Someone needs to warn me when I'm about to start reading a book by a child rapist. Thankfully, I only got 85 pages into it before realizing this was *that* author of "The Mists of Avalon" by Marion Zimmer Bradley. (Warning: the later paragraphs of this post turn homophobic, but here's the article: that author.) If you're looking for book reviews, maybe skip this one and just remember to research authors before diving in.

The whole King Arthur legend, retold from a completely different, female viewpoint, simultaneously critiques faith and patriarchy, achieving ultimate prime-level character development. It's about crushing eco-social, nature-loving bonobo matriarchies to install theistic terror states.The way the book handles the death of a better, older system to establish a religious terror state, while simultaneously exploiting the existing dictatorship, reminds me of something else entirely. I love the metaph...

Hmmm, I'd really like to see the miniseries based on "The Mists of Avalon". I thought "The Mists of Avalon" by Marion Zimmer Bradley was a good book, although it got a bit boring at times, or maybe that was just me! I loved reading about the history. The most I'd ever known about Arthur and the gang was through the show, Merlin. The ending of "The Mists of Avalon" was really sad to me 😕 But it was excellent as well, if that makes any sense. It's definitely a book review that reflects my fee...

My final book of 2017! I didn’t think I’d finish it before the year ended. I started it back on October 1st, and it was slow going. I often found myself not reading it for days at a time. It really wasn’t capturing my interest. But, with a week to go in 2017 and about 300 or so pages left, I buckled down and finished it at around 8:15 PM on December 31st!You might think that my opinion of this book won't be stellar considering it was such a slog. About a week ago, when I committed to finishing i...

I picked up *The Mists of Avalon* because I really love Norse myths, and usually any stories about King Arthur. Everyone seems to adore this book; even my librarian told me that this was a really good Arthurian tale! Well, it's not. It's horrible. The Christian bashing was just a tad boring, or repetitive (said as the atheist that I am). As if having one stupid priest wasn't enough, the author just had to fit in several more and call each stupider than the previous. Yeah, there were dumb/evil p...

My all-time favorite fantasy novel, penned by a serial rapist and child abuser. Thinking about it now, it's interesting to recall that the person who recommended *The Mists of Avalon* to me was also a huge Nietzsche fan. Makes you think, doesn't it? If you're looking for dark fantasy book reviews, well, this is certainly one way to start.

This is one of those books I actively dislike. As a feminist and a lover of King Arthur stories, *The Mists of Avalon* just makes me feel a little queasy. I kept reading, hoping it would improve, but it never really did, even though there are a few okay moments. Overall, I found it offensive to the Arthurian legends, to history itself, and frankly, to women. And let me tell you, being a 15-year-old girl obsessed with fantasy novels didn't make me any more forgiving. If you're looking for great f...

Okay, I'll admit it. When I told my Arthurian Literature professor in college that I'd read and enjoyed "The Mists of Avalon" by Marion Zimmer Bradley, he launched into a quick lecture before the next class came in about how Bradley's "interpretation" strayed wildly from the genre. He wasn't a fan of this historical fantasy novel.But honestly, I don't care. "The Mists of Avalon" is a challenging book – it's long and utterly depressing – but it offers one of the first in-depth explorations of wom...

The Arthurian myth retold from the perspective of Morgaine le Fay, a pagan priestess. It's supposedly a feminist take on the old legends. But there's a major problem with this approach: let's be honest, women's lives in the Dark Ages were pretty dull. And instead of breaking free from that mold with strong female characters, Marion Zimmer Bradley spends a lot of time talking about spinning, weaving, and having babies. The female characters are either contemptible, irritating, or both. The male c...

In 2007, I joined Goodreads and reviewed some books that profoundly shaped me as a reader. Over the years, I've taken an absurd amount of geek pride in the fact that my review of Marion Zimmer Bradley's *The Mists of Avalon* is, I think, the most popular. And for every comment saying "GET OVER YOURSELF" in response to my using my little corner of the internet to share how this book shaped my life as a writer, a Catholic, and a woman, a dozen other women responded, "OH MY GOD, ARE YOU ME?" I love...