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inverarityI was expecting a furry space opera. Instead I got furry BDSM foe-yay with rape dragons.
Stardancer Studios, 2017, 396 pages
I don't share the widespread fandom hatred of furries per se, and on a writing level, I thought Even the Wingless was fine. M.C.A. Hogarth's universe obviously comes with a lot of deep lore and history, and this book might not have been the best entry point if you're mostly interested in SF and you don't mind furries in your space opera.
That said, this book was not space opera. It was endless pages of interspecies BDSM foe-yay slashfic.
Even the Wingless is set in MCA Hogarth's Pelted universe, which apparently consists of a large number of books with different subseries, the premise of which is that humans genetically uplifted Earth animals, creating a variety offurriesanthropomorphic animal races. Now it's centuries later, there is an Alliance consisting of humans and their furkin, and also a race of empathic space elves called the Eldritch. Then there are the rape dragons.
The Chatcaava are shape-changing humanoid dragonkin, although they are actually mammals. (Which makes the sex scenes ever so slightly more plausible, I guess.) They have a super-misogynistic society where all females are chattel and males constantly fight dominance games which include raping each other (which they do to establish hierarchy and trust, as opposed to raping females, which they do for fun). They also capture and enslave aliens, including humans and Pelted, and rape them too.
There are many, many pages devoted to elaborate S&M, bondage, and rape. Like, seriously, if you took John Norman's Gor series and made everyone dragonkin furries, that's the Chatcaava.
Lisinthir Nase Galare is an Eldritch prince who's been sent as an Alliance ambassador to the Chatcaavan Empire. All previous Alliance ambassadors have returned insane or dead, because the Chatcaava apparently treat alien ambassadors the same way they treat any other aliens (i.e., they fuck with them, first figuratively and then literally). Even though the Alliance supposedly has a peace treaty with the Chatcaava, the Chatcaava shamelessly engage in piracy and enslave Alliance citizens. Lisinthir is supposed to try to do something about that, as well as negotiating things like trade tariffs and finding out if the Empire is planning to go to war with the Alliance.
As background for an interstellar political intrigue, a whole bunch of things did not make sense to me. Like the Alliance's willingness to let the Chatcaava keep committing acts of war against them, or the Chatcaava supposedly being an advanced spacefaring race when the entire book is set in the Emperor's castle, where they all play medieval courtly status games with poison and killing each other with their claws and teeth. That's in between the prolonged BDSM sessions.
Lisinthir needs to find a way to win the Emperor's respect, because the Chatcaava regard all aliens as "female." It turns out that the way to be regarded as a male is to, uh, get raped and fight back, and then get raped some more. So Lisinthir spends most of the book getting raped by the rape dragon Emperor, and then they have sultry post-coital banter. Lisinthir, despite being a fragile space elf from a low-G world whose people suffer from touch-empathy, eventually becomes a bad-ass who's killing other Chatcaava with his bare hands. He also befriends the Slave Queen, the Chatcaavan Emperor's favorite sex slave, so eventually the three of them have a little S&M threesome party.
While there is a lot of psychological depth to the book, as we explore the viewpoints of Lisinthir, the Emperor, and the Slave Queen, all of whom undergo significant character development over the course of the story, I could not stop thinking that this is a book for women who love reading about hot totally straight dudes violently fucking each other. Who might also have some bondage and furry fetishes and other kinks. Ya know, not that there's anything wrong with that, but your kink, Dear Author, is not my kink.
The book is not pornographic in its detail, but it is explicit enough. Space opera with rape dragons I could handle, but foe-yay slashfic pretending to be space opera just kind of annoyed me, because the writing, worldbuilding, and character development was good enough that I probably would have enjoyed the story if it had more space opera and less biting of pillows.
Also by M.C.A. Hogarth: My review of Haley's Cozy System Armageddon.
My complete list of book reviews.
Stardancer Studios, 2017, 396 pages
The Alliance has sent 12 ambassadors to the Chatcaavan Empire; all 12 returned early, defeated. None of their number have been successful at taking that brutal empire to task for their violations of the treaty. None have survived the vicious court of a race of winged shapechangers, one maintained by cruelty, savagery and torture.
Lisinthir Nase Galare is the Alliance’s 13th emissary. A duelist, an esper and a prince of his people, he has been sent to bring an empire to heel. Will it destroy him, as it has his predecessors? Or can one man teach an empire to fear...and love?
I don't share the widespread fandom hatred of furries per se, and on a writing level, I thought Even the Wingless was fine. M.C.A. Hogarth's universe obviously comes with a lot of deep lore and history, and this book might not have been the best entry point if you're mostly interested in SF and you don't mind furries in your space opera.
An actual furry space opera.
That said, this book was not space opera. It was endless pages of interspecies BDSM foe-yay slashfic.
Even the Wingless is set in MCA Hogarth's Pelted universe, which apparently consists of a large number of books with different subseries, the premise of which is that humans genetically uplifted Earth animals, creating a variety of
The Chatcaava are shape-changing humanoid dragonkin, although they are actually mammals. (Which makes the sex scenes ever so slightly more plausible, I guess.) They have a super-misogynistic society where all females are chattel and males constantly fight dominance games which include raping each other (which they do to establish hierarchy and trust, as opposed to raping females, which they do for fun). They also capture and enslave aliens, including humans and Pelted, and rape them too.
There are many, many pages devoted to elaborate S&M, bondage, and rape. Like, seriously, if you took John Norman's Gor series and made everyone dragonkin furries, that's the Chatcaava.
Kinda the mood of the book, but switch the lizards and the humans.
Lisinthir Nase Galare is an Eldritch prince who's been sent as an Alliance ambassador to the Chatcaavan Empire. All previous Alliance ambassadors have returned insane or dead, because the Chatcaava apparently treat alien ambassadors the same way they treat any other aliens (i.e., they fuck with them, first figuratively and then literally). Even though the Alliance supposedly has a peace treaty with the Chatcaava, the Chatcaava shamelessly engage in piracy and enslave Alliance citizens. Lisinthir is supposed to try to do something about that, as well as negotiating things like trade tariffs and finding out if the Empire is planning to go to war with the Alliance.
As background for an interstellar political intrigue, a whole bunch of things did not make sense to me. Like the Alliance's willingness to let the Chatcaava keep committing acts of war against them, or the Chatcaava supposedly being an advanced spacefaring race when the entire book is set in the Emperor's castle, where they all play medieval courtly status games with poison and killing each other with their claws and teeth. That's in between the prolonged BDSM sessions.
Lisinthir needs to find a way to win the Emperor's respect, because the Chatcaava regard all aliens as "female." It turns out that the way to be regarded as a male is to, uh, get raped and fight back, and then get raped some more. So Lisinthir spends most of the book getting raped by the rape dragon Emperor, and then they have sultry post-coital banter. Lisinthir, despite being a fragile space elf from a low-G world whose people suffer from touch-empathy, eventually becomes a bad-ass who's killing other Chatcaava with his bare hands. He also befriends the Slave Queen, the Chatcaavan Emperor's favorite sex slave, so eventually the three of them have a little S&M threesome party.
While there is a lot of psychological depth to the book, as we explore the viewpoints of Lisinthir, the Emperor, and the Slave Queen, all of whom undergo significant character development over the course of the story, I could not stop thinking that this is a book for women who love reading about hot totally straight dudes violently fucking each other. Who might also have some bondage and furry fetishes and other kinks. Ya know, not that there's anything wrong with that, but your kink, Dear Author, is not my kink.
The book is not pornographic in its detail, but it is explicit enough. Space opera with rape dragons I could handle, but foe-yay slashfic pretending to be space opera just kind of annoyed me, because the writing, worldbuilding, and character development was good enough that I probably would have enjoyed the story if it had more space opera and less biting of pillows.
Also by M.C.A. Hogarth: My review of Haley's Cozy System Armageddon.
My complete list of book reviews.
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Date: 2024-01-20 09:45 pm (UTC)