emberly
Message Runner
Posts: 25
Gender: Female
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Post by emberly on Sept 8, 2018 8:27:45 GMT 10
And I have to say, I'm kind of disappointed.
Be prepared for terrible paragraph structure ahead. It felt like nothing really happened, you know? The climax was barely one and honestly by the end of the book I had no idea how old Arram was. I did like it, I felt the flow of how she covered multiple years within the course of the story was nice. The characters were interesting and I didn't like Orzone as much as I thought I would. It will be interesting to see him shift from the boy he is in the end, to the how he is in Daine's books. I loved his teachers! The fact his healing teacher (I listened to the audio book while working, I'm not even going to try and spell his name) was another lgbt character, and it had zero impact on the story, was nice. Tortall doesn't have as many as Emelan does.
I do have to say though, I think Aarram is the most God-touched character.
So there, finally finished. Making it the second most amount of time its taken me to read one of Tammy's books.
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Post by devilinthedetails on Sept 8, 2018 12:21:03 GMT 10
Congratulations on finishing. I understand being disappointed since I think the book suffered a bit from Prequel Syndrome (where the plot can sometimes feel constrained by what we know will happen in the future, there can be details that seem to contradict what will happen in the future, repeating characters might be overused, and the foreshadowing can feel like too much).
I agree that the climax wasn't that impressive and felt kind of rushed to me so that while the early part of the book plodded along, the climax ended up feeling too hurried to me. It was a pacing issue I hope won't be repeated next book, which I anticipate should have more action and political drama. There is definitely the set up for that.
Ozorne is interesting in that I was more sympathetic to him and his mental health issues at the beginning of the book than I was by the end where he was waxing poetical about his tyrannical dreams. Earlier on when his dream his basically to live in a vila with Varice and Arram, his character resonates with me much more.
I think Tammy has done a better job of openly including (rather than merely stating in quasi-canon) characters who are LGBTQ+ in her recent Tortall books like Bloodhound and Mastiff, and Arram's healing teacher is a great example of that. I hope the trend continues.
I did enjoy Arram's interactions with Enzi but I could have done without his interactions with the Graveyard Hag especially since her prophecy near the end of the story felt very unnecessary and as if I were being hit over the head with a reminder of his future that I didn't need. I really wish that moment had been edited out as you can tell...
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Post by Idleness on Sept 14, 2018 17:23:58 GMT 10
I have to say that I was a bit disappointed too. It didn't absorb me like Pierce's other works have, and I had to consciously keep picking it up again after putting it down, which is unusual for me. I'm still wondering if it was a bit of a contractual chore to write. It's taken so many years to get here, and then the experience of reading it... it had all of the components I've come to expect from Pierce's stories, but it didn't manage to be more than the sum of its parts for me.
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Post by MythicMistress on Oct 2, 2018 1:01:55 GMT 10
I was a bit disappointed as well. I felt like all the stuff setting up for the Immortals quartet (meeting an animal god, dealing with the Graveyard Hag, etc.) was a bit heavy-handed. Maybe's it's just the trouble you can have with getting prequels to line up with the established canon.
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Post by devilinthedetails on Oct 2, 2018 1:12:08 GMT 10
I was a bit disappointed as well. I felt like all the stuff setting up for the Immortals quartet (meeting an animal god, dealing with the Graveyard Hag, etc.) was a bit heavy-handed. Maybe's it's just the trouble you can have with getting prequels to line up with the established canon. I agree that the book seemed to suffer for being a prequel. I personally think that prequels (especially ones that aren't planned from the beginning) can be very difficult to tell since it can be a delicate balancing act between setting up details for the later (but previously released) story and not seeming to heavy-handed. Especially with the Graveyard Hag's interaction with Arram at the end of the book, I felt that it was to use your apt term very heavy-handed. Even if I hadn't known where Arram's story goes based on the Immortals books, I imagine it would have felt heavy-handed to me, and it seemed doubly so to me as someone who already knows how his story ends. Honestly I think that conversation Arram has with the Graveyard Hag in the cart should just have been edited out since it doesn't even really bear any narrative fruit within the story itself. Just felt like a needless interaction with a god to prove how special and chosen our hero is, and I'm not really a fan of those scenes in general.
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Post by meekbookworm on Feb 23, 2019 23:13:32 GMT 10
I just finished it now (library book!). Hadn't reread the Diane books for probably over 10yrs and my reread of SotL series semi-recently left me disappointed, so my expectations were really low...
Then I really enjoyed! For me the prequel issues weren't really issues because I didn't recognize any of the names besides Arram, Lindhall, Ozorne, and Varice (and the Hag) or even remember the whole 'Great Gods' plot at the end of realms of the gods (promptly reread Immortals series--couldn't believe she was only 16 in the last book--am headcanoning her to >18!). From that standpoint I liked the interactions with Enzi and the Hag, because I definitely remember Alanna and Diane being very god touched and Numair definitely felt like a secondary character to me previously (Enzi was also fun). If you don't really remember anything, all those anvil sized plot points feel like delicate feathers teasing at something semi-familiar!
Did have some problems with it--the whole 'sexual awakening' bits felt really weird and pointless especially when he was 12ish, the pacing wasn't exactly steady (though devoured it in a night and an early morning), and some bits like his talent in healing or Varice's personality seemed to slightly contradict Daine's books--but I am a sucker for magical worldbuilding and university stories (especially with a talented protag.) and Numair's sense of 'I love this university and my teachers and my friends, but I can't stay here because of this one issue which ostensibly does not affect me' definitely resonated--it's an unusual conflict for me.
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Post by mistrali on Sept 19, 2020 22:25:14 GMT 10
I actually really liked it! I found it an entertaining read and I loved Arram’s nerdiness and his friendship with Varice and even Ozorne. It reminded me a lot of an Emelan-like Tortall book. Maybe that’s why?
In particular, I appreciated the more racially diverse cast of characters, the vivid detail of the arena and the lightning snakes.
Agreed on the Hag. I find myself increasingly irritated by Tammy’s tendency to make nearly everyone in Tortall god-touched.
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