I'm not necessarily disagreeing with you; I just like that Mark makes me stop and consider if I'm overlooking something that's harmful just because it's so normalized.

It's interesting to me because I have always liked Jackrum, but perhaps I've been too willing to overlook his violence...like, he really does (in a round about way) murder that prisoner. And while it's perhaps justified in context of war and their circumstances, it's not...as straightforward as I've usually treated it. So I appreciate Mark's view here.

I love that de Worde tries to test her on it, but in a completely ineffectual way since he doesn't know what the bird is. (or maybe he just wanted to see how she'd react to the question...)

I think root beer is or at least used to be made of sassafras. I had sassafras tea as a kid once and it was uncanny since I was so used to the carbonated and cold and sweetened form

Igorina hates violence because it's like randomized surgery; this feels like the reverse of the normal thinking, that surgery is specifically applied violence.

"Women get to star in a traditionally male narrative." That's the key reason why I like this book so much.

Oh, I've always had the first headcannon but I like the second just as well! Va fbzr jnlf vg znxrf vg rnfvre gb cebwrpg qvssrerag vqragvgvrf bagb Wnpxehz fvapr Cengpurgg qvqa'g fcrpvsl (ohg cneg bs zr jvfurf ur unf fcrpvsvrq? V nyjnlf jbeel n ovg jura dhrre ercerfragngvba vf *bayl* ivn urnqpnaaba.)

Wow, good catch on the box of paints.

I agree with you about Paul. Fbzrguvat gung Cengpurgg qbrf va guvf obbx vf qrfpevor qvssrerag vqragvgvrf jvgubhg ynoryvat gurz. Sbe vafgnapr, naq znlor guvf vf whfg zl urnqpnaaba, ohg V guvax bs Wnpxehz nf n genaf zna, nf jryy.

Tiffany's response to Roland being worried about her possibly killing him instead of the drome--"no, I just explained" is like the perfectly encapsulation of her character.

(And although here I think Roland has every right to be concerned--he doesn't know Tiffany, his experiences in Fairyland have made him see everything is a danger--it also feels familiar to me as a woman who sometimes has to explain things to men. I love Tiffany's matter of factness: she knew she acted based on the best information and the risk was very low, she already told him as much, why is he doubting her?)

A detail that I love here is when Tiffany thinks about the neighbor's painting of the ocean and how you couldn't even see the lighthouse (from the tobacco wrappers) on it. It seems like she has such an absolute lack of conception of what the ocean is, that she basically expects that you should be able to see everything that has to do with it in any given picture of it.