#anyways. happy to talk about the grishaverse but this feels like an oddly small hill to die on

[grishaverse-chaos]

alina starkov is not 17 in the books. That's a retcon Leigh Bardugo makes when she waited and wrote SoC. Instead, read the trilogy again. Mark all instances of timeline time passing. Leigh bardugo made alina starkov be in her early 20s if she'd just done SIMPLE MATHS.

Alina arrived at the orphanage and the very experienced caretaker says she looks like an eight year old. However, the cooks and Mal overhewr how alina isn't eating and as we the readers know she's struggling with wasting sickness. So a heavily malnourished child, who looks one age, is actually one or two years older. But for arguments sake let's leave her at eight.

8

When she starts the trilogy, alina mentioned she and Mal had already completed one full year of first army training.

1

At one point alina mentions the full length of time she stay at the orphanage with mal "over ten years." So more than ten tear...is it 11 years 10 and a half? Who knows but let's mark 10

10

Add these together and from the first page of the first book alina is AT MINIMUM 19. And that's a lenient count because again she's likely older than that with her wasting sickness in tye beginning and the "over ten" remark.

Only now does the story begin. The story that spans multiple months to years. Alina starts in the first chapter in the early autumn and stays in the Little Palace for multiple months since the winter fete happens at the very last day of winter. And I'm not even looking at all the weeks/months it takes them to travel around the country for the stag, leave ravka later etc. Girl was in her 20s.

Leigh bardugo simply cannot math...

okay lmao.

there are inconsistencies in the timeline, I agree, but for my personal calculation, I use the only thing which isn't an estimate - her military training. the draft age is 16. she's had 1 year of training: she's around 17. her being "about 8" when she arrives at the orphanage and staying for "about 10" years are estimates.

if she joined the army at 16 and has been there for one year, she's 17.

again: I agree that the timeline is inconsistent and I've never said it isn't. but this is the evidence I personally use to support my reading of the text, which has been confirmed to be the canonically correct answer.

(also: book 1 spans a couple months and alina leaves the little palace at midwinter. she spends summer at the grand palace after returning there with nikolai. it's entirely plausible that less than a year passes over the course of the trilogy!)

so like, thank you for this ask, and I agree that there's room for interpretation here, but I think our readings of the books differ significantly!