[Dragaera] Peasant fantasy

[Claire R via Dragaera]

On Wed, Oct 29, 2014 at 6:21 PM, Damien Sullivan via Dragaera
<dragaera at lists.dragaera.info> wrote:
> I was asking around today about fantasy novels from a peasant
> perspective.  I thought of two kind of ones: Prydain (Taran Assistant
> Pig-Keeper) and Paksenarrion (Sheepfarmer's Daughter).
>
> Later I realized that _Athyra_ is even better: from the POV of Savn, an
> actual teenage peasant, who for all his experiences stays a teenage
> peasant, rather than being someone with a peasant backstory.
>
> Haven't come up with any others.
>
> -xx- Damien X-)

Instead of Prydain, I would suggest Alexander's Westmark trilogy, told
from the point of view of a printer's apprentice and set in an
18th-century France analogue on the cusp of revolution. It does
feature an Orphan Secretly of Royal Blood, but 1) they're not the main
character, and 2) . . . well, read the trilogy.

Patricia McKillip also writes some fantasy from a peasant background;
I'm thinking of, say, The Changeling Sea, in which a young woman who
helps clean the local inn gets accidentally caught in a story of
princes and magic. And Sean Stewart's Nobody's Son features a young
peasant man who defeats great evil, wins the princess's hand in
marriage, and then faces the cold hard truth that this does not mean
any of the nobility will ever view him as their social equal.

Claire