#and as a shannon fan i'm also inclined to see her actions in a more sympathetic light than others might

[martyreddie]

Hi ☺️

I saw your post about how Eddie and Shannon drifted apart and I’d love to hear more of your thoughts! I’ve always imagined that they didn’t talk at all after she left. Eddie sent her messages and calls that went unanswered. Eddie had many lonely nights in LA thinking if he should call her again, having the phone ring and go to voice mail where he leaves her a message with his voice breaking, “hey Shan, it’s me”

But that’s just my personal headcanon ☺️ what are your thoughts?

-saturn 🪐

Hi!! :D

it's so hard for me to make up my mind about this asfssdsf I keep trying to look to canon to clear things up, but it's really really vague (and honestly kind of contradictory).

I feel like the fact that Shannon picked up when Eddie called to ask her about helping get Christopher into that new school shows that there was the opportunity for communication, they still had each other’s numbers and would answer each other’s calls, but they chose not to do so. 

And I personally really enjoy the idea of that – Eddie feeling like he wasn’t enough, choosing to believe that Shannon only left him, not Christopher, and believing he has no right to ask her to come back (similarly to how he doesn’t ask Chris to come back now) and Shannon being at first too angry to make the first move, then growing convinced that it’s maybe better for her to stay away because she’s the one who ‘hurt’ Christopher, and now ran away, so she isn’t reliable, she’s a bad person, he ought to hate her, right? 

It just seems so emblematic of their entire relationship: they don’t talk enough and marinate in their self-loathing and anger at the other person instead, and so they’re never on the same page (e.g.: Eddie asking for a second marriage the same evening Shannon asks for a divorce).

But honestly, there’s so many ways to interpret it lmao. After Shannon gives the interview at Christopher's school, Eddie says something along the lines of "you were taking care of your mom, and I was taking care of Christopher, and we just drifted further away from each other" and that could imply they were talking at least for a little while still? Idk. 

The great thing is, it’s tragic either way! 

There’s an Eddie who’s staring at his phone in the middle of the night, contemplating, typing up messages he never ends up sending, imagining a thousand phone calls in which Shannon says she loves him and she’ll come back, says she hates him and will never return, says she loves him but it isn’t enough, says she hates him and will come back either way and that makes her hate him even more, and there’s an Eddie that does text, and he does call, but he never gets an answer, even when he’s calling at three in the morning, wrung out and at the brink of tears, only ever reaching Shannon’s voicemail as he’s begging for her to tell him how she helped Chris though his nightmares, in which of the books she studied obsessively while he was in Afghanistan it’s explained just how CP makes it harder for kids to get a full night of sleep. 

There’s a Shannon who’s waiting on a text or phone call from Eddie like it’s a sword hanging over her head, and who, when it never comes, feels broken up inside about it because she can’t call him now, (she left, it’s not her right, and she’s also still so damn mad), and she misses him and she misses Chris, but there's also a sick sort of freedom in watching this string tying her back home slowly dissolve, and there’s a Shannon who receives every message, every call, and doesn’t answer, who’s too angry to write back, then doesn’t know what to say, and then realises that a week, a month has passed and she can’t write back now (it’s been too long, what would she say anyway?), and before she knows it, she mutes her phone, doesn’t look at the messages anymore, doesn’t listen to the voicemails piling up in her inbox, only ever risking a glance when she needs to feel bad about herself, is overcome by the urge to poke at the purpling bruise at the center of her being. 

And there’s an Eddie and a Shannon who get over their anger and self-doubt for just a moment, who stay in contact at the beginning, trade images of Chris and Shannon’s mom, who try so hard for a few weeks, but who are still angry, and overwhelmed, and end up forgetting to reply to messages, biting back a hurtful word on every call, who eventually drift out of each other’s lives because 800 miles suddenly prove too much, too far for what they have to hold together, who watch as they tear apart from another after only a month has passed, who don’t reach out again because she thinks he’ll never come to LA and he thinks she’ll never return to El Paso. 

And I love all of them! Go failmarriage!!!

[bookwyrminspiration]

Imo, Sophie has been kinda entitled since the first book. She's always expected everything to go her way and for others to just... Deal with it. It's like she thinks that her actions don't have consequences, or that they shouldn't have consequences because she's special. The first example that comes to mind is Dex; She played his feelings and was very touch and go, especially after the kiss. She expected him to not be upset that she rejected him, took his first kiss, and rejected him again. I especially don't like how everyone bends to her will even after she treats them horribly. This is probably just because Shannon doesn't realise that's what she's writing, because she thinks that Sophie is a strong, righteous character and is always in the right no matter what, but I find that it diminishes from a character. The fact that she never apologises for her actions just... Rubs me the wrong way. How can a character be good if they don't recognise their own faults? At least anti-heros recognise that they aren't a good person. They aren't gonna do anything about it, but the know and are self aware. Sophie, and seemingly everyone around her, isn't. It makes me want to see someone snap at her for being such an entitled prick, bonus points if it's Dex. He really drew a short straw in all of this.

Dex could've been a great protagonist, by the way. It'd give us more world building about the elves instead of having everything spoon-fed to us, we still hit all of the major plot points but it's more character driven. Sort of like Heroes of Olympus when we get Leo's pov. He's not a main character, but we witness the main character doing main character stuff through his eyes. It would also mean that we get to truly see Sophie's actions, give the chance for bitterness to grow, get to see as Dex grew disolussioned to her. With Dex as the protag, it means more drama within the characters and, frankly, a more interesting plot. Everything just sorta falls in place for Sophie; Nothing falls in place for Dex.

Also, the ability restrictor stuff would be way more interesting if it was laden with Dex's guilt eating him from the inside out

Alright I both agree with some of your points and have reservations about others.

Sophie is a very headstrong person, she learns throughout the course of the series that she has to push to get things done be listened to, as so many people tried to keep her out of what was going on (e.g., Alden not telling her about moonlark things, Black Swan being very secretive). She's stepped out of the quiet girl persona she embodied in the back of her high school class, but now she hasn't yet figured out the balance between pushing and patience. She's full speed ahead, which I think is where that feeling of entitlement comes from. She can learn, but right now is impatient and demanding because that's what she's learned to be.

But I don't think Shannon believes Sophie's in the right all the time--I think Sophie believes Sophie is in the right all the time (though she's made mistakes she's aware of, like reading Dimitar's mind at the funeral). Shannon writing one thing doesn't mean it's what she would do or believes is right. Fans mess that up a lot with the worldbuilding, for example, and say "hey shannon you created a world where people are divided based on talent and then called it perfect? what?" when she openly talks about how the world has problems and things she doesn't like, which is why rebellions exist--it's the elves, not her that call it perfect.

As for Dex being the protagonist, I think that's personal opinion. You find him interesting, so you want to see more of him and his world and are more inclined to see him positively. I'm personally neutral towards him, and when I look at his character and what he can provide to the story, what I see is "a character who is the outcast of his society based on unjust rules proves he's worthy while retaining his quirks." And that, to me, doesn't seem unique enough to justify the switch.

It's also possible keeper just isn't the story you're looking for. Dex as the protagonist could be a very interesting and captivating story, you're right; I'm not disagreeing with you on that. But it would also be a very different story.

Sophie's story is one of self and your agency when so much in your life has been curated and controlled, one of a human perspective in an elven world and how that plays out. Dex's would be one of challenging internal hatred because of how he doesn't fit in, learning his deep seated desire for acceptance isn't always worthwhile, of learning to hate the system and not people caught in it like him, even if they're on the other side (the Vackers). Which would be an interesting story, but isn't the point of this one.

I've paraphrased this before and I'll do it again: As a story goes on, decisions have to made and possibilities are cut off. As it goes on, it narrows because it has to, and along the way the people it appeals to narrows and lessens because the story becomes more specific. It will lose people, not as a bad thing, but because that's how writing works.

If you're finding all these things you disagree with in canon and things you wish had been done (non spoon-fed worldbuilding, character driven plot), maybe you had an idea of what the story would become and the best style for it based on a possibility at the start and as the story made it's decisions, they weren't the ones you wanted and so it lost you. It's not a bad thing, it happens. I'm also not saying "this is what happened and how you feel/think!" I just hesitate to say "the story should've been restructured like this," because at a certain point...that's not the same story, we're not talking about keeper we're talking about something new.

None of this is to say that you're wrong, just that I think this is a very subjective topic and one we don't happen to see eye to eye on. I think Dex could make a fantastic protagonist and tell an absolutely fascinating story! I think Sophie is a little unbalanced at the moment as part of her arc and it's frustrating to read at time. But I also think changing that creates an entirely different story based on personal desires for where you want it to go, and I don't share the same desires. Dex is fine, but he's never really clicked for me, so I like things as they are! Even as much as I love Tam, his POV would be a completely different story too, and that's not what I want for keeper. I want keeper to be itself, even if there are parts that don't appeal to me or if it narrows out of my interest.

I hope this all makes sense and doesn't come off as dismissive, as I'm really trying not to be. But yeah! That's kinda where I stand on the topic at the moment :)