Book Three -- To Serve and Submit by Susan Wright

To Serve and Submit
Susan Wright
Fantasy
300 pages

So a while back Jacqueline Carey wrote a book called Kushiel's Dart that takes place in a sort of alternate Renaissance Europe. The main character, Phadre, is a courtesan and spy, as well as a very serious masochist. The book is a fun combination of action/adventure, fantasy and the occasional kinky sex scene (which, unlike the Anita Blake books, serves the story instead of the other way around), the world-building is interesting and the writing, while a tad purple in places, isn't dire. The book sold well and so far there are two trilogies set in that same world.

I picture Susan Wright reading Kushiel's Dart and thinking, 'I can write that!'

It was at the point where I thought: 'oh hey, is that a spaceship?!' that I really really wish she hadn't.

The book is set in an alternate universe that resemble Northern Europe of the Viking era; it's heroine, Marja, comes from the fens of Alternate Saxon England. She's unusual because her mother is part Skraeling from the New World (Wright doesn't even bother to invent a new word, she just uses the Norse name for Native Americans) and because she can see the spirits. Of course, she's beautiful, if a bit grubby due to being a child of nature and the fens and also, poor.

Enter Lysander, a gorgeous hunk of slave trader who has his own longboat and roams around buying only the most beautiful boys and girls, which he then turns around and sells as sex slaves. But classy ones, mind you, all trained up in submission and pleasure techniques and so on. Marja pretty much falls for him at first sight and convinces her family to sell her. As one would.

So off to Lysander's compound, which for some reason is referred to as a haushold, because nothing adds that spark of the exotic and makes the reader feel all smart and stuff like an occasionally untranslated word, the meaning of which is obvious. Anyway, Marja gets trained (in a series of scenes which are neither very graphic nor well-written and once more depend on untranslated words so Wright doesn't have to decide which euphemisms to use for body parts or sex acts) and also annoys Lysander's partner/wife because she's just so lovely and also, Lysander obviously has a thing for her. Marja is, of course, a natural and superb submissive.

There's a disastrous trading trip during which Marja ends up taking a noblewoman named Silveta's place and getting raped, which ends up with Lysander and Marja being banished from that particular part of the world. Then, her training finally over, Marja is about to be sent to Lysander's mysterious home land on a "winged ship" that appears out of nowhere, when two things happen. One, my dislike of this book becomes active loathing (spaceships?!) and, two, Lysander decides that he loves Marja too much and not only can he not send her off to be the plaything of some cruel Master or Mistress on his planet, but that he must work to end the icky sex slave trade.

He sends her off, telling her he'll meet up with her later, and it's easy to guess that doesn't go well.A fter a series of stupid misadventures, Marja ends up throwing in with Silveta, whose husband has died. The rapist guy is going to become ruler of the land and take Silveta, so the two women run away, trying to recruit an army to help them get back what belongs to Silveta. Along the way, Marja sleeps with just about anyone who gives her the glad eye and in the end, in spite of Silveta's claim to the land and Marja sexing people up to make deals, they are saved by a male deus ex machina.

I could have liked this book if:

1. Wright were a better writer and had depended on more than a few untranslated words to set up her world. I'll forgive a lot if there's good world-building going on.

2. The plot had been less predictable, or more entertaining, or just better.

3. It had been pure porn for the sake of porn, at which point I wouldn't care about the quality of the writing or the plot.

4. The two women, both of whom did grow a little and learn things in the course of their adventures, saved their own asses and won the day for themselves.

Since none of those things apply to this book, the whole thing (including the spanking scene) was pretty much a yawn and if I weren't doing the Cannonball Read, I'd have never finished it. Its only two redeeming qualities is that it's one hell of a fast read (it took me about an hour), and the fact that I got it used for the cost of shipping.

There's at least one more book in the series, but, yeah...whatever.