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cream-and-tea · 2 years

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[ID: a picture of a group of peaches lying in a pile with a faint border around the edge, white text in the centre reads CREAM-AND-TEA while smaller text below that reads reintro/navigation. END ID]

hi! hello! salutations! my name (at least on the internet) is creme (she/her please and thank you), and this reintro has been... a long time coming, to say the least. let’s get some quick facts out of the way so i can talk about my over abundance of projects!

i tend to write character-driven stories, complicated relationships of all kinds, queer/nerudivergant characters (hey, write what you know), fucked-up magic systems, and basically everything i touch ends up having SOME kind of fantasy element (whether intentionally or not)

i also write poetry! but that tends not to get posted as much bc of just how personal it is to me

i’m pretty active on here but i'm trying to get better at actually Posting My Writing, i do have some stuff up (mostly from my main wip Lay Me Down) but that’s something i’m working on

(i’m working on… a lot)

i’m currently studying journalism and creative writing in university!!!

i’d love to be published one day (primarily with my poetry and maybe a novel) but first i have to actual finish something lol

i am literally up to read/follow anything. anything at all. i do have stuff i look for and some genres i read more than others but if something has a premise i like/tropes i like/a cool vibe/anything remotely interesting at all i tend to jump on it

i love love love being tagged in tag games even if it takes me fucking forever to do them lol

aaaaand i think that’s mostly it! now onto the main event (aka all my stories i couldn’t shut up about so i had to put them under the cut):

LAY ME DOWN.

[ID: an opening between two trees surrounded by ferns and leading into darkness, with text across it that reads LAY ME DOWN in white letters. END ID]

BASICS. drafting/outlining. fantasy/horror, dark academia (sort of). third person present tense, dual POV. book one of the gravespeaker trilogy.

PREMISE. On an earth overtaken by a infectious supernatural forest: a runaway with the ability to see the dead, a star student with far worse than blood staining their hands, the ghost of a murdered girl with a score to settle, and a failed prophet who knows far more than he thinks, must work together to unravel the mysteries and secrets of a deadly library at the end of the world that is just as much prison as it is salvation (that is… if they don’t kill each other first).

CHARACTERS.

Agnes-Maria white [17 and too good for this place. she is made of bruised skin and bleeding flowers, a girl half dying who will do anything to live.]

Pallas [17 and exactly where they think they belong. there is nothing safe or kind or soft about them even though they want to be, both the knife and the open wound.]

Nina Martin [18 and longing to leave. she is an echo of someone a different girl used to be, and death is only the beginning.]

Fiver [25 and looking for something better. he exists as an ichor-toned lie and wishes to scrub the residue of it from his skin, someone desperate to break the chains of the past around his neck.]

TAG. wip: ghost story

comic sans intro

playlist.

pinterest board.

TAGLIST (ask to be +/-). @vellichor-virgo @transmasc-wizard @houndmouthed @muddshadow @just-wublrful @corkywantstowrite @shrunkupthejams @andromedaexists @caninemotiff @lungs-and-gills @lychniscitrus @phantomnations @onomatopiya @deer-in-headlights-stare @arctic-oceans @redbloodprose @definitelynotclayface @cannivalisms @atthenian @dallonwrites

BURN THE STARS

[ID: a photo set in a dark space where a young person stands, face upturned, eyes closed, as their arms reach up, hands cupping an orb of light that casts a golden glow in the space around it. the text across the centre of the image reads BURN THE STARS in white letters. END ID]

BASICS. planning (seriously in the very early stages of planning). sci-fi fantasy. third person past tense (for now), four major POVs (for now). book one of a planned duology.

PREMISE. Exiled from one of the galaxies seven holy ruling families and poisoned with magic she doesn't understand, Apollinaires self-destructive spiral is interrupted by an event that leads her into the path of a sharpshooter with a taste for vengeance and a fervent medic pursuing knowledge no matter the cost. Meanwhile, in the heart of a massive rotating space station known as the Rings, wearing a stolen face and longing for home, reluctant assassin Anandi Alva plans to finally bring the star-spanning church to its knees. While within the palace both a fallen warrior and a girl-king strive to remember what means to be human.

CHARACTERS.

Apollinaire Sibel-Marie Gloria Alphonsine el Belrose, eldest daughter of the house of the seventh saint [the unchosen. the eldest daughter. god-cursed and roiling in flame]

Danny [the trickshot. the wanderer too far from home. saltbitter and stormy-eyed]

Silas Ambose [the “healer”. the seeker of truths. broken heart still beating and trembling hands]

Anandi Alva [the assassin. the tortured idealist. silken tongue and a thousand masks]

Rill [the executioner. the punished. steel bite and starstreaked blood.]

Glorian Apollinaire Alphonsine El Belrose, the first mourner, he who bears the sword and cries with the tears of a thousand people, aka “Alphie” [the chosen. the youngest child. golden crowns and redrimmed eyes]

TAG. wip: burn the stars

pinterest board.

TAGLIST (ask to be +/-). @just-wublrful @transmasc-wizard

MISC PROJECTS

[ID: a backdrop of soft, glittery peach fabric. the text across the centre of the image reads MISC PROJECTS in white letters. END ID ]

aka “things i’m not actively working on but constantly ping-pong around my brain on a day-to-day basis”

SALT BIRDS. low fantasy/slice-of-life audio drama. outlining. follows the lonely keeper of a seaside graveyard when one of the bodies she fishes from the ocean ends up being very much alive. With nowhere else to go the teenager she finds washed up on her shore must stay with her and the two must find a way to live with each other, despite the secrets both are keeping.

guilt, redemption and forgiveness. facing the unknown. stagnation and apathy. isolation. the ocean is real scary you guys (but also cool).

ONE DOWN AT DEVONS MARSH. urban fantasy with heavy litfic elements. planning/sporadically drafting. follows twins Friday and Oliver Walker as they attempt to understand the curse that dictates one of them will die on their seventeenth birthday while also navigating their relationships with each other, their family of witches, the town they live in, and the friends they meet along the way.

family (blood and otherwise). complicated platonic relationships. coming of age, faeries and witchcraft. weird small towns. fate and free will. death and grief. oops! this one is all about MY specific high school trauma!

SUNDOWN LAND. soft fantasy/roadtrip. planning. follows Shrike, a runaway thief slowly dying from a magical disease, and Ariel, an artificial construct who's maker has recently disappeared, as they journey through the ruins of their wartorn country in search of a mystical place both know from a popular childrens story.

finding closure. coming to terms with childhood abuse. generational trauma. personal autonomy. fantasy vs reality. discovering and defining identity. places being personified. it can be a pinocchio retelling if you squint reeeealllly hard.

ALL FALL DOWN. superhero. rewriting and replanning. follows hero and villain duo Tatum and Umbra as their city of New Victoria is plunged into chaos following a series of increasingly violent attacks. forced to work together and battling their own inner demons the two and their rag-tag group of friends are drawn into a much larger conspiracy that could unravel their ideas of themselves, each-other, and the foundation of the very world they live in.

enemies-to-lovers. gray mortality. the dangers of black and white thinking. what makes someone a villain and what makes a someone a hero. found family. the dangers of obsessive hate and revenge. heroes who choose to save the world. healing and recovery. heist bullshit.

GO TO #creme does a writing if you want some examples of my scribblings

GO TO #creme does an art if you want to see my gay little drawings

GO TO #creme does a tag for a look at the tag games i’ve done

GO TO #*stares in podcast rambling* if you want a taste of the OTHER things i obsess over constantly

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cattatonically · 4 months

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Better Homes and Hauntings - Molly Harper

Synopsis

Author of the beloved Half Moon Hollow series of vampire romances (Nice Girls Don’t Have Fangs), Molly Harper has created a standalone paranormal romance in which a dilapidated haunted house could bring star-crossed lovers together—if it doesn’t kill them first!

When Nina Linden is hired to landscape a private island off the New England coast, she sees it as her chance to rebuild her failing business after being cheated by her unscrupulous ex. She never expects that her new client, software mogul Deacon Whitney, would see more in her than just a talented gardener. Deacon has paid top dollar to the crews he’s hired to renovate the desolate Whitney estate—he had to, because the bumps, thumps, and unexplained sightings of ghostly figures in nineteenth-century dress are driving workers away faster than he can say “Boo.”

But Nina shows no signs of being scared away, even as she experiences some unnerving apparitions herself. And as the two of them work closely together to restore the mansion’s faded glory, Deacon realizes that he’s found someone who doesn’t seem to like his fortune more than himself—while Nina may have finally found the one man she can trust with her bruised and battered heart.

But something on the island doesn’t believe in true love…and if Nina and Deacon can’t figure out how to put these angry spirits to rest, their own love doesn’t stand a ghost of a chance.

My Thoughts

This book really ticked all my boxes – paranormal romance, sass, bickering, bantering, a historical mystery, a modern mystery (ish), and ghosts. Sometimes, these all appeared at the same time. Just not all from the same character.

I really loved the multiple POV this book offered. I loved seeing the events transpire from so many different perspectives, and how the house affected everyone differently. But overall, I loved that at the heart of it all, they wanted to try to solve the mystery of who, really, killed Catherine Whitney. (For the sake of ensuring this review is spoiler-free, I’ll say no more on the matter.)

I honestly can’t say whether or not I loved one character over the other, but as a group I loved their dynamic. They were all afraid to admit to each other, and themselves, that there were some very haunted things happening around the house, but once they admitted it out loud, they worked together to find a solution.

There was no secret-keeping, or gaslighting, or trying to sweep it under the rug. There a mildly reluctant acceptance of the events that were occurring, and a team effort to find out why it was happening, and how to stop it. And they really all worked so well together.

The mysteries were by far the threads that weaved these characters together, but they were fairly secondary to the connections being built and the overall goal of renovating the historical mansion to a modern version of it’s former glory. (Did I have to google what the Gilded Age was more than once to try understand? Yes. Yes I did.)

Overall, I really enjoyed this book, and it made me realize that I’ve read a couple of Molly Harper titles before, a while ago, that I also really enjoyed. Once is chance, twice is coincidence, but three times is a pattern. It’s time I explore more of Molly Harper’s universe, and her series in full.

#Book review #Better Homes and Hauntings #Molly Harper #Catt reads #Catt's life in books

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gwynpool · 3 years

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it’s 2AM and i just finished Rule of Wolves (spoilers definitely up ahead)

first, to inform everyone, i read the spoilers when it got leaked in twitter cuz i can’t help myself. (it’s a sickness, i know) i think this is important since it definitely influenced my perspective upon reading the book. also, this is my first time being early in a party so yay me! going in ROW was easy for me because i started King of Scars the day before book 2’s actual release date so everything’s fresh.

secondly, this is really long so i’m sorry. i just have a lot of feelings and need to write it all down. on with the rant.

King of Scars was wonderful to me since it gave me my favorite Shadow and Bone character and the girl who i used to hate for being a mean girl but who I now admire with every ounce of my being. It also introduced a new ship that I am now obsessed with and is ruling besides my love for Jude&Cardan. Not to mention, it gave us Nina, whom though i’m not entirely a fan of due to all my love focusing on Kaz and Inej, allowed the connection between Shadow&Bone with SixofCrows.

Moving on, ROW was a ride and whirlwind of emotions. unfortunately, it wasn’t always the best kind.

I love the fantasy elements of it (tho it was a huge leap especially with the saints power thingy) and the politics because i am a sucker for scheming and stealing thrones.

the zoyalai teasing and angst was painful but in the best way since slowburn is what keeps me going.

nina finding comfort (and attraction, apparently) from hanne made my heart flutter because i haven’t gotten over matthias but this allowed a sort of closure and next chapter for our waffle-loving queen.

the promised wedding by leigh wasn’t what i expected but i’m not complaining since david&genya deserved nothing but happiness.

almost everything seems going well (aside from the fact that aleksander was ressurected apparently)and then everything crashes and burns and i just have to wonder why?

so the promised funeral alongside the wedding one, immediately comes after two? three? chapters as they were attacked during the afterparty of the wedding. and guess what? leigh killed the fcking groom.

the thing is i already knew he was going to die (with the spoilers and all) but i did not expect it to come immediately after the freaking wedding. not even halfway through the book!

being spoiled, i think, took most of the pain from the event but it doesn’t lessen the fact that it was completely unnecessary??? like though the characters grieved, nothing much was affected from his death? also, don’t talk to me about the character development for the survivors from this tragic event because there. was. absolutely. NONE.

and then we have the fricking darling ressurected. i love him in the first book of the grishaverse though i knew he was still a villain, don’t get me wrong. and my heart ached but was also relieved with his death in the third. he also inspired one of my all-time favorite fantasy villain(antihero?) in the form of Adelina Amouteru in the Young Elites series.

Ceased to be a Darklina fan and am now shipping Aleksander with Adelina because their power tho? like clings to like and they are both imbued with unfathomable darkness. somebody write fics please.

but bringing him back was what for exactly? leigh bardugo preached on how toxic the darkling character was and how we really shouldn’t like him in terms of agreeing with his ideals and yada yada. and yet she brings him back because apparently, he’s the only one paying her bills.

his conversation with alina tho had me expecting some darklina crumbs with fan service on the side since the stans were all raving about it on twitter *vomiting noises from toxicity* but i was surprised since it just further reminded us of how he truly is a villain in his very core and would do anything to get what he wants. so all in all it wasn’t entirely awful and it actually made me like Mal a bit. (never was a fan of him but that’s my issue, not the character’s)

setting aside the darkling issue a bit, the POV from Mayu was skippable. i mean obviously it still needs to be read for the Shu politics and the khergud existence but it just made me want to go to the next pov. Same goes for the “the monk’s” POV since you all know how i feel about him and the cult with it’s assembly and shit ended up also being unnecessary towards the end. honestly, i could do without the journey of the starless saint and his cult.

i truly enjoyed the fjerdan plot to my surprise and i like how nina kind of went through the last of us 2 circle of hate journey. it was definitely difficult knowing her pain and all that she went through and still choosing to be the better person. and yet, i can’t help but be more proud of her development. also, the supposed death of hanne got me going for a second and was actually ready to storm leigh’s home to fix her mistake. thank god it was plot twist. that’s all i have to say on the nina POV because i don’t wanna ruin my good feeling on this.

the crows cameo gave us a mini heist and it just made me miss reading their adventures. also the suli scene tugged at my heart.

imma skip zoya’s transformation but it utterly made me feel amazing and i have never been more glad that she’s kind of overpowered. she deserves it so fck all them haters. you can choke.

nikolai’s revelation and decision for the ravkan throne was not all that surprising, even without my knowledge of the spoilers. i honestly had a feeling that he was always his best self when he was strumhond and he only chose to fulfill the duties of the king because at that time, there was no other choice. so him giving up the throne to his beloved soldier, summoner and saint was a quite satisfying choice of route. there has been some others who would contest nikolai’s decision to step down as something unnecessary in the grand scheme of things but i would stand by my belief that nikolai made the best choice for ravka and for himself. not to say that i didn’t want to see both the queen and king side by side ruling but what are fanfictions for?

zoyalai is canon and endgame. finally. i can die now.

now the last two chapters was a toss up. for the first one was the darkling’s sacrifice. okay, so i was also spoiled by this from twitter but when i was reading the book, i keep expecting it to be brought up and it wasn’t. so i honestly thought that maybe that spoiler was a prank. lo and behold it was not and it wasn’t until the very last end. so the buildup was goddamn awful. the whole concept of the thorn wood and sort of atlas moment was just no. like you’re just springing this up now? when we’re supposed to be tying up loose ends but making sure it had history and buildup to well, back it up.

also leigh outright writing genya saying it was not a redemption for the darkling and him being unapologetic about his crimes (basically being a truly evil asshole) doesn’t remove the fact that it still comes off as a redemption arc especially with what is now the synopsis of SOC 3 but ill get to that. he still was the one who did a heroic deed and that fucks me up because it was just devastating to me after making peace with his end in ruin and rising. not because i was hurt that he died yet again boohoo but because it kind of invalidates everything that alina, genya, zoya and countless other victims went through.

on a side note, the darling stans on twitter who keeps defending his actions, i would really advise you to reflect on your decisions cuz it is honestly unhealthy. also, you lot talking smack about nikolai and zoya refusing to sacrifice their lives? stop twisting the story to suit your toxic admiration, nikolai was even first to offer up his life and would do so if it was actually possible. so just go hide in your darkling cocoon and stop hating on other characters to justify your favored aleksander.

the very last chapter aka coronation was good because it gave us inej ghafa cameo as captain of her ship and bonding with our resident privateer and also genya, alina and zoya bonding. but it was bad because apparently the darkling chronicles is still not over and now we’re supposed to grant him death like that’s going to make everything okay? i know forgiveness and breaking the circle of hate and revenge is a huge theme in this duology but honestly, this is just too extreme. with nina it was understandable and the people she hated were born of twisted mindset and circumstances but the darkling? hahahah no. he is a literal immortal who was delusional so now that he’s paying for his crimes, you want to allow him death because you have nightmares? zoya, goddamit no! same to you genya and alina. and so this will be the plot for the third six of crows? why can’t we just stop making this about him. now he gunna steal kaz’s thunder? over my dead body.

in the end, i gave this book 4 stars in goodreads because if i ignore the darkling plot, it was a really good use of politics and fantasy merging in a storyline. i can’t fault leigh for choosing to do this since it’s still her book so i definitely don’t have a right to dictate what i expected from this. also, i have a half a mind to believe that she fell in love with ben barnes and had him in mind writing this so i really cannot blame her because i have been under that man’s charms since prince caspian came out. the spoilers i read made me more open in reading this (backwards thinking but eh that’s how i roll) so i’m not at all crushed by what transpired. it was just weird and was lackluster in its attempt to give ravka some sort of peace. frankly, i just want to read the third six of crows book to maybe find some sort of calm in all this craziness and also delve in some zoyalai fanfiction because it was a long time coming.

shameless promotion but if you guys want to check out my nikolai duology spotify playlist, here’s the link:

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yukinojou · 3 years

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I already squeed quite a bit on Twitter, but turns out my Shadow and Bone thoughts demand longform. So that was a 40+ tweet thread or using my Tumblr for an original post for once.

I was wary about the Shadow and Bone adaptation the way I'm usually wary about good books being adapted onscreen. It was amplified because my actual favourites are the Six of Crows books, and because the American-based movie complex has a bad track record of doing anything based on Eastern Europe. 8 episodes in 3 days should tell you how much I loved it - the moment I finished, I wanted more.

First, the technical praise:

Damn but the plotting is tight. It took me a while to realised it's based on heist movie bones, where every little thing (The Freaking Bullet!) is important. The story fulfills its promises and manages not to bore at the same time - it delights by the way they're fulfilled. I called out a few plot developments moments before they happened, and I was happy about it. Such a joy after so many series where "not doing what viewers expect" led to plot holes and lack of sense. It might be an upside to the streaming model after all.

From a dramatic point of view I can tell all the reasons for all the changes, especially providing additional outsider points of view on Ravka (Crows) and letting viewers see Mal for themselves the way he only comes across in later books.

Speaking of which, this is a masterclass in rewriting a story draft. SaB was Bardugo's first, and having read later books you can really see where she didn't quite dare to break the YA rules yet, especially Single POV that necessitated a tight focus on Alina's often negative feelings rather than the big picture and a triangle that felt a bit forced. The world in the series is so much bigger, the way Bardugo could finally paint it when SaB success gave her more creative freedom, and some structural choices feel familiar too. It's a combination of various choices by crew and cast, but the end result meshes together so tightly and naturally.

Visuals! Especially the war parts because Every Soviet Movie Ever, but also the clothes (I would kill for Nina's blouse in the bar), the jewelry, the interiors. The stag was so very beautiful. And a deep commitment to a coherent aesthetic for each character and setting.

Look, you can do a serious fantasy series with colours! Both skin colours and bright sets and clothing! And all scenes were well lit enough to know what's going on, even in the Fold!

Representation (aka I Am Emotion)

To start with: I was born behind the Iron Curtain, in the last years of the Cold War. The Curtain was always permeable to some extent, and we have always been aware that while we have talented artists of our own, we never had the budgets and polish of the Anglosphere Entertainment Machine. So we watched a hell of a lot of American visual storytelling especially because yeah, you can tell we don't have the budgets. 90s and 2000s especially, it's getting better now.

In American stories, the BEST case scenario for Eastern European representation is the Big Dumb Pole, the ethnic stereotype Americans don't even notice they use, where the punchline is that his English is bad or that he grew up outside Anglo culture. Other than that, it's criminals, beggars, sex trafficking victims, refugees. Sure, we may look similar (except we really really don't, not if you're raised here and see the distinct lack of all those long-jawed Anglo faces), but we are not and have never been the West, never mind America. It's probably better for younger people now, but I was raised under rationing and passport bans. Star Trek and Beverly Hills 90210 were exactly as foreign to me.

The first ever character I really identified with was Susan Ivanova in Babylon 5 (written by J. Michael Straczynski, yay behind-camera representation). This was a Russian Jewish woman very much in charge, in the way of strong women I know so well, not taking any bullshit, not repressing her feminity. I recognised her bones, she could be my cousin. The sheer relief of it. There have been few such occasions since.

The reason I picked up Shadow and Bone in the first place was recommendations from other Polish people. I've had no problems finding representation in Eastern European books because wow our scene is strong in SFF especially, but it's always a treat to find a book in English that gets it. And Leigh gets it, the bones of our culture, and I could even look past the grammar issue (dear gods and Americans, Starkova for a woman, Morozov for a guy) that really irked me because of the love for the setting and the characters, the weaving in of religion/mysticism (we never laicisized the same way as the West, natch), the understanding of how deep are the scars left in a nation at war for centuries. The books are precious to me, they and Arden's Winternight and Novik's Spinning Silver.

To sum up: Shadow and Bone the Netflix series gets it. You can tell just how much they've immersed themselves in Eastern European culture and media, it comes across so well in visuals and writing and characters. Not just the obvious bits (though the WWII propaganda posters gave me a giggle), but the palaces, the additional plotlines and characters, the costumes, the attitudes. About the only thing missing in the soldier scenes was someone singing and/or quoting poetry.

I will blame the Apparat's lack of beard on filming in a non-Orthodox country. Poland's Catholic too, but I very much imagined him as an Orthodox patriarch, possibly because I read the books shortly after a visit to Pecherska Lavra in Kiev and the labyrinthine holy catacombs there. Small quibble, not my religion, not my place to speak.

(I've seen discussion on the issues with biracial representation in the show, which is visceral and apparently based on bad experiences of one of the show writers in a way that's caused pain to other Asian and biracial people. I'm not qualified to speak on those parts, other that Eastern Europe is... yeah. Racist in subtly different ways. If anything, the treatment of the Suli as explained in Six of Crows always read so very true of the way Roma are treated, and even sanitised.)

And now for the spoiler-filled bits:

Kaz and Inej. I mean... just THEM. So many props to the actors, the writers, the bloody goat.

I adore the fact the only people who get to have sex in the show are Jesper and a very lucky stablehand.

Ben Barnes needs either an award or a kick. The man's acting choices and puppy eyes are as epic as his hair.

So Much Love for Alina initiating the kiss. Her book characterisation makes sense, she's so trapped in her own head because she has no time to process everything that's happening, but grabbing life by the lapels is a much more active choice. Still not making the relationship equal, but closer to it.

Speaking of, Kaz's constant awareness of how unequal his relationship with Inej is, and attempts to give her agency. I'm really curious how his touch issues come across to someone who doesn't know the backstory there.

Feodor and his actor. He looks exactly like the pre-war heartthrob Adolf Dymsza, a specific upper-class Polish ethnic type that's much rarer now that, well, Nazis killed millions of Polish intellectuals in their attempt to reduce us to unskilled labour only. The faces he makes are the Best.

Nina!! Nina is perfect, those cheekbones, that cheek, I was giggling myself silly half the time. I cannot wait to see Danielle Galligan take on the challenge of Nina's plotline in Six of Crows and Crooked Kingdom, she'll kill us dead.

I already mentioned that the writers fixed Mal's absence from the first book, but Mal in general! The haircut gives him a kind of rugby charm, and Archie Renaux is outstanding at emoting without talking. Honestly, all the casting in this series is inspired, but him in particular.

Extra bonus: Howard Charles and Luke Pasqualino playing so very much against the type of the swaggering Musketeers I saw them play last. Arken dropping the mask at the end... Howard Charles is love.

I can't believe not only was Milo's bullet a plot point, but the fact Alina was wearing a particularly sparkly hair ornament in a long series of beautiful hair ornaments was a plot point.

In conclusion: so much love, and next three season NOW please. Okay, give me a week to reread the books, and an extra day because new Murderbot drops tomorrow...

#shadow and bone #six of crows #shadow and bone meta

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zoyathedragonqueen · 3 years

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Rule of wolves -Review (spoiler!)

puuh... it was certainly not what I expected. I was so excited about it, you cannot imagine how happy I was when it arrived a week earlier than it was supposed to. I started reading the book immediately and honestly, was a little disappointed at first. It took me some time to get into the story, which I did not anticipate. I thought I was going to be hooked from the beginning on but I kind of had to push through the first half of the book before I started to enjoy it.

The Povs: To me, the first half kind of seemed all over the place. There are too many things happening at once and it feels like you are constantly jumping form one story into another. This is partly due to the many povs. The constant change between Nikolai, Zoys, Nina, the monk and Mayu repeatedly rips you out of the story and at times it was quite hard for me to keep up.

The Darkling: I find that he did not serve much of a purpose throughout most of the book. Only in the end he turns out to be the only one that can save everyone from the blight. I think the darkling sacrificing himself for Ravka is quite a good redemption for him. However, his sacrifice felt a little off character for me. He says multiple times throughout the book that he does not regret anything he did showing that he never really was the selfless type even though he claimed that everything he did was for Ravka and its grishas. To me his character kind of seemed inconsistent.

Zoya (aka Queen of Ravka!!!!): I loved the fact that Zoya was opening up more, however, at times it seemed kind of fast to me. I thought that maybe she would struggle a bit more with sharing her past, yet at times it seemed super easy to her. Also, Zoya finally got her big dragon moment!!!! I was so excited for it and Leigh really delivered on that front. And I loved the part where she basically fell from the sky and Nikolai was holding her. Actually, I loved all the Zoyalai moments – them together in the garden, aaaahhh! I could not contain myself! However, what really bothered me is that Zoya is now canonically white passing in the books. I feel like Leigh baited us on this front, even sharing official art in which Zoya is depicted with darker skin.

Nina Zenik: I love her and that’s all I am going to say.

Nikolai Lantsov: I loved him so much in this book. His character is so well done and I love that we got to see more of how he deals with the demon.

The Ending: I was surprised that Zoya was the one at the end who wants to grand the darkling death and now wants to search for Sankt Felix’s heart. The darkling says that despite the demon Nikolai might not live as long as Zoya, implying that the demon will elongate his life. He also said that as long as he lives, the demon will live on in Nikolai. Thus, killing the darkling would mean that the demon dies, and Nikolai would have a normal life span again. Is that what Zoya wants?? In my mind they spend eternity together but apparently, they might not.

I did not like that the ending was kind of open. It is not clear if they actually ever will find the heart and kill the darkling. I thought Leigh wanted to end the grishaverse with rule of wolves, yet she left the open ending… I think because of that the book did not give me the closure I wanted.

All in all… It was fine. It was not the grand ending I expected, maybe my expectations were just to high. I think I might have to read it again in a couple of weeks with a fresh mind and less expectations to see what I think then. Overall, I would give it 3.5/5 stars

#zoya nazyalensky #rule of wolves #nikolai lantsov #nina zenik #grishaverse #king of scars #shadow and bone #six of crows #inej ghafa #kaz brekker #alina starkov #alexander morozova #the darkling #row #zoyalai

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denndrawings · 3 years

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Hi and welcome to Misha Mixes Unrelated Things. Todays episode is called: The Grishaverse Is A DnD Campaign That Got (VERY) Out Of Hand And Here’s Why

(There are going to be spoilers of. Pretty much everything. Except for King of Scars because I’m only like 3 chapters in so. No spoilers from KoS)

Let’s begin with the SOC duology because that’s the first thing I read and also I feel like it has a more “conventional” dnd-esque narrative (probably because of the multiple POVs and stuff idk).

So, first things first: characters. While I think all of the crows are equally important to the plot of the book I also think that not all of them are players’ characters. I don’t think Kaz is, for instance, and probably Wylan isn’t either. But let me explain the rest first and then I’ll elaborate on this.

Inej is a classic rogue with her amazing skills and tragic backstory and everything. I think the person that plays her would probably be a beginner because Inej’s backstory is so intertwined with the plot and so well fitted to the city where the story begins and she has such a clear role and stuff that it can only be because the DM had a say on this. From my experience at least and I’ve been DMing for like 5 years now so maybe I know a thing or two. I may be wrong tho.

Matthias is an oathbreaker paladin. The drüskelle sounds like the kind of half military/half religious organization able to provide paladins in a dnd game. They would be Oath of Devotion paladins. Or like a twisted version of those but yes. Oath of Devotion to Djel or whatever I don’t really like fjerdans let me be. I also think Matthias’ player and Nina’s knew each other/had player with each other before and that’s why they made a backstory together and made sure their characters were… a thing from the beginning. I think they wouldn’t be as committed to the DM as Inej’s character so they probably chose a far off place to set their backstory so they didn’t have to learn all of the kerch politics and stuff and join gangs and shit (even thought Nina’s player kind of ended up doing it but I think I remember it was Kaz who found her and not the other way around so).

Nina is a cleric but like. Either a Death or a War Domain cleric. Not a cleric suited for healing but for killing. Cool shit, I personally love clerics. I think the player would have the curse of being the only “““healer””” of the group without even being a real healer. It happens to the best of us ;_; (not to me tho I never play I’m a forever DM XDD)

I think Jesper is a fighter. I have considered making him an artificer but yeah, no because he didn’t build his guns or anything he’s just really fucking good at shooting stuff. That’s a fighter to me. And he later double-classes and stuff when they arrive to the Ice Court to be able to do his thing. I think this player is this type of player the DM invites to the table because they have played together before and they are fun as shit and they kinda help them direct the party where they need to go. I personally love that kind of player but I mean, who wouldn’t?

So yes, now on why Kaz and Wylan aren’t players’ characters. Maybe this is gut feeling of mine and I’m wrong but they are like. Too well intertwined with the plot like. Wylan is definitely this npc the DM brought randomly to like maybe kill him at some point and make Loving Father Van Eck want to mess with the Crows and then the party just fell in love with him and so the DM couldn’t kill him and made an incredibly tragic backstory for him instead where Bad Guy Van Eck became the man we know and he just was a terrible man stupid enough to mess with them.

And Kaz… he is just /too/ in control to not be an npc. Literally nobody but the DM would know so much about the city and the npcs and everything. That’s just Not A Thing. It would almost be meta-rol. For me it makes sense that at the beginning Kaz was only going to be like the Crows’ hirer like, the contact between Van Eck and the players’ characters. And this time I don’t think it was the players’ idea that he stayed, it was probably the DM’s. Having a character that knows pretty much everything is just So Useful to a DM. And then the DM fell in love with him, gave him an amazing backstory and issues and everything. And the final miracle of bringing Inej’s parents to Ketterdam is something only a DM can do like. The man is a disaster but I think he totally has the signature of the DM of a chaotic AF party that realized that their party needed a compass to remind them all the time what their mission was.

About the plot per se…man I don’t know what to say. That looks like the DM pitching a simple robbery and everybody getting nat20s in super weird situations and getting away with stuff. But I mean, that’s DnD in a nutshell so.

My headcanon for Matthias’ ending is that the player had to leave the group for some reason. They probably had this super cool redemption arc planned for him that he totally deserved (listen I Don’t Like Matthias like. At all. But the man worked for it ok? I think I could have get to maybe like him if he had a little more time to grow but whatever) but then they had to leave and the group didn’t want to like get rid of him right away or for him to become an npc so the DM and Nina’s player took turns playing him until well. The thing. You know. It was kind of a sudden death like, players’ characters usually have death saves and stuff and they don’t get killed that easily and that’s why I think Matthias wasn’t a player character anymore even though he began the campaign as one.

And because y’all have been good and have read my bullshit until this point, here you have my headcanon for the trilogy:

The Grisha trilogy is an overly complicated off-roading some of the players made up during the campaign like imagine the discord server where they usually play. Well in most DnD discord servers there is a channel where you can roleplay through text as your character. I think the Grisha trilogy was born there from the DM telling kind of the backstory of the world and Sankta Alina and the war and stuff and the players made up characters or maybe just took side characters from that story and made them into Proper Characters to roleplay following that but also kind of ended up developing more aspects about it (I imagine the DM probably had a few details on that, like an outline or something and the players just kinda took it to a whole new level. Players often do that kind of magic). And they were all hyped AF when their DnD characters met their Other Dnd Characters, obviously.

I don’t know which player would play each character, though. Maybe Jesper’s was Nikolai just because they both are /like that/ and Nina’s was Zoya and maybe Inej’s was Genya. Or the other way around, idk. I feel like the whole monologue Nina has at some point of Zoya Is To The Drüskelle Like Jarl Brun Is To The Grisha sounds like Nina’s player is also Zoya’s player but idk.

So yes I can probably elaborate on everything if someone’s interested but this is what I have so far.

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dwellordream · 3 years

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A Six of Crows Review: Kaz V through Kaz VI

Previously

On the positive side of things, the reveal of Kaz’s backstory and how he and his brother were conned of their life’s savings and left to starve on the streets is well done. I have to give credit where credit is due in Kaz V. Bardugo very effectively shows the differences between the innocent and playful little boy Kaz was and the cruel and spiteful young man he’s become with the recounting.

On the negative side of things, the efforts by the author to get the reader invested in a burgeoning relationship between Kaz and Inej falls totally flat. Not just because Kaz is a dick who can’t work out that he should probably thank Inej for saving all their lives, but because the narrative keeps insisting to us that there is chemistry and mutual romantic feelings between the two of them, but never really bothers to show it.

Kaz is mean to girls he likes. Inej thinks he’s attractive. It doesn’t go much deeper than that. It feels like Bardugo is far more committed to the relationship than even her audience would be, and we’re nearly at the halfway point of the novel.

I still don’t see why I should want the two of them to be together. I mean, Jesus, there’s more depth between Nina and Matthias, and Matthias’ entire character and backstory is rife with fucking Nazi imagery!

Matthias II does a decent job at continuing to develop his character and his relationship with Nina, though at times it does veer into ‘walking camera’ territory before the flashback to the shipwreck begins.

I find it a little unrealistic how easily Nina falls into a pretty friendly manner with Matthias after they wash up on land, even if she doesn’t think he’s much of a threat to her with them both exhausted and sick from hours swimming for shore.

Cracking jokes with the man who captured her to take her to her death seems a little weird, and it doesn’t seem like this is supposed to be taken as shock induced hysterics. I would think she’d have harsher words for him than ‘big idiot’ and ‘prude’.

And if I never have to read Matthias ‘indecently round’ comment again, I’ll die happy. Is Bardugo aware she can just call a character fat? Heavyset? Chunky? It’s not a dirty word.

Bardugo does try to confront this disparity - the obvious passion between Matthias and Nina, in contrast to the fact that he has been raised to hate all grisha and to an extent still does - with the scene of the pyres. Nina does get in some good lines - “Do you have a different name for killing when you wear a uniform to do it?”, while Matthias defends his prejudice by pointing out that Ravkan grisha soldiers destroyed his home and slaughtered his family.

This is where the real world connections fall flat on their face. Bardugo puts in some pretty obvious connections to actual historical atrocities, such as the witch trials that occurred across Europe during the Renaissance, and the Fjerdan’s whole national image pretty clearly taking some cues from Nazi Germany.

Blonde hair, blue eyes, men fight to protect the fatherland, women stay home and have more pure Fjerdan children, grisha are demons on this earth and lower than dogs who must be exterminated for the greater good… If the latter is unintentional, damn, it is one hell of a coincidence.

But the point is, while real world minorities are guilty of nothing but existing, fictional minorities such as the grisha are depicted as dangerous and capable of wide scale destruction. Real world racism, antisemitism, and other forms of intolerance isn’t based off anything except prejudice, paranoia, and convenient scapegoating.

Yet in Bardugo’s world, there is real basis, and that’s where it gets thorny, and where this novel really, really could have used some sensitivity readers.

And while Matthias II does get at some actual thought provoking conflict between Matthias and Nina, it’s almost all undone in Nina II, which has Nina seemingly forget most of the massive fight she just had with him, and start thinking about how she wants to kiss him again. This, after she just saw the horrific evidence of what Fjerdans do to grisha.

I understand what Bardugo is trying to do, cutting between their current conflict and their reluctant bonding in the past, but there’s just not enough substance to it. I don’t buy that Nina would so easily come to trust, even love, someone dedicated to killing her kind. I don’t buy that Matthias would so easily fall for her.

And I especially don’t like the false equivalence that the narrative tries to bring about by suggesting that Nina is ‘just as guilty’ as Matthias for turning on him when they made it back to civilization. Matthias somehow can’t connect how what he hates her for; falsely accusing him, having him imprisoned, chained up in the belly of a ship, is exactly what he’d just done to her.

Why should Nina have trusted him, just because he became infatuated with her? He hardly changed his mind about all grisha, he just became attracted to one. Matthias does deserve punishment for his behavior. Is rotting in prison for the rest of his life the solution? No, but neither is getting to walk away scot free.

Nina reveals that she in fact accused Matthias of slaving to spare him the worse fate of being captured and brought back to Ravka to be tortured and executed as a druskelle.

Honestly, I don’t think this reveal was necessary at all. I could excuse and even welcome some spite from Nina towards him. Instead this just paints her as this all-compassionate, pure-hearted angel willing to repeatedly sacrifice herself for the sake of both friends and enemies. I like Nina, but I’d like her better with more bite to her.

Inej V unfortunately takes us right back into walking camera territory for her. This could be any character narrating this chapter, and it does little to nothing to develop her.

The travel descriptions are also not terribly interesting and I don’t think the pacing is handled all that well; the book started fast, got even faster and choppier as the Crows came together, and is now grinding into a dull slog ever since they landed in Fjerda, which is a much more thinly sketched setting than Ketterdam.

I think it might have made better use of the book to work it out so all the events took place within the confines of the city, to add to the themes of how Ketterdam can make or break any one of them, but too late now.

It’s even more insulting when contrasted with Kaz VI, which continues to detail Kaz’s backstory, which is where Bardugo is at her strongest. It just emphasizes that this book would have worked better with few characters, tighter characterization, and a plot confined to Ketterdam and its mundane capitalist horrors. It’s too thinly stretched between multiple POV characters, half of whom are barely developed, the other half of whom are frustratingly botched in their development.

I know jack shit about Jesper and Wylan, and it’s aggravating. I still know very little about Inej. Kaz, Nina, and Matthias get the most attention, and Kaz still isn’t very believable or compelling in the present, just the past, whereas Nina and Matthias’ intertwined story is an awkwardly arrayed mess of conflicting ideals and poor characterization decisions.

I only have about a hundred pages left of this book, and right now it’s hovering at like a C- rating. Not badly written enough to be offensive or infuriating, but still firmly stuck in some mediocre traction that, with more stringent editing, could have been resolved.

There are some good plot ideas and good character concepts here, but they’re lost in the mire. I’m barely even invested in the actual heist plot, which just doesn’t feel as urgent as it should, and the characters are not compelling enough to make up for it

#six of crows #in review #kaz brekker #nina zenik #matthias helvar #ya lit

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coffeebooksorme · 5 years

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American Royals ARC Review

GOODREAD’S SYNOPSIS: What if America had a royal family? If you can't get enough of Harry and Meghan or Kate and William, meet American princesses Beatrice and Samantha.

Two princesses vying for the ultimate crown. Two girls vying for the prince's heart. This is the story of the American royals. When America won the Revolutionary War, its people offered General George Washington a crown. Two and a half centuries later, the House of Washington still sits on the throne. Like most royal families, the Washingtons have an heir and a spare. A future monarch and a backup battery. Each child knows exactly what is expected of them. But these aren't just any royals. They're American. And their country was born of rebellion. As Princess Beatrice gets closer to becoming America's first queen regnant, the duty she has embraced her entire life suddenly feels stifling. Nobody cares about the spare except when she's breaking the rules, so Princess Samantha doesn't care much about anything, either . . . except the one boy who is distinctly off-limits to her. And then there's Samantha's twin, Prince Jefferson. If he'd been born a generation earlier, he would have stood first in line for the throne, but the new laws of succession make him third. Most of America adores their devastatingly handsome prince . . . but two very different girls are vying to capture his heart. The duty. The intrigue. The Crown. New York Times bestselling author Katharine McGee imagines an alternate version of the modern world, one where the glittering age of monarchies has not yet faded--and where love is still powerful enough to change the course of history.

I was provided an eARC by Random House via Net Galley in exchange for an honest review.

Did I travel back to early 2000′s YA and read a book? Because I feel like I did. American Royals is definitely a fish out of water book that does not read like a book from 2019 wherein the YA community is awash in diversity, multi-faceted characters, and stellar writing. It’s similar enough to Red, White, and Royal Blue in that it follows the life of teenage/young 20′s royals in modern times but the similarities end there and woobuddy, do the vast differences spring to life.

There are four POV’s in this book: Beatrice, princess and soon to be first queen of America who’s not happy about it; Samantha, princess and Beatrice’s little sister who is jealous and bitter; Nina, token POC and Samantha’s BFF who’s secretly in love with Samantha’s twin brother Jefferson; and then there’s Daphne, token bitch who wants to be a princess, Jefferson’s ex, and will do anything to change that. Those all seem like generic one liner ways to describe these characters but honestly, that’s pretty much it. They are all supremely one dimensional with barely any growth throughout the book.

Nina is described as Hispanic in the book but there’s not a differentiation of how she’s Hispanic. Is she Cuban? Peuto Rican? What? There is literally nothing about her culture in this book. She doesn’t talk about how she was raised, apart from having lesbian moms, and there is no mention of her cultural background until it’s used against her. Strip the Hispanic descriptor from her and she’s another white character. It’s like someone told the author her story was too white so she threw the word ‘Hispanic’ in there to make it more diverse. The only other POC character is a Japanese girl named Himari who’s in a freaking coma!

Samantha reads like the whiny little sister who’s jealous that the older sibling gets all the attention. She’s the quintessential middle child. At first you think that’s all there’s going to be about her but as the book goes on you see more and more of her personality. She has distinct likes/hobbies: history, fashion, skiing, and traveling. She actually matures, grows up, and learns how she not only wants to contribute to the world but who she wants to be as a person.In comparison to the other characters, she’s the most fleshed out well rounded character in this book. I’d have rather read a whole book from her POV.

Speaking of history, you would think that a book that’s basically an alternate universe America would have a thriving history rife with interesting factoids that would suck you in. I should have known better than to expect that from a YA contemporary novel but I was highly disappointed that we didn’t get more history of this book’s America. The biggest thing that made me the most irate is there’s no mention of African American’s or Native American’s. Um...how? This country is built upon the degradation and slaughter of those peoples, how do you leave them out of your AU America? You could have totally flipped the script and given them a super prosperous history and story. I know it’s not important to the actual plot of the book but, damn. I would have really liked to have seen that.

Not only that but the book is super sexist as well. America doesn’t get her first queen until now, what I would assume is 2019 in the book, there’s no mention of any high level females who have any power whatsoever, Beatrice’s mother the queen is talked about as if she’s the essential right hand to the king but there’s no specific mention of how, AND at one point a man who’s the crown’s representative makes this comment: “The crown can’t condone premarital relations.” Um, excuse me, what? There’s also snide remarks made here and there about hemlines, clothing choices, and girls being sexually promiscuous, but never any mention of that to the guys. It was very off putting and annoying. Again, it was a missed opportunity with the author where she could have totally flipped the script.

Plot wise this book read like a season of Gossip Girl. There’s a big bad secret about the only other POC character who’s in a coma. What happened to her? Did someone try to kill her? Who did? Why? It’s barely mentioned among the whining and raging hormones, but it’s there. You eventually find out why she’s in a coma by the end of the book and it sort of leaves it as a cliffhanger, too. As the first book in a series, this book really does a lot of built up to what I think will be the overall story arc to the series.

All in all, this book is a total miss for me. It didn’t scratch any of the itches that the description mentioned, none of the characters are interesting enough to make me pick up the sequel, the writing is average and there’s nothing in the plot line that I couldn’t already guess.

My Rating: ⭐

Expected Publication: September 3, 2019

#booklr #books #book review #book reviews #american royals #katharine mcgee #bookstagram #mine #random house #bookworn #book dragon #bibliophile

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thenerdyunhealthybrit · 5 years

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So finally finished season 2 of House of Anubis and feel dead on the inside, just because I know Nina isn’t in S3, we don’t get anymore Fabina and I know Amber leaves.

So, thoughts:

- When I originally watched S2, I only watched the first half and I really came to dislike Joy because of the love triangle and it killed me because I loved Klariza in Dani’s House and I remembered her in Skins. However, this time round I came to enjoy her. I think young me would still not like her, but adult me, I loved how when she wrote that horrible article about my baby Nina and was like I just want her gone - it sounded immature and spiteful but having her POV when no one was looking really added layers to Joy as a character. Which I think was important because Joy wasn’t really a character in S1 while she was one, so she lacked the opportunity for development like the rest did.

- Also I think the whole Joy storyline should have been explored more earlier, like everyone went through a lot in S1, however what Sibuna went through was way different to what Joy went through so they were forced to grow up and mature as they became responsible for these tasks. Meanwhile Joy she was kind of sheltered from it when she was kidnapped, she never saw the struggle. That doesn’t make what she went through any less but she didn’t have to grow up and develop like Sibuna did - especially when it turned out that she wasn’t The Chosen One - So I think she expected things to go back to normal and move on, especially since no one really wanted to talk about it with her.

- And I think once Patricia became involved with Sibuna again, it only made the situation worse, she truly had no one that knew what she went through since Mara was blissfully unaware and Patricia had to focus on the Mask of Anubis.

- In my last HoA post, I mentioned my complaint about Jerome not being in Sibuna. I still stand by that. I’m happy he got more involved by the end, and he did catch wind of Alfie even if they denied it. However, him not being in Sibuna still doesn’t make sense, considering how he was in S1 about wanting to be part of the gang, he wanted his best mate etc. And if they wanted him out of Sibuna, there should have been a scene or explanation about him leaving Sibuna or not being part of it. Especially since when S2 started, Sibuna wasn’t what it was in S1, there was no mystery and it was just friends having fun, being a gang etc. When Patricia and Alfie got brought in, Jerome should have as well and they could have done a scene where he rejects getting involved because of Poppy and his dad etc.

- I loved Eddie this time round, I remember the first time finding him annoying, it wasn’t the actor but I think I was like Patricia, going “oh not another American.” Because I find in British shows their accent stands out and they sound too American. But this time I enjoyed him. Also grew to like Peddie.

- I do feel like the Osirian stuff was rushed, would have liked a nice build up, like I wouldn’t mind them pulling a S1 with Fabian/Eddie, also the fallout with Eddie would have been great - and I read the spoilers about The Chosen One And Osirian can’t be together or near each other, which as a mythology rule makes no sense - especially with how it’s built up in S2 by Victor Senior.

- Also I think I multiship with Mara, because in my rewatch of S1, my opinion of Mara stayed the same, she really annoyed me, the Mick/Mara/Amber stuff was one reason, like my take on Mara is that she’s that good girl on a pedestal but hides this shady side that even she doesn’t know about it, because she was trying to get with Mick while he was with Amber but it about to hide it under pretences - but I genuinely think she’s trying to do what’s best, to not hurt anyone but I think she made it worse by not being openly honest. Anyway, in S2, Mara I loved way more, as a character she felt more subdued as a goody two shoes, she was still one, but it felt less fake and I thought Tasie was a better actress in S2, also I found myself enjoying Mickara more in the little we got from S2, they were written better than in S1 ironically, considering Mick left early on and returned by the end. Also Jara were great, I liked it in S1 as it added a layer to Jerome but also enjoyed it here. And in the last episode, I was rooting for Mickara and then Jara.

- I love Amber and Alfie, like I’m fully aware that the first half of S2 is not a healthy relationship and Amber treated Alfie awful, but it was entertaining to watch, plus I love Alfie discovering his self worth through this and Sibuna and then the roles reversing at the end of the evening with Amber. I just love the dynamic of them.

- Bobby being credited for the whole season is a joke. I know he left HoA at the end of S2 for Wolfblood, but wonder for the reason in S2, because I never loved or hated Mick in S1, but I would have liked to see more of him in S2, like the beginning of S2, I was like “see ya, not gonna miss ya” but when he returned at the end of S2, I actually missed him and felt he was wasted in S2 and the last few episodes.

- The S2 finale just highlights how big of a shame it was that Nathalia didn’t return. It would have been nice to see Joy and Nina form a friendship or frenemy relationship after this season. That would have been a natural direction, while also furthering Joy and the stuff she went through in S1. Then Eddie/Nina is another one, since you don’t really see a friendship between them in S2, so it would have been fun to see that friendship especially with Patricia and Fabian, since Patricia is Patricia and Fabian has always been the closest to Nina. And of course the Fabina stuff, since we never really see them be a couple. I was robbed.

- Only other thought I can think of is that the acting improved A LOT in S2. The stand out is Patricia with Jade Ramsay, I just remember in S1 thinking at the beginning when she was upset at Joy at the police station, I thought the acting was poor and a lot of overacting. And when she was mean to Nina and bullying her, her acting and voice out on felt quite caricature mean girl, like voice acting. But I’m S2, from episode 1, it felt natural and improved. Nina and Nathalia was another weak link in S1, and in the beginning of S2, it was improved but there were some weak moments, but by the end of the season, maybe even the middle she improved. Like I said, the whole cast improved, Tasie is another one mentioned, but the ones I’ve gone into detail I felt were the biggest weaknesses in S1 and who improved.

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nomattertheoceans · 5 years

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My thoughts on King of Scars

Ok so first of all, obviously, spoiler alert, do NOT read further if you haven’t read the book (I wanted to put a cut but I don’t have the option on mobile, sorry...)

So yeah I think I need some mindless screaming into the void before I can be constructive, so... OMGVRDCNIUBCHIRUFHEJKDFKLUHOSJDXW THIS BOOK WAS SO SO SO GOOD I WISH I COULD FORGET I READ IT JUST SO I COULD READ IT AGAIN FOR THE FIRST TIME!!!!!! IT WAS SO AMAZING AND SO HEARTBREAKING AND SO FUNNY AND WITTY AND PERFECT UGH

Okay, I feel better now.

So... King of Scars. Where do I start?

Bardugo’s style improved so much since the Grisha Trilogy. It was obvious in the SoC duology, but it’s even more obvious now that she’s writing in the same setting, with some of the same characters. Her writing in this book is so good!

This book actually redeemed her in my eyes for the only thing I hated in SoC: Matthias’ death, that I found pointless and not very well handled. But man, did this book improve on it. Nina hearing his voice, her thinking of him when she talks about being a widow for her cover. The whole burying scene had me crying the entire time, it was so well written and so full of emotions, you could actually feel Nina get some form of closure from it, and it helped me accept his death too. So well done.

The prologue was great! I loved these in SoC and I’m glad she kept going with the idea, because introducing Nikolai and Zoya that way was a really good way to get the feeling of the current situation (and the POV of a random stranger works as well as it did in the duology).

NINA THINKING ABOUT THE CROWS ugh I’m dead, it was so amazing to read about how she wanted Inej to be with her to bury Matthias, how she used Kaz’s advice to craft her plan, how she thought about having inherited Jesper’s gift for bad decisions (I actually laughed out loud at that one XD). The whole idea that her year in Ketterdam really changed her and helped her grow into a better defender of the Grisha (even though she’s not as good at following orders ;) ), this was great. I miss the Crows so much.... OH AND NIKOLAI LEARNED TO PICK LOCKS WITH KAZ AND HE THINKS ABOUT HIM THAT WAS A GREAT REFERENCE TOO! Also, the fact that Leoni was the little girl saved by Jesper’s mom, that was such a great coincidence, I hope at some point they might meet and realize the connection, I don’t know how but it was a great detail to include, Leoni saving people thanks to Jesper’s mom’s sacrifice. (Yes, any reference to the Crows had me giggling to my book, I admit it)

So, I know a lot of people are going to be mad at me about this one because a lot of people hold the Darkling in high esteem, but the fact that he was framed as the main villain throughout the Nikolai/Zoya storyline felt really good to me. I honestly never understood how people could see him as a good person after everything that happened and that we learned in the Trilogy, and the fact that Bardugo focused mainly on him as the villain in Zoya’s story was a very good choice. Zoya feels angry and ashamed at how much she adored him and how he manipulated her and everyone around him. She cannot imagine people seeing him as a Saint because she witnessed his actions first hand and was also a victim of it, so she’s angry that even after all this, people can still ignore what he did. She’s mainly angry at herself about all this I think, but it was interesting to see this in her point of view. Continuing on the subject of The Darkling... OMG him being back at the end, I was so angry that he just wouldn’t STAY DEAD!! But I’m glad he’s back because I think his character in Bardugo’s improved style is going to be awesome (and I low-key want people to finally see him as the villain he is, but again, don’t be too angry at me, please!)

David and Genya are married now!! So are Nadia and Tamar!! And Tolya and his poetry XD and Adrik! It felt so good getting to reunite with all the Grisha characters, to see them evolve (again, thanks to Bardugo’s evolution in her writing) and become even greater than they were.

The secret laboratory was such a great addition, I can’t wait to see more of it!!! Also, Nikolai building a secret laboratory under a place of debauchery is SUCH a Nikolai thing to do XD

Nina in Fjerda is... so many emotions all along her storyline, it felt great. Knowing that she mostly managed to get over her addiction made me happy, she’s still an addict of course (kudos to Bardugo for including the fact that you never truly get over an addiction and that sobriety is a work of every day) but she managed to move past it and that’s great. Her new power is amazing but at the same time you can feel her nostalgia when she teaches Hanne, the fact that she stills misses her old powers. The experiments on the pregnant women were terrible, and so well-written, every scene with them killed me a little bit.

Hanne’s character is so good! I really love all of her evolution throughout the book, the way she’s willing to rebel at first but in small ways, and that she ends up actually rebelling with Nina. Also, even though I want it to be slow because I don’t think Nina is over Matthias yet, but UGH the way Nina describes her as so beautiful, I can’t wait for them to grow closer and maybe have a love story! Hanne’s being Brum’s daughter surprised me but in a good way, I love the irony that this monster would have a Grisha daughter (I hope he’ll find out at some point), and I love the way this laid out the plot line for the next book! Nina at the Ice Court!!!!! This is such an exciting thing to look forward to!

The whole Isaak storyline was great and ugh I was so NOT expecting this ending for it, I guess I’m a hopeless romantic because I wanted him to end up with the princess haha (but then I guess that’s what Leigh wanted us to think so good job ^^) and I really didn’t see the assassination coming! I had some doubts about the princess and the guard being interchanged but I had no idea what would be the point of that, so I guess I was seeing only half of the picture.

The fact that Nikolai was officially described as having some form of ADHD, this was a great scene, all of his childhood difficulties, and his friendship with Dominik, too. I loved all of this. I already loved Nikolai before (I mean... who didn’t?) but I love him so much more now! His struggle as King and doing what’s best for his country, knowing that letting his heart talk for him would be a mistake, preparing replacements for him in case something happens... I love him so much!!

Zoya... Zoya Zoya Zoya. She’s a great character, and she’s so interesting and complex and I’m so glad Leigh expanded on her character because it’s not often that women get to be strong and ruthless and beautiful and cold and not the villain of the story. So yeah, I love Zoya, she is amazing and all of her struggle over her past with The Darkling made her even more interesting than she used to be.

Finally, I think I’m going to end with Nikolai/Zoya relationship. I wasn’t completely sold at first, but then Nikolai had to go and think that:

“He’d come to recognize the bizarre phenomenon of Zoya’s beauty, the way men loved to create stories around it. They said she was cruel because she’d been harmed in the past. They claimed she was cold because she just hadn’t met the right fellow to warm her. Anything to soften her edges and sweeten her disposition - and what was the fun in that? Zoya’s company was like strong drink. Bracing - and best to abstain if you couldn’t handle the kick.”

And I was completely on board, never to leave again. Seriously. This quote is so perfect. Nikolai gets her, he loves being with her and how challenging she is to him, and he likes her just like she is, he doesn’t want her to change. And that’s great. Anyway, I really love their relationship throughout the book, its a challenging one but you can feel how much they like to work together and spend time together. The whole exchange when Zoya shows him the scars and he’s the first man she’d told the truth to... That was perfect. But omg, I knew there was going to be some sort of engagement for Nikolai (he’s a king after all), and during the entire book, him and Zoya both repeat more than once that they know it could never work if they let themself feel something for the other, but man I was NOT ready for Nikolai to get engaged to the Shu princess in the end.... Anyway, yes, I love them apart, and I love them together, and I can’t wait to read what happens next.

So overall, another amazing book to strengthen my complete obsession with the Grishaverse!! I will probably post a lot more about it in the coming days/weeks, and probably reread it! If you want to talk about it, don’t hesitate!!!

#grishaverse #king of scars #king of scars spoilers #king of scars spoiler #kos spoilers #kos spoiler #leigh bardugo #nina zenik #nikolai lantsov #zoya nazyalensky #nikolai duology #my thoughts on stuff

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emjenenla · 6 years

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If You’re Gone, Maybe It’s Time to Come Home Part Three [a SoC Fanfiction]

Part One | Part Two | Part Three | Part Four

Sorry for the outrageous amount of time this update took. College eats up all your time. Also, it turns out Kaz in this mental state is ridiculously hard to write in another character’s POV.

Part Three

(Inej)

(1)

The Van Eck mansion is full to the brim of members of the Dregs. The irony is thick because a year ago, such people would never have been allowed on the same street.

Inej threads her way through the drinking gang members. They’re laughing and sharing stories. They’ve all been told that the party is to celebrate the Dregs’ rise to prominence as the most powerful gang in Ketterdam; only the Crows and a few extremely trusted others know that the party is actually in honor of Inej’s successes hunting slavers.

Even though the building is full of people, it still feels empty to Inej. The only Crows there aside from her are Jesper and Wylan. Kaz hasn’t yet appeared, and Matthias’s death still weighs heavily on her, not to mention the fact that it has caused Nina to drop off the face of the world. Inej has no idea where her friend is and no one has heard from her in months.

Inej has tried everything to find Nina, even picking Kaz’s brain in their coded letters (if anyone knows where Nina is, it’s him). However, it’s been months since Kaz mentioned anything even semi-personal in his letters. They were always impersonal, but since her last visit to Ketterdam, he hasn’t bothered to do anything but send her lists of information. She’s starting to think he’s still sulking about the talking-to she gave him the last time they saw each other. That bothers her, because while Kaz is totally capable of holding a grudge for a couple months (after all, he managed to hold one on Pekka Rollins for years), he’s never stayed mad at her for this long before.

(2)

It’s at least ten bells when she finally admits that she’s worried. This isn’t like Kaz. She’d thought that he’d at least show his face, even if that was only because Jesper and Wylan or Anika and Keeg dragged him along.

She eventually seeks out Anika who is sitting at a table playing a good-natured card game with Pim, Keeg, Dirix and Roeder while Rotty and a couple other high-ranking Dregs look on. They all look up when Inej steps up.

“’Lo, Wraith,” Dirix says. “Welcome back. You staying for good this time?”

“Please don’t,” Roeder says with a good-natured smile to show he’s joking. “I like my job, and I don’t want you to steal it back.”

“No, I’m not staying,” Inej says. “Just stopping by for a visit. If you enjoy scrambling over every dirty, smelly crevasse of this city doing Kaz’s bidding, you’re more than welcome to it.” The instant the words come out of her mouth she feels guilty; she had never minded being Kaz’s spider, even when he was in a mood.

Still the Dregs laugh. They are all high enough in the ranks to have personally dealt with Kaz enough to know just how frustrating putting up with his opaque orders and unfathomable schemes could be.

When the laughter dies Inej moves on to the real reason she came over by them. “Where is Kaz by the way? I know he doesn’t like parties, but I haven’t seen him at all since I got back.”

The table goes silent. The Dregs look back and forth at each other like they’re trying to decide who should be the bearer of bad news. Inej’s stomach clenches with a familiar sense of apprehension, one that she’s been getting when she reads Kaz’s letters for months. It’s a subtle hint that something isn’t right, but she can’t for the life of her figure out what it is.

After a moment, Anika pushes back her chair and gives her cards to Rotty. “If you make me lose, I’ll end you,” she threatens, then stands up. “Come on, Ghafa,” she says in what Inej can only assume is her lieutenant’s voice. “Let’s have a chat.”

(3)

They step out into the hallway and Anika paces to the end to look out at the garden, arms crossed.

“Anika,” Inej ventures stepping up alongside her. “What’s wrong? Did something happen to Kaz?”

“I don’t know,” Anika says, slowly and precisely, like saying each word hurts.

“What do you mean?” Inej asks.

“He’s missing,” Anika says. “No one’s seen him in days.”

“What?” Inej can’t help it, she yells. “Why aren’t you looking for him?”

“We are!” Anika’s voice raises too. “But Ketterdam’s a big place and we don’t know where half his boltholes are. To be honest, he could still be holed up in his rooms in the Slat since no one actually saw him leave. No one answers when we knock, but the door’s locked, like, really locked.” She gives Inej a significant look.

Inej nods. Kaz has more locks on his door than any person should ever need, but he rarely uses all of them because several can only be locked and unlocked from the inside. He wouldn’t have gone through that much trouble if he was just going out. “Have you tried the windows?” she asks.

“Yeah,” Anika says. “We sent Mina up the morning after we lost track of him. The windows are all locked. To make matters worse, each one’s fitted with multiple Schuyler locks. Aside from Kaz there’s only a handful of people in the gang who can pick those, and none of them are capable of getting up on that roof without killing themselves.”

Inej bites her lip. She doesn’t know what to say. This doesn’t sound like Kaz at all. She tries to decide how likely it is that he just found an intriguing job and doesn’t like the odds. “Do you think he’s on a job?”

Anika growls low in the back of her throat, and Inej looks at her. “What?”

“You haven’t been around these past couple months, Ghafa,” Anika says. “Something’s not right with him. Hasn’t been in months, but it’s gotten worse since the last time you were here. I don’t know what kind of lover’s squabble the two of you had, but while you’ve been out there gallivanting around the ocean, we’ve been here dealing with him.”

Inej opens her mouth to protest that she’s doing a lot more than gallivanting, but stops herself because she’s not sure if Anika’s on the list of people who have been trusted with the true nature of her mission.

“Pim and I are basically running the Dregs,” Anika admits, calming down. “Brekker barely does anything anymore. I don’t think he’s realized we’ve noticed, though I’m not sure how that’s possible. He’s not very aware of anything. He spends a lot of time just staring blankly off into space. He’s not scheming, but I can’t figure out what he’s actually thinking about.”

Inej doesn’t know what to say. The idea of Kaz not pulling his own weight and leading the gang he bled for for so long is ludicrous. She can’t wrap her mind around it.

“So far, only the inner circle knows exactly how bad it is,” Anika says. She sounds exhausted. “That means me, Pim, Keeg, Dirix, Rotty, Roeder and Mina. We’re trying to keep it from going farther than that, but we’re running out of time. There are low-ranking members of the Dregs who are personally loyal to Kaz, but the majority of them are only loyal to the idea of him—of Dirtyhands, Bastard of the Barrel. When they figure out what’s going on…”

She doesn’t finish, but she doesn’t need to. Inej knows the Barrel well enough to know what Anika was going to say. If word gets out that Kaz is weak the very gang that has followed him so ravenously will turn on him just like they turned on Per Haskell. If that happens, Kaz will be lucky to escape with his life.

The thought is terrifying.

“What happened before he went missing?” Inej asks Anika, trying to push the conversation away from the horrible idea of Kaz’s possibly imminent fall.

Anika sighs. “You’d do best to ask Espen that.”

“What do you mean?”

“Hard to say,” Anika says. “All I know is that the night we lost track of the boss, he was supposed to go out to do some scouting with the spiders. He didn’t show up for hours. Roeder and Mina were just going to go without him, but Espen got angry and stalked upstairs. After a couple minutes he came down and said that-” she cuts herself off. “You know, you probably should talk to Espen about that, I’m not even sure I understand what went on.”

(5)

It takes Inej the better part of an hour to located Espen in the swirling mass of humanity in the Van Eck house. She’s just starting to wonder if he left without telling anyone when she runs into Mina. The young spider is more than happy to point her in Espen’s direction.

“I saw him over by the food,” she says. “Sulking probably; he hates parties.”

Inej threads through the crowd to the location specified. Espen is seated on a couch, crushed between the arm and a couple older members of the Dregs. He is clutching a plate of hors d'oeuvres and looks murderous, but he’s still there. If Kaz had been in his position, he’d have broken someone’s jaw and fled upstairs where there are less people by now.

Espen doesn’t notice her approach him, and Inej makes a mental note to tell Kaz to teach his spiders to be more observant. She waltzes up to Espen and snaps her fingers in front of his face.

He glares at her, overgrown mop of straw-colored hair falling into his angry blue eyes. Sometimes Inej looks at him and thinks that this must have been what Kaz had been like at age eleven, but other times she thinks that Kaz and Espen are only superficially alike. There is something almost theatrical about Espen’s anger, like he’s playing a part or seeking attention. She can’t imagine careful, calculating, brilliant Kaz ever acting like that.

“Wha’ do you want?” Espen asks in a low, gruff voice that might be a poor attempt at mimicking Kaz’s rasp.

“Just a chat,” Inej says and beckons with a finger. “Let’s go someplace quieter.”

(5)

She leads him into an upstairs parlor and locks the door behind them. He stands in the middle of the room, his arms crossed. “I’m waiting,” he says.

Inej rolls her eyes. “Drop the act. You’re not a hotshot. You’re just a kid.”

“I’m one of Kaz Brekker’s trusted spiders,” Espen says puffing his chest out. “I am one of the most important members of the Dregs.”

“Yes, and I’m the Wraith,” Inej says. “Do we really want to start throwing titles and accomplishments around?”

Espen visibly deflates. He either didn’t recognize her (which doesn’t make sense because she’s given him and the other spiders some tips during her visits in Ketterdam) or he was hoping she wouldn’t call him out on his bravado (much more likely). “What do you want?” he asks.

“Anika said that you and Kaz got in a fight a couple days ago,” Inej says.

“Yeah,” Espen says. “Happens all the time. Why does it matter?” There’s now something cagey about his body language. He’d rather not be talking about this.

“Why don’t you tell me about it,” Inej suggests, using the gentle, soothing voice she’s cultivated to put rescued slaves at ease.

She expects Espen to argue, but he grasps onto her offer to listen almost frantically. Whatever happened between him and Kaz has been weighing on his mind and he desperately wants to talk about it.

“I’m not a spider anymore,” he says.

That was not how she expected him to begin this conversation. “What do you mean?” she asks.

“I got fired,” Espen says, his voice is angry, but matter-of-fact in the way that only Barrel rats seem to be able to manage. As if bad things are something to be expected and taken when they come. “After the argument. Boss says he doesn’t want to see me ever again.”

That is odd. Inej has never known Kaz to tell someone he never wants to see them again. Loathe as she is to admit it, normally when he gets to that point he simply kills the person in question to ensure he doesn’t have to deal with them anymore. “What happened?” she asks slowly.

Espen shrugs, evasive anger back again. “I dunno. Brekker’s been really stupid lately.”

That sets off even more alarms in Inej’s head. She has never, ever heard the word “stupid” used in the same sentence as “Kaz Brekker.” “What do you mean?” she asks cautiously.

For a second Espen looks confused then nervous. “If Anika didn’t say anything, then maybe I shouldn’t-”

“Tell me,” Inej presses, shoving away the hurt at the idea that Anika might be keeping things from her. She and Anika aren’t exactly friends, but they’re not enemies either. Plus, Anika holds a position in the Dregs similar to the one that Kaz did when Haskell was general (albeit, with much less actual power). Of all the members of the Dregs, she’s the closest to Kaz and might be the only one who has a firm grasp on how serious Inej’s relationship with Kaz is. “Kaz is my friend,” she continues ignoring the voice that screams that she and Kaz are way past the “just friends” point. “If there’s something going on with him; I need to know about it.”

Espen sighs then relents and begins his story. Inej listens with growing shock as he relates his confrontation with Kaz. She recognizes the Kaz’s behavior because she has seen them in people she rescues from slavers. She has seen people who lash out at every perceived threat, who see such behavior as the only way to protect themselves from a world that has turned its back on them. She has just never applied them to Kaz.

“I don’t know what was wrong with him,” Espen finishes looking confused. “Is he sick?”

“He’ll be fine,” Inej says because she doesn’t feel like trying to explain trauma to a Barrel kid who has been raised in a community that refuses to acknowledge anything but strength. “Do you know where he went after your argument?”

Espen shrugs. “Dunno. I didn’t see him go anywhere.”

“Okay,” Inej says taking a deep breath in an effort to contain her thoughts. “Thank you.”

(6)

She approaches the Slat the way she always has; by the roofs. She isn’t sure that she truly believes Kaz will be there, but she isn’t sure where else to start so she decides to take her chances.

The window she always entered Kaz’s room through, the window she often sat in feeding the crows, is closed with a dark curtain pulled down behind it. It takes her upwards of twenty minutes to figure out how to pick the Schuyler locks, but when she finally does she pulls the window open, pushes aside the curtain and steps inside.

The room is dark and cluttered which is strange because for all his money Kaz owns very little and keeps what he does in impeccable order. Now there are clothes and weapons strewn across the floor. As Inej steps inside she accidently steps on a sheet of paper that is scrawled over on both sides in Kaz’s handwriting. A number of other sheets of paper are spread across the rest of the floor like someone threw them.

She’s just reaching the conclusion that someone must have broken into Kaz’s room and ransacked it when she realizes the room is not empty. There’s a teenage boy-sized lump in the bed and on closer investigation she realizes it’s Kaz.

She knows that Kaz sleeps on his side, curled into the fetal position with his back pressed up against the nearest wall, but she has never seen him take it quite this far. He’s curled up so tightly that he’s almost in a legitimate ball. She knows that’s bad for his leg; he’ll be lucky if he can stand let alone walk when he gets up. His coal gray blanket is pulled up so that only his hair is visible. He isn’t using a pillow and after a second she realizes that’s because he’s clutching it to his chest like it’s the only thing keeping him from drowning in a stormy ocean.

“Kaz?” she asks her voice nervous. “Kaz.” He doesn’t stir so she crosses the room trying to step around the papers incase they’re important. When she reaches his side, she kneels down next to him. “Kaz.” She says a little louder, reaching out and pulling the blanket away from his face, careful not to touch any skin. “Kaz, wake up.”

He shifts slightly, but doesn’t straighten or release his death grip on the pillow. One eye cracks open just slightly then closes again and he buries his face in the pillow.

“Kaz,” she repeats. “What’s wrong? Are you hurt?”

He moves again, just slightly and mutters something, but the words are rendered incomprehensible by the pillow.

“Kaz!” her voice is rising panic now, she grasps his blanket-covered shoulder and shakes him. “Look at me!”

(7)

As always, the physical contact gets a response from him. He bats her hands away with a motion that is a little more haphazard than it usually would be. His eyes open and he looks at her like he can’t decide if she’s actually there. “Inej?” he asks after a moment. “What are you doing here?”

“Looking for you,” Inej says. “Why aren’t you at Jesper and Wylan’s party?”

Kaz looks away. “I’m not going,” he says.

“Yes, I’d kind of figured that out,” she says perhaps a bit sharper than she intended to. She takes a deep breath and changes her tone before she goes on. “Are you still angry at me for the last time I was here?” he doesn’t say anything so she pushes onward. “Anika said you’ve been missing for a couple days. Are you okay?”

No answer.

“Kaz,” she presses. “Are you okay?”

Still no answer. He won’t even look at her.

“Kaz!” she shouts. He jumps which might have actually been funny under different circumstances. “Enough of this. Are You Okay?” She isn’t even sure why she’s continuing on this line of questioning when he pretty obviously not okay and she knows that if she does convince him to talk he’ll just lie. Perhaps she just wants the reassurance of knowing that he’s at least okay enough to lie to her.

If that’s what she wants she doesn’t get it, because Kaz says nothing. He just keeps looking away, eyes vacant and dead.

Just like their argument on the roof. She’d thought how silent he’d been then was wrong. They’ve argued before, but Kaz has never been quiet and listened. When Kaz is in an argument he lays into the other person with every ounce of cruel intelligence he possesses. Before that night, Inej had never won an argument with him. She should have known right away that something was wrong, but she’d been too angry and too high on her own victory to notice.

“Kaz,” Her voice softens, almost pleading. “What’s wrong?”

Finally he looks back at her, his eyes are still dead in a way that looks nothing like the Bastard of the Barrel. “Nothing,” he says. “I’m fine.”

Even though she was expecting this she can’t help but sigh. “Tell me the truth, Kaz.”

“I was sleeping,” Kaz says in a tone of voice that’s a little too flat for his defensive words. “Nothing more.”

“It’s ten thirty,” she points out.

He raises an eyebrow. “All kinds of people go to bed before that.”

“Not you,” Inej points out. It’s true; going to bed at midnight constitutes as early for Kaz Brekker. “Come on, Kaz.”

“I’m fine,” he says. “Leave me alone and let me sleep.”

Then he curls up on the bed again with his back facing her.

(8)

She can’t get him to start talking to her again, no matter how much she pleads. When she tries shaking him again he just shoves her off and pulls the blanket over his head.

Eventually she realizes that she’s unlikely to get any response from him. She’s going to be stuck waiting for the unlikely possibility that he’ll relent and tell her what’s wrong. She stands up. “I’m going to clean up this room a little,” she told him. “I’ll be right here if you decide you want to talk.”

Kaz doesn’t answer.

Inej sighs and sets to work on the mess Kaz has made. There’s an empty whiskey bottle lying on the floor and when she picks it up she realizes that it’s that super expensive whiskey she and Kaz stole once. Trust Kaz not to get drunk on something cheap.

She throws the bottle away, then turns to the papers spread out across the floor. After she picks up a couple she realizes they’re part of a letter. It takes her the better part of fifteen minutes to gather them all up and figure out what order they go in, but then her curiosity gets the better of her and she starts to read.

(9)

What she reads horrifies her.

If it wasn’t Kaz’s handwriting she would have thought someone else wrote it. The words don’t sound like Kaz Brekker. Kaz Brekker isn’t this open. He doesn’t talk like this. Kaz Brekker does not display this kind of abject self-hatred. Yet at the same time she knows that this horrible, untrue letter is Kaz and she knows that this is how he feels. This is what she abandoned him to without even realizing it.

She knew he had a lot armor, but she realizes now she may have given her understanding a bit too much credit. She had thought that she saw Kaz completely through the eyes of the almost eighteen year old woman she is now, but she realizes she was wrong. Somewhere inside of her a tiny portion of the fifteen year old girl she had been when Kaz rescued her from the Menagerie has been hanging on skewing her viewing of him. Back then she saw Kaz as something powerful and immortal, something strong enough to rise above the filth of Ketterdam, something that could make the monsters pay. That was what had drawn her to him in the beginning; the promise that perhaps, just perhaps he could make her something like that too.

Over the years that view of Kaz had started to die as she realized that Ketterdam took something from everyone, realized she did not need to be a monster. She’d also realized that Kaz was no demon, no immortal being, he was just a boy who had suffered trauma every bit as great as hers.

If Inej was honest with herself, Kaz had done more than just buy her indenture; he was why she wasn’t like some of the blank-eyed people she pulls out of slaver holds. From the instant she’d left the Mangerie, she’d never had the chance to sink into the blackness of her own despair because Kaz had always been there pushing her to move climb a little faster, hit a little harder, to be more than that girl who’d been sold in the brothels. He had saved her, even if he’d never intended to, even if he hadn’t even realized he was doing it. She had owed him the same, and she’d failed.

She sits on the floor and presses her forehead against her knees. She’d left Ketterdam thinking that she didn’t need Kaz anymore. That is at least kind of true; she no longer relies on him to determine her identity the she once did. She’s her own person with her own goals in her reach, but she’d forgotten to wonder whether Kaz needs her more than she needs him.

She turns to him. She doesn’t know what she’s going to say to him, but she knows that she needs to say something. “Kaz…” she whispers. He doesn’t respond, but his shoulders aren’t as tight as they were before so she thinks he’s fallen back to sleep.

She carefully pulls the blanket back around his shoulders so it’s no longer covering his face. Then she carefully steps towards the window. She isn’t sure what she needs to do to fix this and the only thing she can think of is that the only food Kaz keeps in his rooms is dry, gross stuff that doesn’t spoil. Food is like a bandage on a gaping wound, but it is something she can do right now.

Before she leaves she thinks about trying to find all Kaz’s knives and lock them up. She doesn’t know if Kaz will try to hurt himself, but she also knows that she’s unlikely to find all the knives he has hidden. She decides she’s better off just moving quickly and hoping to be back before he wakes up.

She takes one last look at his crumpled form and leaps out the window.

(10)

Her first stop is at the Van Eck mansion. She writes a note to Anika saying that she’s found Kaz, and one to Jesper and Wylan saying that something has come up and that she’ll make it up to them later. She doesn’t mention anything about the kind of shape Kaz is in. She’s not going to tell anyone about what’s going on without his blessing.

She gives the letters to one of the servants then sneaks into the kitchens. She makes off with some meat and vegetables because it will be easier than finding a shop to break into. She’ll pay Jesper and Wylan back later.

After leaving the mansion she stops by the Wraith to grab a few things. This only takes a few minutes and the crewmember on watch doesn’t even notice that she’s there. She makes a mental note to give her crew a talking to about how to be on guard duty, but right now she has bigger problems.

As she heads back to the Slat she passes by the small toy shop where she got the stuffed crow she gave to Alby Rollins before she left Ketterdam. She picks the simple lock on the backdoor and lets herself in. The shop is just as small and quaint as it was the last time she was here. She remembers belatedly that she’d promised the owner she’d convince Kaz to put this shop under Dregs protection in exchange for making the crow toy in a matter of hours. She’d forgotten in the whirlwind of preparations for her voyage. She renews that promise to herself as she looks at the wares spread out around the dark shop. She should not get in the habit of breaking her promises.

She wanders through the store looking at all the cute, fluffy stuffed toys. She isn’t exactly sure why she came here, but she feels like she needs to be here.

Eventually she stops before a rack of stuffed bears. She had a bear toy as a child. She remembers hugging it to her chest and feeling safe. She wonders briefly what happened to it when she got too old to want it anymore. Suddenly she hopes her parents didn’t get rid of it. She would like to see it again.

As she runs her fingers along the shelves of stuffed bears she wonders if Kaz ever had a toy like this. She has spent a lot of time recently trying to figure out exactly where Kaz came from. She knows that at some point in his life someone must have cared for him--he would have died as an infant if he’d been completely abandoned from the moment he was born--but she hasn’t been able to figure out who. She knows Kaz had a brother, but she doesn’t even know what his name was let alone how much older he was. Perhaps this older brother raised Kaz in the Barrel and then ran afoul of Pekka Rollins.

The only person who could answer her questions is Kaz and he’s so close-lipped about himself that it’s honestly a miracle he admitted he even had a brother. She wishes she could convince him to talk to her. She wants to help him, and talking always helps.

She shakes herself. She’s not helping Kaz by sitting in a toy shop and leaving him all alone. She starts to leave, then pauses and turns back to the rack of bears. She suddenly becomes aware of the idea that has been forming in her mind the entire time she’s been in this shop. She’s fully aware it might be a terrible idea and that he might refuse it at best and assume she’s mocking him at worst, but she feels like it’s something she needs to do.

She chooses to a medium-sized bear with a soft, cuddly body; silky, caramel-colored fur and a sweet, reassuring face that doesn’t have any uncomfortable wires in it. She sets the tag on the shop counter along with twice the kruge the owner is charging and slides the bear into a bag she took from Jesper and Wylan’s.

She leaves the shop, locking the door carefully behind her. Then she takes a deep breath, collects herself and takes to the rooftops for the journey back to the Slat.

That teddy bear is probably the one concession to fluff you’ll get out of me. I read a headcanon post on Tumblr once where Inej wins a stuffed animal in a throwing contest and gives it to Kaz, and ever since I’ve been sort of obsessed with the idea.

One more part left. Hopefully it will get out soon, but I’ll make no promises.

Thank you for reading!

Emjen

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diaryofabookgirl · 7 years

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Women In Young Adult Literature

This Wednesday we're celebrating the social, economic, cultural and political achievements of women on International Women's Day. I’d like to use that as an opportunity to talk about a few of my favorite female characters in Young Adult books. Careful if you haven’t read these books because of possible spoilers.

Cather Avery (Fangirl)

Cather Avery and her twin sister Wren are starting college and Wren has announced she wants to discover college on her own, leaving an introvert Cath hiding out in her dorm, writing fan fiction. I really liked that Fangirl was about Cath as a character at first and everything else second. Cath is shy and introvert but she’s also sure of who she is and isn’t ashamed of that.

Madeline Whittier (Everything Everything)

Madeline has a rare illness which prevents her from leaving her house, but Maddy is a happy teenage girl. She reads a lot, takes classes online, has a friend in the form of her nurse. Despite the fact that she was missing out on so much in her life, she keeps being optimistic. It is impossible not to like her. Of course, she was also moody and curious. This curiosity eventually leads her to uncover a secret that will change everything for her.

Glory O’Brien (Glory O’Brien’s History of the Future)

One evening Glory and her best friend mix up beer with the remains of a bat (that is as weird as it sounds). Next thing they know they can see people’s pasts and futures. Glory becomes obsessed with the second civil war and decided to write down every piece of information she gathers from seeing people’s futures. I loved how Glory handled seeing the future. She questioned everything in her past and present; her future, the strange hippie community across the street and especially her mother’s suicide and what I means for her.

Rose Hathaway (Vampire Academy-series)

Rose Hathaway is a Dhampir and thus fated to guard a Moroi. She's determined to protect her best friend Lissa, a royal Moroi. Rose is sarcastic and insubordinate but she is fiercely loyal to Lissa. Over the course of the series Rose loves and loses Dimitri. The loss of him puts her friendship with Lissa and even her life at stake.

Mara Dyer (Mara Dyer trilogy and upcoming Shaw Confessions)

She has to power to kill people with a thought, but is she a villain? Throughout this trilogy, Mara tries to figure out what is happening with her. She means no harm, but around her people start dying under strange circumstances. She tries to understand her powers and is put in dangerous situations because of it. To get herself out of these situations she must use her power and questions who she is when she does.

Gwendolyn Shepard (Ruby Red)

Kerstin Gier gives us curious and funny heroines. These characteristics often put them in complicated situations. Take Gwendolyn, (Gwyneth in the US/UK editions) for example. She can travel through time but it isn’t nearly as fun as it sounds. She always taught her cousin would inherit the time travel gene, she isn’t ready to fulfill tasks that would take her across time. Yet, Gwendolyn uncovers the truth and stands her ground while taking on an ancient organization.

Shahrzad Al-Khayzuran (The Wrath and the Dawn)

She marries the Caliph, not to love him and be his bride, but to kill him. Khalid has had countless wives and has killed every one of them, including her best friend. But when Shahrzad finds out her husband is cursed she takes it upon herself to save him and their people. Shahrzad can come across as spoiled, but she also doesn’t take shit from anyone and doesn’t like to be told what to do.

Inej Ghafa & Nina Zenik (Six Of Crows)

Inej can climb the most impossible buildings. She grew up with loving parents but was separated from them and sold to a brothel. Her time there still causes her anxiety. Nina was a member of the second army in the Ravkan war. She's a heartrender. Nina loves her power, she loves food and she loves Matthias, who is supposed to be her enemy, and she knows he loves her too. Nina is determined to show him Grisha aren't evil like he has been told, to not only accept her but her kind as well. Inej and Nina are just as much a part of The Dregs as the boys and just as important for their mission.

Kestrel Trajan (The Winner’s trilogy)

As the general's daughter Kestrel knows politics very well. She has always had a privileged life. When Valorians and Herrani's go to war, Kestrel is put in a difficult position. Her people are in the wrong, but they are her people. Arin isn't one of them. He's her slave, the boy she's in love with. She has to help his people. Kestrel is often put before terrible options but they are her only options and what do you choose when the outcome is bound to be horrible either way?

Verity (Code name Verity)

“Kiss me, Hardy. Kiss me, quick!” Well, if this book didn’t destroy me. Verity is captured by Nazi’s and tortured until she agrees to write down everything she knows - everything. The first half of the book is her confession, the second half is told from her best friend’s POV. Maddie and Verity are major friendship goals. Their story was so inspiring and completely heartbreaking at the same time.

Bianca (The DUFF)

The Designated Ugly Fat Friend is what Robbie calls Bianca, explaining that it isn’t a bad thing, but it’s a fact. Bianca tries to not let this bother her, but it does. She is the DUFF. Despite the fact that he hates Robbie the two of them start a friends-with-benefits relation, except for the “friends” part because they hate each other. The book discusses many others topics, such as friendship, neglect, alcoholism and divorce. Bianca uses the words ‘slut’ and 'whore’ a lot throughout the book. In the end, she comes to a nice conclusion about these labels and ultimately it’s a good message. I would also recommend Kody’s other YA novels.

Linh Cinder (Cinder)

So far I’ve only read the first book in the Lunar Chronicles series, but it was enough to see that Cinder is bad-ass. She’s funny and sassy and the best mechanic in New Beijing. Instead of going to the Prince' ball she'd rather use that opportunity to elope from her evil guardian. Things don't go as planned when it's discovered that Cinder is a Lunar, that she has powers, and that if the Lunar queen finds out, she will take Cinder to Luna and most likely kill her.

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shanie-the-toyaddict · 3 years

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SOOOOoooo...

Just got home from In the Heights, and I’m SO HAPPY! Honestly after years, no, DECADES of getting burned by adaptations like RENT and Les Mis (and we aren’t even getting into Cats...) to finally have someone make a Broadway-film adaptation that WORKS is a long fn time coming.

That said, I have some thoughts about the show (good and otherwise) which I want to discuss with yinz.

Put below a cut and tagged for spoilers

I thought I was going to hate the change in show placement for when Abuela Claudia dies. I did not. Far from it, having it happen when it did almost seemed better than Broadway because it came off as far more emotional than simply killing her off-screen/stage. I know it sounds like I’m shitting on the musical. I’m not. But, for me, having Usnavi find her and watching him freak out was much more emotional than just hearing an announcement from Kevin over the dispatch.

That said, I managed not to cry over her death. Have no idea how I pulled that off, but I did. Can’t say the same for the rest of the theater though, you could just hear the entire theater losing it.

Having “You’ll Be Back” as the hold music made me snort with ugly choked laughter. I’m pretty sure there was only one other person in the theater who got the reference though because they were the only other person laughing and then they had to explain it to their date. (There were only about 10 other people in the theater with me, I live in a small town, and this was a matinée.)

I have... thoughts over the difference in time/dates between the Broadway and Movie versions. First off, one of the biggest things that always bugged me about the Broadway version was that time was TOO compressed. In Broadway, it’s made to seem like the entire show happens over 3 days – far FAR too fast for Abuela to collect her lotto winnings in cash and for Usnavi to arrange passage back to DR. The movie fixes this by changing the entire lotto storyline (more on that in a moment) and extending the timeline drastically. Now, while I agree with the timeline switch 100%, the problem is that the lyrics to the Broadway version are written from the POV of it all happening in a few days. Changing the timeline to last months or, in the case of the ending, years later leads to several awkward points where the unchanged Broadway lyrics don’t match up with the movie version. A good example of this is how it’s written that, in “When You’re Gone”, Nina and Benny have to “Pretend” the blackout is still ongoing, a month later, for the lyrics of the song to fit. There’s a line in the finale that’s an even more glaring example of this but I am leaving that out here in case some of you don’t know about it. Look, as I said, I’m all for changing the timeline. It’s a great change. But Chu’s dedication to change as little of the original lyrics/songs as possible is a bit of a detriment here because, as I said, it leads to awkward moments that, IMHO, makes you double take and pulls you out of the moment.

On a related note: Leaving the line in about Nina and Benny having sex during the blackout but never once acknowledging this in the shown storyline? Yeaaah, no.

Re: That Point – Between that and “Champagne” I really think there’s stuff that got cut because Vanessa states that Daniela tells her what Usnavi did – something shown in the musical – but in the movie, there is no scene present where Dani spills the beans. You just hear from Vanessa that she was told. Again, this is a bit problematic and causes a double take that draws away from the scene and, again, I feel like there was stuff that got cut from the finished product that would fill in some of these gaps.

I love the beachfront framing method. Great stuff as, for someone who doesn’t know the musical, you really do spend the whole movie thinking he left.

On one hand, the DACA storyline is one that needed told. On the other hand, it seemed out of place. Either way, the framing point of “Not all dreams come true” and not seeing Sonny in the finale (he might have been there, and I missed him) makes me think that his story didn’t have a happy ending. Or it did, and he was at college. Who knows?

I cannot tell you how happy I am that they got rid of the racism storyline as it dealt with Kevin and Benny.

I am even happier that they left racism in as a plot point and made it about Nina instead. Awesome change and, again, it’s a story that needed told.

The Lotto Ticket. Hooo boy. Look, to anyone with prior knowledge of the show, hiding the fact that Abuela won the lotto seems forced. From my point of view, there’s this ginormous showstopping number in 96,000, and then it isn’t mentioned again until the very end of the movie. I don’t know if I like it or not. I can’t judge this one at all from an objective point of view because I’m too attached to the original “Abuela Wins the Lotto” storyline to say if it’s good or bad. Regardless, I honestly wonder if not revealing the lotto ticket as a change came first, or if it was in reaction to all the other changes made to the storyline. For example, big BIG change in the movie is the store doesn’t get trashed in the Blackout. With Usnavi not getting the lotto winnings it means that he wouldn’t have it to fix up the store when he stays. Did they leave the store intact and then realize he wouldn’t need the money, or did they change the lotto storyline and then realize he couldn’t save the store without it? Or, if the change for the store came first, is that why they wrote the DACA storyline, as a way to take the winning ticket away from him? I’m honestly curious about the writing process for this show and how the various changes were decided upon.

Lin as the Piragua Guy is the purest thing about this entire show. Lin also steals every scene he is in so it’s a good thing that they removed most of the character’s role in the story.

Nina seeing visions of her younger self throughout the show was a close second (for purest thing).

I love Christopher Jackson. But Mr. Softee is an asshole and I’m glad his truck died.

Look, I’m not from NYC and I’ve only spent a few days there over the course of a couple high school band trips. But really, HOW LONG IS VANESSA’S LUNCH BREAK!?!?!? Seems to me you’d need a hell of a lot longer than just a lunch break to head home, change clothes, take a subway downtown, visit a landlord about an apartment, get rejected for said apartment, take the subway BACK to Washington Heights, stop by the bodega and schedule a date with Usnavi, and THEN head back to the salon. There is the chance that there is time-wonkery happening here because the ending of her song is shown to be a dream but if the entire thing happened at other times, it wouldn’t really fit the timeline that exists within the story. So, again, how long is her lunch break???

While my favorite thing overall to see cut from the Broadway version is the Kevin vs Benny plotline, my second favorite thing was changing “The Club” and “Blackout” to get TF rid of Benny’s drunken antics. Benny comes off as a MUCH kinder and more respectable character than in the Broadway version where he always, to me, seemed a bit like an asshole who didn’t deserve Nina. It’s funny how changing a couple small plot points can completely re-work a character but in the Movie, Benny is 100% likable and, at times, downright heroic. In this version you can really tell how much he loves Nina, and you just know that, even when she leaves for college, they’re going to end up working out... which makes it even more odd when you realize that, in this universe, he’s already had a failed relationship with Nina ONCE.

Sonny is a far more fleshed out character in the movie and, my hesitations about the DACA storyline aside, it’s wonderful to see him get some love as a character.

Paciencia Y Fe is a cinematic masterpiece of a segment. For a song that’s, in essence, an extended inner monologue, this was handled amazingly, especially knowing that it’s Abuela’s swan song.

Look, this has already gotten way too long, and I could go on for days about things I liked or didn’t like. Just know that this is a hell of a movie and I want to go back and see it again tomorrow. (But, alas, half price tickets are only on Mondays.)

#In The Heights #In The Heights Spoilers

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