laleia

First, I was absolutely DEVASTATED that my OTP didn't pan out. I've shipped Beka/Rosto SO HARD since the first book, and I knew within 20 pages of the third book that it wasn't going to happen, and it made me sad. I mean, we had two pages of Rosto before she set off to solve a mystery and I knew in my heart that she wasn't going to return to Corus in time for an actual romance to develop there.

And I guessed from Farmer's first appearance (and knew from the moment she first contemplated his broad shoulders) what the endgame was going to be.

And see the thing is, I should have expected this. Tamora Pierce always does this, goes with realistic development of romantic relationships as people fall in and out of love. The problem is that I didn't care so much about past OTPs. I wasn't a huge fan of Alanna/George first time I read the Alanna books, but I also read the books wildly out of order and wasn't a huge fan of Alanna/Jon either, while my Alanna/Liam OTP died so tragically. Each subsequent reread of the Alanna books has me finding Liam more and more boring, finding Jon more and more pretentious, and falling in love with Alanna/George more and more even though it's not what you would expect was the endgame.

I was never a fan of Daine/Numair period because I don't like age differences, so I never actively shipped them. Aly/Nawat grew on me on rereads but I'm still not sure how I feel about the fact that she ended up with a crow. I only ship Aly/Nawat because the books do. I think the Keladry books do the best job of giving me a multitude of possible romances (Neal, Cleon, Dom) that all were equally uninteresting so my heart didn't break when she fell out of love with all of them.

But Rosto/Beka is the exact kind of ship that tugs at my heartstrings. It's my perfect id!OTP, precisely because realistically there's no way a Dog and the Rogue could go out, and of course Tamora Pierce does try to strive for romantic realism.... I hate when authors change romantic endgames on me. I'm looking at you, Terry Pratchett, Maria Snyder -- but at least those were ones I didn't actively ship. This one I did!

Maybe Farmer will grow on me with reread ... I hope so otherwise I'm pretty much only be reading the first book on my rereads and ignoring the second and third!

Second, I am SO sad about Tunstall even if I was expecting it (Farmer was too obvious of a choice; Sabine would be too random; Tunstall would have the maximum unexpected emotional devastation). I don't know if I'm going to be able to reread the first book anymore without this looming in the back of my head. SO depressing.

I feel like the only fictional betrayal off the top of my head (given that I only read about the betrayal and finished the book 10 minutes ago) that upset me more than this one would be the one in Dawn' Cook's Princess at Sea where the romantic leg of the love triangle that I had been cheering for all along turned out to be a VICIOUS SOCIOPATHIC LIAR. There's a reason I tend to reread Decoy Princess and try not to reread Princess at Sea.

I feel like I should reread the book to see the changes in Tunstall's character but I almost don't even want to ruin Tunstall by actively contemplating him being evil. We'll see.

Third, I enjoyed the book overall. I liked the way we could see the things change as this Tortall became the Tortall we know, from the Gentle Mother revolution (ugh) to the abolition of slavery. But I don't think I will ever not be bitter about the lack of Rosto. :(

I also finished reading Terry Pratchett's Snuff recently. Loved it (I always love Vimes books, much like I always love Witches books) but it's not going to make my list of favorites, I don't think.