diplomatic battle between conjurers in an alternate fantasy world where "Roumania" is a leading European power. Miranda was hidden by her aunt in our world. An American couple adopted and raised her in their quiet Massachusetts college town, but she had been translated by magic back to her own world, and is at large, five years in the future.
The mad Baroness Ceaucescu in Bucharest, and the sinister alchemist, the Elector of Ratisbon, who holds her true mother prisoner in Germany are her enemies. This is the story of how Miranda -- separated from her two best friends, Peter and Andromeda who have been left behind in the forests of an alternate America -- begins to grow into her own personality. And how Peter and Andromeda are shockingly changed in the process of making their way to Roumania to find Miranda again at the end of this book.
Teenager Miranda Popescu is at the fulcrum of a deadly political and diplomatic battle between conjurers in an alternate fantasy world where "Roumania" is a leading European power. Miranda was hidden by her aunt in our world. An American couple adopted and raised her in their quiet Massachusetts college town, but she had been translated by magic back to her own world, and is at large, five years in the future.
The mad Baroness Ceaucescu in Bucharest, and the sinister alchemist, the Elector of Ratisbon, who holds her true mother prisoner in Germany are her enemies. This is the story of how Miranda -- separated from her two best friends, Peter and Andromeda who have been left behind in the forests of an alternate America -- begins to grow into her own personality. And how Peter and Andromeda are shockingly changed in the process of making their way to Roumania to find Miranda again at the end of this book.
350 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 2006
6 people are currently reading
137 people want to read
About the author
Paul Park
62 books47 followersPaul Park (born 1954) is an American science fiction author and fantasy author. He lives in Berkshire County, Massachusetts, with his wife and two children. He also teaches a Reading and Writing Science Fiction course at Williams College. He has also taught several times at the Clarion West Writing Workshop.
Park appeared on the American science fiction scene in 1987 and quickly established himself as a writer of polished, if often grim, literary science fiction. His first work was the Starbridge Chronicles trilogy, set on a world with generations-long seasons much like Brian Aldiss' Helliconia trilogy. His critically acclaimed novels have since dealt with colonialism on alien worlds (Coelestis), Biblical (Three Marys) and theosophical (The Gospel of Corax) legends, a parallel world where magic works (A Princess of Roumania and its sequels, The Tourmaline, The White Tyger and The Hidden World), and other topics. He has published short stories in Omni Magazine, Interzone and other magazines.
Park appeared on the American science fiction scene in 1987 and quickly established himself as a writer of polished, if often grim, literary science fiction. His first work was the Starbridge Chronicles trilogy, set on a world with generations-long seasons much like Brian Aldiss' Helliconia trilogy. His critically acclaimed novels have since dealt with colonialism on alien worlds (Coelestis), Biblical (Three Marys) and theosophical (The Gospel of Corax) legends, a parallel world where magic works (A Princess of Roumania and its sequels, The Tourmaline, The White Tyger and The Hidden World), and other topics. He has published short stories in Omni Magazine, Interzone and other magazines.
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July 29, 2009Not all alternate history is of the classic mold. You know the drill. Lee wins at Gettysburg, and the world is different because of it. Varus' legions aren't slaughtered by the Germanic tribes, and Rome continues on and on. The Spanish armada conquers England, and Shakespeare turns out to be a hero to the oppressed English.
The Roumania novels are definitely different. The first novel, a Princess of Roumania, started ordinarily enough, with Andromeda, Peter and Miranda slowly discovering that their modern day New England world was in fact, an illusion, an artiface. The real world is very different, where Roumania is a major power with magic at its command, and a vicious conflict between Germany and Roumania only part of the complicated politics.
The second novel takes up from the first and continues the stories of Miranda, Andromeda and Peter as they start to learn their real identities, and their destinies, in Roumania. Throw in one of the most complex and multi-sided antagonists I've read in fantasy, the Baroness Ceaucescu, a slow reveal of more of what this alternate "real" world is like, and mix well.
It's certainly not everyone's cup of tea. Its been a while since I read the first novel, and like when I read the first novel, it took me a while to get used to Park's dream-like style and characterizations. You really have to pay attention to the prose, and go with it, and even then, things aren't always crystal clear. And I am pretty sure its a feature, not a bug.
I certainly would never start the series with this book. But those who liked the first novel should and will likely enjoy the second.
October 20, 2018
So, you're Miranda and you've recently been taken via magical means to a magical land that your dad once ruled before he was killed and replaced by someone else who was also killed. Your real mom is under house arrest, your weird aunt is orchestrating stuff through mysterious letters and dreams and people you've never met want to kill you without explaining what exactly makes you so dangerous. Oh and your best friend has been turned into a dog while your other friend got his missing hand replaced but he's starting to act like someone else.
This is Roumania. Hope you enjoy your stay.
Actually, after the sort of climax of the last book we actually get Miranda to Roumania, after spending most of the first volume roaming around a forest in the Massachusetts countryside (I think . . . though they almost ran into a wendigo and isn't that a Canadian thing? or am I just assuming that because one fought Wolverine?) . . . how she gets there isn't totally clear, nor is the reason for a five year jump that things seem to take (though not across the board . . . I couldn't tell if the baroness and the elector took the leap as well) but it separates her from her friends, who at least have their own problems to keep them busy. And that's all before the vampire shows up.
The second book in the series ups the weirdness quotient by several degrees but unfortunately does nothing for any sense of clarity as to what we should be rooting for in all this. Spreading a cast out further that was already kind of spread out does the book no favors and that strange miasma that bogged down the proceedings the first time out doesn't lift and in fact gets heavier at times. No matter how much Park tries to spark stuff with a sense of mystery (a very strange conversation during a tomb excavation was actually a highlight of the book for me because it felt for the first time like the book was tapping into the vein it had been digging for all this time) it eventually sinks back into that heavy state of lethargy that it can't seem to shake. He can change the setting all he wants, he can throw in various degrees of unexplained magical events, he can toss in more characters to vaguely tell us what's going on but he can't seem to convey what this is all building toward.
It involves a gem called the tourmaline and the legend of the white tyger. The baroness seems to be trying to cement herself in the hearts and minds of the people, the elector appears to be trying to get more power for himself, both of them seem to want Miranda but since neither of them are good guys with any redeeming qualities you're just waiting for them to wipe each other out (they come close . . . the elector in particular seems to catastrophically collapse at least once per book but then get better). I feel sometimes if we had just stuck with navigating the politics of their alternate world and dumped the magical Miranda plot entirely we would have been better off, or simply embraced the magic and gone all-out . . . this six of one, half a dozen of the other approach doesn't do it any favors.
Meanwhile, everyone drifts through stuff. We get more time spend with Peter and Andromeda, which can be a mixed bag because they don't seem to like each other (and Peter keeps pining for Miranda). The fact that they seem to be turning into reincarnations of two soldiers who worked for Miranda's dad has some fascinating aspects to it, but the lack of any rules being applied to it makes it hard to embrace (like Andromeda continually and randomly turning into a dog . . . is she supposed to be a werewolf, if so then there seems to be no rhyme or reason to the changes, nor consistency to what she's experiencing). Andromeda actually could be more interesting than Peter in that she seems to be turning into a man as well, though anyone hoping for a guest appearance by Virginia Woolfe's Orlando may be sorely disappointed.
With everything seeming to take place at night or in a fogbank, without any real conflict to push against, without anyone having any aims except hoping for clarity, its a hard series to embrace. Everyone keeps moving pieces around the board without making any true progress and at times it feels like everyone is waiting for everyone else to make a move before they do anything. But when everyone does that, all you have is stasis. The introduction of the "vampire" (don't get your hopes up) is probably one of the more dispiriting aspects . . . given the prospect of an actual villain for once the book muffs the concept entirely, giving us only sporadic appearances of someone utterly normal but with an intriguing past before dispatching with him almost perfunctorily. It starts to make you wish for a struggle, any actual struggle, so that you can feel momentum building.
Alas, its not to be. While his prose can take flight, too often he's so opaque that important acts come across as muffled and buried, slipped in so subtly that you have to check back to see what you missed. The dream sequences, including an extended bit in a mythical death realm that ranks as another high point, wind up being more distinctive than the magical real world but all the stuff with impact needs to happen in the real world. The elector feints and pulls back, feints and pulls back, the baroness is so impulsive at times that it seems like she's just acting based on random dice rolls and if you're hoping that something, anything, will have resolved by the time the book ends, it just finishes like any other chapter, dangling before you the promise of actual honest to goodness climaxes in the next book. Park has enough talent and there's enough ideas here that given the length of four novels he may be able to pull this off but whoever's idea it was to structure the series this way does it a disservice.
This is Roumania. Hope you enjoy your stay.
Actually, after the sort of climax of the last book we actually get Miranda to Roumania, after spending most of the first volume roaming around a forest in the Massachusetts countryside (I think . . . though they almost ran into a wendigo and isn't that a Canadian thing? or am I just assuming that because one fought Wolverine?) . . . how she gets there isn't totally clear, nor is the reason for a five year jump that things seem to take (though not across the board . . . I couldn't tell if the baroness and the elector took the leap as well) but it separates her from her friends, who at least have their own problems to keep them busy. And that's all before the vampire shows up.
The second book in the series ups the weirdness quotient by several degrees but unfortunately does nothing for any sense of clarity as to what we should be rooting for in all this. Spreading a cast out further that was already kind of spread out does the book no favors and that strange miasma that bogged down the proceedings the first time out doesn't lift and in fact gets heavier at times. No matter how much Park tries to spark stuff with a sense of mystery (a very strange conversation during a tomb excavation was actually a highlight of the book for me because it felt for the first time like the book was tapping into the vein it had been digging for all this time) it eventually sinks back into that heavy state of lethargy that it can't seem to shake. He can change the setting all he wants, he can throw in various degrees of unexplained magical events, he can toss in more characters to vaguely tell us what's going on but he can't seem to convey what this is all building toward.
It involves a gem called the tourmaline and the legend of the white tyger. The baroness seems to be trying to cement herself in the hearts and minds of the people, the elector appears to be trying to get more power for himself, both of them seem to want Miranda but since neither of them are good guys with any redeeming qualities you're just waiting for them to wipe each other out (they come close . . . the elector in particular seems to catastrophically collapse at least once per book but then get better). I feel sometimes if we had just stuck with navigating the politics of their alternate world and dumped the magical Miranda plot entirely we would have been better off, or simply embraced the magic and gone all-out . . . this six of one, half a dozen of the other approach doesn't do it any favors.
Meanwhile, everyone drifts through stuff. We get more time spend with Peter and Andromeda, which can be a mixed bag because they don't seem to like each other (and Peter keeps pining for Miranda). The fact that they seem to be turning into reincarnations of two soldiers who worked for Miranda's dad has some fascinating aspects to it, but the lack of any rules being applied to it makes it hard to embrace (like Andromeda continually and randomly turning into a dog . . . is she supposed to be a werewolf, if so then there seems to be no rhyme or reason to the changes, nor consistency to what she's experiencing). Andromeda actually could be more interesting than Peter in that she seems to be turning into a man as well, though anyone hoping for a guest appearance by Virginia Woolfe's Orlando may be sorely disappointed.
With everything seeming to take place at night or in a fogbank, without any real conflict to push against, without anyone having any aims except hoping for clarity, its a hard series to embrace. Everyone keeps moving pieces around the board without making any true progress and at times it feels like everyone is waiting for everyone else to make a move before they do anything. But when everyone does that, all you have is stasis. The introduction of the "vampire" (don't get your hopes up) is probably one of the more dispiriting aspects . . . given the prospect of an actual villain for once the book muffs the concept entirely, giving us only sporadic appearances of someone utterly normal but with an intriguing past before dispatching with him almost perfunctorily. It starts to make you wish for a struggle, any actual struggle, so that you can feel momentum building.
Alas, its not to be. While his prose can take flight, too often he's so opaque that important acts come across as muffled and buried, slipped in so subtly that you have to check back to see what you missed. The dream sequences, including an extended bit in a mythical death realm that ranks as another high point, wind up being more distinctive than the magical real world but all the stuff with impact needs to happen in the real world. The elector feints and pulls back, feints and pulls back, the baroness is so impulsive at times that it seems like she's just acting based on random dice rolls and if you're hoping that something, anything, will have resolved by the time the book ends, it just finishes like any other chapter, dangling before you the promise of actual honest to goodness climaxes in the next book. Park has enough talent and there's enough ideas here that given the length of four novels he may be able to pull this off but whoever's idea it was to structure the series this way does it a disservice.
June 16, 2008
Why can't I stop reading these books? They're not that good!
May 31, 2019
In the second book of Paul Park's "Princess of Roumania" saga, he continues to upend everything you thought you knew about the fantasy novel. He still pushes firmly against a standard "Hero's Journey" trope by giving his characters strong senses of self-determination as well as by setting up goals that we, as readers, believe we understand, but prove far more elusive as they're neared. He also, brilliantly, tantalizes with magic without ever allowing us to feel confident in it.
Magic in the world of Roumania is accepted as a reality while also considered almost obscene and thus is rarely explicated. But don't let this fool you into thinking that when he DOES explain it that you're going to be any more comfortable. This is a world where Greek mythology, Christianity, Renaissance Hermeticism and Vampires interrelate.
"I thought a vampire was someone who sucked your blood, " she grumbled. In the humid, breezy air the statement seemed absurd.
"I never heard that."
The result of all of this fraying of the edges is that the book has an elusive sense of force, of potency. Your preconceptions are not safe and so the world that has opened before you is untameable. The tension is delicious and in those moments where, like the magic in the book, the right series of elements do seem to fall into a pattern that just about feels comfortable, it's a delight.
Magic in the world of Roumania is accepted as a reality while also considered almost obscene and thus is rarely explicated. But don't let this fool you into thinking that when he DOES explain it that you're going to be any more comfortable. This is a world where Greek mythology, Christianity, Renaissance Hermeticism and Vampires interrelate.
"I thought a vampire was someone who sucked your blood, " she grumbled. In the humid, breezy air the statement seemed absurd.
"I never heard that."
The result of all of this fraying of the edges is that the book has an elusive sense of force, of potency. Your preconceptions are not safe and so the world that has opened before you is untameable. The tension is delicious and in those moments where, like the magic in the book, the right series of elements do seem to fall into a pattern that just about feels comfortable, it's a delight.
March 9, 2021
I have no idea where this series is going, but Park has a way of holding my interest/investment in the characters even as I’m constantly whispering “what the hell” as I’m reading. At this point I’m going to trust the blurbs comparing this to John Crowley (and the quote from Crowley himself) and keep going, hoping that like Crowley’s Aegypt series, Park will bring all the disparate threads together in a way that makes sense by the end. (Or at least some semblance of sense.)
October 31, 2014
It's been a while since I read A Princess Of Roumania, and my memory of what happened in that books is a bit sketchy, but I remember enjoying it enormously, so I'm delighted to have the next three books in the series to dive into. Miranda Popescu grows up in a small town in America, only to discover that she is, in fact, in a hiding place. Our world is merely a conjuring designed to keep her safe from her enemies. She is, in reality, a princess of Greater Roumania, and when our world vanishes, she and her two friends find themselves in a North America that is nothing but sparsely inhabited wilderness, hunted by soldiers sent by the evil Baroness Ceausescu. At the end of the first book, Miranda is transported to Roumania, leaving her friends behind.
Book 2, and we discover that she has not just been transported through space, but through time. For her, it is now five years later. While Peter and Andromeda set out to find her, their recent identities as American teenagers merging with their old identities as imperial soldiers, Miranda is taken by gypsies to her aunt's shrine, hunted by a vampire and used by the German Elector of Ratisbon in his war against the Baroness.
The Tourmaline is a fantasy in the mould of a fairy tale, a princess returned to reclaim her rightful throne. But Park avoids and defies convention and cliche. His protagonist jumps from young adult to adult in the space of a page. Her friends take on new, less attractive personalities. The careful plan laid by her aunt is immediately thrown away when the letter she leaves is destroyed unread. The political complexities of Europe are beyond Miranda's grasp and the woods and shrines and caves of Roumania are filled with magics and conjurings she cannot understand.
Comparisons with Pullman, Wolfe and LeGuin abound, and there is no question that if you like those authors you should give this a shot. There is also Margo Langan, of whose dark fairy-tale style this reminded me quite strongly. It is a subtle, sophisticated, ambitious work, and I'll be diving into the next volume directly.
Book 2, and we discover that she has not just been transported through space, but through time. For her, it is now five years later. While Peter and Andromeda set out to find her, their recent identities as American teenagers merging with their old identities as imperial soldiers, Miranda is taken by gypsies to her aunt's shrine, hunted by a vampire and used by the German Elector of Ratisbon in his war against the Baroness.
The Tourmaline is a fantasy in the mould of a fairy tale, a princess returned to reclaim her rightful throne. But Park avoids and defies convention and cliche. His protagonist jumps from young adult to adult in the space of a page. Her friends take on new, less attractive personalities. The careful plan laid by her aunt is immediately thrown away when the letter she leaves is destroyed unread. The political complexities of Europe are beyond Miranda's grasp and the woods and shrines and caves of Roumania are filled with magics and conjurings she cannot understand.
Comparisons with Pullman, Wolfe and LeGuin abound, and there is no question that if you like those authors you should give this a shot. There is also Margo Langan, of whose dark fairy-tale style this reminded me quite strongly. It is a subtle, sophisticated, ambitious work, and I'll be diving into the next volume directly.
May 29, 2009
This book continues the tale begun in A Princess of Roumania in which a young woman named Miranda Popescu learned she was hidden away in our world but is a princess caught amidst political intrigue in an alternate *real* world where Roumania is one of the world's superpowers and is busy fighting off the advances from Germany in a Victorianesque era. The goings-on get even stranger in this second book (of a quartet) and we follow the exploits of Miranda and her friends Peter and Andromeda. Peter is actually a renowned soldier named Pieter de Graz and Andromeda is really a (male) soldier named Sasha Prochenko. But in this story she morphs from a dog to a young woman. Miranda also ventures into the hidden world while conjurers like the Baroness Ceausescu and the Elector of Ratisbon put their own plots into play. It sometimes gets confusing only to clear up later and I enjoyed the real sense of strangeness in this story. It's always interesting and I'll be reading the follow-up soon. It's called The White Tyger.
July 19, 2008
I enjoyed A Princess of Roumania a lot; the sequel -- not so much. While it has many of the features of the previous volume -- a complicated, slowly-unfolding plot, interesting magic, a clever alternate history that is revealed in a fairly naturalistic way (ie no huge infodumps) -- the characters this time around pretty much lack any kind of agency -- they are pushed around by Fate (or, really, the Author's thumb) which they experience as a sort of waking dream. This can be used to good effect, but when all the characters are doing it all the time, and the experiences are so cryptic... well, it was a struggle to finish. Which is kind of sad. I will likely look at the next one, but I am not exactly in a hurry....
September 1, 2010
I enjoy the plot of this series a great deal. I found the writing in this second installment much improved over the first. I very much enjoy the use of magic in these books, it's a far less complicated sort of magic than what is described in many fantasy novels. The magic in these books is more of an instinctual sort of magic, without a lot of explanation required. Something about the way these stories are structured, the natural quality of the magic, and the use of "spirit animals", reminds me of Charles de Lint. I find de Lint's writing less awkward, and his novels are usually much more cohesive that I've found Park's to be, but there is a similarity in terms of the plot.
November 27, 2008
After finishing this book, the second of a series of four, I honestly didn't have any enthusiasm to continue. Partly this is due to the fact that the author split up into four books what is essentially one. The separate books don't have individual story arcs, just another series of confrontations that the protagonists feebly struggle against. I can't help but think of this book like a soap opera. Conflicts are not overcome so much as new ones supersede the old ones. Bleh. This was even more frustrating because the world that Park created was so interesting.
May 7, 2012
This is really good! I liked it much better than A Princess of Roumania. You still have to bear with the story, because a lot of times (as with the first book) something happens that won't make sense until a whole scene or so has played out. Definitely worth reading, though, and I'm excited to see what happens next!
June 8, 2007
This was a follow-up to A Princess of Roumania. I liked it about as well as that book. They're not my favorite fantasy, and they move a little bit slowly for me, but they are definitely worth reading.
January 6, 2008
Suffers less from the pacing problems of A Princess of Roumania; I especially like the character development of Peter and Andromeda in this volume. I am looking forward to reading the last book in this trilogy.
October 4, 2012
See rating for first book lol.
November 2, 2013
Draws you in, holds you spellbound.
December 21, 2013
Seems like an interesting series. Looking forward to reading more.
July 19, 2017
I'm glad I reread this after finding a paperback copy. I remember reading it impatiently, frustrated by its characters, uneasy in its world. Now I find it wondrous.
February 6, 2009
See review for Princess of Roumania
Displaying 1 - 18 of 18 reviews