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Sphinx

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  1. I'll bite. I'm going to stick the whole thing in spoiler tags for length/so that people who want to read the book themselves can. What an Esk is: I loved Ancillary Justice, but it took me a while to get into it. Once I finished the book, I could appreciate the choices the author made, but they definitely took some getting used to and it is definitely not a light read. And if it ends up not being your thing, oh well! Rambling about the narrator/main characters/use of she that shouldn't spoil anything but may help clarify. I'd be happy to answer other questions in pm or something if you want.
  2. This list is incredibly fluid (if I posted tomorrow it would probably be about 50% different) and in no order whatsoever J.R.R Tolkien Dorothy Sayers C.S. Lewis Diana Wynne Jones Rosemary Sutcliff Gillian Bradshaw Jane Austen Connie Willis Lois McMaster Bujold Ursula LeGuin
  3. Some of the female fantasy authors on my bookshelf that I've collected over the past decade or so: Katherine Addison: I haven't actually read The Goblin Emperor yet, but it came in second for the Hugo this year, and is on my to-read list. Gillian Bradshaw: She writes both historical fiction and what I would call "historical fantasy". Her Arthurian trilogy is absolutely brilliant (begins with Hawk of May). The Wolf Hunt is my favourite of the other books with magic. The Beacon at Alexandria and Island of Ghosts are the ones I love best of her more standard historical fiction. Marie Brennan: Author of a series about a woman who becomes the foremost expert on Draconology in a country reminiscent of Victorian England. Starts with A Natural History of Dragons. I can't speak to anything she's written outside of the dragon books (they have GORGEOUS covers and illustrations) Lois McMaster Bujold: I've mostly only read her science fiction (which is excellent, quite varied, some of it better than others), but I've been meaning to get to her fantasy. I've heard lots of good things. Olivia Butler: I haven't actually read anything by her, but she's on my to-read, highly recommended list, so I figured I'd throw her name out as well. Susanna Clarke: Author of Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell, a really interesting book about magic and faeries in Britain during the Napoleonic era. Some people might find it a bit slow. Susan Fletcher: Her stuff falls under YA or maybe even younger. Her Dragon Chronicles are really lovely books. Shadow Spinner isn't really fantasy, but is about Shahrazad and the art of storytelling and is a comfort read. Diana Wynne Jones: So many excellent books, with a lot of variety. My favourite is probably a toss-up between Howl's Moving Castle and Hexwood. Her Chrestomanci series is a lot of fun. Her Dark Lord of Derkholm and Year of the Griffin are hilarious if you've read a lot of fantasy. Ursula LeGuin: I absolutely love the Earthsea books. I also really enjoy the Gifts trilogy (again a bit younger) Patricia McKillip: She has this talent for writing books that leave me a bit dazed when I'm done reading them, and feeling like I've just experienced a dream that I don't remember terribly well. Strongly recommend her Riddle-Master of Hed trilogy. Robin McKinley: The Blue Sword and The Hero and the Crown are both really, really, really good. I like a lot of her other books as well, but those are some of my absolute favourites. Naomi Novik: I really enjoyed most of the Temeraire books, and Uprooted was really enjoyable as well. Sharon Shinn: The Safe-Keepers secret series is probably my favourite of what she's written, but she has written a lot, and it's pretty varied. Sherwood Smith: I enjoyed Crown Duel. I haven't been able to get into the rest of her Sartoria-deles stuff for whatever reason, but some of my friends really like it. Rosemary Sutcliff: A lot of her books are historical fiction/fantasy than straight up fantasy, but they're absolutely amazing. Laini Taylor: I've only read her Dreamdark books, but a friend of mine says her Daughter of Smoke and Bone books are excellent. Megan Whalen Turner: Greek-inspired YA fantasy that specialises in unreliable narrators and trickery. Definitely read The Thief first. Martha Wells: I enjoyed the series she wrote that begins with The Wizard Hunters. Patricia C Wrede: Magic and Malice is a lot of fun: Regency period with magic and adventures and thieving. The Cecilia and Kate letter books are also fun, with a similar setting. I also really love her retelling Snow White and Rose Red in Elizabethan England with Faerie. Her Frontier Magic books are younger than her other stuff, but really fun.
  4. I wasn't particularly suspicious of Trimat before, but I am now.
  5. Edit: Didn't read carefully. I'm somewhat inclined to be suspicious of this Dreamwalker, given that Jain was a villager. Of course, they probably assume that. I'll agree that Jain was likely the first dreamwalker message
  6. I'm inclined to believe Kaim's witness for Weas's playstyle Whether or not Jim Bob Dirt was a darkfriend, we can probably anticipate some darkfriends to have voted for him, possibly towards the middle of it. They probably also participated in the vote for Jain, but frankly Jain was behaving fairly suspiciously at that point. I'm aware that I'm likely under a good deal of suspicion due to my absence, which is fair. If I'd known how crazy everything was going to get, I probably wouldn't have signed up to a game I couldn't commit to. For what it's worth though, I'm usually pretty quiet the first few days. There seem to be quite a few newer people this round, which is keeping things interesting.
  7. ... I totally thought there was another 12 hours to the day. Woops. *goes back to reread everything*
  8. "Ma!" Senna Wefan didn't bother to glance up as her daughter burst into the house, the dressing of the great loom she reserved for special projects occupying the majority of her concentration. "Don't shout, Lien." Senna admonished, "and leave me be. This must be finished before the meeting, or it'll be all to do again." She had been so busy with smaller, hardy weavings, that she'd had no time for anything fancy until this most recent commission. Cloaks and bandages were all well and good, but this hanging, this hanging would be art. Senna was not a frivolous woman by nature, but it had been a long time since she had woven something purely for the beauty of it. Of course, beauty took work, and concentration, and steadfastness, something that she wasn't sure her daughter would ever learn. "But Ma!" Lien said,setting the basket of bread she'd been out to fetch on the scrubbed table, the urgency in her tone finally catching her mother's attention. "He's dead! The mayor's dead!" the twelve year old proclaimed with wide-eyed excitement. "They're saying the travelers did it, but Sim says no, that it's the trollocs!" Senna carefully tied off the warp, and straightened, a little painfully, to stare at her daughter, her expression grave. Her daughter, at least, seemed more excited than fearful, and Senna felt a stab of hope that Lien was mistaken. "Are you sure?" She asked, then shook her head. Of course Lien was sure. "I had best go. Stay inside until I'm back, and keep Robbie with you." Lien nodded, moving towards the room where they slept to check on her little brother. Senna took her cloak from its peg. She had woven it herself, half a decade ago, as a present for Dereth, woven with a pattern of the trees he had loved. After his death, a year later, she had kept the cloak. She'd trimmed it some so it would better fit her smaller statue, but it was still plainly too large for her. A large crowd was gathered around the Town Hall, and Senna politely shoved her way through it to reach the steps, and then wished very much that she had not. She'd seen death before, seen ugly death before. But this, this was something else. The stench alone made her reel, and Senna made a hurried grab at whoever was closest to retain her balance, clinging tightly to their arm until her head stopped swimming. Thank the Light that I left Lien and Robbie at home. But home would not likely be safe too much longer, if the perpetrators of this horrific deed were not caught soon. One quick question, will roles and alignments be revealed upon death?
  9. Some stuff from here is interesting, particularly
  10. Nixi slipped through the streets, trying to steer away from the shouting, the clashing, the screams. Her freehand stung from where she'd scraped it on the cobbles when she'd tripped earlier. Everything, everything had been going so well, and then suddenly chaos. How could that ardent have done what she did? Surely, surely such an action went against all that was holy? But she'd been an ardent, and now the divisions were spreading rapidly. I had something lengthy, went to post, and lost it all. So you get the redo of the first paragraph, because I need to post something. Teach me to not write things up in at least notepad first. Blaaaaaaaaaaaah.
  11. Thanks for hosting, Mailliw, it was definitely interesting and fun to participate.
  12. If people make a claim to be a member of the 17th Shard, or any other role, must these claims be true?
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