I don’t agree with most of your complaints about “bizarre” word usage (that don’t involve the word moonslight, which doesn’t bug me but I don’t love it either). There’s nothing wrong with having a decent vocabulary, and at least she is usually using the words correctly. And do you really find the word bodice to be obscure? What else would you call the part of a dress that covers the torso?
This one, though, made me laugh:
“Extreme unction” or anointing of the sick is a Catholic sacrament. I doubt that’s what is meant, although I don’t have the context. Could she have meant unctuousness, i.e. fawning? If so, I wonder if this was an autocorrect issue, and I would find it very funny if it was.
Also, re this:
At least they waited for the younger kids to do this. It leads to me picturing an amusing conversation when Vereesa was born: “What should we call the new baby?” “I already used up all my ideas on the first two. Let’s just slap our names together and call it done.” And then Lirath: “Ehh, it worked the last time. But I’m warning you, no more kids or they just won’t have names at all.”
I get being upset about it, but it has long been a problem in writing overall. English lacks a very effective gender setup, some writers default to the writing standard of male pronouns, some go the exact inverse and use female no matter what. Some try being neutral and going with ‘them/they’.
Rephrasing the sentence to avoid gendering the general would have solved the problem easily. “She observed her Forsaken like a general inspecting the troops.” Boom. Done.
Certainly, that is true. But I doubt anyone even noticed it as a mistake, as it is really easy to miss. There is actually even a chance it got changed in editing to be “grammatically correct” and Golden never even knew it happened.
I dunno, Roux struck me as kind of a Sylvanas-hater, with how she went out of her way to retroactively destroy the one positive thing about undead!Sylvanas (her lingering affection for Nathanos) and said it was her personal interpretation of their relationship. I’m no fan of Golden’s characterization of Sylvanas, but I don’t think I’d trust Roux to make Sylvanas sympathetic as the main character of a book.
I think they’d just be different flavors of bad takes on the character. But I agree with the person who said they’d like to see Brooks do more with her.
I didn’t include this part because I think Nathanos was being sarcastic there.
The problem isn’t that he’s a prodigy, the problem is that he’s making melodies before he has the ability to speak. Golden has given characters near-impossible talents without drawbacks before.
I probably could’ve used a different term for that, but I don’t know what. I’m of the opinion that authors should avoid using words that the average reader doesn’t know the meaning of. Sometimes it felt like Golden was doing an English class assignment to use words she found in a thesaurus.
Not bodice, moonslight.
She was referring to the Domination runes on Frostmourne after Zovaal tells her what they are.
Golden does this when the adventurer gives Sylvanas her necklace, atleast three times. She knows how to properly use it, so it’s purposeful.
Could not understanding how to write good sarcasm or banter be a Goldenism. Because her banter fell flat. I fell for this ship becsuse of the Vol’jin funeral banter and Golden tried and failed to provide good relationship banter.
I am not willing to call it intentional in a malign way. While it would surprise me if they were actually doing the sensitivity editing that you do for gender correctness and whatnot it is possible during editing one slipped by, and she used ‘he’ everywhere in her manuscript. Even many female writers default to he/him, particularly if they are over 50 as it is a generational thing.
I don’t know about anyone but for me, the book doesn’t really answer the questions we been asking since the end of BfA and the entirety of SL, that and the low key misogyny doesn’t really do the book any favors.
I don’t really hate the book per se, there are some good lore tidbits. But things like the Nathanos and Sylvanas relationship came off as super creepy to me in this book.
Might just be me though. But if anyone else noticed anything different, feel free to correct me on it
I don’t think she was being malicious about it, but it is noticeable. There’s very little sexism in this book, which is good especially since some of Golden’s previous books have been more blatant. I don’t have much of a problem with some of the things I’ve listed but they are worth noting because of them being hallmarks of her writing.
Jirri I could have sworn from the excerpt was male but she’s female. I will have to re-read to make sure Golden was not confused on Jirri’s gender. Maybe it was just me.
Either way she was introduced as an important satelite character and then immediately dropped.
A lot of nitpicking, to be honest. Nothing here seemed particularly egregious. In fact, some of the stuff you brought up is kind of weird.
(Also: Disclaimer, I haven’t read the book, I’m just going off of what you’ve presented)
Babies repeat noises and sounds they hear a lot. Have you never been around babies before? I’m not saying they’re like parrots, but the idea that an infant Lirath was able to reproduce, on some level, a sound reminiscent of whatever nursey rhymes he was getting, is hardly far fetched or makes him a, ‘Gary-Stu.’
Now if he was a babe, stood up, picked up a bow, and starting shooting perfect shots, then sure, that’s a Gary-Stu.
This is toxic-masculinity how? She’s the daughter of the Ranger-General of Quel’Thalas and publicly criticized a member of the royal family. That’s legitimate political problems in the making. Pretty sure if Kael’thas had been a woman Lirath would’ve berated Sylvanas just the same.
Starting to think you just don’t like Lirath. Granted I’m assuming you’re using hyperbole, because the idea of them canonizing rap is indeed cringe.
