The Lies of Locke Lamora – Read Along: Wk2

Considering in last weeks post I said I couldn’t put the book down I suddenly realised on Wed night that I hadn’t started any of the next section of the read along. I blame the fact that Mass Effect 3 came out, I was kind of busy playing it. Good thing I have a commute to work gave me a chance to read the section, especially as I want to read the section before I read through the questions.

Although I think perhaps this may not be the best book to commute with. I’m not particularly good with blood and gore and so I tend to skim over these sections carefully. I very nearly fainted (vision faded, dizzy, shortness of breath, cold sweat) on the tube a few months ago from reading a book where a character broke a leg. I had a massive freak out and the sensation is not pleasant! I may have been ok with this section but I really don’t want to risk that any more on the tube. Think it might be safer to read this book at home? 🙂

Edited to add: This section covers Chapter three through to the end of Interlude called “The Boy who Cried for a Corpse”

1) Do you think Locke can pull off his scheme of playing a Midnighter who is working with Don Salvara to capture the Thorn of Camorr? I mean, he is now playing two roles in this game – and thank goodness for that costume room the Gentlemen Bastards have!

I thought that was a very interesting development, and the way it was introduced was cleverly done, messing with the time line slightly to get you the reader guessing. When the Midnighter turned up I was like ‘uh-oh – very convenient how much this person knows!’ and I did wonder if maybe it was Locke but I couldn’t see initially how that might help them in anyway at all, not until they finished the conversation. Its a clever if dangerous rouse, shows how very good they are at their costumes that the Don can’t recognise him! I guess the hope is that he’d be too intimidated by a Midnighter to look too closely. I do wonder what’s it was that was following Locke and Calo. That’s the second time so far (I think unless I missed one) that something has leaped about on buildings nearby them.

2) Are you digging the detail the author has put into the alcoholic drinks in this story?

I must confess that I do and do not take these things in as I read stuff. I notice it when I read it but then kind of don’t think about it after until someone asks questions like this! 🙂 But now its been pointed out and I think about it, yes, it gives more vibrancy to the world. Poor Locke and his first ever hangover.
3) Who is this mysterious lady Gentlemen Bastard Sabetha and what does she mean to Locke?

Hmm I believe he might be in love with her? 🙂 Question is does she return those feelings? Have they had a falling out is that why he doesn’t want to talk about her? Is she ignoring feelings she has for him to get something else done? Questions questions questions!

4) Are you as creeped out over the use of Wraithstone to create Gentled animals as I am?

Not really. Yes I probably should be, it is a creepy thing, making ‘zombiefied’ animals that have no personality. But I read a lot of gritty/dark fantasy, play computer games like Dragon Age/Mass Effect/Fallout and roleplay in games like Dark Heresy (Warhammer 40k Universe). In all of these things there a lots of things that are just as creepy if not more so.  I mean Dragon Age as the Tranquil these are mages that have been cut off from the Fade, so they can’t dream and therefore don’t have emotions. They have to do this to mages who don’t have enough willpower to resist the persuasive power of the Demons who live in the Fade. Otherwise they could become a demonic monster or simply summon demons and they become incredibly dangerous and a threat to everyone. So I am somewhat inured to it all. Although saying that, in Dragon Age they do it to keep dangerous threats at bay to them its necessary they don’t have any other solutions other than say killing the individual, in this its there to what? simply stop animals from spooking? They’re too lazy to train animals properly? So actually maybe it’s worse here as its simply used as a matter of convenience.

5) I got a kick out of child Locke’s first meeting with Capa Barsavi and his daughter Nazca, which was shortly followed up in the story by Barsavi granting adult Locke permission to court his daughter! Where do you think that will lead? Can you see these two together?

I was a little worried when we first met her as a child she might grow up to be very spoiled, as I could see Capa Barsavi indulging her all the time. But after the first conversation as adults she strikes me as quite an intelligent and confident young woman. Based on what I’ve seen so far I can see these two being good friends or if not quite that far then good allies. Don’t expect, not sure I want a romance between them. It would be nice to see a woman in a position of power, who is of a similar age to main character and not have a romantic attachment.

I do love that she is taller than Locke! Is he short? Or is she just tall? 😀

I found  the fact that Nazca and her two brothers wear glasses a nice touch. Often in fantasy novels they never seem quite advanced enough to have glasses, let alone having the children (who I imagine are quite scary in their own right) of one of the most powerful men in the city wearing them.

6) Capa Barsavi is freaked out over rumors of The Gray King and, in fact, us readers are privy to a gruesome torture scene. The Gray King is knocking garristas off left and right. What do you think that means?

Capa Barsavi is really freaking out isn’t he? Torturing what should be trusted me is a sign of a man losing control and being very paranoid. He could have used the fact that they “don’t remember” as a potential clue. Why don’t they remember? What things could make them forget? Drugs? Magic? (I don’t really know enough yet about what if any kind of magic there is that could do this?) Then questions like how could someone have got in and done that to all of Tesso’s men before killing Tesso.  A wasted opportunity. Nazca seems to be the only one thinking straight in the family (although I don’t know her brothers well enough yet.)

I’m sort of wondering if The Grey King  might be Locke… But that could be pushing it a bit. I’m basing this on Chains saying he want’s to destroy the Secret Peace – this seems possibly more violent though then he had in mind. Then again he’s teaching them all how to pretend to be other people so who knows. Or if its not Locke its simply someone else wanting to break down the current structure, or get revenge for something.

7) In the Interlude: The Boy Who Cried for a Corpse, we learn that Father Chains owes an alchemist a favor, and that favor is a fresh corpse. He sets the boys to figuring out how to provide one, and they can’t ‘create’ the corpse themselves. How did you like Locke’s solution to this conundrum?

It was the most sensible one, I was thinking the same thing just before Locke carried out his plan. It’s the kind of thing you might have to do in a roleplaying game and that’s probably one solution we’d do IF we had a quest to do that.  Although once they had the corpse I did wonder what was happening with the candle maker! That was very sneaky! Clever way to make back what they’d spent. Didn’t see that additional part of the plan coming. So I was pleasantly surprised. 🙂 It does make me worry at some point though that Locke might do something too clever for his own good.. again. (Which I suspect he will?)

Last weekend a friend asked me about my first post and when I explained to him what the read along was and how it worked,  he said it seemed like homework. Like the sort we used to get in English when we were studying a Shakespeare play or something. Perhaps in a way it is, but I’m really enjoying this so far, it’s making me think about things and notice things which I might not have given as much thought to before.

Edited to add: I am amused by how much wealth they seem to be amassing! I was wondering what the hell they were going to do with all of it and then its pointed out that even they don’t know what to do with it all!