The Mount (Paperback)

by Carol Emshwiller (Author)
Key Phrases: halfway hut, dry cakes, white wires, Little Master, Merry Mary, Bright Spot (more...)

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly
Like Emshwiller's startlingly perceptive short fiction and her previous novel, Carmen Dog (1990), where women begin to degenerate into animals and animals start evolving upward into womanhood, this novel turns our supposed certainties into beautiful and terrible insights. Writing in skeletal prose from the adolescent point of view of Charley, a boy who dreams of becoming a famous racer (ridden by his alien Little Master, the reptilian? avian? marsupial? Future-Ruler-of-Us-All), Emshwiller picks up human history several generations after a successful Hoot invasion has turned most of humanity into "mounts," bred for speed and beauty and trained with whips and savage bits to do their masters' will. In the mountains, though, a few wild humans lurk, led by Charley's father, plotting to rise up against the Hoots and take back the world they lost. Glimpses of arresting sorrow meld here with teenage dreams and hopes and anguish, shaped subtly with a poet's sure touch into finely crafted characterizations of human-as-not-quite-animal, Hoot-as-not-quite-monster, coming together through heartbreak and abandonment of previously hard-held prejudices. Brilliantly conceived and painfully acute in its delineation of the complex relationships between masters and slaves, pets and owners, the served and the serving, this poetic, funny and above all humane novel deserves to be read and cherished as a fundamental fable for our material-minded times.
Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information, Inc.

From Booklist
A rider is talking to its mount, a human. The rider (the one who gives a ride) belongs to an alien race, the hoots, that landed human generations ago. Now the hoots keep humans as mounts, breeding them much as humans once bred horses. The very best mounts are imprinted as infants and train with their riders from childhood. Charley, one of the best, is destined to be the mount of The-future-supreme-ruler-of-us-all. When he is about 12, Wilds--renegade humans-- come from the mountains on a raid and kill the hoots. Charley saves his Little Master, though, and becomes the only Wild with a hoot. Mount and rider learn a lot about freedom from the Wilds, and when the humans are ready to fight the rest of the hoots, the solution to a crisis is the unexpected result of Charley and the Little Master's relationship and their understanding of the truth about hoots and their mounts. A memorable alien-invasion scenario, a wild adventure, and a reflection on the dynamics of freedom and slavery. Regina Schroeder
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

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Product Details

• Paperback: 242 pages
• Publisher: Small Beer Press; 1 edition (August 1, 2002)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1931520038
• ISBN-13: 978-1931520034
• Product Dimensions: 8.2 x 5.6 x 0.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 11.8 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars See all reviews (14 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #527,446 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

15 of 17 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars An Incredible Multi-Faceted Vision of the Future, October 13, 2002

By	Jack M. Walter "Jack M. Walter" (Baltimore, MD) - See all my reviews

Rather than write another synopsis of the novel, I would instead comment on the number of different themes which present themselves in this incredibly imaginative tale. I see themes of Whites and Black slavery, the relationships between parents and children, the universal process of coming to adulthood, the idea of dominance and submission in relationships, and our treatment of the other creatures on this earth which we call "animals." If we were not the "dominant" species on this planet, would we be treated like the mounts in this story? I believe that we would. And I wonder about something else: If horses could speak, what would they tell us? This is a disturbing story which does what all great literature does. It changes us forever.

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Excellent gift for a reading kid., January 5, 2003

By	Dr. Steve Irving (New York, NY USA) - See all my reviews

This is a science fiction/young adult novel told from the point of view of 11 year old Charlie.

The story is set in a society where Earth has been colonized by Hoots, who breed, ride and race tame humans. Charlie, a well-conformed Seattle, the strongest and best looking of the human breeds, is chosen as the mount for Little Master, The-Future-Ruler-Of-Us-All.

The story -- a good coming-of-age story on its own fictional merits -- also explores the nature of slavery without pomposity, without simplistic proclamation as Charlie sheds slavery as he also sheds childhood -- both with some regret. The coming-of-age elements (coming to terms with his father, searching for a missing mother, finding a young-adolescent place for himself in terms of family and in terms of a role in society) are beautifully plotted. The fantasy element is imaginative.

A recommendation. Especially if you have a smart 12 year old to read it with.

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars So original and really good! (Okay, so I'm bad at titles...), April 26, 2004

By	R.K.M. "RKM" (Seattle, WA United States) - See all my reviews

Woah. Read this whole book on a six-hour flight. Very different from what I expected. It's really good. Carol Emshwiller (the author) really gets inside the heads of her characters. The tale is told mostly from the point of view of Charley, a teenage boy who lives in a world where humans serve as steeds for a ruling class of weak-legged aliens that like to ride around on our shoulders. It's more about the bond between young Charley and an infant alien, the next in line to the alien throne, as they learn together about what it means to live under this current symbiotic(?) system.

Ms. Emshwiller's grasp of psychology is amazing. I especially loved it when she would step outside of Charley's head and spend a chapter from an alien's point of view, or from a different human. The way that she managed to explain the entire society in the first chapter without ever really seeming to lay it on with the exposition. She's a master. I'm definitely going to have to hunt down more of her work.