Kevin's Watch

Well, Linden still hasn't realized (maybe by the last sentence) that she's responsible (or going to be, or was) for destroying the Arch of Time, stealing the Staff of Law from its proper time, that sort of thing. The Awful Realization hasn't yet fully dawned. I am beginning to wonder if it can, or if Linden is just so narcissistic that it will never dawn.

I was right in stating that Linden was on a greased slide to disaster. And right now it doesn't even look like she's going to get what she wants. All that power for nothing but personal and petty use, repeatedly stated, repeatedly warned (and why DO people follow her, anyway?), leading ineluctably to catastrophe.

As a minor side-note, I hated all the idiot-plot retcons. ("Other people didn't tell you this in the past because you were idiots and didn't ask" sort of thing.) Still too much going back over old plot and reworking it; somehow the infodumps in the first two sets weren't as annoying as these were...

The only prediction that I got right was about the cover.

As far as the cover goes, having read the book I think it's a really poor cover. At least the Runes cover showed a scene from the book, if not a very interesting one. Is that supposed to be Caerroil Wildwood? Where's his garland of flowers and why does he have a staff rather than a tree limb sceptre? Apparently the real Caerroil Wildwood was too busy chasing down Ravers so the artist had Saruman stand in for him.

Yes, it's supposed to be Wildwood. And it's supposed to be Linden's staff I think. Of course, it's an "artistic representation" hence the fact he looks like Saruman.

I did predict over two years ago that Jeremiah was

Spoiler

a croyel

but not quite in the way he turned out to be - although the jury is still out on the detail.

Just about everything else I got wrong except for the predictable ability of Linden to make things worse at almost every turn.

Seareach wrote:Yes, it's supposed to be Wildwood. And it's supposed to be Linden's staff I think. Of course, it's an "artistic representation" hence the fact he looks like Saruman.

It really waxes my surfboard when artists get it so wrong. It would be a little harsh to expect some poor arty schlub to read a whole book for one paycheck, but providing pertinent character descriptions is an art director's duty. Thjat's what art directors are paid for. How hard could it be? And if the art director can't be arsed to read the book, the art director can just ask editorial. For pete's sake, somebody involved in the process must have read the books at some point, right?

Caerroil Wildwood had a more than typically complete description, with the orchids and the flowing robes and whatnot. Sheesh. And what's up with the belt?

Being a Forestal fangirl, I'm gratified that even an iffy pic of a Forestal made the cover. As a fan, I have to like it, because any Forestal art is good art. But professionally this kind of thing really makes me tired. It's so easy to avoid.

I had few predictions about the book because I really had no idea from Runes where SRD was going with the story. My only significant prediction, that Jeremiah was already in the Land, is partly true, though not in the way I thought. Although I think we need to be careful of trusting too much in anything Jeremiah and Covernant (yes, he is still a Covenant) told Linden, unless it's corrorated by someone else. Jeremiah's structural abilities have been corroborated (by the Harrow I think), but I don't know that much else has.

Did anyone else, as they were reading, pick up on who Covernant really was? I think SRD made it pretty obvious early on when Covenant's request for the Ring put Linden in mind of Roger's demand for it. That and the fact that Covenant could not remember how he got his forehead scar-- something it would be impossible for the real TC to forget as it was closely connected with his 2nd Summoning and, in the Land, with Elena's fall.

I did not however guess who, specifically, Roger was working for. And I was clueless about Jeremiah (until the last minute I thought he somehow was a total fake, not Jeremiah at all)

By the way, why does Roger have some of TC's memories but not all of them? Did Kastenessen give him TC's Land-based memories (or at least detailed knowledge of his deeds), but could not give him TC's real world memories?

I thought <i>something</i> was wrong with Covenant early, and much more as we proceeded into the book, but the actual revelation came as a surprise to me.

tonyz wrote:I thought <i>something</i> was wrong with Covenant early, and much more as we proceeded into the book, but the actual revelation came as a surprise to me.

I had no clue about that part. And lame as I am, I thought TC hitting the bottle was pretty funny. I mean, he's been holding up the arch for yonks, he finally takes a break, who wouldn't want a belt? I thought, OMG, being a demiurge has taught him to make some concessions to human frailty! Yay!

But then his nasty, nihilistic talk started to get me down, so I was really relieved to have him turn out to be not TC. I guess I have more invested in ol' TC than I realized.

I had almost no predictions, because Runes left me at sea. I did have a couple of hunches, one regarding Jeremiah. And the Jerimiah thing didn't pan out in this book, but eh: maybe the next?

jwaneeta wrote:

Seareach wrote:Yes, it's supposed to be Wildwood. And it's supposed to be Linden's staff I think. Of course, it's an "artistic representation" hence the fact he looks like Saruman.

It really waxes my surfboard when artists get it so wrong. It would be a little harsh to expect some poor arty schlub to read a whole book for one paycheck, but providing pertinent character descriptions is an art director's duty. Thjat's what art directors are paid for. How hard could it be? And if the art director can't be arsed to read the book, the art director can just ask editorial. For pete's sake, somebody involved in the process must have read the books at some point, right?

Caerroil Wildwood had a more than typically complete description, with the orchids and the flowing robes and whatnot. Sheesh. And what's up with the belt?

Being a Forestal fangirl, I'm gratified that even an iffy pic of a Forestal made the cover. As a fan, I have to like it, because any Forestal art is good art. But professionally this kind of thing really makes me tired. It's so easy to avoid.

I nominate Jwaneeta to do the next cover.

dlbpharmd wrote: I nominate Jwaneeta to do the next cover.

I'd just want to do another Forestal.

I am gonna spoiler this, I know this is the FR forum, but this gives the whole damned book away, so if you arent finished, dont read the spoiler below. I warned you. Jwaneeta, I would love your comments on this.

Lets think about the cover:

Spoiler

Is Caeroll Wildwood holding the Staff of Law (OK, so where are the heels? )

We can imagine that the tree behind him is part of the gibbet in Garroting Deep, where the arch enemies of the forest are hung.

SO, in that particular scene of the story, what happened then?

First he asked Linden a question, about how the Land was supposed to go on when the forests died. She said she didnt know, but then said she'd find out. I think this figures heavily in AATE...

Then the Forrestal took the staff and finished it, encarved it with Runes to allow Linden to rise above the Laws of Life and Death, which then allowed her to resurrect Covenant, and subsequently (and allegedly) wake the Worm at the Worlds End.

I think that that act by the forrestal was extremely significant, and is very relevant to the story and symbolizes it well.

After all, the One Forest is what the whole land used to be, before Men came and cut down the trees and gave Foul somebody to manipulate. Isn't the restoration of the one forest the ultimate great good of the Land? Would not the answer to the question asked by the forrestal be a pathway to that end?

so why don't we recognize the Staff of Law on the cover? Because it would give the story away. either that or it's just a tree branch, albeit a striaght one, and I am wrong ab out the whole thing.

iQuestor wrote:I am gonna spoiler this, I know this is the FR forum, but this gives the whole damned book away, so if you arent finished, dont read the spoiler below. I warned you. Jwaneeta, I would love your comments on this.

Lets think about the cover:

Spoiler

Is Caeroll Wildwood holding the Staff of Law (OK, so where are the heels? )

I think the cover would've been much better if the staff had heels and runes... but I think the artist simply wasn't given enough information. I don't think it was omitted or made deliberately vague for the purpose of concealing future developments.

Edit: I simply can't seem to spoiler all these quotes and responses. I don't want to mess things up for anybody, so I'll just say I think you're right about the One Forest and everything the issue implies.

yikes.

*screams in defiance, shaking her tiny fist*

i love the book.

i love linden.

i love the cover.

i love where its going.

call me crazy!

ship me off to the booby hatch. hellfire and bloody damnation.
i loved it.

Booby hatch -- sounds like a place I'd want to visit!!!!

FR Rocks, and Linden rocks in it. It's right there with TIW.

Lucimay wrote:yikes.

*screams in defiance, shaking her tiny fist*

i love the book.

i love linden.

i love the cover.

i love where its going.

call me crazy!

ship me off to the booby hatch. hellfire and bloody damnation.
i loved it.

Um... me too?

(Except the cover, which could have used a ... never mind. )

As re: above, I went into a long song and dance about where I thought the story was going and how much I loved it, but I couldn't seem to spoiler/black out my responses and didn't want to give too much away. I figured better safe than sorry. Sorry if I gave the wrong impression.

Oh, and my prediction that the vision of the <i>skurj</i> was a symbolic way of indicating the ceasures -- that seems to have been wrong, they're separate things.

jwaneeta wrote:

Lucimay wrote:yikes.

*screams in defiance, shaking her tiny fist*

i love the book.

i love linden.

i love the cover.

i love where its going.

call me crazy!

ship me off to the booby hatch. hellfire and bloody damnation.
i loved it.

Um... me too?

Thirded. Enthusiastically.

iQ, I think you're right-on about where this is headed. The one thing that makes me think that Linden isn't totally off her nutter with what she's doing is that Caerroil Wildwood seemed to condone it. Everybody's got their own agenda, and they all think Linden's screwing up because of the way it interacts with their aims. Caerroil Wildwood is the only player whose dog in the hunt, if you will, is the intrinsic health of the Land.

That's not to say that Linden's not going 'round the bend here. I do wish she was a little less single-minded about her goal -- it would be nice if she would qualify her "Save Jeremiah, regardless of the cost" with a little bit of "with the least harm possible to the Land." But I suspect that's part of what SRD is driving at.

As for the cover: meh. I don't really like it but I hope it sells books. Dammit.

I dunno, The fact is that Covenant himself thought what Linden did at the end was awful. So... *shrug* my assumption is that Linden didn't use the runed SoL the way Caerroil Wildwood wanted her to. But I suspect she she'll redeem that action in the end... But I also suspect that the world ends (I mean, what does The Last Dark mean, besides that?) and yet LF is somehow, finally, really defeated.

But perhaps at the cost of the Land's reality being totally destroyed.

Aleksandr wrote:Did anyone else, as they were reading, pick up on who Covernant really was? I think SRD made it pretty obvious early on when Covenant's request for the Ring put Linden in mind of Roger's demand for it.

The real TC wouldn't have asked for or demanded the ring. After all, he WAS/IS the white gold....