#Tress and the emerald sea

[querade]

*deep breath in*

THANK YOU COSMERE TUMBLR FOR BEING SO GOOD WITH SPOILER TAGS!! I LOVE YOU ALL!!

-someone (me) yet to read wind and truth who is on tumblr daily

[comiclysmic]

A Gift for Ulaam!

He did this to mess with her. There will be fallout.

✒️ Made in ClipStudio Paint

[willshaper]

Tress and the emerald sea and yumi and the nightmare paper are sisters. Twins even.

[a-dux]

Is Dr. Ulaam connected to Yumi's world and the prime spirals somehow? There was this mathematician Stanisław Ulam (who was also a nuclear physicist, but that isn't relevant right now) who came up with a way of visualizing prime numbers in something called Ulam's spiral.

Here is a small version of it so you can see how it's formed:

And here is what it looks like when it's much bigger:

I might be totally reaching, but I can't help but pay attention to the coincidence of one cosmere character dealing with a form of prime number spirals (with her rock stacking) and another cosmere character basically being named Ulam (Ulaam).

[nemmiril]

I love how every Cosmere Secret Project book puts Hoid into a Situation^tm

The man used up all his mystique during the Calamity and is now spending most of his time getting stuck on remote colorful planets.

[readingthief]

Tress and the Emerald Sea is easily my favorite book I’ve read in 2024 so far. It’s so good. Perfect amount of whimsy and adventure and cozy. Plus, I love a narrator with a strong voice.

[gal-palanaeum]

Trillium by Truthwatcher_Vez

Rated Teen, 1000 words, Ann/Tress/Salay Salay prepares for an espionage job, and reflects on the precious people in her life.

Salay lets herself in to the posh suite located on the top floor of the premier hotel of the Core Archipeligo.  Ann is settled on a couch in the main room, three guns disassembled onto the coffee table in front of her, the parts lovingly organized in neat rows.  She notices Salay, and lowers the piece that she’d been meticulously polishing.  “Any luck?”

Salay nods.  “Right where the informant said.  Third floor of the embassy, hidden away in the study.”

Ann smiles in delight.  “The job’s a go, then?”  She looks fondly at the rows of tranquilizer gun pieces.  “Better get these babies reassembled and ready for action!”

Her enthusiasm brings a smile to Salay’s own lips.  She crosses the room and bends forward to exchange a quick kiss of greeting with her trigger-happy lover, then turns towards the entrance of the adjoining room of the suite.

A line of silver foil has been laid across the threshold.  Salay steps over it and into the other room.  Here, a portable worktable has been set up by the window where the light is best, near the foot of the room’s single king-sized bed.  There was a time that Salay wouldn’t have dared cross the boundary of silver into a space where a sprouter is working.  But Tress is nothing if not meticulous, and it’s been ages since a single spore has escaped the raised metal sides of her sprouter’s bench. 

Tress is absorbed in her work, and so Salay clears her throat to give warning as she approaches.  She sees Tress bob her head in acknowledgement, swinging closed the compartment of a needle-like device that contains a tiny pellet of sunlight spores.  She half-turns to look at Salay, pushing thick goggles up on her head and removing her leather work gloves.  “Back so soon?”

“It didn’t take long to confirm the location of the safe.”  Salay nods to the device in Tress’s hands.  “That’ll be enough to melt the lock?”

“That’s the idea.” Tress looked over the device with a critical eye.  “It’s done well in all of the initial testing, at least.”

Salay looks over towards the armoire, where three cocktail dresses hang in a row in contrasting yet complementary colors.  Their target is confirmed, their preparations complete.  Now all they have to do is attend the ambassador’s party, sneak into the study, and find evidence to verify that one of the dukes is committing treason by selling state secrets.

After all this time working together, the three of them function in beautiful harmony.  Salay works point.  Ann is the lookout.  Tress is their sprouter and mastermind.  If someone had told Salay at this time last year that she would be working with one of the King’s Masks, she wouldn’t ever have believed it.  Her life now is so, so much better than it was all those many long months ago.

Keep reading

[duskflavors]

As I endeavor to "wake up and do good" I strive to be aware of my surroundings, recognize the strength of my empathy, and explore the good in things. For me, part of that has been to delete all meta apps and tiktok from my phone and address the backlog of books cultivated in my little library. So far I've read two books this year (January 2025) and I am about to start my third. I would like to show some record for this; maybe share some thoughts if anybody is interested. In addition, I am always appreciative of any suggestions because I truly do love reading and an individual recommendation always feels more sincere than published lists I find online. For now I'm going to tag these posts as "duskflavor reads". Following are the books I've read so far and the one I'm about to start.

The Door to Summer : I still don't know what I think about this book. It's not bad, but it's not one I feel like I'm going to recommend. it definitely didn't hit me even remotely close to how Fahrenheit 451 did. Its a relatively short sci-fi novel and it does have a cat in it (which for anyone who is concerned about such things I will spoil you now and let you know that the cat is totally fine and nothing bad happens to them, a point that I always get very distressed about when reading novels with animals in them). spoilers ahead I guess: I think I would have enjoyed the book much more without the weird "12-year-old girl eventually becomes the love interest of the 30-year-old protagonist but only after a Time leap, even though he totally knew her as a 12-year-old" . Something about it just kind of left a gross taste in my mouth. The imagery at the very beginning of the book with the Door to Summer and the way it ended with that imagery was interesting but everything else in between felt like it could have been cleaned up and edited a bit better. Overall the book was pretty mid.

Red Rising: I really really enjoyed this book and the only reason I'm not reading the second one is because it's currently on its way from Barnes & Noble. I even went to my local store for it but they were sold out so I had to order it. It's a dystopian sci-fi novel although to be honest it kind of skirts that line a fantasy when the sci-fi technology is so advanced that feels like magic. In fact it really reminds me of The Will of the Many by James Islington which I also really enjoyed. I know the series is still being written, at least to my understanding, but I ordered the next five or so books that should arrive here by tuesday. It reminds me a little bit of The hunger games on a planetary scale. Anytime however an author has a character resisting an oppressive tyrannical government by infiltrating the system and the highest echelon in hopes of bringing it down from within, I get nervous that the moral of the story will be something similar to "well actually maybe this oppressive government had a point and things is just work out better this way". Hopefully that's not the case here but I've only read the first book so I'll have to keep reading to find out.

Tress of the Emerald sea: this is one I have on my bookshelf that I am reading while waiting for the next in the series after Red Rising. I'm only eight pages in so I can't comment on it so far, but I do like Brandon Sanderson and the Cosmere universe. I've heard it's a cozy stand-alone novel and that's what I wanted for an in between book.

If anybody has any other books they recommend I would love to know them. If I haven't read them already then they will be added to my list or at least looked into.

[nikihawkes]

Book Review: Tress of the Emerald Sea by Brandon Sanderson

[brothermouse-skeleton]

yOu HaVe tO rEaD tHe cOsMeRe BoOkS iN tHe RiGhT oRdEr Or YoU wOn'T kNoW wHaT's GoiNg On!

Gancho, Doug, my brother in Adonalsium (Highly), I'm going to hold your hand when I say this:

Not knowing what's going on is the default state for Cosmere protagonists.

Even Wit, who's whole deal is standing over there in the corner smirking like he knows what's going on, doesn't have a single rusting clue.

Read the whole Stormlight Archive backwards for all I care, you'll still find yourself better informed than Kaladin Stormface

[fippydarkpaw]

[dbmartist]

Cosmere...ASSEMBLE!

[es-3]

[emily-e-draws]

verdant vines 🌱

[asteroidfieldgame]

The real funniest Cosmere character is Riina (the Sorceress)

She shows up, plans to gain ultimate power on a planet that isn't even aware of the wider Cosmere, and gets beaten by someone who barely knows who she is and doesn't even know what an Elantrian is.

Then she does it again in Tress.

She's the only main villain of a cosmere book to survive her series.

Can't wait for her to be the villain of another book she's barely in

[onlycosmere]

I just found a 1-star book review featuring my all-time favorite piece of literary criticism: