strange and random happenstance: Ever After

The Viscount Who Loved Me by Julia Quinn
Published by: Avon
Publication Date: December 5th, 2000
Format: Kindle, 1053 Pages
Rating: ★
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Sophie Beckett's life was never going to be a fairy tale. She was born illegitimate and unwanted. Yes, her father touted her as his "ward" in order to give her a semblance of respectability, but when he married, his new wife did everything in her power to grind Sophie down. After his death Sophie became nothing more than a servant to those who should have loved and cared for her. Her only joy in life is reading Whistledown and dreaming of the world right outside her door. The parties in ballrooms throughout London where it seems anything could happen. A life she will never be a part of, until the other servants concoct a scheme for Sophie to attend Lady Bridgerton's masked ball. In spangles and silver she enchants all those who see her. But she instantly captures the heart of Benedict Bridgerton, as he does hers. At midnight she flees, never to see that ballroom or Benedict again, or so she thinks. Her life will have to be bearable with the memory of this one perfect night. But then her stepmother discovers her deceit and throws her out onto the street. With nowhere to go she flees to the country and eventually ends up working as a maid in a country house. It's not ideal. She sells her hair for money and loses too much weight, she's unrecognizable to even herself, but she is making do until her master's son and his friends attempt to assault her and she flees right into the arms of Benedict. Benedict has been looking for the mysterious lady from the ball for years. She is the only one he wants to marry and yet she is elusive. The girl he rescues from some louts at a house party is sweet, but not the woman of his dreams. Or is she? As Sophie nurses Benedict back to health after he takes ill after a long ride in the rain, he starts to wonder if perhaps a real flesh and blood girl is better than a figment of his imagination that he has been embellishing for years. The only problem is her station in life. Can they overcome society and a scheming stepmama to get a chance at a happy ending?

Benedict Bridgerton is the apotheosis of white male privilege. He is toxic masculinity hiding behind a veneer of savior complex. Oh, look, he has a rock from the day his dad died, boo hoo, does that humanize him as he tries to defile a woman of a lower station? NO! I just couldn't with Benedict. He is not a romantic hero, he is an ass who is totally incapable of empathy. He can not see that by forcing Sophie to take him as her lover he is destroying her heart and soul. She is incapable of saying no because she is deluded enough to think that she loves him. A delusion born of a time when he thought her his equal and therefore treated her as such. Now that she is "below" him he thinks nothing of taking her to bed despite the very real consequences that could happen. He doesn't get how having a child out of wedlock would destroy her. He just doesn't get it because he is a white man and everything has always gone his way. Consequences are for other people, not him. Oh, how I hated him. I wanted to claw out his eyes. Every interaction he had with Sophie made my skin crawl. And she just takes it. She puts up with his bullshit because, sadly, his bullshit is less horrific than the other bullshit she had to deal with in this very inadequate reimaging of Cinderella. Here's the thing, I think everyone out there, if they know one fairy tale, they know Cinderella. It's like genetically coded into humankind of something. Therefore when it is reinterpreted it really has to get it right because every single one of us has expectations born of genetic knowledge. In my mind there are literally only two that work, the film Ever After, and the book Cinder by Marissa Meyer. That is it. There are no others. The Viscount Who Loved Me doesn't even chart. There is no depth, no truths brought forward by seeing the story in another light, there is just an asshole "prince" who forces himself on his "true love" and I guess they have a happily ever after. Personally if I had to be in a room with Benedict for more than a minute I would not be a happy camper. Lucky for Benedict that Sophie isn't that picky.

Posted by Miss Eliza at 12:00 AM 0 comments

Labels: An Offer From a Gentleman, Benedict Bridgerton, Bridgerton, Cinder, Cinderella, Ever After, Fairy Tale Retelling, Julia Quinn, Lady Whistledown, Marissa Meyer, Regency England, Regency Romp, Toxic Masculinity

The Wise Man's Fear: Kingkiller Chronicles Day 2 by Patrick Rothfuss
Published by: DAW
Publication Date: March 1, 2011
Format: Hardcover, 1008 Pages
Rating: ★★★
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It is day two. The story resumes at The University where Kvothe, in another gallant attempt to win Denna, puts his life at risk once more, yet again in the hands of Ambrose. He escapes with his life, but Ambrose is not done with him. Kvothe is brought up on charges stemming from the incident where he broke Ambrose's arm the term before. While he does get cleared and Chronicler is sad that Kvothe refuses to go into details, Kvothe claims that this episode in his life is already well documented, it is brought to Kvothe's attention that it might be best if he where to take a semester or two off. Count Threpe, who has never been able to sponsor his musical abilities, due to the blacklisting from Ambrose, secures a position for him in Severen to work for Maer Alveron as a musician. While Kvothe loses everything but his lute on his journey, he soon becomes invaluable to the Maer. Not only providing music and tips for wooing a lady love, he also saves his life. All this while Denna is also in Severn, making it a very happy time in Kvothe's life, despite all the court politics and intrigues he has to navigate.

After Kvothe is successful in obtaining the hand of Meluan Lackless for the Maer, Kvothe's presence is no longer desired and the Maer sends him off with some mercenaries to the Eld to locate thieves who have been stealing his taxes. One of the mercenaries, Tempi is an Adem warrior and after much coersion from Kvothe, starts to teach him their ways. But soon Kvothe is lured into the land of fairies only to emerge a much more sexual and virile man, willing to go with Tempi to Ademre to learn to be an Adem warrior. Kvothe is slowly become the man of legend, the lover, the fighter, the hot head who still doesn't know when it's best to hold his tongue. Things will soon get bad, but hopefully they will also bring answers.

I always have problems with the second book in a trilogy. It's like a placeholder book. The book before the final, so you have to be given enough information to entertain you but not enough information so that you can solve all the mysteries. So frustrating! I was very sad that there was not much at The University what with Kvothe needing to get out of the glare of his infamy for a bit. But I loved the Renaissance world of Severn and the Maer. The court intrigues and back biting. Like Machiavelli and the movie Ever After in one. The beauty combined with the scheming. I could have spent the entire book there, which made me pissed when we went off on the weird mercenary jaunt. What is it about Kvothe that made the Maer go, yes, he'll lead a band of mercenaries. I do know that it was really just to get him out of the way, I'm not stupid, I just think it could have been a better more feasible excuse.

All that is nothing compared to the teenage fantasy fairy sex wet dream land made me want to hurl. Felurian, oh how I wish you weren't in this book. Obviously Kvothe has to become a great lover, a Casanova if you will, but, really!?! This is how you chose to do it!?! I mean, I'm sure that weird Cheshire cat creature will become very important given Bast's reaction, and it's important to show that Kvothe, even besotted with ecstasy can outwit a fairy, it was all too, urrgh. Though, I will admit that Felurian making his cloak out of the darkness was way awesome. So I'll forgive some of the fairy orgy for that. But nothing will make me forgive Kvothe's "Shogun" period that just about drove me round the bend. I was never one of those kids who wanted to do martial arts, and in fact don't really have an interest in martial arts. Wasn't it Kvothe who earlier said that it was annoying when Tempi was working on the Ketan and gave the names of the moves but they had no correlation to what Kvothe knew? Then Kvothe spends a couple hundred pages listing names of moves you have no idea what they are so therefore you don't care or have any connection to them. Double standards Kvothe! Just cause it's you listing names doesn't make it less annoying. While discussing this with one of my friends he said that not knowing what the names meant didn't matter... then why use names at all was my response? It just gets under my skin and chafes. Fist shaking at the sky time people.

Also, I think I'm going to start an "Oh, Kvothe" for all those times when he does something that makes me cringe and go, no you didn't dumbass. The main one being when he returns to Severen and his Ruh heritage rears it's ugly head. You can become the worlds greatest lover and an Adem yet still get pissed off when people denigrate your Ruh heritage. Get a thicker skin. In the end, which I felt came about abruptly, though I could see there where less and less pages, I was left happy that I know this world but desperate to know more. Also I'm glad that Denna is starting to have a point versus someone for Kvothe to moon over.