Q Literature

A Brother’s Price
by Wen Spencer, Roc

Wen Spencer has always given us great science fiction: compelling characters, interesting backgrounds, compelling stories. In the four books of her Ukiah, Oregon series - spanning just four months in the character’s life - she showed us a band of heros pitted against an evil alien empire bent on taking over Earth and wiping out all life as we know it, right under our noses today, unnoticed by the general population. Among her heros are gays, lesbians, Native Americans, and some pretty mean biker dudes - all pretty rare in the field of science fiction literature. (Alien Taste, Tainted Trail, and Bitter Waters, reviewed in Lifeline Alternative Newsmagazine, January 2004; and Dog Warrior, not reviewed.)

Now Spencer gives us a completely new science fiction universe, just as fascinating. It reads like a medieval fantasy because of the feudal political and social structure, but is actually set on a far future earth where a biological disaster has befallen the human race: there are far fewer men born every generation than women. Partly it is because, through this disaster, there are far fewer sperm carrying Y chromosomes than X chromosomes in each man, and partly because most of the male children who are conceived suffer massive birth defects that lead to death, or are stillborn, or miscarry.

So, women rule and run everything and men are property. When a man marries into a family, he is bought by the family into which he marries, and he becomes the husband of all the sisters in that family in his generation. The Eldest mother rules the family, and the Eldest sister controls her siblings.

Jerin Whistler is the oldest boy in the house, and about to become of marriageable age. He is worried that his sisters will sell him in marriage to the girls next door, as dirty and backcountry a group as one could imagine anyone to be. That changes when, out in the fields one day, he sees a woman attacked and left in a creek for dead. He comes to her rescue, and brings her home to tend to her wounds, only to discover she is one of the royal princesses. He falls in love, but becomes dismayed at the huge difference in rank. The royal family can easily afford to buy him in marriage, but only choose their husbands from among the nobility.

However, when Princess Ren hears of the closely held Whistler family secret, she sees a way to persuade her mother to allow the marriage. But mother will only agree if all Ren’s sisters agree, and one sister, out investigating a long-simmering rebellion, has been missing for months.

Jerin and his sisters, unaware of the royal interest in him, are offered a reward for rescuing the princess: the royal family will sponsor his coming out in the capital. This will allow Jerin to be seen and bid on by the best families, and will also allow his sisters to look for a husband of their own. But coming to the capital plunges Jerin and his family into the middle of the political tensions which quickly escalate into civil war.

Spencer gives us a world which I hope she will return to often, as the story is open ended enough to allow for more in the series.

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Cary Renfro is an author and book reviewer.  He is a feature writer for The Capitol Forum in Salem, Oregon.