#shinntastic

One of my favorite lines is Justin explaining that the group is his family and immediately stating "Tayse is my father" and Senneth taking on that parental role for Cammon just WORKED for me. But yay so happy you love Amalie tooooooo.

I like both options! I was in fact 100% sure she was going to go with Senneth claiming Cammon, and I’m always happy when an author does something I don’t expect but that I can believe. So while the events of the “Oh Ariane honey ” came out of left field, I believe it of her character, y’know? Plus, Rappengrass is a more useful alliance than Brassenthwaite, which is very much “choir. right here. preaching to it.”

Content notes: I'm gonna talk about my feels on Rayson Fortunault's very rapey subplot and how I am not okay with it. 

To the surprise of absolutely no one I have found my favorite in Princess Amalie--this girl speaks to me on a spiritual level, y'know? She's lonely and isolated and when she discovers that people can be kind and like her she wants more of that, and she's cleer and smart and has literally no concept of the things that might limit her, and a very tiny bit of self-loathing for her magic that just makes my heart hurt. I love her and want to wrap her in a blanket and spend 14 hours watching netflix while painting each others' toenails and ordering dubious takeaway. "There's a place that'll bring us a pint of gelato. The gelato alone hits their delivery minimum. Y'know. It exists." "YES."

(Also the way she handled Toland was probably in part responsible for Storian joining the rebels. They might've joined anyway. But when Amalie put the fear of god, such as it were, into that boy--I tink that sealed the deal.)

Valri I never did quite warm up to--she's a giant ball of stress and anxiety and a whole lot of her character hits way too close to home, and in the way of the empanada hornkerling's mention that she wishes Valri were Cammon's inappropriate love interest is something I didn't know I wanted til she said it.

So Justin is back to acting in-character and that's good. I'm writing off almost all of his romance-hero-boundary-ignoring in Dark Moon Defender to being not good with his his people being in peril and being unable to do anything about the peril they're in. I also want to ask Shinn what the production schedule was like as she was writing Dark Moon Defender and Reader and Raelynx and how it differed from the first two books. Because I think if she was writing 2-3 books a year at the time and/or that these were running late/being rushed to publication ... that would do it. That would account for the rough edges.

I was not happy with the ultimate Senneth-Halchon showdown. I wanted her to get out of that scrape--or at least to get mostly out of that scrape--on her own. With a last-minute charge from the cavalry.

Why was it necessary to make Rayson Fortunault a rapist, again? To keep our heroes' hands squeaky-clean in assassinating him? Really? That was a quick and easy and emotionally manipulative piece of writing and I don't like it one bit. I'd have let Kirra and Donnal get some blood on their hands--let them be sneaky and underhanded and commit morally dubious acts in the name of a greater good. That happens in a war. Let them deal with the guilt after murdering one man in his sleep in order to protect the lives of countless others. It's messier. It's--and I hate to say this because look at all I'm willingl suspending disbelief over but--it's more realistic. But instead Fortunault is a rapist and killing him horribly does no one any ill. Bah.

Incidentally a rattlesnake is quieter and just as effective as a swordsman, Donnal. Incidentally if an asp is good enough for Cleopatra it is good enough for Rayson and the Gisseltess siblings, and why did no one put an arrow through their throats while they were out leading troops on the battlefield?

Overal I am glad that the actual war part of the book only took about 1/3 of the book and that the rest of the books was so completely devoted to preventing war. I'm still on the fence about whether executing Halchon at the end of Mystic and Rider would have made things better or worse--a little of both, probably--especially considering that Coralinda ended up being the bigger big bad.

Minor characters & representation: Jareel strikes me as being on the autism spectrum and Lara as having some kind of developmental delay and both of them are excellent characters, yes, I enjoyed them very much.

A while ago I texted Lisa and said, "please tell me Cammon isn't somebody's lost scion that would be terrible" and she laughed evilly and refused to tell me why and now I know and I think that Ariane adopting him in that manner is just perfect. Convenient, yes, but glorious in execution because I was so sure that she was telling Senneth's story and that Senneth was going to be the one to take up the burden of that lie, and I don't know that she had the strength for that left over, after everything. And I love Ariane and I'm glad she offered herself in service, plus, she gains a son and the same political link to the throne she would've had if she'd managed to set up Darryn and Amalie.

I do not know how I feel about Darryn and Sosie, because that seems just a little too nice and neat in the everyone in this story is paired off with someone else because why? that bothers me in fanworks. (You know the kind. It's the kind where you go in to read some Tony/Pepper, and end up with Clint/Coulson, Steve/Bucky, Bruce/Darcy sidepairings and you go, I just wanted the one ship!) So there is that.

I am also upset that this fandom has like six stories in it, five of which are written by my friends, and I am absolutely requesting this series for yuletide.

(On the topic of omg BABIES: I am pretty sure that Ellynor also desperately wants another woman in her found family with an infant for child-minding exchanges and also who will understand and offer support on a visceral-this-is-happening-right-now level exactly what she is going through. I think the prospect of not having loads of family with young of their own around her is a little terrifying.

Also I adore Ellynor even more because when she's not constrained and afraid and constantly watched she is pretty amazing. Justin is going to panic when he finds out and Ellynor is going to be all, yes, this is why I didn't tell you until now.)