dragonagefemslash | Member Posts

Not really, but it feels like it.

Remember those exams I was taking? I passed the first one but failed the second, so ehh. It was my first time failing an exam ever, though, so I'm grateful for the experience. You learn from failure, I guess.

And as soon as I got home that day I had decided I'd start watching the entire Robron storyline and that's exactly what I did. I finished yesterday, so here we are now. Assuming most of you need more context, let's get into it. I've been watching British soaps on and off for 11 years now. I'm Spanish, so they've never aired here, but I got into them because of a specific actor and since I loved the format I kept watching other soaps when a storyline sounded interesting. But I'd never dared to actually sit down and watch the Robron storyline, and yet when I heard that Robert Sugden came back to the show in May, well... I decided to finally watch it. And boy, did I love it. Of course, I got to know the recent state of the show in general, as well as its characters, and I love plenty of them. So, yeah, now you've got me waking up at 7am on weekdays to watch ED.

I'm jobless again now, since my last job finished in late May. I was teaching at a religious high school, which was certainly an Experience. The teens were lovely. Mostly. I'm not very good at managing them as of yet, which I hope changes with experience, because when you teach you do want them to learn, you know? Oh, well.

Due to everything life-related I dropped some bingos I was doing, even the one I was very close to finishing, which is a shame. I'm reluctant to join other events now, considering.

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This is going to be a more general review of a series. Since I picked up the Libby app for my commute, I've been interspersing my novel reading with lectures from The Great Courses, and they have been such a delight. Each lecture is 30 minutes, and there's usually 12-24 lectures within a given course. They've done a great job so far of being informative, digestible, and engaging. They cover virtually every area of learning you might be interested in (though, of course, any given library will have a more limited selection) and are also available for purchase on their website if that's more your preference.

So far I have enjoyed:

Origins of Great Ancient Civilizations by Kenneth Harl
The Persian Empire by John Lee
Warriors, Queens, and Intellectuals by Joyce Salisbury
The Odyssey of Homer by Elizabeth Vandiver
The Surveillance State by Paul Rosenzweig
Ancient Civilizations of North America by Edwin Barnhart

- Privacy, Property, and Free Speech by Jeff Rosen; and
- The Aging Brain by Thad A. Polk

They're a great way to brush up on knowledge you may not have thought about for a while, or to introduce yourself to new topics. I've learned a lot of new things since I started listening to them, and gained new understanding of things I vaguely recall from school growing up. They've been a great way to pass the time while stuck in traffic or during slow periods at work and I will definitely continue to look at more. The one downside is that the library usually only stocks the older ones, in my experience, so the information in them will not be as up-to-date as if you paid for a newer version of the course (for example, the privacy law-focused one referred to Roe v. Wade and its successor, Casey, both of which were overturned in 2022).

Something to check out if you're looking for some nonfiction listening!

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The 23rd was the 20th anniversary for Conqueror of Shamballa! I won't lie, this was difficult knowledge, but I thought it would be fun to commemorate it with a bunch of icons, mostly from the movie, but a few from the 2003 anime as well. (^^) I rewatched it on Wednesday, and it really is a visual treat of a film!

( 115 icons under the cut... )

Current Mood: accomplished
Current Location: That Digital Highway

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A+ Library is my bit where I review books with asexual and aromantic characters.

Went on a weekend trip with the squad this weekend and we had to stop at the local Barnes and Noble (It's been a while since I was in one that big! Ours in my town is now in the mall, so it's quite small.) where I spent too much and picked up some things on my TBR plus my own copy of Our Wives Under the Sea. We had some downtime on the trip and I managed to finish the first of the new books while we were there. This was Someone You Can Build a Nest In by John Wiswell.

I wanted so much to like this book, and not just because I was charmed by the purple-themed Barnes and Noble-exclusive cover and edging. It landed on my TBR for being an asexual romance (sapphic, if you take Shesheshen for female, which you don't have to do), and I enjoyed the plot concept. Unfortunately, I did not like the book. If I had not paid for it I probably would not have finished it. The following review is not to say it's a bad book—it has an average rating of 4.05 stars on StoryGraph based on over 6,000 reviews, so obviously people like it—but to say that it specifically had a number of things that made it a big thumbs down for me.

The Character(s): Shesheshen, asexual; Homily, asexual
Verdict: Thumbs down
Previous read: To be Taught, if Fortunate

( Full review below )

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Some books you read not for the experience of reading them, but for the information within. Such is the case with Gulbahar Haitiwaji's memoir, How I Survived a Chinese "Reeducation" Camp: A Uyghur Woman's Story. As the title suggests, this is a first-person account of Haitiwaji's experience in Xinjiang, where she was subjected to "reeducation" on suspicion of terroristic activity. This book was written with the help of Rozenn Morgat and Haitiwaji's daughter Gulhumar, and translated from French by Edward Gauvin.

To quickly summarize for anyone unaware, the Uyghurs (also spelled "Uighur") are an ethnic minority in China, inhabiting the northwestern region of Xinjiang, which is quite large. They are predominantly Muslim; speak Uyghur, a Turkic language; and frequently have more culturally in common with neighboring Kazakhstan and Tajikistan than with the Han in eastern China. For many decades, the Chinese government has viewed Uyghurs with suspicion and since the 1950s has continually ramped up levels of surveillance against Xinjiang. I wrote a paper on this situation in graduate school several years ago concluding that China is enacting a slow genocide against Uyghurs, with the intent of fully wiping out their culture.

Uyghurs are subjected to relentless video surveillance, intrusive police home visits, regularly summoned to the police station for interrogation without any suspicion of a real crime, forcibly sterilized, and punished for any excessive displays of religiosity such as wearing a hijab or visiting mosque too frequently. Some years ago, "reeducation schools" entered the picture.

Haitiwaji's novel is unremarkable in terms of writing. Particularly in the beginning, it jumps around its timeline frequently in ways both unnecessary and sometimes confusing. It style is simplistic and straightforward and it does not go into as much detail as it might have about the day-to-day in the camps. However, Haitiwaji's story, and that of those around her, is absolutely vital, and the courage it must have taken for her to come forward is remarkable. This is a critical read not because it's a great book, but because the torture that Haitiwaji went through must be known, and it is still happening to thousands of Uyghurs who were not able to escape.

Originally, Haitiwaji got away. She and her family left China in 2006, moving to France and applying for refugee status there on the basis of the mistreatment they had already experienced in China. But in 2016, Haitiwaji was contacted by Chinese authorities and told there was a problem with her pension from the oil company where she had worked in Xinjiang. She would have to return to China to sign some paperwork to sort it out. Although suspicious of their intentions, Haitiwaji did as she was asked. Once in Xinjiang, she was arrested on the basis of a photograph her adult daughter Gulhumar had posted online, showing her waving the flag of east Turkmenistan, perceived by Chinese authorities as a sign of separatism. Haitiwaji insisted the image was simply from a cultural gathering of Uyghur expats, but the police would not hear it: Gulhumar was a terrorist, and therefore Haitiwaji was also a terrorist.

Haitiwaji is far from alone. Throughout her years in captivity, more and more Uyghur women pour into prison, frequently sentenced to long periods of incarceration for minor or distorted "violations." Haitiwaji herself is sentenced to seven years of reeducation on the basis of Gulhumar's photo. These women appear before military judges without counsel or even a clear understanding of what the charges against them are. Family members struggle to find out where their loved ones are being held. Physical abuse is common; privacy is nonexistent.

Once one family member falls under suspicion, a cloud comes over them all. Haitiwaji's family in Xinjiang, her mother and siblings, eventually beg Gulhumar to stop calling them asking about Haitiwaji, because the frequent foreign phone calls are attracting police attention and subjecting the family to lengthy interrogations. A palpable atmosphere of apprehension and fear exists both among Uyghurs in China, but also among the expats, who know their families in Xinjiang may suffer for the actions of the expats.

Once free, Haitiwaji realizes that her lone escape has not meant any victory for the Uyghurs. In fact, the only reason Haitiwaji was eventually able to get away was her French connection: at Gulhumar's relentless urging, the French government pressured China to release Haitiwaji and send her back to France. But many Uyghurs do not have a foreign government to advocate for them, or family members with the time and knowledge to agitate for their release. So Haitiwaji penned her story and eventually agreed even to put her name and face on the book, because the world must know what is happening to the Uyghurs.

The book is a fast read; its roughly 230 pages go by quickly, but for the weight of suffering in the tale. The scope and scale of terrible things happening around the world at any given time can be exhausting, but if you have time to read about some more, I would recommend this book. Haitiwaji's story also suggests China is not immune to international pressure on the issue, although international sanctions against products coming out of Xinjiang on suspicion of forced labor of Uyghur prisoners has not put an end to the camps yet. Still, the less they are able to sweep the plight of the Uyghurs under the rug, the more they will be forced to moderate action taken against them, one hopes.

Crossposted to

books and

booknook

anneapocalypse

Long time no post, I know! June was Junelezen over on tumblr and I spent the month gposing my little heart out; if you want to take a look at what I made this year, you can see it all here!

July has been for writing. So far this month I've written 27637 words, my highest wordcount month this year by more than 100%.

Goal this month has been simple: finish the draft(s) of Harsh Light/Gentle Dark (separate but parallel fics that explore Ariane and Urianger in late and post-Heavensward) or get as close as possible. Write as many days as I can, but don't create guilt for missing a day.

One of the big things I came into this month needing to write was the Warring Triad quests, as I'd realized they needed to be incorporated into both fics but hadn't full figured out, how, where, and what they'd add to the story. Yesterday, I wrote the last Warring Triad scene I needed to write. As challenging as it was to figure out how they fit into the story, I'm really glad I did it, because Unukalhai adds a lot to both Ariane and Urianger's stories. To the extent that I really want to have him play a larger role in the Scions going forward, and I'm not bound by the restrictions of writing an MMO, so I don't have to leave him standing alone in the Solar until Shadowbringers and have all the other Scions basically forget about him!

I still need to write the end of Urianger's fic, and both need some interludes written and incorporated into earlier chapters.

So, with eight days left in July, can we make it? I don't know! We'll find out! Even if I don't, I'll have made tremendous progress. I've got a busy few weeks coming up irl, but not in a way that should necessarily preclude writing.

Regardless, we're on the home stretch, and I'm so excited to finally share this when we get there.

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We're back to the "Women in Translation" rec list, with book #10: Consent: A Memoir by Vanessa Springora, translated from French by Natasha Lehrer. This autobiographical novel is the story of Springora's sexual abuse as a young teenager at the hands of Gabriel Matzneff, a well-regarded and prolific French writer, who was in his late forties when he entered a romantic and sexual relationship with Springora (called "V" in the book).

The most shocking thing about V's ordeal, and this is clearly highlighted in her reflections on the experience, which took place between the ages of 13 and 15, is that it was an open secret. V's own mother was aware of it and condoned the affair as within V's rights to choose. Essentially, V was caught at a terrible intersection of the obsessive sexual liberation of French artistic elites at the time—to the extent of claiming it was a violation of an adolescent's rights to forbid them from sex with adults—parents who were tuned out of her emotional well-being, misogyny, and simply meeting the wrong man at the wrong time.

It wasn't just the relationship itself either. Springora cites how she was repeatedly victimized and unpersoned by Matzneff's frequent publishing of autobiographical works which openly recounted his distorted version of their affair, even referring to her by name. For decades before and after the affair, he waxes lyrical about the "sublime" and "passionate" relationships he's had with teenage girls, and the "warm memories" he leaves them with when they get too old for him (as well as his not infrequent abuse of male child prostitutes in the Philippines). She becomes, to her desperate grief, a mere character in Matzneff's self-aggrandizing and self-absolving mythology.

In 2020, by then in her forties, Springora decided the best way to hit back was on Matzneff's own turf, with her own love of writing which he had stolen from her for so many years: and so she published Consent, finally depriving Matzneff of the freedom of being the first and last voice on his many abuses.

Springora's novel is a tight 5 hours on audiobook. She does not linger, but recounts her story, including the childhood experiences which may have made her particularly vulnerable to Matzneff's seduction, with intimate but clear honesty. She has an ear for elegant turns of phrase and skillfully illustrates how even as she continued her relationship with Matzneff and insisted it was what she wanted, the seed of its wrongness had been growing in her mind. With crushing bluntness she shows how jaded she had grown by a mere 15, already world-weary and exhausted by Matzneff's relentless manipulation. For the most part, Springora's story is delivered with calm, factual clarity, but there are a few moments when her simmering rage boils to the surface, and the power of these moments is palpable. In one scene, a sobbing V insisting that she cannot go on like this is told by an adult friend that she should be "honored" to be "chosen" by someone as great as Matzneff to "support him" on his journey as an artist. Both V the child and Springora the adult relating the episode remain in shocked, disbelieving fury at this response.

A broad indifference to Matzneff's victims persisted for decades. On televised interviews by major networks, Matzneff is playfully ribbed about his penchant for teenagers. A Canadian writer who calls him out as a predator is castigated by Matzneff's supporters and told she needs "a good fucking." V is approached by fans of Matzneff's who recognize her from his work, hoping she'll indulge their sexual fantasies as well. Even the young man who persuades V at last to leave Matzneff—a 22-year-old to V's near-16—also initiates a sexual relationship with her, and eventually grows tired of her depression, unable to see her trauma for what it is. At every turn, the system protects and even celebrates Matzneff. As recently as 2015, he was still receiving prestigious literary awards.

Springora takes this book not only to call out Matzneff's abuse, repeated across countless other children, but also everyone around them who knew of and tolerated it, who believed that his artistry placed him on some other moral plane where he could not be criticized by pedants concerned with restricting sexual impulses; as well as the entire societal system which said that V was not a victim, that she had consented to this, that responds to stories of teenage girls seduced by fifty-year-old men with cheeky grins, that doesn't even concern itself with foreign child prostitutes abused by pedophilic tourists.

Springora admits she wished one of Matzneff's other victims had published an account first, so that she wouldn't have to, but eventually she had to speak out, to take power back, and to point the finger at every person who enable this predator to carry on his grotesque work. And with this incisive, ringing indictment of a novel, she does. (And, at least, there have been consequences to Matzneff since Consent's publication, including apologies from Le Monde and other institutions which published some of his most repulsive essays in the 70s and 80s, as well as France raising the age of consent to 15.)

The translation by Natasha Lehrer is skilled and neat; she captures both Springora's more lyrical phrases and the emotionally charged but sometimes understated descriptions. The prose flows well and the dialogue sounds natural. Anne-Marie Piazza does a wonderful job with the audio narration as well, particularly given the weight of the content. She matches Springora's mostly calm tone, and perfectly channels the barely-leashed rage that surfaces at times.

Overall an excellent work. Not enjoyable, given the story, but important, and well-done.

Crossposted to

books and

booknook

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On Friday I sat down with The Old Guard 2, a sequel I hadn't even known was in the works. Although actions movies are far from my bread and butter, I enjoyed the first Old Guard film when it came out. It centered an interesting group of characters with genuine struggles with their immortality, and featured queer actions heroes. Also, Charlize Theron. So when the sequel popped up in my Netflix queue, I was delighted and immediately added it to my list of things to be watched.

Spoilers Below

Charlize Theron still stars, and she and Kiki Layne as Nile are the only good parts left of the movie. The Old Guard 2 is nothing but a jerky back and forth of long fight sequences and exposition. Nothing happens in the film except the characters flying around the world, having lore-dumping conversations, and then getting into another fight. The end of the last film teased the return of Quynh, Andy's former companion who's spent the last 500 years drowning and reviving at the bottom of the ocean, but Quynh's role is lost in the shuffle of plots this quite average length (1 hr 45) film is trying to juggle while still including lengthy beat-em-up sequences. It felt like an enormously lost opportunity, as Quynh could have been such a fascinating character, and I was very interested to see more of her and how she was impacted by her ordeal and what her relationship with Andy was then and is now, but she felt more like window dressing. We actually learn nothing about Quynh that we didn't already know at the end of the last film. I haven no problem with the ambiguity the film keeps in Andy and Quynh's relationship, but in a film that centers (sort of) on their reunion, it seems like we should have learned something new about them.

We don't learn anything about any of the characters that we didn't know last film, except for Discord's claim that Nile is the last of the immortals who will ever be born. Although the characters are arguably what carried the last film, the sequel is content not to bother with fleshing them out further or showing any character growth or decline. Furthermore, the group dynamic from the last film is almost nonexistent. These characters have very little to say to each other, and virtually nothing of personal consequence. Andy never talks about what it's like to suddenly be mortal after thousands of years; Joe doesn't get to really share why he got back in touch with Booker, nor Nicky express his sense of betrayal about the lie; Nile never discusses how she's feeling or settling in after several months in her new life; outside of one brief sequence of banter over drinks, this feels more like a team of coworkers than the (admittedly, struggling) family we saw in the last film.

Plot-wise, there's Quynh's return, there's Discord and whatever her nefarious plans are, and there's lots of new lore about Nile as "the last of the immortals" and what that means for all of them. Any one of these could have been a sufficient plot on its own, and they do not come together gracefully, but rather like a high-speed car wreck where they tear pieces off of each other in a wince-inducing collision. The Old Guard 2 is desperately trying to expand is story, here by dropping in new, previously-unknown immortals (we were led to believe in the first film that Andy's band were the sum of all immortals in the world) and retrofitting them into the same flashback sequences we saw in the earlier film. Now it's Tuah who saved Andy from Quynh's fate; now there's Discord who was there and saw Quynh be dumped in the ocean and decided then to be evil I guess.

The movie also clearly doesn't know what to do with Booker, who was exiled by the group at the end of the first film. It brings him back into the fold only to have him immediately pursue suicide, at which he is eventually successful in the most meaningless of sacrifices, which gains the group nothing and actually leaves them in a worse position, as they're now down a man. As the heavy music swelled during Booker's sacrifice, I could only keep thinking of how stupid this was. If he was going to let himself get killed, it could have at least meant something. Well, now Booker's out of the way, so the film can focus on...what?

Thirty minutes out from the end, I was wondering how they were going to wrap up all of these plot threads they'd tossed around, and the answer was simply: they won't. The film ends on a massive cliffhanger, fates of most of its characters unknown, almost nothing still known about Discord, the Big Bad or about Nile, and for the most part handwaves the conflict Andy and Quynh experienced throughout the film, as Quynh tried to process her grief and anger at feeling abandoned to her fate by Andy. It never even explains how Discord was able to find Quynh, considering the ocean drift of five centuries. These aren't some minor threads left hanging to tantalize us for another film: this movie is just straight-up unfinished, like a proctor called "time!" before they were able to finish filming.

Finally, personally, I think Quynh should have been a lot more unhinged after 500 years of drowning over and over again, hundreds of times a day. The film could have gone a lot harder selling her as a villain lashing out after unimaginable suffering, and done a lot more with where her psyche might be at after this horrific fate. Sure she's angry at the world for what was done to her, and at Andy for moving on when she decided finding Quynh was impossible, but she could have been so much worse. She seems to move on pretty quick.

Incredibly bold of this film to think they'll be getting a third movie after this flop. I could not be less interested in seeing anything else from this franchise.

Current Mood: annoyed

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I first read The Goblin Emperor by Katherine Addison last year, but I never got around to reviewing it, in part because I didn't know what to say about it. My friends had loved it, and while I'd found it enjoyable, I was still percolating on what I liked (or didn't!) about it. Listening to The Witness for the Dead, a book in the same universe, got me thinking about TGE again, so this month I gave it a re-read. This time, it all clicked.

This book is truly such an enjoyable read. The basics of Maia's tale are not unfamiliar—a seeming nobody is thrust into a position of power no one ever expected them to have—but Addison puts her own fascinating spin on it. It has the same feeling I got from The Witness for the Dead, where the story prioritizes doing the right thing and many if not most of the characters in it are striving to be good people (whatever that means for them). It makes a nice contrast to the very selfish, dark fantasy where you know from the start every character is just in it for themselves (and I do enjoy those too, not to say one is better than other!) The protagonist Maia in particular is put in any number of positions where he could misuse his power for personal gratification—such as imprisoning or executing his abusive former guardian, Setheris—but he, with conscious effort, chooses differently. That is not the kind of person—not the kind of emperor—Maia wants to be. And honestly—there is very gratifying fantasy, particularly today, in the idea of someone obtaining power and being committed to some kind of principles of proper governance, of having some code of honor above their own personal enrichment.

As a longtime Tolkien fan, Addison's focus on fantasy titles and linguistics was delightful to me, even if it kept me flipping back to the opening pages on pronunciations (adored the use of the formal singular "we" and the you/thou differentiation). The various layers of manners, societal expectations, customs, and practicalities with which Addison builds up the elven court makes for such a rich and realistic picture of a fantasy court. You can just imagine how the court's current processes built up over centuries, and Addison does a great job of using the characters around Maia—who are far more familiar with these things—to help define them. Not through infodumping, but through their own reactions and behavior, which create a firm outline of customs and expectations with which Maia and the reader are completely unfamiliar.

And Addison's characters stand out. She pays particular attention to giving details or characterization even to passing minor characters, which serves both to flesh out the court, and to indicate the attention Maia pays to those around him. While a reader—particularly a first-time reader—may be a little baffled by the jumble of fantasy names, I doubt anyone will be mistaking Cala for Beshelar for Kiru, even though they all serve the same function within the story (Maia's ever-present bodyguards). It's clear what a three-dimensional picture she has of this world in her own mind, and I think she does a wonderful job of letting the reader in on that picture.

They're all layered, too. Despite Maia's efforts to be good, he's not a perfect person—he has his own selfish and childish impulses to reign in. Two characters who would have been the easiest for Addison to paint black and white—Maia's father, Varenechibel, who exiled Maia's then-17-year-old mother from court because he disliked her—and Maia's guardian from age eight, his drunkard cousin Setheris—she instead takes time to show had other sides, too. Even the heart of the conspiracy to down the airship whose crash instigates Maia's rise to power by killing everyone else who would have taken the throne before him is given sympathy and rationality, never made into simple hateful caricatures whose downfall we can cheer unreservedly.

I was further charmed by the eventual choice of Maia's future empress, who is allowed to be both passionate and flawed, and who is specifically noted to be physically unattractive. Fantasy as much as romance is often filled to the brim with heart-stoppingly beautiful princesses and queens and warrior women, so it's always nice to see something else. This empress to be may not be beautiful, but I do believe she's the best woman for the job, and that she, like Maia, will do her best.

Then there's the politics! I've said it before, I'll go on saying it: I love fantasy politics. All the fun and thrill of politics with none of the real-world stakes or consequences! I've seen this book described (lovingly) as a story where "nothing happens," but much of what's happening is politics. Maia is not only dropped into a role he wasn't remotely prepared for—he's dropped into a group of people all of whom had/have their own goals and schemes ongoing, and a significant part of Maia's introduction to court is having to figure these things out. Just as there are many keen to rid themselves of an inexperienced and potentially useless emperor, there are many equally eager to find a way to make a potentially pliable and ignorant emperor sing their tune. Addison's writing is very strong here; she balances a number of factions within various parts of the court, and their roles and positions are logical and believable. In fact, one of Maia's strongest skills proves to be his ability to trace a person's opinion or attitude down to its root, and then use that to reach understanding with them.

On the whole, this is such a lovely book, and I'm so glad I bought the copy I have so that it was available for a quick re-read. I will definitely read it again in the future, and I will proceed with the rest of the trilogy about Thara Celehar (who appears here as a side character). I just love the world that Addison has created, and I want to live in it a little longer if I can.

Current Mood: happy

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Oof. Today I threw in the towel on Margaret Killjoy's The Sapling Cage because I'd rather be alone with my thoughts than sit through another three hours of this book. This is a fantasy book about a "boy," Lorel, who disguises herself as her female friend to join a witches' coven (She's a transgirl, but her journey on that understanding is part of the book, and she refers to herself as a boy for much of the story.)

First, I will say that I think Lorel is a protagonist written with love; clearly Killjoy wanted her to be relatable and sympathetic, and someone eager for a trans fantasy protag may be willing to forgive the book's many weaknesses for that. That said...

I was shocked to realize this book is not categorized as Young Adult/Youth literature. Lorel is 16 at the start of the book and she's very sixteen. She makes all the sorts of stupid, immature mistakes you would expect from a teenager, which makes her a realistic character, but also deeply frustrating to read as an adult, particularly since the first-person narration puts us right in her head. The book feels young even for a sixteen-year-old; it reads more like a preteen novel about teenagers.

The book itself feels incredibly juvenile, both in prose and in narrative. The writing is simplistic, the narrative barely there, and the worldbuilding painfully thin. The book infodumps on the reader constantly, going into detail about things that are then never relevant again and don't connect into any kind of overarching picture of what this world is like. Reads very much like the author just throwing a bunch of things she thought were cool at the reader without actually thinking about how they would impact her world or the characters in them.

The opening chapters were a warning, because it was exactly the kind of rushing through the necessary set-up to get to the plot the author's actually interested in that I might have written when I was sixteen. Lorel comes up with this (allegedly very dangerous) plan to take her friend's place, convinces both her friend and her mom this is okay, and gets the boot out the door at lightning speed. Where the author might have taken time to thoughtfully build up the world Lorel lives in and what she's seeking or giving up by seeking witchhood, she clearly can't wait to get to the witches, and so skips over the rest of that stuff.

It's not even clear why witches exist or what they do besides run around and get chased out of places. At 68%, the entire story has been has been the witches walking from one place to another, being unwelcome, and having some random little dangerous encounter which is resolved in a page or two. Not only do they have no plan for dealing with the individuals or organization causing the blight at the center of the plot, they also seem to have no plan for improving their PR or for dealing with the "whelps" (pre-apprentice stage witches, where Lorel starts out) or any organization to their group at all. They seem to just wander around the world following magical sources with no goals, plans, or purposes. There's barely even a dim philosophy holding them together. All of this makes it a little baffling why any parent is promising their kid to the witches, which is the case for most of the whelps.

There are also other groups: "knights" of various branches who stand in near-universal opposition to witches, and "brigands" who seem to be highwaymen. Killjoy must have wanted to establish some balancing dynamic between them, but it just comes off like sorting characters into factions (This character wants to be a Knight, this character wants to be a Witch, etc.) as shorthand for having to get into that character's personality or worldview. Although the knights are frequently presented as enemies of the witches, we learn basically nothing about them (except that Lorel's best friend has joined them, which seems like it should cause some conflict between them, but it doesn't), and the brigands are treated as some group akin to knights or witches, rather than a synonym for "criminal," which is a pretty broad term.

The teenage whelps do a lot of dumb things, but the witches also consistently fail to adequately prepare them for the various dangers they encounter. I realize they're supposed to be tough mentor types, and that tracks with the dangerous lives witches lead here, but they come off remarkably irresponsible to their charges. They also seem to prioritize physical combat above anything else they could be teaching the whelps, for reasons they never explain, and the whelps seem as often a burden to the witches as the next generation of witches themselves.

The inter-character relationships are very predictable, you can see the whole outline of them from the very beginning, and nothing happened that was surprising. The characters themselves are flat and shallow and there's very little variation between them, and certainly not in their speaking style. I could not identify anything about the fellow whelps, except Didey who is the mean one and Araneigh (she will always be RNA to this audiobook listener) who is the one Lorel has a crush on.

The majority of conflicts set up are solved almost immediately, with the exception of the main plot about the blight and the issue of Lorel's gender identity, which makes it grow tiring to encounter some new problem which you know will be over shortly. These are often the opportunity for Killjoy to introduce some fantastical creature which will never matter again outside of this one scene and whose existence does not figure into any cohesive worldbuilding. (And for a very minor, worldbuilding-related nitpick, how does Lorel know what "adrenaline" is? The technology of this world is at a medieval level at most.)

I also hated the audiobook narration. I've never disliked one so much before that it was distracting me from the story, but here we are. The narrator uses a phenomenally grating flat and nasally voice for many of the characters, and is prone to trailing off into a near-whisper, which makes managing the volume a pain. She also mumbles: I couldn't tell if Lorel's fellow whelp was "Hex," "Pex," "Ex" or something else for several chapters, and it wasn't until over 60% through the book I realized the name of Lorel's hometown was "Leadston" not "Ludston." Thought she was just mispronouncing "dame" the entire time until reviews revealed the witches' titles are actually "Dam So-and-so."

It has some nice messaging about growing into yourself and accepting your differences and learning to get along with others, but so do a lot of other books that are better-written.

This was a very disappointing book, and I will be avoiding anything else from this author going forward. Possibly when I was a teenager I would have found it entertaining, but I'm not sure even then. It just feels so very hollow.

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