Amberites

Quarter of two. I’ve been sleeping with interruptions, but well enough. Weird dreams, vaguely about powerful people, superheroes with ingenuity but also a bit of ruthlessness. Machiavellians: doing anything to get their way. The ends justify the means. What counts is that we acted authentically, did what we wanted to do, and no remorse. But I think I know where I got the idea; it’s from the Chronicles of Amber by Roger Zelazny. The whole family of characters are a super race from the ideal realm of Amber, calling upon each other with a pack of trumps. Corwin wants to usurp the throne from his brother Eric, and his family is divided between devotion to him or his brother. I read Nine Princes in Amber when I was 15 years old and just starting high school. Evidently it made a big impression. The story was cleverly done, introducing the reader to the characters and situations by describing Corwin’s amnesia from his own perspective. He’s been in an automobile accident and lost his memory. It’s the reverse of dramatic irony, for the reader is as uninformed as the narrator. We learn about the world of Amber and its royal family while Corwin is recollecting it by degrees… I read it in the fall, perhaps even in October. I didn’t get around to reading The Guns of Avalon for another decade, but I enjoyed it too.

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