Customer Reviews

A Brother's Price

5 star:		(28)
4 star:		(16)
3 star:		(12)
2 star:		(8)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

Jerin is nearly sixteen, and soon his sisters will sell him off to other women as a husband so they, too, can buy a husband. But while his slightly older sisters neglect their duty, he helps his younger sisters save an injured princess.

The story starts there, and never stops moving forward. Jerin has been raised unconventionally for his world. He reads, writes, and knows self-defense as well as tactics and strategy. His kind heart and bravery stand him in good stead as he faces moral and physical danger, and overcomes it.

Other reviews have focused on the astonishing world-building Wen Spencer did for A Brother's Price, and then get caught up in the political and moral implications of the world, rather than seeing the story as a very fun tale with a resourceful young hero. Because they disagree with the politics of the story, they have marked the tale lower. It seems to me that this story was written as a reaction to some of the "feminist utopia" fiction that was written in the 1970s and 1980s. It's not so much a "nurture determines all" world as it is a world where everyone is human, with human ambitions, frailties, and gifts.

Although the prose isn't as jewel-like as the Ukiah Oregon books, I still intend to keep this book, and re-read it many times. The story is a rollicking adventure story with a plucky young thing, determined to protect both his new family and his birth family.

Wen Spencer, the innovative author of Tinker and the Alien Taste series, has once again rung changes on the historical bodice ripper plot of the family daughter sold to enhance the family fortune.

In this case, the female roles are reversed, with men being the protected and virginal ones, and the women serving as soldiers, butchers, bakers, candlestick makers and rulers. Spencer is so matter-of-fact with the milieu that we are left with questions only after the story is over. Why is the ratio of women to men so skewed? How did these women create a society like this, with approximately early 19th century tech?

Wen's writing is so good that you don't really start asking those questions while you are reading the book. Like time bombs they only occur to you afterward. Wen invokes a nearly indestructible willing suspension of disbelief, and does it so easily that it is hardly noticeable.

I'm looking forward to a sequel. Please let there be a sequel.

Walt Boyes, the Bananaslug. at Baen's Bar

I thought this an original and thoughtful novel. The concept of a female dominated society with a shortage of males was intriguing to me, because of the realism. Many people (both female and male) have voiced the opinion that if only women were in charge of the world, the world would be a far better place. Obviously the author of this book, doesn't buy that concept. The world portrayed in this novel is as screwed up as any male dominated society in our own history. What with brothers being sold to multiple wives or worse being sold to a slave brothel (called a crib in this book).

With many novels I tend to imagine myself in the settings that are portrayed, NOT WITH THIS ONE. I'm a guy, living in that world sounds like a d**n scary thing to do. I enjoyed the book, but wouldn't want to live there. I hope that this is the first of a series. I would really like the author to explore the relationships between countries and the impact that the female/male ratio has on those political relationships.

The technological level portrayed in the books seems to be a mix of American West (Post Civil War) and the Civil War period. The author seems to present the fabled fast draw skill of the American West as being a necessary skill of her Queensland soldier in the novel. It might be that in her envisioned world, more emphasis is placed on the warrior attribute (the lone fighter), than the idea of organized and disciplined soldiers. As I said earlier, I hope there are more explorations into this world.

Love Wen Spencer. Love her stories. This book, actually, is pretty good. It's not Spencer's fault that the book left an unpleasant aftertaste. As a feminist, you'd think I'd just say "You go, Girl" to any writer who turned the tables so completely on gender roles and stereotypes. You'd think! The lead character is beautiful, feisty, naive, beddable (sp?) and perfectly happy with a future filled with the propagation and rearing of the species. The romantic interest (no spoilers here!) is commanding, authoritative, and seduces the lead character in a matter of oh, 5 sentences. From which a Great Love is born. The dizzying spin on the story is, of course, that the lead character is a boy, and the romantic interest a woman. But, the very things that make me crazy when it's a female protagonist, are making me crazy here with a male. I don't like to read about the diminishment of anybody, and the condescension of the dominant women toward the submissive male was just as infuriating as it would be in the reverse. Maybe I would have felt better if the love story had been at all developed. Spencer does not do love stories well, which is very odd. Often the romantic interest is attractive and interesting, but Spencer just will not generate any mood or atmosphere in which you can see love grow. Nope, love just is, which makes for a boring love story. Fortunately, the love angle is the least important element of Spencer's interesting tales. This book is worth purchasing, because Spencer always entertains. Unlike the Oregon and Tinker books, however, it is not a keeper. If the genre had more good authors like WS, this books rating would be lower. Since most of the books out there are crap, I'm grading this one on a curve.

Spencer doesn't do much inquiry into What the Sexes are Really Like in her world of scarce men; I'm wildly entertained by what readers, e.g. my fellow reviewers, find plausible and what overturns our assumptions.

Like a couple of other reviewers, I was exactly as annoyed by this plot as I am by romance novels that think it's fine for the world to be sexist as long as one pretty protagonist is saved by Love (and Money). For any guy who doesn't want to live in Jeris' world... well, no, join the club.

Unlike some other readers, I think this is SF; the science she's playing with is sociobiology. In Spencer's alternate history (????? most of this is my deductions), somewhere around the European discovery of the New World syphilis mutated to attack male infants, which is why so few men are born and sexual diseases are so terrifying. I would guess that humanity was nearly wiped out. This is the more plausible because syphilis was a scourge in our history too.

The socio- part of socio-biology describes how human culture adapts, and adapts to, human biology. The husband-buying, the male prostitution, are like the management of female fertility in our world. Spencer noticed that male fertility is, you might say, easier to share, and her families of sisters who work and marry together have a lot of biological paralells: bees, lionesses. Culture, law, and economy follow sister-logic, which follows natural selection. It isn't rockets, but it's science.

Suspend disbelief, and you're okay.

"Brother's Price" is the second departure novel from the Ukiah Oregon novels and in this reviewer's opinion, not as well written or explained as Ukiah's stories or "Tinker."

In "Brother's Price" women far outnumber men. The few males who are born are wed to households of women and serve as the father to many children. The title refers to the 'bride price' of a male child.

"Brother's Price" is told from the point of view of Jerin Whistler, a young male coming of age and about to be sold, and Princess Ren, one of the women soon to be one of the Queens of the Realm. They exist in a beginning Industrial Age--germs have just been detected, they are capable of forming steel into ships.

We open with Jerin taking a grave risk, he urges his sisters to rescue a soldier who was found injured near their spring by outlaws. Turns out, the soldier is a Princess of the Realm. They're due to be rewarded by 'sponsorship' of their family into Royal Court. This means, the handsome Jerin is going to receive a lot of attention and hopefully, a good price.

The Whistlers have just managed to score a coup--purchase of a store. Land generally is held in families for generations, but the unlucky Picker family lost their man and was barely able to hold onto their fortune, so their store's being sold for their old age. Jerin must fetch a high price, else his family might be ruined, too---the expense of the store would be what they would spend on a husband to start a new generation.

Meanwhile, both Princess Ren and Jerin need to find out who is stealing valuable cannons and attacking their soldiers. The future of the Realm and both families may depend on this knowledge.

Just read the book. Don't wonder why or how the situation got as it is. That takes the fun out of the reading. The pacing is off in this novel. Without giving away too much of the plot, the court manipulations are too long and drawn out. We get to the point where Jerin discovers a key fact too late in the novel. The last chapters are real page turners, but properly written, the whole book could and should be a page turner.

The founding premise of the book, what would a society dominated by woman be like? Is hardly new in speculative fiction. However Spencer built a convincing and believable alterative world based on the "simple fact" of an imbalance in female and male births numbers. The females outnumber the males by a factor of ten or twenty and the rest of the book is a logical continuation of that basis premise. Including incest, male brothels, venereal diseases, buying and trading brothers for husbands and kidnappings by the sisters who can't afford to pay a brothers price for a husband of their own
The world in "A Brother's Price" is a fascinating mix of the American west ca 1860 and regency England, with steamboats, six-shooters theaters and ballrooms. Also it is far from a paradise or utopia as the basic human nature of hate, greed, hope and love is unchanged and it is those emotions that fuel the actions of the books characters and make them believable and their actions convincing and understandable.

I normally don't read sci-fi, and I picked this up on accident thinking it was fantasy. I knew it had romantic elements in it after reading a praising review in Romantic Times Magazine.

This really wasn't sci-fi, which was OK with me. The only thing that made it sci-fi was that they had guns and steam engines. People still ride around on horses, etc. The female dominated society could go either sf or fantasy.

I felt like I was reading a male romance novel. What guy wouldn't want to be screwed by 30 women? The only difference with this and a normal romance novel was a love of guns and warfare. As a girl though, who am I to say no to a little romance? Ok maybe not a little.

Just like a romance novel, the reader is supposed to assume its entirely possible for people to fall in love after 5 minutes. Even worse, 10 girls fall in love with the same man after hardly debating the issue. Lets face it- girls (me included) can hardly figure out what shirt to wear in the space of time it took for all these girls to swoon over the male lead.

Considering I'm not adverse to reading your basic romance novel, I didn't mind all of this. It was enjoyable enough to pass the time with, but not an award-winner by any means. But for those of you looking for an exciting, action-filled sci-fi story, look elsewhere.

Imagine a world where women have trouble giving birth to mal children because of an extremely high rate of still births and miscarriages. Women rule the world, run the factories and farms, and keep the males hidden to protect them from desperate females who are husband thieves. Men are considered property with no rights whatsoever. They are sold to wives of their family's choosing.

Jerin Whistler is luckier than most because his family loves him and want to make a match for him that will make him happy. That chance comes when he helps rescue a female on his property who had been attacked. It turns out she is a royal princess and her sister Ren comes to find her. Ren falls in love with the handsome Jerin who shares her feelings. Because they have royal blood flowing through their veins Jerin is considered eligible to be the prince consort. When they get to the capital, all Ren's sisters agree to the match but there is a plot to overthrow the crown and Jerin is caught in the crosshairs.

When it comes to fresh, innovative storytelling, almost nobody is better than Wen Spencer. In a world where men are cosseted and hidden away because they are so rare, the hero accepts his lot in life as the norm since that is how it has always been. Feminists are going to take this book as their symbol because the author proves women can do what are traditional male roles in our world. Once the audience starts this novel, they will find it absolutely impossible to put down.

Harriet Klausner

After reading the other reviews I don't think I have much to add, except that this book was a fun read. I am one who puts books down after 40-50 pages if I don't like them, and this was one I read from beginning to end, smiling at the cliches, and enjoying it thoroughly. It is interesting to think about what might happen in a world where women outnumber men something like 40 or 50 to 1 (or even more, that wasn't clear). Yes, fertile men would be prized, fought for, purchased, or won. Yes, biologically it makes sense for a family of 10+ sisters to marry one man they can all agree on and that man to father all their children.

I'm not as sure as another reviewer that physiology would make Wen Spencer's scenario implausible. Maybe one man can overcome one woman - but 5 or 10 or more women???? And if men are sheltered, kept in a version of purdah, spoiled and pampered and not taught to read or do much besides home-making and nurturing, it stands to (Spencer's) reason that women would invent and develop steam boats, rifled cast-iron cannon (one shudders at the cost of the failures until they found something that worked), and the beginnings of indoor plumbing.

All in all, if you accept Spencer's world as presented (and if you read SF, you *should* be starting with that attitude), the story works. It is a retelling of the virtuous, brave, beautiful prince(ss), educated in ways not the norm to the prince(ss)'s gender, kidnapped by the evil plotters, escaping through our hero's own cleverness, and reunited with the prince(ss)'s faithful, loving spouse(s). As one who enjoys regency romances almost as much as SF, fantasy, S&S, etc., Spencer's book is a well-written take-off of romance, with a twist that works because Spencer is a good craftswoman. SF - yes, unless you don't consider alternate history SF.

A good, page-turning read after you accept Spencer's world premise.