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vaguely-concerned · 5 years

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Temeraire let’s read: Crucible of Gold AHOY!

- lol I’m glad hammond is back, he is phenomenally funny. I do love me a bureaucrat character who won’t let trifling things like dignity, morality, politeness or common sense get in the way of their job

- it is a CRIME that Tharkay had to leave before he got to see Laurence all sun-bronzed and casually dressed and golden haired and relaxed, I wish to petition the universe itself on his behalf to correct this injustice

- hahaha shen li is the best; a buddhist dragon would be the greatest party pooper among her own kind

shen li, serenely: attachment to material things can only bring suffering

literally every other dragon, dripping bling from every available surface: um actually

- . . . without the clinging stink of murder and treachery which seemed to have by slow octopoid measures attached itself to his life. laurence I understand where you’re coming from on this but you have served colonial britain since you were like twelve. this has been an extremely slow process of waking up to smelling dem roses (fatherhood changes your perspective on your life situation I guess)

- awwwwww laurence finally studying some more chinese while temeraire helps him... no no this is just rain on my face yes I know I’m indoors it’s just me and lady allendale sitting here with our arms around each other crying about our boy reading poetry of his own freeish will

- oooh I really like how novik writes the way hammond talks -- it can be hard to write a character who constantly breaks up their own dialogue and interrupts themselves and continually couches their words without it being hard to read and annoying, but she really nails communicating that he’s a) completely graceless and with no dignity but also undeniably intelligent, b) definitely a Diplomat but not a total weasel, if only by a hair, c) hilarious

- pour one out for laurence’s civilian beard with me guys, gone too soon and dearly missed (and again tharkay didn’t even get to see it! this continues to be the greatest tragedy of these books let’s hope he grows it out again later when they’re all settled down.)

- . . . These were distinguished from the others mainly for their having had less time in their careers to demonstrate a lack of initiative or skill, so he could have some small hope of uncovering some previously hidden talent. OH MY GOD LAURENCE the straight up savagery

- DAD!LAURENCE!!! DAD!LAURENCE!!!!!!! (aaah it’s so interesting that when he gets a bit more stern you can definitely see sides of his father peeking out, but he deeply remains his mother’s son -- he’s acting from a place of affection, feeling of responsibility and concern for their futures, not the weird controlling shit lord allendale routinely pulls)

roland is such a teenager at this point oh my god. also laurence’s whole speech to demane about respecting her boundaries and agency... *chef kiss emoji* and ALSO demane is so sympathetic in this still because who HASN’T wanted to dangle some asshole over a cliff for being a creep to your friend/crush... they’re all good and perfect and I love them actually

- ...I’ve managed to put it out of my mind in the last few books but with the allegiance going down like that I keep remembering there were so many actual children onboard and now I feel ill

being an adult and realizing the full fuckedupedness of these things sucks haha

- 1) the description of seeing the ship sinking from underwater is hauntingly beautiful and 2) as I have said many a time before, thank god for demane

- see this is the other side of the coin of these books making you care so deeply about the characters; I know that no important characters die in this book but I am still so fucking stressed out by all of this D:D:D:

- well well well if gong su’s ludicrous competency wasn’t suspicious before it certainly is now, I guess china trains its spies well in the culinary arts haha

- I mean uh. what a way to symbolically and literally sever laurence from his former life and former self, I guess. you’d be hard pressed to do so more explosively at least

- something extremely bad happened to granby, we can tick that off the list

- I feel like the prose and writing in general is super improved in this one? it feels sharp and purposeful in a way the last few haven’t quite been

- He hoped Riley would be mourned; Riley deserved to be mourned ahfksahsdajklhsajkfhaslkjfhsakjdfhdaslkfhakj pain :(:(:( I’m so sorry laurence and I didn’t even like the guy. I can’t believe that the first thing this madman does after trying to secure their survival as best he could is writing letters -- on dragonback!!! hands stiff from cold so he can only work in five minute increments!!! -- to make sure riley’s memory isn’t blackened how can he be like this

- emily roland is so smart and capable and amazing my heart is blooming with pride

- iridescent feathered dragons... holy shit this is awesome

temeraire has a little feather envy tho and also maila casually eavesdropping so he can chat up (literally) hot babes... I know they’re prisoners of war and everything but this is all pure unadulterated gold

- oh temeraire darling no have no fear hammond has no self respect whatsoever, that will not be what stops him

- I can’t believe laurence is actually taking time to tie himself in knots over not following perfect procedure around his officers’ future career options while they’re FUCKING MAROONED with a bunch of asshole sailors fkdfhsjdh

- GET YOUR DIRTY FUCJING HANDS OFF DEMANE OR I’LL CHOP THEM OFF FOR YOU YOU SWINE

sipho is like eleven and a nerd and ready to run at all these grown men armed just with a branch PAIN

- granby’s unending exasperation at laurence not knowing all the stuff that seems self-evident to him having grown up with dragons fksjdhfskajd

- aw laurence finally having a little dad talk with roland ;____; and demane has proposed to her repeatedly and she would agree in a moment under other circumstances ;________________; and it never even occurred to me that that’s why she was so upset about him taking on his own dragon but of course that would fuck everything up if that’s what she was planning OH NO ;_________________________________________________;

laurence confirmed for boytoy & hideously embarrassed about it flasdfsdkjhfksd

“But I don’t want someone I want, if I can’t be sure of seeing him one week in the year” crack crack goes the sound of my heart breaking

I hope they find a way to solve this eventually :(

- really interesting what a clear view emily has of roland and laurence’s relationship tho, considering he’s basically her father figure -- like there’s clear affection, physical attraction and camaraderie there but it never feels particularly romantic & they both have other shit to do. (and laurence knows it too on some level, considering his main emotion when she refuses his proposal is relief lol. it really shows off this central conflict he has where like... he has a very clear idea of who he feels he should be and managed to convince himself he was for a long time, and what that man wants and needs (namely very little, emotionally) and is loyal to. aaaand then there’s the person he actually is, who’s been fighting his way to the surface since temeraire showed up in the very first book and sort of woke him up by giving him something he actually loves and values with all of himself and can’t compromise on. proper gentleman/navy!laurence feels like he has to do what society deems decent and marry roland to be a good person, actual!laurence seems to know that what they already have isn’t wrong or immoral in any way as long as they’re both happy with it. ugh I love him and I hope his last remaining character development includes realizing that who he really is is not only acceptable but actually a better man than that imagined perfect self ever could be and how many people love him for who he is already A N Y W A Y onwards)

- the incan dragons continue to be dope as hell

it’s super interesting how they’ve grown to value people -- and not just one special person, like british dragons, but whole groups of people -- over gold and jewels. like the tendency is there in dragons from other cultures; temeraire loves The Bling but would still easily prioritize laurence and his crew over it. presumably some of it is cultural and some of it must stem from the sheer trauma of losing so many people within a few centuries, which is basically living memory for a dragon (which makes it equal parts sympathetic/heartwarming and juuuuust on the edge of being too creepy and possessive haha).

- jeez this book is doing a good job at showing what a haunting fucking sight it must be to enter a land where like. 90% of the people are dead in plague and their cities stand abandoned

- fhasdklhfaskljfhs hammond going full diplomat on the dragons squabbling... he truly is something

and laurence apologizing to demane because he was out of line and he is a fellow captain now T_____T lord allendale could never

- haven’t had a lot to say for a while because I’m just so entranced with the world building and stuff haha, I find the irl history of this area super interesting as well

- ambassador iskierka........ what a time to be alive

poor poor poor granby hahahaha

- if these books were named harry potter style this one would be ‘william laurence and that time he tried to put off wearing his ceremonial robes for as long as humanly possible’

- granby being good at drawing but having atrocious handwriting is such a good little character detail, novik is just so expert at nonchalantly plopping them in

- temeraire is being haunted by a green-eyed monster the size of a continent huh lol fair play to maila tho, he’s given it his sleazy all right from the start

I can’t believe gong su invented dragon ice cream solely so temeraire could eat it out of a tub over this... the real mvp

- awwww granby <3 I’m glad there’s some actual canonical queer rep in this series as well (as for the technically not stated straight(heh) out in canon... listen my friends if you can come up with any kind of heterosexual explanation for normally extremely sensible tenzing tharkay gazing at his friend and thinking shit like ‘in the fading light he was a statue gilded by sunlight’ and ‘it was a pang not unmixed with pleasure to look on him, as ever’, you are free to try to come at me with it but I won’t believe you lol. also laurence has the most potent disaster bisexual energy of any man in modern media even if he hasn’t quite caught on to it himself)

tbh I know it’s mostly in desperation but they should come up with some new kind of medal to give granby for having this particular Talk with william laurence, one of the most awkward men to ever walk this earth... braver than any us marine etc.

- temeraire and iskierka in this scene STRONGLY evoke dirtbag teens sneaking off to make out in the backseat of a car or something god bless

- ...I guess you can’t fault the empress for siding with the dude already crashing like a natural catastrophe over his own home continent and who is eyeing the other six like a starving eagle would a pack of mice. all the europeans suck but I guess it’s sort of her best bet to ally herself with the biggest bully on the playground, especially since forces in her own court would be hard pressed to do anything about the situation. respect sister & congratulations granby lol

- hahahahahahaha leave it to hammond to be forcibly adopted by a dragon

poor churki tho she’s a grownass adult and she only has one weird coke-addled diplomat and three basically adolescent dragons to work with here

- GRANBY SETTING SOME BOUNDARIES FINALLY I’m so proud of him ;__; this book really does have a lot to say about dragon/human relations huh

- LETHABO!!!!!!!!!!! man i’m so happy she’s doing well, she fucking deserves it and she’s doing good work

- laurence has evolved to his ultimate form of give-no-fucks-do-some-good laurence and hammond was not prepared lol

“You forget yourself, Captain Laurence,” Hammond said . . .

“I forget nothing,” Laurence answered . . .

im crying b/c he literally has forgotten before but remembers himself at the end of victory of eagles b/c of tharkay and and aaaaaaaaaaaaaugh here he is refusing to do the dirty work he’s handed once more

- lily and maximus! this is not a drill it’s the good good kids back at it again. also temeraire’s phenomenally misplaced sense of superiority re: his reaction to kulingile growing bigger than any of them fkshdfksahdfkj

- berkely <3

- poor harcourt :( ah well she’ll survive it tho he wasn’t that important it’s not like she lost her dragon lol (I honestly can’t feel that bad about riley considering y’know how he was not only chill with but actively for the institution of slavery)

- YOOOOOOO GONG SU! and temeraire is so happy they’re going back to china aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah I love this (laurence’s stammering outrage at this reveal is also highly entertaining “he STAYED in my father’s HOUSE!!!!!!!”)

- man that entire last battle scene was so cool in the context of the rest of the series; the sheer effort and ingenuity that went into avoiding a bigger battle and slyly aiding the only worthy cause in the situation (the tswana and freeing the slaves) is so satisfying, especially after VoE

- holy shit I really enjoyed this one! It had a good balance of travelling/character moments and giving us time with the culture and characters of the Inca and their dragons, as well as driving the overall plot forward splendidly! I also feel like we got some more meat to the laurence POV (in hindsight it feels like it was mostly temeraire POV in tongues of serpents, which is fine but I do love our golden boy and his slow burn character development too)

on to blood of tyrants! I don’t know anything about this one except a) amnesia and b) some Very Important Lines I’ve already picked up along the way, I’m not sure I’m prepared (as a trope amnesia can be pretty hit or miss for me, so it’ll be interesting at least!)

#temeraire #meta #his majesty's dragon #yes hello I am back on my bullshit

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