The Heart of What was Lost + The Witchwood Crown

I finally got into both of Tad Williams’s new books in his Memory, Sorrow, and Thorn world, Osten Ard. For those who aren’t familiar, this is an excellent fantasy series, and very worth checking out. The original trio came out in the early 90s, and I love them.

Interestingly, they also are credited with inspiring George R.R. Martin’s A Game of Thrones. Having read both, the common elements can be pretty striking, even though the stories are completely different, as is the tone. If you’ve only read Martin’s series, and aren’t a big fan of the gore and sexual violence, you should definitely check out Memory, Sorrow, and Thorn. Tad doesn’t go in for that gratuitously gritty feeling, and I really appreciate that about his work. His stories and characters don’t feel unrealistic – much the opposite, in fact. They’re believably flawed and interesting, and his non-human characters in particular are uncommonly rich and personable. His focus in general is just a hell of a lot more uplifting than seems to be popular in epic fantasy these days.

It took me a little while to get around to these new books, but I finally did.  I just finished The Witchwood Crown, and I’m so ready for the next book.

The first and shorter of the two that are currently out is The Heart of What was Lost. It’s set right after the climax of To Green Angel Tower, and introduces some new characters that become relevant in The Witchwood Crown, while laying some more world-building groundwork. It delves much further into the Norn culture than before, which is really cool, and even gives us some POV Norn characters for the first time. (Norns are the eternally pissed-off northern cousins of the Sithi, a race of elf-like people that share Osten Ard with humans, trolls, giants, dragons, and the changeling creatures called Tinukeda’ya.)

The Witchwood Crown is set many years after all the previous events, when the main protagonists, Simon and Miriamele, are much older. It focuses on a mix of other familiar characters, and new ones, including their grandchildren and Binabik the troll’s daughter. Overall, it feels very much like the original books, although Simon has been replaced as resident mooncalf by his grandson, Morgan.

My one complaint would be that The Witchwood Crown has a pretty slow build, and that’s really less of a complaint and more of an observation. I really like how full Tad’s stories tend to feel, even if it does make the main plot move a little bit slowly. There are a lot of different characters and stories to follow, and I found it a really relaxing read, although there were some pretty tense bits, and I was surprised by how genuinely nervous I felt when my favorite characters were at risk. He really knows how to build up that tension and toy with the reader’s expectations, and I never feel quite certain that I know who’ll make it through to the end of his books.

Depending on your preference, of course, I’d highly recommend checking out the audiobook versions of these books. I quite enjoyed the voice acting, especially for the trolls. It gets a little silly, but it’s fun.

(Writing days this past week: 2)

Entertaining Sea Lions

It is a truth universally acknowledged, that Sea Lions suck. Or at least, it should be.

No, not the graceful marine mammals, but the guys (and some non-guys) who gleefully waste the time and energy of people who respond to their willful ignorance in good faith. The more a person honestly cares about educating and helping others, the more vulnerable they become to these unmitigated trashbags. That’s the worst part, to me, at least. They specifically prey on caring people in order to drive them to completely legitimate frustration and exhaustion, at which point they turn to gaslighting. They were just asking questions. They just want to understand. This kind of behavior is why activists never get anywhere.

Ironically, they’re sort of right about that last part. Working our asses off to educate these malicious garbage cans is not productive. It’s more like cooperating with emotional vampires while they suck our lives away, but we’re required to do it because people who lack privilege are always required to assume good faith on the part of privileged assholes long past the point where it becomes painfully obvious that they’re just dicking with us.

Their tone is always disgustingly condescending to start with, and it only gets more ridiculous as conversations go on. They love to incorrectly accuse others of logical fallacies, while actually using them freely themselves. Their questions are repetitive and can be easily Googled, their super clever arguments are all exactly the same offensive and illogical nonsense, and they blatantly refuse to learn, no matter how clearly anything is put to them. Their protestations of innocence when they’re called on this are similarly cookie-cutter and blatantly insincere.

It’s infuriating that even here, in my own space, I feel obligated to explain what they’re doing and to make my case as to why they don’t deserve our time, when all that should need to be said to this behavior is “No.”

“Intriguing post about your boss hitting on you in the workplace, could you please provide several scientific studies to back up your personal experience and also a psychic to prove that he meant to be sexist in the first place?”

“No.”

“Well then, prove beyond a shadow of a doubt that I wasn’t asking in earnest.”

“No.”

They lose their shit, I gotta tell you. Sea-lioning jerks absolutely unravel at the seams when someone won’t play their rigged game. They melt down, and desperately try to force reengagement. Their supporters flock to wail about the unfairness of such a harsh response to an innocent question and to bemoan the future of the civilized world when a random person won’t accept their challenge to a word-duel literally anytime they demand one. Truly, human intellect is dead because a woman won’t drop everything to explain feminism 101 for a completely uncooperative and demanding audience. How can her personal experiences with sexism be legitimate if she doesn’t submit to random interrogations at the drop of a hat?

I still personally feel deeply insecure about just saying “no,” because that’s how I have been conditioned to feel. I want to explain what it feels like, as a woman, to have grown up absorbing the inescapable fact that my opinions and knowledge are all subject to challenge and judgment by men. Any man, no matter his qualifications on a topic or mine, can challenge me freely, and if I don’t play, he can declare me ignorant and hysterical and automatically wrong. He can do this, and he will receive support from pretty much any bystanders, because this is totally normalized.

The thing is, though, I shouldn’t have to defend my experience of this. Other women already know the helpless rage this induces, and men just need to stop perpetuating it. Y’all dudes can just take my word for it, that this experience is infuriating and invalidating, and you really should just take my damn word. This same principle also applies to racism, homophobia, transphobia, ableism, and more.

What if that fine inquisitive fellow was actually in earnest, though, you ask? What if he didn’t deserve this cruel treatment? What if he wasn’t literally Hitler?

So what?

“No” is still a completely reasonable answer, and one that should be respected. So is “Look it up yourself, person who clearly has access to the internet and its vast stores of recorded knowledge.”

If I say something true, and won’t explain it to you, it’s still true. Mind-blowing, I know.

If you say something ridiculously wrong, and I point it out, I am not honored bound to become your indentured teacher until you admit your mistake or defeat me.

Refusal to argue has nothing to do with the correctness of a person’s beliefs.

This doesn’t mean that many beliefs are not inherently harmful. Many are. This doesn’t mean that many beliefs should not be challenged whenever they’re expressed. Many should be. Sometimes, this shit gets complicated, but I swear that nobody owes a damn sea lion the satisfaction of a fruitless argument.

You can just say “no.” You can say it at any point in the process, too. That’s kinda how consent works, and those principles extend far beyond just sexual interactions.

Just say “no” to sea lions.

Actual sea lion with a “how dare” expression on its face.

Writing days this week: 1