RAINBOW ARC OF FIRE; A series review
The following is a review of the first seven volumes in the series from Will Morgan (aka Howard Stangroom). It is probably the fairest and most accurate review of the series. However, several spoilers exist throughout the review, so be forewarned.
In 1996, Gregory Earl Sanchez began publishing his fantasy series, "Rainbow Arc of Fire", about a group of gay and lesbian pagans who, over the course of the sequence, gain superhuman powers of such magnitude that they can change the course of the world. RAoF is in part a roman a clef - especially the first volume, in which the backstory of the hero, Greg, closely parallels events in the life of the author - and in order to differentiate the two figures, Greg the character is referred to by his first name (especially since he didn't get a second name until about Volume Five), while Greg the author is generally referred to by his surname, Sanchez. The review covers all aspects of the series including some of the endings, and may reveal some plot points you might not choose to have known in advance. You have been warned.
All clear? Now read on...
Vol. I: A MILE-HIGH SAGA
Greg, our protagonist throughout the series, is a man in early middle age, single, and, while moderately affluent, discontented with his life. A former member of the Air Force thrown out on trumped-up charges once his homosexuality became known, he has risen above his setbacks and achieved a degree of stability, but he still feels some purpose to be missing. When a series of coincidences - a news story on television, a chance encounter in a nightclub - draws the gay pagan group, the Rainbow Arc of Fire, repeatedly to his attention, he decides to join them on a trip to the mountains, and during one of their celebrations to celebrate the Summer Solstice, gains supernatural abilities, including perfect physical health and enhanced strength, but primarily related to the dominion of the mind - the power to read and transmit thoughts, influence behaviour, and create illusions and beliefs in the minds of others. In addition to cataloguing Greg's reactions to his new abilities, and the good he sets out to do with them, a large part of the story concerns his searching for, and ultimately finding, his ideal partner, a man named Paul, a member of the Air Force who is aware of a sinister conspiracy within that organisation that has potentially disastrous consequences. Through Paul, Greg is drawn into the last section of the book, the 'action story', in which the conspiracy is thwarted and all set right with the world - at least for the time being. The scheme is efficiently trashed and the story well told, but the whole dilemma seems perfunctory, an afterthought to the introduction of the characters and the relationships. And that's just fine. Sanchez writes with a unique voice; firstly, in his use of the present tense, second person singular - "Greg strides across the cluttered room; his eyes alight on a discarded copy of Millie the Model with a gleam of triumph. He seizes the magazine." (Not an actual quote, by the way!), which, though initially jarring, gives a sense of drive and immediacy to the narrative which rapidly draws the reader in and makes him/her feel involved in the events. He deviates from this style only very rarely throughout all the books, and this, coupled with the use of very short chapters to compensate for their sometimes oratorical wordiness, keeps up a driving pace throughout the series. Secondly. well, on reading A Mile-High Saga, one of my first thoughts was; "Crikey, I haven't read anything this didactic since Philip Wylie!". Sanchez has his own worldview, a very strong set of opinions as to what should - given the will and ability - be done to set the world to rights, and is unafraid to enumerate it in some detail. On frequent occasions, he digresses from the tale with "infodump" sequences, some merely factual, some opinion, outlining points he Must Get Through. Me, I like Wylie and Heinlein (most, not the mad ones like "Farnham's Freehold"), so stroppy authorial opinions are like mother's milk, and since my opinions, broadly, appear to coincide with Sanchez's, I found this intriguing rather than off-putting, but it could deter readers whose favoured authors are less assertive. In the very last sequence of the book, Paul, also, is transformed by a phenomenon very similar to that which empowered Greg.
Vol. II: AUTUMN SAGA
I'll start out by 'fessing up that this is by a long way my least favourite of the series. A somewhat over-calculated exercise in whimsy, I think the intended light tone falls flat, and some of the pivotal events, which change the lives of Greg and Paul - the latter now possessed of control over the classic four elements - would have been better after an in-between novel in which the characters and their relationship were more firmly established. Of course, I'm not privy to how or when the series was written, so Sanchez may well not have believed, at the time he wrote the second book, that he would have the luxury of a third, but even so, while the actions taken by Greg and Paul with their suddenly-acquired fabulous wealth are interesting, this is one instance when the pace of developments is a little too breakneck. After the most heavy-handed, expository opening chapter of the series yet, the primary plot concentrates on a ritual by Greg, Paul, and their friend Joan, a powerful witch, which inadvertently unleashes simulacra of the "Famous Monsters of Filmland" - Frankenstein, Dracula, etc. - on a local park. It's too cute, and too strained, and, while far from being without merit, feels oddly incomplete. The only one of the series I had to work to finish, so far.
Vol. III: SOULS WITHIN STONE
An unlikely, and, indeed, unpromising springboard - the pagans' intervention in the buffalo cull in Idaho and Wyoming - results in a moving and affecting story, as our telepathic hero must overcome his own reluctance to closely touch the minds of dying creatures in order to help them achieve a meaningful demise. Along the way, encounters with a band of survivalists and would-be queerbashers liven up proceedings, but once our merry band reach the locale of the slaughter, a lyrical tone develops which is entirely appropriate to the latter half of the book. Sanchez effectively conveys the sense of unity with nature that the pagan banner encompasses, and succeeds in making the oddball premise fly. Brought a tear to this old cynic's eye.
Vol. IV: WORLDS BENEATH US
If Volume Three brought a tear to my eye, Sanchez may be obscurely gratified to know that the opening events of Volume Four had this hulking great man sobbing like a baby on public transport. Thanks, pal. Hope to do the same for you sometime! The story begins with the demise of one of the hero's cats. His thoughts and feelings on the matter are sincere and heartfelt, and while some of the language may be too ornate for several reader's tastes, I found it powerfully moving - so much so that I tried to re-read it just now, to refresh my memory, and had to stop because I felt myself breaking up again. This may be dismissed as trite by some, and it *is*, unquestionably, sentimental, but I don't think that's any bad thing, as long as the sentiments are authentic. One flaw of the RaoF series is that while we are told of events that are taking place, in exhaustive detail, we are seldom shown how the characters feel about occurrences, leading to a certain detachment. Here, the feelings are prominent, and pre-eminent. The cat's death leads to the back yard of a house in Colorado where, she spent many happy years, and where Greg and a few close friends want to inter her ashes. This innocent action results in an unwitting summons to Hades, Lord of the Underworld, who promptly takes four of our heroes captive, compelling Greg and his lover Paul to go on a subterranean quest for their friends. Eventually, a confrontation ensues with the entire classical pantheon, who have emerged from long retirement and once again want to exercise their old powers over the Earth. During the course of events, four more of the pagans - the aforementioned Joan and her lover Marina, and another couple, William and Joseph, also gain supernatural abilities. Needless to say, our heroes triumph, but, although mischievous, the ancient gods do not seem malevolent, and are rapidly reconciled to their new roles, becoming, in essence, the Legion of Substitute heroes to the RaoF's Legion. The truly heart-rending (to anyone who's ever owned a pet, at least) opening sequence is rather at odds stylistically with the adventuresome romp that is Greg and Paul's crusade through the underworld, but the whole is eminently satisfactory.
Vol. V: SLIGHT OF MIND
My favourite of the series, this sees Greg stricken with selective amnesia, forgetting his lover, Paul, and becoming involved with someone else. More than that, events seem to have changed retroactively so that he and Paul never met, or became intimate. An understandably distraught Paul enlists the aid of the rest of the "Gang of Six" - who also seem to have disappeared from Greg's memory, as have Greg's powers. They track Greg and his new lover, Mark, on an extended vacation to England and then to Europe (the two regions are *not* interchangeable, I sternly remind America.) in order to discover the cause of these events. Love and betrayal are the themes of the novel, and given events in the previous volume, it won't take the Brain of Britain to determine which capricious being eventually turns out to bear responsibility. Shuffling Greg off to the sidelines, as the victim rather than the central figure he has been, is a sound tactical move, as it grants the others time in the limelight. This is the volume in which I finally felt I'd got a 'handle' on Paul, Joan and Marina, and began to perceive them as distinct characters rather than as Greg's backing group; (William'n'Joseph never did successfully separate out, and remain in my mind inextricably jumbled, like ham'n'eggs, or assault'n'battery..) the Search For Greg's Brain is well-delineated, with several amusing character bits, and the resolution pleasingly done. An intriguing mystery that engages from the beginning (one of the more accessible opening chapters of the series, too), breezily told, and if the pagans' - particularly Paul's - reaction to Greg's apparent betrayal seems a little restrained and well-mannered, well I guess some folks are just more highly evolved than others.
Vol. VI: HARMONY OF SPHERES
The Squadron Supreme volume (and please don't think that, in these comics comparisons, I'm accusing Sanchez of plagiarism; I'm merely relating shorthand parallels that I think most of the GLA will get..) sees our heroes, in effect, taking over the world in order to save it. In the face of anti-gay legislation in their native Colorado, our six protagonists are planning a joint commitment ceremony to publicly demonstrate their love. Their celebrations are postponed, however, when a rogue comet threatens to obliterate life on planet Earth, and in their greatest challenge yet, the RAoF must find a means to reach the menace, destroy it, and safely return to Earth, a series of tasks that looks insurmountable even for them. In the process, the group are 'outed', not only as gay men and lesbians, or as pagans, but as beings possessed of great power; they 'go public', and, in an interesting take on the dangers of celebrity, find the consequences of their emergence into the glare of publicity almost harder to deal with than the Menace From Outer Space. Indeed, dramatically, the comet proves to be something of a damp squib. The real issues here are the reactions of the public, and the world's leaders, in the face of impending doom; and the radical action the RAoF take in deciding to simply not permit humanity to go on destroying itself any longer.
Vol. VII: WHO HAS DOMINION?
Mn. Okay. While "An Autumn Saga", Volume II, is the book which I disliked most thematically, this is one which, structurally, gets away from me. It starts out enigmatically, with incursions into the RAoF's world from what appears to be a parallel Earth - one in which they are the subject of series of novels. Gradually, the group keep seeing these phantom books around, and experience other odd manifestations, until Greg Sanchez, the author of the series, begins interacting with his own fictional creations. So far, so good; it's a bit of a "Lieutenant Mary Sue", but that's not always a bad thing. Greg (Sanchez) and the gang set out to investigate the phenomenon, fearing that the incursions from one Earth into another may bring about The End Of All That Is - you know, the usual - and start a time-hopping sojourn that results in the deaths of several of our protagonists. It's at this point I began to get a bit cheesed off. Okay, the first death might be 'real', and is presented touchingly, but by the third or fourth you realize your chain's being yanked, and then when the Greek pantheon turn up, and are forced to replace the Norse pantheon in Asgard, (for reasons that remain foggy), and then there's big fights and everybody dies horribly, sometimes more than once.. argh. That's when I literally, lost the plot. I did finish the book, but I have very little idea what Sanchez was attempting to communicate. The first half, I liked; the second half is so incongruous that it could have come from a different book altogether, and the disparity between the two is inelegant.
What would I like to see in future volumes? Well, more on how the characters feel about what they're doing - so far, they've received incredible powers, done miraculous things, saved the planet, but they appear, with rare exceptions, pretty blasé about it. Descriptions of actions are fine (and in fact one of the things Sanchez excels at), but a glimpse into these character's interior lives would not come amiss. When Sanchez does touch on emotions, he does so effectively, therefore we know it's not through lack of ability that he refrains; but he's a little too sparing in this aspect.
I'd like to see less 'cabbagehead' dialogue - "As you know, Marina, the Albert Symphony Orchestra was founded in 1067, but the melting point of Dysprosium is 26 degrees" (again, not an actual quote, but evocative of the sort of thing that is often said, except that Sanchez's sentences tend to be longer!) - if Marina (or whoever) does know this, then there's no way she'd sit still for lengthy exposition, and the implausibility tends to grind scenes to a halt. I can understand Sanchez wanting to vary necessary exposition between narration and dialogue, but I think it's a mistake; no-one who reads the book can mistake the strong authorial voice (which I regard as an asset, in case I didn't make that clear), so why not leave the exposition to the narration, and not lumber the characters with these unwieldy speeches?
These, however, are comparatively minor points; the only questions that really matter in the case of series such as this are, "Do we want to see more?", "Will we fork out money for future volumes?" and the answer to those key questions is an emphatic 'yes, please.'.
The following is a review of the first seven volumes in the series from Will Morgan (aka Howard Stangroom). It is probably the fairest and most accurate review of the series. However, several spoilers exist throughout the review, so be forewarned.
In 1996, Gregory Earl Sanchez began publishing his fantasy series, "Rainbow Arc of Fire", about a group of gay and lesbian pagans who, over the course of the sequence, gain superhuman powers of such magnitude that they can change the course of the world. RAoF is in part a roman a clef - especially the first volume, in which the backstory of the hero, Greg, closely parallels events in the life of the author - and in order to differentiate the two figures, Greg the character is referred to by his first name (especially since he didn't get a second name until about Volume Five), while Greg the author is generally referred to by his surname, Sanchez. The review covers all aspects of the series including some of the endings, and may reveal some plot points you might not choose to have known in advance. You have been warned.
All clear? Now read on...
Vol. I: A MILE-HIGH SAGA
Greg, our protagonist throughout the series, is a man in early middle age, single, and, while moderately affluent, discontented with his life. A former member of the Air Force thrown out on trumped-up charges once his homosexuality became known, he has risen above his setbacks and achieved a degree of stability, but he still feels some purpose to be missing. When a series of coincidences - a news story on television, a chance encounter in a nightclub - draws the gay pagan group, the Rainbow Arc of Fire, repeatedly to his attention, he decides to join them on a trip to the mountains, and during one of their celebrations to celebrate the Summer Solstice, gains supernatural abilities, including perfect physical health and enhanced strength, but primarily related to the dominion of the mind - the power to read and transmit thoughts, influence behaviour, and create illusions and beliefs in the minds of others. In addition to cataloguing Greg's reactions to his new abilities, and the good he sets out to do with them, a large part of the story concerns his searching for, and ultimately finding, his ideal partner, a man named Paul, a member of the Air Force who is aware of a sinister conspiracy within that organisation that has potentially disastrous consequences. Through Paul, Greg is drawn into the last section of the book, the 'action story', in which the conspiracy is thwarted and all set right with the world - at least for the time being. The scheme is efficiently trashed and the story well told, but the whole dilemma seems perfunctory, an afterthought to the introduction of the characters and the relationships. And that's just fine. Sanchez writes with a unique voice; firstly, in his use of the present tense, second person singular - "Greg strides across the cluttered room; his eyes alight on a discarded copy of Millie the Model with a gleam of triumph. He seizes the magazine." (Not an actual quote, by the way!), which, though initially jarring, gives a sense of drive and immediacy to the narrative which rapidly draws the reader in and makes him/her feel involved in the events. He deviates from this style only very rarely throughout all the books, and this, coupled with the use of very short chapters to compensate for their sometimes oratorical wordiness, keeps up a driving pace throughout the series. Secondly. well, on reading A Mile-High Saga, one of my first thoughts was; "Crikey, I haven't read anything this didactic since Philip Wylie!". Sanchez has his own worldview, a very strong set of opinions as to what should - given the will and ability - be done to set the world to rights, and is unafraid to enumerate it in some detail. On frequent occasions, he digresses from the tale with "infodump" sequences, some merely factual, some opinion, outlining points he Must Get Through. Me, I like Wylie and Heinlein (most, not the mad ones like "Farnham's Freehold"), so stroppy authorial opinions are like mother's milk, and since my opinions, broadly, appear to coincide with Sanchez's, I found this intriguing rather than off-putting, but it could deter readers whose favoured authors are less assertive. In the very last sequence of the book, Paul, also, is transformed by a phenomenon very similar to that which empowered Greg.
Vol. II: AUTUMN SAGA
I'll start out by 'fessing up that this is by a long way my least favourite of the series. A somewhat over-calculated exercise in whimsy, I think the intended light tone falls flat, and some of the pivotal events, which change the lives of Greg and Paul - the latter now possessed of control over the classic four elements - would have been better after an in-between novel in which the characters and their relationship were more firmly established. Of course, I'm not privy to how or when the series was written, so Sanchez may well not have believed, at the time he wrote the second book, that he would have the luxury of a third, but even so, while the actions taken by Greg and Paul with their suddenly-acquired fabulous wealth are interesting, this is one instance when the pace of developments is a little too breakneck. After the most heavy-handed, expository opening chapter of the series yet, the primary plot concentrates on a ritual by Greg, Paul, and their friend Joan, a powerful witch, which inadvertently unleashes simulacra of the "Famous Monsters of Filmland" - Frankenstein, Dracula, etc. - on a local park. It's too cute, and too strained, and, while far from being without merit, feels oddly incomplete. The only one of the series I had to work to finish, so far.
Vol. III: SOULS WITHIN STONE
An unlikely, and, indeed, unpromising springboard - the pagans' intervention in the buffalo cull in Idaho and Wyoming - results in a moving and affecting story, as our telepathic hero must overcome his own reluctance to closely touch the minds of dying creatures in order to help them achieve a meaningful demise. Along the way, encounters with a band of survivalists and would-be queerbashers liven up proceedings, but once our merry band reach the locale of the slaughter, a lyrical tone develops which is entirely appropriate to the latter half of the book. Sanchez effectively conveys the sense of unity with nature that the pagan banner encompasses, and succeeds in making the oddball premise fly. Brought a tear to this old cynic's eye.
Vol. IV: WORLDS BENEATH US
If Volume Three brought a tear to my eye, Sanchez may be obscurely gratified to know that the opening events of Volume Four had this hulking great man sobbing like a baby on public transport. Thanks, pal. Hope to do the same for you sometime! The story begins with the demise of one of the hero's cats. His thoughts and feelings on the matter are sincere and heartfelt, and while some of the language may be too ornate for several reader's tastes, I found it powerfully moving - so much so that I tried to re-read it just now, to refresh my memory, and had to stop because I felt myself breaking up again. This may be dismissed as trite by some, and it *is*, unquestionably, sentimental, but I don't think that's any bad thing, as long as the sentiments are authentic. One flaw of the RaoF series is that while we are told of events that are taking place, in exhaustive detail, we are seldom shown how the characters feel about occurrences, leading to a certain detachment. Here, the feelings are prominent, and pre-eminent. The cat's death leads to the back yard of a house in Colorado where, she spent many happy years, and where Greg and a few close friends want to inter her ashes. This innocent action results in an unwitting summons to Hades, Lord of the Underworld, who promptly takes four of our heroes captive, compelling Greg and his lover Paul to go on a subterranean quest for their friends. Eventually, a confrontation ensues with the entire classical pantheon, who have emerged from long retirement and once again want to exercise their old powers over the Earth. During the course of events, four more of the pagans - the aforementioned Joan and her lover Marina, and another couple, William and Joseph, also gain supernatural abilities. Needless to say, our heroes triumph, but, although mischievous, the ancient gods do not seem malevolent, and are rapidly reconciled to their new roles, becoming, in essence, the Legion of Substitute heroes to the RaoF's Legion. The truly heart-rending (to anyone who's ever owned a pet, at least) opening sequence is rather at odds stylistically with the adventuresome romp that is Greg and Paul's crusade through the underworld, but the whole is eminently satisfactory.
Vol. V: SLIGHT OF MIND
My favourite of the series, this sees Greg stricken with selective amnesia, forgetting his lover, Paul, and becoming involved with someone else. More than that, events seem to have changed retroactively so that he and Paul never met, or became intimate. An understandably distraught Paul enlists the aid of the rest of the "Gang of Six" - who also seem to have disappeared from Greg's memory, as have Greg's powers. They track Greg and his new lover, Mark, on an extended vacation to England and then to Europe (the two regions are *not* interchangeable, I sternly remind America.) in order to discover the cause of these events. Love and betrayal are the themes of the novel, and given events in the previous volume, it won't take the Brain of Britain to determine which capricious being eventually turns out to bear responsibility. Shuffling Greg off to the sidelines, as the victim rather than the central figure he has been, is a sound tactical move, as it grants the others time in the limelight. This is the volume in which I finally felt I'd got a 'handle' on Paul, Joan and Marina, and began to perceive them as distinct characters rather than as Greg's backing group; (William'n'Joseph never did successfully separate out, and remain in my mind inextricably jumbled, like ham'n'eggs, or assault'n'battery..) the Search For Greg's Brain is well-delineated, with several amusing character bits, and the resolution pleasingly done. An intriguing mystery that engages from the beginning (one of the more accessible opening chapters of the series, too), breezily told, and if the pagans' - particularly Paul's - reaction to Greg's apparent betrayal seems a little restrained and well-mannered, well I guess some folks are just more highly evolved than others.
Vol. VI: HARMONY OF SPHERES
The Squadron Supreme volume (and please don't think that, in these comics comparisons, I'm accusing Sanchez of plagiarism; I'm merely relating shorthand parallels that I think most of the GLA will get..) sees our heroes, in effect, taking over the world in order to save it. In the face of anti-gay legislation in their native Colorado, our six protagonists are planning a joint commitment ceremony to publicly demonstrate their love. Their celebrations are postponed, however, when a rogue comet threatens to obliterate life on planet Earth, and in their greatest challenge yet, the RAoF must find a means to reach the menace, destroy it, and safely return to Earth, a series of tasks that looks insurmountable even for them. In the process, the group are 'outed', not only as gay men and lesbians, or as pagans, but as beings possessed of great power; they 'go public', and, in an interesting take on the dangers of celebrity, find the consequences of their emergence into the glare of publicity almost harder to deal with than the Menace From Outer Space. Indeed, dramatically, the comet proves to be something of a damp squib. The real issues here are the reactions of the public, and the world's leaders, in the face of impending doom; and the radical action the RAoF take in deciding to simply not permit humanity to go on destroying itself any longer.
Vol. VII: WHO HAS DOMINION?
Mn. Okay. While "An Autumn Saga", Volume II, is the book which I disliked most thematically, this is one which, structurally, gets away from me. It starts out enigmatically, with incursions into the RAoF's world from what appears to be a parallel Earth - one in which they are the subject of series of novels. Gradually, the group keep seeing these phantom books around, and experience other odd manifestations, until Greg Sanchez, the author of the series, begins interacting with his own fictional creations. So far, so good; it's a bit of a "Lieutenant Mary Sue", but that's not always a bad thing. Greg (Sanchez) and the gang set out to investigate the phenomenon, fearing that the incursions from one Earth into another may bring about The End Of All That Is - you know, the usual - and start a time-hopping sojourn that results in the deaths of several of our protagonists. It's at this point I began to get a bit cheesed off. Okay, the first death might be 'real', and is presented touchingly, but by the third or fourth you realize your chain's being yanked, and then when the Greek pantheon turn up, and are forced to replace the Norse pantheon in Asgard, (for reasons that remain foggy), and then there's big fights and everybody dies horribly, sometimes more than once.. argh. That's when I literally, lost the plot. I did finish the book, but I have very little idea what Sanchez was attempting to communicate. The first half, I liked; the second half is so incongruous that it could have come from a different book altogether, and the disparity between the two is inelegant.
What would I like to see in future volumes? Well, more on how the characters feel about what they're doing - so far, they've received incredible powers, done miraculous things, saved the planet, but they appear, with rare exceptions, pretty blasé about it. Descriptions of actions are fine (and in fact one of the things Sanchez excels at), but a glimpse into these character's interior lives would not come amiss. When Sanchez does touch on emotions, he does so effectively, therefore we know it's not through lack of ability that he refrains; but he's a little too sparing in this aspect.
I'd like to see less 'cabbagehead' dialogue - "As you know, Marina, the Albert Symphony Orchestra was founded in 1067, but the melting point of Dysprosium is 26 degrees" (again, not an actual quote, but evocative of the sort of thing that is often said, except that Sanchez's sentences tend to be longer!) - if Marina (or whoever) does know this, then there's no way she'd sit still for lengthy exposition, and the implausibility tends to grind scenes to a halt. I can understand Sanchez wanting to vary necessary exposition between narration and dialogue, but I think it's a mistake; no-one who reads the book can mistake the strong authorial voice (which I regard as an asset, in case I didn't make that clear), so why not leave the exposition to the narration, and not lumber the characters with these unwieldy speeches?
These, however, are comparatively minor points; the only questions that really matter in the case of series such as this are, "Do we want to see more?", "Will we fork out money for future volumes?" and the answer to those key questions is an emphatic 'yes, please.'.
