Greg S > Recent Status Updates

So this tree-human love story is starting to remind me of Cronenberg’s Crash, except this has the additional internalized oppression. Poor tree. The tree really doesn’t have any choices. Kostas kidnapped her from her native soil and…etc. etc.

This is a sick toxic love. — “On such nights I felt so much love and affection for him that it hurt.” “turn my branches into arms to embrace him, my twigs into fingers to caress him,” “Some of your roots will break, but don’t worry,’ Kostas said. ‘The ones remaining will be more than enough to keep you alive.’“ “If I were human, it would have been the sound of my bones breaking.”

I know it’s not the authors intention but from now on I’m going to interpret this tree’s human-centric instead of tree-centric psychology as being an example of internalized colonialism or internalized oppression. It’s the only explanation I can think of. It reminds me of the white gaze or the male gaze. So really this tree is a tragic figure stuck in her own oppression.

Why would a tree give a fig about a bible myth story?? Instead of, I don’t know, maybe that woodpecker or beetle burrowing into my flesh.

So. Is the logic that this tree is knowledgeable of the 19th century literary french term “femme fatale”?

Sigh. Why would a tree shame herself using human beauty standards?

Someone tell this tree that it’s wrong. If her assertive statement is that trees are not alone because they have bacteria then I have some high school biology to teach her about humans.

Author is so dramatic.

Can I just ignore this chapter and imagine it doesn’t exist?

Wow, I’m a first generation immigrant and this is reductive and insutling. I’d like to know where the author found this stereotype and courage to write it? — “First-generation immigrants are a species all their own. They wear a lot of beige, grey or brown. Colours that do not stand out. Colours that whisper, never shout…by some unspoken experience, like survivors of a car accident.”

I think that the logic must be sacrificed here to expand the story. You could have more of a Beckett or Proust but maybe those don’t sell very well.

How a london Tree knows about California, I don’t know. If anything, the life of a Tree would be incredibly local and ignorant.

I’m just curious if other people enjoy the word “steel” here. — “…it glistened every time he forced the steel edge of the spade into solid earth.”

Ada obviously wasn’t listening in science class if she’s wondering if sorrow can be genetically inherited.

I’m more interested in the Greek Dad marriage to the Turkish Mom story.

Artificial cliff hanger, author.

A bit extreme, Ada.

I’m curious about this relationship where it’s ok to laugh at a porn magazine with your mom.

“Interview your family” assignment. Is this a middle grade book?

Right. Dead parent trope.

Funny. I feel like I’ve read other stories with a fungi professor father before. Is this a common trope or something?

Nope. — “Time is a songbird…”

No metaphors in this book, I noticed.

The problem with this Lore is that there’s no anecdote or story attached to them.

What is a golden wind? It must be me but some of these sentences are confusing.

Rocannon watched the moons drift across the sky? How slow or fast are these moons? I guess its not too bad if they’re going maybe 2 minutes per degree.

Yes, author, I see you putting in that Deu ex Machina. You promised us that interest things are in the mountains and nothing will deter your authorial conviction in narrative progression.

The Lore is too impersonal. Durholde of Hallan set free the prisoners? Ok, but how is it relevant now? Also what does that teach me about Durhole and his life?

Rocannon on a mission and a mysterious Enemy.

The Star Trek sociologists are a fun idea. Star Trek aired the same year this book was published!