Parenthetical

Boyfriend E, video game fan extraordinaire, caught sight of this lying on my coffee table and cracked up. He played the original game as a kid, of course (if someone wants to fix that Wikipedia page, by the way, it could apparently use some fixing), and expected from the cover that this would be based on the more recent versions. “It’s actually kind of good!” I insisted.

But he’s right; the cover doesn’t really convey that. You can’t see it from my jpg, but the letters are sparkly gold stars, like the cover of some straight-to-video Disney junk. Shirin is shown looking all sexy with long hair and cleavage, even though she spends most of the book with short hair, kicking ass. And the prince at the top is posed like Super Mario jumping over a koopa. The whole thing says “cheesy video game nostalgia fest,” and that’s a shame, because I rather enjoyed the book within.

There’s a lot going on in the plot, but basically it switches back and forth between two time periods in early-C.E. Persia. In the first, there’s a power struggle for the throne, which leads ousted prince Guiv to disappear to the desert. A few centuries later, Shirin, the daughter of the decadent governor, finds out that there’s some bad stuff going on outside her sheltered palace, so she poses as a boy and runs away to find out for herself. She ends up hooking up with a young man obsessed with the stories from Guiv’s day, and leading a revolution with him against her own father.

Some bits were a little hard to follow, but the story kept me turning the pages. It has all the “we must wait for the one who is destined to rule us” garbage that I’m so tired of, but that’s moderated by some strong female characters who are unhampered by destiny.

I was also impressed by the way the art delineates the older story from the newer one. Guiv’s story uses super-saturated bright, warm tones. Shirin’s story uses more muted blues and purples. Even at the end, when the story switches back and forth between the two time periods quickly, I could always tell which one was which. It’s an elegant and beautiful solution.

I have no idea how much the story has to do with the game(s), but of course that doesn’t really matter — the book has to stand alone, and it does.

* The credits are too long for the title on this one, but credit where it’s due:
[Original game] Created by: Jordan Mechner
Written by: A. B. Sina
Artwork by: LeUyen Pham and Alex Puvilland
Color by: Hilary Sycamore

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