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Book of the Ancestor trilogy by Mark Lawrence {spoiler thread}


AncalagonTheBlack

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I think the grey mustard scene was the first time the book was clicking for me. It was tense and horrifying. Also reminds me how the school is pretty f'd up with deliberately endangering kid's lives. Harsh world i guess

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On ‎4‎/‎26‎/‎2019 at 4:46 AM, Varysblackfyre321 said:

I honestly don’t think it would man. If I don’t like reading something, and I don’t have to read it, I don’t see why I should keep reading it in hopes that I’d eventually like it. I’m fine just skipping to “The holy sister” Lawrence’s little recaps at the beginning are generally enough to get someone just getting into a trilogy of his at the second or third book all caught up to what they need to know to follow along.

To me this is crazy. These are books about characters. The plot isn't the big deal. If book 2 doesn't work for you then give up. Reading a page catch up instead of the book will not connect you to the characters emotionally. And if you're not connected then why on Earth pay for book 3 and invest time in it. That makes no sense.

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1 hour ago, Blank said:

To me this is crazy. These are books about characters. The plot isn't the big deal. If book 2 doesn't work for you then give up. Reading a page catch up instead of the book will not connect you to the characters emotionally. And if you're not connected then why on Earth pay for book 3 and invest time in it. That makes no sense.

I actually really liked Book 2. Was excited for Grey sister, but it did disappoint. I don’t have to enjoy every sequel in a series in order to read the next one. 

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3 hours ago, Varysblackfyre321 said:

I actually really liked Book 2. Was excited for Grey sister, but it did disappoint. I don’t have to enjoy every sequel in a series in order to read the next one. 

I assume you mean Book 1 there.

You're clearly in charge of you, but there is a big difference in not having to enjoy every book in a trilogy in order to read the next, and being able to enjoy a book 3 without having read book 2.

I find it impossible to imagine how you could enjoy Holy Sister without having read Grey Sister. Good luck trying, but it seems a foolish move to me.

 

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Wait, she has a crush on Ara (i'm about half way through book 3), have I missed this completely by reading/skimming through on the train in the morning when I've been tired? 

Has this been mentioned before, whats going on here?  Its a while since I read book 1 and 2 but I don't remember her being that way inclined.

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@BigFatCoward, This is covered in the short story he released digitally "Bound" (meaning thread bound).  I'm pretty sure it was originally part of the final book but they cut it for some reason so he just put it out as a short story.  Im not sure why he didn't cover it in the recap section.

It's a fun short story but features a weird fan fiction-esque scene where Ara has to make out with an assassin who is poisoning posh girls through kissing (she has to stick a needle on her tongue then puncture the guy's poison sac through hunska tongue speed to kill the guy while avoiding getting poisoned herself, told you it was weird).  In order to practise kissing Ara and Nona make out which leads to them inadvertently developing a thread bond (one of about 4 Nona has by the end of the series).

Anyway, the upshot is Ara is gay and likes Nona.  Nona is confused, probably bi, and doesn't realise Ara likes her.

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I tore threw Red Sister and Grey Sister the past couple days, and I've got the third book on the way from Amazon now. I haven't read anything else by Mark Lawrence, so I can't compare them to previous works, but I think these books are really good. The slow-drips of world building have been very well done and I really like the setting he's created. The supporting characters are perhaps a little too interchangeable with each other, but I like Nona quite a bit and I'm looking forward to seeing how things wrap up in book three.

I did get a little tired of the school training stuff in the first third of Grey Sister, which seemed like it was about to just repeat the first book, so I glad when things shifted up. I had a pretty high tolerance in general to all the school stuff though since I've been reading less fiction in the past 5 or 6 years, so a lot of stuff that may seem trope-y to others was still pretty fresh to me (though I did recently read The Poppy War, which covered a lot of the same ground in its first half; I think this series is better).

I sort of feel that the Corridor is almost too narrow at this point for the story being told, but that's a pretty minor world-building complaint. At less than 50 miles across, I think society would've totally collapsed, not just being the mid-stages of collapse that it is. And with there essentially only being two directions that people can go in, I think if there were still societal structures in place, as there are, it would be much harder to keep a secret than it is. People should be stumbling across the Noi-Guin all the time and tracking people should be much easier, for instance.

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4 hours ago, BigFatCoward said:

Liked book 3, didn't love it. Too many of the peripheral characters had no distinct personality. Other than Nona, Ara, Zole, the posh bitch, Glass and Kettle I had no idea who anyone really was. 

 

Same here and similar reservations. During this book i also realised that I Don't find Nona herself that interesting a POV and missed some of the characters from book 2 in terms of POV.

Thankfully the ending was pretty strong with some enjoyable twists and developments. I particularly liked the epilogue and final paragraph even if it reminded a lot of the legend of korra.

I think my problem with a lot of the book was the structure in that it felt like 2-3 concepts/storylines stuck together to resemble a whole story. For the most part it holds up but it felt like we were missing a lot of flesh off a bare boned story and the split narratives were trying to hide that or at the least try and dodge connective tissue had the story been presented in a linear fashion. Credit to Lawrence for his lean writing though which does go against the fantasy grain. I'm reading "the ember blade" and seeing the opposite problem of step by step coverage of every little detail and how AtoE can be a reasonable alternative to ABCDE.

The book probably also fell prey to me reading straight after "one word kill". Hard not to compare the same author and i simply enjoyed his SF tale far more. Speculation on my part but i do wonder if Mark's "i don't plan further ahead than the book I'm writing" comes into play regarding his approach/my enjoyment. I can't see how "one word kill" and it's sequels doesn't demand more stringent planning which maybe lends to a certain structure. But it's still a win for the author when i really like one of the two books he released in the same month.

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  • 2 months later...
On 5/10/2019 at 5:33 AM, red snow said:

Thankfully the ending was pretty strong with some enjoyable twists and developments. I particularly liked the epilogue and final paragraph even if it reminded a lot of the legend of korra



I just finished the book and was coming in here just to say that :lol:

The Ara/Nona subtext was strong throughout the whole series, IMO. I'm a bit disappointed that it remained subtext given that the series has been touted on some lists as having strong LGBT rep in the main characters, but at least there was Apple / Kettle and the two novices in Nona's class. 

I have to say, I don't really want the story to end. There's so much still to explore in the world and learn about the moon / the missing / the ancestor etc, so I'm looking forward to other books set in this world and hope we get to revisit some of these characters some day. 

My jaw 

dropped at Sister Path having not stepped off the Path in 20 years! That was a top moment for me for the whole series, if not THE top.

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7 hours ago, Underfoot said:

I just finished the book and was coming in here just to say that :lol:

The Ara/Nona subtext was strong throughout the whole series, IMO. I'm a bit disappointed that it remained subtext given that the series has been touted on some lists as having strong LGBT rep in the main characters, but at least there was Apple / Kettle and the two novices in Nona's class. 

I have to say, I don't really want the story to end. There's so much still to explore in the world and learn about the moon / the missing / the ancestor etc, so I'm looking forward to other books set in this world and hope we get to revisit some of these characters some day. 

 

  Hide contents

My jaw 

dropped at Sister Path having not stepped off the Path in 20 years! That was a top moment for me for the whole series, if not THE top.

 

Yeah, the sister path moment was cool. Up there with Banner saying "because I'm angry all the time" in avengers

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On 5/10/2019 at 7:33 AM, red snow said:

I'm reading "the ember blade" and seeing the opposite problem of step by step coverage of every little detail and how AtoE can be a reasonable alternative to ABCDE. 

That book did not need to be as long as it was, and I found it suffered not just from the detail, but also from a lot of very heavy-handed "I'm going to tell you exactly how this character thinks about this situation, so you can tell it's oppression going on"; it felt like the narrator had an absolutely perfect view into each character's psyche, which means there weren't many mysteries or ambiguities about motivation.  I read it at about the same time as Miles Cameron's Cold Iron, where comparatively characters were more opaque, even to themselves, and the feeling of discovery/revelation was much stronger.

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  • 2 months later...

Think I might wait a while on the next trilogy and pick up in a sale. His fantasy hasn't been clicking with me that well of late - might be due to listening to the books but I also found the Loki series hard work at times. I'm really hoping he does some more SF/contemporary work as I've really loved his Limited wish series and eagerly awaiting the final part next month. Might just be his style of fantasy isn't for me at the moment - although he's probably come the closest to making a magic/assassin school work for me. I think there's only Hobb who has managed to make me love that style of fantasy beyond the things I read as a kid.

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  • 2 weeks later...
  • 5 weeks later...

Dispel Illusion was an excellent conclusion to his "impossible times" trilogy and one of my highlights of the year. It's time travel that doesn't "cheat" (although it plays around the author's rule) making for a really satisfying conclusion that really does make each book work as a stand-alone and as a whole. Definitely worth a read and I think it may be my favourite work from Lawrence. I really enjoyed his first trilogy but I think this benefits hugely from the fact he had to plan the trilogy out beforehand while he admits his other books are more improvised. That and the setting of the "real" world with more relatable characters than Jorg or Nona helps. I hope Lawrence does more SF going forward.

The series is free on kindle unlimited so worth a try if anyone has that!

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  • 3 months later...

Not this series...  but Mark Lawrence related.  I received my signed/numbered Red Queens War omnibus today.  Grim Oak does a helluva job on those.

The included short story is the (for now) aborted beginning to a new Jalan/Snorri tale set on my side of the Atlantic. It was a fun 60ish page read and made me remember just how much I love Mark’s humor as it comes through Jalan.

I love Jorg and Nona... but Jalan is probably one of my favorite fantasy characters of all time.

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On 4/7/2020 at 10:48 PM, Rhom said:

Not this series...  but Mark Lawrence related.  I received my signed/numbered Red Queens War omnibus today.  Grim Oak does a helluva job on those.

The included short story is the (for now) aborted beginning to a new Jalan/Snorri tale set on my side of the Atlantic. It was a fun 60ish page read and made me remember just how much I love Mark’s humor as it comes through Jalan.

I love Jorg and Nona... but Jalan is probably one of my favorite fantasy characters of all time.

It's in the mail for me. Coincidentally, Snorri is my favorite 'side kick' of all time. :)

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