Sarah Connell > Recent Status Updates

“The voice was low and somehow insubstantial, and it seemed to come from inside his head. At the same time, the pond in front of him grew dark, as though something behind him were casting a large shadow. He could feel a presence, a terrible unseen shape, standing so close behind him that he was sure he should feel its breath on his neck. He knew, somehow, that it would be a bad idea to turn around.”

“She brushed her hands together: green and pink ghosted away like smoke; violet and white tumbled to the ground. The steerswoman closed her eyes and listened. The endless sound of [ocean], now quieter; the sudden cry of a gull, sharp, like a little knife of sound. No sound of demons, no voices or footsteps of humans.”

“What might the world be like, in the absence of humankind?

Perhaps like this, everywhere. Perhaps nothing like this. Perhaps stranger.

She tucked her hands under her arms and sat wrapped in her cloak, with the cooling earth beneath, the cooling air falling from above, and the chill sight and sound of the stars all around her.”

“The [mooring] line was marked by a sphere of murky yellow glass…Above the tide line there was a small but solid hut…Outside, water barrels crowded against the hut, some in various stages of being reduced to firewood. These last gave Rowan an eerie feeling; there remained here a feeling of work interrupted. Rowan caught herself looking around warily, half expecting someone to suddenly return.”

“It was a little like making the Edenier trap – the same sense of cold satisfaction at creating something from nothing – but without the creeping horror and sensation of violation that came with using demon-tainted magic. A fly touched his face, and he batted it away impatiently, smearing black mud there. He barely noticed.”

Glad I’m on vacation bc I can’t put this book down

“he couldn't fight them with a sword, like Rowan, or with a bow, like Arvin. Maybe he wasn't any better with words than he was with a sword or a bow, but he wouldn't die if he tried and failed at it. Which he might, with a sword or a bow. "Right."

She clapped him on the shoulder, like he'd seen
the militia do with each other. "Good man. You start on one end, I'll start on the other"

“From here, the lights of the town looked small— not distant, exactly, but one and one and one, each alone. Down below, among the trees, the lights of torches flickered from their own sputtering and flickered more when people passed in front of them. Everything you could see twinkled, but everything you could feel was solid, like the ground beneath your feet that seemed exactly perfect.”

“Way up, little clouds moved, dashing across the winking stars and showing one Guidestar, then the other, then neither. The air was exactly the best temperature: cool enough to feel but not any cooler.”

“The bathhouse was noisy. Belinda had brought the twins, and Ivy had brought Tarlie, who was too young to be much good, but old enough to complain in words. Old Galer had brought little Anna, and she was all right, quiet and hardworking, but be was a chore, always grumping how people had it sott now, not like in his day. Which you wouldn't think should be a complaint, rightly speaking, but he made it one.”

“She didn't talk all during lunch, and neither did Steffie. Because if be said anything, it would be about what she'd said last night, and somehow he didn't want to do that. It had been like he'd gone to a strange land without quite knowing how he'd done it like it was special, maybe magical, and touching it with new words would make it all go away.”

“A pair of ancient divans were…frowsily comfortable, like elderly uncles. Apparently Brewer's was the final repository of much of the town's cast-off furniture… Rowan wondered if everyone present recognized at least one object in the room, and perhaps was made more comfortable because of it. She could not imagine people more harmless.

She felt rather a fool for being armed.”

“in the darkness of the tent at night, she listened to his long, sleeping breaths among the breathing of the other warriors and in the light-spattered brightness of the daytime tent, and they two alone together, his long, angular body a lattice around hers, they had spoken and not spoken, touched and moved...

And this is how people come to believe in ghosts”

“Her short hair looked like it had been trimmed with a knife; and it was a dry, harsh yellow on top, darker under. Her skin was sunburned and weather-rough…close up, you could see that the wrinkles weren't real— just pale lines on darker skin, as if she had spent a long time squinting into long distances against bright sunlight.

She looked like a woman from a land with no shadows.”

Trying to give it the benefit of the doubt…

She loved the shape of this small ship, the segmented curve of the sails. It carried twenty crates full of the dried petals of a certain orchid, the captain had told her, greatly prized in the southern lands as a means to make both perfume and poison. That is what this place is, thought Ephemeral. It is perfume, and it is poison. The scent of the orchids seeped up from the hold until everything was permeated with it.

It’s interesting pitting ‘empire’ vs. ‘rule by immortal super monster’ (i.e. sphynx, gorgon, etc.).

🤣🤣 i can’t get over the sentient, magical book made of crystal who thinks that ppl are types of trees and so makes nests for random pine cones bc it thinks they’ll grow into ppl!

“I’m pretty sure he thinks people are types of trees? He never really saw many trees until this summer and i guess he thinks pine cones are ppl eggs? I’m having a lot of trouble following…”

“When despising something, it is important to cultivate both high minded and low minded reasons to do so. Over the centuries, i’ve found that petty spite is one of the few joys that never fades’

The deep fake scenario is feeling too real.

“he leaned back out to look down on the face of the ghost. The figure was still looking back up at him, he could make out the smooth planes of his face, the darker furrow of his brow. Sebastian thought the figure looked worried, or confused. And then, as he watched, the ghost began to fade away, evaporating like marsh mist. In a handful of seconds, the street was dark once more.”

I knew she was going to rip my heart out in this book. I just thought I’d get at least 100 pgs in first. Alas, this doesn’t bode well for my feels in the next 500 pgs…

Giant octopus overlord ✅

Now Frith stood on the doorstep, looking down across crowded roofs to the sea below. The rains of earlier had cleared swiftly, just as Wydrin had said they would, and now the night sky was a hectic explosion of stars.

Already confused.

Welp. They killed off my fave character so I probably won’t continue the series.