So much water.
March 31, 2018 7:17 PM Subscribe
Looking for the name of a YA book series about people who, unbeknownst to them, live in a dry Mediterranean basin; and it is slowly filling. It features big cats and the environment lacks of wood (an intact log is a king's treasure). Anyone recall the name? [inspired by this front page post]
The story, at least initially, follows the son of a famous warrior. Son has some relationship with a big (IE: ride-able) cat. The father now does marquetry. The basin is very dry, desert like.
The story, at least initially, follows the son of a famous warrior. Son has some relationship with a big (IE: ride-able) cat. The father now does marquetry. The basin is very dry, desert like.
Response by poster: Yes the Gandalara Cycle is it.
posted by Mitheral at 7:31 PM on March 31, 2018 [1 favorite]
posted by Mitheral at 7:31 PM on March 31, 2018 [1 favorite]
Response by poster: PS: I've been hammering away at this on google for the past day. It turns out I even knew the title of one of the books (the River Wall) without knowing it was the title and not just a setting but searching for that turns up a bunch of unhelpful results unless you add "novel" rather than story/fiction.
posted by Mitheral at 7:37 PM on March 31, 2018
posted by Mitheral at 7:37 PM on March 31, 2018
I could be wrong - it's been 30 years - but I don't think these novels are actually YA.
posted by Chrysostom at 8:42 PM on March 31, 2018
posted by Chrysostom at 8:42 PM on March 31, 2018
FWIW, I just googled "mediterranean flood sf fantasy book", found the Wiki article for the Messinian salinity crisis, and came across the book in the obligatory "In Popular Culture" section. It's a more popular concept than you'd think!
posted by Rhaomi at 9:21 PM on March 31, 2018
posted by Rhaomi at 9:21 PM on March 31, 2018
That really REALLY sounds like the Gandalara Cycle. I bought them in the mid-80s, when they were repackaged from seven books into two volumes of three stories each, and The River Wall as the last in the "trilogy". I last re-read them about two years ago, and the first sentence of your description REALLY sounds a lot like the Gandalara Cycle. I don't know that the novels were originally YA, but they became so.
The son isn't a famous warrior - he actually has kind of a not-great reputation - but the people who knew him think that he must have been touched by a very wise and/or famous ancestor, to account for all of the knowledge and sudden maturity that he exhibits once the narrator-character drops into that world. The father didn't do marquetry, but a few times the main character mentions all the craftsmanship that would have gone into making the marquetry-stair-steps in the father's house. And, yes, it turns out that this entire world is on the now-dessicated Mediterranean Basin, which dried up when the straits of Gibraltar closed off.
posted by Tailkinker to-Ennien at 9:35 PM on March 31, 2018
The son isn't a famous warrior - he actually has kind of a not-great reputation - but the people who knew him think that he must have been touched by a very wise and/or famous ancestor, to account for all of the knowledge and sudden maturity that he exhibits once the narrator-character drops into that world. The father didn't do marquetry, but a few times the main character mentions all the craftsmanship that would have gone into making the marquetry-stair-steps in the father's house. And, yes, it turns out that this entire world is on the now-dessicated Mediterranean Basin, which dried up when the straits of Gibraltar closed off.
posted by Tailkinker to-Ennien at 9:35 PM on March 31, 2018
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(Another dry-Mediterranean possibility: The Saga of Pliocene Exile)
posted by Rhaomi at 7:28 PM on March 31, 2018 [2 favorites]