Smuggler's Fortune & Pyramids

Episode 14

Release Date: 8/4/2021

Smuggler's Fortune by Angela Boord

Pyramids by Terry Pratchett

Your hosts argue over the relationship dynamics in “Smuggler’s Fortune” by Angela Boord while Lilly tries not to drool over the main “flirt interest.” (She fails). They also discuss “Pyramids” by Terry Pratchett, and the overall Discworld tropes that are well-explored possibly for the first time. Sara gets really into puns. Lilly brings us on a trip to her Pet Peeve Corner where she complains about “shy porn” and horrifying euphemisms. Leave kittens out of it!!!

Thanks to the following musicians for the use of their songs:

- Amarià for the use of “Sérénade à Notre Dame de Paris” - Josh Woodward for the use of “Electric Sunrise” - Scott Buckley for the use of “Twilight Echo”

Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 4.0 License

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Episode Transcript*

*this transcript is AI generated, please excuse the mess.

Lilly 00:03

Hello, and welcome to fiction fans, a podcast where we read books. And other words, too.

Sara 00:11

I'm Lily. And I'm Sarah.

Lilly 00:15

And we like to start things off on a high note in this podcast, but mine is not actually a high note. It also is. But, Sarah, I'm a terrible mother.

Sara 00:27

Why are you a terrible mother Lily.

Lilly 00:29

It was sips birthday today. And I didn't even realize until I opened up the calendar to start this podcast recording.

Sara 00:39

I mean, that's better than me. And my good thing for this week, which is that it was Norreys gotcha day two days ago. And I didn't remember until now. So you're one up over me.

Lilly 00:53

I do know how to make a calendar of events. That's true. That gives me plus one mother point.

Sara 00:59

I have just been relying on remembering that it's sometime in July and then going back into my photos. Just see if I can grab the date from the first picture I took. Matches not very effective. Surprisingly, well, sift

Lilly 01:13

doesn't look like she's taken it too hard. She is currently rolling around on her back and stretching her little feets out for context, Sif is a cat. I assume everyone knows that. But just in case.

Sara 01:28

You mean you didn't forget your human child's birthday?

Lilly 01:31

Oh, boy, if I had a human child whose birthday I forgot there would be other issues. Like not knowing I had a human child. I feel like that would take precedence.

Sara 01:43

Surprise. Oh boy, what

Lilly 01:46

is the Sleeping Beauty? Anyway, my good thing is actually that my sweet baby kitten is not actually a baby or a kitten. She is a whole Oh, no. Three years old. I think she's has just turned three or four. Somewhere in that

Sara 02:01

range. In yeah, I've started nodding and then realized that podcast listeners can actually hear that.

Lilly 02:08

So we've got we've got some some sweet, fuzzy animals, and they are good. And they make life good.

Sara 02:14

They do even when they have huge vet bills and cost me lots of money.

Lilly 02:20

Well, speaking of medical bills, what are you drinking tonight,

Sara 02:24

I'm not drinking anything that will send me to the hospital, or cause me to have medical bills.

Lilly 02:30

Oh, I was making fun of how terrible medical bills are and how they drive one to drink.

Sara 02:36

I was thinking that you were referring to the fact that alcohol is bad for your liver. Oh, I am actually drinking tea today. Because another good thing that happened this week was I ran out of a particular blend called divinity, from teas with meaning, which is an Oakland company that I discovered. And I went on their website and they didn't have any divinity. Like it wasn't listed on their site. So I reached out to them on Instagram. I think it's one woman who runs it and said, you know, hey, I, I just used up the last of my tea. I really enjoy it. But I don't see it on the site. Like, are you still making it? Could you let me know when it's going to be back in stock? And she said, oh, I'll just send you some. It'll, it'll be back on the website in the fall, but I'll just send you some. And I said, okay, but like, how should I pay? You know, if we're doing this through Instagram and not, not on the website? Like, how do I make sure that you get paid for your teeth? She's like, No, I'll just, you know, don't worry about it. So she was very lovely. And the tea is very good. And that's what I'm drinking tonight. teas with meaning

Lilly 03:47

well, and we all know you're gonna order someone it is back in stock. So it's not like she missed out on us.

Sara 03:54

She won't be she will probably get a larger sale than she would have

Lilly 03:58

otherwise, to be honest. And that's good marketing.

Sara 04:01

Indeed. And what are you drinking tonight?

Lilly 04:03

Lilly was a out of a box.

Sara 04:06

like good old standard.

Lilly 04:08

Yep. My usual box wine brand is local, which I harp on too much make it sound fancier than just coming out of a cardboard box. But it still is.

Sara 04:18

I mean, you know, I think the local supersedes the cardboard box, dude,

Lilly 04:23

why thank you. And since this is, of course, a reading podcast, you've done any of that.

Sara 04:31

I have I read victories greater than death by Charlie Jane Anders, which I believe that I've mentioned on a previous podcast, I think it was I mentioned it when we were talking about The Long Way to a Small Angry Planet. And I really enjoyed it. Anders has watched a lot of Doctor Who and you can kind of tell because it feels very similar to how a Doctor Who episode feels, if that makes sense.

Lilly 04:59

Oh yeah, I get At completely, yeah,

Sara 05:01

you would probably call it space fantasy, but you would also appreciate the diversity of alien races. And something that I thought was really cool was there is an explanation for why there's a lot of human shaped alien races. I do like that. Is it

Lilly 05:17

a seeding race that went through and sprinkled genetics throughout the universe? I feel like that's the go to. Wonderful. All of this is great news.

Sara 05:29

Yeah, I don't, I don't want to go any further into it, because I don't want to spoil it. But I thought that the explanation was unique and appropriate. And I'm really looking forward to seeing how things play out in the next book. Very exciting. And I know that you have actually had a chance to read things other than podcast stuff for once.

Lilly 05:53

Have I already spoke about it, slash will speak about it. Time is an illusion. And we are recording these episodes out of order. I recently read a romance novel, I found it on Twitter, not someone we know. So I don't have to be too worried about this. I'm still not going to name names, because I'm perhaps not going to be extremely flattering. But there was a free preview on Kindle. So I thought, well, heck, why not? And then it was terrible. But it was also free on Kindle Unlimited. So I thought heck, why not? And I when I finished it, so.

Sara 06:36

So I mean, even if you enjoyed it for reasons, maybe that the author hadn't intended, you still enjoyed it enough to finish it.

Lilly 06:45

Yeah, it wasn't all bad. It, it had this thing. And I've noticed this in other romance novels, where the main character has to be exceedingly shy, and not just in interpersonal interactions, because that's fine. Some people are shy when dealing with other people. But when dealing with sex, which is clearly the whole point of the book, like it's right there on the back cover, we all know what we're here for.

Sara 07:15

I think there's a place for having characters who are shy when it comes to sex, but you want to see variety, right? And it's,

Lilly 07:22

it's not the character's internal reaction. It's the book itself. shying away from mentioning it straight out, like there are actual sex scenes in this book later on. But earlier on, it uses like cutesy euphemisms, and that is just like, What are you doing? Who do you think you're fooling? We all know where this is going?

Sara 07:50

Was it specifically in erotica book or just a romance book?

Lilly 07:54

Hey, don't know what the distinction would be.

Sara 07:57

I mean, I think, at least personally, I don't know if this is how anyone else use these terms. But for me, erotica, means there's going to be lots of Layton sex, and explicit sex. And romance doesn't necessarily like romance might have a Fade to black.

Lilly 08:15

There was only one interaction of this variety. But it was very explicit.

Sara 08:21

So I'd say that that maybe still qualifies as romance, though.

Lilly 08:25

But if you're going to be explicit in one scene, why?

Sara 08:29

Yeah, you might as well be explicit in other scenes. Yeah. Or the other scenes with the main love interest.

Lilly 08:36

It was the the book refused to acknowledge the existence of sex until it was happening. I mean, that's my complaint. But like it, it's not that it happened earlier and faded to black, and we only saw it happen once. Fine, that's just a pacing choice. But when there is explicit sex later, you don't have to use cutesy euphemisms for it earlier on. Like, I don't know, I'm not explaining it very well. I did read this a little, a couple days ago now. So I'm not, this isn't super fresh. There are a couple of instances that I'm going to complain about explicitly in the pet peeve section of this episode.

Sara 09:19

But I like I think I think I get what you're saying is that if you're going to show explicit sex later on, you can directly reference the fact that these characters are having sex like earlier on right

Lilly 09:30

now, but they weren't having sex earlier on.

Sara 09:34

Oh, it was when talking about sex. Yeah, and not

Lilly 09:37

the characters because again, characters, verbal tics or whatever, like the book itself was scared to acknowledge that adults sleep together until it happened.

Sara 09:50

That's yeah, okay. That's a That's an odd choice.

Lilly 09:56

Yeah, yeah. Anyway, it also promised me Someone on the run from the law, but was actually just family drama. And I was supposed to find it charming that her family was super nosy. And that is not my vibe at all. So that was just annoying for the entire book

Sara 10:16

feels like a bit of a letdown. Yeah,

Lilly 10:19

this author's idea of on the run, I guess not from the law from an organized crime, whatever was her family, the mafia? No, she lived out of town from home. And so when she got into trouble, she went back to visit her family. And so the whole book was family drama. And then also, there was one scene at the very end again, one scene at the very end where she gets kidnapped. And of course, love interest saves her because duh. But the entire book was her mom going, Oh, someone saw you at the gas station with a boy today. And I have no patience for that shit.

Sara 10:59

I'm sorry that that ended up being a bit of a disappointment.

Lilly 11:03

I mean, I read it how much of a disappointment was it? Really?

Sara 11:07

That's very true. So a while back, we asked on Twitter or I asked on Twitter for suggestions of books that we should cover on the podcast. And Crystal matar crystal matar, author of legacy of the bright wash and friend of the show and all around wonderful person suggested that we've read smugglers fortune by Angela bored. So wait,

Lilly 11:33

did she actually suggest that we read smugglers fortune? Or did she just suggest that we read this series,

Sara 11:40

if I recall correctly, she mentioned both smugglers Fortune and Fortune full fortunes full is the first book in the series, although smugglers fiction takes place chronologically before it, but fortunes fool is like 700 pages. And our calendar was already pretty full. So I thought Lily's gonna go for the 170 page book, not the 700 page book.

Lilly 12:04

I mean, that's correct. But oh, boy, I Well, I don't know about you. But I was definitely missing out on background information here.

Sara 12:14

i Yeah. So smugglers fortune does technically stand alone, but does it? I mean, I, I think you can enjoy it without having read the pre I'm only about 25% of the way through a fortunate school. But there's a note at the beginning of the book that Angela wrote that says, you probably should read fortune school first. And I got there to that note, and I was like, Oops. And it

Lilly 12:41

was correct. I also, I mean, I enjoyed smuggler's fortune, but I definitely felt in over my head 90% of the time. I

Sara 12:51

Yeah. Like, there were there was some contexts that I think that I got, because I have read some of the first book. But I think that and I've, like I said, I really enjoyed this book. But I think that it would have benefited from having read having read the first book first, surprise, surprise, I will

Lilly 13:11

say, anytime there was a place or family name in this book, my brain went, okay. It's the family and they're doing politics stuff moving on.

Sara 13:22

I mean, I think that you are probably right about that. There are a lot of families doing politicking stuff.

Lilly 13:28

And it didn't matter which one was which, which luckily, it didn't, because if it didn't matter, I would have been completely lost. But there were so many place names and family names in this very, very short book. It was not, that was not a good ratio.

Sara 13:47

would have helped to be more familiar with the setting. I will say, though, that I'd like it's kind of like a magical Venice, that fortune is full at least starts in and I it's great. I love the setting.

Lilly 13:59

Yeah. And it honestly, none of that, like I said, interfered with my reading of the book of this novella, in particular, is it a novella, I think it's just a short novel, right?

Sara 14:11

I have a very nebulous understanding of where a short story versus a novella versus short novel have their boundaries. There's an actual word count Kindle said it was 170 pages

Lilly 14:26

pages, not how cut offs work. Oh,

Sara 14:29

you mean there's a word count for what makes a novella? Yes, I see.

Lilly 14:34

I think a novella is only 40,000 words, which is pretty short. Or I should say that's the line where it switches over.

Sara 14:42

As someone who does not write, I look at word count and just think that's a big number. So I have I have no actual context for like a word count really means doesn't

Lilly 14:53

matter. Anyway, it's a good book. It doesn't take that long to read. I would say the ratio of specific Place location words to other words is too high for the length of the book, whether it's a book or a novella doesn't matter. But I've, like I said, I muddled through. I completely glazed over anytime. Any word that was not an English happened. And it didn't affect my understanding. Wow, surprise, different families don't like each other. Luckily, they all started with a different letter. So I didn't actually have to internalize what their names were. That's, that's true. Yeah, like, Okay, this is the family that starts with an A All right.

Sara 15:37

I just got very hungry when I read this book. There are a lot of descriptions of food. And I was like, I want to eat this.

Lilly 15:44

Oh my god. Dolma does sound really good, though, doesn't it? Well, other than this book have like a lot of places, and family names that I did not register. on any level. The main character is a woman who is masquerading as a man, which I have read more than one way a novel written for girls in my life, and so therefore have a huge soft spot for that narrative.

Sara 16:12

Yes, but one thing that I like about this is that I feel like in a lot of YA novels that feature the same plot point, the female character is very enthusiastic about dressing as a man.

Lilly 16:28

Whereas in this book, it was more of a necessary evil.

Sara 16:31

Yeah, exactly. Like, she's not necessarily doing it by choice. So much as like, that's what makes the most sense for her. And she's not entirely sure that she wants to continue doing it. Like she kind of wants to settle down and have a family. So it was nice to see a character like grapple with those questions.

Lilly 16:49

That's a great point. I'm not sure if the books I read when I was younger, were just from a different era, or written for a different age group. But it definitely felt more like the women involved. Were running towards something. And so they dressed as men instead of running from

Sara 17:06

something. They were going on an adventure.

Lilly 17:09

Yeah. Well, they wanted the opportunities for men in their society. And that was the whole thing, right? Whereas in this, it's much less yea, this is gonna get me what I want, but more, this is necessary to survive.

Sara 17:24

Yeah, like I said, I like that distinction.

Lilly 17:27

It feels like a much more thoughtful exploration of that. Pretending to be something you're not must get tiring. And I don't think that really comes up in my novels,

Sara 17:40

it also brings up a lot of the issues that you have when you want to form like interpersonal relationships, because you can't necessarily have a physical relationship with someone unless you tell like unless you disclose that you're a woman and you spend all of your time lying to your, your closest companions.

Lilly 18:00

I really did like Razzie Razi that's probably his name right? That's how I pronounce it. And he was the sort of flirt interest I'm gonna say, not love interest, but there was definitely overtures between them. There was physical attraction between them that I have opinions we're gonna get into

Sara 18:18

later. I have I have opinions too.

Lilly 18:22

But I really did like

Sara 18:24

maybe it's just he was a bit of a charming rogue,

Lilly 18:27

and he was shamelessly hitting on this dude. That's just because we know, Kira, Kira,

Sara 18:35

that's how I pronounce it.

Lilly 18:36

I didn't even know if that was how it was spelled. Okay, just because the reader knew that Kira was a woman. Razzie didn't. It did kind of remind me of that joke about Mulan. How that movie must have been a by awakening for that guy. Besides, he's in love with Mulan and then finds out she's a woman. Yes, like that doesn't get explored at all.

Sara 19:04

But I would watch that movie. Like I'm loving

Lilly 19:07

it better. Well, I mean, Razzie doesn't go through a crisis. He clearly already knows who he's interested in and doesn't seem to care too much either way. Yeah. But that it just reminded me of that joke. Oh, boy. I originally wrote that I have a soft spot for Razi, but then I started giggling because it's really much more of a hard on and then what are those phrases? So similar, but so different at the same time? raise a good point there. Yeah, that's, that's just funny, soft and hard meaning the same thing. Also, he was excellent.

Sara 19:45

He was excellent. He has not shown up in fortunes full yet, but I hope that he does.

Lilly 19:51

I'm assuming that's because I'm supposed to like cure his actual love interest more than him and reading this book first was a mistake if that's where I'm supposed to go?

Sara 20:01

I think that's just because you have a very low tolerance for this kind of pining

Lilly 20:06

right. So Razi is extremely into cura at are curious as her her male name in the book is. And she turns him down, which makes sense, like you said, because she's trying to portray herself as a man. And that would be a little difficult in that kind of scenario. But that's never the narrative that she brings up. I don't think this is a spoiler, because it comes up very early in this novella, but she has some old flame that she's just thinking about the whole time. And that's always the reason that she brings up for not being able to take Razi up on his advances. And that did not sit well with me at all.

Sara 20:49

I mean, but she's not emotionally attracted to Razi necessarily like

Lilly 20:53

she I don't think that's true at all. She's physically attracted to him.

Sara 20:57

And she likes him. I like I think that there could be an emotional attraction that develops, but I think that her reaction to him at this point, is mostly physical. And I can see why she would prioritize the stronger emotional connection over something that might not go, you know, beyond the, the physical,

Lilly 21:21

they save each other's lives, if like, there's an emotional connection that creates an emotional connection, because

Sara 21:28

you save someone's life doesn't mean that you have the depths of emotional connection needed to supersede the emotional connection that she has with her old flame, as you call him.

Lilly 21:41

I forgot his name. That's how little I cared about.

Sara 21:45

I mean, he doesn't actually show up in the blog he's just mentioned. So his

Lilly 21:47

name is just on every fucking page. I'm supposed to care about this guy. And I'm like, Oh, great. He's keeping her from being happy. Sure, hope that's worth it.

Sara 22:00

I think you like I said, I think you just have a very low tolerance for this kind of connection. Okay, when you when you when you don't know the character,

Lilly 22:10

both, uh, yeah, I sure don't know that character. Maybe it's different because you've read. Presumably something about him in the actual novel?

Sara 22:20

Yeah, he has they they don't have a romantic relationship yet. So I guess in that sense, smuggler's fortune was a little bit of a spoiler, except that I, we follow. I mean, like, Angela is wonderful. And we follow her on Twitter. And like, it's, it's all over the Twitter that he's the love interest. So.

Lilly 22:40

Okay, but I think we're the impression that I got is that Kira didn't allow herself to form a romantic connection with Rosie, because she felt like that was cheating on this guy. That was always the phrasing that she brought up was, Oh, I like I really like him. He's really great. But I can't let this evolve, I have to shut myself off from him. Because this douchebag might still be alive.

Sara 23:09

I think I think calling him a douchebag.

Lilly 23:12

A little. That's just my interpretation.

Sara 23:15

I mean, I think I think it's I really cared about arsenal, and I am not really over the fact that he might be dead. And I don't want to form a relationship with anyone until I confirm that he is dead or not. And I like I can understand not wanting to move on.

Lilly 23:35

You don't have to move on. If okay, if it had been that they left each other with promises of fidelity, then I would completely understand wanting to be loyal to that. Like I'm not questioning that at all.

Sara 23:49

Not everyone wants just like sex without strings.

Lilly 23:53

But she did want that with Rosie, and then said, Oh, but I can't because that wouldn't be fair to this guy who's probably not even alive. I mean, I like in the book. She said she wanted it but wouldn't allow herself to have it.

Sara 24:06

Well, she said that she wanted sex, but like, I don't think that she wanted just like I think that if she had had sex, she would have wanted to form a relationship, but she's not ready for that.

Lilly 24:19

Maybe. But then I have no sympathy for her. being sad and horny. Because girl you're doing that to yourself. I mean, because a lot of the book is her being Wow, I'm so sad and horny. I hope my boyfriend's not dead. Well, there's a solution right in front of you, who is excellent. I think it felt like Razzie was being dangled in my face as the reader and like that was like a little unfair. Come on. Don't give me this really extremely wonderful of pan or bisexual man and not let me enjoy it at all.

Sara 24:58

Maybe he gets maybe he That's a love interest unfortunate school. And then

Lilly 25:02

yeah, hopes all of it. Really the reason why this was so frustrating to me was because board created this character that I as a reader was super into. And it felt like a tease. So really, it's just a compliment for how well done and extremely sexy Razi was. But there was also Naevus, who was the other of this trio of mercenaries, which is plot of this book, I don't think we brought up at all really, I don't think we've talked about the plot of the book at all it it really does feel more like character banter taken to the nth degree. And I wasn't do it from the beginning. Clearly, the action was great. Like I said, Three mercenaries signing on to defend this cart of goods, shenanigans. That's not fair, high octane adventure and drama ensues. But the third guy that's traveling with them. Me This is just curious old friend, who only knows her as a man also. But their friendship was really wonderful. And at one point, Naevus asks her, how do I know you're not going to betray us or something, right? Because they're mercenaries. And they're very genuinely just doing this for money. And she kind of just looks at him and says, How long have you known me? Or how long have we been friends? Or something like that? And he's like, Yeah, okay. And I really loved that moment of, he has to ask, because that's good practices. But that answer was enough for him. Like that was really, like genuine and sweet. And I loved

Sara 26:35

they, they had a really great relationship. And I think Angela is really, really good at character work and creating these characters who have believable relationships with each other, and just a lot of depth to them. And really bring the story to life. I was

Lilly 26:53

trying to come up with a why you should read this book for this book. And my initial response was, don't I mean, not don't read her work, but like, read fortunes

Sara 27:03

full first.

Lilly 27:04

Is that the other one? Yeah, that's read the actual one. But if you're on the fence, 700 pages is a lot. And if you don't know, if you want to commit that much time to something, I do think this was probably like a great exposure to, like you said, the way her characters fit together, and this world building and the narrative style. So if you want to give a little taste test, I would say read this book, if you don't mind, just committing the time, which that's a lot of reading. It's a it's a bit of a chunker. I don't know what kind of reader you are theoretical listener, but read this if you want to be convinced to read more. How's that? That's why you should read this book. Yes. Otherwise, read it in the middle like you're supposed to. Don't do what we did. Read it. Read it in the proper order. Yeah. Don't Don't do it. I kind of feel like returning to my silly over the top intro for drew me to the center of this world.

Sara 28:13

I think you should do it.

Lilly 28:14

It's been a little while now. It's funny to be again. And it really matters, isn't it? Is all that really matters? Well, in that case? Hello. And welcome back to this continued Journey to the Center of Discworld. We are taking another step that I already say step I might have. I don't think you know it again. I don't think that you said stuff yet. Well, now I'll say it for a second or third time. Take a step with us. The steps on the side of a pyramid to read pyramids by Terry Pratchett. The something is number in his Discworld series. Six. You're checking the front of the book as if they're an order.

Sara 29:04

Or an order. Oh, they're

Lilly 29:05

not mine. They're in honors. Jelly.

Sara 29:10

Seven, I believe. Dude,

Lilly 29:12

my lists guards guards first. Really?

Sara 29:15

Yeah. In the books by Terry Pratchett. Do we have the same edition?

Lilly 29:19

Clearly not hold on? Where's my book go? Oh, just kidding. Books by Terry Pratchett lists the carpet people

Sara 29:28

first. Yeah, because it's it says non Discworld books that okay. Yes.

Lilly 29:32

So for the Discworld series it lists making money first. Oh, I think it might go in the opposite order.

Sara 29:39

Interesting because of using so we don't have the same edition

Lilly 29:45

will clearly not right yeah. Equal Rights. Yeah. So let's just print it in opposite order, which is not helpful. Can I say?

Sara 30:02

I mean, you figured it out eventually, only because

Lilly 30:05

I knew what order they were supposed to go in. If you saw these in a bookstore, and we're like, well, I'll grab the first Discworld book. I'll check the front to see what the first one is, would not help. That's true.

Sara 30:19

But we also do argue that you shouldn't start at the beginning. So maybe it's not that bad.

Lilly 30:25

That's true, but it gives you no frame of reference. No wonder it's so hard to figure out where to start and Discworld because, like there's no help at all, except for our episode, go listen to it. I have to start with a mini words are weird.

Sara 30:42

What is your Discworld related words are weird.

Lilly 30:46

In this book, Tepic, the main character begins the novel studying to become an assassin. And I really love the way Pratchett does his guild system. There's a guild of assassins, and that's, we'll talk about that later. But he mentions edit fussing as one of the things he was learning. And I was so confused, because the word edification means to learn. But edit fussing or to edit fussier is to scale a wall, or something was the best I could tell from context clues in this book, but those are clearly the same root word that was that a pun that I just didn't get?

Sara 31:36

Um, I mean, I think it has to do with edifice being like a big building.

Lilly 31:43

Okay. But edifice as I think you do. Well, I guess edification is not a verb. I was gonna say as a verb. But that's how I have liked that's the word I know. And so it was baffling to

Sara 32:00

it's at a fist thing is certainly not a word that you want to use every day. Partially because I think that Terry Pratchett made it up. But

Lilly 32:08

was it supposed to be a pun on edification? Because it is 90% The same letters, okay.

Sara 32:17

I'm saying that I don't think it's has anything to do with edification. I think it has to do with edifice building.

Lilly 32:23

Well, then he made up a bad word, because it's confusing. But like, they're

Sara 32:28

climbing walls, like they're, they're climbing buildings,

Lilly 32:32

right? But if he didn't want me to think of edification, he couldn't have picked a word. That was 99%. The same as it. There were other words that mean big buildings.

Sara 32:43

I mean, I think that's just an English is weird and has too many, like plus words.

Lilly 32:47

And that is why that was my mini words are weird. Thank you for joining. Okay, guilds in Anke. morepork love them. love it so much. I love the I guess. Okay, I just thought about that for more than 30 seconds and realize that I'm saying I love organized crime, which I don't. But there's something about the system and NK morepork, which is so fun and whimsical to me.

Sara 33:19

I do have to stop you there just really quick. Yes. Because once again, we have a difference in pronunciation, where I say Ogmore pork, and you're saying and can work work. And I just find that very interesting.

Lilly 33:34

Yeah, I go back and forth. Maybe I go back and forth, because I'm talking to you, but it is probably pronounced ONC. I will keep that in mind going forward.

Sara 33:46

I mean, I don't I don't know if my pronunciation was right. And my default pronunciation for things very often is incorrect.

Lilly 33:53

But it's spelled the same. Yeah, so it's probably pronounced the same.

Sara 33:58

It doesn't stop English from being English. It's not English. That was it? Well, it's more Porkins

Lilly 34:05

Yeah. When an arc is not an English,

Sara 34:12

I'm not talking about on cousin, the Egyptian symbol. I'm talking about Augason onto Moorpark.

Lilly 34:19

Again, if Terry Pratchett did not want me to associate these two words, he should not have used the exact same word.

Sara 34:28

I mean, that's why I pronounced it on Moorpark.

Lilly 34:31

You know what I also I wouldn't say I misread, but the first time I read this book, I didn't even attempt to read this word, because it's a nonsense word. And that's fine. Terry Pratchett has a lot of nonsense words, but when I was reading it for this podcast and realized I was going to have to say it out loud. I was a little bit more thoughtful in my reading and realized that the name of the Country. This particular novel takes place in is Jelly Baby. Yes, it is. It's spelled DJ ELIBEYB. I

Sara 35:14

still Jelly Baby.

Lilly 35:15

Definitely jelly baby did not catch that first time around didn't look that hard. Probably should have.

Sara 35:22

I mean, he does have a footnote that talks about it.

Lilly 35:26

Yeah, I think you mentioned off air that I didn't have the reference to the candy because that's not a thing we have. But with Dr. Who and all of that nonsense. I now have a frame of reference. I noticed the connection this time. Yeah. But that was funny. I noted it down.

Sara 35:44

It's always nice to reread a book and find new things in it. It is and

Lilly 35:48

I do think I've been finding fun new things as we're going through this reread you probably less so since you've read these. reread these more often and more recently than me.

Sara 36:02

Yeah. But I mean, I'm still enjoying rereading them. I don't think that I could ever get tired of rereading Pratchett? Well, maybe more. I can maybe get tired of rereading.

Lilly 36:11

I will say, When was this book written?

Sara 36:15

It was published in 1989. I believe

Lilly 36:17

we have to address the cringy racism. There's there's a little bit of racism. It's not funny Pratchett? Yeah. I don't care if you think it is. It's not you can't refer to someone wear towels on their head. Who lives in a? Okay, sure. Not on Earth. But like, we all know which cultures you're trying to mirror here and being really rude about it. Yeah, that bits of bits of Pratchett and this book did not age well. There's not a lot of it. But there is some. There are just a couple of lines. Yeah, it feels like he plays off as zingers one line zingers that are just a big Yikes.

Sara 37:00

Yeah. He's he's trying to be funny, but it just ends up, like playing into racism rather than Yeah,

Lilly 37:07

he's making fun of the wrong person. Yeah. But like you said, it doesn't come up too much. And it was written in 89. I don't know.

Sara 37:15

I'm willing to give Pratchett a little bit of leeway. Because I think that as he continues writing this series, he gets better about realizing that that's not funny. It's just racist. Yeah, but that doesn't mean that we shouldn't still call it out.

Lilly 37:29

Absolutely. I mean, he clearly noticed it. So we're not wrong to notice it.

Sara 37:34

One thing that I also noticed, probably given that we just recently discussed, American hippo with Hannah and Laura from our pod, or on Wednesdays we read was there were a lot of hippos in this book.

Lilly 37:45

There were so many hippos in this book, I definitely found that way more charming than I would have in any other situation. But that's just an example of every reader brings something different to the table. And for us, the hippos were well, for me, at least the hippos were really exciting. They don't even I don't think live hippos show up in this book. It's just statues of hippos. Ah,

Sara 38:09

yeah, I think you might be right. There's a lot of crocodiles. Yeah, the hippos are very background. Not important in any way.

Lilly 38:17

But they're also constant. And that was nice. I got some, some hoppers. I will say on this reading, I made the connection that Pratchett connects sunrise and religion, an awful lot.

Sara 38:34

I mean, a lot of times religion talks about what religion is doing to make the sunrise.

Lilly 38:39

That's true. I mean, that's a good point. But he really leans on that metaphor, and turning it into a concrete issue or example, in a lot of his books. And I think maybe because that is such a visual and also universal experience,

Sara 38:55

but also, especially in this book, because it is a play on fantasy, Discworld, Egypt, and Egyptian gods there, you know, it makes sense that there's a lot of talk about correlating sunrise and religion,

Lilly 39:08

it does make sense. And it makes sense every time he brings it up, I just don't think I realized how often that sort of his Keystone metaphor or anti metaphor because he makes it a real thing. But that he uses that as his sort of touch point for all of the other magical shenanigans that are happening, but this is the one that sort of binds it together, and that we use as like a temperature check. For the state of the world. If the sun is rising, everything's fine. And that shows up in a couple of different books, but it doesn't feel repetitive because he is approaching it from such different mythological angles. Like you said, this is the Egyptian mythology. The other one I'm thinking about is of course, the Hogfather which is much more European

Sara 40:00

Hogfather is one of the books that I haven't reread recently. And it's not a book that I tend to reread frequently. So I can't comment on or I can't yet comment on how how religion and belief and the sunrising plays into that book?

Lilly 40:18

Well, it's central, we'll get to that. That's funny, because that's probably the one I am most familiar with.

Sara 40:24

You've always gravitated to the desk books a lot more than I do. That's true.

Lilly 40:28

And also Christmas. It's just a good combo for me. Yeah,

Sara 40:32

I'm not really a Christmas person. That's fine.

Lilly 40:37

One of the things that this book does, that I love is that it sort of backwards maneuvers into science fiction. There's a lot of issues with time flow, and they just sort of accidentally discover quantum physics because of it. But it's magic. It's gods and pyramids and things. But

Sara 40:57

it's definitely still like a fantasy book. I don't think it ever veers into a science fiction book.

Lilly 41:02

No, they just the characters use the word quantum to describe stuff. And I really love a fantasy book, using science words to describe things as a opposite example for sci fi books using fantasy words to describe things, which I feel like happens a lot. Yes, yes. And so now we get to see the kind of the other side yet.

Sara 41:26

It's a nice role reversal. Something that this book does that not very many of his other Discworld books do at all is that it has chapters, and it also has kind of like, it plays with time in a way that I feel doesn't happen very often.

Lilly 41:43

At work. Well, the whole book was about time. Yes, the narrative lashed back and forth between topics, current day versus sort of his childhood and appraising. At the beginning, I made this connection literally. Well, I was saying the sentence, but it makes a lot of sense, because the book then goes to play with time, in this more catastrophic way of people looping back in on themselves. And there's that one family where there's 40 versions of the sun's at once. Like, there's a lot of time dilation nonsense. And so the book itself with the narrative structure, dealing with time, I think really fits with the story it's telling.

Sara 42:25

Yeah, you know, that's not a point that I had considered before. I was just thinking, oh, you know, I kind of like it. But I think I think you're right, that he probably made that structural choice with the idea and minds that this book was going to play with ideas of time.

Lilly 42:43

He also names the sections after things that I recognize as being vaguely caricatures of Egyptian culture. Like there's one that's the Book of the Dead.

Sara 42:56

Yeah, I tend not to pay attention to segment headings or chapter names are things I mean, the book of 101 things a boy can do. I think that's a play on English stuff.

Lilly 43:09

Yeah, that's yes. But there is also a section called the Book of the Dead. Yes. Which I know is in the mummy. And so I vaguely relate to Egypt stuff, but I believe

Sara 43:23

that there is a book of the dead.

Lilly 43:25

Okay. I would not be surprised if they made it up for that movie is all I'm saying. My understanding of, of Egypt, mythology is definitely restricted to pop culture garbage.

Sara 43:38

I had an ancient Egyptian phase when I was younger, but that was a long time ago. I am no no longer younger.

Lilly 43:47

And the information we had access to when we had our young obsessions is still not necessarily super accurate. That's very true, too. Because I had my ancient Greek mythology phase, which does kind of come up in this book a little bit, but now revisiting it as an adult. The sources I am finding are super different. Oh, man, Okay, before we start talking about all of the puns, there were good puns, though. I know we're gonna talk about all of the puns or some of the puns anyway. That's true. The ones that stood out in a first to note them down. Should we give like a quick high level what the hell is this book probably and

Sara 44:30

I'm going to vote that you do that because you're much better at summaries than I am.

Lilly 44:35

Alright, Tepic lives in Hong Kong more pork. And this book starts with him doing his final exam to become an assassin. Because there's a guild of assassins and I love that so much. It comes up more later, but this is kind of one of our first like, really big tastes into that. And I still feel weird saying it because I don't love organized crime. I just love this world. Okay, so Chad BIC is doing his exam to become a certified assassin. And he is also sort of flashing back to his youth growing up in Jelly Baby. This country in the desert where things are a little bit old timey, even by Discworld standards, and through the book, we discover that he is actually the prince of jelly baby. And the

Sara 45:27

son would say through the book, like he's established as the prince pretty early on

Lilly 45:33

through the intro. And he is eventually called back because his father dies. And that's obviously they need a king, especially because the king is a manifestation of a god on earth who makes the sunrise, which is very important, obviously. So he returns home and is maybe more modern than everyone else. They're a and begins planning the pyramid for his late father, except he doesn't actually have any power. Everything is run by the high priest. And that was extremely frustrating for me to read about, but I think that was one I mean, it was on purpose. It was supposed to be frustrating. Yeah, the point. Oh, but the high priest sucks so hard,

Sara 46:19

he keys he sucks as a person. But as a character, I love him.

Lilly 46:25

But you still expect me you? If I am expected to read this book, you gotta give me something fun. And there is a big chunk in the middle where it's just all miserable, and he sucks. And that's all that's happening.

Sara 46:41

I disagree. I mean, are you saying that that's all that's happening with the Dios the priest or that's all that's happening in the book. And there's nothing else fun going on?

Lilly 46:50

No, just there's really just like a couple chapters. And it is establishing that as the status quo, but it goes on so long that I was a little miserable reading about it, which is good, because Tepic was also miserable.

Sara 47:05

I didn't have that problem. That was not I was not miserable reading any of it.

Lilly 47:09

It just frustrated me. And it was supposed to frustrate me. It did its job. Okay. So we discovered that pyramids in this country have jelly baby, which I am going to repeat 100 times because it's pretty silly, absorb and then release time energy. This is a fantasy book. There is not a good description or understanding of this on a science level, except that the architects designing the pyramids say, oh, that's quantum all of time getting absorbed and then discharged. Yeah, that's Quantum. And then Tepic has to deal with the fallout from that, which I feel like the rest of it would be spoilers.

Sara 47:51

Yeah, he has to deal with the ramifications of being king being powerless, and building this pyramid.

Lilly 48:00

But before all of that during his assassination exam, oh, this is going to be a segment where we just read quotes at each other, but that's because they're good. All right. The first one is mine. Sorry, no, sorry. Yeah, no. Okay. Tepic is in the middle of his assassination exam. He discovers that there are caltrops on the floor of this room. He thought for a while he had slip on priests in his pouch. They were devilish things to prowl around the room in but he shuffled into them anyway. Priests remittal reinforced overshoes they saved your souls. This is an assassin joke. And I you know, it was funny. And then we got to the this is an assassin joke. And I could not contain the giggles It was excellent. It's just

Sara 48:56

like that that deadpan delivery. I mean, as much as you can have a delivery in a book, it was

Lilly 49:03

the meta of hey, here's this joke, calling these Foot Guards, priests because they save your souls, which is a dumb pun. But then making fun of that for being an assassin joke was just so good. It's very

Sara 49:17

good. My quote that I'm going to read out is not an assassin joke. But Tepic and his friends have graduated successfully. And they have gotten themselves very, very drunk and they're walking through the bad part of town or a bad part of town, and they're being followed by some unsavory characters broadly, therefore, the three even now lurching across the deserted planks of the brass bridge were dead drunk assassins, and the men behind them were bent on inserting the significant coma. And the Pratchett is just so good with word play.

Lilly 49:55

dead drunk.

Sara 49:57

Yeah, dead, drunk.

Lilly 50:00

assassins. All right, our last pun for the evening. Topic is back in Jelly Baby, and he is exercising his assassin skills by climbing around. There was a guard standing just outside the room. Tepic drifted past him and climbed carefully up the wall. It had been decorated with a complex boss relief of the triumphs of past monarchs. So typic used his family to give him a leg up. Okay, it's not a pun, this last quote, I think, is a very good, it's a thread. I don't think I realized until I had gotten to this book. But the Discworld novels vary wildly. They have different settings on the disk world. They are satirizing wildly different source material. But one of the common themes throughout all of them has been criticizing the old guard, the people who are saying, but this is how we've always done it. And there is a very good quote, in pyramids that illustrates that and kind of made me clue in like, I don't think I had, I had noticed it, but I don't think I realized how ubiquitous through practice work. It was until I had gotten to this point. It's not necessarily

Sara 51:25

spelled out quite as clearly in any of the other books as it is, in this book through this quote.

Lilly 51:33

So the pyramid architects are a family business. And the father is thinking, you scrimped and saved to send them to the best schools, and then they went and paid you back by getting educated is hilarious, first of all, but also really does just sort of really fit in with, I would say, maybe the only universal theme and Pratchett's work that just because you've always done it doesn't make it good. Yeah.

Sara 52:06

And it's something that's still very appropriate, like it feels fresh and modern. Today, that quote is applicable to modern society, still. certain segments of modern society

Lilly 52:20

paid you back, but getting educated is so good. Okay, Sarah, I'm gonna say when should you read this book, but I, I quite liked this book. I don't think it gives you a great example of Discworld as a whole because this country within Discworld is not really explored much after this. However, from a fantasy high jinks combined with philosophical satire, I think this would be a pretty good place to start,

Sara 52:51

I think I think it's a decent place to start, it might not be my choice of where you would start. But if you start here, you could do worse.

Lilly 52:59

I think we both kind of overlooked it during earlier conversations. But it it hits a lot of the high points that Pratchett does really well. And it doesn't have some of the well, it still has some dated issues, like we mentioned with some of the racism, which later Pratchett is better about. But it doesn't have some of the pitfalls of some really, maybe lazy relationship work from his earlier books. If you're looking for

Sara 53:31

a good standalone novel to start off with, and you're interested in satirical look at religion and belief and family. This is the this is not a bad place to start.

Lilly 53:44

And if you like Egyptian mythology, I wouldn't say it's super heavy in that, but there's definitely the veneer of that. Yes. So it could be fun. To avoid spoilers for pyramids, skip to one, eight teen 10. So you just mentioned satirizing religion. Yeah.

Sara 54:11

So this this book does touch on religion and belief. And I bring that up, partially because one of the later books small gods is very explicitly a book about exploring religion and satirizing religion, and I think in this the religious discussion or the discussion of religion is kind of subsidiary to the plot, or is small gods like that is the plot. But there there is a lot of overlap. I agree.

Lilly 54:38

belief itself, I think, plays less of a role in this book than it does in some of his later books as a power source. But it definitely is maybe one of his earlier forays into religion as a concept and what do these concrete ideas look like or what do these abstract religious ideas look like if we treat them as concrete, which actually Okay, actually kind of really bothered me. So there's a really weird contradiction there within this book, because in Discworld magic and gods are real, especially in Jelly Baby, but that's part of the question, right? The main character is trying to decide, does his father actually cause the sun to rise? So that's part of the joke. But we as readers, at this point in Discworld, know that the gods do exist, magic does exist. So when this book characters in this book, but also the book itself, treats pious characters as absurd, it kind of hits wrong to my

Sara 55:49

so I disagree there slightly, because I think that it's not that the book is treating pious, it's it's not treating piety in itself as absurd. It's treating piety to the exclusion of anything else.

Lilly 56:04

Okay. I think you're right. You changed my mind. It's treating ceremony? Yeah. As ridiculous. Yeah, because I'm remembering one of the characters at the beginning of the book, who was one of epics, classmates, who had a whole ceremony for praying every day. It involves a bunch of symbols, he had to write on the floor and a goat to sacrifice. It was extremely over the top. It was ceremonial. And he thought if he didn't do this, every evening, his God would literally pull out his entrails. Of course, he didn't. And so that was kind of one of the first questioning moments for Tepic of okay, well, then maybe my dad doesn't actually cause the sun to rise. But I do remember reading that and the classmates digging into this character, and the character being treated as sort of weak, for being upset by this. But if I lived in a world where magic and gods were real, I wouldn't want to take the risk. I mean,

Sara 57:06

these these are also like 12 year old boys who are not known for being bastions of sympathy and self awareness.

Lilly 57:14

Yeah, the characters being need were fine. It felt like the book was also like, the narrative itself was saying, isn't this boy being silly?

Sara 57:23

I think I think but I think that that's, like, like I said, I think that's poking fun at not religion, but religion to the exclusion of anything else.

Lilly 57:32

Yeah, I think your description actually flipped me on that. But I still wanted to bring up my point. Yes. At the time of reading it, that felt bad.

Sara 57:46

That also goes back to the theme that we're talking about about the old guard and tradition for traditions sake.

Lilly 57:53

Yeah, absolutely. And that kind of ties into this concept of belief, which comes up in this book, as we mentioned, maybe not in the same concrete way, as it does in some later works of Discworld. But one of the main plot points is that, at around the halfway point of this book, all of the non Egyptian gods become extremely real. People look up in the sky, and there's an actual woman in the stars instead of just, Oh, this guy is a lady. And it freaks everybody out.

Sara 58:33

And it's, it's really fun, because there are a lot of differing beliefs as to who makes the sun go up and what the stars really are. And so you have all of these different aspects in the same place.

Lilly 58:47

But all of these characters are confronted with the idea that Sure, they believed all of this was true. But seeing it is kind of worse. Especially in regards to the priests, the high priests of all these gods were extremely upset.

Sara 59:07

Well, because the gods are just ignoring, you know, all of their priests and doing their own thing, which there's a quote about how, if you're asking, if you're, if you're praying to make the sunrise, like, it's a good chance that God's gonna hear your prayer and the sun's gonna rise. But if you want direct inter intervention to something concrete in your life, that might be a little bit harder to manage.

Lilly 59:30

But all of these priests who have committed their lives to worshipping these gods are now faced with them, not as abstract concepts, but as physical realities, and it's very hard for them.

Sara 59:44

There's a quote on page 61. About how actually for a priest, you don't want to believe that hard deals. First Minister and high priest among high priests wasn't a naturally religious man. It wasn't a desirable quality. To get a high priest it had it affected your judgment made you unsound, start believing in things and the whole business became a farce. Well, I

Lilly 1:00:08

think that's also a comment on how religion in historical cultures served a purpose beyond just faith and spirituality, there was this huge concept of social services and administration and even politics, that religious orders served. And that's, I mean, that's obviously been codified differently in today's government system, depending on the country you live in. But I would say in most places, the church probably plays a little bit less of an administrative role than it used to. I think that's safe to say, but they really were just sort of, you know, heads of state. Especially in this in this world.

Sara 1:00:53

Yeah. And you don't want if you are fanatical about your beliefs, it doesn't make for a good administrator.

Lilly 1:01:00

Except Dios was fanatical about his and he's and he's not a good administrator. Yeah, absolutely. except his beliefs were not so much in the gods, but in how things have always been done, but still a fanatic in that way.

Sara 1:01:15

Yeah. He He's not great with change

Lilly 1:01:19

his characters like what's what's the good omens quote? Slow mosey downwards? Yeah. is so good.

Sara 1:01:27

I absolutely love the reveal that he's not just, you know, the, the evil high priest, but there's a little bit more to him than just the trope. And the slow discovery of that throughout this book is just perfect,

Lilly 1:01:47

even if it's very frustrating to get there. Okay. Maybe this is just like personal sensitivities, but the powerless feeling that Tepic had, okay, but I had reading about Tyvek literally saying one thing. It there were there were so many scenes where Tepic was giving decrees as the new King. And do said, Oh, the king meant that

Sara 1:02:13

Dios is the voice of the king and interprets and his interpretation that he is giving to people who are in the same room as topic who theoretically heard what topic said, is just so drastically different. Yeah, and

Lilly 1:02:27

that's the absurd degree that pressure is taking it to. But the feeling that he didn't even want to say anything, because he was worried it would like kill somebody is that Ooh, maybe that's just like a personal deep fear of like having absolutely no control over your destiny. Not even just destiny, but like, goddamn day to day life.

Sara 1:02:54

I mean, it definitely sucked. Like I don't I don't want to say it didn't suck. I don't think that I had as much trouble reading about it as you did. But it certainly was not great for topic, and he was understandably frustrated with it.

Lilly 1:03:07

Oh, yeah. I just kept, it's hard for me to read scenes like that and not think just make a scene. Just like stand up and start cursing and like, take off all your clothes and run out naked. Like, what's he gonna do with that?

Sara 1:03:23

I think I like I think the topic considers that or maybe not quite in those drastic of terms. But he comes to the conclusion that it wouldn't change anything. Yeah.

Lilly 1:03:33

I mean, and then he disappears and then it doesn't change anything. So he wasn't, he wasn't wrong, but his way of fighting back. Okay. Here's one of the reasons why I think this is one of the best written Discworld novels we've gone to so far. I did really love how to epics skills as an assassin, were sort of brought back into the book. You know, it starts with him learning to be an assassin. And then he finds himself constrained by the norms back home, so he can sneak past the guards, he can pick the locks on the jail cells of people, he didn't intend to sentence to jail. Because Dios was willfully and purposefully misinterpreting everything he said. It felt very, like Chekhov's Gun kind of thing, where we were given his training in the beginning. And then it actually was relevant at the end of him pulling off all these things, even the end of the whole book, he has to climb to the top of a pyramid to let all of this extra temporal power discharge, so that the whole frickin country can resume existing. And he was able to do that because of his assassin skills. And so that that felt very Hurry, fulfilling in a way. I think it shows pressure growing as a writer,

Sara 1:05:06

we spend so much time seeing him become an assassin, or like pass the test to graduate that if that had not been relevant at all, it would have been kind of a waste of pages. Well, sure, yes.

Lilly 1:05:22

But it could have been, oh, he had just been off doing something else. And then he came back and then the whole book would have continued. But because what he was off doing, came back to the part of the solution of the book that felt very well constructed. Mort, not to pick on more. Being a grape farmer had nothing to do with more the book, but that was his background.

Sara 1:05:55

Yeah, I mean, I think that we're coming around to say the same thing from different angles.

Lilly 1:06:00

Tepic does spend a lot of time in on morepork that we as readers get to see. And it not only comes back from a plot perspective, but it also informs quite a bit about his character.

Sara 1:06:14

It's an interesting exploration, I think of nature versus nurture, a little bit, and it doesn't come up like it's not a major theme in the book. But it is explored because Tepic spends the first couple of years of his life, you know, in Jelly Baby. And then he goes to Ogmore pork. And he has a quote, at one point, when he's back in Jelly Baby about he, he's talking with Tracy, and we'll talk about Tracy in just a minute. You're absolutely right. He said, I never thought about it, where I come from, it rains nearly every day. I'm sorry. And Tracy is like what you're from, you're from jelly baby. It doesn't rain. She doesn't even know the word rain, at least in that context, in the context of waterfront falling from the sky. And it's epic, says where I come from his uncle Moorpark, where I started from us here. And I just thought it was interesting to see the effect of living in a place for so long on a person and a character.

Lilly 1:07:15

I think it's very interesting that you use the phrase, nature versus nurture, because the B plot in this book, if you will, is Tepic father who dies and is a ghost and spends the entire time trying to communicate that he does not want all of this traditional shit for his, you know, funeral ceremony or whatever. And

Sara 1:07:41

he wants to be buried at sea.

Lilly 1:07:43

Right? It felt to me kind of like a Like father like son. They didn't have any interaction. In according to the book topics father like Pat's him on the shoulder, when he's sending him off to go become an assassin. And that's the only physical contact they've ever had, or something ridiculous like that separate father's

Sara 1:08:03

very absent minded when he was alive. And it's not a great parents.

Lilly 1:08:08

So I would not call any of their similarities, nurture, because I would not call him nurturing at all, but they both end up in the same place of these traditions are hindering us as a people. And I'm not saying that that's in their DNA, because that's ridiculous. But it is also sort of an interesting counterpoint to that, that these two men thrust into the same position, come to the same conclusion and are battling with the same things at extremely different phases of their life or afterlife. First, I none of that contradicts what you just said. I just thought it is interesting. Yeah. And then having that counterpoint of Tepic, going through things while he's alive, and his father continuing to go through the same things that he had been through his whole life. And you kind of realize as a reader, why topics father was so disconnected from everything because none of his decisions mattered. How could you be involved when you have a high priest who is contradicting everything you do? Yeah. There are two dirty jokes that we noted in this book. But it's Pratchett so there's a lot. The first one is Tepic and Tracy, who we are going to talk about soon because she's pretty excellent. They are riding away on a camel. And Tepic says, are you alright? He shouted above the wind. I'm hanging on with my knees. That must be very hard. You get special training. Tracey is a handmade and quote unquote handmaiden which is implied to be a sex worker of some kind, but then we also find out that Tracy Is Topix half sister and so his father doted upon her more as a daughter. There's not that much weird incest in this book.

Sara 1:10:09

I mean, there's a little bit of weird incest in this book, but not in regard saw their daughter. Not in not in regards to Tracy and topics father are Tracy and her father.

Lilly 1:10:21

Right. But her her training as a sex worker is obliquely referenced in ways like that.

Sara 1:10:28

The other dirty joke, although I feel like I feel like that's such a good segue into talking about Tracy. You're right. Let's talk about Tracy.

Lilly 1:10:37

She was very interesting. So I mean, there is sort of the romance between her and Tepic. But we do find out they're half siblings, but the whole book, they're trying to get Tepic to marry his aunt. So it kind of feels like the country itself does not have a problem with this.

Sara 1:10:54

I think the country itself, Jelly Baby would be happy if Tepic and Tracy got together. And Dios would be happy if they got together.

Lilly 1:11:02

And Tepic would have been happy if they got together until he finds out that they were half siblings,

Sara 1:11:07

although he introduces her to one of his old friends after they, they are out of jelly baby. And he kind of expects that she and his friend are going to get along well, shall we say? And he doesn't he doesn't know that they're siblings at that point.

Lilly 1:11:25

No. Well, because he has no claim on her and what's he going to do not introduce her to the sky? Okay, I feel like the I'm gonna say romance. They don't actually get together. But they are definitely romantic interests through the main portion of this book.

Sara 1:11:42

I think I think there's an undercurrent. I don't know if it's quite as explicit as romantic interest makes it sound but I think that there's definitely like, oblique references to attraction.

Lilly 1:11:55

But this relationship is so much more well developed than any of the ones I've seen from Pratchett so

Sara 1:12:02

far, at least in terms of romantic relationships. Yeah, yes. Well, that's

Lilly 1:12:06

why I started by saying I'm gonna call this a romantic relationship. Because that's the context of talking about it. And she is an interesting character, you know, trained as a handmaiden for the Pharaoh. I don't think they're do they use the word of Pharaoh? That's what he is. I think they do.

Sara 1:12:23

I think they just call him the king. Okay. Well, I don't I don't know. They call him Pharaoh.

Lilly 1:12:29

She's certainly trained as a sex worker, even though that's not the services she provides for the man who ends up being her father. And as she sort of escapes the confines of jelly baby, she becomes extremely outspoken and opinionated in a way that is extremely satisfying for me as a reader, at least

Sara 1:12:54

she has she has room to allow her intelligence to show and develop,

Lilly 1:13:00

but she is still a sex symbol. She She is allowed to be both at the same time, which I thought was very well done. She you know, she's often described as being scantily clad and using her presence as a weapon, her sexuality, her effect on people as a way to advantage herself. There was one moment that didn't hit well for me. They are on what is effectively a pirate ship. And she walks up to one of the lackeys and is noticing his tattoos, which are lewd and athletic sex acts. And through the whole book, men have been ogling her and affected by her presence. And I think she was literally described as wearing less clothing than a postage stamp. You know, she's definitely been sexualized as a human being. But then these characters, these these other men on this pirate ship, have a woman come up and go, Oh, that sex act is actually physically impossible. Haha, that's funny. And they all for reached out and make this guy put on a long sleeve shirt. Because it's totally fine for him to have a sex act depicted between a man and a woman on his body. But the second a woman is in on the joke, it becomes uncomfortable to them. I do think Pratchett was making fun of those guys though.

Sara 1:14:34

I do think that that's intentionally poking fun at the kind of person who becomes uncomfortable when they received the treatment that they themselves are giving to other people. But yeah, oh, oh no. How dare a woman OGL something on a man's body.

Lilly 1:14:51

That is about a woman like to me that I think was the cherry on top is that

Sara 1:14:57

the tattoos involves men and when minimum. Yeah, I mean,

Lilly 1:15:01

obviously, your diagrams of SEC facts there are. There's no obvious about that. No, that's true. But I think earlier on, there have been other references to what I'm assuming is the Kama Sutra, but not exactly.

Sara 1:15:16

He has images from the Ogmore port Kama Sutra, basically.

Lilly 1:15:20

And it's been established that Tracy's grandmother was the model for this book.

Sara 1:15:25

Yeah. And Tracy has read it and Tepic has read it, and it's come up previously, but this whole group

Lilly 1:15:31

of pirates thinks it's so great and funny that he has these explicit sex acts tattooed on his body until Yeah, I don't know. I don't I don't want to take this too far. It does annoy me when jokes can be made at a woman's expense. But if she dare participate, it's no longer funny. I don't think that's where depression was going with it. So I don't want to go on a rant.

Sara 1:15:56

Yeah. I don't think that that's what he was going for.

Lilly 1:15:59

I think that's what he was making fun of. Yeah. Yeah. So poor Tracy. Love that she ends up being king love that they call her king. That's yeah, so really good. And I really do want to say, I think Tepic and Tracy have more chemistry than any other couple in previous Discworld novels.

Sara 1:16:20

I have to agree with you there.

Lilly 1:16:22

They don't even end up together and they still have better chemistry, practice growing as a writer. It's wonderful.

Sara 1:16:28

It's nice to see that he's getting better at writing these romantic or pseudo romantic relationships. Because it's, again, their relationship is not ever overtly romantic. There's like, there's hints,

Lilly 1:16:40

right? But she reminded me a little bit of the character in the color of magic, the virgin sacrifice, who not Conan the Barbarian save specimen or something? Oh, yeah. Bethan. That's yeah, it's sort of a similar playing on

Sara 1:16:57

us on a similar not trope, but like pastiche Sure,

Lilly 1:17:01

yeah. And then trying to evolve the character past that. But I think what Pratchett was trying to do with Beth and he succeeded with and Tracy.

Sara 1:17:12

Yes, he also has more time with Tracy. That's true. With Bussum. Yeah. But he's he has gotten better as a writer and it's just able to do more with the character that he could earlier

Lilly 1:17:24

even just for dialogue with Tepic, Tracy's dialogue with Tepic is really good banter. She actually has an opportunity to banter which you're right is maybe a page count issue.

Sara 1:17:39

Yeah, I mean, I don't I don't think it's exclusively a page count issue, but I think it is partially a page count issue. And it also is Tracy and Tepic are main characters and Bethan and Cohen are not so they they get more screen time, Beth and

Lilly 1:17:55

did have dialogue. And it was all pretty boring and expository. Yeah. Whereas now I am getting to see I think I yeah, I think Tracy is what he wanted them to be. And yeah, he accomplished it here. Oh, boy, is it time for me to complain about this bad romance novels, the more

Sara 1:18:22

I know that there is one complaint in particular that you have about this room about this novel,

Lilly 1:18:28

it is calling back to my issues with the book as a whole. Also the characters in the book being so shy about the existence of sexual relations between consenting adults. And it ends up using a lot of euphemisms. This particular complaint that I have is in dialogue, which I should acknowledge, yes, that is the character speaking. But it's pretty indicative of the book as a whole. Like the whole book has this sort of tone to it of using cutesy words, which makes me vomit in my mouth a little bit. Especially when one character, their sisters, like I said, this is all family drama, and the main character is dealing with her family being over involved in her life, and I'm supposed to find that charming and a good thing. According to the end of the book, is not a good book. Her older sister asks her if she needs time to do kitten scaping, referring to getting ready for a date. She of course means shaving her junk, but used the literal worst euphemism i Have you ever heard in my entire life?

Sara 1:19:50

That is a man. That's um, that's that's sure a euphemism?

Lilly 1:19:56

I am aware that the phrase Sex Kitten is This. I don't like that it does. I prefer no one to ever use it. But leave cats out of this.

Sara 1:20:11

I also wouldn't. I mean, now that you've made the connection to Sex Kitten, I can link the two, but I've would not have made that connection on my own.

Lilly 1:20:22

I actually, oh, making use of the explicit tag. I assume the phrase kitten scaping is referring to the slang term pussy. I think that makes more sense. From a concrete diction standpoint.

Sara 1:20:39

That doesn't make more sense.

Lilly 1:20:41

i It's also awful. Yeah, like, I understood what they meant, did not like it one bit. These were two fucking adults who are being like, cutesy and shy about referring to Yeah, you know, your bikini area? I don't know, there are less gross euphemisms for it. Okay.

Sara 1:21:09

That's not to, but also I probably if I had a sister, who was getting ready for a date, I probably wouldn't ask if she was gonna shave her bikini lines.

Lilly 1:21:18

Well, that was also her family is like, super toxic and over involved in her life. And I'm supposed to find that to be a good thing. Which is why this book bothered me quite a bit.

Sara 1:21:31

Yeah, that's, I mean, asking about some levels of preparation for the date, fine, whatever. But I don't need to know about my siblings, shaving habits, you know, at all.

Lilly 1:21:45

Maybe we're the wrong audience for this because neither of us have siblings.

Sara 1:21:49

No, but I mean, like, I mean, you and I are basically siblings.

Lilly 1:21:53

I would not ask you that question. It's true.

Sara 1:21:59

And we you lay it's not that we don't over evolve into each other. And what I was gonna say it's not like we are uncomfortable asking each other explicit things. That's true. Like we've we've had explicit conversations, but that's still not a question I would ever ask before you were getting ready for a date? No, like, I don't need to know about that. I'm sorry. I certainly, I certainly don't need to call a kitten escape.

Lilly 1:22:30

That. That just bothers me so much. It really does just boil down to leave the kittens out of this. They didn't ask to be involved in your weird sex. Shaney. Like, we all want to enjoy sex, but we can't admit it. So we're going to use gross words to talk about it. situation. I don't know I have cats. So why would you shave my cat? Leave them alone. And that's all I can think of.

Sara 1:23:02

It's it's an odd choice.

Lilly 1:23:08

Thank you so much for listening to this episode of fiction fans. Come disagree with us. We're on Twitter and Instagram at fiction fans pod. You can also email us at fiction fans pod@gmail.com If you enjoyed this episode, please rate and review on Apple podcasts. And follow us wherever your podcasts live.

Sara 1:23:30

Thanks again for listening and may your villains always be defeated. Bye