Uvrón’s Reviews > Sword & Citadel > Status Update

As my friends and I read on and see Severian recognize his fuckups, separate from the only roles he’s known (torturer, man pursuing women), and be haunted by past failures and present mistakes as he tries to learn how to be a person with strangers and children… I’m realizing this is really one book, not a series, and appreciating the discussions it’s inspiring

I am left sad, touched by Severian who tries to do good with so little tools for it, and by Dorcas depressed by incomprehensible life. And even by Thecla and her fear of flame (or by an energy the Salamander and the Revolutionary share…?).

Such alien people and lives, and yet written with pathos.

Six or seven chapters in & Severian is reaching new lows by managing to combine his heartless teenage horniness with his love of torturing people for the state. Will the magic Christ-gem ever teach him empathy? Will he ever ask Dorcas how she feels about being a resurrected amnesiac, or anything else? What did wrestling that Mayan hero ghost accomplish? Wait, did he say every mountain is a carved statue???