Day 29
Standard Year 1118
Gobelyn’s Market
Opposite Shift
In which Jethri Gobelyn has one of those shifts.
In this chapter we’re introduced to the family-run trade ship Gobelyn’s Market and its crew, particularly young Jethri, who has some trouble fitting in, partly due to the usual issues of being the youngest, and partly on account of certain particular issues which will doubtless be revisited later.
We also hear our first about some actual Liadens, in both a lurid version and a more considered version which amounts to suggesting that the Liadens are more subtle than the lurid version indicates, but not necessarily any less dangerous. Presumably they’ve changed some from when we last heard about their ancestors, since that was a while ago (possibly even as much as 1118 years and 29 days).
It’s interesting that the first novel with Liadens, by chronological order, ended up being the one with the foreword laying out exactly how the Liaden currency and calendar work. Useful place to have it, if one happens to be reading by chronological order. I don’t know if that was something the authors had specifically in mind, though I’m pretty sure I remember them saying somewhere that this was deliberately set out to be a novel that would work as an introduction for people who hadn’t read any of the earlier-later novels yet.
Yes, as a reader I appreciated the intro with the list of characters and places, the currency, and the calendar. I noticed that the Liaden relumma is quite similar to Earth’s reckoning of four seasons, and the Liaden year is only a little longer than our year.
I had forgotten how much a cantra was worth. Big bucks.
Quite liked the “lurid tale” you mentioned. Captivating and amusing. Clever way to present an outsider’s perspective of Liadens.
Jethri is such a likeable character: trying to inject happy thoughts into a thorough grump, and making the best of “stinks” duty. He knows he’s left out of things, but he’s not sullen about it. He’s easy with his cousins and his Uncle, but everyone allows his mother her determined black cloud. He makes the best he can of all his circumstances.
Now that I’m on my second read, I know why there is such a black cloud over the captain…BUT…even though we are eventually given some explanation/rationale…it was never enough for me to reconcile the behavior of this character. Did the authors need to find a way to justify “giving” Jethri to ven’Deelin for the sake of the plot? Yes, of course. But as a mother, it just continued to leave a bad taste in my mouth.
On this reading, even though once I stopped to think I realized who Khat was referring to as “Uncle” when she says “Uncle’s pleased,” my first thought was that she referred to Uncle as in *the* Uncle.