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rachelmanija Dec. 8th, 2018 01:06 pm)
rachelmanija Dec. 8th, 2018 01:06 pm)Oh, my brave and heartbreaking bug people!
Book 7 was fantastic and had me biting my nails every other chapter; Book 8 was probably my single favorite of the series so far, despite zero appearances from two of my three favorite characters (but my third had a huge role). It was even more of a nailbiter and heavily featured one of my favorite things, the culture of fighter pilots in a time period when you can actually see the faces of your opponents.
All else is spoilers.
Heirs of the Blade:
One of the neat things the entire concept of kinden does is defamiliarize some common fantasy tropes. Even if you're wise to how feudalism and hereditary aristocracy is not a good thing, it's easy to get swept away by the romance of the Dragonfly people and their fascinating society. So I really enjoyed how this book sucked you in, then took you on the journey of realizing that actually, it's kind of terrible and the rebels are absolutely right.
Tynisa's journey was so heartbreaking and nerve-wracking. I was sure she was going to die, and so glad she didn't, and that she didn't reject Che for trying to separate her from the GHOST OF THE WORST ASPECTS OF HER FATHER but understood, and they got their reunion. I really want the whole "honorable Weaponsmaster dies honorably" thing to be subverted and have her survive the book and go on to other things.
Also loved kadith/caddis. Of fucking course they have a vague equivalent of the tea ceremony which involves carefully tending ponds of underwater larva cocoons.
Was this the one with Laszlo and the sociopathic Firefly, or is that the next one? Another romance I did not care about.
The Air War:
I'll just copy some of my emails to Layla liveblogging it:
- YESSS, the Assassin Bugs are back! I had literally just been thinking what a shame it was that they made such a brief appearance. Ditto Taki, who was one of my favorites. But man, this arc is rough if you liked Tisamon.
- It's intense but the worldbuilding has so much glee that it takes the edge off for me. That being said, I was more invested in the younger generation so I just want Che to be happy and Tynisa to miraculously not go down in flames.
Also I want to know more about the roots of Aptitude and magic, and it looks like the story is going there. Plus, the Slug kinden are back! Now if we just see more of the Woodlouse kinden I will be very happy.
- Immediately after writing that email, I read a little more before bed and was introduced to another Woodlouse kinden! YESSSS.
- Okay so I'm still reading The Air War and I'm at the part where Seda is reading a Moth book and Gjegevey tells her this weird symbol is the Seal of the Worm, which has been mentioned before in a "too terrible to discuss" context, only now it's finally described: "the symbol, a crooked spiral hatched with a hundred tiny lines, seemed to writhe."
I KNOW WHAT THAT IS! I SAW IT IN THE CABIN. IT IS THE DREADED CENTIPEDE KINDEN, SEALED AWAY FOR HUNDREDS OF YEARS BUT SOON TO RISE!
Okay, I'm going back to reading now, but I had to take a moment to make that prediction. Centipedes. They are totally centipedes. I had been trusting in Tchaikovsky to make earthworms scary because hey, he made slugs majestic and eerie, but nope. It is centipedes.
[Please don't tell me if it actually is or not! I want to be surprised.]
- Just finished The Air War. Man, that was so good and so heartbreaking. The buildup of both communities of pilots (and bombardiers), culminating in the battles shown simultaneously from both sides where you want everyone to survive but one character's triumph means another's death...
Even though Taki is still my forever favorite (SO GLAD she made it, I was biting my nails over that) the moment that got to me the most was when that poor Wasp pilot who'd been slowly losing his mind over guilt, telepathy, and drugs cuts Pingge loose from her chains as he goes down in flames.
- I'm glad I'm reading it right now, because "people pulling together against impossible odds and trying to be decent people while caught in really tough moral quandaries" is really something I want to read now. It's really brutal but not in a despairing way.
Also, centipede people. I think. This book doesn't say for sure, other than that "worm" is an insult and they're not actually worm kinden. "Locked away in another dimension/alternate timeline for hundreds of years" is pretty mind-blowing and I eagerly await Centipede World.
Another thing I really like that hardly any writers do is that he's writing war novels where the war basically is justified in self-defense, and yet the people arguing that peace is possible and maybe the war could have been avoided are not presented as morons. I love the third-generation iteration of the quartet of friends, this time with a Wasp.
Heirs of the Blade (Shadows of the Apt Book 7)
The Air War (Shadows of the Apt Book 8)
Book 7 was fantastic and had me biting my nails every other chapter; Book 8 was probably my single favorite of the series so far, despite zero appearances from two of my three favorite characters (but my third had a huge role). It was even more of a nailbiter and heavily featured one of my favorite things, the culture of fighter pilots in a time period when you can actually see the faces of your opponents.
All else is spoilers.
Heirs of the Blade:
One of the neat things the entire concept of kinden does is defamiliarize some common fantasy tropes. Even if you're wise to how feudalism and hereditary aristocracy is not a good thing, it's easy to get swept away by the romance of the Dragonfly people and their fascinating society. So I really enjoyed how this book sucked you in, then took you on the journey of realizing that actually, it's kind of terrible and the rebels are absolutely right.
Tynisa's journey was so heartbreaking and nerve-wracking. I was sure she was going to die, and so glad she didn't, and that she didn't reject Che for trying to separate her from the GHOST OF THE WORST ASPECTS OF HER FATHER but understood, and they got their reunion. I really want the whole "honorable Weaponsmaster dies honorably" thing to be subverted and have her survive the book and go on to other things.
Also loved kadith/caddis. Of fucking course they have a vague equivalent of the tea ceremony which involves carefully tending ponds of underwater larva cocoons.
Was this the one with Laszlo and the sociopathic Firefly, or is that the next one? Another romance I did not care about.
The Air War:
I'll just copy some of my emails to Layla liveblogging it:
- YESSS, the Assassin Bugs are back! I had literally just been thinking what a shame it was that they made such a brief appearance. Ditto Taki, who was one of my favorites. But man, this arc is rough if you liked Tisamon.
- It's intense but the worldbuilding has so much glee that it takes the edge off for me. That being said, I was more invested in the younger generation so I just want Che to be happy and Tynisa to miraculously not go down in flames.
Also I want to know more about the roots of Aptitude and magic, and it looks like the story is going there. Plus, the Slug kinden are back! Now if we just see more of the Woodlouse kinden I will be very happy.
- Immediately after writing that email, I read a little more before bed and was introduced to another Woodlouse kinden! YESSSS.
- Okay so I'm still reading The Air War and I'm at the part where Seda is reading a Moth book and Gjegevey tells her this weird symbol is the Seal of the Worm, which has been mentioned before in a "too terrible to discuss" context, only now it's finally described: "the symbol, a crooked spiral hatched with a hundred tiny lines, seemed to writhe."
I KNOW WHAT THAT IS! I SAW IT IN THE CABIN. IT IS THE DREADED CENTIPEDE KINDEN, SEALED AWAY FOR HUNDREDS OF YEARS BUT SOON TO RISE!
Okay, I'm going back to reading now, but I had to take a moment to make that prediction. Centipedes. They are totally centipedes. I had been trusting in Tchaikovsky to make earthworms scary because hey, he made slugs majestic and eerie, but nope. It is centipedes.
[Please don't tell me if it actually is or not! I want to be surprised.]
- Just finished The Air War. Man, that was so good and so heartbreaking. The buildup of both communities of pilots (and bombardiers), culminating in the battles shown simultaneously from both sides where you want everyone to survive but one character's triumph means another's death...
Even though Taki is still my forever favorite (SO GLAD she made it, I was biting my nails over that) the moment that got to me the most was when that poor Wasp pilot who'd been slowly losing his mind over guilt, telepathy, and drugs cuts Pingge loose from her chains as he goes down in flames.
- I'm glad I'm reading it right now, because "people pulling together against impossible odds and trying to be decent people while caught in really tough moral quandaries" is really something I want to read now. It's really brutal but not in a despairing way.
Also, centipede people. I think. This book doesn't say for sure, other than that "worm" is an insult and they're not actually worm kinden. "Locked away in another dimension/alternate timeline for hundreds of years" is pretty mind-blowing and I eagerly await Centipede World.
Another thing I really like that hardly any writers do is that he's writing war novels where the war basically is justified in self-defense, and yet the people arguing that peace is possible and maybe the war could have been avoided are not presented as morons. I love the third-generation iteration of the quartet of friends, this time with a Wasp.
Heirs of the Blade (Shadows of the Apt Book 7)
The Air War (Shadows of the Apt Book 8)
From:
no subject
Some people talk about Adrian's books as grimdark, but I was really surprised the first time I heard this because I've never thought about them as such. I think, for me, the thing that makes a book grimdark is an awful world where everyone is awful in response. The thing about these books is that everyone is basically doing their best and wanting to make the people they care about/the world better, and sometimes that takes them down terrible paths, but it's all very real and overall hopeful. Things like Pingge's pilot cutting her free. That, for me, is the opposite of grimdark. And more believable imo, because always in the dark you have people making light.
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(Where are you now? Are you in book 9?)
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I feel like when I finally finish I will immediately reread the earlier books.
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