ROASTING Fourth Wing for over 2 Hours (Rebecca Yarros)
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 28 ส.ค. 2024
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It would’ve been cool to follow her as a scribe when her family is so notorious as dragon riders. It could’ve been an exploration of what strength looks like beyond the the physical
That’s what I wanted. Like when Dain offers to smuggle her out, I could not understand why she didn’t go. Then she could have had a whole story about overcoming her mom’s prejudice and flipped the narrative of overprotective friend so that she was helping Dain from the outside. So much wasted potential.
She could be a tyrion lannister type ad be resourceful and be different and find round about ways and like the healer could hav taught hr tricks to manage.
You would think she would be creative resourceful badass.
Or if she hasthat immarure thoughtsshe is blinded by blind natioalism, while also ,i dont know,maybe they coveredfor her and thereare weird eugnics and she has to prove to herawfulmom.
With the end, you could have that play into nationalism and her really into talking about grand heroes and thats why sh recites history.
It could be interesting to be va character thats blind nationalist but facing stuff due her grave disability. And youcan hide it behind her initial blind loyalty. And healers hlpher covr uptoa degree with magic potions and the sharade.
And zaiden notices somethingoff and sems threatening, and wants to use her but they learn to trust.
YES! And if she had actually wanted to be a dragonrider, she could have researched dragons and ventured into their land and maybe found a dragon egg or defended the baby dragon after getting lost, and thus been saved from dragon execution by crossing into special dragon territory. That’s the book I wanted to read!
And it would make sense for her to then somehow acquire the small dragon bc it would represent her. Small and weak against the big boys.
Then, the better she gets as a scriber with a dragon, the stronger they both get, and thr dragon starts to grow bigger and stronger.
So much magic and dragon/"rider" connection in this story!
@@thgritic102 ooo that would've been so interesting, watching the two underdogs grow into their strengths and proving people wrong would've been fun
As a disabled person, I've found that the best way to write us doing cool shit while living with a disability is to have them: create an aid, develop a new strategy that suits them, and/or have other people adapt to their needs.
Disabled people know their limits better than anyone else ever will and if we say we can't do something or we need extra help, we mean it. I have autism and when I say I can't do a certain thing because it will set off my sensory issues and harm my ability to function, I mean it. I have tourettes syndrome too and similarly can't hold them back and know my triggers.
I cannot brute force my way through these issues. It's so frustrating to see disabilities used in this way where it feels like able-bodied inspiration porn.
Hey! I really enjoyed your comment and I think the first part is especially great advice for writers.
I’m sure this is a very big/broad question, but is there any way you can speak to your experience with tourette’s syndrome specifically as it relates to fiction? As in, how are some of the ways you’d like to see it represented, or examples of books where authors have portrayed it poorly or in a problematic fashion and how you would change it.
Have you ever read a book featuring a character with tourette’s that you felt was accurate?
What would be your advice be to someone who wants to write from the perspective of someone with tourette’s but doesn’t have it themselves?
I’m just a curious aspiring author who always likes to hear how people feel about their own personal representation. I feel like tourette’s is rarely featured, especially in the fantasy genre, and I’m wondering why? Interested to hear your take, but only if you’re comfortable answering, obviously. 🤗
@@darkclowdes I haven't actually read a book about someone with tourettes syndrome, but I'd absolutely love to!
To start with, people with tourettes syndrome suffer from something called "tics" which are involuntary actions we do. They can vary widely but mostly are separated into two categories: motor tics and vocal tics. Motor tics are tics to do with movement, eg: neck jerking, punching, kicking, etc. Vocal tics are tics to do with your throat and/or voice, eg: saying certain words or phrases, making noises, coughing, etc.
In order to have a tourettes syndrome diagnosis, you need to have at least two motor tics and one vocal tic. Otherwise you would just be classed as having another type of tic disorder.
Tics cannot be stopped but they can sometimes be redirected to another part of the body or a different function. Eg: I have tics where I jerk my arms and legs back but I can just sharply tense my muscles to give a similar feeling without causing as much disruption. Not every tic can be redirected though and it usually takes therapy to do so. It's often like having an itch on your leg and trying to scratch your arm to get rid of it, and we generally need a good understanding of our body and how sensations feel to be able to redirect it.
When a tic is coming, you can sometimes feel it and sometimes not. I have a coughing tic and I can usually feel it coming but I can't always feel my jerking tics. For lack of a better analogy, it feels like you've been holding in pee for a really long time and you're sat on the toilet. You know you're going to pee at some point and the stress and physical strain will be gone but you're self conscious about the sound of going while people know who you are in the cubicle. But no matter what you do, it has to get out and once you do, you feel way better.
Sometimes it's also like a random sneeze you don't see coming too.
Sometimes tics can be based off actual things we do in real life. My coughing tic used to be a joint tic where I reached my arm up to my elbow and coughed into it because we were told it was safer than using our hands in school. Sometimes people imitate whistles they do for sports or mannerisms they learned for a certain task.
Tics are also rarely one off. If you have an n-word tic, you probably won't just do it once but several times throughout your life. Sometimes they're less common than others but a one off tic is incredibly rare.
Thinking about tourettes or how our bodies feel can cause tics to flare up. Feeling stressed or uncomfortable can make our tics flare up. And when we're happy, calm or focussed on something, they're often less prominent. We do also sometimes have specific triggers, like clicking fingers or making loud noises. It's highly recommended you don't do this though, it's awful to lose your agency for someone else's sadistic entertainment.
Neurological disorders also often come with others, and tourettes is no different. It's quite common for people with ADHD to have some sort of tic disorder, and looking into all sorts of conditions can show links to other disorders. I have autism and possibly ADHD, and they interact with my tourettes syndrome. My sensory issues cause me stress and so they can make my tics flare up. If I'm hyperfixated on a task, I'm less likely to tic. Anxiety and depression disorders can also make them worse.
Now, as for writing a character with TS, I'd recommend asking yourself "how has their experiences with tourettes shaped their lives?". Many musicians with tourettes find singing helps them calm down and allows them to focus. Ergo Billie Eilish and Lewis Capaldi. If sports helps them, they might focus on that. I'm an artist and art is what helps me calm down. Though sometimes I use it as a crutch.
Having tourettes can also make us feel unconfident and concerned when doing certain tasks. I don't like handling delicate objects because I have thrown my phone via tics before and don't want to repeat that with ornaments or china sets. So I'd say they're likely to be quite cautious.
How do people around them treat their tourettes syndrome? Are they ableist and resent them? Do they laugh at them or with them? Do they purposefully trigger their tics? How prominent are they in their every day life? How does it affect their self image? Do they have friends or family with similar conditions? (My little brother has Echolalia, a condition where he repeats sounds and phrases he hears in a similar manner to a tic. It's quite common to have family with similar issues).
I'd also recommend putting a focus on how the character feels when they're ticking rather than what the actual tics are. Especially if they're just noises or words, unless the specific tic is important to the scene. Maybe describing swearing every now and then as "a flurry of empty profanities" or something of the like.
And finally, don't let their tourettes syndrome be their defining feature. At the end of the day, disabled people are still people and though our conditions do heavily affect us, there are other elements to our personalities and lives beyond it.
Thank you for actually asking me about it! Most people never really want to learn or think they know about us already. Most disabled folk are happy to share their experiences so long as you're polite and respectful. I know this is a lot so thank you for reading ❤️
Oh my goodness thank you so much for this reply! There’s so much great information here that I didn’t know before. Definitely saving it for my research.
I’m truly sorry that no one asks you or assumes they already know, especially about something so individual to you. We always have more to learn as humans! I really appreciate you taking the time to respond and I feel like I learned a lot! Thanks friend.
Absolutely love this comment ❤❤❤
Yes! The funny thing is that I actually have knee problems. Not like they get dislocated, but they can't bend much or carry my weight in certain situations. Powering through this would be the absolute worse thing, because I have done that early days and then I couldn't stand for an hour. I have no idea how someone who has a disability can write it so poorly. Unless she internalised the "tough it out, power through it" rhetoric.
As someone with a chronic disability... Its not just the pain that's a problem. All of these physical injuries, and pushing yourself beyond your limits, creates more literal physical restrictions. Like stiffness in the joints, for example. Its why a lot of people with this kind of disability often push themselves harder on a 'good' day, but then for about a week they can barely get out of bed. And it effects things like sleeping, which effects then performance and it becomes a balance of how much should I push forward vs how much should I hold back so that tomorrow I can function. I feel like if it was something the author was going to include, it should have been more focal. EDS is a 'serious' disability that changes someone's lifestyle choices, its not something you can just have as a 'quirk' of character building. I wish I'd joined the Patreon earlier in the month for this, actually.
Also toxic positivity is the bane of my existence. It was a staple of my childhood and lead to complete disfunction as an adult. The idea that if you just push hard enough you can be 'normal' instead of accepting there are limits, and working with that is healthy. I actually did a lot of long term physical damage to myself with this mindset.
I'm only at the 1hr mark lmao.
This is honestly really valuable insight. One of my problems with the book was that the actual logistics of Violet's condition felt very vague and sort of generically 'weak'. The kind of specificity you go into would've been great for the book to go into, and would've gone a long was towards making it feel less tokenistic. Not to mention the idea that condition has hard boundaries that you can't just white-knuckle your way through.
--Will
@@unresolvedtextualtension Its an interesting one to tackle, because you'll find a lot of the disabled community is split on this topic. A good portion will tell you they don't want to see that level of realism in media, because its escapism and wish fulfilment, and that's not what they're looking for in entertainment. Another large group will tell you they would much rather their condition wasn't used as a token quirk and that the grittiness of a realistic portrayal is important to convey, since a chunk of society just doesn't understand how chronic disability functions. The community is so broad that representation is always going to be controversial. But in this case I think if she was going to go into this much detail, she should have gone a bit further.
So true! I have Ehlers-Danlos but didn’t know that this book had EDS in it until I got a quarter of the way through, thought her symptoms sounded alarmingly familiar, and found out the main character and the author both have EDS. 🙃 I think it’s amazing that she’s bringing more awareness to an illness that is very under-diagnosed, but I worry about the exact toxic mentality you described being pushed in the book.
The MC never has pain days or flare ups, her injuries seem to be mostly annoying at best. And while most men with the condition function like this and don’t develop chronic pain (like the men in my own family) but women are quite often disabled by pain and other common comorbidities. Especially in the big final battle, it felt like the author totally forgot the character even had EDS, when in my experience, it’s during the most important high-stakes moments that EDS likes to strike and majorly screw up your life. I thought there would be some sort of build up to her doing everything she can to strengthen and protect her body, but her genetic connective tissue disease would win out in the end, with the EDS turning some minor injury into a nearly fatal blow for her. Because you can’t just “power through” a literal flaw in your DNA.
Because EDS is an invisible illness, we are constantly told growing up to “walk it off” and push through the pain, but at some point, you’ll burnout and crash (I sure have!) I worry that those with more severe EDS (like me) who have to adapt to some pretty hard physical limits, it might make people feel like they aren’t “trying hard enough” when we do the best we can each day with the cards we’re dealt. I also worry that others may not understand after reading this that EDS can be a severely disabling disease and will believe that we all could be dragon riders if we just tried hard enough, when that is so not the case.
Even with my concerns, I am glad that EDS is featured in such a viral book! I sincerely hope she listens to all the reader feedback about all this and can strike a better balance in the next book.
I am so used to push past pain and severe discomfort at this point, due to pressure to be a function human beeing in a not very acommodating society, that yes it causes physical harm! I do not register certain typs of pain really anymore. I broke two toes and it was way less painful then my periode can be. I miss signs of when I should seek a doc since I am mostly told its psychosomatic and they cant do anything or its linked to a chronic condition and they cant do anything so yeah, unless I got something concrete I wont go and chalk up pain, dizzyness and things like that as my usuall . . . . I probably would not register the pain from an inflamed apendix as anything unusual.
I bleed pretty badly into a pair of shoes, since I did not register they tore up my feet, the wound was about 1 mm deep and needed 1.5 months to close.
I cant count how often I crossed streets with barely any sight of sense of direction and it was just dumb luck that I made it . . .
and no matter how far I push and how I ignore all warnings signs I should not keep going as fare as its possible, I still have more sickdays then any profession allows
Hey, disabled reader here! This book is absolute shit for representation. The narrative of "pushing through the pain" isn't just insensitive, it's dangerous and insulting. I dearly hope that no one genuinely thinks this is how disabilities work, because abled people seeing our ongoing pain as moral weakness is a viewpoint that's done a lot of damage
Thank you for this lol I don’t have EDS but I am hyper mobile and have always had a huge plethora of chronic pain in my hips, knees, back and neck. I’ve always needed accommodations and to be careful if I don’t have to be in inflamed pain for days. I was SO excited to read about this main character and was utterly dissapointed. I was expecting accommodations, understanding and realistic solutions for violet. Instead I was left feeling shitty about myself for wanting to take dain up on the offer to get to safety while violet goes and “pushes through”. This really isn’t the way a book about a disabled character should be written. Let’s bffr violet would’ve been out for the count on SEVERAL occasions in this book to the point I think she should actually be in worse pain tbh
Imagine killing someone to bond with their super powerful dragon, then being all shocked pikachu when said dragon decides to incinerate your entire body
Yaross has been vocal about wanting to see herself and her disability represented, and has stated that that’s one reason why she gave Violet EDS (along with another, potentially icky reason, but we’ll come back to that). Because the author’s intention was to depict and represent a character with EDS, I have to question why the way she chose to depict EDS was to strip it of the elements that would have made it ACTUALLY realistic, representative, and inclusive of people with EDS. Everyone’s experiences with EDS are varied, but I and all of my EDS friends have dislocated joints just by walking and doing low-impact daily activities. Activities or sports like baseball, martial arts, and running, are advised against for people with EDS. There's a video of Yarros saying their family doctor has told them that her sons should not be playing hockey (and basically goes but boys will be boys, ew), and this is because of how prone we are to injury, long-term deterioration due to injury, and prolonged recovery times. Yet she has Violet sparring, being thrown around on a mat, doing wonder woman obstacle courses, etc. for a WHOLE FREAKING YEAR and it DOESN'T MATTER??
I also disagree with people who claim that every decision Violet makes is informed by her disability, because violet isn’t ever really thinking of anything specific or being mindful of how she moves and acts. Where is her planning to find pain-relieving herbs? Where is her sneaking (since she proves she can sneak) and finding the herbs herself or asking her healer/mender friends (plural) to help her in secret, making a heat pack, SOMETHING? Where is her wrapping her shoulders for more stability before going out to the obstacle courses she KNOWS she has to participate in? She read as incredibly dense to me, and i kept feeling like Yarros wanted me to pity her, because oh no look she's in pain and will be injured at any time, how sad.
It’s both a manifestation of Violet’s overall lack of agency and knowledge of her own body/disability, as well as a facet of her perseverance that is realistically toxic but never treated as toxic in the text. For it to seem like a really intentional part of the text, I think that the author needed to have shown some consequences of pushing herself so hard and not accommodating herself.
Also the thing about this portrayal of EDS/disability that bothers me along with the whole toxic perseverance thing is that Yarros does explicitly give us symptoms throughout the book. We get chronic pain, chronic sprains, subluxations (partial dislocations), dislocations, muscle weakness, joint laxity, and brittle bones. she says this plainly, yet these symptoms and manifestations never seem to matter outside of plot moments of dramatic injury. i think this is what allows people to argue on both sides of the coin, some saying "she would be unable to do all that, this is unrealistic and harmful" and "no she's fine, she can do it, see! her disability doesn't need to be her whole personality". i read the book and believed it when yarros told us Violet's symptoms (more fool me, i guess), and then was constantly baffled at the fact that it hardly mattered, and didn't seem to inform Violet's character much.
I’ve learned so much about EDS just through the discourse about this book and people speaking out about their own experiences, so that’s the ONE positive thing I can say about it, I guess 😅
@@robinronin lol yeah, another reason i actually am so annoyed by how it's depicted in this book because people who don't know what it is/how it works might now have unrealistic and harmful expectations of the disability and what it means for those with it. I've got screenshots of people on tiktok buying into the whole "just push through it" mentality from reading this book specifically, even going so far as to say that anyone who dislikes/takes issue with Violet's approach is just lazy/not willing to "do the hard thing" and try to better their own lives through working hard and exercising. quite frankly, it's terrifying. i struggle to get proper medical care from doctors who don't believe my disability literally disables me, and now i'm seeing it everywhere because of this book.
so if anyone sees me in like 100 other comment sections, it's because of this. 😅
@@whatareyousayinggirl Also, just falling off of your dragon and literally being grabbed by said dragon's claws, tossed into the air and thrown again onto your dragon's back while doing flight training seems like it would lead to major injuries, especially if this is happening 20-40x/day (as the book said). Again, I don't have EDS, but I think I'd be beaten up pretty badly if this was a regular day in my life. It felt so odd how none of the characters, disabled or no, suffered any consequences of the constant, nonstop physical beatings they were taking. She should have died or been permanently injured. But so should most of the characters. (In the author's defense, I guess most of the characters did die, so that's something...)
EDS gremlin here. The way disability is written in this book is so surface level and ableist- thank you for addressing it. "Just work harder" is such a harmful narrative and leads to so many of us causing permanent damage to our bodies in a futile attempt to do what an able bodied person can, in the same way. There was such a missed opportunity to show how the unique skills a disabled character has had to develop can serve her in the story. Violet could have been adaptive, resilient, resourceful- instead we got insincere inspiration porn.
01:19:43 --> "Congratulations. You gave the most high-profile son of a traitor the most powerful dragon. Good job! This is how you oppress." 🤣🤣🤣
There's something really uncomfortable about the worldbuilding in this. It's a cartoonishly brutal system that's based on extreme eugenics, but it's just... background...? and the main character just goes along with it? As a disabled character, she doesn't question these values at all, but aspires to them even more than everyone else. It's not that the character lacks awareness because that's the culture she grew up in either, it's like you're not supposed to think it's wrong at all-- it's not really a conflict in the book, it's just how the world is. It's like if Harry Potter set up Umbridge but then all the main characters just tried to join her club (whatever it was called) instead of fighting back
Instead of the theme being "everyone is valuable in their own way/a person's value isn't quantifiable based on pure strength", it becomes "wish fulfillment that someone with a disability can magically also become strong and succeed in a eugenicist society"
You hit the nail on the head. Also it's not just extreme eugenics but dumb eugenics.
Like, obviously all eugenics are dumb but this is especially egregious because so much of what it's selecting for isn't actual survival advantages like... physical robustness, cleverness, loyalty and compassion and other desirable traits that aid human survival.
They're selecting for ruthlessness, callous disregard for human life, plot armor, and sheer dumb luck. Actually that probably explains why the leadership of this country are a bunch of assholes.
I'm not trying to throw shade on military wives or families as a general group of people, but finding out that Yarros is a military wife just... made a sad amount of sense to me. The way nothing in the story - let alone the characters - question anything about the reasons or ethics of the war they're fighting, beyond 'we good! they bad!' just left such a bad taste in my mouth.
Wait a minute! Are you saying there's a dragon kingdom and a griffon kingdom, like one kingdom that has all the dragons, and one that has all the griffons. Two huge beast species that have wings and can fly hundreds of miles at a pop, and they both are satisfied staying put in their own human-made borders?
Yes. -Katie
Okay hear me out.
Little gold dragon and disabled girl bond over learning how to adapt in a world/lifestyle that isn't set up to accommodate them. After all the murder and romance and triumphs you like, they come to realise they have to establish their own place in the military and learn to balance their own limitations against their ambitions. Courier dragon rider.
There's a series of books in the same vein, I think its the Gryphon Rider Academy. Its obviously wish fulfilment/romance but goes way more in depth into how the military functions. The world building is much simpler but at the same time, stronger. No bratty main character. Its like a way less obnoxious alternative.
About the saddle problem: I'm going to reference Eragon by Christopher Paolini of all books. One image that's stuck with me for years was how dragon scales in that world were so sharp that sitting on them without a saddle would rip your skin to shreds, which happens to Eragon's thighs the first time he flies. It makes sense if dragons are meant to be this offensive species as I'm getting the sense they are in this world
That's such a good point
I remember first reading that book and even now it still sticks out in my mind because it was so horrific (especially since in the scene Saphira is rescuing Eragon, not trying to cause him any harm)
Eh if the scales are more like alligator skin they wouldn’t be sharp. Alligator skin has hard, smooth scales with bones called osteoderm that are plates growing under the skin. The osteoderms are the actual protective armor for them. Alligators aren’t the only animals that have them, some fish, extinct ground sloths, and some dinosaurs have them. It’s a pretty common adaptation so I could see dragons have something like that.
@platedlizard I know this is 5 months old so sorry if it's not relevant anymore but I just wanted to clear up the confusion... Eragon's injuries weren't because Saphira's scales were sharp, per se, but because they were so rough they rubbed through his clothing and then his skin (like super bad road-rash) from the friction. Maybe Yarros' dragons are of the "smooth-scale" variety more akin to snakes, but I think there would still be severe rubbing if they're supposed to be riding for long periods of time/energetically with lots of changing positions (not to mention, saddles help riders stay on a heck of a lot too). Again, sorry if it's an untimely reply, I'm just really into dragons and Eragon's problem with the dragon scales was really innovative writing to my preteen mind so it stuck 😅
i just loved how in context of the ending, xaden's initial hatred of violet makes no sense?? he's literally been allied/friends(???) with brennan the entire time? thats her family! but the sole reason he hated her IS because of her family. it literally makes no sense unless i'm missing something. anyway horrible book but thank you for the great review!!!!
Its the whole trope of "Family rival continuing the generational grudge for seemingly no reason". Its like Ganon and Link's fued continuing down the line between Ganon and Link's children, and then their kids, and it just goes further down. Unless Ganon is literally reincarnating and wants to kill them solely to stop the bloodline, there's no reason for it to keep going
@@arkkon2740 it would make sense if his hatred for her was because she shared her mother's ideology, or if he just assumed so. But from what I've gathered, it's never elaborated upon and the fact that he's been allied with her brother makes it even dumber. Like, just ignoring her and giving her a stink eye sometimes would have been fine, but threatening to kill her etc? Like, for why?
Books like this are motivating me to write decent fantasy fiction. Like dear GOD this book is terrible.
But everyone loves it on Good Reads... I have no faith in anything... yet again.
When I get off work, I'm going right back to my fantasy bc dear gawd! 😫
@@vapx0075i found that strange too. Goodreads gives it like a 4.6/5
Maybe because its so long and shallow that they don’t stop and think about the logical fallacies. Probably for the best
The problem with seeing this as a fine introduction to fantasy - as the author presumptuously intended it as - is that people won't go from this to actual adult fantasy. I've already seen people in reviews go "I didn't like this. Fantasy isn't for me." Which might be the case, but you can't judge fantasy from this. And if they like it they'll just read more romantasy books similar to it. But there are any number of well written fantasy books that don't have complicated world building or super fancy prose. Which are the usual stereotypes. I'd never in a million years recommend this to beginners. It's not doing them any favors.
And because this is so bizarrely successful there will just be more copycats. It's not the end of adult fantasy or anything. But we're starting to get some bleed over between things that used to be a lot more separate. The publisher actually tried to comp this as "Game of Thrones meets [something]". Just because it has dragons. Which is just absurd and causes the wrong expectations in people.
urg somoresarah j mass ripoffs
@@marocat4749i love samora j. Mass. Reading throne of glass (the second book) right now
This is labeled as a romantasy, but there was no to build the fantasy or the romance, so what were we here for? If she wanted to write erotica, she should have just done that 😂
The lack of any real attempt to at least flesh out the world building is so upsetting to me. 😭
Romantasy author seems to be ashamed to write straight up erotica so they had to conceal the "low brow" genre with fantasy settings lol
This could have been a KU smut novella and been pretty ok. The people had sex while their bonded dragons had sex and they could all feel each other? Doesn’t sound like the most horrific thing ever.
@@tungstensmum1491hate to be bonded to a hornball dragon and you just gotta endure ts
42:08 as graceless as reciting facts can be as a form of worldbuilding, my favorite example to cite of reciting facts doubling as exposition and character work is actually through Fishlegs from How To Train Your Dragon. I know it’s a kids movie, but I just think it’s well handled! Fishlegs always recites stats & facts about the dragon’s they’re fighting in the practice ring. It helps the audience get up to speed about each type of dragon, but it also is great economical character work for him as well bc it’s in lieu with his other character traits. He’s kind of cowardly and incompetent in battle, so him memorizing stats and absorbing as much as he can about dragons from a textbook is clearly a way he tried to gain control over a scary situation. However, because of his nerves and awkwardness, he is unable to funnel his knowledge into battle skill. Recitation comes across as a coping strategy, but its not just that. He clearly has enthusiasm for the subject matter that the other students dismiss because it’s “nerdy”, he takes pride in his dragon knowledge bc it’s the one thing he’s actually pretty good at, but his infodumps are usually ignored further characterizing him as socially awkward. Him lacking in discernment also comes across in the arena, fact reciting also shown as distracting to the other kids and ruin more stealthy combat situations. I genuinely think this could’ve been a good approach to take in characterizing Violet. As a scribe, she’s probably used to a more insular life, so maybe she relies on the knowledge she absorbed in the scribe quadrant and lacks in social tact. Basically she has book smarts but not street smarts. I really don’t see a character reciting facts about the world that have nothing to do with dragons benefiting the story bc it doesn’t do enough to characterize her. It’s just infodumping for the sake of the reader
Another really awesome series that delves into dragons as characters is the “How to Train Your Dragon” series, both the books and movies. Even if they’re for kids, they really make the main dragon, Toothless, feel like a character in his own right
and the books do the whole small pathetic dragon and “weak” scholarly kid with big warlike parent who wants them to follow in their footsteps things SO much better than this!
HTTYD is a brilliant series I love the movies so much!
I said it in Rachel's comment section and I'll say it here, too. It BOGGLES the mind that the main character delivers exposition by narrating it to herself when there is an entire HISTORY CLASS, just RIGHT THERE, where such exposition would at least make logical sense!
A lyrics from a in world song or fairy tale would be so much better.
One of the BEST podcast episodes for one of the WORST books to read. I hope Violence and Rhysand, sorry i mean Xaden have a dragon foursome in the next book, and in the throes of passion Tairn accidentally sits on the humans, killing them both... but thats a vain hope. They're probably going to bicker and act like adolescents in between bouts of strenuous coitus, while the dragons pant and hiss and clean up after their little gremlins for no apparent reason.
"He looked like statue that a master sculptor had worked on for years, only for the master to die right at the end, leaving his mediocre assistant to finish it."
Fed up? Me? Nah...
I love when you do 2 hour long podcasts . It's the perfect thing to have when doing art.
Yes I agree! I’m drawing rn 😂
One of the main problems I have with this book is actually the problem I have with the whole fantasy romance genre, and that's that, most of the time, it isn't marketed properly. Maybe because it mostly grew in the indie sphere where people are doing their own marketing (and I'm not knocking indie; I'm an indie author myself). But to me, fantasy romance is a subgenre of the ROMANCE genre - it falls alongside paranormal romance, suspense romance, billionaire romance, etc. But more often than not, I see these books marketed like they fall under the Fantasy heading first and foremost. If they're in bookstores, they're likely to be shelved under Fantasy, the covers trend more towards fantasy than romance, they're marketed alongside other Fantasy book that often are very different. (I've heard this book as marketed towards readers of Leigh Bardugo and SJM - SJM is a fair comparison, because ACOTAR is definitely fantasy romance, but Bardugo? I don't get that comparison.)
I'm not knocking the fantasy romance genre in general - it's not really my cup of tea because I'm not big into romance, but overall I love that fantasy romance has emerged as such a big genre. I just wish people recognized it as primarily romance, rather than fantasy, for the reasons you guys say here - people who aren't familiar with fantasy reading books like this and thinking it's representative of the fantasy genre, when mostly, it's not.
This is the first time someone said exactly what I've been thinking since ACOTAR blew up. But I've always been wary of being accused of thinking that book written for women are worth less and that's why I would want them in the romance genre while it's the complete opposite.
I wholeheartedly believe that putting romance fantasy in the romance genre would free authors from desperately trying to include many fantasy genre conventions that clash with the romance one. And allow them to indulge the reader more with romance and smut because they don't need to pretend that worldbuilding and plots are more important then the spicy scenes.
I have always wanted more romance book set in a fantasy world but sadly the closest was paranormal until now. Problems is that I also love standard fantasy and have lost all trust in publishing company and marketing. Because of all of romance fantasy being wrongly labelled and 99% of those books not giving me what I wanted aka good solid worldbuilding, complex plot and romance being secondary or largely absent. At least I'm immune to hype now since I know that anything popular will not be to my taste.
I would not be surprised if marketing is well aware of what they are doing by mixing books that have nothing to do with each others. But I hope that with so many of us complaining newcomer in the fantasy genre will have more chance seeing that romance fantasy is not the same as fantasy if you know what I mean.
Yea it's a bit weird seeing ACOTAR besides Terry Prachett.
Yes! That was my main issue with this book. If I'd known it was romance first, fantasy a distant second, I'd have skipped it. (Also it's YA. The characters don't act 20+ at all. Just let it be YA.) But this was marketed as Dragonrider Academy, and I was like what's up with this dragonrider school? Why aren't they learning how to ride dragons? This just irritated me more and more until I gave up. I read romance, and I read fantasy, and you can do both well. But most fantasy romance isn't for me and I know it. So just be honest about what the book is with the marketing and we can all be happy.
I disagree. I think fantasy is the genre for books that don’t have a large romance plot. Most fantasy books have some romance. But to be called a “fantasy romance”, it’s a bigger part.
@@CaliforniaBabe3 Was this comment directed at me? Because I'm not sure how your comment disagrees with mine. What you've said here is in line with my opinion as well?
My quick fix of this novel:
1) keep the reveal of Xanden's father till the halfway point.
Like say, Violet's mother is visiting the school, and during a brief talk with Violet, Xanden rounds the corner, sees them and gets visibly frightened. Violet's mother orders him away and Xaden books it out.
It's at that point we get her mother explains that that Xanden is the youngest child of the great traitor and violet must be weary of him.
Violet then recalls that her mother personally executed his father and she's like....oh...shit.
2) keep the whole mated bond thing, and have violet continuously question if her lustful feels towards Xanden are generally hers or her dragons.
3) actually develope the side characters more!
I found that a big issue with this book is that we don't spend time with side characters beyond their narrative points.
4) with Dain - have him be under Violet's mother thumb!
If you have the plot point where her mother doesn't want her to be a rider, she uses her influence as a prominent figure to have Dain spy on Violet/ convince her to be a scribe
He's ment to be career focused- have that his position be threatened or even his father's own position be threatened
So to save that, Dain tries to everything to stop Violet. Including playing on her crush.
Yes, it sucks - but would make that betrayal hurt more
And shows how far her mother is willing to go.
😅😅😅😅😅oh I'm 17:35 n bm
One thing I hate so much about the so called disability representation is the fact that the author didn't even give much attention to Violet's disability and what type of lifestyle she leads because of it. It's brought up only when the plot has a reason to bring it up. The least Yarros could do is mention Ehlers Danlos Syndrome, but no, we get a half-hazard, generic description of an illness which some people might not even pick up because it is THAT unimportant. Yarros only brought up the broken ligament so Dain could coddle her and Violet could feel like a little baby. Never mind that many people with EDS have a hard time doing basic movements and they are advised against to NOT do any physical activities because it might harm them. But the author doesn't have that, instead Violet is doing kickass battle with no problem and we have a plotline where the protagonist is learning to "push through the disability". This type of representation is not new and it's so frustrating to have to read about a character who is disabled, who is not like able bodied people and told to just push through the pain and be like them. No, you don't need to push through, you don't need to be able to do what abled people do to be worthy. WHY IS THIS STILL HAPPENING IN BOOKS?
I don't have EDS but I'm mentally disabled and I've had been told by many people that I should just "try harder". I don't. I'm disabled and yet I'm categorized as lazy, stupid and so much more. I'm tired and frustrated by people telling me and other disabled people that we don't try hard enough.
in all fairness she literally couldve mentioned it by name since we already established "October" was a month in a fantasy world 💀
@@jinphany.EXACTLY! If she can have 'for the win' in a fantasy world (which is apparently translated from an old language) it doesn't make sense for there to not be a better explanation for the illness. Worse, she gave vague and contradictory reasons for it. Did Violet get this illness because of the fever her mother got? Or is it because she stayed at the library too much? WHICH IS IT YARROS
@@DarwinRoger893 exactly like the excuse it’s a foreign world isn’t applicable here because we have real word Morden phrases and months in said world 😭 at this point she should just say all the illnesses or conditions by name along with the therapeutic or medicinal practises used to help them 🤦♀️😭
I know this is kind of late and I agree with the if she mentions October why not mention EDS point but also Authors leave notes in the back of their books all the time like thank yous to the fans. They have dedication pages and sometimes trigger warnings or even just pages talking about their real life influences in the world they created. If she didn't want it in the actual story itself why not just say in the back or front of the book what the disease is?
I have Ehler's Danlos. My hip pops out during tame naughties, how was she still in one piece after a railing? If I am not super conscious of how I'm positioned, I can get dancer's hip for 2 weeks. And for the record, my EDS isn't even as severe as hers!
I don't think I even have EDS, just some weird hypermobility & fucky joints, & I can literally feel my knees sublaxate just trying to get into a proper position, how she does *anything* with her level of EDS I have no fuckin clue
I am physically disabled from my service in the USAF (and have some wonderous serious autoimmune disorders on top of this) and am a daughter of a woman who has been physically disabled from birth. Most times that I hear that a book has a disabled character it is either a) some minor character that is either sidelined or made to be useless or b) the disability has no real repercussions and is just there for...uh, "flavor". I work in a profession that is physically hard on me and I have to think about how to go about things to protect myself physically along with being aware that there may be a time I can't do this work. It's just important to me and that's why I do it.
I have a friend that has EDS along with her oldest daughter. Now my friend was a wild child and can tell you stories about being arrested in the dead of night as a teen, dislocating her fingers to get the handcuffs off and climbing out of the windows of cop cars. That doesn't change the fact that she suffers from EDS and I remember the last time I saw her in person - her daughter had just dislocated her pelvis while getting ready for school, not watching what she was doing, and they were working on fixing that.
EDS (Evil Disease Serpent is what I always thought of it as when I was younger) is a serious condition that has a variety of effects for those who are unfortunately afflicted with it. They can certainly live full lives, be adventurous, and should be seen as people. Holy hell, yes. But it isn't something to just shrug off and it sounds like this book does just that.
If you're giving characters limitations, then they must abide by those limitations. I'm not sure why physical prowess for women is so worshipped in literature these days instead of having Violet be able to figure out a way to overcome her problems in other ways. Having someone fight who is effected by EDS and not seeing the massive negative outcomes this could have just makes me want to hit my head against a wall. It makes me feel like the message is women only have worth if they are "strong" and only certain kinds of strength are acceptable.
And lol Song of Achilles - gah what a terrible book that neuters the men as if: "It's fine that men are lovers, as long as they act a certain way." It's so gross. And this is coming from someone who likes slash fanfiction when done well. This is before the whole white-washing of Achilles' story, villianizing his mother for no reason while making her year-long 'grape' okay, and making Patroclus an ineffective and useless bobble that Achilles treks around with because...well, not sure why Achilles keeps him around.
In fact, I think I hate SoA even more because I know a couple of men who served in the US military during the "don't ask don't tell" era who had to keep their lives a secret or risk losing their whole careers. And that was a real possibility - people would walk in and claim they were gay to an NCO/CO in order to get out immediately. So, to take Achilles and Patroclus, two warriors who were incredibly skilled, and take that away from them (especially Pat) for a story with cardboard characters sold with promise of "boys kissing in a safe way" is even more infuriating to me.
Sand dan Glotka in First Law is pretty great. He can't escape his physical limitations. He is constant pain. Stairs are his biggest enemy. But his job requires him to walk all over the city. It's constantly emphasized how doing most things is painful to him. It doesn't go away when convenient. His strength is his intelligence and his personality instead.
But that's grimdark and as such it can get away with portraying his life as miserable. In most other fiction I think something more inspirational is expected. Certainly in YA. Something to show that life can still be great. You'd just think that someone who is personally affected and should know better would manage to combine that with having realistic limitations.
Why does it feel like the more popular the YA book the worst it is.
I can't wait to listen to this at work later omg. I was screaming at this book for about 200 pages until finally surrendering to its abject stupidity and then I ended up enjoying. And I'm trash so I pre-ordered the next one. There's so much implausible nonsense but one thing I can't shake is why she didn't make Violet the rebel's kid and Xaden the general's kid. It would have fit the self-indulgent tropes she was going for better. Then there'd be a reason for other kids to want her dead, a reason for her to ~stay away~ from the fiercely loyal general's son, a reason she is completely physically ill-equipped to be there, a reason for people to be angry that she got the best dragon bonding, and then when in a 'shocking' twist of fate Xaden turns out to be aiding the enemy, it would be more meaningful for both characters.
Wow that would have been so much better . . .
Omg such a simple tweak that would have been so good!!! 🤯
So...everything except the "magic" in regards to the bond with dragons is straight lifted from Pern, right down to the way the dragons' relationships affect their riders. At least Lessa and F'lar are fully realized adult characters, damn.
Edit to add: For real, it's wild to me that Song of Ice and Fire is the presumed touchstone for these dragon riders. It's Anne McCaffrey's Pern. This writer read Pern and poorly recreated that bond. (And PS: Sounds like Temeraire also uses Pern as inspiration)
Yes, this. This is so much like Jaxon and Ruth bonding. Also a bit of Eon, which handled disability better.
YES I'm so excited for this roast!! I actually thought the book was so bad it was fun--until that is the enemies-to-lovers was revealed as INSTALOVE. To me that's just a total betrayal to the audience; I for one wanted to read an enemies-to-lovers story, not an instalove one.
I'd argue it wasn't even instalove since they never fell in love. They just had s3x and were forced to hang around each other
Yes!! I was frustrated that this was marketed as enemies to lovers, when this is absolutely just instant love.
did anyone else suspect this started as how to train your dragon fanfic?
Nah the dragons would atleast be creative if that was the case not just different colours with different shaped tails
I got this book for .99 cents in an audiobook promo and I was a victim of the hype. At no point could I ever remember that these characters were over the age of 20. "plot twists" happened that had me scratching my head (the part where a wing leader tries to kill her caught me off guard bc I genuinely didn't remember ever hearing that character's name).
The fmc was a Mary Sue in my opinion. She was a super special girl who does no wrong, bonds with the most powerful dragon EVER, bonds with TWO DRAGONS (also unheard of), and has super special powers that she absolutely has to keep secret.
This book falls into the trappings of many new authors with things like massive character casts and many side characters have indistinguishable voice. There were periods in the audiobook where several characters were talking and I couldn't distinguish who was who until another dialogue tag popped up. All of the side characters were entirely forgettable aside from Jack and that was because there was never a period of time where he didn't confuse me by simply existing.
As a writer seeking to publish soon, I'm often smacked with bouts of imposter syndrome and the belief that my work is subpar. If this book was good for anything, I was good at filling the silence in car rides to work and making me realize that truly anything can get published with proper hype.
Side note: the word repetition was driving me to violence (also, the worst possible nickname that the fmc could've been given btw). If I have to hear one more time about how someone "palmed" this or that, I may cry
It was "quirked" for me!! If I read it one more time....
@@dixieAQHA between "palmed", "quirked", and the infamous tingling/icy scalp, I genuinely felt like I was just reading the same things over and over again
These are the type of books you should check out when you don’t feel good enough as a writer
My issue with this book isn't a matter of "how does anyone like this?" It's that something that is so fundamentally badly written is being glorified. It's not even a guilty pleasure. It's like, sure, everyone should be allowed to enjoy a Twinkie once in a while. Twinkies aren't good for you, but they are fun and fluffy and okay as a treat. But this is a pile of garbage that people are squeeing over like it's a Twinkie at worst, lobster and steak at best.
Why train War Dragons and then refuse to use them in battle to defend your neighbors? If you're hiding behind an OP magical barrier then why have Dragon Riders and battle magic at all?
And really the Rebels being the good guys is so predictable.
Books like this is exactly why I hate competition YA. 99% of the time it's garbage.
I actually dropped reading this in the first chapters, so thank you for telling me how it went without having to go through the whole experience.
Again, thank you.
Thanks for taking one for the team, guys 😂
Also, Will I forgot to mention this before, but I named a character in one of my stories after you 🙃 Working on a Maria and Katie atm 😂
It’s been weeks since my mind was ravaged by this book and I stand by my conclusion: This book is bullsh*t soup.
Lol this is just a worse Eragon with Divergent sprinkles
I enjoy listening to this podcast while I write my own book. I would listen to y’all's criticisms and critiques and make sure I don't have any of the same problems.😅
I can't stop thinking about how this book has an extremely similar plot to Fireborne by Rosaria Munda (dragonriding academy, military aspect, revolution, the two main characters having different backgrounds, etc. except in Fireborne it was done waaay better imo)
it's so similar that I wonder if Yarros ever read that book and decided to take inspiration from it (maybe not the military part 'cause she's a military wife) but because she's used to contemporary, she didn't spend much effort on the worldbuilding.
Also goes to show how books should be marketed-this is romance fantasy/romantasy, it sounds cringe but it's a useful label. As a fantasy media consumer (not limited to books) I was intrigued by Fourth Wing up until I saw and read reviews. I see why people enjoy it, but it's just not for me.
It is somewhat impressive how uncreative Yarros can be when writing a fantasy book.
I remember you guys talking about omegaverse when talking about ACOTAR 2(tbh i forgot the acronym) and this kinda made me realize its becoming more of a thing in romantacy YA novels for some reason. Despite the fact that 90% of these settings dont or at least shouldn't have a system like this besides facilitating for smut at relatively inconvenient or dull parts of the plot. Just make em smash and get on with it 💀
It's so goddamn weird how common that got in ya fantasy romance. Like am i literally living through the ear of ABO in fantasy literature? I'd honestly rather take back all those conan the barbarian style pulp shitshows.
& it's always between straight couples too! If you can't do gay A/B/O like god intended you to, why do it at all? /j
Those authors are cowards, they don't even commit to the bit and make it downright omegaverse which at least would be fun to read. But again it would be straight omegaverse and that's for losers unless the man is the omega
@@CursedCatTruffa They're not gonna make the man the omega mostly because *he's* sought after more than the alpha girl and they cant have that. Especially since this is a polyamory plot that just turns into a tug of war over come coochie
This book drained me of the will to live on this planet 😢 but we all must make sacrifices for the algorithm 😅
A major problem of the book is that these nominal twentysomethings, who murder often and fuck constantly, all talk, act, and think like middle-schoolers. It's bizzare, and borderline-gross in the allegedly spicy scenes.
the scream I scrumpt when I saw the title 🙏 Fourth Wing slander is on par with Lightlark slander
I highly recommend for anyone who likes the premise of fourth wing but wants to read an actually well written version of it, to go check out Fireborne by Rosaria Mundo.
Fireborne is a YA fantasy (1st book of a completed trilogy), and follows two main characters who are in a military academy and training to become dragon riders.
The world is really interesting and well thought out.
The story takes place right after a big revolution and the people have overthrown a dragon riding aristocracy. A lot of the story revolves around the questions that come up when a newly formed government is put through crisis. All seen through the eyes of the protagonists, who as teenagers are old enough to know what life was like before the revolution, but young enough to have grown up in the new system.
Also the military elements all make sense in this series. They employ logical means to train their most valuable military assets, their dragon riders.
Another great thing about this series, that not just makes it a great dragon riding book, but also a fantastic Ya series, is the way the story manages to create stakes and allow for really complicated and nuanced conflicts.
It also has one of my favourite slow burn romances (at least in YA), the relationship has actually depth and tension, while also providing believable reasons why the characters can't just get together.
I'm actually really salty that Fourth Wing kinda took of over night, and was, at least inintally, advertised as this YA adjacent military dragon fantasy with a slow burn romance when that is literally a (much better) perfect description for Fireborne.
So, for anyone who picked FW up without realising that it is actually just a very trashy smutty romance mascarading as a high fantasy, I highly recommend reading Fireborne.
The discord is an absolute organism and it's lovely.
This book read like a first draft and the author didn’t have any critique partners within the fantasy genre.
While I always feel bad when you read a terrible book, I love watching you tear through a review of a book you hate. I salute your pain!
I live in the space between hope and dread that they’ll do that to me one day. 😅
01:13:35 I strongly agree on the point that there is no commentary on the world that would support the idea of this book being disability representation. The fact that so many people die in this world for so-called being weak and everyone just accepts is a factor of abilism.
So the entire dragon unit is built on the precepts of eugenics....... wtf 😭😭😭
I work in a library and the DAY this book went into the catalog - before it was even through processing and on the shelf - we got THREE different borrowing requests from other libraries.
On the subject of shadow powers, and I mentioned this elsewhere, I think that the problem with its use in modern YA is that it's not properly understood beyond Bad Boy Powers. "Shadow" magic originally is never literal shadows, but it's shorthand, usually for dark magic that stems from a usually evil source, sometimes with a "light" to balance it. One could argue that this extends to Final Fantasy's black and white magic, which is series shorthand for offensive and defensive and not literally black and white colored.
And yet authors see something like "He uses the powers of the corrupted old gods that slowly devour the world from the inside out and it manifests as black energy and people call him a shadow mage" and boil it down to "shadow boy hot."
I bought this book before seeing any hype about it and I read the whole thing in one sitting. So I completely agree with what you said about how fast paced it is. But when it was done I was just like “well that was entertaining!” And put it out of my mind. Didn’t love, like, or hate it. It was just whatever to me. Haha. So I was so surprised when it took over the internet 😂
How...how do they do effective aerial combat without saddles or harness for the riders? Do the dragons just limit themselves to always flying level and never making any sudden turns during battles? Or do the riders not really ride them in combat situations?
ETA: having now finished the whole video, my questions have been answered and I am baffled by these choices.
Every time you guys say Xaden Riorson's last name my brain puts an image of Ned Ryerson from Groundhog Day in my head. This is an interesting headcanon that's developing...
Wait, the big, scary black dragon is named Tír na nÓg? (Sorry, don't know how it's spelled in the book.) As in the Irish myth of the Land of Youth?
Even though I had nothing to do with you guys having to suffer through this book or any of the previous dumpster fires you've read, I apologize. But I also appreciate your sacrifice, to warn others.
The whole point of her being frail and doing all the non-combat training is so she can be an extra-out-of-water fish. Really cranks up the adversity.
Problem is, of course, as you've already described: lacking foundation. There's really no reason not to be a scribe; she's good at it, trained for it, it's important, it's a position of at least modest prestige. Had she been cast out of the scribes for some reason; copying forbidden text, sneaking into an area she's not supposed to be in, budget cuts, where no one is really pleased to have her becoming a Dragon Rider, but it's a job that needs filling.
The issue impacts a lot more, unfortunately. The Dragons are subservient because they are. It's not as though they need to be or there's something humans provide them in exchange, it's just how it is, like her being made to be a rider instead of a scribe, and so on and so on.
Katie is talking about Dragon Actually by G. A. Aiken and it’s a series. And it’s a fun romp with randy dragon royalty.
OMG THANK YOU, I need to reread it -Kt
They set up a society where all the elites are psychically bonded to dragons, and the academy where you learn to bond with dragons is a murder competition academy. It feels like the obvious thing to do is have the dragons be an intensely fratricidal species and the psychic bond has side effects on the moral/psychological outlook of the humans. You could even have it be that dragons don't grow from age but go through growth spurts when they eat other dragons and the biggest and strongest dragons are the ones who devour the entire rest of their clutch mates. It even kind of thematically mirrors the way expansionist empires consume their neighbors. Also, if they're gonna be so militant that they feed their children into a meat grinder then they should be an expansionist empire or at least trying to maintain some kind of regional hegemony. I'm not saying that's the only correct synthesis of dragons and murder academy but that just seems like the easiest way to pay off that set up.
I am so glad I didn't waste my hard working money on this book.
I am still so disappointed that the book has DRAGONS and doesn't do anything interesting with them, easily the worst part of the book for me
I did not understand why she was so pissed at Xaden at the end.. it wasnt just his secret to tell.. he was protecting how many of the rebel kids? She's supposed to be so smart and it just didn't show..
I was immensely frustrated by this book, and yet I want all my friends to read it now. Misery loves company XD
You put into words some things I was feeling about it. That things just happen one after another and theres no attempt to keep the tension building or story threads pulling, either in the 'romance' plot or in the overarching 'world' plot. It really felt to me like it was written all in one run, start to finish, with the author making things up as she went along.
I lost all interest in reading this book, when people compared this to SJM books, especially ACOTAR series. The main guy is supposed to be like Rhysand 2.0, so no thanks.
Also, can someone confirm if it's true, are they similar?
yes
Agreed that the excessive deaths in the school and to get into the school was dumb. I really did not understand that part. Along with that, there are pretty much no consequences for people like Jack who just break peoples necks??
And I guess the author was trying to make it sexy too???? Like why are you sexualizing this mf killing people???
If they feel what the dragons feel when they have sex, wouldn't they be horny for dragons then, and not for a human? Because the dragons are not just horny for anyone, they apparently have a specific partner they're horny for, so shouldn't Violet be horny for the blue dragon? 🤔 And why do the riders only feel the dragons when they're horny and not when they're feeling anything else?
This is such stupid cringeworthy worldbuilding.
If you think it like that, then yeah, absolutely
Buuuuut if you think it like omegaverse, they're gonna think they're dragons in their head or something 💀
The whole horny dragons making their riders be horny thing makes me think of Dragonriders of Pern. Which was written better though it is rather dated in some aspects given it came out in the 70s or 80s and the author had weird ideas about gay men.
Is nobody going to mention Katie's mousey sneeze?
13:21
Also, everybody push this channel, let's try to bump them up to 10k... They deserve it.
as someone with chronic and at ties absolutly debilitating pain and having to push the the lesser one all the time . . . I do have an insane pain tolerance when it comes to certain typs of pain. I will not notice doing actuall physical damage by keep going sice it is just drowned out. For example I do not use local anesthesia when my teeth are treated, I can hold still and that little pain is less of an inconvinience then the numbing and waiting till that recides.
I wore illfitted shoes all night and ended up creating a more then a mm deep wound that way, that would not heal for one and a half month, cause yeah it hurt, but I am used to so much worse. I broke toes and that was less painful then my periode can be when I got a bad month (have like 3 conditions that make that hell)
I was forced to run sprints while dizzy enough, that I could barely see anything, since my sports teacher was a drill sargent. my perseption for pain and discomfort is completle screwed and I am pretty sure I would have it way easyer dealing with an injury then someone less used to it.
but when I say something hurts or I can not do it, there is no push myself harder, just trying harder and so many people do not get it, cause they do not see the source of my pain, only how well adapted I am to deal with getting dizzy etc and thing I make it out to be worse then it is . . . it really is not.
Why would a dragon bond with the person that killed their rider if doing so puts that dragon under extreme duress? I’m confused.
I think you can both have stuff make sense later in a series, but also make it make sense in the book it comes up with. You tie up MAJOR events and arcs and details in a book, but MINOR details or throw away lines that need only a sentence explanation are there to be expounded upon in later books.
Something that effects the plot in a major way-. =Explain and make it make sense
Something minor like a feature or single line of detail = can wait, AS LONG as its not something that effects the plot
Example, in A series of Unfortunate Events, the second book the Klaus and Violet are remembering how they tried to make toast for thier parents once and they burned it and caused thier parents to run downstairs and were mad at them for a bit, befire they all make breakfast together
The point of that in the second book was how they remembered thier parents weren't as idealized as they usually remember, because that is what happens to loved ones who die, we tend to remember only the best stuff, and then remembering something that wasn't so great makes you feel guilty, bit them they recall thier parents weren't mad for long.
Later when the books explain more about the secret society their parents were in and how atarting fires is a trademark of the enemies (and what eventually killed thier parents) its not pointed out, but there's a moment as a reader where you go
"Oh, thier parents were mad that day because they were scared, because they woke up smelling smoke in the house"
That's how you sow and tie up seeds in a book series
FINALLY oh my god I needed y’all’s opinions more than anyone’s 😭
I feel so bad for putting off watching this one, but I wanted to read the book first. Alas, I got halfway through it, said that’s enough, and rushed to your video. Y’all are insightful and entertaining as always.
Is the dragon REALLY called Tirnoch, Tirnannoch, whatever? This is the second fantasy series, after Kingdoms of Amalur, that has a dark scaled dragon called Tirnoch & I'm pretty sure they got that name from a Celtic legend about a mystical land where some fairies live. What is up with dragons & being named after mythical places in fantasy series?
Reading this book made me develop temporary tourettes. The number of "Oh [expletive] come on!!!" That burst out of my mouth in disbelief, if I had a swear jar, I'd be broke.
I was so angry at this book.
Y'all were talking about the emotional impact and how it fails in Fourth Wing and I started thinking about Temeraire, my favorite series, and how well it does. THEN Y'ALL MENTION TEMERAIRE? Reading my mind, instant follow.
Haven't read it yet. But I've heard it is one of those books where you will love it or you will hate it. I guess there's no in between
Adding onto the bad execution of the reciting facts to ground herself - it could even be the way that she connects with the dragon (these dragons are super old & sentient, they might enjoy people just talking to them and actually respecting their sentience beyond 'keeping the kingdom safe') instead of oh no these people are trying to kill me and then boom big ass dragon comes to protect me
Edit: the laziest thing that could've been done is since Violet was training to be a scribe her whole life she uses that knowledge to gain an advantage when meeting the dragons - obviously the scribes would have knowledge over dragons since they're a quadrant of the military and the dragons are the most important part of it. For example, she's a scribe who specializes in dragon behavior/anatomy/identification as a compromise her father might've had with her mother since Violet has EDS which would make dragon riding difficult for her
Edit 2: I just remembered this book named Damsel which also has to do with dragons (vaguely) and the plot twist there was...certainly something. One of the worst books I've read
Kate: that sounds like a medical issue
Me: dead 😂😂😂😂😂
I couldn’t get past the fact that the military is low on manpower, so the first thing they do is kill off at least half of their best soldiers over the course of the training for no reason. and secondarily, this is a dragon riding academy, but some percentage of students fail to ride the dragon and plunge to their deaths upon being chosen by their Dragon. WORST dragon riding Academy ever! YOU HAD ONE JOB! If your students spend months in a dragon riding Academy, and they can’t ride a dragon, this is a failure! No matter how many Ninja Warrior obstacle courses they can handle.
I kept hoping this book would get better, and while I liked the dragons, it was not enough. I DNFed. Thank God before the sex scene!
I have a hard time believing the author is that enamored of the military though, because she doesn’t seem to have any understanding of how it would logically function. Like elite military training in the United States does have the occasional death, but that is not the goal. And if you are training as a Navy Seal, for example, you can always ring the bell and leave. You may not be happy about it, but you live to fight another day. Training soldiers is expensive! Recruiting is expensive. I would suspect even the conscription had some expense.
I don’t even want to read her contemporary military fiction because I doubt it makes much more sense. And I wish she had run her draft by her military husband.
I also wonder if her EDS made her dramatically overestimate what a human being without this disability is physically capable of. Because the obstacle courses she had them doing and the stacked up physical challenges would have probably killed most people no matter how good of shape they were in. Muscles and bones can’t just be continually hammered like that! I mean, there is a reason why many seasons of Ninja Warrior would go by and nobody would win the final level or even get there. like I spent a lot of time asking myself not just how the main character was surviving this, but how any of them were still alive!
Reading this book was just frustrating on every level. And I went into it really wanting to like it! Okay, nuff said.
Military aviation is also another good example. And not just because it's also about flying. It's dangerous and accidents happen. But there are investigations into the reasons. And if possible they put procedures or rules into place to prevent similar mishaps.
RIGHT! And you don’t have to be a military expert to recognize that keeping YOUR soldiers alive should be a priority. You shouldn’t be killing more of your own folks than the enemy is!
So apparently she's making another military book, but it's kinda sorta non-fiction. I say that because it takes place in the Iraq war, in real life, probably around the time where really bad shit has been going on.
And to no surprise, its gonna be a lil racist. Becca has a military husband but i highly doubt he had much of a part in this
@@arkkon2740 Ugh! This is upsetting. Fingers crossed she does a better job than with the new book. It's one thing to play fast and loose with your fantasy world. Another thing to play fast and loose with real life. Sigh.
@@arkkon2740
That's still fiction. I think she also wrote a romance set during the withdrawal from Afghanistan. So she already proved that she has no shame whatsoever.
This book feels written by someone who doesn't like fantasy for people who don't like fantasy, the world and characters are so barebones and boring.
Also it feels like a first draft, it has no consistence and the author clearly made shit along the way without proof reading.
You guys are my favorite podcast! haha. I'm a new subbie and i think this is the first time i've seen the two of you record together while physically being in the same room
I absolutely hate the lethal training trope. Nothing will break my immersion quicker.
I'm embarrassed that this book is on my shelf. It's just so bad.
It is a pretty book at least.
The library really helps me read the books for the podcast so I can participate and spend no money.
"why do u keep admitting to people that you pee its gross" LMAOO will is so funny 😭
Ok I but my mind went elsewhere when William mentioned Patroclus getting ran by a train ...
Have you guys ever read an Alexa Donne book? She’s an “Author-tuber” 😳. I have not read her books, but the premises are interesting, I’m not against having thing spoiled so I think you guys should try it! 😄
(I’ll eventually read them but I never have time)
👏👏👏👏 you guys have such a fun dynamic for these videos
she literally only has two dragons so that if one dies she can still live, plot armour is plot armouring just you wait and see 😭
YESSSSS I have been waiting for this one! *gets popcorn* Oh I'm going to enjoy this. Let's heckin tear it to shreds, Maria!
There's so many issues with this but also, nerve sensitization is a thing which is basically that, if you have a lot of pain regularly, your nerves get oversensitive and less pain actually aggravates them more than if they aren't often stimulated by pain so the "I'm used to the pain, I can ignore it" is actually nonsense.
Hot take! I read this book, guessed all the plot twists, and agree with most of your opinions about the issues with the book...but I still read the entire book, and I was entertained. And i will probably read it again eventually. It's a cultural phenomenon right now. And I want a dragon!🐉 But GOT made me want a dragon first. Lol
"She never thinks, "Huh this is an uncomfortable position, despite all the leverage he has" absolutely sent me 😂
Well the Romans had plumbing in some buildings and the ancient Greeks theorized about atoms.
It "shows it's hand" when the main couple gets together. Well said! I felt the exact same, I was really into it until that point
I reread the first chapter and dropped it for a second time. I don't need to hear "you could die" or "I could die" TWENTY-SIX TIMES IN TWENTY PAGES. It continues into the next two chapters, really undercutting when Yarrows writes a good scene that actually shows the stakes. I wish I could speak on other parts of the book, but when it just hits me over the head with how weak Violet is and how murdery everyone who isn't Violet is, I'm spending my time on something else.
I agree with Katie on this one, and coincidentally my name is also Katie😂
I am a very picky reader, never read Sarah J Maas, can’t stand poorly done tropes, etc. So I was very much expecting to hate this book as much as Will and Maria because I knew it was a very YA ish crappy fantasy story. Was it good? No. But was it the worst thing ever? Also no. I should have hated this book, but for some reason I had the time of my life instead😂 Was it aweful in some places? Yes, full of tropes? 100%. I can’t put my finger on exactly what worked, but something did and I enjoyed it a lot more than I thought it would. The first half was great, I honestly liked Violet and Xaden as characters, Xaden didn’t have stupid lines or say things just to sound hot, he actually made a valid point every time he spoke to her and I liked that he was a decent person also (taking care of new marked ones) however, his lines got worse in the second half, the sex scenes were awful and so unrealistic😂 So it did go downhill from there, but although she didn’t do the tropes well, she didn’t do them completely terrible. I’ve seen worse in every aspect.
It wasn’t great, but I still enjoyed it😂
Also, I’m pretty sure Imogen is pronounced “Imma-Jean” at least that’s how I’ve heard it pronounced, could be wrong.
so many pages and all of it was so empty. Violet describes how she wants to be a scribe because of her father, but the words are so empty. I don't believe her. so many, many words and it could've been done so much better. I don't like the fact that killing students is encouraged in the first place. I think if Violet had accidentally bonded with the dragons prior to Parapet and then is now faced with a thrilling timeline to course correct her life in order to learn to wield before the power consumes her, it would be a much better introduction to the story