Hawkmistress! is a great novel for girls. It's pretty much a coming of age story about Romilly, a girl laran-gifted with the power to control horses, hawks or dogs.

However, Romilly lives in a time and place where girls are merely marriage pawns. She is unwilling to accept the marriage her father sets for her and runs away. She plans to join her brother, who also ran away to train his laran gifts in a Tower, but is sidetracked into helping King Carolin reclaim his throne from a usuper.

Along the way, Romilly spends some time pretending to be a runaway boy, that being safer than being a runaway girl. She also fights to keep control of her gifts, keeping them from destroying her. At times she has doubts about the ethics of using her gifts to control animals.

This is one of the more feminist of the Darkover novels. Romilly joins the Sisterhood of the Sword to gain her freedom - one of the few ways a woman can live in the society without a husband. She has little to no interest in marriage through much of the story, which is quite understandable considering her experience of being promised to an man she found repulsive. 

All in all, this is a good read, especially for teen girls, but even as an adult I enjoy rereading it. 

Ever read a Russian fairytale? Happily ever after isn't what they're about.

Enchantment is a new take on the Sleeping Beauty legend, and yes, it takes place in the Ukraine. Sometimes the Ukraine (not called that yet, of course) is of 1000 years ago, sometimes it is modern day Ukraine.

As a boy, Ivan finds a strange clearing in the forest and catches just a glimpse of what appears to be a beautiful woman sleeping beneath the leaves. He is frightened off by something coming at him from under the leaves. Shortly thereafter, his family leaves for America.

As a graduate student studying the proto-Slavonic languages, Ivan returns to the Ukraine after the Soviet Union collapses. He returns to the clearing because he has been haunted by the memory of what he saw. Again he sees the woman and again something charges toward him. But now he is a runner, and he finds that the thing under the leaves is in a circular pit around the sleeping woman. He runs in circles and is followed by what turns out to be a huge bear. Eventually he tires the bear, jumps the chasm to land near the woman. He kisses her awake.

The bear is approaching, and in a language Ivan just barely understand, she tells him to ask her to marry him. He does, the bear is gone and a bridge appears.

But they don't cross that bridge. Instead, the princess, Katerina, takes him across the bridge she sees, as she cannot see the one he does. This takes them into her time, 1000 years before. Ivan's clothes, however, fail to come along, to his embarassment.

This causes only the first of a series of culture shocks. He asks for her hoose and she is horrified that a man could think of wearing woman's clothing merely because he is naked. It is far worse, in her mind, for a man to wear woman's clothing than it is for him to go naked. 

He is welcomed as her betrothed, but his unfamiliarity with the culture causes tremendous problems.

It turns out that Katerina was put under a spell by Baba Yaga, a witch who desires to rule her kingdom of Taina. If she does not marry Ivan and produce a son, Baba Yaga will be able to justify conquering the little kingdom. But Ivan is already engaged in his time and not in love with the beautiful and hostile Katerina. 

Despite Ivan's reluctance, they finally do marry, but a plot on Ivan's life is uncovered. The newlyweds flee to Ivan's time, where Katerina suffers much the same confusion as Ivan had in her world, especially as her clothing does not come with her over Ivan's bridge. However, one of the old gods of her kingdom turns out to have been masquerading as Ivan's cousin and is able to help her.

The story continues, but I think that is enough detail for a review. I have a definite fondness for retellings of fairytales, and this one is quite interesting. Not a nice, smooth happily ever after kind of fairytale, but a more mature version of a great story.

I will add that for those of you with a passing familiarity with Russian folklore, the origin of Baba Yaga's house on chicken legs is quite ingenious. 

Following in the footsteps of the hilarious Shrek, Shrek 2 is one of those rare sequels that works at least as well as the original.

The story starts where the movie left off - right after Shrek and Fiona get married. There's a delightful selection of scenes from the honeymoon which shows that the sense of humor and parodying of other movies is alive and well in this one. Then comes the time to meet Fiona's parents!

Now, meeting the parents is rarely comfortable in the real world, and it's no more comfortable in the movie. Lucky for those of us in the real world, most fathers don't hire a hitman if they disapprove of their son-in-law. Well, at least mine didn't when my sister married someone he disapproved of.

Now, we're all familiar with the Fairy Godmother from stories such as Cinderella. This Fairy Godmother, however, is a coldhearted businesswoman, determined to get her son (Prince Charming) to marry Fiona. She is most displeased with Fiona's choice and makes sure the King does everything he can to get rid of Shrek.

Here's a list of just a few of the movies and shows parodied in this movie:

• The Lord of the Rings
• The Matrix
• Spiderman 
• Ghostbusters
  
• Flashdance
• Mission Impossible
• and, of course, various fairy tales
  

I'm not going to spoil the entire movie for those who haven't seen it, but it is very much worth watching. There's a fair bit of humor that the kids won't understand (and you won't want them too!). My 3 year old loves to watch this one over and over, which is a relief considering the movies she watches over and over again otherwise. You might enjoy Far, Far Away Idol, an American Idol parody at the end of the movie, even if you don't enjoy American Idol.

"Take my love, take my land, Take me where I cannot stand. I don't care, I'm still free. You can't take the sky from me. Take me out to the black, Tell them I ain't comin' back. Burn the land and boil the sea, You can't take the sky from me. There's no place I can be Since I found Serenity, But you can't take the sky from me..."

Those words, from the theme song of Firefly, perfectly capture the spirit of the television show, from the creator of Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Angel, Joss Whedon. Captain Malcolm Reynolds and his daring crew aboard the spaceship Serenity forge their livings in a vast and lawless frontier, reminiscent of the Wild West. The show actually embraces the Wild West theme, featuring six-shooters, horses, cowboys, and twangy music. From a sci fi show, that might seem odd, but it makes sense. If you're struggling to survive in distant space, would you rather have expensive, state-of-the-art equipment that could break and then require scarce parts, or cheap and proven technology that's easily replaceable?

Even considering the logic of the Wild West theme, it would shift from novelty to annoyance quickly in a normal show. Thankfully, Firefly is not a normal show. I say, without exaggeration, it is one of the best science fiction programs of all-time.

As you might have inferred from the program's desperate Wild West theme, the crew of the Serenity aren't virtuous and heroic explorers spreading enlightened values, a la Star Trek. They're real people facing serious problems that don't always wrap up neatly with a bow on top by episode's end. As they smuggle, help, thieve, and sneak their way across the far reaches of an oppressive empire, each of the unique characters demonstrates the best and worst of humanity. We flawed yet decent humans can sympathize and emphasize with these characters: The irascibly ethical Captain Reynolds. The tough and sensitive Jayne. The perky, plump, sexy, and intelligent engineer, Kaylee. The super-talented but super-unstable River. The moral though practical preacher, Book. The scrupled whore, Inara. Etc.

In that regard, Firefly distinguishes itself from the modern Battlestar Galactica. Even when things go to hell, and the baser instincts of people emerge, the courage, hope, and humor that are also hallmarks of our species burst into view. Light triumphs over dark, not always cleanly, but eventually. The same episodes that make us gasp and cry also make us smile and laugh. To some people, that might seem like a dichotomy that could only lead to disjointed installments. But Whedon makes the juxtaposition work.

Further adding to the appeal of Firefly is its defiance of genre. Certainly, as a show with a spaceship in the future as its primary setting, Firefly is a science fiction program. Yet weird aliens, peculiar anomalies, and complicated technobabble don't drive its plots. Anyone who likes drama, comedy, and action could enjoy Firefly.

Unfortunately, Firefly only ran half a season in Fall 2002 before Fox canceled it, after bungling it throughout its whole time on the air. For example, Fox aired the first episode, explaining the premise of the show, last! Luckily for us, we can still watch Firefly as its creators intended on DVD. It's 14 episodes of sci fi/action/drama/comedy goodness.

Additionally, Universal Pictures has picked up the Firefly ball from where Fox dropped it, and they're using it in a grander game than Fox ever considered. On September 30, the rough-and-tumble crew will fly across the silver screen in the motion picture Serenity. Now that Star Wars has become one with the Force, and Star Trek has stopped boldly going, the adventures of the Firefly-class Serenity can satisfy our craving for space adventure.

And then some!

The author, Jason Vines, maintains Hypersyllogistic, a freewheeling personal website, at http://www.hypersyllogistic.com. Hypersyllogistic enshrines independent thought and respectful discussion.

This article is © Jason Vines. All usage of this article must include a citation to the author and a link to Hypersyllogistic.