A Spell for Chameleon (Magic of Xanth)

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Despite its apparent flaws, there are some genuinely touching moments, however fleeting. Perhaps, at its heart this is just a love story, perhaps not, but the essence of the book is really captured by the following line: Xanth is an enchanted land where magic rules, a land of centaurs and dragons and basilisks where every citizen has a unique spell to call their own. For Bink of North Village, however, Xanth is no fairy tale. He alone has no magic. And unless he gets some—and fast!—he will be exiled. Forever.

It had hurt, but the worst of it was that because he was not supposed to play with the cleaver, he had not dared scream or tell of his injury. He had controlled himself with extreme effort and suffered in silence. He had buried the finger, and managed to hide his mutilation by keeping his hand closed for several days. When the truth finally came out, it was too late for a restorative spell; the finger was rotted and could not be reattached. A strong-enough spell could have attached it—but it would have remained a zombie finger. The King may be old and only dubiously aware of his surroundings but he’s also doctrinaire and inflexible. Bink is cast out of the Land of Point 1 Xanth, into the world of magiclessMundania. At that point, there's just nothing left to say. I finished the damn book... and I doubt I'll read anything else by Anthony in the near future.

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All women are the same inside. They differ only in appearance and talent. They all use men.” —Spoken by Iris the stereotypically conniving sorceress, to which Bink replies, “Maybe so. I’m sure you know more about that sort of thing than I do.” Looking up Piers Anthony, I found his preoccupation with teenage or younger and the intellectually challenged being molested was a big thing with him. From ages five and up, with the child being the 'instigator'. There’s also aremarkable even by the standards of the 1970s obsession with sex. The first instance of Male Gaze shows up about seven paragraphs intothebook: Bink looked at the girl beside him as she stepped through aslanting sunbeam. He was no plant, but he too had needs, and even the most casual inspection of her made him aware of this. Sabrina was absolutely beautiful — and her beauty was completelynatural. Whenever I rate a book I try to bear in mind when it was written. That’s to say, what may have been relevant in 1977 (when A Spell For Chameleon was published), may not be relevant today, but should not by default disqualify the book. Or, for example, if the book was written for a younger audience, I should not be rating it down for being immature, because it may be exceptionally suited to its target audience. The book was well received, at any rate, and it won the August Derleth award.

The tendency of men to want to have sex with anything even vaguely awoman turns out to have significant implications for Xanth. One of Trent’s goals is to mitigate the effects of rampant miscegenation, which Ihave to say is aword Ididn’t expect to use in this review. Isuppose given that Xanth is Fantasy Florida, it makes sense at least one major character would be obsessed with the supposed dangers of race-mixing. So, the first half of the book is undoubtedly silly. So what? In fact, it’s more than silly, it’s often frankly bizarre and most likely best enjoyed with your hallucinogen of choice close at hand. And, A SPELL FOR CHAMELEON might have been a charming, endea Bink gets to a town and a guy agrees to help him as long as he'll get some help in return. See, he needs to take care of some unpleasant business. At the end, everyone agrees that it's best to just not deal with this, to save everyone involved. Oh, and if they ever talk about it again, they'll be tried with contempt of court. Yay! Nothing like shutting up the survivor who was pressured into being silent with the treat of legal action if she ever speaks up again!It can all be yours,” she said. The alluring fourteen-year-old reappeared. “No other woman can make you this promise.” I think someone has serious issues with women. I just don't understand how anyone can say Piers Anthony himself isn't sexist. Say all you want that he just isn't good at writing women (although that on its own is a sign...); the problem here is that he doesn't think women are people. He clearly has a fixation with rape and possession that's not healthy. Access-restricted-item true Addeddate 2021-02-15 13:00:59 Boxid IA40060603 Camera Sony Alpha-A6300 (Control) Collection_set printdisabled External-identifier I’ve been somewhat unfair to Wynne above because the beautiful dolt is only one aspect of an unfortunate woman named Chameleon (this is the spoiler referenced above, by the way). Chameleon does not have atalent so much as she is atalent: she cycles from beautiful to hideous over the span of amonth, and from phenomenally stupid to extremely bright at thesametime.

Despite the lightheartedness of the story there is a perilous undertone. Xanth is a magical place, but it can be pretty dangerous too, since it is extremely unpredictable. It’s a place where walking off into the woods at night is almost sure to get you killed, and the method of demise can be as inane as “death by peacefulness” (which essentially boils down to losing all interest in living). Humfrey knows a hundred spells. Maybe one of them—I’m sure he could find out what your talent is. Then everything would be all right.” I start reading the book, and I immediately have legitimate questions. We have the whole standard "we don't need to know what the men look like, but if we don't know the cup size of the female characters, she's not described well enough" situation. We have the "25-year-old" protagonist acting like a horny 12-year-old boy at best. We have a "boys will be boys" scene where his father laughs it off that Bink tried to "sew wild oats" which would have bound a nymph to him as the "fertilizer figure" (because he watered them with his own urine) so he could use her as a sex toy. The ridiculousness of the book is its own reward. It’s (almost) impossible to take it seriously. This is particularly true for the first half of the story, but the tone changes somewhat in the second half. The latter sequences deal with themes like the nature of the magic of Xanth, its relation to the “real” (mundane) world and the Xanth gene pool. Also: redemption, haunted castles and zombie crocodiles. Due to the combined power of the sexist parts, especially THAT scene, I just could not say that I liked this book. I really would have liked this book. It had so much fun stuff to offer, and I thought the story was delivered really well. But this was not to be. I'm just glad I didn't pay money for this book.The title character of A Spell for Chameleon, Chameleon, is a woman whose magic (everyone in Xanth is magic) is that she waxes and wanes in intelligence and beauty over the course of a monthly cycle. Intelligence and beauty are out of phase, so that when she is highly intelligent she is ugly, and when she is beautiful she is so stupid as to be barely capable of coherent speech. Our hero Bink, when he figures this out, describes her as the Perfect Woman, combining in one person the best that a woman can be. And I don't deny that some of his conclusions, even though they are wrapped up inside a lighthearted fantasy story, are a bit chauvinistic, but that isn't the point.

I first read this book when I was in college, I think. I had read several other series by Piers Anthony which all started out well enough but somehow got needlessly bogged down in mathematical games or sophomore philosophy, none of which did anything for the later stories. Also the actions and motives of the characters in his sequels seemed to get more complex, while the characters themselves remained undeveloped. So I will admit starting this book with some hesitation. I have to credit this book as being the book that really introduced me to reading as a fun pastime. I originally read this in my early preteen years and I loved the way it awakened my imagination. I was able to immerse myself in the land of Xanth. I found it to be a good easy read that had colorful characters and an extremely well put together world of magic that I have never seen duplicated. Xanth is rich in magic and rich in magical creatures, plant and animal, happy to chow down on acareless, powerless human. Bink’s quest becomes that much more difficult when he encounters the beautiful but extraordinarily stupid Wynne, her propensity for wandering into danger compensated for only by her amazingtits.The second real issue I had was not quite so offensive (not hard to be less offensive than that scene), but it did still rub me the wrong way (VERY spoilery spoilerage). The central premise here is this: which is preferable, a very beautiful, very dumb woman, or a super smart, wise but ugly woman? Because his talent cannot be discovered, Bink is exiled to Mundania, the land of no magic. While there, he is captured by the Evil Magician Trent, who was exiled 20 years ago for attempting to overthrow the current king. Trent is trying to invade Xanth with his Mundane army to usurp the throne but has been consistently prevented from entering by the magic barrier which surrounds Xanth. He believes that Bink can help him get into Xanth by providing information on the location of the source of the magical barrier, and attempts to coerce Bink into giving him this information. Trent has prepared a special elixir that can temporarily nullify magic and has a special catapult that can hurl this elixir into the land of Xanth. All that Trent needs now are the exact coordinates of the shield-stone. Bink refuses to cooperate and is thrown into a pit with a woman from Xanth that has followed him there named Fanchon. Bink and Fanchon escape to sea but are pursued by Trent's forces. Eventually, Bink, Trent, and Fanchon are all swept into Xanth via a whirlpool but Trent's forces are left behind.