Grayson's Inheritance, Part 3

My last post on this laughable book. At least, I think this is the last. I can't believe I've written this many posts on a book that was barely literate. I finished my skim read of it last night. Since Dick's traumatic childhood didn't have as many focal points as Roy's, Devin had to create a lot of other stuff for him to keep the flashbacks somewhat balanced. There was a lot of happy circus scenes that bored me. And most of the Dick and Batman scenes in flashback weren't as interesting as Roy's past simply because they went over much more familiar territory.

Dick calling Ollie "sir" made me nearly choke at times. I don't think I've ever heard anyone, let alone Dick, call Ollie "sir." And since it's made clear that this story takes place after Roy was shot in The Outsiders, an issue where Dick is giving guest star Ollie orders, it's clearly wrong. Dick doesn't defer to Ollie as his elder.

p. 180, bottom. A reference to Dick's old Robin costume in Ollie's thoughts as "cute" made me nearly want to barf. Nevermind the homosexual subtext, and not that sub, either; this bordered on pedophilia. Ollie always struck me as someone who was tolerant of people who were different, including gays, as long as he didn't have to deal with it in his family. Ollie has always been Mr. Macho, and the sexual byplay, innuendo, etc of these scenes were bizarre. Sure, he takes some perverse pleasure out of Roy following his lead in being a healthy, sexually active with women sort of guy, and he might question someone's manhood (and likely not in a nice way), but I seriously doubt Ollie would ever engage in thoughts or teasing when it comes to boys of any age below the age of consent. I can't imagine him thinking any costume on a man or boy as being "cute."

p. 331. Roy has stubble on his unshaven jaw. Well, duh. I wouldn't expect him to have it on his shaven jaw. That's just sloppy writing and sloppy editing.

The best part of the book, if any part of this could take on the descriptor "best," is the end when Dick, Roy, and Garth get together. The friendship of the original 5 Teen Titans is something special and one thing Devin rarely screws up. I especially liked Dick telling Roy that Ollie told him how Ollie and Roy had met and Roy asks which story, telling Dick they were all fabricated. It was a neat bit of retconning because while the original origin tale(s) might've been fine for the 7 Soldiers era, or even the Silver Age, it doesn't make much sense in modern times. And that Ollie would exagerate things, including his own origin (which I wasn't as happy about), makes sense.

So, there you have it. A bizarre book featuring my favorite DCU characters that had me wishing someone would write a good book about them.

Holy Moley, Batman!

Sorry, dear readers. I can't help myself. I have to pick this so-called novel apart. Did no one edit Devin Grayson's Inheritance? Did no one edit it who had at least a high school education?

Cases in point:

• p.94. Except for a heavy exhale that escaped from his nose... (Uh, Devin, hon, exhale -- and inhale, which you've also misued -- is an f'in verb. Learn it. Use it. Embrace its power. People exhale breaths, air, whatever. The actual breaths are exhalations. Got it? Good.)
• p 108. ...perhaps the medical infirmary. (Um, Dev, sweetie, according to the dictionary, an infirmary is a place where the sick, or infirm, get treatment. If that's not medical, I don't know what is. What else could an infirmary be used for? This is not the only redundancy I've found. You must learn how to kill your darlings. Trust me. You'll be a better writer for it.)
• p. 109. ...he was immediately forced to go flat on his stomach, facedown as he clung to the roof of the speeding vehicle. (Great Googly Moogly, Devin, how else would you go flat on your stomach? Face up? Sheesh. I think we can figure that one out without the explanation. Truly. Trust your readers. They really are smarter than bricks. I know it might not seem like it, but you only demean your writing by explaining every little thing. This is almost to the level of mentioning a cat, then explaining it to be a fuzzy animal that licks itself and purrs.)

That's enough nitpicking for one night. They are rather large for nits.

More Thoughts on Grayson's Inheritance

Devin Grayson clearly understands Roy better than she does Dick. I don't think she's got Roy nailed, exactly, but she's close in her portrayal of him. But Dick? Not since his teens has he been so easily intimidated by authority figures, including Batman. He's also a natural leader, not a follower, which isn't coming through at all in this book. He hasn't "hungered" for praise, from Bats or anyone, ever. He once was eager for it, but even that is in the past. Dick's a fairly self-assured, well-adjusted young man, given his odd background and life.

In fact, Roy and Dick seem to be written as teenagers rather than young men in their early '20s. It's disconcerting. Aquaman seems completely out of character, especially in his dialogue. And dialogue isn't all that's at fault. Too often, Devin's sentence structure seems wooden or reads as if it's a manual for a book. Too often, she's seems obsessed in describing the guys in ways to reveal facts about them not germaine to the scene or in a jarring way. That's where a lot of the Hardy Boy syndrome comes in.

Twice within 20 pages or so, we're told Lian is Roy's 5-year-old daughter. Granted, not every reader will be familiar with him and his background, but the memory of the average reader could probably retain that fact for a couple of hundred pages. And most readers of the book will have passing knowledge of the DCU. I doubt anyone else would want to read this. (Go ahead, someone; prove me wrong.)

An example of her awkward descriptions has Dick being described as a former acrobat jumped out at me. Granted, it's Roy's thoughts as he's comparing himself to Dick (p.57) and soon enough, there's a fight scene, so there is some context, but it struck me as being there solely to feed readers a bit of background on Dick not needed there. Plus, it's inaccurate. He's still an acrobat; he's just not getting paid for it. But he sure is acrobatic as Nightwing.

Her overuse of the word "even" as a modifier has me ready to pull out a red pen and strike them out of the book. And I think the book is written in the omniscient point of view, albeit a sloppy form of it.

*sigh* I'm on page 79 of 336. Maybe someday, someone will write a good novel about Roy, Dick, Ollie, and Bruce. This isn't it.

Devin Grayson's Inheritance

I bought Devin Grayson's Inheritance when it came out. An attractive paperback, it focused on a couple of my favorite characters, Arsenal and Nightwing. I skimmed through it in the store and admittedly, didn't think there was much to the story, but there were nice enough flashbacks for the guys, and since I trusted Devin to understand the characters since I enjoyed her run on Outsiders and some of her Batman and her Nightwing stories, I bought it.

I didn't really want to read it, so I skimmed it, looking for the good parts, mostly the flashbacks. It wasn't all that impressive and I set it aside. Little did I realize how entertaining it could be as this LiveJournaler has found.

Apparently, I had missed a lot of man-on-man (I hesitate to use the word gay, because I don't consider taking characters I consider straight and putting them in homosexual relationships, known as "slash" to be gay) sexual innuendo. I've now started to read the thing. I'm still skippingover the actual story/plot points, aka the scenes with none of our heroes (Batman, Green Arrow, Aquaman, Nightwing, Arsenal, and Aqualad). And I am stunned. As maelithil, the LJer, says:

"It defies logic and explanation, it's Lord Kind Bad Novel and Porno Rag In
Syllables all in one. She either bribed the editors or shot them, I can't decide
which. I can't believe DC published this. If you thought she was outspoken in
certain interviews, you ain't seen nothing yet."

There are some entertaining excerpts on the LJ.

It's not just the suggestive content that boggles my mind. I remember a Star Trek: Original Series novel that was pulled and re-edited before being republished, to remove suggestive slash passages, slash having originated (in its current form; I'm sure the idea has been around a very long time, but Star Trek man-on-man sex was called Kirk/Spock, abbreviated K/S, which got known as slash when it referred to other characters due, of course, to the / mark. Except for some purple prose, that Trek book wasn't bad at all, well above the average fan fiction novel. I wish I could say Devin's effort reads as well as that. It doesn't come close.

So far, and I'm not all that far in yet, it's reading like a Hardy Boys tale without the earnestness and innocence. Actually, books on the Hardy Boys's level are better because they are what they are and they aren't striving to be something more. They're books for kids. Simple, straightforward prose. Devin's book, ostensibly, based on its shelving with adult books in my local B&N (in the science fiction/fantasy section -- yeah, it's fantasy, all right), is supposedly an adult book written for someone first learning English. The prose is as flat and unemotional as an average piece of wood, except when it's also awkward and/or unintentionally funny.

I wasn't expecting great literature, but I was expecting solid writing, not something that comes across as amateur hour on paper. And as maelithil said, I wonder how this thing got published. Did the editor actually read it? Who was the audience? Did they think the innuendo would go over the average fanboy's head? Did it go over the editor's head? Has the standards of good writing taken such a blow at the book division that drek like this is publishable? I expect this level of prose from PublishAmerica, not a major book publisher.

Has anyone read it? Care to comment?