Len > Recent Status Updates

Bored to tears right now. There is very little happening in the way of plot and almost nothing propelling this story forwards. The worldbuilding isn't enough to keep this story afloat for me.

will anyone make a single good decision in this book

I fear I am getting bored

The toxic lesbianism of it all...

"Women, however, were not allowed to watch the Olympics where men competed in the nude (they did have their own little ‘games’, separately conducted in honour of the goddess Hera)."

LOVE how condescending this is -- calling the women's Olympics "little games"

Absoutely ZERO chemistry between any of the romantic pairings I fear

magical artifacts and such being discovered completely by accident is such a lame plot point and this series does it TWICE

fidele is such a boy mom 😒

that twist! finally things are actually interesting. it only took three entire fucking books

What the hell is up with all the terrible italics in this one.

the way heroes keep dying left and right but every single antagonist keeps miraculously escaping death via inane plot devices is really breaking the story's immersion

this book is so bloated with irrelevant info

Someone teach John Gwynne how to open chapters

Whyyyy do all the men in these books think like children. I, too, would be trying to take over their lands if they were that stupid

I am TIRED OF READING FANTASY WITH STUPID FUCKING PROTAGONISTS. Can one of you use a single goddamn brain cell!!!

What is it with fantasy authors making all the Evil Women characters extremely promiscuous...I am detecting coded messaging about something here 🧐

Okaaaay wheel of time subplot, come thru

The chapters in this book are way too short for all the POV swapping that's going on. Like please let something happen before changing plotlines

"I would make a blood-oath with you. You are Elyon’s gift to me."

this is the most romantic thing everrr they better kiss

A third of the way in and the only thing that has happened so far is petty squabbles between a bunch of men who act like children

"Let’s not gape in amazement that such things were said and done, as if they’re a thing of the past. We still do this. Those monstrous descriptions of Jews and Muslims haven’t gone anywhere, and continue to serve as justification for violence." I guess that's the closest we'll get to this author acknowledging the dehumanization of Palestinians by Israel

"I’m writing this as I live on Lenape tribal lands where European colonists, seeing what is now the United States as their promised land, their Canaan to conquer, monsterized diverse Native peoples in many ways." Yes, AND?GIRL COME ON THE LINK IS RIGHT THERE

I can't believe the author writes this with ZERO mention of the occupation of Palestine: "This pattern in the biblical writers’ views of the distant past, times already ancient to them, doesn’t only reinterpret the Israelites as heroic—it reinscribes God as reliably on the side of the conquerors of indigenous populations."

"Real-time monsterization does one kind of damage. The fantasy of having long ago vanquished a monstrous enemy—with God’s help—does another. As the inhabitants of Canaan are reinterpreted as monstrous, we witness the biblical writers’ creation of monsters, and of their own identity in contrast: They are giants, We are altogether distinct, and what’s more, we’re heroic and God is demonstrably on our side."

"...the entire myth of conquest—which extends through several biblical books and is internally wildly inconsistent—and kicks it off with a picture of going up against giants. The Goliath story, written long after the time of David, reinforces the image of the monstrous enemy. These giant stories aren’t reports of monsterization in the moment, but retrojections imagining Israelites as heroic monster-slayers."

"Biblical giants are born to be conquered. Their form intimates a kind of ancientness: they are the Before people. Even the giants who have nothing to do with the Israelites—the indigenous populations conquered by the Ammonites, Moabites, and so on—are the Before people of those lands...The monsterized foreigners are giants to be slain, food to be eaten, and animals to be killed."

I am low-key finding this book pretty boring at this point. The plot is draaaaaaagging. The narrative structure is interesting, and prose is beautiful, but man am I finding it hard to stay engaged.

This SLAPS so far. The overlapping narratives and character voices are 🤌

so debt is the root of all evil, is what I am getting from this

The way Graeber draws links between violence, slavery, and honour has shaken me to the core. holy shit.