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Bold as Love #5
Rainbow Bridge
It's the final curtain call for flame-haired rock princess Fiorinda and her comrades Ax Preston and Sage Pender—a 21st century Guinevere, King Arthur, and Sir Lancelot. Together, the Triumvirate have fought to save their Britain, and America—indeed, the whole world—from the depredations of a collapsed economy and environmental meltdown. Together they have fought the evil magic of Fiorinda's wizard father; they have explored the depths and heights of ultimate consciousness, the fusion between mind and the world. And they have discovered a love that goes back centuries, and lives. But is all this enough to save a world that has fallen apart at the seams, a world that has given itself over to the dark side?
376 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 2006
1 person is currently reading
67 people want to read
About the author
Gwyneth Jones
149 books108 followersGwyneth Jones is a writer and critic of genre fiction. She's won the Tiptree award, two World Fantasy awards, the Arthur C. Clarke award, the British Science Fiction Association short story award, the Dracula Society's Children of the Night award, the P.K.Dick award, and the SFRA Pilgrim award for lifetime achievement in sf criticism. She also writes for teenagers, usually as Ann Halam. She lives in Brighton, UK, with her husband and two cats called Ginger and Milo; curating assorted pondlife in season. She's a member of the Soil Association, the Sussex Wildlife Trust, Frack Free Sussex and the Green Party; and an Amnesty International volunteer.
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Displaying 1 - 9 of 9 reviews
September 5, 2014
considering that i looked for evidence and could find nothing to indicate this was part of a series no wonder i was baffled and occassionally shocked by this book,convinced there must be a backstory.
and yay! there is!
and yay! there is!
September 10, 2017
Rainbow Bridge is the fifth and more or less final novel in the sequence Gwyneth Jones began with Bold As Love (there is a sixth book set in the same universe, published several years later, but that appears to be a YA novel with a different main character, rather than part of the main continuity). It begins more or less where the fourth left off, in a near-future, post-oil England which has just been invaded and is under military occupation, and sees Ax, Fiorinda and Sage (Jones's near-future rockstar Arthur, Guinevere and Lancelot) playing a complicated game, having to work with the invaders to try to prevent further loss of life and manipulate the global political civilisation to give the world the best possible chance of surviving the coming Dark Age.
It's taken me over a decade to finish this series, despite loving the first two; it took me a while to get round to obtaining a copy of the third, and then I wasn't reading much, because citalopram killed my ability to become absorbed in a narrative, and in any case I was scared to try to face the darkness of Jones's post-catastrophe near-future. I only returned to it after re-reading The Once and Future King left me thinking that the tragedy of the Arthur story could have been avoided if only someone had told them about poly, and I remembered that that's exactly what Jones does here.
Despite reading it so slowly, I have liked the series a lot; the narrative is odd, disjointed in places, and the structure of the novels is somewhat unconventional, veering between affairs of state and the trio's polywobbles, with parts of the political action taking place offstage and merely reported in a way that would drive the advocates of show-don't-tell as an unbreakable rule of writing round the bend, but somehow it works for me. I like the characters, too, even if I have found myself wanting to smack all of the central trio with codfish at multiple points throughout the series. And actually, like Rosemary Sutcliff's novels of post-Roman Britain, which are an obvious influence on Jones (there is a chapter in Rainbow Bridge entitled 'The Lantern Bearers', and a section called 'The Shield Ring'), while the future of these novels is dark and scary and beset with difficulties, it's not a hopeless future; what matters, mostly, is love and loyalty and being able to be flexible in some things while absolutely inflexible in others, and ultimately, it's quite a hopeful book, and ends with Jones's three heroes finally able to settle down in peaceful obscurity, away from the public eye.
It's taken me over a decade to finish this series, despite loving the first two; it took me a while to get round to obtaining a copy of the third, and then I wasn't reading much, because citalopram killed my ability to become absorbed in a narrative, and in any case I was scared to try to face the darkness of Jones's post-catastrophe near-future. I only returned to it after re-reading The Once and Future King left me thinking that the tragedy of the Arthur story could have been avoided if only someone had told them about poly, and I remembered that that's exactly what Jones does here.
Despite reading it so slowly, I have liked the series a lot; the narrative is odd, disjointed in places, and the structure of the novels is somewhat unconventional, veering between affairs of state and the trio's polywobbles, with parts of the political action taking place offstage and merely reported in a way that would drive the advocates of show-don't-tell as an unbreakable rule of writing round the bend, but somehow it works for me. I like the characters, too, even if I have found myself wanting to smack all of the central trio with codfish at multiple points throughout the series. And actually, like Rosemary Sutcliff's novels of post-Roman Britain, which are an obvious influence on Jones (there is a chapter in Rainbow Bridge entitled 'The Lantern Bearers', and a section called 'The Shield Ring'), while the future of these novels is dark and scary and beset with difficulties, it's not a hopeless future; what matters, mostly, is love and loyalty and being able to be flexible in some things while absolutely inflexible in others, and ultimately, it's quite a hopeful book, and ends with Jones's three heroes finally able to settle down in peaceful obscurity, away from the public eye.
February 26, 2011
I think Gwyn Jones certainly saved the best for last. The book was amazing and finished the series off with a resounding success. I can see echoes of Spirit in this novel and to me it has more of a relationship with the world she describes in Spirit than the one in White Queen
The book is still too vivid in my mind to say much else at the moment, except I can see that I'm going to have to reread it soon. In the meantime, I will think of Ax and Sage and Fiorinda with their daughters Cosoleth and Faraj and the cat Min enjoying their well desrved freedom, even if that freedom comes at a cost.
Reread - Feb 2011
The book is still too vivid in my mind to say much else at the moment, except I can see that I'm going to have to reread it soon. In the meantime, I will think of Ax and Sage and Fiorinda with their daughters Cosoleth and Faraj and the cat Min enjoying their well desrved freedom, even if that freedom comes at a cost.
Reread - Feb 2011
August 17, 2019
Jones's disjointed style and multifaceted perspectives can be difficult to follow. Is this product of a radical England suffused by music redolent of that musical progression (now deceased) and a green future that never materialised? The book strikes a note of hope, now lost, as the culture celebrated has warped away from the path mapped by Jones. The book is now a might have been, a lost fable.
Read
January 19, 2024Note of hope
to freedom even its cost
with green road
music float in sky
strange but high
one have a code
but can take it
changet it
make dream to future
save the home with rock
from other having
from strang ourself
from gov rule
to make dream come true
to freedom even its cost
with green road
music float in sky
strange but high
one have a code
but can take it
changet it
make dream to future
save the home with rock
from other having
from strang ourself
from gov rule
to make dream come true
May 9, 2010
The cover blurb described this as "Iain Banks on acid". My immediate thought was, "Well, if I had to name an author who really didn't need pharmaceutical enhancement, Banks would be one."
Still, the comparison to Banks is not entirely inapt. Certainly, Jones and Banks share a tendency to create fantastical but fantastically detailed futures, with a bit of sex-drugs-and-rock-and-roll about them. Jones doesn't have quite the whimsical tendency of Banks - there are no spaceships with funny names or snarky AIs here.
What I didn't quite realize when I picked up this book is that it is several books in to a cycle that began with Bold As Love. While I enjoyed Rainbow Bridge, I think I'd probably have gotten a lot more out of it if I'd actually read the previous volumes. Jones is a somewhat oblique writer - or at least, like Gene Wolfe, she doesn't spell out any more for the reader than she thinks is necessary.
The book is set in a post-petroleum world of energy scarcity, in which our heroes have until recently been rock-star (yes, literally) rulers of Britain. Their rule is abruptly ended by a Chinese invasion, and they decide to play along to avoid further bloodshed, knowing that they harbor secrets that could make the Chinese rulers very unhappy indeed.
I still feel like I need to go back and read the previous books to put the whole picture together, but this book has made me fairly eager to do so.
Still, the comparison to Banks is not entirely inapt. Certainly, Jones and Banks share a tendency to create fantastical but fantastically detailed futures, with a bit of sex-drugs-and-rock-and-roll about them. Jones doesn't have quite the whimsical tendency of Banks - there are no spaceships with funny names or snarky AIs here.
What I didn't quite realize when I picked up this book is that it is several books in to a cycle that began with Bold As Love. While I enjoyed Rainbow Bridge, I think I'd probably have gotten a lot more out of it if I'd actually read the previous volumes. Jones is a somewhat oblique writer - or at least, like Gene Wolfe, she doesn't spell out any more for the reader than she thinks is necessary.
The book is set in a post-petroleum world of energy scarcity, in which our heroes have until recently been rock-star (yes, literally) rulers of Britain. Their rule is abruptly ended by a Chinese invasion, and they decide to play along to avoid further bloodshed, knowing that they harbor secrets that could make the Chinese rulers very unhappy indeed.
I still feel like I need to go back and read the previous books to put the whole picture together, but this book has made me fairly eager to do so.
February 26, 2013
And now I must bid farewell to Ax, Sage and Fiorinda having reached the end of the Bold as Love series.
It's been a weird ride. The narrative structure is disjointed and strange in a way I'm not sure I've seen before (or would necessarily want to see again), we've roved seemingly haphazardly from event to event, gig to gig, viewpoint to viewpoint. This is rather cheekily alluded to at the end of this book. I have not been able to get the slightest grasp on most of secondary characters, I still find the series opening premiss frankly ridiculous, and Jones writing style has occasionally grated.
But still I sort of loved this. And not just because this is the closest I'm ever going to get (this side of fan fiction) to having Arthur, Lancelot and Guinevere solve their silly love triangle with a threesome. Jones has consistently pulled off last minute raising of the stakes just when my interest is waning, and managed to sneak in a great exploration of how government should function in the face of economic collapse, environmental devastation, and technological expansion.
Not too shabby for a silly story about rock stars saving England.
It's been a weird ride. The narrative structure is disjointed and strange in a way I'm not sure I've seen before (or would necessarily want to see again), we've roved seemingly haphazardly from event to event, gig to gig, viewpoint to viewpoint. This is rather cheekily alluded to at the end of this book. I have not been able to get the slightest grasp on most of secondary characters, I still find the series opening premiss frankly ridiculous, and Jones writing style has occasionally grated.
But still I sort of loved this. And not just because this is the closest I'm ever going to get (this side of fan fiction) to having Arthur, Lancelot and Guinevere solve their silly love triangle with a threesome. Jones has consistently pulled off last minute raising of the stakes just when my interest is waning, and managed to sneak in a great exploration of how government should function in the face of economic collapse, environmental devastation, and technological expansion.
Not too shabby for a silly story about rock stars saving England.
May 18, 2025
I think this is the third read for this one. Incredibly, it's coming up to twenty years since the first time I read it. Although it's not the final book in the series, it's the last one featuring the adventures of Sage, Fio and Ax. I will re-read 'The Grasshopper's Child' just as soon as I find it on my shelves, but for now, I'll leave it as a treat for future me.
What can I say about this, the end of the story of the most charismatic, stubborn, talented threesome that ever loved? It's satisfying, it's a happy ending, you'll be glad to know, and it comes after another thick book full of mortal danger. The Chinese have invaded England, but luckily their leader fancies Ax. Who could blame them, to be fair? So, there's a sex show in an old prison camp, a visit to a bunch of affluent Ruskinites in Cumbria, the Adventures of Cos and Min - deserving of a book in itself - and just as we think everything is going just fine, Fio finds out that no good turn goes unpunished.
I adore these books, and I promise myself that I won't put off the next re-read so long.
What can I say about this, the end of the story of the most charismatic, stubborn, talented threesome that ever loved? It's satisfying, it's a happy ending, you'll be glad to know, and it comes after another thick book full of mortal danger. The Chinese have invaded England, but luckily their leader fancies Ax. Who could blame them, to be fair? So, there's a sex show in an old prison camp, a visit to a bunch of affluent Ruskinites in Cumbria, the Adventures of Cos and Min - deserving of a book in itself - and just as we think everything is going just fine, Fio finds out that no good turn goes unpunished.
I adore these books, and I promise myself that I won't put off the next re-read so long.
March 19, 2015
I found this a year ago as a giveaway in a bookshop in Helmsley , North Yorkshire and I've finally struggled through it and I am none the wiser. It's obviously well written but largely incomprehensible to me. But now I've discovered that this is volume 5 of 6 and if I'd have known possibly I would have started at the beginning ? Why doesn't say on the book somewhere I wonder?
Displaying 1 - 9 of 9 reviews