Emelan Read-a-long: March - The Fire in the Forging

[Kypriotha]

Oops, almost forgot about this month's read-a-long! But never fear, there is still a little bit if March left, so there is still time to discuss this month's read-a-long book: The Fire in the Forging!

In this book, we leave Summersea and see more of Emelan and the people of the Pebbled Sea region. We also find out some ramifications of the four's power being woven together and what they need to do to fix it.

What are your thoughts on this book?

[Rachy]

I feel like I have very vivid memories or mental pictures of the Emelan books, and the scene with Rosethorn and Briar and the crocuses/saffron is one of those scenes when I picture the series.

[mistrali]

Rachy The Emelan series is very easy to have vivid mental pictures of

For whatever reason, this is my least favourite of the quartet. Maybe because I never connected with Daja (Cold Fire is also my least favourite CO book by a small margin).
Maybe I’ve just outgrown it, or maybe it treads by-now-old ground with the “arrogant academic mage” stereotype (WotE beat us over the heads with that one, and BM finished the job). Not to mention the reoccurrence of “Never meddle with nature”, which Yarrun is evidently supposed to have been doing.
Having said that, lots of interesting tangles involved in the crossing of the Circle’s magic, and Daja’s relationship with the Traders. I’m not too keen on Polyam (don’t like her much as a character), but I loved the parts of the book about bargaining, and the worldbuilding about Traders.

[aki]

I put this on hold at the library so I'm hoping that I will be able to get it and read it before the end of march. LOL. Guess I'm a little late to the game.

[devilinthedetails]

Another one of my recent purchases and re-reads. With apologies to the lateness of my post to this discussion, here are my thoughts:

I think this is my favorite of the Circle of Magic quartet. I love exploring the world beyond Summersea and the landscape with the drought and the fires feels very vivid to me. The focus on the Trader culture and Daja's complex connections to the culture of her birth are extremely compelling to me. Daja's coming to terms with her relationship with the Traders sort of echoed Tris's need to make peace to a degree with her family that we saw in the second book, but here that idea resonates with me even more perhaps because I find the Trader culture more interesting than Tris's relative.

I also find Polyam a very complex and engaging character. Nice to see a character with a disability play a prominent role and not be treated in a simplistic way.

I also enjoyed the mage whose job it is to put out the drought fires. I felt Tamora found the right mixture of bitter and sympathetic in his depiction.

Oh, and I also liked hearing some of Frostpine's backstory. His relationship with Daja is awesome.