Greetings, oh fans of the Sanderson! We are here today to bring you yet another reread!
This one is specifically intended to lead up to the release of Oathbringer, which I’m sure many of you are reading in the serialized form released here on Tor.com. Today, we begin an accompanying reread of the novella Edgedancer, released in the Cosmere short works collection Arcanum Unbounded. This is, as noted in the AU postscript to the novella, an opportunity Sanderson took to fill in some of the details for Lift and Nalan which needed to happen between their appearances in Words of Radiance and the next time we see them in Oathbringer. Note: this reread will contain no spoilers for Oathbringer. Read along, then, and lets start right in!
First, some housekeeping. If things go as planned (and we know how plans are!), this reread will be a joint effort between your accustomed rereader Alice Arneson and your new favorite rereader, Lyndsey Luther. Since we haven’t worked out all the details yet (something something Oathbringer prep), I’m winging it this week on Chapter 1, working with a tentative list of themes, with probably-lame titles for them. If there are additional recurring units you’d like to see, or if you have suggestions for what to call them, speak up in the comments and we’ll take it all into consideration. And now, let’s check in on Lift and Wyndle.
The Awesomeness
(a.k.a. a recap of the chapter)
Lift races across a field, ignoring Wyndle’s complaints—as usual—and just as she gets nicely going in a glide, she crashes into something and feels stupid. Also as usual. Once she’s stopped, Wyndle takes advantage of the moment to argue further about her decision to leave Azimir, but she is adamant. She takes off running again, thinking about all the reasons she had to get out of there; it all comes down to feeling like everyone was trying to change her.
She crashes again, first from losing her balance, then from hitting a tree. Wyndle continues his rebuke of her rudeness in leaving, but she insists she left Gawx a note—she ate his dinner. Though Wyndle doubts the effectiveness of her means of communication, it does remind her of the price she has to pay for practicing her awesomeness so much—she’s run out of food again. As she begins sucking on her handkerchief in case it has crumbs in it, Wyndle moans about his own sacrifice—back in Shadesmar, he’d had the most magnificent collection of the souls of chairs.
Walking now, Lift enters a small forest and pauses to look back. Wyndle, still trying to figure out why she wanted to leave, asks hopefully if they’re going back, but no—she’s just saying goodbye.
Kadasixes and Stars
(a.k.a. quote of the week/chapter)
Lift shaded her eyes. The wrong things were changing. She was supposed to stay the same, and the world was supposed to change around her. She’d asked for that, hadn’t she?
Had she been lied to?
Well, there’s a clue… Lift had asked the Nightwatcher to make her stay the same, which is why she was so confident in insisting that she was only ten, even if she’d been ten for three years.
Pet Voidbringer
(a.k.a. interesting things about Wyndle and/or their bond)
This would be the place to crack up over Wyndle’s big project, interrupted by the decision to send him to bond Lift. Back in the Cognitive realm, he was a gardener. No pedestrian gardener, either, growing anything so lame as plants. No, Wyndle was an artist. He had a magnificent collection of the souls of chairs, which he grew into grand crystals. Before the Ring chose him for this “atrocious duty” he’d even been planning an entire exhibition of sofas! LOL.
Journey before Pancakes
(a.k.a. food, because Lift + Food = Awesomeness)
Food is critical to Lift, so we’ll note when/what Lift is eating, especially if it actually matters. In this chapter, it’s more a matter of what she’s not eating—because she already ate everything she’d brought along, and is reduced to sucking on her handkerchief, hoping there are some crumbs left in it.
Friends and Strangers
(a.k.a. people we should notice for one reason or another)
There really isn’t anyone in this chapter but Lift and Wyndle, plus mention of Gawx and reference to his advisors, but there will be people of note along the way. Some will be people we’ve seen in the books already, some will be new people that might be important later, and some will be representative of entire cultures. On that note…
For anyone who forgot, Gawx is the young thief who was with Lift when she snuck into the palace to eat the Viziers’ dinners. He was struck down by one of Darkness’s minions, but Lift went back to him, speaking her second Ideal and healing him. (I’m assuming it’s her second, anyway, because we don’t know it isn’t.) Because of this miracle, the viziers made him Prime Aqasix – the emperor of Azir. For what it’s worth, they renamed him Yanagawn, because Gawx isn’t a very emperorish name.
Storming Mother of the World and Father of Storms Above
(a.k.a. anything we learn about the Shards, the Old Magic, or curses)
If we learn anything specific about Shards or the Old Magic, it should be called out. I shall include any bizarre things Lift says; they may be unrelated, but I don’t care. This title is actually one of her curses much later in the story, and it cracks me up.
In this chapter, we learn a tiny bit, as noted in the quote above: when Lift went to the Nightwatcher, she asked not to change. Whether this is simply beyond the Nightwatcher to accomplish, or she didn’t entirely understand the request, we don’t know. We just know that it didn’t happen the way Lift wanted it to!
Darkness & Co.
(a.k.a. anything about the Skybreakers)
Of course we have to note everything we learn about Nalan and the Skybreakers in general. Also Szeth. And Nightblood. This chapter doesn’t say anything about them, but they’ll show up eventually.
Everything Else
(a.k.a. everything else that we want to talk about, duh.)
Partly because I don’t have the exhaustive coverage of recurring units that I did last time, and partly because I want to do it this way, I expect this to be significantly larger than the Exhale section of the Warbreaker reread. This week, for example…
The only real action is Lift running away from Azimir and attempting to learn how to use her Abrasion Surge, which is entertaining but not all that momentous. It’s interesting, though, that part of her reason for the current effort is the words of Darkness, back on that fateful night:
They were elegant things of beauty, Darkness had said. They could ride the thinnest rope, dance across rooftops, move like a ribbon on the wind…
She keeps pretending to blow it off, but it really matters to her. She wants to fit that image, somehow.
Anyway, the Big Thing in the chapter is why she left Azimir. As noted a couple of times now, Lift has a real issue with change for some reason – not with the world around her changing, but herself. We can only speculate on what happened in her past to make her so averse to it, but we do see the effects. As she’s running and sliding, she thinks about the ways the viziers etc. kept trying to “fix” her—comfortable clothing, shoes, lessons, studying the Knights Radiant and what she could do.
It had started to consume her. If she’d stayed, how long would it have been before she wasn’t Lift anymore? How long until she’d have been gobbled up, another girl left in her place? Similar face, but at the same time all new?
She’s afraid of letting anyone get to know her too well, or get too close to her. If they knew her, and started expecting things of her, she’s afraid she’ll start trying fulfill those expectations, and next thing, she’ll have changed. There’s one last thing, which Wyndle suspects may be the real reason she left; it’s not entirely, but I think he’s more right than Lift will admit anyway.
“Is this about what happened to you?” Wyndle asked. “I don’t know a lot about humans, but I believe it was natural, disconcerting though it might appear. You aren’t wounded.”
For a girl who had believed, or convinced herself to believe, that she wouldn’t ever grow up or change, menarche would be a rude shock. (I mean, it’s a bit of a rude shock for any girl, but this would be worse, I think.) Eventually, she’ll admit that there’s a bigger reason she left Azimir and went the direction she chose, but I suspect this evidence that her body is changing despite her boon was a triggering factor.
Well, it’s a short one, but that’s it for this week’s reread. Next week… well, I don’t know exactly what will happen next week, but it will involve chapter 2 and probably chapter 3. Till then, join us in the comments! Also, please, let’s keep the discussion free of spoilers for the released chapters of Oathbringer, because not everyone is reading along. If you absolutely must mention something, make sure to white the spoiler text.
Alice Arneson is a SAHM, blogger, beta reader, and literature fan. In Oathbringer news, the copyedit is complete; look for a refresher on the Knights Radiant to come soon, another great cosplay article, and of course the early release chapters. Also, did y’all see the announcement of the Black Piper soundtrack project for The Way of Kings? The kickstarter campaign will be launching soon—I heard rumor of this coming Saturday.
ALSO: No Oathbringer Spoilers!!! Ima go add that…
WOOHOO!
With that out of the way, I wonder if Lift’s curse from the Nightwatcher has anything to do with needing to eat to use stormlight. She hasn’t been shown to suck in stormlight from a sphere right?
@2 – correct, but that doesn’t mean she can’t!
Poor Lift.
She thinks she gets to be 10 her whole life. I remember not wanting to grow up.
Then she’s finally eating enough that her body starts changing on her. :-(
Poor girl. Remember in WoR, Wyndle threw out the line that she was at risk at malnourishment. That will often delay the onset of menarche.
What a great word Alice. So underused too.
This chapter makes me want to hug Lift. She’s a very aware little girl, understanding how all that education would indeed change “eat away” at the girl she currently is.
P.S. I love the cut line from the home page. A vegetarian Voidbringer indeed. :-D
Thanks for the write-up, Alice! For the record, I love the section titles.
Some good insight here. It’s probably more obvious to other people, but as a single guy who grew up with only brothers, I was completely oblivious to what Wyndle was talking about in that last section. Totally makes sense that would freak her out, especially when she thinks she’s supposed to stay the same.
Did Gawx’s new name come up in the text? I don’t remember seeing Yanagawn anywhere, but then again, I’ve only read Edgedancer twice, so it’s entirely possible I just missed it (and/or kept calling him Gawx in my head because that’s how we met him).
Lift really needs to eat more. Having the ability to metabolize food directly into Stormlight is so powerful, and neglecting her own nourishment not only diminishes her health, it deprives her of awesomeness. Assuming she keeps herself well-fed, she has a huge advantage in any extended fight, as her Surgebinding should theoretically be able to just last longer than anyone else’s. I’m curious what would happen if she had access to a universal bendalloy metalmind (storing nutrition). Could she metabolize that stored nutrition into Stormlight, or only food she ate the old-fashioned way?
IIRC, Lift notes (cannot remember if it is later in Edgedancers or in WoR) that her mother died when she was younger. I think that is why Lift did not want anything to change. She saw change happen to her mother: from healthy to dead. The key is exactly how she asked the question: and how the Nightwatcher chose to give her her boon. I wonder if the curse part is that her Investiture method is through the consumption of food (rather than absorbing stormlight as do others on Roshar).
Thanks for reading my musings.
AndrewHB
aka the musespren
The first word in Oathbringer is ‘Prologue‘ Mwah ha haa! Now you can’t unsee it!
On a more serious note yet slightly odd note, Have you seen Brandon’s homepage recently? Theblackpiper album Kaladin? Apparently this is a thing, did you know this was a thing? It’s an interesting thing…
jeremy @5 – I had to search the text and make sure it was there before I used “Yanagawn” – it comes up somewhat later when they’re using the spanreeds. :) But there’s really not much reason for anyone to remember it; he’ll always be Gawx in our minds, right?
ChocolateRob @7 – Yes, I knew the soundtrack was a thing. See my bio blurb, wherein I comment on all sorts of different things going on in the Sanderson world. :D
@8 Fortuona who?
I think the section titles are good how they are. If you feel like you have to let your new co-host contribute some, that’s fair too.
She is an orphan no? She’s naturally falling in with thieves in the like and has no compulsion about stealing from others as long as she’s not hurting others. IF she changes, maybe her parents can’t find her again.
@6 “The key is exactly how she asked the question: and how the Nightwatcher chose to give her her boon.” This is a common belief, but it’s contradicted by (an unreliable narrator, granted) in WoK, I-7:
@6: I think you may be taking a too innocent PoV on Lift.
Sadly, I’m thinking she didn’t want to grow up, because life as a “not child” female on the streets is harder than a boy.
While in real life we know boys and girls can be forced into prostitution, in Sanderson’s book world – the risk is higher for girls over a certain age. Thus one reason Vin tried to pass a boy early in Mistborn.
@9: LOL!
This should be fun!
Alice, I like the section titles/themes so far.
My theory on Lift’s boon is that she is not changing emotionally, i.e. her compassion, empathy, outlook on life, etc.; and that her curse is the food-to-stormlight conversion–perhaps the only way she can charge up. Please feel free to tear it apart.
@9: Uh-huh!
I have been reading your rereads for years, but have never had the gumption to post any comments until now, but with gearing up for the release of Oathbringer I am trying to be a more involved participant instead of just a passive reader.
When I read the Lift interlude when WoR came out I did not much care for it. It didn’t help that, like with most interlude chapters, it was in the middle of the big storylines with characters I already loved (or loved to hate), and then I was suddenly reading short stories about people I didn’t know at all. (I think I like the interludes most in rereadings, when I mentally can take the space to enjoy them more). Regardless, it wasn’t until I read Edgedancer that I felt like I caught the essence of Lift’s character, and really appreciated her voice and story.
I too thought about how, along with worrying about getting “eaten” by all of the expectations on her, along with her starting her menarche would have been behind her wanting to leave, although it sounds like finding out that Nalan was in Yeddaw was the (unconscious?) catalyst for her actual departure. Interestingly, my husband completely missed the reference by Windle to her menarche. Makes you wonder what we are pre disposed to see or not see in a text based on our own life experiences.
I am excited for this reread – I reread all of Stormlight Archive, including Edgedancer, to get ready for the serialized released of Oathbringer, and now I am chomping at the bit for the new material. While that gets doled out once a week, it will be nice to have this reread running on a different day each week as well.
Ways @@@@@ 14 – Interesting theory on the boon referring to psychological changes rather than physiological ones – I haven’t considered that possibility before. As far as the curse – I’ve seen a few people theorizing that because Lift can metabolize food into Stormlight, that she therefore can’t get Stormlight the regular way (i.e. through spheres), but I’m not convinced. I don’t recall any specific reference to her actually inhaling Stormlight, but I also don’t recall any comments about her trying and failing. I guess what I’m saying is that there isn’t concrete proof either way, but for now, I’m assuming that she can. I suppose we’ll have to RAFO.
Thora @@@@@ 15 – Thanks for sharing about your husband missing that reference – I’m glad I wasn’t the only one!
Just FYI, as a guy, I’ve never in my life heard the term “menarche.” You learn something new every day!
Okay, I’ll ‘fess up here… I actually didn’t catch it the first time through the beta. It registered as “I should go back and figure out what Wyndle is talking about” but I wanted to keep reading, so I flagged it in my document and kept going. When I looked back, one of the guys (yes, one of the guys) had made the comment about menarche (which I had to look up to confirm it meant what I thought it might), and I went, “… uh… Oh. Right. Now it all makes sense.”
Hey everyone – let’s end the discussion of menarche, period!
:-)
Rob, I see what you did there…
Grooooooooan.
(Frequently lurking re-reader, rare post-er)
I guess I’m in the minority then, because I picked up on the menarche thing right away on my first read-through.
Re: Lift’s theory on change (i.e., how you cease to be yourself after a while and turn into someone else) – did anyone else suspect this was a reference to the Ship of Theseus? Very interesting concept to apply to human personality, instead of physical objects.
I just love Lift! When I call the kitties for dinner, I sometimes tell them “Gotta lunks for smalls!” ;-)
Thanks for the new reread Alice (and welcome to Lyndsey; looking forward to your posts)!
For what it’s worth, I did have an idea of what Wyndle was referencing in my first read through; but I can’t recall ever hearing the term “menarche” before, so thanks for the education!
It was interesting to see that Lift’s desire to figure out more of her abilities originates from Darkness’s comments. When Wyndle tried to freely give her information about her abilities in the WoR interlude, she ignored him, but she grows curious about them in response to Darkness’s taunts. Which totally fits her personality.
It was pretty cool to see her test her abilities out and discover how fast she can go. One thing that I found curious though. She was able to remove any friction between the air and her body, which allowed her to go super-fast, but her skin still started to glow and she emitted “a smoky light” which had me believe that something was burning due to the superspeed-induced, increased friction. So, was the air that was caught in front of her body burning when pushed up against other air molecules? Was something else burning? Or did folks just read that as excess stormlight coming from her body?
Looking forward to the discussion on the pancakes!
jeremyguebert @16
I most heartily agree there’s no evidence she can’t pull Stormlight from spheres. Time will tell.
KiManiak @23
I read it as Stormlight bleeding off, FWIW.
Pancakes for everyone in the Stormcellar!!
ETA–suppose that should be Storm Cellar.
Every time I have read this my eyes have completely missed the term (reading the correct “”copse” automatically) until I get to the second line and realize that I’ve missed it. Cracks me up every time because it’s not just a groan-worthy (i.e. majestic and wonderful) pun but some fantastic characterization of this wonderful girl. Oh, Lift, don’t you go and change at all! (see what I did there? see? :P )
Seriously and sadly, I would love to see more development and involvement of Lift in the main series, but while I think she is totally mistaken (or she was lied to) about what she was given and how, based on what Brandon has said, I don’t think much of her character development will be seen until the back 5 of the series. Or maybe I need this re-read to force me to re-look at this because I’m having a hard time remembering much of it beyond the general plot. Does she have a big character arc here? (rhetorical question…I’ll figure it out as I re-read).
Thanks for doing this Wet and welcome to Lyndsey!
The whole idea of change making the “old” you disapear seems exactly what happens. Puberty does turn us into someone who is completely different, a new person. It’s a scary time, even without becoming a knight Radiant. And in this world, for a child alone, it becomes even more dangerous.
I think I also figured out what Windle was talking about on my initial read, and I’m a guy. The sentence initially didn’t make any sense because I didn’t remember Lift suffering any injury either, and I re-read from the beginning to make sure I hadn’t missed anything, then it occurred to me what natural phenomenon would fit the emotional and physical reactions Windle must have been referring to.
Though this chapter presents several reasons for why Lift left Azimir, they all turn out to be red herrings. The key is not why she is leaving, but where she is going.
Two of my favourite quotes from this novella (which, as it happens, have nothing to do with Lift or Wyndle) come from this chapter:
“The tree slowly fell over, playing dead.”
and
“The bubble of power around her popped. The tree toppled over—and,for good measure, the two next to it decided to fall as well. Perhaps they thought they were missing out on something.”
@22: Funny you should bring up the Ship of Theseus, what with Arclo revealing what he is later on in Edgedancer… :)
As someone who really enjoys Lift, I’ve been a little surprised at how divided readers are in their opinions of her. The major factor is whether or not her brand of humor works for them, but another seems to be how much they trust her narration. There are some who believe Lift (e.g. when she says she is only there for the pancakes), and those readers think she’s an annoying young teen. Others think she’s lying to herself, and that she knows it. These readers (including me) see Lift as a someone with strength and depth.
As Edgedancer continues it becomes increasingly obvious that Lift has much more in her head and heart than she will admit. But even though it is fully clear by the end, at that point the readers who don’t like her may have given up on the character and/or story. I would guess that a big predictor of whether someone will enjoy Edgedancer is how early in the story they suspect Lift isn’t as flighty as she tries to appear.
Ccstat @31: Totally agreed. This is one of the reasons Lift is my favorite Stormlight character.
@24: Thanks Ways. I posted pancakes in the Storm Cellar and you made a bunch of us hungry. As is common while reading a Lift chapter.
@29: I agree. I love the Drop Dead trees. I’m guessing they are a soft wood, because I can’t imagined a hard wood doing that. Or they are actually a type of plant we would see as an odd grass like bamboo. The plant world on Roshar is so rich and strange.
@31: Yep. You hit the divide with Lift dead on. I figured she could never be as silly as her surfaced seemed. Not with her bond. This story just confirmed my love of her. And her “I will remember those that are forgotten.” :-(
Celebrinnen @29 – Thank you for quoting the drop-deads!! There was just so much in this chapter, but that whole bit made me laugh SO hard!! This is probably my fifth read, and it still makes me snicker. :)
Ccstat @31
Lift’s character reminds me a lot of Mat’s character in Wheel of Time. Both will do pretty much everything to help people but will not admitted it to themselves in their POV
@33
Glad to be of service. ;-) I got caught by a Karmic backlash reading your FB post. Does that mean I’ve met my ‘toh?
Thinking out loud: We could have pancakes for the rereaders dinner next year at JCon. It would require a little more coordination than usual in terms of picking up take-outs from different vendors in the area (IHOP or whichever, local crepe shop, Jewish deli, etc.) and that could be a logistic challenge. But tuck it away for future consideration.
@31 Ccstat, I also agree about Lift. While I’m more involved with Kaladin’s story, Lift is a more engaging and far more enjoyable figure with a similar mission in life. She, too, is engaged in protecting the seemingly helpless and forgotten, even at her own peril. One of her motivations in seeking out the city of Yeddaw was to confront Darkness (the deranged Herald, Nalan) before he destroyed another proto-Radiant. This, despite her close call with execution at his hands in Azimir (see the chapter about Lift in WOR). Of course, she advances other incentives such as escaping from the royal palace in Azimir before being changed into another girl by tutors and dressmakers. Her, tongue in cheek, explanation of the latter motivation to Wyndle is that “they’re planning to eat me”. Her ostensible ambition is to be ‘forever young; forever wild; and forever free”. Of course, that is most unrealistic. She can’t be forever young physically. She notes that she has grown since her meeting with the Nightwatcher. Wyndle implies that she has reached puberty. Lift, herself, is a bit too conscious of male genitalia despite her protestation of childlike innocence. Her sense of responsibility certainly limits her freedom. While the goal of eating all 10 kinds of Yeddaw pancakes appears to be a frivolous excuse for entering that city, it is consistent with her constant thinking about food since the latter is the source of her magical abilities and she is normally starved between eating occasions. She is certainly a relief from the altogether serious and brooding Kaladin. While I still hold out hope for a Kaladin-Shallan pairing (Shaladin), a pairing of Kaladin and an older Lift (Kalift) would certainly brighten his mood.
Lift is The Best Ever. Lift is seriously my hero right now. Lift is a shardfork-trident-carrying honorary member of House Manderly because I said so. I love Lift so much.
Wyndle’s chair-gardening rant is one of the funniest Cosmere conversations I’ve read, and that’s saying something. I didn’t pick up on the menarche reference because I probably didn’t realize that her body was changing with puberty despite her claim of being forever 10, even thougb it was clearly hinted at. I blame the painful distraction of holding the heavy book.
Magical abilitly tied to food intake is an established trope (what isn’t?) known as Cast from Calories, but the only thing I’ve read that Lift reminded me of is Robin Hobb’s Soldier Son Trilogy where fat = magic and vice versa. Earlyish in that plot, a mage uncontrollablyabsorbs magic from the air and stores it as body fat, growing obese refardless of diet and only losing weight after using a lot of magic. But later it’s linked exclusively to food, with a mage caste of Big Eaters converting food to magic if used immediately or fat for later use. Not quite the same as Lift, but I’ve called her a lost child of those people. She probably wouldn’t like being among them, with limitless food but a lot of social expectations and responsibilities. And I’m glad she’s not, because I like Stormlight Archive much more than Soldier Son.
My theory for Lyft’s gift is that she did get something that will never change, but it’s not her body. Later on she thinks some about how she’s always been hungry, and (IIRC, I don’t have a copy on hand to check) how people change once they find other things to care about. And so the Nightmother gave her an ability that means she’ll always be hungry, always be searching for the next meal.
I also wonder if the idea of the Nightmother giving unrelated blessings and curses is a mistake that people in-world are making, like Sanderson likes to throw in. It seems to me that all the gifts we’ve seen are both blessing and curse, not two separate things. Lyft, for example, is a given a way to use Stormlight that’s a big advantage for a Knight Radiant, since food is a lot more common than Stormlight might be. But it’s also a curse because she’s always starving. Similarly, tying intelligence to empathy is one thing that can be both blessing and curse. The same with Dalinar forgetting his wife, which would make things stop hurting (blessing) but is also forgetting all the good times (curse).
But remember in wok’s I think one of the interludes had two people talking about it while smashing artwork. I forget what the boon was but the curse was he saw everything upside down for the rest of his life. Which while annoying is easy to get used to.
@38 Glenda Larke’s Stormlord books also use that conceit – Stormlords and Rainlords control water using energy they explicitly gain from food, and if they run out only eating restores it, not resting or sleeping, and eating restored their power fairly quickly, moreso than you would expect digestion to take. It definitely intrigued me in its specificity!
Time for a critical voice sorry. Just last week I read ED for the first time. (And I haven’t rerread WoK or WoR for over a year, so i might be wrong BUT:)
I didn’t like Lift’s humor (her comparisons especially) in ED. It delt as if David from Steelheart had been transplanted here. I remember (maybe wrongly) much more serious. I don’t remember the name-calling either and don’t like it.
Thank you for this new reread of Lyftdancer, I love reading up on all of your posts and the comments that follow.
This will be my new daily fix!
@31 I totally agree about Lift. I liked her character immediately. I think you bring up some good reasons for the divide. I wonder if the way you read it might also be a factor. I think Kate Reading’s performance of Lift is excellent (as to be expected) and that may have predisposed me to like Lift, as I heard the audiobook first.
@42 I guess it’s just a matter of preference, but I found David’s bad puns to be endearing. I don’t think that they’re exactly the same as Lift’s, though, I could see why that might strike a similarly irritating note, if you didn’t like them.
@19 – so, my first instinct was to get all, ‘uh, we can discuss periods if we want, stop enforcing the dumb taboo on it!’ but then I realized what you were doing.
It’s funny to see that others iddn’t get it, becuase I remember as soon as Lift said ‘the wrong things were changing’, my mind immediately went to ‘OMG SHE GOT HER PERIOD’ and that’s why she’s freaking out and wants to leave. Even for a normal girl, the change – emotionally, mentally, and physically – of puberty, is a frightning thing, especially with no guidance. I love her way of articulating her fear that she’ll gradually be ‘eaten up’ by all the different expectations and change.
I also so far tend to go with the idea that he request was mostly borne out of the vulnerability of her mom dying, and that it seems like psychologically, she’s staying the same (even if she grows biologically). In some ways…she kind of reminds me of Auri in the Kingkiller books (although I like the Mat comparisons too). But I never thought about her having to eat to get Stormlight as also being part of the curse.
Regarding food/magic – when a person is healed in WoT, they generally have to eat copious amounts of food afterwards.
Overall, I really like Lift – she’s a good reprieve from Kal’s brooding, and Shallan’s neurosis, and I think that while she isn’t outright lying, she definitely has a lot more going on than is on the surface (perhaps than she would even admit to herself). But I also like David’s puns :)
Thank you Alice for a new word. I did not know that such a term exist. Menarche
Alice,
Long time reader, first time commenting. I think that this is a delightful chapter that shows us the vulnerability of Lift. Additionally, I agree with the general consensus that if the Nightwatcher is responsible for this willingness to not change, that it was most likely psychological and not physically bound.
The one thing I haven’t seen brought up from this chapter that I found interesting was Wyndle’s comment about “the Ring.” I wonder what the spren governing body is like. Are these Elder Spren? Do they control all types of spren or just those like Wyndle?
@47: I think the Ring is just over Wyndel type spren. Or Syl might have said something about them.
@48:
They manifest as vines. I took The Ring to be a reference to their vine-likeness. So, i agree with Braid_Tug.
@42:
I think a whole novel of Lift would be annoying for me. But as a respite from Kaladin and Dalinar, I found her wonderful.
Not much to talk about with this chapter, but big doings upcoming, especially with Nalan and Szeth, and the Skybreakers.
I keep reading Skybreakers as Skywalkers. It’s going to be a long few reread/OB read, haha.
@50 I’ve been unconsciously thinking of Nalan as Darth Vader.
Enter: Darkness *cue Imperial March* *cue dramatic fog* *cue ominous breathing*
My daughter and I just finished listening to Kate Reading reading this wonderful story. My daughter is 13 so she’s about the same age as Lift…and LOVES her character. I can’t count the times she has laughed at something Lift said or did as we would drive to and from school listening or sitting at home. Being adopted herself, she has a soft spot for stories with characters that are orphaned and dealing with that reality.
She and I have hypothesized that the boon granted by the Night Watcher definitely is more psychological than physical. You can tell in the way that Lift processes thoughts and her responses to almost every situation she is in. I think that is also her curse…because there seem to be so many moments where she seems to be fighting herself to allow for more “grown-up” type thinking, more critical and abstract pondering…but then all of a sudden she gets pulled back into that 10 year old mindset, whether she or the power of the boon are doing it.
Wyndle really comes into his own and helps to showcase some characteristics of Cultivation based spren, whom I feel like have been overshadowed by references to Honor up until this point in the first two books.
Looking forward to this!
Re my critic: i liked David’s bad puns. I just think they don’t fit the Lift character we met in WoR. That’s what bothered me.
Hey folks, I finished my read of WOR ReRead, so I’m almost caught up to everyone in real time. I have made the decision that I am going to break down and read the released chapters of Oathbringer concurrently with this reread, I wasn’t going to, but it will be great to participate in the spoiler group.
I’m actually rereading WoR right now, and I plan to jump in on the Oathbringer chapters as soon as I finish–I’m planning to get the actual book in November, so I won’t have a huge wait.
Its a belated comment, but I just realized that the QOTW contains this gem:
Considering how careful the phrasing in these books tends to be, and how significant the lighteyes/darkeyes split is, I can’t help but think that this has a second meaning.
I don’t know what it is, mind you, but…?