Chalice – Robin McKinley

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Chalice is a different reading experience from the Robin McKinley versions of classic fairytales like Beauty and the Beast. It really is another world and it takes some time to sort out what is going on and what it means. Once you work your way in, you are hooked, though, and it’s a fast clip through the action of the plot to the very satisfying finish.

In the demesne of Willowlands, Mirasol is a beekeeper from one of the old families. She hears the earthlines murmur and protest and her abilities land her the position of Chalice when the Master and the Chalice die in some disaster of disharmony with the forces of nature they govern. The demesnes are kept whole and balanced by the Master, Chalice and Circle—each has a specific role. The Chalice must bind the land and people and the Master together to create a profound harmony but Marisol despairs because there is no Master and she does not have the long years of apprenticship that prepare someone for her role. As she struggles to absorb myriad arcane rules and protocols and provide the service required of a Chalice, she takes frequent refuge in her small woodright and tends her bees. Bees and honey she knows better than anything else—Marisol’s honey is the best in Willowlands and it has energizing and healing powers.

And then the Circle sends for the old Master’s younger brother to be the new Master. The younger son of another old lineage, he was shipped off to become a Priest of Fire when his arrogant brother became Master. Now he returns to protect the land and no one knows if someone who is far into the process of becoming Fire can even be around humans or safeguard Willowlands. An accidental touch from him will sear flesh right to the bone.

Intrigue abounds. Outsiders arrive to wrest control from the half-Fire, half-human Master.  Marisol tries to win the trust of the people and perform the Chalice rituals that keep the land from tearing apart. The story is amazing, unexpected, beautifully written and engaging. It’s fantasy but not a classic fairytale. There is trickery, romance, challenge, cataclysmic upheaval and villainy to deal with. Marisol inadvertently commits a grievous error that could destroy the land and will certainly wreck her own life. It’s an odd story but never a dull one.

Robin McKinley must live in another realm entirely when she writes these books. Chalice is such a completely realized world—and such a complex and foreign one—that I can’t imagine how she moves into that space to write and then emerges to have lunch or talk to ordinary people. Bravo to her for pulling it off, though. The bees are a force to be reckoned with and so, in the end, is the beekeeper. You can almost taste the honey, feel the fire and the fear, and see the spells that heal villagers and rifts in the land as the Chalice works her uncertain magic, hoping somehow it will be enough.  

Chalice    Robin McKinley | Firebird  2008

The Hero and the Crown — Robin McKinley

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Robin McKinley does literate fantasy with enormous intelligence and a sure command of story. Her re-imaginations of Beauty and the Beast and Sleeping Beauty are revelatory and emotionally satisfying. Her heroines are strong and believable in ways more female protagonists should be. The Hero and the Crown won a Newbery Medal for its characters as much as its flawless craft. The story draws you into a world that seems real from its first detail to its last litter of puppies in the middle of the royal featherbed. It is Aerin’s story but it is a classic hero’s journey and every girl who reads it should get a few ideas. Every boy who reads it should re-examine a few.

Aerin is the king’s daughter, child of a mother who died at her birth, a mother who was considered by the good folk of Damaria to be a witch. So Aerin’s place in the kingdom is far from assured and she is the merciless taunt of her gorgeous and shallow cousin who schemes for power and position. The people believe Aerin may be a witch-child, a sol who has no apparent magical gifts, uncommon blazing red hair and white skin and a tendency toward unladylike pursuits.

From earliest childhood, Aerin has been inseparable from her friend Tor, the appointed first sola or heir to a king with no male children. Tor teaches her swordplay and confides in her but even Tor can’t define where Aerin fits in and what she is meant to be. She heals and tames her father’s injured war horse who has been turned out to pasture, teaching herself to ride hands-free and wield sword and spear on horseback. When she discovers an old formula for a fire-shielding ointment, she determines to perfect the recipe and become a dragon-killer—the dragons being fiercely volcanic vermin that terrorize the countryside, although they bear little resemblance to the legendary flying monsters that are long gone from Damaria.

Arlbeth, the king, refuses to take his daughter to battle with threatening dissidents from the North so Aerin sets out in secret to destroy Maur, the horrifying Black Dragon now returned, a massive evil presence laying waste to villages and farms at the outskirts of the kingdom. Her adventures are epic, her encounters deadly and the consequences of the lethal struggle with Maur set events in motion that spin wildly through tragedy, deep magic, heroism and destruction to the story’s conclusion.

McKinley has written another terrific tale, a fantasy with no fairytale princess but a tough, smart and battle-scarred heroine who shies away from the people who mistrust her and is desperate to prove her place. Aerin is funny, irreverent and brave. She is also impulsive, awkward and a miserable dancer. Her uncanny empathy with animals and the powerful magic she doesn’t realize she has propel her on a journey into a Tolkienesque hell that she undertakes as if fate compels her. Fate does. Aerin is no ordinary mortal but she is an extraordinary heroine and her quest captivates us. I rooted for her, even as I wanted to shout, “Go back! This is a really bad idea!” But there is no turning back. The losses are losses that can’t be redeemed; the victories are bittersweet. The story unspools as intensely visual as a film and I was sorry to leave the world McKinley created as I turned the last page.

 The Hero and the Crown    Robin McKinley | Firebrand 2002