Tag Archives: modes

Ambient Conditions

In which Kishara jit’Luso takes advantage of ambient conditions.

This is an oddity: a story retelling another existing story from another viewpoint. We’ve had stories that crossed paths before (“Quiet Knives” comes to mind), but usually that’s a case of two people on different paths that happen to intersect for a sentence or two. This is a special case, for reasons that are explained in the author’s note.
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Trader’s Leap – Chapter 24 (I-IV)

Volmer

In which yos’Galan and Carresens begin an exchange.

The other thought I’d had about the people on the cover — in fact, the first thought I had on seeing it, and the only possibility I’d seriously entertained before Mar Tyn and Dyoli showed up — was that it was Padi accompanied by a new character we hadn’t met yet. I’d been becoming less confident about that possibility recently, as we got so far into the book without encountering any new character who fit the bill. I believe we have him now.

(I’ve commented before that I seem to have a tendency to ask questions and make guesses one chapter before the answer shows up. I consider that this says good things about how well paced the books are.)
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Trader’s Leap – Chapter 13

Dutiful Passage
Pommierport

In which there is an unexpected detour or two.

I think that when Priscilla talks about “ambient noise”, she doesn’t mean quite the same thing as the Haosa do when they talk about “the ambient”. If it is, it’s noteworthy that the course of action suggested by her training is to try to block it out.
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Trader’s Leap – Chapter 9 (I-IV)

Dutiful Passage
Millsap Orbit

In which Padi and Shan commune with inanimate objects.

This is a surprisingly long chapter and I’m up against a deadline, so I’m going to do it in two parts.
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Trader’s Leap – Chapter 7

Millsapport

In which the Healers of Millsap are unhelpful.

That went… about as well as I was expecting, really.

There were moments when I had hope it would go better, but the point at which I became convinced it was going to go off the rails was when Healer Ferin chose to ask the question “What did you do to deserve this?”, which is never an appropriate thing to say to a trauma victim under any circumstances and especially not when one is treating them for that trauma.
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The Gate That Locks the Tree – Act 4, Scene 1

Comes a stranger from the storm
Enter Boss Gotta

In which Vertu’s cab reaches the scene of the accident.

From context, Boss Gotta (“Boss Gotta, a metaphor”, according to the dramatis personae) is a Surebleak version of the philosophy Vertu embraced in “Skyblaze”: if you find yourself saying “somebody’s gotta do something about this”, and there’s nobody around with a clear claim to the problem, that means you’re somebody.

This time, when Anna speaks soothingly to her dog in the language that slips by Vertu’s ears, the narration does report one of the words she uses, which we know the meaning of though Vertu doesn’t.

Accepting the Lance – Chapter 49

Bechimo

In which the Pathfinders join the conversation.

Chernak and Stost are welcomed back with some of Clarence’s baking — more maize buttons?
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Accepting the Lance – Chapter 20

Surebleak Port
Office of the Road Boss

In which Delm Korval has visitors.

Well, there’s an answer to my question about how things would have gone if Emissary Twelve had done this on Liad, anyway.
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Accepting the Lance – Chapter 3

In which three get with the program.

I mentioned the way the team had split up last time, but I only just now realised that it’s reflected in the chapter titles: they’re called “One”, “Two”, and “Three”, not just because they’re the first three chapters of the book, but also because that’s how many of the Six are in each chapter.
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Degrees of Separation – Chapter 3

Liad

In which Don Eyr fails to persuade Serana to leave him.

I was actually kind of surprised by how useful Don Eyr and Serana found the melant’i plays as a guide to Liaden behaviour; people who have tried that in other stories have had mixed success due to their source texts being unrealistic, melodramtic, or outright fraudulent.
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