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ljwritesAs discussed in Part 1 of this review, Guide Me Home by Qwi-Xux is an inspiring and well-plotted story that gives much-needed depth to the character of Ursa. Now I will discuss what I see as the flaws in that story.
My main problem with Guide Me Home was that the story was too introverted. Not in the sense that the characters were introverted or anything, but rather that at times it dealt too much with the inner life of the main character and not enough with the external details. To some extent this is a virtue, because I really do not like romance stories that go on and on about the characters' perfect physical attributes. Excessive physical description is more often than not alienating and impedes identification with the characters, which is a drawback if the characters are meant to be identified with. And it's not like the two leads are lacking in physical aspects of their relationship anyway--there's an endearing scene where Ursa gets an eyeful of Hakoda changing, and a tastefully executed sex scene later on.
What I was missing were markers of the secondary characters' identities, particularly those of the Southern Water Tribe whom Ursa sailed with. Her camaraderie with these men was one of my favorite parts of the story, and it was a bit disconcerting that I had so little to identify them with other than their names. In the absence of distinguishing characteristics or quirks, they largely remained blanks with names that I kept confusing. One warrior named Mikko stood out more than the others because he was younger and more playful and taught Ursa to use a boomerang, but other than that they all seemed interchangeable in personalities and roles. That was a shame, because it prevented me as a reader from caring about them as characters and really getting into the friendship Ursa shared with these men and Hakoda.
Another way in which the story gets introverted is where it occasionally focuses for long stretches on the point-of-view character's thoughts. I think passages like this, interspersed with action and dialogue, had more punch...
...compared to paragraphs of introspection in passages like this one:
...which is in my opinion too long and static, and should have been broken up into the action (which includes dialogue) of the story. Alternately, a lot of the above could have been edited out to let Ursa's actions speak for themselves. Actions are usually the best way to show the inner workings of a character in my opinion. I also could have done without a cliche like "knife to the heart," but that's a different discussion and one in which I probably shouldn't be throwing the first stone.
The next point that bugged me about the story is even more subjective, and has more to do with how I see stories and characters than anything else. It's also part of the unclear focus on secondary characters described above. Namely, both the good guys and the bad guys were somewhat flat. Hakoda and Ursa were both wonderfully characterized, as already discussed, but they seemed to have no real darkness to them. Even more, Hakoda's Southern Water Tribe warriors appeared to be the best-behaved band of roving armed men imaginable. As far as our point-of-view characters knew these men were all perfectly faithful to their wives, never got bloodthirsty toward their Fire Nation enemies or showed any sign of trauma or paranoia, and were all open-minded and accepting of Ursa when her nationality was revealed. They also showed no sexual jealousy whatsoever despite the fact that the leader of their crew appeared to be the only one to be getting some in two years away from home. In other words Hakoda's crew behaved like romanticized versions of ideal suburban dads, rather than hunters and warriors used to deprivation and violence. Even if we take into account the sanitized nature of the canon, I didn't find the above entirely believable because the Southern Water Tribe culture does not appear to be free of misogyny itself (as the author herself noted when I contacted her about this review). Overall, I think a bit of genuine shadow would have added depth to the SWT warriors and made them more like characters than backdrops.
But lest you mourn the demise of fictional misogyny, there is some of it to go around--at least for women of the other Water Tribe. When Mikko, one of Hakoda's men, takes Ursa aside to learn the boomerang on the North Pole, it's partly as cover from Northern Water Tribe ladies who keep throwing themselves at him and wouldn't take "I'm married" for an answer. From this I gathered that the NWT women a) are man-crazy and have boundary issues, and b) are not worth spending time with compared to spending all day throwing boomerangs with Ursa. It seemed to me a subtle put-down of other women in the story to emphasize Ursa's status with desirable men, and it's a trope I've never particularly cared for. I think it could have been a much more nuanced character moment if there had been some discussion of how little Mikko had in common with these sophisticated urban women living mostly comfortably in the midst of war, which would have emphasized the bond between Mikko and Ursa without painting the Northern Water Tribe women with such a stereotyped brush.
I asked for the author's comments on these points, and as I rather suspected, the way things came across to me wasn't the author's intention at all. Both the suburbanized Water Tribe Warriors and Mikko's flight from the Northern women seemed to have been a case of unreliable narrator: Ursa desperately wanted a sense of family and connection in the Southern Water Tribe men, and Mikko likely got a big head from all the attention being paid to the exotic stranger, some of which attention was no doubt flirtatious. I can accept that, and I adore unreliable narrators myself. I just think that unreliability would have been clearer if it were explored in the story itself; for instance Ursa might try to explain away behaviors in the Water Tribe men that didn't conform to her image of them, or Mikko's image of himself as an exotic Casanova might be jokingly debunked by Ursa or the other men.
But these complaints are just points to learn and move on from, not deep problems that undermine the story. It's been a year since Qwi-Xux has been writing fanfic and she told
me herself that she would have done a lot of things if she did them today, and really it's a problem if a writer isn't embarrased by something she wrote a year or even a few months ago. The author was very gracious about making her clarifications, and was in fact adamant that I not change my review to conform to her intentions, which I appreciate. I would be similarly distressed if the author changed her story just to fit my views; to me Guide Me Home is what it is, warts and all, and what we get out of it as author and readers is what we learn from it, and the way we improve in creating and enjoying fiction.
Continuing on the flatness of the secondary characters, perhaps it should come as no surprise that the bad guys of Guide Me Home are so completely evil, given the canon. Still, I thought Ozai was something of a wasted opportunity given Ursa's prior relationship to him and the different sides to him she must have known, which she even alluded to when she mentioned how ambition changed him. To be sure, adding depth to Ozai in a fanfic could be a tall order given how little there was to work with in the canon character. (Though the author was willing to shoulder the blame, too. :) Nevertheless, the total monsters that seemed to populate the Fire Nation with a few exceptions, plus the paragons of virtue that were the Water Tribes (except the man-snatching Northern Water Tribe women), felt unsatisfying in what is a very well-written story for the most part.
So Guide Me Home is a story with its imperfections, just like any story. Some of them might not even be flaws, depending on the reading and even on the reader's taste. I don't think, however, that its flaws should detract from the very moving story at its core, about a woman who came back from terrible trials to build her life back and grow stronger than ever before. It's a superb story of resilience and courage in the midst of war, and I highly recommend it.
My main problem with Guide Me Home was that the story was too introverted. Not in the sense that the characters were introverted or anything, but rather that at times it dealt too much with the inner life of the main character and not enough with the external details. To some extent this is a virtue, because I really do not like romance stories that go on and on about the characters' perfect physical attributes. Excessive physical description is more often than not alienating and impedes identification with the characters, which is a drawback if the characters are meant to be identified with. And it's not like the two leads are lacking in physical aspects of their relationship anyway--there's an endearing scene where Ursa gets an eyeful of Hakoda changing, and a tastefully executed sex scene later on.
What I was missing were markers of the secondary characters' identities, particularly those of the Southern Water Tribe whom Ursa sailed with. Her camaraderie with these men was one of my favorite parts of the story, and it was a bit disconcerting that I had so little to identify them with other than their names. In the absence of distinguishing characteristics or quirks, they largely remained blanks with names that I kept confusing. One warrior named Mikko stood out more than the others because he was younger and more playful and taught Ursa to use a boomerang, but other than that they all seemed interchangeable in personalities and roles. That was a shame, because it prevented me as a reader from caring about them as characters and really getting into the friendship Ursa shared with these men and Hakoda.
Another way in which the story gets introverted is where it occasionally focuses for long stretches on the point-of-view character's thoughts. I think passages like this, interspersed with action and dialogue, had more punch...
Ursa still felt so dazed, numb, like she was standing outside herself and watching this happen. Why should she be surprised? Watching her inn burn was just like watching a culmination of the rest of her life. Maybe she had just gotten too comfortable, felt too safe.
Tan looked over Ursa's shoulder and spotted the Water Tribe warriors. "Who are you?" he demanded.
...compared to paragraphs of introspection in passages like this one:
I've spent all this time trying to protect them. I've kept their identities a secret even from the person I love and trust most in the world. I keep telling myself that when Ozai is defeated, it will be safe. That it will be safe for people to know who my family really is. That it will be safe for my children.
But…they're not children anymore. If we defeat Ozai, then what? Will that leave us with two new tyrants? The world will set their sights on defeating Zuko and Azula. Because…because they're not the ones in need of protecting now. It's the world that needs protecting from them.
That truth was a knife to her heart. Thinking of what her children had become…had she protected them only to have them destroy others to continue a century-long war?
It's what they know. It's all they know. Maybe I didn't really believe Zuko and Azula would go this far. Did I really believe they were capable of killing?
Every prayer she'd had that her children would find the right path, every fear that their spirits would be bent toward Ozai's goals, every hope her sacrifice wouldn't be for nothing?they all hung in front of her, shattering her heart. It was always shattering, it seemed, when it came to Zuko and Azula. But this time, it was also breaking for the people harmed by her children.
Am I too late? Am I always too late?
No. As long as we're alive, there's a chance. As long as my children are alive, there's a chance they can learn. That they can change. There has to be.
...which is in my opinion too long and static, and should have been broken up into the action (which includes dialogue) of the story. Alternately, a lot of the above could have been edited out to let Ursa's actions speak for themselves. Actions are usually the best way to show the inner workings of a character in my opinion. I also could have done without a cliche like "knife to the heart," but that's a different discussion and one in which I probably shouldn't be throwing the first stone.
The next point that bugged me about the story is even more subjective, and has more to do with how I see stories and characters than anything else. It's also part of the unclear focus on secondary characters described above. Namely, both the good guys and the bad guys were somewhat flat. Hakoda and Ursa were both wonderfully characterized, as already discussed, but they seemed to have no real darkness to them. Even more, Hakoda's Southern Water Tribe warriors appeared to be the best-behaved band of roving armed men imaginable. As far as our point-of-view characters knew these men were all perfectly faithful to their wives, never got bloodthirsty toward their Fire Nation enemies or showed any sign of trauma or paranoia, and were all open-minded and accepting of Ursa when her nationality was revealed. They also showed no sexual jealousy whatsoever despite the fact that the leader of their crew appeared to be the only one to be getting some in two years away from home. In other words Hakoda's crew behaved like romanticized versions of ideal suburban dads, rather than hunters and warriors used to deprivation and violence. Even if we take into account the sanitized nature of the canon, I didn't find the above entirely believable because the Southern Water Tribe culture does not appear to be free of misogyny itself (as the author herself noted when I contacted her about this review). Overall, I think a bit of genuine shadow would have added depth to the SWT warriors and made them more like characters than backdrops.
But lest you mourn the demise of fictional misogyny, there is some of it to go around--at least for women of the other Water Tribe. When Mikko, one of Hakoda's men, takes Ursa aside to learn the boomerang on the North Pole, it's partly as cover from Northern Water Tribe ladies who keep throwing themselves at him and wouldn't take "I'm married" for an answer. From this I gathered that the NWT women a) are man-crazy and have boundary issues, and b) are not worth spending time with compared to spending all day throwing boomerangs with Ursa. It seemed to me a subtle put-down of other women in the story to emphasize Ursa's status with desirable men, and it's a trope I've never particularly cared for. I think it could have been a much more nuanced character moment if there had been some discussion of how little Mikko had in common with these sophisticated urban women living mostly comfortably in the midst of war, which would have emphasized the bond between Mikko and Ursa without painting the Northern Water Tribe women with such a stereotyped brush.
I asked for the author's comments on these points, and as I rather suspected, the way things came across to me wasn't the author's intention at all. Both the suburbanized Water Tribe Warriors and Mikko's flight from the Northern women seemed to have been a case of unreliable narrator: Ursa desperately wanted a sense of family and connection in the Southern Water Tribe men, and Mikko likely got a big head from all the attention being paid to the exotic stranger, some of which attention was no doubt flirtatious. I can accept that, and I adore unreliable narrators myself. I just think that unreliability would have been clearer if it were explored in the story itself; for instance Ursa might try to explain away behaviors in the Water Tribe men that didn't conform to her image of them, or Mikko's image of himself as an exotic Casanova might be jokingly debunked by Ursa or the other men.
But these complaints are just points to learn and move on from, not deep problems that undermine the story. It's been a year since Qwi-Xux has been writing fanfic and she told
me herself that she would have done a lot of things if she did them today, and really it's a problem if a writer isn't embarrased by something she wrote a year or even a few months ago. The author was very gracious about making her clarifications, and was in fact adamant that I not change my review to conform to her intentions, which I appreciate. I would be similarly distressed if the author changed her story just to fit my views; to me Guide Me Home is what it is, warts and all, and what we get out of it as author and readers is what we learn from it, and the way we improve in creating and enjoying fiction.
Continuing on the flatness of the secondary characters, perhaps it should come as no surprise that the bad guys of Guide Me Home are so completely evil, given the canon. Still, I thought Ozai was something of a wasted opportunity given Ursa's prior relationship to him and the different sides to him she must have known, which she even alluded to when she mentioned how ambition changed him. To be sure, adding depth to Ozai in a fanfic could be a tall order given how little there was to work with in the canon character. (Though the author was willing to shoulder the blame, too. :) Nevertheless, the total monsters that seemed to populate the Fire Nation with a few exceptions, plus the paragons of virtue that were the Water Tribes (except the man-snatching Northern Water Tribe women), felt unsatisfying in what is a very well-written story for the most part.
So Guide Me Home is a story with its imperfections, just like any story. Some of them might not even be flaws, depending on the reading and even on the reader's taste. I don't think, however, that its flaws should detract from the very moving story at its core, about a woman who came back from terrible trials to build her life back and grow stronger than ever before. It's a superb story of resilience and courage in the midst of war, and I highly recommend it.
