Thursday, July 26, 2018

SciFi/Fantasy Book Review: The Tropic of Serpents by Marie Brennan




  The Tropic of Serpents is the second of Marie Brennan's Hugo-Nominated (for Best Series) The Memoirs of Lady Trent, following up from "A Natural History of Dragons" (Review HERE).  This story tells of the second adventure of Isabella, world famous dragon naturalist, to a foreign land to study species of dragons - in this case, she journeys to a fantasy equivalent of some African land.  But of course, the study of dragons is not nearly so simple as simply journeying and observing, and it doesn't take long for Isabella to find herself immersed not just in the local dragon culture, but the culture of the local humans and the politics thereof.

  The Tropic of Serpents is a solid follow up to A Natural History of Dragons, although I'm not sure whether it's better or worse than that (pretty good) first book in the series.  The voice of the older Isabella as the narrator of the story remains very fun (as she retrospectively remarks on the oft-insane actions of her younger self) and the story I think (as a White American mind you) avoids the dangerous tropes that have been badly used in the past when setting stories of Europeans traveling through Africa.  That said, if you didn't like A Natural History of Dragons or found it only okay, you won't feel any differently about this book instead.

Note: Though the entire series is in the Hugo Packet, I actually read this as an audiobook, and the reader is very good.  So I recommend for sure the book in that format.
------------------------------------------------Plot Summary---------------------------------------------------
Two years have passed since Isabella Camherst lost her husband during their expedition to Vystrana, where she and her companions discovered the natures of Vystrani Rock-Wyrms and the potentially deadly secret method to preserve dragon-bone.  Political obstacles since then have prevented Isabella and Tom Wilker from their planned second exhibition to Eriga, to study the dragons there including the dangerous Moulish Swamp-Wyrm.  Moreover, the chemist they have hired to fabricate a replacement for dragon-bone has yet to bear fruit in his research.

But when that research is stolen by an unknown and suspected to be by another scientist with less ethical concerns about its implications, the future of dragons starts to look bleak.  And to make it worse the father of Isabella's companion Natalie is now objecting to their association and especially to Natalie joining Isabella on the trip to Eriga.  And of course Isabella's mother is protesting her leaving baby Jacob to journey in search of more dragons.

But Isabella cannot deny her urge to research dragons, so off to Eriga she goes.  But while Isabella would like nothing more than to simply examine the dragons, she finds that to do so, she will have to navigate tricky political waters in order to get permission to enter the dangerous Moulish swamp, known as the "Green Hell," in order to study the dragons in the first place.  And the Green Hell isn't just called that for no reason...and Isabella might not survive the experience to see the dragons in the first place....
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This series is a really ideal one to listen to as an audiobook, because it essentially is written like a real memoir, with the older Isabella narrating (and thus the audiobook reader narrating for her) the story, with occasional comments aside on her current views on her past actions, as well as asides about other things readers in her world might know about or might want to look up (which is a nice gimmick).  And it works really well despite maybe a little repetition (the amount of times older Isabella will stop to try and assert she was not being noble in the past is maybe a bit too much).

Still, young Isabella is a great character, essentially a female pulp adventurer (think Indiana Jones, except instead of archeology, she's a student of Dragons) who constantly gets herself into dangerous situations - frequently due to her impulsive nature and one-track-mind in terms of examining Natural History - and the result is a lot of fun.  Her companions are excellent too - Tom Wilker returns in a much less abrasive form, and he's a good counterpart who shares her interests and understands that if there's a crazy thing that will further their research, she's probably going to do it.  And then Natalie, who cameoed in the first book, is another solid addition to the cast.  Still, this is Isabella's book, through and through (to the point where those two other major characters are sidelined for the last portion of the book).

Brennan is excellent at expanding the world in this book, and as a natural historian researching dragons, that's obviously going to be a big part of this series.  Again, the setting is based clearly on a fictional version of Africa, but it's still varied and different enough to be very interesting as it is revealed to the reader.  These books are as much about Isabella exploring the cultures of new places - in this case, Eriga and the Moulish Swamp, as they are about the Dragons, and the cultures explored here are a lot of fun.  And well, the story in general features a number of just pretty damn funny moments.

Again, the book isn't perfect, but it's a lot of fun and it manages to not go too far in the silly direction to breach the suspension of disbelief needed by the reader.  If there's a fault, it's that the first part of the book, which takes place prior to the trip to Eriga and is undoubtedly dealing with an issue (the formula to preserve dragonbone) that will be followed up on in future books, is never really followed up on in this book, making it seem like a waste of time before we get to the interesting part of the story.  But overall, it's another fun adventure of Isabella, and I look forward to reading the next in the series soon.
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