[SPOILER-Y TITLE REDACTED]
Mar. 24th, 2010 02:55 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
jade_sabreA CONSPIRACY OF KINGS REVIEW
actual title of the post: ONE CONSPICUOUSLY ABSENT HOT PIECE OF ATTOLIAN MANFLESH
four hours, minus half an hour of walking and another fifteen minutes of squeeing to Lovie and rereading scenes
okay okay okay okay okay okay uuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuum, bad things first:
1) this is definitely not the strongest of the four, and also not a standalone novel, I would say at all, period. 50% of the enjoyment and several of my favorite scenes just wouldn't be the same if you didn't know the characters and hadn't read KoA, for reasons which I will elaborate on later.
1a) There's a lot of self-referential-type humor, which made me smile, and which totally works even out-of-context, but is way better in-context.
2) This feels like a setting-the-pieces novel, and so it was of course going to be shorter, and its not-as-goodness is perhaps going along with that. Which is confusing, given the fact that there are allegedly two more books; again, more on that later.
3) I didn't find Sophos to be as memorable of a narrator as Eugenides, and I also found that knowing he was talking to Eddis lessened my worries about how his sections would turn out (although to be granted, I didn't figure out he was talking to Eddis until p.131, so). Not to say my worries disappeared altogether, though. Still, while I enjoyed his POV, it wasn't as characterally colorful as Gen's.
4) COSTIS. WHERE IS COSTIS. More on that later too. But still. Costiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiis. :-(
I think the best way to describe A Conspiracy of Kings is as TT and QoA spliced, then sprinkled with liberal doses of KoA. I mean hell, it's even structured that way, so go figure.
OKAY SO
SQUEE TIME
1) wait hold on I have a piece of paper I ought to take a picture of it it has all my reactions written down starting with me figuring out about Eddis being the audience on page 131 anyway I will post that picture later BUT
actually I don't even know where to start. I can't quite number the things that made me squee; I could list the moments I wrote down, such as "staving off her smile by crossing his arms" and ATTOLIA GRABBING EDDIS'S HAND and and and and "I can tell when I'm being an ass" and the epic music in my head as Sophos was chasing after Eddis and MOIRA TUTORING OMG (also LOLOLOLOL the philosophical moment about how classifying everything won't explain everything, we talked about that in class today, MOIRA, ILU SO HARD), and the myths in this one! (more obviously explicated than the one in KoA and slightly moreso than QoA). And the fact that the self-referrential stuff BECOMES IMPORTANT TO THE PLOT OMG EDDIS YOUR LOVE LETTER IS AWESOME (also the fact that I knew something was up as soon as Eddis was like mmmmmmmm marriage bed) OH MY GOD, INKPOTS OTPS, THE INKPOTS, I READ THAT LIKE LIKE A BAZILLION TIMES
let's see, I could list what I loved by what I read aloud to Lovie
INKPOTS
"my brothers made you cry"
a couple of other things
the most important of which I am saving for its own spot.
But mostly, what I loved about this novel is probably that which puts me off KoA, a little: everyone was back.
They were back, and we were getting their thoughts! Unfiltered! Attolia took Eddis's hand! (I have a whole paragraph about that I think too.) Sophos grouched to the magus! And EUGENIDES WAS BACK.
Eugenides was back, and we got this beautiful little character moment gem handwrapped and given to us:
"He was trying to propose marriage and she thought he was talking about a poem he was writing. I was laughing like a very quiet fiend, trying not to make the branches around me shake, and then, between one heartbeat and the next, and to my complete surprise, it wasn't funny anymore."
As I said to my roommate, "Um, this time that I'm reading it to you? Is like the third time I've read this paragraph." And then I read the scene about two more times, just for good measure. And I mean, in KoA, we get moments like that, but they are very rarely unfiltered--here, it's just Sophos and Eugenides, and Gen is telling us THE MOMENT HE REALIZED HE WAS IN LOVE, and like, I never ever expected to get that, and it's just so--Dite! Attolia being oblivious! Eugenides's immediate reaction being MUST DESTROY DITE! The fact that we're able to have this scene at all, that we're able to have Eugenides being himself like this--oh, that is what I missed in KoA.
So for that alone, for having double dates with Gen and Attolia and Eddis and Sophos all just being together being BAMFs, as Quark's icon so aptly says, for that alone, I loved this novel. Because in KoA we lost a lot of that, and I missed it terribly.
But! We do not have Costis.
In KoA, we have Costis, and once you get used to him he almost makes up for the lack of Gen (almost, and I say that as someone who loves Costis unconditionally). Costis, while not up to Gen's level of machinations, is not politically stupid; he gets what's going on with the dogs and Aris right away (both times), and it's easy to see how he could one day become Captain of the Guard. And there are moments, in the book, when he and Eugenides are on the same wavelength (fertilizer on the tables!), and while he'll never be Gen's advisor he could certainly be a friend--but then at the end of the novel, BAM, Gen reminds us that while we've been living in Costis's head, he's "never heard [him] put that many words together at one time," that there's a vast gulf between the two. And I personally find that frustrating because I want them to be BFFs so that I can have both Costis and Eugenides, because I love them both very, very much.
Alas, it seems it is not to be. Because to me, this book, in its shortness and its character reuniting wonderfulness, is the last book before the big battle. MWT's putting all her pieces on the chessboard and organizing them the way she wants; everything has fallen into place, the last moment of laughter before the ultimate showdown. And yet there are, allegedly, not one but TWO books left in the series. So it seems that the last book will be the ultimate showdown, which means there's one more bridge left--and so I think it will be in the Medean Empire, and I think Costis will play a major role, while Eugenides and his BAMF Brigade have little scenes of preparation scattered throughout. The fan theory about Costis being a ninja in Medea isn't that far off from being plausible (I mean, okay, Costis will probably never be a ninja), and I think, if we were to have another novel that was more him and less Eugenides, that I would want it to be about him, rather than the ways in which he gets bounced around and occasionally does something decisive.
So. Costis in Medea. We'll see.
Back to things I loved, like Eddis and Attolia. I think one of the things that doesn't come across here (because MWT is notoriously bad about that sort of thing) is the age difference between Sophos and Eddis; she's five years older than Gen, and even if Sophos was fourteen in TT that still makes him six years younger than her, and in my head Eugenides and Attolia are seven years apart. So when Attolia takes Eddis's hand, when Sophos is leaving, and the magus is the one who sends her to watch for her fellow monarch--they're all older, and perhaps Eddis, in her own way, was as adjusted as Attolia was to the idea that she'd never actually fall in love, or marry someone she loved. Sure, she didn't have Attolia's other emotional problems, but I feel like they were both in that situation, and so when Attolia is there to take Eddis's hand it's a deeper understanding about how love affects one. It's rather like the scene in QoA where Eddis assures Attolia that Eugenides is only sleeping.
There were lots of scenes that were similar to ones in the other books, but not really in a bad way.
I liked that Gen was an idiot about Sophos and his loyalty; it was nice to see Gen screwing up like that. Although I did yell at my book at one point, "EUGENIDES. YOU'RE THE ONE THAT MARRIED THE ICE QUEEN. You get the whole masks thing, the whole figuring-out-what's-below-the-surface, not-trusting-appearances, yadda yadda, SOPHOS IS IN LOVE WITH EDDIS, HE DOES NOT GET THESE THINGS." Eddis smiles and men beg to walk across hot coals; Attolia smiles and men go "I CAN'T TELL IF SHE'S GOING TO KILL ME, OR IF SHE'S PLEASED."
I did feel like the resolution to that was a little rushed, almost as if she went "oh God, grumpy cold distant Gen is depressing, I'll just have Sophos trip him so we can hurry up and get to THAT SCENE WHERE THEY GO TO THE BAR, I LOVE THAT ONE" which hey, not like I'm disagreeing AT ALL with that part.
I love the subtle communications between Eugenides and Attolia. I love the way Sophos is like "Attolia was cold and gorgeous. Attolia was cold and gorgeous. Attolia was cold and gorgeous and also kind of funny OH GOD HER JOKES ARE TERRIFYING." I love love LOVE, as previously mentioned, that scene where Gen talks about her, but I also just loved the camaraderie the two kings shared and just--them being themselves, and everyone being together, and oh my goodness, I've missed them terribly.
ALSO SOPHOS'S PARENTS OTP, they're like the Malfoys, I LOVE IT WHEN GRUMPY PEOPLE REALLY LOVE EACH OTHER.
OH I guess I could talk about the plot. For the most part, I figured out the twists or at least guessed where they were coming--I think the biggest surprises where Sophos getting captured the second time, and HOLY SHIT THE EXTRA TEN THOUSAND MEDE, WHAT, WHAT. I don't know how much of a twist that counts as since it was all on the Medes' part (also, lolol hatred of the Mede, I hate them SO MUCH), but I still had to reread that a couple of times. My initial reaction was "he's totally bluffing!" and then no, he was not bluffing.
YOU SHOT THE AMBASSADOR? oh Sophos.
AND THE LIBRARY. It sounds wonderful. And Sophos hiding in Gen's room. WOULD LIKE A SHORT STORY OF INA'S VERSION OF THEIR ESCAPE, PLZKTHXBAI.
Okay, I think I covered all the main points I wanted to, and everything else can be remembered in the comments. Overall, I really, really loved it, and it's still really, really good, and the ways in which it is lacking are bolstered, at least for fans I think, by the characters.
Remind me to tell y'all my adventures in finding my copy. AND REMEMBER, FEEL FREE TO SQUEE AWAY.
actual title of the post: ONE CONSPICUOUSLY ABSENT HOT PIECE OF ATTOLIAN MANFLESH
four hours, minus half an hour of walking and another fifteen minutes of squeeing to Lovie and rereading scenes
okay okay okay okay okay okay uuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuum, bad things first:
1) this is definitely not the strongest of the four, and also not a standalone novel, I would say at all, period. 50% of the enjoyment and several of my favorite scenes just wouldn't be the same if you didn't know the characters and hadn't read KoA, for reasons which I will elaborate on later.
1a) There's a lot of self-referential-type humor, which made me smile, and which totally works even out-of-context, but is way better in-context.
2) This feels like a setting-the-pieces novel, and so it was of course going to be shorter, and its not-as-goodness is perhaps going along with that. Which is confusing, given the fact that there are allegedly two more books; again, more on that later.
3) I didn't find Sophos to be as memorable of a narrator as Eugenides, and I also found that knowing he was talking to Eddis lessened my worries about how his sections would turn out (although to be granted, I didn't figure out he was talking to Eddis until p.131, so). Not to say my worries disappeared altogether, though. Still, while I enjoyed his POV, it wasn't as characterally colorful as Gen's.
4) COSTIS. WHERE IS COSTIS. More on that later too. But still. Costiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiis. :-(
I think the best way to describe A Conspiracy of Kings is as TT and QoA spliced, then sprinkled with liberal doses of KoA. I mean hell, it's even structured that way, so go figure.
OKAY SO
SQUEE TIME
1) wait hold on I have a piece of paper I ought to take a picture of it it has all my reactions written down starting with me figuring out about Eddis being the audience on page 131 anyway I will post that picture later BUT
actually I don't even know where to start. I can't quite number the things that made me squee; I could list the moments I wrote down, such as "staving off her smile by crossing his arms" and ATTOLIA GRABBING EDDIS'S HAND and and and and "I can tell when I'm being an ass" and the epic music in my head as Sophos was chasing after Eddis and MOIRA TUTORING OMG (also LOLOLOLOL the philosophical moment about how classifying everything won't explain everything, we talked about that in class today, MOIRA, ILU SO HARD), and the myths in this one! (more obviously explicated than the one in KoA and slightly moreso than QoA). And the fact that the self-referrential stuff BECOMES IMPORTANT TO THE PLOT OMG EDDIS YOUR LOVE LETTER IS AWESOME (also the fact that I knew something was up as soon as Eddis was like mmmmmmmm marriage bed) OH MY GOD, INKPOTS OTPS, THE INKPOTS, I READ THAT LIKE LIKE A BAZILLION TIMES
let's see, I could list what I loved by what I read aloud to Lovie
INKPOTS
"my brothers made you cry"
a couple of other things
the most important of which I am saving for its own spot.
But mostly, what I loved about this novel is probably that which puts me off KoA, a little: everyone was back.
They were back, and we were getting their thoughts! Unfiltered! Attolia took Eddis's hand! (I have a whole paragraph about that I think too.) Sophos grouched to the magus! And EUGENIDES WAS BACK.
Eugenides was back, and we got this beautiful little character moment gem handwrapped and given to us:
"He was trying to propose marriage and she thought he was talking about a poem he was writing. I was laughing like a very quiet fiend, trying not to make the branches around me shake, and then, between one heartbeat and the next, and to my complete surprise, it wasn't funny anymore."
As I said to my roommate, "Um, this time that I'm reading it to you? Is like the third time I've read this paragraph." And then I read the scene about two more times, just for good measure. And I mean, in KoA, we get moments like that, but they are very rarely unfiltered--here, it's just Sophos and Eugenides, and Gen is telling us THE MOMENT HE REALIZED HE WAS IN LOVE, and like, I never ever expected to get that, and it's just so--Dite! Attolia being oblivious! Eugenides's immediate reaction being MUST DESTROY DITE! The fact that we're able to have this scene at all, that we're able to have Eugenides being himself like this--oh, that is what I missed in KoA.
So for that alone, for having double dates with Gen and Attolia and Eddis and Sophos all just being together being BAMFs, as Quark's icon so aptly says, for that alone, I loved this novel. Because in KoA we lost a lot of that, and I missed it terribly.
But! We do not have Costis.
In KoA, we have Costis, and once you get used to him he almost makes up for the lack of Gen (almost, and I say that as someone who loves Costis unconditionally). Costis, while not up to Gen's level of machinations, is not politically stupid; he gets what's going on with the dogs and Aris right away (both times), and it's easy to see how he could one day become Captain of the Guard. And there are moments, in the book, when he and Eugenides are on the same wavelength (fertilizer on the tables!), and while he'll never be Gen's advisor he could certainly be a friend--but then at the end of the novel, BAM, Gen reminds us that while we've been living in Costis's head, he's "never heard [him] put that many words together at one time," that there's a vast gulf between the two. And I personally find that frustrating because I want them to be BFFs so that I can have both Costis and Eugenides, because I love them both very, very much.
Alas, it seems it is not to be. Because to me, this book, in its shortness and its character reuniting wonderfulness, is the last book before the big battle. MWT's putting all her pieces on the chessboard and organizing them the way she wants; everything has fallen into place, the last moment of laughter before the ultimate showdown. And yet there are, allegedly, not one but TWO books left in the series. So it seems that the last book will be the ultimate showdown, which means there's one more bridge left--and so I think it will be in the Medean Empire, and I think Costis will play a major role, while Eugenides and his BAMF Brigade have little scenes of preparation scattered throughout. The fan theory about Costis being a ninja in Medea isn't that far off from being plausible (I mean, okay, Costis will probably never be a ninja), and I think, if we were to have another novel that was more him and less Eugenides, that I would want it to be about him, rather than the ways in which he gets bounced around and occasionally does something decisive.
So. Costis in Medea. We'll see.
Back to things I loved, like Eddis and Attolia. I think one of the things that doesn't come across here (because MWT is notoriously bad about that sort of thing) is the age difference between Sophos and Eddis; she's five years older than Gen, and even if Sophos was fourteen in TT that still makes him six years younger than her, and in my head Eugenides and Attolia are seven years apart. So when Attolia takes Eddis's hand, when Sophos is leaving, and the magus is the one who sends her to watch for her fellow monarch--they're all older, and perhaps Eddis, in her own way, was as adjusted as Attolia was to the idea that she'd never actually fall in love, or marry someone she loved. Sure, she didn't have Attolia's other emotional problems, but I feel like they were both in that situation, and so when Attolia is there to take Eddis's hand it's a deeper understanding about how love affects one. It's rather like the scene in QoA where Eddis assures Attolia that Eugenides is only sleeping.
There were lots of scenes that were similar to ones in the other books, but not really in a bad way.
I liked that Gen was an idiot about Sophos and his loyalty; it was nice to see Gen screwing up like that. Although I did yell at my book at one point, "EUGENIDES. YOU'RE THE ONE THAT MARRIED THE ICE QUEEN. You get the whole masks thing, the whole figuring-out-what's-below-the-surface, not-trusting-appearances, yadda yadda, SOPHOS IS IN LOVE WITH EDDIS, HE DOES NOT GET THESE THINGS." Eddis smiles and men beg to walk across hot coals; Attolia smiles and men go "I CAN'T TELL IF SHE'S GOING TO KILL ME, OR IF SHE'S PLEASED."
I did feel like the resolution to that was a little rushed, almost as if she went "oh God, grumpy cold distant Gen is depressing, I'll just have Sophos trip him so we can hurry up and get to THAT SCENE WHERE THEY GO TO THE BAR, I LOVE THAT ONE" which hey, not like I'm disagreeing AT ALL with that part.
I love the subtle communications between Eugenides and Attolia. I love the way Sophos is like "Attolia was cold and gorgeous. Attolia was cold and gorgeous. Attolia was cold and gorgeous and also kind of funny OH GOD HER JOKES ARE TERRIFYING." I love love LOVE, as previously mentioned, that scene where Gen talks about her, but I also just loved the camaraderie the two kings shared and just--them being themselves, and everyone being together, and oh my goodness, I've missed them terribly.
ALSO SOPHOS'S PARENTS OTP, they're like the Malfoys, I LOVE IT WHEN GRUMPY PEOPLE REALLY LOVE EACH OTHER.
OH I guess I could talk about the plot. For the most part, I figured out the twists or at least guessed where they were coming--I think the biggest surprises where Sophos getting captured the second time, and HOLY SHIT THE EXTRA TEN THOUSAND MEDE, WHAT, WHAT. I don't know how much of a twist that counts as since it was all on the Medes' part (also, lolol hatred of the Mede, I hate them SO MUCH), but I still had to reread that a couple of times. My initial reaction was "he's totally bluffing!" and then no, he was not bluffing.
YOU SHOT THE AMBASSADOR? oh Sophos.
AND THE LIBRARY. It sounds wonderful. And Sophos hiding in Gen's room. WOULD LIKE A SHORT STORY OF INA'S VERSION OF THEIR ESCAPE, PLZKTHXBAI.
Okay, I think I covered all the main points I wanted to, and everything else can be remembered in the comments. Overall, I really, really loved it, and it's still really, really good, and the ways in which it is lacking are bolstered, at least for fans I think, by the characters.
Remind me to tell y'all my adventures in finding my copy. AND REMEMBER, FEEL FREE TO SQUEE AWAY.
