By the Mountain Bound by Elizabeth Bear – Review

By the Mountain Bound is the prequel to Elizabeth Bear’s All The Windwracked Stars and may be of most interest to those who have read that first, acclaimed novel.  For full disclosure, I have not read All The Windwracked Stars, and this may color my take on the book.  It is the story of the Children of Light, the einherjar, left alone to await the coming of the All-Father who will never arrive.  The Children have been left to uphold the Light and to be guardians of the humans who are to inherit the world when they are ready for it.  Loosely based upon Norse mythology, the story unfolds like a myth with power and force, and yet the characters seem too childlike and human to be part of a myth.

I have enjoyed many of Elizabeth Bear’s novels in the past; her Promethean Saga and A Companion to Wolves, written with Sarah Monette, were very enjoyable.  Unfortunately I found this story to be ultimately unrewarding.  It is full of unwavering doom and despair; even courage is betrayed.  I did find myself following the characters somewhat, and yet I had to force myself through to the end where I met with an unsatisfactory finale.

The main characters, Strifbjorn the Warrior, Mingan the Wolf, and Muire the Historian were at first difficult to follow.  Each point of view came with its own characteristic oddness of thought that finally became smoother as the story wove together.  At first their inner thoughts were disjointed, unclear, and seemingly unrelated.  And yet, these eventually became fuller thoughts and fewer incomplete feelings, as if as the reader gets to know each character, their thoughts become clearer.  For me, this is the one device that works in the book, and I cannot say if this was an intentional writing device or if the author moved towards clarity to aid in telling the story.

After an introduction to each of the main characters, a woman, near death, is found by Strifbjorn and brought back to the hold.  Once the woman is over her ordeal she convinces the Children that she is The Lady they have waited for and bids to lead them against a coming enemy force of Giants.  Mingan, Muire and Strifbjorn are the three main Children who are intent on not allowing the supposed Lady lead the host of the Children of the Light.  They are certain she has ill intentions when it comes to their brethren.  Their rebellion, shaky and disjointed, gains some followers but as time goes on no enemy force shows itself.  Again, I found this to be one of the flaws of the story.  The Lady’s main stated purpose is to gather the forces of the Children of the Light and lead them against a force of Giants that are practically on her heels and intent on destroying her and any with her.  And yet, there is no hint of an enemy in sight and months go by without an inkling of their existence.  As the time trickles away, the Lady actually adds to those on her side – somehow convincing these intelligent warriors that in no way could she have lied or tricked them.  Even more incomprehensible, she begins to bend their purpose to the opposite of its intent and convinces them to break all of their principles for the purpose of strengthening themselves against this mysteriously unseen enemy.

I had some trouble believing in the mythology as it seemed to have twisted upon itself.  The einherjar await The Lady to serve and yet they also await the All-Father.  Which is it and why the distinction?  And how, when confronted with a supposed Lady, are they to know?  How is it that he who set them to hold a place for the Lady cannot know if this is she?  As a reader, I felt that the purpose of the einherjar was set forth, barely explained, and then discarded as unimportant.  And thus these nearly immortal godlings, seemingly satisfied with their singular purpose, allow it to be perverted into death and hate with too much ease.  Courage was not rewarded, no hope was offered, and uncharacteristic cowardice came in at the very end for a very specific purpose.

In some cases, despair can be uplifted; doom is overridden with hope and faith.  In this case however, I was unrewarded with resolution, or even a clean end to the strife.  There were no answers here for me.  Ultimately I did not enjoy the book; in fact it was almost painful to my psyche.  Death, despair, betrayal and a calm acceptance of each as if nothing mattered.  I was enjoined to care about some of the characters, though it pained me much.  I came away with the feeling that the purpose of the story was to shoot down any stray hope that any one individual could matter at all in any capacity.  While fans of Norse mythology might enjoy this connected work, and fans of All The Windwracked stars may also like to see the seeds of that story, I would not recommend this to others.