Back to Dunnett (wrote this over the past couple of days)

[petronia]

Heavy spoilers for book 3, mid-level spoilers for, um, random other books.

Comments

crying, this was supposed to be a quickie comment

[rondaview]

BRB getting some popcorn to read with this post

(kay i swear i wrote the above line before getting to the part in your post where you talk about mariotta...also...getting popcorn, bawling. there's just something about this series that makes popcorn go-getters out of all of us i guess!)

CLIFFS NOTES VERSION:
- you'd do well with your excel sheet. Jerott and Lymond should just. nnnnnngh. is all I'm going to say about that.
- This book has done a number on my sleep/wake pattern this weekend, so I really wasn’t gaming it in the middle - try that at 5AM after you’ve been reading for 10 hours straight. STORY OF MY LIFE. WAIT TILL YOU GET TO PIF OH MY GOD.
- the only thing I called was the fact that Joleta was pregnant when she snuck up into Lymond's room and threw herself at him. totally didn't see the incest coming AT ALL; when the cross wound cut into Gabriel's shoulder was revealed I blinked and mouthed in astonished revulsion before then proceeding to spam applegnat with a thousand exclamatory emails hahaha.
- None of which explained

Re: crying, this was supposed to be a quickie comment

[rondaview]

Yeah, you're totally right ... oh my first time around I think I waved away the incongruity of Lymond getting so worked up over anything by saying to myself, oh, you know, he's just pissed because Gabriel has a Guiding Light in his life and is so deeply vested in his faith, while Lymond has ... nothing much really? Besides his valiant quest to protect his mother nation at all costs I guess. But of course it would make sense that something else was afoot. And that Lymond would get his knickers in a twist because Gabriel reminds him so uncomfortably of himself, in a way -- a symmetrical bearing that's developed further in PiF. Oh god Sabina, it's like what you said: clusterfuck incoming.

Gosh, whatever happened to Eloise? I hope we get some backstory filled in in books 5 & 6.

Re: crying, this was supposed to be a quickie comment

[petronia]

Well, I was kind of like... who else would have slept with Joleta? Apparently the answer is EVERYBODY, bawling

No no, that section was the (completely unlooked-for) justification for my call. XD; I'm talking about... the actual passage in which Jerott first appears, come to think of it. Other than featuring some beautiful descriptive writing, this scene thru the arrival at Birgu, Gabriel's introduction (where you have to read the initial assessment as being Lymond's), and the first council meeting with Homedes hews more closely to Lymond's POV than any time previous - and for that matter afterward, at least in book 3 - close enough that it felt like it was very carefully not falling into 3rd person limited. And I really noticed that, because these books normally rely so much on outside perspectives of Lymond: the camera is always on him, never with him. But here you have a character introduction where the camera stays with Lymond as he stands and stares at someone for fifteen minutes in the candlelight, thinking about how the two

[applegnat]

None of which explained Lymond’s virulent emotional response

His deep and abiding manly patriotism?

[petronia]

It's clearly personal though! Everyone just assumes it's personal for the wrong reasons. I think supacat is right - there's a sort of doppelganger/dark mirror thing happening.

[applegnat]

I read both Chandler and Dunnett and I find this parallel that you draw vastly interesting. I think the reason I like the first three books so much is because it's so full of dames - there's another one, my favourite, coming up in the next book, who is the damiest dame of them all, and yet, my god.

I'm always interested in WHY she buries all those Jerott clues around the place and through subsequent books. You have one brother figure. You have several acolytes. How come suddenly the need for a -- well. I guess it's true what they say about boon companions, you find them when you aren't looking for them.

Philippa and Kate are so lovely.

[petronia]

I don't usually like to go outside the text completely, but that was actually what did it for me - "Hey, where have I seen this scene before?" And yes, the dames. XD

You don't think Lymond needs a BFF-like sorta character? I thought he desperately needed one. XD; At the end of book 2 I had a mental casting call on. His best friendships are with women but women can't follow him everywhere he goes.

[petronia]

ONSEN EPISODE, CAT

ONSEN EPISODE

[petronia]

Crying hard, Cat, HE UNLOCKED THE SHACKLES BEFOREHAND

In actual seriousness? XD; 20-23. I started off at 25 and just kept revising downward. At the end of GoK I would have put it at the upper end of that range, now I'd put it at the lower. It's sorta why I'm worried about Philippa; it's still all very Nancy Drew for her, but she's only a teeny bit younger than Lymond must've been during the actual post-Solway Moss plot.

[petronia]

basically Will Scott if he'd managed to get out into the world and sprout

But that is kind of the thing, though. Insofar as Lymond has feelings for Jerott, they seem to be rooted in uncomplicated (by Lymond's standards) boyhood-era emotions; and it's not anything he can't handle, which is good for him in its own way. I'm not sure how significant it is at this point, in the grand scheme of Lymond as it were XD I would expect him to do just that: handle it.