Blood of Elves
Sep. 12th, 2020 08:01 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
kraitI finished Blood of Elves!
Triss is so thirsty for Geralt I find it hard to keep a straight face when reading. "I value Yennefer's friendship more than Geralt's cock," she thinks to herself, and then spends another twenty lines on his sexiness and how much she wants to drag him off to bed. She'd rather sleep with him in the worst room of the keep than warm in the nicest tower room! I can only assume that this is because she doesn't yet know how cold Caer Morhen gets at night. :D
I might be more annoyed if the whole book was Triss --> Geralt pining, but the narrative moves on and switches POV enough that I just find it entertaining. Poor Triss! Horny and hopeless.
There are a lot of minor characters in this novel that I ended up wanting a book about! Coën, the Witcher "from Poviss" spending his first winter at Kaer Morhen, who's presumably from another Witcher school. The group of dwarves who are guarding a caravan for a human king, whose leader lost family in a pogram. Thebiology geek scholar on the boat who tries to explain to Geralt how many fish species in this river have been extirpated by pollution and that the monster he's guarding against doesn't exist. (And then excitedly tries to classify it while it's attacking.)
There's plenty of Dandelion - inexplicably misspelt 'Dandilion' throughout - but while he had some entertaining scenes here and there, Book!Dandelion is not exactly the most charming fellow and honestly I could do with less of him.
[Dandelion] divided women - including magicians - into very likeable, likeable, unlikeable, and very unlikeable. The very likeable reacted to the proposition of being bedded with joyful acquiescence, the likeable with a happy smile. The unlikeable reacted unpredictably. The very unlikeable were counted by the troubadour to be those to whom the very thought of presenting such a proposition made his back go strangely cold and his knees shake.
Philippa Eilhart, though very attractive, was decidedly very unlikeable.
Since he doesn't appear to recognise the concept of women he would not proposition, either Dandelion has standards at absolute zero, or he doesn't even acknowledge the existence of unattractive women.
On the plus side, Ciri's a darling. ♥ I love her telling Triss that she's going to be a Witcher and that Witchers don't feel fear, when it's obvious that she really wants this to true so her lingering nightmares about Cintra won't haunt her anymore. I also love the scene where she pwns the cleric trainee with a crush on her when he stealthily kisses her hair.
I thought there'd be some more unravelling of her mysterious visions and strange magical talents, but the book ends without revealing anything about how Ciri can have zero magical aura only to speak prophecy five minutes later, or what strange being is trying to possess her (or just talking in her head?) Nor do we learn what a "Source" really is, though we're told that Ciri is one. So there's lots of mystery about Ciri's abilities and magical dangers!
Her rather contentious relationship with Yennifer is interesting, too; I look forward to seeing more of that, because we get a whole lot of odd hints about Yennifer's relationships and history, but no details.
The other top candidate for the 'Well, This Was Definitely Written By A Man' Award, for the curious, is Triss's initial reaction to Ciri being given secret Witcher herbal supplements while at Kaer Morhen. She's appalled and concerned, because Ciri has recently had her first menstrual period and the supplements appear to be increasing her discomfort. Triss marches into the group of Witchers and lambasts them for not knowing she was menstruating, then demands they stop dosing Ciri and don't mess with her hormones, because...
... she might not grow breasts. Once they understand what she's suggesting, they're horrified enough to agree to stop the treatments.
Triss is so thirsty for Geralt I find it hard to keep a straight face when reading. "I value Yennefer's friendship more than Geralt's cock," she thinks to herself, and then spends another twenty lines on his sexiness and how much she wants to drag him off to bed. She'd rather sleep with him in the worst room of the keep than warm in the nicest tower room! I can only assume that this is because she doesn't yet know how cold Caer Morhen gets at night. :D
I might be more annoyed if the whole book was Triss --> Geralt pining, but the narrative moves on and switches POV enough that I just find it entertaining. Poor Triss! Horny and hopeless.
There are a lot of minor characters in this novel that I ended up wanting a book about! Coën, the Witcher "from Poviss" spending his first winter at Kaer Morhen, who's presumably from another Witcher school. The group of dwarves who are guarding a caravan for a human king, whose leader lost family in a pogram. The
There's plenty of Dandelion - inexplicably misspelt 'Dandilion' throughout - but while he had some entertaining scenes here and there, Book!Dandelion is not exactly the most charming fellow and honestly I could do with less of him.
[Dandelion] divided women - including magicians - into very likeable, likeable, unlikeable, and very unlikeable. The very likeable reacted to the proposition of being bedded with joyful acquiescence, the likeable with a happy smile. The unlikeable reacted unpredictably. The very unlikeable were counted by the troubadour to be those to whom the very thought of presenting such a proposition made his back go strangely cold and his knees shake.
Philippa Eilhart, though very attractive, was decidedly very unlikeable.
Since he doesn't appear to recognise the concept of women he would not proposition, either Dandelion has standards at absolute zero, or he doesn't even acknowledge the existence of unattractive women.
On the plus side, Ciri's a darling. ♥ I love her telling Triss that she's going to be a Witcher and that Witchers don't feel fear, when it's obvious that she really wants this to true so her lingering nightmares about Cintra won't haunt her anymore. I also love the scene where she pwns the cleric trainee with a crush on her when he stealthily kisses her hair.
I thought there'd be some more unravelling of her mysterious visions and strange magical talents, but the book ends without revealing anything about how Ciri can have zero magical aura only to speak prophecy five minutes later, or what strange being is trying to possess her (or just talking in her head?) Nor do we learn what a "Source" really is, though we're told that Ciri is one. So there's lots of mystery about Ciri's abilities and magical dangers!
Her rather contentious relationship with Yennifer is interesting, too; I look forward to seeing more of that, because we get a whole lot of odd hints about Yennifer's relationships and history, but no details.
The other top candidate for the 'Well, This Was Definitely Written By A Man' Award, for the curious, is Triss's initial reaction to Ciri being given secret Witcher herbal supplements while at Kaer Morhen. She's appalled and concerned, because Ciri has recently had her first menstrual period and the supplements appear to be increasing her discomfort. Triss marches into the group of Witchers and lambasts them for not knowing she was menstruating, then demands they stop dosing Ciri and don't mess with her hormones, because...
... she might not grow breasts. Once they understand what she's suggesting, they're horrified enough to agree to stop the treatments.
no subject
Date: 2020-09-14 01:35 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2020-09-14 10:25 pm (UTC)Meanwhile, the sheer volume of fics featuring show-Dandelion suggest he must be more personable!
no subject
Date: 2020-09-15 01:59 am (UTC)