Valdemar Revisited

They are fine. It’s fine. They are fine. Those Valdemar books by Mercedes Lackey.

Recently, I’ve read another couple of Valdemar books, including an omnibus about Tarma and Kethry, the pair of a warrior and a sorceress, Brightly Burning, a tale of fire-gifted Herald, and Mage Storms omnibus, which is just the penultimate sequence in Valdemar’s universe’s chronology. And if you don’t know what’s going on, it’s about a fantasy kingdom of Valdemar, guarded by Heralds and their horse-shaped Companions. But, of course, there are other ethnic groups in this universe, such as Hawk Brothers, and other organizations, such as Sworn Sisters of the Goddess. Sounds cheesy? Sounds too typical? To my mind, it’s still better than many other fantasy series. Because it’s just openly YA, and it had been so even before anybody came up with the very idea of specifically YA books. And as for the child of the nineties, it has aged well, better than Harry Potter, to my mind.

In Valdemar series, you have everything. You have young protagonists, you have an important message on friendship and cooperation, and you have diversity, not tokenism. There are gay people in this series, asexual people, bisexual people, and there are ethnic minorities and people of colour, some of them based on Native Americans and some, although more loosely, on Middle Eastern people. Sure, there are problems to it, such as portraying Karsites as enemies and religious fanatics, and making stereotypes on Native Amercans… uhm, Hawk Brothers loving nature. But there is time and place for everything in Valdemar Series, and thus we are given the Karsite perspective, and we are introduced and led by so many Tayledras (Hawk Brothers) characters that we gain a better understanding of their culture.

The more you get into Valdemar tales, the more you see that it is a story of mutual understanding, of uniting against a common enemy, of forming new bonds, of breaking the old prejudices and enmity. There are cheesy parts to it, or not very subtle ones, but it is, at least, hopeful. But there is also a more realistic side to it, the one in which Lackey’s intrigues prove no worse than those in contemporary YA books. Mage Storms trilogy captures quite well grey characters and secretive plots. And although in other sub-series some plots may seem generic, there is still a bigger pattern to it, with classical background of ancient wars and magic artifacts, and mysterious remnants. Of course we’ve seen it many times, but at Lackey’s, it feels thrilling, not boring. There’s a certain pleasure of making out the way the author uses well-known tropes, and Valdemar Series gives you a lot of that.

But it also gives you things which were unusual for 1990’s books, such as the trope of female friendship or LGBT people representation. The former sounds the strongest in the books on Tarma and Kethry. Adventures of a sorceress and a warrior hunting demons and taking revenge for abused women may be generic and sometimes turns grim, but it also captures the relation we usually see from the male-team perspective; a sisterhood in fight. And unlike some other authors, Lackey never fetishizes female suffering and female sexuality. If gritty things appear, they appear on purpose.

Still, I think that her best books are those centered on Valdemar and on its changing relations with other cultures and countries. Valdemar is the place depicted most vividly in this universe, with a convincing culture and set of ancient traditions. It’s also a welcoming place where people escaping war and magical havoc can find their shelter. And this question, once risen, is actually very up-to-date in those books. Because cooperation above differences and prejudices gives hope. The notion that we can live side by side in concord gives hope. Such is Mage Storms trilogy and such is the trilogy about Darian, an owl mage.

And if books give you hope, they are good books.