Gobelyn’s Market, Clawswitts
In which the Gobelyns receive news of kin.
So that’s why Jethri suddenly decided he needed to send a message to Freza.
Apart from the trade and economic factors, which I don’t feel qualified to judge, one useful effect of publishing the Envidaria that Jethri must have considered is that the Liadens will have to stop bugging his friends and family for a copy. (Whether they’ll believe, among themselves, that the published Envidaria is the real thing, is another matter – I suspect those Liadens inclined to believe in Terran trickery will consider this more of the same – but at least they’ll have to act in public as if they believe it.)
And it looks like I was wrong (again) about Ynsolt’i. I think, looking back, that I’ve been tending to get predictions wrong about this book by tending toward being too neat and tidy. Life don’t always go in for quick and tidy endings to things.
Speaking of things in life that aren’t neat and tidy, I’ve got some of my sympathy for Iza back. She’s a complicated woman, is Iza Gobelyn.
Regarding Iza: I don’t think I really got back any sympathy for her, but I did appreciate that she finally seems to have reconciled herself to who and what Jethri is.
I forgot to mention to you on the previous chapter, Paul, that I appreciated your summation of what Arin was trying to communicate about the Seventeen Worlds problem. I didn’t follow very well (although I did get the hint that there would be a connection to the need to revise jump tables in the future) so thank you for putting it in simple terms.
I loved Dyk’s version of a dish rather familiar to authors who had moved to Maine: “Niglund Boilt dinners.” It’s fun to try to decode the versions of things we know from the way they’re said by spacers. Usually I can’t do it until I try to pronounce it aloud. Then it clicks in my brain (language is oral first, then written).
Finally, I’ll put it here since the last chapter has comments about other matters: Sometimes…this book being one of them…I find the authors’ use of denouement to be rather unsatisfying. I’m one of those readers who is much happier seeing all the loose threads tied up, or even tied down in a nice long, gentle denouement. *sigh*
@ Ed8r
What is Niglund Boilt dinners? I’m not familiar with Maine dishes.
@ Paul
Oh, I put my comment about Iza in chap 28. Maybe it is more suited to be here. Felle free to move it.
“Niglund Boilt” is a run-together, contracted, and mispronounced version of “New England boiled” dinner, which is a “one pot dish consisting of corned beef or plain beef brisket or smoked picnic ham shoulder, with cabbage, carrots and potatoes.”
Denouement…
Well, too much explication is a turn-off for me, but some of this book felt like deliberate obfuscation, a tease, or even almost a kind of laziness — it takes work to think about and write out a vivid, present tense, logical and coherent scene and embellish it with details and facts. Lots easier to write hazy-dazy style. I say this as one who writes research papers. I am not gifted to write fiction. But I know writing…and it takes work to conceptualize, nail it down, and keep your ducks in a row.
In this chapter, I wanted / expected Jethri to show up on the Market, or to pinbeam them. He has reason to be concerned for them, given what chel’Gaiban did — and he knows about it. So I thought he’d go there. After all, Grig and Raisy went to Irikwae to help him, and Khat sent him a warning…
As for Iza….she’s cold. He was a little boy who lost his father. No compassion. If she was only trying to keep him safe and off Arin’s course, she could have found a kinder, gentler method. Mac Gold would have beaten him daily on that ore ship.