mornelithe_falconsbane: (Most interesting cat in the world)
mornelithe_falconsbane ([personal profile] mornelithe_falconsbane) wrote in [community profile] 21_days2015-07-17 11:13 am

Valdemar Discussion Post!

This is the official Dead Vanyel Party discussion post!

Whether it's your first read or your millionth, there's always something worth talking about--and rambling at length about at that. Confide in your fellow Lackey fans--who's your fave? What books do you eat up with a spoon? Does Vanyel end up as a gay Companion after the Mage Storms books? Or is he reborn as the very subtle baby herald "Vanel"? If so, does that make Stef his life-bonded companion "Tylenol", or what? And is Ma'ar REALLY dead? (No!)

Life's little questions, and we all want to talk about them.

Anon and unanon are currently allowed on this post. As of August 9, only anon posting will be allowed, in order to foster an anonny sense of anonymousness, in the vein of everyone's favorite meme ;P. The exception to the anon-only rule is the Introduction Thread, where you can introduce yourself and meet fellow players.

If you're looking for "Research Materials", join the comm and visit this post. (Subtle, right?)




harukami: (the lord lucifer demands pants)

Re: Introduce Yourself!

[personal profile] harukami 2015-08-26 03:03 pm (UTC)(link)
Extremely belated:

Username on DW/AO3/Tumblr: harukami on all three!
Favorite Valdemar Book: TLHM... probably Pawn? Stef is my favorite but Price is kinda sloppy, and Promise is fairly solid but the plot kinda sags around knowing that Vanyel just came back from doing the stuff of legends and this book for some reason is set during his brief vacation home. Pawn is fairly solid beyond having a random villain in the last 30 pages lmao and beyond my thoughts on yaoi below. But either way these are the only Valdemar books I've read until they fall to pieces.
Most hated Valdemar book: I'm only just rereading literally these last 2 months so I can't answer this fairly yet, but I remember not being able to get through the Gryphon books when I was younger, and finding the...events... of the Oath series kind of egregious.
Age of first exposure to Lackey: 12! My grade 8 teacher had the Arrows series in her portable and let me borrow them and I was hooked.
Favorite Valdemar protagonist and villain: STEFEN ok he's a POV character he counts. (Vanyel, yes). I... don't really have a fave villain, they're all kind of written the same way most of the time and a friend couldn't resist spoiling me on the fact that a good 90% of them ARE the same guy.
Least favorite: Skif... gets so Nice Guy in Winds... I want to love you, Skif, but your writing there makes that so hard.
Thoughts on Yaoi: Okay but my one quibble with Valdemar as a setting is that I feel like sometimes it fails to take into account the impact that it would have if your king and the majority of your ruling class and important movers and shakers were mind-readers, empaths, etc. I mean it has rules around them, which is great, but I wonder if Valdemar in general wouldn't be just a bit different than it's written? Not more Noble and Pure, it's got that, but in general for example in TLHM the whole plot literally hinged on "We can't let anyone find out Vanyel's gay because we literally have no legal resource to prevent him from getting abused over it" and I understand this is 500 years before the main timeline in a fantasy-medieval society but regardless it's difficult for me to believe that within the context of how this society is formed around gifts, the best solution would be for one of the most powerful adults in the capital to earnestly tell an emotionally-abused sixteen-year-old to hide who he is, how he feels, and who he loves in public for two years while he gets steadily more hated by everyone around him including those in charge of his education and future. Like I feel like something else would logically exist there. [Seinfeld voice] Also what is the deal with Nevis being the only bi representation in a queerpositive story?
shadowsapiens: (pawn)

Re: Introduce Yourself!

[personal profile] shadowsapiens 2015-08-26 07:05 pm (UTC)(link)
Welcome! And agreed -- it seems like the Heralds are always completely unable to control the nobles at court. And you would think they'd make a more concerted effort to educate the populace about what Heralds are, what they do, that the Companions aren't horses...