Monday, March 1, 2010

The Queen of Attolia: Countdown 8 Days

Wow. Eight days. One day more than a week. You know the transition from *I-am-excited-because-I-know-this-will-be-great-and-it's-coming-up* to *Oh-my-god-oh-my-god-oh-my-god-oh-my-god-its-so-close-I-can-already-see-it-and-its-gonna-be-better-than-great*? I've just made it.

I think this largely has to do with the fact that I just finished re-reading The Queen of Attolia and am now almost done with the King of Attolia (but I will hold comments on that until I've given 'The Queen'a good run through). I'm wondering if I ought to have put off reading them another couple of days because now I'm going to have a whole week to suffer through in fresh suspense. But I've survived FOUR YEARS of that suspense right? What's another eight days?

A life time. That's what.

It is odd the things I remembered from The Queen of Attolia and the things I forgot. I remembered the scenes in the dungeons, and the 'calve's love' scene on the stairs and the kidnapping of the magus and Gen's excessive sulking, the eatings, his divine message of "stop whining". I completely forgot about the betrayal of the gods and the shattering glass. Him visiting the wounded. Mostly I forgot how much he grows up in this book. How fierce he becomes. How much pain he goes through. How crazy he is.

Before when I read this book I though it was a good story but I also got tired of listening to Gen sulk because I wanted to more involved in the action of the story. Now I realize that that IS the action. The irrepressible thief gets caught. He looses his hand. He looses his livelihood and possibly who he is is destroyed and he has to find a way out of that. Maybe its because I've done some growing up myself since I was sixteen (despite all the measures I've taken against it). I don't know, but I've found his sulky, bitter behavior not only understanding but also entertaining and in many ways moving. And the betrayal of the gods at the end --just when you think that everything is finally resolved and working itself out --hit me like a lightning bolt.

Well done Megan Whelan Turner. Well done. (because you know . . . be approval matters . . . and stuff)

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