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With Morning Comes Mistfall (2011)

by George R.R. Martin(Favorite Author)

3.56 of 5 Votes: 1

languge

English

genre

Fantasy

publisher

Random House Audio

review 1: Having just finished reading "A Storm of Swords," I thought I would try something different from George R. R. Martin. In his short story, "With Morning Comes Mistfall," a short story from his Dreamsongs collection, Martin shows that he's equally good with science fiction as he is with fantasy. The story takes place on a planet called "Wraithworld." On Wraithworld, there is a strange weather phenomenon that occurs every day: In the morning, the mist comes down from the mountains to reveal the beauty of the planet. Of course, not all is beautiful on this planet. There is a legend that there are wraiths all over the planet, and several people have died from wraith attacks. This legend has made Wraithworld a popular destination for tourists and for wraith-hunters.A team of sci... moreentists arrives to prove (or dis-prove) the legend. Their purpose is to find the truth; however, the truth may take away from the legend--and from the charm of the planet. Sometimes, it's better not to know the truth. A little mystery in life is not such a bad thing.
review 2: 3.5 StarsThis was a very short, but enjoyable story from GRRM. Very different from what I'd experienced of his before (which is basically only his "Song of Ice and Fire" series). My only complaint, if one can call it that, is that it's just not as fleshed out as I would like it. I mean this in pretty much every way - from the characters, to the world (although the descriptions were fantastic... I just wanted to know more), to the mystery and the philosophy. I just wanted a bit more depth to all of it. That being said, I did enjoy this, and it has made me interested in reading GRRM's Dreamsongs collection. So, a short plot synopsis, then. It's presumably the future, and there've been quite a few inhabited/inhabitable planets found, and colonized. One such planet, Wraithworld, is a tourist destination because it is, literally, enshrouded in mist-ery. (See what I did there?) From dusk until dawn, the planet is covered in thick mists. They retreat during the full light of day, but never fully disappear. Ground level is always covered, so the hotel Castle Cloud was constructed above them. (Wait, this actually reminded me of another small nitpick I had with this story. I've just mentioned that many different inhabited planets have been discovered, yet at one point, one of the characters likens believing in UFOs to believing in ghosts. Which just struck me as odd, because if WE can travel to other, inhabited, planets, why couldn't they travel back to Earth? Wouldn't that then PROVE UFOs exists?)Anyway... Since the planet was discovered, people have turned up dead, or simply vanished. The initial party of explorers claimed that they saw an 8 foot tall, incorporeal humanlike form over one of their crew who was brutally killed, which promptly disappeared into the mist, leading to stories of the mist wraiths, and giving the planet its name. A scientist sets out to prove, once and for all, whether they are real or not. This was the aspect I did like the best about this story, because I could see both sides of this argument so clearly. On one hand, the fact that a mystery is a mystery to us indicates that we do, at some level, want to know what the truth is. It's just a matter of whether that desire is strong enough to overcome the sense of wonder and curiosity we hold. The mystery is the draw... while there's a mystery, there's possibility and imagination. Are the wraiths real? Are the mists causing some sort of hallucination? Could it be that the wraiths ARE the mists? Or that the water content reflects shapes and shadows in the right conditions causing people to report a "wraith sighting"? So many possibilities and theories. The curiosity keeps people coming back the Wraithworld to try to figure it out for themselves. But then there's the attempt to prove. As people, we thirst for knowledge. We want to know how things work, what they are made of. We want to know the answers to life's questions. But sometimes that knowledge can be so limiting. Once you know something, that's it. There's no getting back the wonder one had before all other possibilities were removed in the name of truth. Sometimes, I just don't think it's worth knowing every answer. Sometimes, we should keep our sense of wonder. less

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