Episode 7: Lioness Rampant, Part 1
0:00:00 Amy: Hey everyone, it's Amy. I am just popping in really quickly to hit you with a few small announcements. First announcement is we didn't say the name of the book at any point during this episode. So I am here to tell you that it is Lioness Rampant, the fourth book in the Alanna series by Tamora Pierce.
0:00:18 Amy: Secondly, we are recording an Alanna wrap-up episode, so that's going to include two panelists that you haven't heard anything from yet. That's Shelby and Kelly, and we would love it if you send in any questions you had about the Alanna books that we didn't discuss in any of the episodes or any questions you might have for them specifically, or any questions you have for any of our panelists specifically. And you can do that by engaging with any of our social media. Our email would probably be pretty good for this. That's [email protected]. You can also go to any of our social media that we list at the end of the show. We would love it if you had those in by February 15th because we are going to record the episode shortly after that and we are not inventing a time machine just to answer your questions.
0:01:00 Amy: Finally, we talk about some sensitive topics in this episode at minute 40. We discuss sexual assault in the context of the books that will be book-ended by our opening theme music.1 So you can skip right through that and we will put the time stamp in the description. We also talk about some light spoilers that I had to listen to for this episode anyway! So that is at about minute 54 and again, it's book-ended by music and I will put the time stamp in the description. That's all. Enjoy the show. See ya Tortallini.
0:01:39 Abby: Gus is gone.
0:01:41 Aurora: Gus? We miss you.
0:01:43 Amy: Gus left.
0:01:44 Abby: Okay. Gus is back.
0:01:46 Gus: I'm back, sorry.
0:01:47 Amy: We did the whole podcast without you.
[laughter]
0:01:50 Aurora: Yeah.
0:01:50 Abby: We're done now.
0:01:51 Aurora: Analyzed the whole thing.
0:01:53 Gus: Oh, wow. It goes so much faster when I'm not here.
1 This will be marked in the transcript with red text, for those who’d like to skip over it.
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[laughter]
[Intro music fades in: Greensleeves (a dubstep cover) by Zetta]
0:02:16 Abby: Hello and welcome to Tortall Recall, the podcast where we re-read the Tamora Pierce books and yell about them. My name is Abby and my pronouns are she/her.
0:02:24 Amy: My name is Amy and my pronouns are she/her.
0:02:27 Aurora: My name is Aurora and my pronouns are she/her.
0:02:29 Gus: My name is Gus, and my pronouns are they/them.
0:02:31 Amy: So guys, we've come out of the darkness into the sun. This book is so much better than the last book.
0:02:40 Gus: This book is so much better than all three books before it.
0:02:43 Amy: Oh, it's so true.
0:02:44 Abby: It's so much better.
0:02:44 Amy: I would agree, yeah.
0:02:45 Abby: I'm so happy.
0:02:46 Amy: Like the last quarter of this book, super good.
0:02:50 Gus: Yes.
0:02:51 Amy: Well, except for that one, the very last...
0:02:54 Gus: Right.
0:02:54 Abby: I mean, look. It has bad points that we will talk about, but I really enjoyed reading this book.
0:03:00 Gus: Yeah, Amy, I know you've read one other book than the Alanna books, so I don't know if you really like... I don't know what your sense of Tamora Pierce's overall writing style is, but this... This is classic. This is the good stuff.
0:03:14 Abby: Yeah, I have to... Gus, I think you were commenting at some point that you can really honestly, chapter three of this book, there's a very specific point where Buri and Thayet are introduced and that's when it becomes Tamora Pierce. I think that's when she hits her stride and you can really tell at that exact point like, ‘Oh, this is what Tamora Pierce does, she's there, she made it.’
[Gus laughs quietly]
0:03:39 Aurora: Ah, Buri and Thayet.
0:03:40 Gus: I love them.
0:03:41 Amy: I couldn't tell whether it was that the writing actually got better or if it was just like, characters I care about.
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[laughter]
0:03:47 Abby: Well, right.
0:03:48 Gus: Those are both the same things sort of.
0:03:50 Amy: That's fair.
0:03:51 Gus: When there... Good writing should make characters that you care about, I think overall in most cases.
[chimes]
0:04:03 Abby: Yeah. So let's get into the segments here. Right, I guess, start with ‘First Adventure.’ Our background with this book, which we've established that Amy's is none, zero amount.
[laughter]
0:04:15 Amy: Yeah.
0:04:16 Abby: But Aurora and Gus, when did you first read this and when did you most recently read it?
0:04:22 Aurora: I first read this book as a pre-teen, so I was probably maybe 12, and I have a terrible thing to admit, when I was... When I first read it, this was probably my least favorite of the Alanna books...
0:04:41 Abby: I will say that it's more adult.
0:04:42 Aurora: Yeah.
0:04:43 Abby: You know, you're not following a kid hero.
0:04:45 Aurora: Exactly. I think there was a lot of interesting political things and world-building and I was not a particularly... As a youth, I guess I wasn't as into that, and I think the pacing’s a little different in this book. But...
0:05:03 Abby: Definitely.
0:05:04 Aurora: I most recently read it like two days ago, and I...
[laughter]
0:05:10 Aurora: Well suffice to say things have changed.
0:05:15 Abby: Nice. Gus?
0:05:17 Gus: Well, I most recently read this book, I finished it six hours ago.
[laughter]
0:05:24 Abby: That was so late in the night 'cause we're recording in the morning and I'm really sad about that for you.
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0:05:30 Aurora: Gus, you're a hero.
0:05:32 Gus: Well, I work late.
0:05:34 Amy: You're stronger than any of us.
0:05:35 Abby: You are.
0:05:35 Aurora: You are so strong.
0:05:36 Gus: But look it was a fun read, it was a fun read, it was a fun time.
0:05:40 Abby: It was fun.
0:05:41 Abby: Yeah.
0:05:42 Gus: Those last... The last epilogue or so, which was what I was reading at 4:00 in the morning was... I mean, it was a little more rough to read because it was at 4 in the morning, which is for all that I pretend to be a night person, a little bit late.
[laughter]
0:06:01 Abby: Four is a little late for most people.
0:06:04 Gus: The birds starts singing.
0:06:05 Amy: Yeah, you have to prepare to be awake... I always make sure I eat a lot of protein and drink a lot of water if I'm gonna be awake at 4:00 AM. That's a pro tip for all the kids out there.
0:06:15 Gus: That's smart. I don't do that.
0:06:18 Amy: You have to prep. Build a sleep bank. That's what Alanna would do.
[laughter]
0:06:24 Abby: Anyway, so Gus, what was your experience reading this as a kid?
0:06:27 Gus: Well, see, the reason I hadn't got around to that is I don't really remember it. I don't have clear memories. I do remember that I was super shocked as a kid that they introduced a surprise third love interest this late.
[laughter]
0:06:41 Abby: Yeah, I know it was late for that.
0:06:42 Gus: Yeah and I was like... As a kid, I remember thinking that was really weird and I think I appreciate that more now, regardless of what I think of the love interest himself.
[laughter]
0:06:57 Abby: Yeah, I do think that when I read this as a kid, I was a little more sort of confused by... Because the previous ones, except in, excepting the third one which I hadn't read, followed much more of a structure of just like, she's masquerading as a girl and she's
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trying to become a knight and that's what she's doing. And then this one does introduce a lot of sort of extra stuff that I wasn't sure how to feel about it.
0:07:21 Gus: Yeah, it's not a school story in the same way the first two are.
0:07:24 Abby: No. Right, so I think it is a little weirder to approach as a kid because it's part of this fairly middle grade or young YA series, but at this point, Alanna is an adult and she's going around doing adult things and having sexual relationships and stuff. I don't think I was totally sure about how to feel about that as a kid, but I did actually read this book right around the time we discussed Tamora Pierce in our book club, which was a couple of months before we started the podcast, and I really enjoyed it a lot. And then I also, re-reading it six months after that, I really enjoyed it a lot again.
0:08:08 Aurora: [laughing] Yeah.
[laughter]
0:08:09 Amy: Yeah, I really liked that it both, as you said, introduced these new adult elements but also brought back things that I thought were dealt with in her childhood but that weren't? Just like sort of these lasting repercussions of things that were shown to have been overcome by Alanna and then they come back and they're worse, and I just think that was a good move.
0:08:31 Abby: Yeah, it has some good continuity to it, which makes sense given that they were originally all one book.
0:08:37 Gus: Mm-hmm.
0:08:38 Aurora: I mean the odd thing about that is that since they were all one book, this one seems to stand, I don't know, alone as one book much better, but it does, as a reading experience, at least for me, it was far better than the other books.
0:08:51 Gus: It's way more...
0:08:52 Aurora: Which is odd since it was originally part of just like a big thing.
0:08:55 Abby: Yeah, no, I do think it stands alone pretty well. I think you could read, especially given the exposition at the beginning, I think you could read this book without having read the previous books and have it stand alone. It's just... At that point, it's basically just adult romantic fantasy, right.
0:09:11 Gus: Mm-Hmm.
0:09:12 Amy: I really like the very early exposition that was mostly just like, "Yes, I have healing magic and also here's a list of people who died."
[laughter]
0:09:23 Amy: It's pretty good.
[chimes]
0:09:29 Abby: Okay, so before we get into... We're kind of already there, but before we get into more detail, let's do ‘First Test,’ give sort of a general plot summary of this book, try to remember what was in it.
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0:09:41 Aurora: I wrote, I think, three separate plot summaries, all of varying lengths. [laughter] But I can give you all my shortest one if you want to do a slightly more in-depth version.
0:09:54 Abby: Yeah, go for it, give us a short one.
0:09:57 Aurora: Great, okay, so it comes in two parts. Part One, Alanna goes to find the Dominion Jewel, making some friends and friends plus on the way. Part two, Alanna defeats and kills her greatest enemy… [drops voice] Again...Fulfilling the destiny of being the most legendary hero of all times. That's my super short summary. The other one is half a page long.
0:10:19 Abby: Yeah, that basically covers it.
[laughter]
0:10:21 Abby: Right, there's a lot more stuff in there, but basically, right, she goes on a quest to get this jewel, meets some fun people along the way, brings them back to Tortall with her. Jon is going to be...coronated? He's going to become king.
0:10:37 Gus: That's the one.
0:10:40 Abby: Roger is back and just like there.
0:10:43 Amy: So is her childhood enemy who she beat in a fight and then never came back.
0:10:47 Aurora: Yeah.
0:10:48 Gus: And then she...Does she ever? She never interacts with him, right. That's all George.
0:10:51 Amy: No! No.
0:10:53 Abby: Yeah, right, that's totally a subplot for her.
0:10:56 Aurora: She kind of...
0:10:56 Abby: Right, she's not involved in that.
0:10:58 Aurora: She indirectly interacts with him, I think he'd send some people after her to try to kill her once.
0:11:03 Gus: Oh yeah, right.
0:11:04 Abby: Right.
0:11:05 Aurora: Yeah.
0:11:05 Abby: But that's still related to George. Earlier in the book, Ralon sends some...
0:11:09 Gus: Right, it's just...
0:11:10 Abby: ..people to kill her and it's like, ‘We’ll tell George that you're dead or whatever 'cause we're doing this to hurt George.’ Which is, right, it is weird that her childhood bully comes back and it's barely related to her at all.
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0:11:25 Amy: Yeah.
0:11:26 Abby: But anyway, then Roger is trying to destroy the country or whatever.
0:11:31 Gus: Not quite sure what his goal is.
0:11:33 Abby: Everyone has to band together to stop him and she kills him again.
0:11:37 Gus: Also also Thom is there and then he dies.
0:11:39 Abby: Ah Thom...
0:11:40 Gus: I cried.
0:11:40 Amy: I cried at Thom's first scene and I didn't even know he was gonna die.
0:11:46 Gus: Oh man.
0:11:46 Amy: I just started crying because that's so messed up. He's clearly just withering away because of his hubris but he never had friends and he just immediately went out there and isolated himself and it's so hard to find people to rely on at that point. His sister is the only person he knows, then he meets a bunch of people who manipulate him into raising the dead and then it turns out that he wasn't even dead, he was trying to get someone to siphon magic out of, so this great thing that he accomplished, he doesn't even know that it wasn't even that big a deal. I'm so upset about it.
0:12:16 Aurora: Poor Thom.
0:12:19 Abby: Full disclosure, we did accidentally spoil Roger's return from the dead for Amy or–she spoiled herself...
0:12:27 Amy: Why would I have thought he was gonna come back to life? Give me one reason why I should have expected that reading something about Roger after he had canonically died would be a spoiler.
[laughter]
0:12:41 Abby: Fair.
0:12:42 Aurora: You have a point.
0:12:45 Amy: Also you put it into our chat. You linked it to all of us. And by you, I mean Grace. Grace, I know you're listening to this.
[laughter]
0:12:54 Gus: Grace can't defend herself. She's not on this podcast right now.
0:13:00 Abby: Yeah, I mean it was inevitable that some spoilers would happen.
0:13:02 Gus: It was a big one.
0:13:03 Abby: It was a pretty big one. But there are other big ones that we did not spoil, such as Thom tragically dying, which is horrible...
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0:13:10 Amy: God yeah. Such as the fact that Faithful is a Warrior Cat so.
0:13:16 Abby: Yeah. [laughter] Faithful has ascended to StarClan.
0:13:21 Aurora: Yes.
0:13:21 Amy: Which means that Faithful was a regular cat, I was right.
0:13:27 Amy: Oh good, silence. So I was right.
[laughter]
0:13:33 Gus: Amy, did you notice the part where there's a new constellation in the sky?
0:13:37 Amy: Yeah, the Warrior Cat went to StarClan.
0:13:39 Aurora: StarClan?
0:13:40 Abby: Right, he just ascended to StarClan. Anyway, let's stop talking about this for the moment.
0:13:44 Gus: A normal thing that happens with the cats when they die in the series. All cats.
0:13:51 Aurora: They all go to the sky.
0:13:52 Amy: None of the other cats have died yet.
0:13:54 Abby: Technically true, I guess.
0:13:56 Gus: None of the many other cats that we have not met.
0:14:00 Aurora: I mean we know nothing about Ali Mukhtab's cats and...
0:14:02 Gus: Oh, you're right.
0:14:03 Aurora: Where they could end up.
0:14:04 Abby: That's true.
0:14:05 Gus: Mm-hmm.
0:14:05 Abby: Also, we'll get into this later. They did a lot of pairing the spares in this book. Like matching up various people and putting them in heterosexual relationships for no real reason, they did that to the cat. There's a scene where Faithful goes to meet a lady cat.
0:14:22 Amy: Yeah.
0:14:23 Abby: So unnecessary. Why does everyone have to be heterosexual?
0:14:25 Amy: So unnecessary. None of these characters are believably heterosexual. There was a point where I thought, it could be believable that Alanna is heterosexual and cisgender. And then I read the third book...
0:14:36 Abby: No, wrong. No.
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0:14:36 Amy: ...and then I thought no, neither of those things are true. Tamora Pierce doesn't know, but I know.
[laughter]
0:14:43 Gus: Okay, I have an theory.
0:14:44 Abby: We all know.
0:14:44 Gus: I have a theory... My theory which I'm going to explore as we continue to read these books….my very good fan theory is that there's one person in this entire... In all of the Tortall books, who is cisgender and heterosexual and that person is Jon.
0:15:01 Amy: Oh, that's true.
0:15:02 Abby: I believe it, yes.
0:15:03 Amy: Yes.
0:15:03 Aurora: Yeah, yeah, I would get on that theory.
0:15:06 Gus: Yeah. We'll see.
0:15:08 Abby: Yeah. Well, we'll see if any other cishets arrive.
[laughter]
0:15:12 Abby: Well, you know, track the progress but so far no sign of any.
0:15:16 Amy: Oh, Mother Goddess?
0:15:19 Gus: Yes, the Goddess.
0:15:22 Amy: I feel like she does keep showing up and being like time to be heterosexual, Alanna.
0:15:28 Gus: Oh yeah, you're right.
0:15:29 Abby: She definitely enforces the patriarchy, but you know, as a goddess who represents all women, I feel... I struggle to see her as cisgender and straight 100%.
0:15:41 Amy: Okay, that's a fair reading.
0:15:43 Aurora: Yeah, I think as a kid, I wanted to read her as queer and so I did and so I'll just keep doing that.
0:15:48 Gus: I mean, yeah.
0:15:49 Amy: Yeah, I read her as queer initially.
0:15:50 Gus: It's like as a character, we know that she should be queer, but she clearly has not been written that way and that is a fault on the part of Tamora Pierce.
0:16:00 Abby: Yeah.
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0:16:00 Gus: And not on the part of us.
0:16:01 Abby: But death of the author. We don't care what she thinks.
0:16:03 Gus: Right.
0:16:03 Amy: Yeah.
0:16:04 Aurora: Obviously.
0:16:04 Amy: In fact, she can't know what we think because there are two rules to this podcast, and one is don't spoil me and the second is Tamora Pierce can never know.
0:16:11 Gus: And we will not–
0:16:13 Abby: Please don't tell her.
0:16:14 Gus: We will not break the second rule like we broke the first rule.
0:16:17 Aurora: Oh gosh, yeah no.
0:16:19 Gus: Anyway.
0:16:20 Abby: Yeah, so I did also just wanna mention that this is another book with just a bunch of good duels and I really love a good duel. Like, Alanna never loses them so there's not a lot of suspense but I just really enjoy watching her beat everyone with swords.
0:16:34 Gus: Yeah, they're still fun... Yeah, they're still fun to read.
0:16:37 Amy: There's one duel I'm really excited to talk about when we get to animal friendship probably.
0:16:43 Abby: Okay.
0:16:43 Aurora: Yeah.
0:16:45 Abby: Let's continue.
[chimes]
0:16:50 Abby: Let's move on to our next segment which is ‘Run the Dominion Jewels’ and let's talk about plot and world-building.
0:16:56 Aurora: There was so much...
0:16:57 Gus: So much world-building.
0:17:00 Aurora: Yeah, it was delightful. A lot of it, I really, really enjoyed and we should talk about every single thing.
0:17:05 Amy: Well, first, can I just say I know what the Dominion Jewel is now...
0:17:09 Everyone else: Yay.
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0:17:09 Amy: So I know what I made the pun about.
[laughter]
0:17:12 Gus: Mm-hmm.
0:17:15 Amy: I don't really understand if it does anything or not, I think it might just be a symbol.
0:17:20 Abby: I mean it's like a Fisher King situation where... Well, it's I don't know, it's maybe not explored as much, this book is a little vague about what it is. But my understanding of it is that if you have a good natural leader who possesses the jewel, it ties them to the land in a way that magically improves the land or it keeps the people safe or it allows the leader to control the land to some extent.
0:17:49 Gus: It also mentioned...
0:17:50 Abby: So, it's a handy thing to have.
0:17:51 Gus: ...returning life to dead babies when they were describing what it did initially.
0:17:55 Abby: Yeah, that was pretty wild.
0:17:57 Aurora: I mean, I think that was only if the person who's using the Jewel has the Gift.
0:18:02 Gus: Oh, yeah, it was definitely an only the Gift thing.
0:18:04 Abby: Right. It's definitely yeah more powerful in the hands of an actual mage versus... But it can be used by anyone.
0:18:10 Amy: It's kind of unethical to not just hand that to every mage if it brings babies back to life.
0:18:17 Abby: Well, no, it has to be controlled by a natural leader of a land so it's not like you can just pass it around.
0:18:23 Amy: Then natural leaders of the land should all have the Gift, and they should pass it around to each other because it literally brings children to life.
0:18:29 Abby: I don't think that's how it works. And also the second you're just all about necromancy, you're getting into some slightly shady territory.
[laughter]
0:18:38 Amy: Necromancers are just doctors who don't give up. I stole that from internet. Anyway.
0:18:45 Abby: So I did wanna just correct myself from the past, what I said on the previous podcast, is that the Dominion Jewel kind of confers divine right to rule, which is not actually true in that we know that tyrants and bad people can have the Dominion Jewel and use it negatively. But, also we explicitly do know that Jon has the divine right to rule so like, still got that. Still got narrative weight of the gods behind Jon as a good king.
0:19:20 Aurora: There is... I feel like the Jewel itself kind of is... How to explain. Whoever
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uses it, the results of that are because of them and...
0:19:30 Abby: Mm-hmm. Yeah, definitely.
0:19:31 Aurora: Like the gods perhaps have less to do with that bit of it. Like you know, Alanna tried to give the jewel to Thayet and the Jewel started lighting up proving that...
0:19:40 Abby: That was great.
0:19:40 Aurora: ...Thayet is obviously talented...
0:19:43 Gus: Wonderful.
0:19:43 Aurora: ...And wonderful and strong-willed. But, she didn't take it.
0:19:47 Abby: Perfect.
0:19:47 Aurora: I think showing that just because you have strong will and can use the jewel doesn't mean that you're necessarily going to. Yeah.
0:20:02 Abby: Yeah, I think that clearly the Jewel is more of just a tool. It only works for natural leaders but the leaders can be bad, they can be noble, they can be common. The jewel doesn't really discriminate in terms of who uses it and it doesn't control who uses it. But Jon is clearly considered a quote unquote "natural leader" because he can use the Jewel and then separately, there are some pretty clear indications in this book and previous books that he is chosen by the gods. And also they specifically mention in this book, the rogues talk about the fact that royal dynasties are given divine right to rule by the gods, which has wild implications, that divine right to rule is real in this universe.
0:20:49 Aurora: Oh yeah. Totally true.
0:20:51 Amy: Yeah, they do talk a lot about divine right though, just in general, so I don't know.
0:21:00 Abby: Which relatedly, I thought it was really interesting that Roger, who, to be fair, is also royal, is next in line for the throne again in this book 'cause they just forgave him for everything.
[laughter]
0:21:10 Gus: Because he's good now.
0:21:11 Abby: It's kind of like...
0:21:13 Gus: It's because there is no evidence that he's bad.
0:21:16 Amy: She killed only the murderer part.
0:21:18 Aurora: No evidence.
[laughter]
0:21:19 Abby: [laughing] It kinda... Like it almost makes me think he's like Dr. Doofenshmirtz or something where it's like, like ‘Well, he did try to take over everything, but he wasn't successful, so we'll just keep him around, it's fine. [laughter] He's not like a big
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threat.
0:21:39 Amy: What happened was he came back and they were like, ‘Okay, if he's still alive, he had two things about them, and one of them was killing people and the other one was a sick sense of fashion, so if he still has that fashion sense, we know the part of him that died, was the murder half.’
0:21:52 Abby: Except that he doesn't have the fashion sense...
0:21:53 Amy: Yes he does.
0:21:54 Abby: They mentioned that. No, they mentioned that he's like unkempt.
0:21:57 Amy: Yeah, but he still has an amazing robe. You can be unkempt and still have really good clothes. [laughter]
0:22:03 Abby: Okay, fine. But anyway, back to my original point, which was Roger has a cool sort of motive, I guess, in this which is that he mentions that he acknowledges that the gods are real and very powerful, but he doesn't worship them, because they're not behind him. They've turned their face from him or whatever, so he hates them and he wants to destroy them, even while acknowledging that they're extremely powerful, which I think is cool.
0:22:28 Gus: That was neat.
0:22:29 Abby: That's something that you don't see... I think a lot of the time you see in worlds where the gods are real, atheists that don't really make sense because they just don't believe in the gods–which doesn't make sense when there's evidence for them. But I appreciate this alternative where you recognize that the gods are real, but you're not religious, 'cause you hate the gods.
[laughter]
0:22:53 Gus: Argument for worlds where the gods are real and there is proof of that, and yet there are still atheists: in the real world, flat earthers exist.
0:23:04 Abby: Oh, I mean, you're not wrong.
0:23:05 Amy: Oh! I wrote down when they mentioned the Top of the World, I was like, ‘Is Tortall like Flat earthers?’
[laughter]
0:23:09 Abby: No, it's not flat.
[laughter]
0:23:12 Amy: But the world can't have a top if it's a sphere.
0:23:16 Gus: It's a Roof. It's a...
0:23:16 Abby: It's a mountain–It's a figurative name for a mountain range.
0:23:19 Amy: It's above the world. I apologize.
0:23:19 Gus: It's a very tall mountain range.
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0:23:23 Amy: Yeah, it took me a while to figure that out because usually, they just say like the mountains, as in like, ‘We're gonna kill Hill people in the mountains,’ which is a thing that happened also in this book.
0:23:32 Abby: No. There's hill country, and then separately, there's the roof of the world, which is a very tall mountain range.
0:23:37 Amy: Okay.
0:23:38 Abby: Which, okay, but we do need to get into the fact that it's not on the map. There's a map in this book and then half of... Like two-thirds of the action in the book takes place off the map.
0:23:47 Aurora: Oh, I don't have the map.
0:23:49 Abby: Which... Oh, you don't have the map? My book has a map.
0:23:50 Gus: There isn't a map in your book?
0:23:53 Amy: I have the four. The four.
0:23:57 Abby: Oh, it doesn't even at the beginning?
0:23:58 Amy: Oh... No. Yes! What a world.
0:24:04 Abby: Right, we all have the same map, and it's the map that's printed in all four Alanna books. And I think also, I think it's the same map that you get in Kel and maybe Daine, I'm not sure. But yeah, it doesn't have most of the action in this book, which is in some ways interesting I think because it's a map of Tortall and Alanna sort of leaving Tortall and exploring new things, But also, I want a map.
[laughter]
0:24:26 Amy: Guys, guys.
0:24:28 Abby: Yeah.
0:24:28 Amy: There is a country called Tyra. Its border that has water. Tyra Banks. [note: Tyra Banks is a celebrity best known for starring in the Disney Channel original movie Life Size and hosting America’s Next Top Model.]
0:24:38 Gus: Doh.
[Aurora laughs]
0:24:38 Abby: Okay, fine Amy, fine.
[laughter]
0:24:41 Amy: I'm so mad. And like, there's the Water Gate later. Watergate already existed.
0:24:48 Abby: Yeah, right. Tyra banks was not an intentional pun, because this book came out in 1988.
12/19/18 Page 14 of 36
0:24:53 Amy: But there's a water gate and that was 1972, 1973.
0:24:58 Gus: I don't know.
0:25:00 Abby: Yeah, but also that's like a thing that exists.
0:25:02 Amy: Yeah, sure. I just like... I have some thoughts.
0:25:07 Abby: Yeah Amy -well, Gus, were you gonna say something about the map that was more relevant?
0:25:10 Gus: You addressed it all.
[laughter]
0:25:12 Abby: Okay.
0:25:14 Gus: But I would like everyone to know that I side with Abby on this. There should be more map.
0:25:21 Abby: Okay, good. I'm glad we agree. Oh, I did appreciate just that they gave us a very detailed description of the layout of Corus, that was nice. They didn't... We don't have a map of Corus, but now we know the geography of Corus. That was nice. Anyway, Aurora, what was your thing?
0:25:36 Aurora: I did have a question about the map. So. When she's talking, when Alanna's talking to the innkeeper in...Maren? He says that Maren and Tortall are cut out of the same cloth. But there's like two whole countries between Tortall and Maren. I don't understand it.
0:25:52 Abby: Yeah. Well, they say... He says Maren and Tusaine I think and Tyra are all cut out of the same cloth. I think it's Tyra that he mentions. Right, 'cause Tusaine is just a little tiny country that's right between Maren and Tortall.
0:26:06 Aurora: True.
0:26:07 Abby: The reason that Tortall is so large is so clearly because it's an empire and they... And we'll talk about this later, but the fact that they don't acknowledge that is just ridiculous.
0:26:17 Gus: Going back to the Dominion Jewel for a bit. When they were describing what the Dominion Jewel was, there was a whole part where they were condemning empires, they were like, ‘Some people use the Dominion Jewel to expand empires.’ And I know that there hasn't been any talk of continuing to expand the Tortallan empire, but just like in regards to it still being an empire.
0:26:40 Abby: Yeah, but they do mention that it would be bad if Jon was a weak ruler and the edges of Tortall defected, and the Dominion Jewel can help avoid that, which does seem similar to the empire thing. But let's... Let's save this for the imperialism section.
0:26:57 Gus: Oh, yes.
0:26:58 Amy: [laughing] The imperialism section.
0:27:00 Gus: It's all imperialism section...
12/19/18 Page 15 of 36
[laughter]
0:27:02 Abby: Do we have any other magic and world-building stuff?
0:27:06 Gus: I do, yes.
0:27:07 Aurora: Yeah.
[laughter]
0:27:08 Gus: Pretty early on, they mentioned the Goddess on Earth in the City of the Gods, which I thought was really interesting. That there's somebody who is the or acts as the physical representative of the Goddess, who lives in the City of the Gods. I love that stuff. I wish we like, at some point, got to see her or would get to see her in the future.
0:27:31 Abby: Yeah, we get so many little interesting hints about the religion in these books.
0:27:34 Amy: Yeah!
0:27:34 Abby: And I wanna know more.
0:27:36 Gus: When they were in the convent and there was a woman who dressed in the black habit of the Hag. A Hag priestess, which...
0:27:42 Abby: Right, there was a Hag priestess.
0:27:44 Gus: Amy, you don't know anything about the Graveyard Hag yet, but you will.
0:27:49 Abby: But she's very exciting. We'll get there.
0:27:51 Amy: You said the words, ‘hag’, and I was in it.
0:27:55 Gus: Yeah, okay.
0:27:55 Amy: Like, you know that.
0:27:56 Gus: I know we don't have to sell you on this.
0:27:57 Abby: Yeah, we know that's a good choice.
0:28:00 Gus: Yeah, I just wanted to point out those two things as things I really like as like religion stuff.
0:28:05 Abby: Well, yeah, I also just wanna briefly point out on a world-building note that the map Alanna follows to get to the Dominion Jewel, has Old Ones writing on it. The Old Ones, they were mentioned again. [laughter] We still don't know anything about them but they know about the Dominion Jewel and they can read their writing. I just wanna know everything about the Old Ones.
0:28:23 Amy: The Old Ones, who are they? What is it?
0:28:25 Abby: Yeah.
[laughter]
12/19/18 Page 16 of 36
0:28:27 Amy: They're here!
0:28:28 Abby: Just, I really wish that at some point, she wanted to delve into that, but I appreciate the hints.
0:28:33 Gus: Yes, just any explanation please. [laughter]
0:28:37 Aurora: Along a slightly...very tangential line, as in not related to quite like maps and stuff. But in terms of world-building, I loved all of the tidbits that we got about the Shang in this book, that they exist, that they have cool names like griffins, and unicorns. And that in addition to teaching fighting, they all become very good cooks.
0:29:06 Amy: Yeah.
0:29:07 Abby: Yeah, that's great.
0:29:08 Amy: It's so good.
0:29:10 Abby: Yeah, no. I really like the Shang. There's some racial iffiness about them...
0:29:15 Aurora: There are some things. Yeah.
0:29:16 Abby: ..that we'll probably get into but we'll get into it.
0:29:19 Amy: I have some questions.
0:29:21 Abby: I have one more thing to mention, just related to magic and world building, which is I really like that a lot of magic that we've seen in previous books, comes back here. Roger uses a gate of Idramm, which we saw the shaman in the last book use, and Eleni in the last scene uses thread magic. And also before, when Alanna is gearing up to go out into the snowstorm to get the Dominion Jewel, she's putting all her warm clothes on and she uses a word of command to tie the warmth to her clothes, and she does it so casually when it was such a huge deal that Thom did that two books ago, and that...she's so powerful and awesome, I love her. Yeah, so that's all I had to say about that. But it's cool that there's a continuity of all these different types of magic.
0:30:07 Gus: While we're in the world building section. We should probably just... Obviously, we touched on this with when we were talking about the map, but we went to a whole other country. We went to two whole other countries we hadn't seen before.
0:30:17 Abby: Yeah.
0:30:18 Gus: It started out in Maren and then we went to Sarain and we learned about the K'mir and we learned all about like the Saren and Thayet's family and her whole backstory with her mom and everything.
0:30:32 Abby: Awesome, super cool.
0:30:34 Gus: And like, Oh my God, I love Thayet so much.
0:30:39 Abby: Yeah, I'm sure we'll talk about that more, but all her this stuff is so good. And I still can't believe that Sarain the country is just not on this map at all.
0:30:48 Gus: It's egregious.
12/19/18 Page 17 of 36
0:30:49 Abby: Thayet's homeland. It's so weird.
0:30:51 Amy: Well, I mean... They didn't go there because of the civil war also?
0:30:54 Abby: No, they did go through it, and that's where they met Thayet and Buri.
0:30:57 Amy: Yeah, yeah. They tried to avoid going through it.
0:31:01 Abby: They talked about avoiding it...
0:31:02 Amy: But then they just did it.
0:31:02 Abby: ...and then they were just like, ‘No, we can fight an army.’
0:31:04 Gus: Because Alanna didn't wanna go on a boat. I love her.
0:31:07 Abby: Yeah. [laughter]
0:31:09 Amy: I love Alanna.
0:31:09 Abby: I love her.
0:31:10 Gus: And then she wound up going on a boat anyway.
0:31:11 Abby: She literally would rather fight a civil war, an army in civil war than go on a boat.
[laughter]
0:31:18 Amy: I mean, to be fair, there's no proof that there wouldn't also be a civil war and army on the boat.
0:31:23 Abby: Well, questionable.
0:31:24 Amy: At least this way, they're on land.
0:31:27 Abby: We don't know because we don't have a map, but you would think they would have to cross some amount of land to get to the top of a mountain range. Like generally, you can't get straight to the top of the mountain range by boat.
[laughter]
0:31:40 Amy: Fair.
0:31:43 Amy: Well, if it's a rowboat.
0:31:48 Abby: Hmm...don't think that's quite how that works.
0:31:50 Amy: Trust.
0:31:53 Gus: In earlier, yeah, in earlier episodes, I think, in the first book and stuff, we talked about how it seems kind of weird that there are people who are afraid of magic in a world where magic is common.
0:32:07 Abby: Yeah.
12/19/18 Page 18 of 36
0:32:07 Gus: Or, and is a gift from the gods. And I liked that we got some exploration of that in this book, and that there was like... We saw reasons for that and stuff.
0:32:18 Abby: Yeah. No, I thought it was a really interesting and well thought out part of Shang culture that they dislike magic. Although, Alanna did say, ‘I've never met anyone who's afraid of magic before.’
0:32:28 Amy: It's true.
0:32:28 Abby: When clearly, Coram is afraid of magic. Maybe less now than he was in the first book, but still.
0:32:34 Amy: Yeah, but Coram's one of her dads.
0:32:37 Abby: He is.
0:32:37 Amy: So like, I don't think she would...
0:32:39 Abby: And he's so supportive. I liked when she did all of the big magic thing that she did, and Liam, where she held down the entire camp of people, and Liam was all mad about it and was like, ‘I don't want you ride with me.’ And, but Coram still took her up on his horse and it was... Coram is also afraid of magic, but first and foremost, he is a supportive dad.
0:33:04 Aurora: And he taught her to change a diaper and it was very sweet.
0:33:07 Gus: Oh, that was the best.
0:33:08 Abby: Oh, that was so good.
0:33:09 Amy: Yeah.
0:33:10 Abby: Okay, we're getting into other stuff now. So let's move on to our next section. Oh wait, very fast linguistics. I like that the K'mir had their own language, unlike the Bazhir, very good. We'll probably get into that more, but it was good.
0:33:23 Amy: I have two linguistics.
0:33:23 Aurora: It was great.
0:33:23 Abby: Oh, you've got linguistics. Go for it.
0:33:24 Aurora: Yeah, I also have one too.
0:33:25 Amy: Well, I technically have really have three linguistics, two of them are very fast.
0:33:28 Abby: Of course, yeah.
0:33:29 Amy: First one, what are the swear words, Tamora Pierce? What are the Tortall swears? [laughter] Second.
0:33:36 Abby: I liked that Liam used ‘Shang masters’ as a curse or an expression. Do they have their own worship system? I don't know. Cool. Yes, let's move on.
0:33:46 Amy: Yeah. And sometimes, Alanna says things related to gods, but other times, it
12/19/18 Page 19 of 36
just says “Alanna swore.” So what are the swear words, Tamora? Secondly, fruit juice. Tamora Pierce never names a fruit, but everyone just asks for fruit or asks for fruit juice, but no one ever names a single fruit.
0:34:00 Abby: There is a lot of ambiguous fruit in these books.
0:34:03 Amy: Yes. So my question is, do people look at fruits as one semantic category, and there are different species of fruit, but the thing is called fruit? So like...
0:34:12 Abby: Or do they just have different fruits that we don't know the names of? Because it's a fantasy world, do they literally not have the same fruit as us?
0:34:20 Amy: No, but they all call it fruit. No one says the names of it.
0:34:23 Abby: Yeah, I know, I know.
0:34:24 Amy: And Alanna will specifically order fruit juice. Do different languages have different typical fruits that they do as the first fruit that they think of? For example, when I say fruit, you're probably thinking about an apple, because we're all Americans, but maybe somewhere else, they don't think of apples first. I haven't done any research on this. What are the main fruits that people think about when they think of fruit, which is all one thing?
0:34:45 Gus: You should address this on More Research Required.
[laughter]
0:34:48 Amy: Yes.
0:34:49 Gus: Crossover-esque.
0:34:50 Abby: Yeah. No, I think that this linguistics is getting less long, but maybe we can get to our other podcast.
0:34:56 Amy: Okay, cool. And...
0:34:57 Abby: Or less fast.
0:34:58 Amy: Third. Okay, translating the map. It took this guy like two seconds to do it, which makes me think he has seen this exact phrase before by the Old Ones and is just like reading it off the top of his head.
0:35:09 Abby: It seems like at least that he's probably fluent in Old One language or right, has seen very similar stuff. He's like a real expert on Old One language, which like is very exciting. What do they know about the the Old Ones? Would you please tell us?
0:35:23 Amy: Yeah. Also, it's a dead language so translation is going to be more difficult because it doesn't exist alongside the language that is being spoken today, probably. Like, those two languages probably didn't exist at the same time which means, translation is less likely to have like, sort of one-to-one terms. How did he do it that fast?
0:35:39 Abby: I mean, I will say that being able to translate an ancient map or book very quickly is a common adventure story trope.
0:35:46 Amy: I know.
12/19/18 Page 20 of 36
0:35:47 Abby: That does not hold up linguistically.
0:35:49 Amy: I know, but...
0:35:49 Gus: Maybe he has linguistics magic.
0:35:51 Abby: Yeah. Okay.
0:35:52 Amy: Okay, those are my things.
0:35:53 Gus: Okay, Aurora.
0:35:54 Abby: [speaking quickly] Very fast linguistics. Go!
0:35:56 Aurora: Okay, so Liam, when Alanna describes his accent, she says that he has broad vowels and nearly skipped Rs. Presuming that Common is like this weird parallel to English, is Liam from New York? Just a question.
0:36:13 Amy: Oh I thought he was [in a questionable Southern US accent] Liam Ironarm.
[laughter]
0:36:17 Amy: I thought he was a good Southern boy. Pictured him as a little cowboy.
0:36:23 Abby: Yeah, but I mean, dropped Rs is a bit more of like a New England thing, although it does seem like he could be a good country boy.
0:36:29 Amy: No, but at some point, he's like, something about, ‘Your mama tell you that?’ Or something like that. Just like something that a good Southern gentlemen would say. Give me a sec, 'cause I have like a notation for this.
0:36:44 Abby: We're doing pretty well on very fast linguistics so far, but it's getting less fast.
0:36:49 Amy: Didn't your mama teach you to be nice to...polite to strangers on the road?
0:36:53 Gus: Oh my God.
0:36:53 Amy: That's not something a New Yorker says. That's a Southern gentleman.
0:36:55 Abby: Yeah, no it's true, or like a Bostoner.
0:36:58 Amy: Liam Ironarms is a Southern martial artist.
0:37:04 Abby: Yeah. He's a white Southerner who just does karate.
0:37:07 Amy: Liam Darkness Dementia Raven Ironarm is a Southern boy.
[laughter]
0:37:15 Abby: With beautiful color changing eyes.
0:37:17 Amy: And a mustache.
0:37:17 Abby: This is totally off topic for this section, but I just want to acknowledge that, as of this book, Alanna's three love interests are: the king of a giant country, the king of thieves
12/19/18 Page 21 of 36
in that country, and the best fighter in the world who also has beautiful color changing eyes.
0:37:33 Gus: The only person who has more fantasy eyes than her.
0:37:37 Abby: Yes.
0:37:37 Amy: The Shang Dragon.
0:37:40 Abby: I love it.
0:37:40 Amy: And also, the Lion and the Dragon? Pretty good. Pretty good.
0:37:44 Abby: It's pretty good.
0:37:46 Gus: Pretty good.
0:37:46 Amy: Too bad Liam’s like that.
0:37:49 Abby: Okay, I feel like... Wait, Aurora, are you done with very fast linguistics?
0:37:53 Aurora: Hm?
0:37:53 Abby: Are you done with linguistics or do you have...
0:37:54 Aurora: I'm never done with linguistics.
0:37:56 Abby: Fair.
0:37:58 Gus: Can I say one linguistics thing? And then can we not discuss it and move on?
0:38:01 Abby: [laughter] Gus, you've been corrupted. Yeah, go for it.
0:38:04 Gus: My linguistics thing is, they mentioned October. They have our months.
[laughter]
0:38:08 Abby: You're so right. What is up with that?
0:38:14 Gus: Rome didn't exist. They don't have Latin. I know this is on the same scale is like, they use our words for everything, but. Months.
0:38:22 Abby: Yeah, that's pretty wild. I also, I did notice the mention of Beltane, which is a real holiday in the real world, that Celtic people celebrate but...
0:38:30 Gus: But it seems less out of place.
0:38:32 Abby: Right. It seems like a fantasy thing whereas, October does not so much. Wait. I think in later books, they have fancy month names. Wait, well, we'll keep an eye on this for the future but let's move on.
0:38:42 Gus: We'll keep an eye on it but moving on.
0:38:45 Amy: Month watch!
[chimes]
12/19/18 Page 22 of 36
0:38:49 Abby: Let's get into ‘Social Justice Corner.’ And specifically, let's start with feminism.
0:38:57 Gus: Hey, folks, Alanna had some romantic and sexual encounters that were pretty solidly consensual and not super icky.
0:39:06 Abby: Yeah.
0:39:06 Amy: That's true.
0:39:07 Gus: I'm so happy for her.
0:39:09 Abby: If you ignore all the other books, I actually am capable of shipping her and George in this book, which is nice.
0:39:16 Gus: Right. If I forget what happened in the second book...
[Aurora makes a dubious noise]
0:39:20 Abby: Okay, Aurora made a noise.
0:39:21 Aurora: I mean...
0:39:22 Abby: Okay, Aurora doesn't agree with us, but that's okay. We're allowed to have conflicting opinions.
0:39:26 Aurora: I mean, George is arguably kind of better in this book.
0:39:31 Gus: He's like, fine.
0:39:32 Aurora: And I think the way that their relationship was balanced has kind of shifted. If you look at the last bit when she says that she'll marry him, he keeps saying things like, “I've tamed myself a lioness." And "Are you okay with her having my... "
0:39:50 Abby: Oh yeah, that was gross.
0:39:51 Aurora: And then "our children" And I'm like... Ugh.
0:39:53 Amy: Yeah, that last page
0:39:54 Aurora: But then she pushes back and she's like, ‘Haha, tamed. Nah-uh.’ And she's like, ‘Of course I'm not gonna settle down, that's silly, but you can come with me.’ And so I feel like, before when it was there was this really uneven power dynamic between the two of them, that has shifted and he seems, like in the way that he corrected himself when he was like, "Will you bear my, I mean, our children?" That he's maybe coming into a place where he will view her as more of an equal, which is good and healthier, but it still wasn't the most...
0:40:28 Abby: Right. I think that all the boys, all the love interests in this book were still kind of gross and patriarchal and patronizing.
0:40:37 Aurora: Oh yeah.
0:40:37 Abby: Oh my god, Liam's so patronizing.
0:40:39 Gus: Oh God.
12/19/18 Page 23 of 36
0:40:40 Abby: But, right. What makes it better is that Alanna is not just gonna sit there and take that.
0:40:45 Aurora: Exactly.
0:40:46 Abby: And I think that George is the most amenable to actually being a partnership, and stuff. I don't love that the book ended with them getting engaged, but...you know.
0:40:56 Gus: You know. There was a fun line about Liam, where Alanna's like, ‘Were Liam and Faithful in a plot to make her feel young and ignorant?’
0:41:06 Abby: Yeah.
0:41:06 Gus: Yes, probably. I mean, that might not...
0:41:09 Abby: No, Liam is so much like the dirtbag older guy who wants to date a teenager 'cause she's like young and malleable and will bow to his wisdom and then when she doesn't, he gets annoyed about it.
0:41:22 Gus: She is like 20, but yes.
0:41:23 Amy: The first page where he showed up and called her kitten, I was just like... ‘She is a goddamn lioness. Sit down.’
0:41:29 Abby: He calls her a little girl.
0:41:31 Amy: Yeah.
0:41:31 Abby: And then he dates her.
0:41:33 Amy: Yeah, like it's messed up and I do hate it. And I was like, just hoping from the beginning that he would turn out to be a villain, and she would stab him and be like, something about cats and claws or something.
[laughter]
0:41:46 Abby: Nice. Liam's whole attitude is bad. I do appreciate that she's clearly and obviously into him, which is so not true of Jon and George for most of their, the time that they're in a relationship, and they also sort of used language–They mention at one point, they say they kissed rather than, even in this book, with George, we mostly get, “Alana was lifted up and thoroughly kissed.” She doesn't do anything, it just happened to her, but she and Liam are clearly mutually into each other, which is nice.
[Greensleeves by Zetta fades in – CW for sexual violence starts here. To avoid, skip to page 25.]
0:42:25 Amy: It does worry me though, that Alanna finally get some agency in her sexual interactions in this book when there is very early on and we're gonna have to do another trigger warning for this episode, sorry. But very early on, there's a scene where a bunch of soldiers do try to rape her.
0:42:45 Abby: Oh, yeah.
0:42:45 Amy: Like actually, which I just like I want to read through these books without
12/19/18 Page 24 of 36
thinking about sexual violence.
0:42:56 Gus: Yeah.
0:42:56 Amy: Is that too much to ask? [uncomfortable laughter] Is that ridiculous?
0:43:02 Abby: Yeah. It is unfortunate to see a female character, a very powerful warrior of a female character lose a fight and immediately become a victim of sexual violence that she immediately has to be sexualized.
0:43:18 Amy: Yeah.
0:43:20 Abby: That's unfortunate, but at least it's treated as a negative in this book.
[laughter]
0:43:23 Gus: Oh my god.
0:43:23 Aurora: Yeah
0:43:24 Abby: ...like that's a bad thing that would have happened to her.
0:43:27 Gus: Our standards...[laughter] are so low.
0:43:29 Abby: Very low [laughter]
0:43:30 Amy: So true. I'm so grateful. Thanks, T Pierce.
[laughter]
0:43:37 Gus: Oh man. Yeah.
0:43:39 Amy: I just...
0:43:40 Abby: Yeah and I also don't love Liam saving her from that encounter.
0:43:44 Amy and Gus: Yeah.
0:43:47 Amy: She didn't even get to fight them off herself. It has to be a place where a older man ends up putting himself further in her favor by saving her from a threat that she cannot defeat because of her specific situation as someone who is not a physical...
0:44:02 Abby: Well, they did say afterwards like... Liam said something like, ‘You probably had it. I just speeded it it up.’ And she was like, ‘Yeah.’ Maybe if he hadn't shown up, it would have been fine, but in this situation, it was definitely very much like she is helpless, and about to be raped. And then Liam shows up.
0:44:19 Amy: Yes, and also that's what happened in the book is, what was made to happen.
0:44:26 Gus: Right. That was the purpose of that scene.
0:44:27 Amy: Yeah, was to make it so that she is ingratiated to Liam for fighting off a kind of violence that women are not allowed to fight off in books. Because it's always like a man comes in and beats up an attempted rapist and it's not a good trope.
12/19/18 Page 25 of 36
0:44:45 Abby: Nope. Bad trope.
0:44:47 Gus: We found a bad trope. Gold star.
0:44:49 Aurora: Then she beat him with a sword.
[laughter]
0:44:51 Amy: And then she beat him with a sword.
0:44:53 Gus: Yes.
0:44:53 Abby: She did beat him with the sword. She beats everyone with swords.
[laughter]
[Greensleeves by Zetta fades in – CW ends]
0:45:16 Abby: She mentioned, I liked... When she beats Liam with a sword, he asks, ‘Are you the best in Tortall?’ And she says, ‘I still lose to Duke Gareth pretty often. And also Alex of Tyrian beat me one time,’ implying that he's the only other person who's ever beat her.
[laughter]
0:45:23 Amy: Oh also she said, ‘Well, I don't fight the peasants. There could be a stronger peasant than me.’ Like I am not I just...
0:45:30 Abby: Well she said commoners, but yeah.
0:45:32 Amy: Okay sorry, I just, I'm quoting off the top of my head. But that's great. I love that.
0:45:38 Abby: Although, also, she definitely did–when she was a squire, she did train with commoners so yeah.
0:45:43 Amy: But she hasn't fought all of them.
0:45:45 Gus: She has not fought all of them.
0:45:46 Abby: She hasn't fought every commoner who's good with a sword and she acknowledges that.
[laughter]
0:45:51 Amy: There's no proof that she's the best but she is the best of everyone she's fought ever.
[laughter]
0:45:55 Abby: Yes.
0:45:57 Amy: True.
0:46:00 Abby: Oh okay. Yeah, I have more like there's so much more that we could say about Liam being a creep, but maybe let's move on from that unless anyone has anything
12/19/18 Page 26 of 36
really pressing.
0:46:08 Aurora: Oh, this is Liam-tangential. But when she first meets him, I was initially amused and then very saddened by her little... She didn't know how to deal with, like she saw him, she was interested in him, and then she's like, ‘How do I flirt?’ And she's like, ‘I can't throw a handkerchief. What do I do?’ And I was so sad that she'd never had that amount of agency in a relationship before.
0:46:37 Abby: Right. Definitely. Yeah, and when they... In that scene, they had her mention, ‘Well, George flirted with me, and it made me uncomfortable, and I ordered him to stop,’ which is what happened but then she leaves out the fact that he didn't stop and then did sexually assault her.
[laughter]
0:46:57 Aurora: Yeah.
0:46:57 Amy: That was very bad. Also at one point, I think that it said in the narrative, Alanna didn't really understand how to talk to men or didn't really like to talk to men.
0:47:08 Abby: Yeah, I think you're talking about the same part.
0:47:10 Amy: Oh yeah, but it's like–her whole life is men. The way that that's framed in the narrative is there are always men around her, but she never gets to be in control in that situation and that's really sad. You're right, there is something really upsetting about that.
0:47:27 Abby: Right. Well yeah, I mean it's somewhat treated as, she's so much one of the boys or whatever, that she's never figured out how a deal with men in a romantic context, but it is very much...like, she's had romance. She just hasn't had agency in that romance which sucks.
0:47:44 Amy: Yeah.
0:47:45 Gus: Hey folks, remember when... Sorry. This is just only tangential to like Liam is kind of a jerk. Remember when Alanna put on a dress and Liam got really freaked out about it?
0:47:56 Abby: The worst.
0:47:56 Amy: Yeah.
0:47:57 Abby: I will note that a thing I liked about George in this book is that she had some vision of him or something, I don't really remember, but he had a little miniature painted of her that he was looking at and it was her in armor.
0:48:07 Gus and Aurora: Aww.
0:48:08 Abby: 'Cause he loves her as a warrior, it's good.
0:48:12 Abby: I like it when she decides that she can be both woman and warrior, it's ridiculous to frame that as a dichotomy, but there's a point where Faithful says, ‘You wanna be a woman and also a warrior, make up your mind.’ And she says, ‘I'm great at doing both. Excuse you.’
[laughter]
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0:48:30 Abby: And like yeah, tell that cat.
[laughter]
0:48:32 Abby: That's great.
0:48:34 Abby: But there's a few points I think where Liam sort of asked her like, ‘Have you ever thought about getting married? Don't you wanna have kids? You can be both woman and warrior, you know.’ And in that context, I hate it because I want her to choose that, but when other people tell her like, you have to be more of a woman, that's really frustrating.
0:48:54 Gus: Everyone gets so freaked out by Alanna's gender presentation all the time!
0:48:58 Amy: They sure do.
0:49:00 Gus: All the time! No matter what she does, someone's freaked out about it.
0:49:02 Amy: I will say, most of the people who tell her to be more or less feminine do die. So, that's good.
0:49:07 Gus: True. Jon didn't, but...
0:49:08 Abby: Right, well, and the good ones...
0:49:09 Amy: Jon didn't, but...
0:49:10 Abby: Yeah. Yeah, that's unfortunate, but all the good people that we like are into it, like Buri and Thayet and Coram all applaud when she start, shows up in her dress. And then Thayet designs her a beautiful outfit that's not female or male fancy dress.
0:49:30 Gus: I love it so much. It gave me so many feelings.
0:49:34 Abby: Oh, it's so good.
0:49:34 Amy: I love Thayet.
0:49:35 Gus: And Myles got her earrings.
0:49:38 Amy: I love Myles.
0:49:38 Gus: I love Myles. And when Alanna got her hair cut, it was like, only George and Buri weren't super dismayed, which...
0:49:47 Abby: Yeah.
0:49:47 Gus: Okay, everybody else can like...
0:49:48 Abby: Right.
0:49:49 Gus: You know...
0:49:50 Abby: Yeah. Whatever.
0:49:50 Gus: ...shut up, but, good job, George and Buri. I love you both.
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0:49:53 Abby: Buri is literally the best...
0:49:55 Gus: Buri's the best.
0:49:56 Abby: Best character ever.
0:49:57 Amy: Does Buri make more friends after this?
0:50:00 Gus: Yes.
0:50:00 Abby: She sure does.
0:50:01 Amy: Good.
0:50:01 Gus: Don't worry.
0:50:03 Amy: Okay.
0:50:03 Abby: Buri is so good. Yeah, I guess let's move on from talking about romance stuff, I guess. And can we talk about Buri and Thayet and just how they're the best ever. And I mean, this is the reason that... I mean, I don't know if it's the one and only a reason that Tamora Pierce hits her stride here but she introduces these two wonderful, amazing, perfect female characters who are totally different in their womanhood from Alanna, but are still capable and relevant and have rich internal lives and are down to adventure. It's great.
0:50:38 Gus: They're so different from each other, and they're so different from anyone we've met before.
0:50:42 Abby: Right!
0:50:43 Gus: And they're best friends!
0:50:46 Abby: They're so good.
0:50:46 Amy: [overcome] They're best friends.
0:50:47 Abby: And they're such good friends with Alanna, and they all learn so much from each other.
0:50:51 Gus: Oh man, I'm crying.
0:50:53 Amy: I love them so much, I'm so happy that I got to this point.
0:50:57 Abby: Oh, they're so good. Right. Thayet's super beautiful and wears dresses, and Alanna wears dresses some of the time, but sometimes she wears her own thing that's different and then Buri is always wearing the K'mir dress of leggings and whatever, and ah, they're just all... They present differently, but they're all supportive of each other.
0:51:16 Amy: They're so good.
0:51:18 Abby: But I also... The feminism gets better. It's only been five years, I think, something like that, since the first book in the series was published, but we talked in the last episode about how Alanna so often is the exception. She's doing all the stuff that other women can't do and she's shown as different from other women, but in this... Thayet is such a good
12/19/18 Page 29 of 36
feminist. She doesn't wanna just be different herself, she wants to change the whole world and bring every woman with her.
0:51:50 Gus: She wants... Doesn't she want to open a school?
0:51:53 Abby: She does, yeah. She wants to open a school. She wants women to be able to fight, like all women. She said something about like, "We nobles shouldn't leave it to our Shang and K'miri sisters." She's the best.
0:52:04 Amy: I'm so glad that...
0:52:04 Aurora: She's so good.
0:52:07 Amy: On the one hand, the fact that she married Jon is deeply upsetting to me, but on the other...
0:52:12 Abby: Oh yeah, she's too good for him.
0:52:14 Amy: Like, she is positioning herself in a great place to do all the stuff that she wants to do by marrying this bland, terrible man.
[laughter]
0:52:23 Abby: I really do appreciate that they showed up in the... She showed up at the, where Alanna was in the last scene, or towards the end, and asked for her permission to marry Jon, which was great, 'cause she prioritizes her friendship with Alanna over her relationship with Jon.
0:52:39 Aurora: Yeah.
0:52:40 Abby: But also, that Alanna gives her okay, and then Thayet immediately launches into talking about all the changes she wants to make in Tortall.
[laughter]
0:52:50 Aurora: Yeah, like, not about Jon...
0:52:53 Abby: No.
0:52:53 Aurora: ...just the things that she's going to do, which is great. And she really... She will take none of Jon's, oh I don't know how to say that with not a bad word, his crap.
[laughter]
0:53:01 Amy: Nonsense. Poppycock.
0:53:03 Abby: Yes.
0:53:03 Gus: Nonsense!
0:53:06 Aurora: Yeah. And like, that should not have to fall on her.
0:53:10 Abby: Right.
0:53:12 Aurora: But, it's good that...
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0:53:14 Abby: Right. No, they do repeatedly sort of talk about their relationship as like... ‘She'll stand up to him. She won't, yeah, let him be too much of a prig,’ is a thing that I think they say, which like, that's not what a relationship should be, but I'm really glad that Thayet is co-ruling this country.
0:53:30 Gus: Yes.
0:53:31 Aurora: Oh yeah.
0:53:34 Gus: I like how we're, nominally, we've said things that are like, ‘Maybe monarchy isn't great,’ but then we're also just like, ‘Thayet is great, and also should be the queen of like everywhere, if there's gotta be monarchs.’
0:53:46 Abby: Yeah, I mean.
0:53:47 Amy: The thing is, the monarchy exists in this. Like, Thayet is definitely a good first step to de-transitioning from the monarchy and that she is going to accomplish good things and enable people who are not monarchs to be able to make the kinds of decisions related to policy that they need by giving them a school and teaching them to fight and just giving them the power to reach out for these resources.
0:54:09 Abby: Right. She wants women to have more of a voice and she wants to educate commoners. She's gonna do good things for his monarchy.
0:54:17 Gus: I love her.
0:54:17 Amy: Yeah.
0:54:17 Gus: Thayet's good.
0:54:18 Abby: She's really good.
0:54:19 Gus: Thayet's good.
0:54:21 Abby: We hear about so many cool women in this book, too. I mean, obviously, we have Alanna and Buri and Thayet, who are all super great in different ways. But then we also get the various holders of the Dominion Jewel in the past, who were all super cool and different and we get the Shang Unicorn and the Wild Cat and I love both of them a lot.
0:54:46 Amy: Yeah, the Shang Unicorn, the only thing we know about her is that she is beautiful and very good at fighting.
0:54:51 Abby: Yes. And super deadly.
0:54:53 Gus: Yeah, and her name is Kylaia al Jmaa, and also, apparently, there's a short story about her. That's what the short story “Student of Ostriches” is about.
0:54:58 Amy: Yeah. We're gonna have to read that.
0:55:00 Aurora: Yeah, you need to read it.
0:55:00 Amy: Okay.
[chimes]
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0:55:05 Abby: Let's move on. We'll talk about queer stuff, and race and imperialism next time.
0:55:11 Gus: As well as friendship moments, even though we addressed a ton of that already. We have not nearly exhausted it.
0:55:17 Abby: No.
0:55:18 Aurora: Oh, no.
0:55:18 Abby: Yeah, but now, let's talk about ‘Palace Gossip.’ I have an ask here from Phoenix Flight, which asks our thoughts on Myles' alcoholism and mentions that when he's first introduced, he is called the court's drunk and later, he mentions something about quitting drinking, which I believe is actually in the previous book, Woman Who Rides like a Man. He mentions, ‘My daughter convinced me to quit drinking,’ which is cute. But they said, "I can't think of any scenes where he's supposed to be drunk. So I've always wondered why this detail is included." Any thoughts on that?
0:55:53 Gus: I don't remember super clearly.
0:55:58 Abby: Wait, Amy, quit listening for a second.
0:56:00 Amy: Okay, bye guys. I'll miss you. Love you. [To avoid spoilers, skip to the next page]
***BEGIN SPOILERS***
[Transition music plays: ‘Crunk Knight’ by Kevin MacLeod]
0:56:15 Abby: We know at this point that he's the king's Spymaster, right? Or do we not know that?
0:56:19 Gus: I don't think we know that.
0:56:20 Aurora: I think we do know... Well, okay. He's at least the pseudo Spymaster because he does have an agent in Maren.
0:56:26 Gus: Oh yeah.
0:56:27 Abby: Right. We know that he has informants and stuff.
0:56:28 Aurora: The innkeeper is his agent. So he's at least a Spymaster in a kind of more unofficial capacity. And I think George will of course later take on...
0:56:37 Abby: Yeah, which I guess we get some indication of that in this book as well.
0:56:41 Gus: We do.
0:56:42 Abby: I always wondered, especially by the time we get to Kel, if he is largely a drunk because it's a good cover for noticing things without people thinking that he is. But it does seem clear in this that he does actually drink a lot, so that's an interesting... I always, especially from the Kel books, read it mostly as a cover, but he does... He drinks a lot in these books, for real.
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0:57:06 Aurora: Yeah, especially in the Alanna book, she's often helping him back to his room.
[Transition music plays: ‘Crunk Knight’ by Kevin MacLeod]
***END SPOILERS***
0:57:19 Abby: Hi.
0:57:19 Amy: Hi.
0:57:20 Aurora: Hey, Amy.
0:57:21 Amy: Hi, I missed you so much.
0:57:25 Abby: Yeah, no, personally, the drunkenness might just be a thing about Alanna and Myles bonding. They first get sort of a close relationship as a page because she waits on him and helps him back to his room and stuff, and then later, that's a thing that she does as his daughter, is encourage him to stop drinking, which is really sweet.
0:57:46 Gus: Right, so the reason it might be in there as a character trait might be to facilitate that relationship.
0:57:54 Abby: Right. To just sort of be a character detail about how they're bonding and helping each other out.
0:57:58 Gus: Mmhm. About how they relate to each other.
0:58:02 Abby: Yeah.
0:58:03 Amy: I don't know if it ever comes up later or is even mentioned in later books because I do know that Myles is in the first Kel book because that's Alanna's dad, but does anyone ever talk about it? Does anyone ever mention it like, ‘Oh yeah, you're the drunk guy from the past, but now you're very wealthy, and doing good?’
0:58:22 Abby: He's been very wealthy the whole time and clearly pretty sort of sharp and aware and into politics. It's not like his drunkenness has ever impeded him much, except for just generally in the way that alcoholism is not great for you on a health level. But I think he's still... I don't know, in Kel's time, he's a history teacher, but I think he does still maybe have a reputation as the court drunk.
0:58:54 Amy: I'm just interested in whether or not there is anything in it that is a story of addiction and having been an addict or if it is just there to serve as a device for Alanna and Myles to become closer, because I think that those are two very different things.
0:59:08 Gus: I think that is what the... I think that's what the ask is getting at... I'm sorry, what the letter is getting at.
0:59:14 Amy: Yes, our missive, our epistle.
0:59:18 Gus: That it's wondering whether it's given a good amount of weight, whether it's treated as a serious topic as opposed to just like ‘what a fun quirk Myles has.’
0:59:30 Amy: Yeah, and how easy it was for Alanna to make him stop doing that by showing him some support sometimes.
12/19/18 Page 33 of 36
0:59:37 Abby: I do think that this is total speculation, but it could be something about... She sort of included it as like, a quirk that makes him a fun character in the first book when he and Alanna bond, and then she might have later thrown in in Woman Who Rides like a Man that Alanna asked him to quit drinking or helped him do that, because she sort of realized that it was not a totally fun and light topic to throw in there. Which I do think over the... Even though these books started as one book, over the course of them, you can definitely see Tamora Pierce sort of becoming more aware of some stuff and...
1:00:16 Gus: A few things...
1:00:18 Abby: ...improving on some sort of sensitive topics. I think it could be that.
1:00:24 Aurora: Yeah, totally.
1:00:25 Abby: Thank you for the letter.
1:00:26 Amy: Thanks.
1:00:32 Abby: And I have some other people we can thank, maybe I'll do Tumblr, this episode and Twitter next episode. So we have some for both.
1:00:39 Gus: Yeah.
1:00:41 Aurora: Perfect.
1:00:41 Abby: Okay, so theknightswhosaybook was live blogging our podcast, which was super cool.
1:00:48 Gus: It was so fun to read.
1:00:49 Abby: Also, thomtrebond did some of that too, really awesome. Both of you, thank you. And then also, thanks to the following people for interacting with our Tumblr: pheonixflight, wierdkid20, thomtrebond, fairytaleonfire, transcoranic, incorrectortallquotes, and whyisitfollowthespiders.
1:01:09 Gus: Yeah, thanks.
1:01:10 Abby: Yeah, thank you for talking to us.
1:01:11 Amy: Thank you so much.
1:01:12 Aurora: Thank you.
1:01:13 Abby: If you, the listener, also want to be on that list, you can get in touch with us on Tumblr at tortallrecall.tumblr.com or on Twitter @tortallrecall.
1:01:26 Gus: You could send us an email, our email is [email protected]. We also have a website.
1:01:33 Abby: Yeah! Our website is tortallrecall.com. All of our things are just Tortall Recall.
1:01:38 Amy: You're so good at branding, Abby.
1:01:39 Abby: A lot of this was Gus.
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1:01:41 Amy: Oh, you're so good at branding, Gus. Abby, you're terrible at branding.
1:01:43 Gus: Oh, thanks!
1:01:44 Abby: Oh, thanks.
[laughter]
1:01:49 Abby: Yeah, you can rate and review us on iTunes, you can listen to us pretty much anywhere, podcasts are given away for free. Not sold.
1:01:58 Amy: The podcast vendors.
[laughter]
1:02:02 Abby: And I think that's about it for this episode. Anything else?
1:02:07 Amy: No.
[laughter]
1:02:12 Amy: Alright well, if that's everything, Aurora, I know that you normally like to say the fun words.
[Greensleeves begins fading in.]
1:02:22 Aurora: Bye, Tortallinis.
[laughter]
1:02:24 Abby: Thank you, Aurora, for falling on that sword so that we don't have to.
1:02:34 Amy: Our theme music is Greensleeves by Zetta. Our spoiler music is Crunk Knight by Kevin Macleod, and our transition music is Charm. Links to all of this are in the description. Thanks for listening.
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[Greensleeves continues, then fades out.]
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