Status Updates From The Ones We Burn

This chapter is another point where it feels like the author forgot what she was writing. Where is the smoke coming from if the pyre isn’t lit yet? How is it a pyre if in the prior chapter this was described as a bound girl kneeling before a pile of kindling? That is a much smaller description than the author seems to have thought.

This chapter is kind of a mess. The dream sequence is well done, giving us a look into the witch’s’ experiences as culture and alliances changed, but as soon as Ranka wakes up it’s a disorienting read. She’s panicked, there’s smoke, something wrong at the castle but wait, there’s nothing wrong at the castle and she had time to slowly talk to Percy but if she does he will figure out her plot?

The author is leaning heavily into Belren, and how Ranka feels about the royals, and we haven't had enough to really feel like this is deserved. We haven't seen enough interactions with Galen or Percy or the guard to justify Ranka's softening feelings and it seems out of nowhere that Aramis is talking about Belren like this topic has come up before or like it's been established that this was a world-shaking event.

I think what it is is that this book feels underdeveloped, and like the author occasionally forgets what she’s written.

Wait wait wait, “surely they wouldn’t burn witches “? If they don’t burn witches in this city then what was that whole part with the girl in the line to get into the city, who was surely going to be burned if she was discovered? Did the author forget about that whole thing?

What is going on with this whole “education was never high on the Skra’s priority list.” Do the skra use the same language as the people of Seaswept? Because I was assuming she couldn’t read their language because it was a different language or because her people didn’t have a strong written tradition. Kind of weird how this is being positioned as a failing.