[polishgenius]

That there was rather awesome, although the fact of it being two books split in one does show. I'm not convinced Butcher initially intended the Ebenezar-Harry fight to go here, or at least the way it did, but he needed some kind of climactic confrontation with the actual climactic confrontation now being a whole second book. Not that the fight itself didn't work, but it did feel like (rare for Butcher) the characters were being railroaded into it some.

Lot of early reactions assumed Ebenezar was gonna die. He might yet do so in the war of course, but I thought that was gonna be too obvious for Butcher and that did prove true.


I hadn't realised previously that the Fomor were out of Irish myth. I quite like the link between that and the Cthulu mythos though.

On some points raised in the other thread:

Chance, on 15 July 2020 - 06:20 PM, said:

Skywalker, on 15 July 2020 - 01:10 PM, said:

there's almost certainly hints in here about the identity of Mab before she got the Mantle, right? I didn't dwell on it much because there was epic $hit going down in the meantime, and she'd just been acquainted with some walls. Someone from Arthurian legend I reckon. possibly Guinevere? Did anyone else figure that one out?

I'd go for Morgana once the apperentice of Merlin for symetry with Molly in so many ways. At the same time if I remember right they say she came with the conqueror which would make her a french/normand person possibly not associated with arthuric mythos thought that is also implied.

Morgan Le Fay makes the most sense out of available information, but in most stories it was Merlin whow as more in love with her than the other way around, and the same goes for Nimue. Not familiar enough with Arthurian myth to think of a figure who Merlin cast out that could fit, and like you say the Conqueror reference doesn't really fit Arturian myth.

Quote

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Also I have one crazy theory for early-ish in the book: Thomas was not trying to say "Justine" when Dresden shushed him right after the assassination attempt. What if he was saying "Justin". as in freaking DuMorne?

That would just be rather awesome but also problematic.

I didn't think of it myself but the thought did cross my mind that we hadn't heard any thoughts on a potential Justin for a while and that he may well be in this book, so yeah, as soon as I saw you raise the prospect I thought that's bang on. Increasing my sureness is that Harry is very carefully not shown wondering overmuch about why the fuck Thomas would ever do such a thing, almost as if Butcher wants to draw us away from the question, and whether it's Justin or not I'm positive that the King isn't who he says he is.




Anyway, BIG stuff for next time. People are gonna be dying. Better not be Murph. That even fricking Odin and Ferrovax shit their pants at Ethniu's presence is a thing. Marcone, not nice as he is, is a fucking badass. Ferrovax is flipping out, Marcone's just like 'yeah and what' and organising the defence within fifteen seconds.


One detail I'm not fond of Ethnui being labelled a Titan when she's not. But oh well minor ting.

[D'rek]

Just finished it. Overall it was a pretty fun little romp of a book. Far from the best Dresden books, but it's not a disappointment, either.

The Ethniu scene was awesome, and the whole Accords meeting in general was a ton of fun.

Everything with Maggie, Butters, and Molly was great. HarryXKarrin was written pretty well, too, I think, though the latter "it's dangerous but we won't stop each other" parts feel pretty repetitive, both within the book and to previous books.

I do have some criticisms:

1) Definitely doesn't seem like things really "linked up" all that well. Like, how come no one else knew about and there was no follow up to the Cornerhounds attack? Ramirez and the rest of the escort didn't even comment like "someone summoned Outsiders, possibly to disrupt negotiations, look for these signs someone is tainted by Outsiders.". When Mab says the Outer Gates are under full assault, everyone should make the connection that Ethniu/Fomor and the Outsiders attack are linked and start talking about how Outsiders were summoned in the middle of the city two days ago so they'll surely be summoned again while the Fomor assault from the lake.

Ramirez and team suspecting/following/confronting Harry didn't really mesh well with things. The timing of the confrontation is weird (why would they reveal themselves then instead of continuing to track him and see what other suspicious places he goes to?) and nothing really seems to come out of it.


2) Harry (and everyone in general) acts a lot stupider than usual here when it comes to information gathering. Him not even knowing what Conjuritis is is kind of ridiculous, but even so why didn't he immediately ask Ebenezar what it is when it was first mentioned?

Lara seems very knowledgeable about how Thomas being attacked by his Hunger, this isn't a surprise condition the Raiths don't know about. Harry saw at the start that Thomas was badly beaten by the Svartalves, so would he not describe that to Lara and would she not think that Thomas will potentially be suffering from that by the time they rescue him? Seems like with a bit of forethinking they could have had 20 Raith sex-retainers already on board the Water Beetle ready to help Lara treat Thomas and not needed to do the whole put-him-in-stasis-also-its-torture thing. For that matter, if you're taking Thomas to the island to protect him, why not take Justine there, too?

It's weird how Harry goes to see Thomas in confinement in the Svartalves embassy and doesn't ask him anything. Why not ask Thomas why he did it? Who put him up to it? Anything?

Harry goes to visit Butters but doesn't take that opportunity to get any info from Bob? There's a ton of useful questions he could have asked then. Hell, even just ask what Conjuritis is.


3) Butcher has gone completely out of control with making every female character "inhumanly" attractive and/or having Harry get the hots for all of them. We've got actual-OTP Karrin, and Mab and Lara being their usual immortal sex-goddesses, sure, Justine still needs her requisite description of being a glamour model, PLUS Butters' werewolf threesome, fine I'm happy for Butters, but we also need Harry repeatedly noticing Molly's curves and her kissing him on the mouth for some reason, PLUS Freydis flirting and suggesting a threesome (which would never happen anyways, it's completely out of character for the other two, so what purpose does this even serve?), and if all that weren't enough we Harry also needs to descriptively notice how the older teenage girls like Hope and Ivy are starting to get "curves" or whatever I thought it was especially hilarious when Lara suddenly attacks Harry and instead of having any sort of defensive combat instinct the winter mantle immediately goes into horny mode instead. Yeah, I know, this is hardly a new thing for the series.

[Imperial Historian]

I agree with all of those 3 criticisms, if I was being charitable I'd say some of 3 is the winter mantle affecting Harry, but that tendency has been in the series forever.

I'm hoping we get suitable resolution in the next book, harry has done similarly stupid things to drive forward the plot but it's usually resolved in book.

All in all good but not great.

[Sindriss]

Well written post Drek.

Seems kinda stupid to have some juvenile wizard sickness affect Harry and then he doesn't know about it. I mean, I understand he was not raised in the wizard community, but sounded like something that affected most/all young wizards (i.e. wizard pimples), so quite unbelievable that he wouldn't have heard of it before.

[amphibian]

Harry noticing the hips of Ivy and the adultness of Hope was flat out skeevy. If Butcher isn't getting feedback on this, his advance readers are failing him.

The other stuff, I think he did an ok job with as the White Court is a bunch of sex vampires.

I think Mab is Nimue rather than Morgan LeFay. That would help explain why Mab through Lea has taken such an interest in developing Harry into a world beater - he's clearly a Merlin to be and has the possibility of ending the Outsider war with his star born powers.

That happening every 166 years is interesting. Means that Mab and others likely tried to do this stuff before and failed.

Who do we wildly speculate is the other Demonreach prisoner that is in contemplation mode?

I think it's Harry - time traveling shenanigans.

[champ]

Random thoughts...


The Ivy comment actually took me out of the book, it was a case of WTF? Really?


Considering he met her when she was like 6-7 and the last time he saw her she was like what, 11-12 year old? That was just wrong, Butcher really needs some new descriptive methods.


For Mab, my first thought was Morgan Le Fay too but it seems a bit obvious... from legend I don't really see why Merlin would cast out Nimue. And which Conqueror are we talking about I wonder?


But holy shit, who ever thought they would see Mab getting kicked through two walls, I had to read that a few times to make sure I read it right...


When Butcher is talking about the effects the Winter mantle has on Harry it's like he is talking about mental health...

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Being the Winter Knight isn't much fun. Having that mantle in my life on a daily basis meant that I had to fight and work, every day, to keep being more or less me...

That's straight up living with Bipolar. There are quite a few lines throughout the book like that.


Re the prisoner on Demonreach, I've thought Harry or Merlin, the OG.


Butcher talks about time travel too much for it to not happen in the series. Whenever he talks about it he always says how difficult and messed up it would be though it could potentially be possible...


Any speculation on who the Athame used to belong to and what the wooden placard is? The two weapons from Hades vault.


Also with the whole Starborn and 666 years, Harry to die at the end of the series? Made me think that especially when he started talking about all the precautions he has taken if he dies again.


I wasn't too impressed with the Last Jedi Luke/Kylo fake-out fight between Harry and McCoy too...


And finally, when Harry mind battles the Cornerhounds and we see Harry from their POV - I wondered if that is what people see when they soulgaze Harry...

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A being made of coherent light, a column of glowing energy centers, and pure dread, standing like an obelisk before the Cornerhounds, a bolt of terrible lightning gathered around its upraised fists, head and shoulders, like a miniature storm front.

Edit


Also when Thomas gets locked up, it's said that only one other prisoner is on the same "programme" as Thomas, that has got to be the sleeping mystery prisoner and I'm sure it said they could share thoughts or something like that, may be wrong.

This post has been edited by champ: 16 July 2020 - 04:43 PM

[Chance]

Morgan is usually cast as the bad one right, I assume the summer queen was Nimue or something similiar.

From one of the other books there was something about the families of the fey queens last being assembled at hastings, which immidiatly made me assume the conqueror is william of normandy.

amphibian, on 16 July 2020 - 02:17 PM, said:

That happening every 666 years is interesting. Means that Mab and others likely tried to do this stuff before and failed.

It gives some interesting periods for when starborn appear; current times, black death, something in the later 7th century (emergence of islam seems the big one), time of christ.

About time travel I think it was the next one which was going to be Mirror Mirror or something like it the time travel book?

This post has been edited by Chance: 16 July 2020 - 04:48 PM

[polishgenius]

champ, on 16 July 2020 - 04:40 PM, said:

Re the prisoner on Demonreach, I've thought Harry or Merlin, the OG.

Assuming the prisoner referred to this time is the same guy he conversed with before, didn't he have a British accent? I do think OG Merlin and him being imprisoned fits with his legend of course, even if Chicago is slightly out of the way.


And yeah, Harry noticing Ivy's hips is just fucking ewww.

This post has been edited by polishgenius: 16 July 2020 - 05:24 PM

[champ]

polishgenius, on 16 July 2020 - 05:20 PM, said:

champ, on 16 July 2020 - 04:40 PM, said:

Re the prisoner on Demonreach, I've thought Harry or Merlin, the OG.

Assuming the prisoner referred to this time is the same guy he conversed with before, didn't he have a British accent? I do think OG Merlin and him being imprisoned fits with his legend of course, even if Chicago is slightly out of the way.


And yeah, Harry noticing Ivy's hips is just fucking ewww.

Good point, yeah he's described as British and tells Dresden to piss off so there's a +1. It's got to be someone of note...


Another nod I loved in the book was the linking of the Tunguska event to a dragon getting popped, that was a great tidbit.

[champ]

Holy shit, what if it's Arthur? Fallen hero entombed, destined to rise again at the end of the world... Island on a lake... Amoracchius yet to have an owner...

Butcher also said Amoracchius won't come out until its apocalypse time...

[D'rek]

champ, on 16 July 2020 - 07:21 PM, said:

Holy shit, what if it's Arthur? Fallen hero entombed, destined to rise again at the end of the world... Island on a lake... Amoracchius yet to have an owner...

Butcher also said Amoracchius won't come out until its apocalypse time...

Amoracchius is 99% going to Thomas. Maybe Thomas is stuck in "stasis" all the way until the Apocalyptic finale (because they can't cure his Hunger eating him, or he's Nemesis'd, or whatever) and it turns out he's been chatting with Arthur during all that stasis time? Gives a nice sort of parallel / "passing the mantle" element from Arthur to Thomas as he emerges from the mystic island on a lake with Excalibur to smite evil.

[champ]

D, on 16 July 2020 - 07:43 PM, said:

champ, on 16 July 2020 - 07:21 PM, said:

Holy shit, what if it's Arthur? Fallen hero entombed, destined to rise again at the end of the world... Island on a lake... Amoracchius yet to have an owner...

Butcher also said Amoracchius won't come out until its apocalypse time...

Amoracchius is 99% going to Thomas. Maybe Thomas is stuck in "stasis" all the way until the Apocalyptic finale (because they can't cure his Hunger eating him, or he's Nemesis'd, or whatever) and it turns out he's been chatting with Arthur during all that stasis time? Gives a nice sort of parallel / "passing the mantle" element from Arthur to Thomas as he emerges from the mystic island on a lake with Excalibur to smite evil.

What makes you sure on Thomas and Amoracchius? Just interested in your thoughts behind it.


But I like the way that rings the Merlin/Dresden and Arthur/Thomas parallel, especially more than just having Arthur turn up smiting fools left, right and centre. Would feel a bit Dues Ex unless we get a future book with interaction between Dresden and say Merlin laying some groundwork.


Oh crap, to add to that theory...


We also have Nicodemas in possession of the Grail... sounds like a mission for some Knights...

[amphibian]

I think the whole bit about Fidelius not being able to harm humans means that it will get put through Thomas to kill the Hunger within. He'd then be able to take up Amorrachius and be the Love Knight.

Really curious to find out what the Outsiders were doing because just sending "keep 'em busy" hounds at McCoy isn't enough for the incursion right before the Fomorians move. Something had to have gone down and we'll likely find out in the next book. I also wonder why McCoy is the priority over the Winter Knight - the fourth highest ranking being in Winter, the only thing keeping the Outsiders out.

[D'rek]

champ, on 16 July 2020 - 07:58 PM, said:

D, on 16 July 2020 - 07:43 PM, said:

champ, on 16 July 2020 - 07:21 PM, said:

Holy shit, what if it's Arthur? Fallen hero entombed, destined to rise again at the end of the world... Island on a lake... Amoracchius yet to have an owner...

Butcher also said Amoracchius won't come out until its apocalypse time...

Amoracchius is 99% going to Thomas. Maybe Thomas is stuck in "stasis" all the way until the Apocalyptic finale (because they can't cure his Hunger eating him, or he's Nemesis'd, or whatever) and it turns out he's been chatting with Arthur during all that stasis time? Gives a nice sort of parallel / "passing the mantle" element from Arthur to Thomas as he emerges from the mystic island on a lake with Excalibur to smite evil.

What makes you sure on Thomas and Amoracchius? Just interested in your thoughts behind it.


But I like the way that rings the Merlin/Dresden and Arthur/Thomas parallel, especially more than just having Arthur turn up smiting fools left, right and centre. Would feel a bit Dues Ex unless we get a future book with interaction between Dresden and say Merlin laying some groundwork.


Oh crap, to add to that theory...


We also have Nicodemas in possession of the Grail... sounds like a mission for some Knights...

Exactly - the Merlin/Arthur v Harry/Thomas parallel. There's a clear Merlin->Harry succession going on (not only Demonreach, but Harry's lineage of wizard mentorship goes back to Merlin), and Thomas' conflicts and trials are always themed round his love, so it's a really fitting way for him to be eventually redeemed/saved. Plus Thomas was the one to retrieve Amoracchius in Grave Peril and was safeguarding it on the boat for a while. And he's got the requisite son-of-a-king aspect already.

Plus Thomas is in a great position to become a very good Knight long-term, too. After overcoming his own conflict with his literal inner monster and the bad things he has done but come back from, he'd be exactly the right sort of person to understand how a person that has turned evil is feeling and want to save them, similar to how Michael always wanted to.

amphibian, on 16 July 2020 - 08:28 PM, said:

I think the whole bit about Fidelius not being able to harm humans means that it will get put through Thomas to kill the Hunger within. He'd then be able to take up Amorrachius and be the Love Knight.

Maybe, but I get the feeling that Thomas is going to be in stasis at least until the epilogue of the next book - the stasis jail procedure thing seemed a bit too weighty to only last half a book. And I think the Fidelius setup scene will more likely be for something in the next book, though it could also come back again for helping Thomas later, too.

amphibian, on 16 July 2020 - 08:28 PM, said:

Really curious to find out what the Outsiders were doing because just sending "keep 'em busy" hounds at McCoy isn't enough for the incursion right before the Fomorians move. Something had to have gone down and we'll likely find out in the next book. I also wonder why McCoy is the priority over the Winter Knight - the fourth highest ranking being in Winter, the only thing keeping the Outsiders out.

Some people are theorizing that Justine is infected by Nemesis and the Cornerhounds were sent after Harry visited her in case he had figured that out...

I don't buy it, but don't have any better suggestions either. Someone working on the Fomor side is particularly afraid of the Blackstaff for some reason?

[amphibian]

The hounds were definitely going after McCoy when they had the choice between the two.

I think Thomas isn't getting out of stasis for two books at least. There's no time to undo Demonreach when they're trying to seal away a Titan and push back the Outsiders.

I pick Nimue for Mab because I think the dialogue suggests that she'd loved Merlin. The others don't quite come off as the be the winter queen for a thousand years type.

[D'rek]

A lot of people on the reddit are coming up with various theories that Mac is related somehow to Ethniu/Balor/etc and will have a role of some sort fighting Ethniu in Battle Ground. Ultimately, it just comes down to the fact that Mac is a Gaelic/Irish/whatever name, and Ethniu/Balor are Irish mythology so of course all the characters in the mythology related to them are also named Mac Something. All that said... some of them are pretty damn good... especially when people keep pointing out all the repeated emphasis in the book about how quarrels between family.

[Chance]

D, on 16 July 2020 - 09:44 PM, said:

Some people are theorizing that Justine is infected by Nemesis and the Cornerhounds were sent after Harry visited her in case he had figured that out...

I don't buy it, but don't have any better suggestions either. Someone working on the Fomor side is particularly afraid of the Blackstaff for some reason?

Lara does have secret information leaking in the book, which we know Justine has previously done for Harry. Don't know about Nemisis but Justine playing for the other team by choice or coercion doesn't seem far fetched.

This post has been edited by Chance: 17 July 2020 - 06:05 AM

[Cyphon]

Anyone got a theory on Harry being betrayed to get at him by the nefarious forces against him suggested by McCoy? I.e. who it will be?

Or do people think that was a set up for McCoy's attack on Harry?

[TheRetiredBridgeburner]

amphibian, on 16 July 2020 - 11:52 PM, said:

I pick Nimue for Mab because I think the dialogue suggests that she'd loved Merlin. The others don't quite come off as the be the winter queen for a thousand years type.

That angle doesn't necessarily rule out either Morgan or Nimue - earlier versions (pre Le Morte d'Arthur, in particular) do sometimes have Morgan and Merlin as lovers. Granted though, Nimue being his lover is certainly the more popular version.

As to the reference to coming over with the Conqueror... dunno. You've already got one of the Swords of the Cross being Durandal (Sanya's, I think?) so there's a link to the Matter of France. Arthur is part of the Matter of Britain - seems a stretch but he might be conflating the whole lot.

[Cause]

So many thoughts, I’ll come back and post more but for now I’ll simply ask, does anyone else feel the books were split unnecessarily? Feels more like a cash grab than an artistic decision.

Was the athame the spear of Longinus?