They say that everything happens for a reason.
They say that everything that happens to you
happens to you, or happens for you, not to you.
And they say that, you know, you'll look back
and laugh about this in the future. And while
I do think that's true in life, it's more often
true, or it's more evidently, it's easier to
see in fiction. And that's something that...
is happening in Chapter 8 of Lloyd Alexander's
Book of Three, which I just finished reading.
And I want to talk about a lot of things that
are going on here, but I am stopping myself because
I don't want to jump into Chapter 9 yet. And
this is part of the bad thing about covering
these books chapter by chapter, is when I've
already read the book or when there's... Oh,
desire for speculation. I hold myself back from
indulging in that because I want to keep it topical
to the chapter. And then eventually I'll talk
about the book as a whole and I can have fun
doing that when I do that. But yeah, there's
things going on here that you could argue are
convenient or contrivances or that's just because
it's a book. But honestly, in my experience,
that's how life works out. Crazy bad things happen
to you and you don't understand why. You don't
understand why you're suffering at this time,
why you lost that thing, why this opportunity,
you know, went away from you or whatever. You
were, you know, unable to capture it. And then
later on, three months, six months, three weeks,
three hours down the line, something happens
and you say, oh, wow, thank God this happened.
So I was in this position so that I could be
ready to receive X because X was exactly what
I needed. And it reminds me of, what is it, the
Beatles, right? You can't always get what you
want. No, that's the Rolling Stones. But if you
try some time, you... You just might find you
get what you need. So Tarn and Elanui are stuck
in this tunnel that isn't a very good tunnel.
It's a dead end. And they want to get out of
there. And Tarn, again, he's being pessimistic.
He's seeing the negative side of things. Elanui
is being her positive, optimistic self. And she
is stumped. But she says, I'm not lost. I'm not
really lost. I just don't know where I am right
now. And there's a big difference between that.
And Tarn can't see that. In retrospect, I'm not
going to spoil exactly what happens in the chapter,
even though I would have liked for you to have
read it already, but they needed to go to the
end of that tunnel with her confidence to backtrack
one turnoff so that they could find their way
out of Spiral Castle. That's what I'll say. And
it's interesting because their perspectives are
so different from each other. Tarin is coming
from a perspective of fear and doubt. And a lack
of self -confidence. And really, Elanui is this
great foil to him because she lacks those things.
She has confidence in herself. She doesn't fear.
She trusts. And she knows that things are going
to be okay. So she proceeds as if they will be,
because they are going to be. And that benefits
her because she sees opportunities where he doesn't.
Or she can more easily see the opportunities
when they come for success. And she takes them
and seizes them. I'm just going to say she inadvertently
does something in this chapter that really changes
the course of the book and changes the course
of the story and has, I think, a huge payoff
in, like, book five, book four or five. But anyway,
it's interesting because who they are as people,
the way they're foiling each other, their perspectives
on things, it's all naturally coming from the
characters where these miscommunications, these
missteps, them being out of sync with each other.
It all makes sense with their characters. It's
not a contrivance. It's not done for fun. Yes,
Lloyd Alexander contrived them to be like this
and set their characters like that so they could
play off with these dynamics to show like the
twists of fate or possibly what faith or the
divine, what destiny has in store for these characters
and how they can fulfill their destiny through
making their own choices or by making choices
that are wholly their own and not done like to
manipulate destiny or anything like that. But
I don't know. It's interesting. It's very interesting.
But, like, that's clever. That's what a writer's
supposed to do. They create the world, they create
the fictional world, and they tell these fake
stories in there to reveal deeper hidden truths.
And I think that's exactly what we're seeing
here. And it's funny. At one point, Tarn's upset,
and he tells Elanri that she's like Dolben, and
she asks, who's Dolben? And he says, he's mine.
Then he cuts himself off and doesn't want to
share with her. And I was about to say, yeah,
he's your foil. He's, like, you know, what you're
supposed to be. He's your master. He's the one
guiding you. And now Elanri's taking that role.
Gwydion took the role of guidance. First it was
Dolben, then it was Call, then it was Gwydion,
now it's Elanwy taking this place of, like, a
mentor and a foil to Tarn directly, or to directly
show him what he needs to be, to show the audience
what he could be and what he isn't. And I just
find that a really fascinating, really satisfying
thing that Alexander's been doing in this book,
and it's just really enjoyable. There's a lot
of cool, like, creepy... lore bits like textual
ruins and things like that in this chapter with
like the king of this in this barrow and how
did he design it and and build the castle and
you know what is spiral castle and you know why
is the why is he buried under it and why is that
important why is the sword matter and all these
different things um that are really interesting
uh but i won't get into now but it was just a
fun cool chapter um i listened to it twice because
the first time i thought okay that was good and
i listened to a second time okay okay now i'm
picking up on more stuff and this really is a
good chapter and there's It's like an interstitial
chapter, but I love, but it's good, and it works
on its own, and it has things in it that you
don't realize are a bigger deal until they happen
later. And then at the end, it has a great closing
hook, which makes me want to read the next chapter,
which was they see Melengar and a companion cloaked
in hood or whatever, and Tarn had never seen
this man before. Boom! Cut! And we don't know
what happened. So it's like, well, what's going
to happen? So you want to read the next chapter.
And I held off because I know who it is. And,
you know, it's going to be fun. So look forward
to that. Anyway, if you want to hear more honest
critique of books, you can subscribe. Check out
mgmooners .com. You can find a link in the show
notes to find more of me talking about other
books. I talked about Secret Garden. I did a
big, I did some chapter by chapter coverage on
that. And I did a huge, like a 40 minute or so
review of the whole book because I just finished
it. all in one go. And I'm working on books that
are going to be like my book, Mockering Mayhem,
which is coming out in like before the summer
or before the summer, hopefully of 2025. But
I'm working on that and I'm going to start reading
and reviewing some books more or less weekly,
maybe every other week that are similar books
to it to assess them and to talk about them and
how they compare to the book, which by the way,
if you want to check out my... Mockwing Mayhem,
which is about magical bugs battling monsters.
The monsters find out where the magical bugs
live. They go there to kill them all. And the
bugs have to defend themselves, especially two
untrained, untested, untried grow bugs. Then
check out the link in the description below.
And it'll be on my website as well. You can sign
up to my newsletter and you can get a free short
story as well as a free guide to the world of
grow bugs and mock wings. And it's very cool.
I think you're going to like it. If you like
adventure and fantasy, it's a very much like
a secondary world within our world. And I think
it's a really fun book. I think it's really cool.
And I'm excited to get it out there. Just fine
tuning stuff in the background to publish. It's
the first time I've self -published a book or
published a book at all. So I'm learning a lot
as I'm going along, but I think you'll enjoy
it. And I think if you like Tower and Wanderer,
or sorry, I really like that book. If you like
these Lloyd Alexander books, the Prydain books,
I think you'll like Mocking Mayhem as well. There
are some similarities, but they're very different.
books from each other, but still the heroism
and the core of goodness and nobility is there.
And that's good stuff. Anyway, until next time,
folks, take care. This is MJ signing out.