#dark lord isn’t even crippled they’re just dead now

[cocoraral]

ok this isn’t roblox related but forgive me Hi AvA/AvM fans

yes this is based off of that one animatic image

[chronicalchaos]

Instability

John sits up, his eyes wander back to the cell bars, where's not just the place where the only source of light comes from, but also where he last saw one of his children, and that bothered him a lot. After everything he did, all the sleepless nights, every drop of blood he spilled, every innocent he killed...he didn't find anything, for a long time he thought they had simply vanished from existence.

Until, a few days ago, he met his youngest son, Caleb, once again, one who went missing when he was only 9. Of course, he isn't a boy anymore, 14, almost 15, years later, he's a grown man now, about to celebrate his 23rd birthday. The circumstances that lead them to meet again are concerning, one of the first things he noticed was the dried blood on his chin, then the pointy canines and fingers, reassuringly, he still looked human, however, he didn't want to imagine the reason he was being arrested...

"Can't sleep either?" John looks over to the voice, Mary, his wife, sits up as well "No, it's just..." He averts his eyes, staring at his hands "I hope they're safe" Mary sighs, pushing her legs off the bed.

"I'm sure Benny is taking good care of Lillian" Her voice is soft, almost in a whisper, looking up, he frowns, looking at her from his peripheral vision, she's smiling a bit, trying to reassure him "...and the twins?" Her face dropped, hands clutching the thin blanket at her side.

"You're not gonna answer me?" John turns to Mary, who's face almost twitched in annoyance, after a few seconds, she finally answered "They wouldn't survive" He heard a sigh coming from James, they probably woke him "That cripple was taken without his stupid orthosis, he wouldn't even be able stand" She adjusts herself so her back is touching the wall.

"Don't call him that!" John snaps, quickly standing with his fists clenched "I'm sure they found a use for them" James interrupts, he's sitting with his back straightened, hands resting on his lap "What do you mean–"

Suddenly, the guard by the cell is pushed and pinned to the floor, the three turn to the cell bars, the man seems to be on his late 20s and he's uncharacteristically well dressed for someone covered in blood, before the guard had time to react, the man had stabbed him in the forehead about 5 times, he seems dreadfully familiar...

The most familiar thing about him is a long sleeve white shirt under a plaid green vest and his reddish-brown hair, they used to wear those... He couldn't help but stare, the man laughs maniacally, stabbing with much more enthusiasm than before "My Lord..." Mary gasps, quite hypocritical on her part, she has done things around the same level, maybe even worse, than that.

The man raises his armed hand, seemingly about to give the final blow, however, he was pulled up by an unseen force, one that not only pulled him to his foot, but also turned him around, John gasps in horror, recognizing him instantly, just as he did with Caleb.

Tim's face twists in something that could be mistaken for anger, but there was definitely something else mixed in there, the most predominant change were his eyes, ones who once had a brown color, now are bright red, he does have more scars than he did before.

"Of course you ran off." A tired, and a bit soft, voice was heard, followed by the echo of booted footsteps, turning to the voice's direction, he witnessed another familiar figure appears, one with a messy dark brown hair and matching clothing, differing from his brother by a long piece of fabric stitched to his vest's shoulders.

Him, on the other hand, had a more drastic change on his appearance, there's a black mark coming from the top of his forehead, passing through his left eye, getting thinner when passing his lips and ending at his chin, another black mark came from the bottom of his chin and has a pointy end almost touching his right eye, his whole neck has that same black color.

John looked pale as Tom stops infront of his twin, arms crossed with a tired expression, his sleeves are rolled up just above his elbows, Mary and James were horrified at the sight of the two, who either didn't notice them or just didn't care.

Looking behind Tim, the taller sighs, moving his head in disapproval, looking back at him right away "...you disfigured him" Tom has a serious face, not seeming to be bothered by the dead body, Tim snickers "I didn't just disfigure him, i crushed his fucking brain!" He smiles almost spatting at his brother, his eyes are unfocused, almost as if he's looking for something or trying to ignore the person infront of him.

  Tom, fairly agressively, cupped his twin's face, holding his head in place while staring at him with a serious expression, they could see that, from the tip to the bottom of his fingers are completely black as well, there is another black spot around his right elbow "We're not here to play genocide and you know that." His tone is abnormally harsh and stable, just like Tim's normally was before their disappearence.

"Well, did you do your part?! 'cus i did mine!" Tim's tone is surprisingly the unstable one, he starts pulling on his arm, trying to free his arm from the 'spell'(?) "you'll hurt yourself–" "Hurt myself?! Don't make me laugh!" Tim cuts him off, John felt unease, this could be his opportunity to finally know the truth, the opportunity he lost on the small time he and Caleb met, Tom sighs, closing his eyes and furrowing his eyebrows for a few seconds, but before John could call them, he opened his eyes "Timas, it's trying to take over you again, i know it's tempting..." A wave of nostalgia and worry fell on him as Tom's voice quivers.

"...but you have to fight it, just like you've done before."

━━━━━━━━━

It's finally finished! And it's kinda long...

Mary and James didn't do much, and i felt there wasn't space for John to do anything when Tim and Tom were interacting, but i like it a lot!

Especially the "He's uncharacteristically well dressed for someone covered in blood", i absolutely love this line.

[gffa]

You have great taste, so I was wondering if you have any fic recs for the OT trilogy? Specifically with Vader? Your recs are the reason that I no longer eat or sleep and exist entirely of off Ao3.

Thank you, that’s very sweet of you!  I’m glad to help with the “I should be sleeping but who am I if I’m not staying up way too late to read just twenty more chapters before finally collapsing into unconsciousness, like, WHO AM I AS A PERSON if I’m not doing that?” because I don’t want to be the only one!So, here, HAVE SOME VADER FEELINGS.  And some occasional post-Vader feelings, but that were meant to take place near the end of the OT.  This is specifically for Vader fics, but if you want other OT-era stuff, like with Luke and Leia, just let me know.  ♥VADER & LEIA FIC:✦ Just a Little Bit of History Repeating by victoria_p (musesfool), anakin & leia, 3.7k    “I’m in charge of security, Your Highness,” Vader said, haughty and automatic, and had to shove away a sudden onslaught of memories. It was this building, he thought, and the presence of a small brunette senator with a smart mouth. That was all.✦ Father’s Heart by FernWithy, anakin & leia & ocs, 38.8k   During Princess Leia’s teenage years, she discovers a friend in an unlikely – and disturbing – person: Lord Vader. ✦ Leave Me, Oh Love by AceQueenKing, han/leia + anakin & leia, 3.2k    “No offense,” she said, “but I’m not in the mood to deal with you right now.” “Leia-” Vader said, but she held up her hand. “Of all the dead people in my life, you really are the one I least want to see right now.” ✦ The Tyranny of Kinship by amarielah, anakin & leia & luke & han & obi-wan & rex & ahsoka & cast, 23.6k wip    The presence of an Alliance mole aboard the Death Star leads to Bail Organa learning quickly of his daughter’s capture. With the dissolution of the Senate, only one option remains for him to save her life: telling Vader the truth of her parentage.✦ on the day… by victoria_p, anakin & leia & obi-wan & bail/breha & cast, 6.4k    Darth Vader eavesdrops on a very interesting conversation.✦ which grows higher than soul can hope by victoria_p, anakin & leia & luke & han & cast, 8.6k    “If Vader captures you, if he threatens to torture or kill you, you tell him you’re Padmé Amidala’s daughter.”✦ Everything That Rises Must Converge by victoria_p (musesfool), obi-wan & anakin & luke & leia, 5.1k   In which Leia makes it to Tatooine’s surface after the Tantive IV is boarded, and nobody is prepared for this particular family reunion.✦ I Won’t Disturb the Slumber of Feelings That Have Died by Darkmagyk, anakin & leia, 1.6k   Leia Organa is no angel. ✦ Clarity by Orange_Clown, anakin & leia, 1k   By the time that the Imperial Forces landed on Hoth, Leia was the only one left on the base. ✦ Flesh of My Flesh by igrockspock, anakin & leia, 3.6k   Leia was not adopted. She was stolen in the middle of the night and registered to House Organa with forged papers. This was kidnapping, a class one felony, and her parents could be executed – unless she returned voluntarily to her rightful father. Immediately. A man called Grand Moff Tarkin explained this to Leia when she was eleven years old.✦ Carmine by AceQueenKing, anakin & leia, 2.7k   The Princess stirs, waking; her eyes catch him at her door and her face darkens, ready for a fight. ✦ The Trick is to Keep Breathing by AceQueenKing, anakin & leia, 3.3k    She’s older now, and so is he. Far older now. She wonders: will he have lost any power with his age? Will he be shorter, weaker? An old man on a ventilator?It’s hard to imagine that he won’t still be dangerous. But then, that’s exactly what she’s counting on.✦ Hear Me by crowleyshouseplant, anakin & leia & luke & cast, 3.2k   Leia struggles to reconcile Luke’s experience with his father and hers with Darth Vader.✦ In Which Vader Discovers He is a Father by glompcat, anakin & luke & leia & cast, 27.7k   A collection of (mostly self-contained) AUs where Vader learns about his kids earlier than he did in the canon timeline. Exploring both that moment of initial discovery, and the way the story unfolds after Vader finds Leia and/or Luke. ✦ deep as a secret nobody knows by victoria_p (musesfool), leia & anakin & obi-wan & luke & han & bail & cast, 6.3k   “If Vader captures you, if he threatens to torture or kill you, you tell him you’re Padmé Amidala’s daughter.”✦ daughter of mountains (the flesh and bone remix) by darlingargents, anakin & leia, 1.4k   Vader was Leia’s father, too. To die by his side would be the greatest honour.✦ The Gifted Child by AceQueenKing, anakin & leia & bail, 2.3k    Bail Organa watches his daughter navigate Coruscant society.  So does Darth Vader.✦ Siren Song by madame_alexandra, anakin & leia, 1.8k    Lord Vader has a crippling headache, and the source of it fascinates him.✦ The War at Home by victoria_p (musesfool), anakin & leia, 1.4k   He’s been there for all her other losses, so it feels right for him to be here for this one, too.VADER & LUKE FIC:✦ Sibling Revelry by frodogenic, anakin & luke & leia & cast & ocs, 25.5k   After Bespin and before Endor, Darth Vader is shocked to discover that Luke and Leia are twins. He’s even more shocked when Imperial Intelligence reports that Organa and Skywalker are, erm, a tad closer than previously suspected. ✦ Limpet AU byfrodogenic, anakin & luke & mara & piett & cast, 69.8k   AU. Darth Vader, having survived the Battle of Endor, proceeds to get himself and his ship lost in the Unknown Regions for twenty-five years. When he returns, he finds the Empire has fallen, the New Republic is in force, and he himself has a new role to play…Grandpa. If you have ever wanted to see Vader vs. toddler, this is your story. Fluffily humorous.✦ a walk on part in the war by victoria_p, anakin & luke & leia & ahsoka & cast, 10.3k    Luke considers this family reunion far more successful than the one in Cloud City. At least this time, no one loses a hand.✦ In Loco Pirates by izzythehutt, anakin & luke & cast, 34.9k   A down-on-his-luck Hondo Ohnaka manages to capture the unicorn of all bounties–Luke Skywalker, which sends Darth Vader, Lord of the Sith, on a painfully familiar trip to the planet Florrum to collect his prize. The failed negotiations leave Vader in the awkward position of being stuck in a besieged pirate bunker, trying to balance keeping his wayward child safe (and in his custody) with controlling the tongue of a loose-lipped pirate who–to the surprise of no one–has a bad habit of telling ‘amusing’ anecdotes from the Clone Wars.✦ Deja Vu by SkippingSteppingStones, obi-wan & anakin & luke, 2k   When Darth Vader is roused from sleep by a sob he feels strangely connected to, he is compelled to find its source.✦ Two and a Half Men (with a baby) by jerseydevious, obi-wan & anakin & luke & piett, 5.5k wip   After a long day of bargaining with Hutts and attempting to ignore his past, Darth Vader is nearing the end of his rope. When he discovers his two-year-old son, it’s the straw that breaks the semi-rational Sith Lord’s back; in a rash act worthy of the Skywalker name, he scoops his son into his arms, steals a shuttle from his own fleet, and punches in random hyperspace coordinates to a destination on the other side of the galaxy. Unfortunately, father and son are not the only ones on the ship.✦ The Family Tree by frodogenic, vader & luke, 12k   In which Luke Skywalker is stranded in a tree waiting for a flash flood to recede. Too bad he’s got company… Post-ESB oneshot, can be read as canon-compliant.✦ Out of the Darkness and Into the Sun by Spongyllama, anakin & luke & leia, 2.7k   Luke is desperate to keep his father alive after Endor, but he’s the only one who thinks Vader should be allowed to live.VADER & AHSOKA FIC:✦ trade your heroes for ghosts by victoria_p (musesfool), vader & ahsoka, 1.5k    Vader presents Ahsoka with an ultimatum. ✦ memories like ashes at our feet by ambiguously, anakin & ahsoka, 4.2k   Darth Vader was gravely injured in the explosion of the Sith Temple. Now Anakin Skywalker has no memory of what he’s doing here with Ahsoka.✦  the stillness of remembering by darlingargents, anakin & ahsoka, 2.3k   A few years after the rise of the Empire, Ahsoka starts to have a recurring dream ✦ Balance Point by Vinyarie, anakin & ahsoka, 34.3k   Ahsoka wakes up trapped beneath the rubble of the Sith temple on Malachor with the man currently known as Darth Vader. He’s a Sith lord who has done some truly awful things, but she’s certain that some part of him is still Anakin Skywalker, and she’s going to convince him of that. No matter how many times he tries to kill her for it.✦all the words i once believed by darlingargents, anakin & ahsoka, 6.8k    Anakin Skywalker wakes up after fifteen years with a body that isn’t his.✦ Precious Illusions by amarielah, anakin & ahsoka, 2.4k    In the aftermath of their confrontation on Malachor, Ahsoka pays Vader a visit. From a certain point of view.OTHER OT/VADER FIC:✦ Not Placid Stars But Singularities by iceplanet, anakin & cast (obi-wan & luminara & ahsoka & darth plagueis), 6.2k    In the weeks after Mustafar, Vader must come to terms with his new body and the remnants of his past. In the process, he has a few conversations that he does not expect. ✦ Salvage by SharpestRose, obi-wan & anakin & luke & padme & shmi & qui-gon, 4.6k    Obi-Wan thought he’d seen the worst of what Anakin was capable of. Obi-Wan’s not entirely right about that.✦ Wrong Number by Siamesa, obi-wan & anakin & luke & yoda & owen/beru, 3.4k   In hiding on Dagobah, the Lars family aquires a holocom. Things go horribly wrong.✦ Surrender to the Light by Raven_Knight, obi-wan & anakin & luke & qui-gon, 1.1k   Ben Kenobi knew exactly what he was doing when he saw Luke watching his duel with Darth Vader.✦ Domo Arigato, Mr Roboto by amarielah, anakin & sam & dean & cast, crossover, 16k wip   When Sam and Dean investigate a spate of Vader sightings in a remote Wyoming town, they discover that – this time – they’re hunting the real deal. Vader, meanwhile, has to adjust to a world that seems designed to piss him off. All while trying his best not to strangle the Winchesters.OBI-WAN & VADER FIC:✦ Cold by Yesac, obi-wan & anakin, 5.4k    Luke wasn’t the only one that Obi-Wan visited after he died. ✦ Betrayal: A Love Story by Shiny_n_new, obi-wan/anakin, 2.7k wip    A week after he kills Obi-wan Kenobi, Vader realizes he is being haunted. ✦ untitled by phosphorescent-naidheachd, obi-wan & anakin, ~1k    All you really need to know is that Obi-Wan’s ghost is in the slow process of haunting Vaderkin back into the Light during the original trilogy. ✦ Until Their Dying Breath by Down the Rabbit Hole, obi-wan & anakin, 1.1k    Vader’s ghosts are complicated. Set between The Empire Strikes Back and The Return of the Jedi. ✦ You Can’t Front on That by victoria_p (musesfool), obi-wan & anakin, 3.9k    When he hears Kenobi’s voice again months after killing him, Vader wonders if perhaps he’s begun to go mad.✦ Replaceable by amarielah, obi-wan/anakin, mildly nsfw, ~1k    He buries hands of flesh in thick, auburn-colored hair. He knows this is a dream. ✦ World Come Undone by crazyundeadfairy, obi-wan/anakin & luke + background anakin/padme, 68.3k wip    Unexpected things happen when ObiWan takes Luke to Tatooine. ✦ Second Chances by Driverpicksthemooseic (Ratkinzluver33), obi-wan/anakin & han/luke & leia + cast, de-aged fic, 106.3k wip    Leia wasn’t convinced inviting evil incarnate to join them in fighting the Empire was exactly one of Obi-Wan’s brightest ideas. ✦ Everything You Wanted by obaona, obi-wan & anakin + background anakin/padme, 11.3k    A RotS AU. Anakin is now Emperor and has captured ObiWan. But things are never that simple …✦ Back Drifting by puts foot in mouth, obi-wan & anakin, de-aged!obi-wan, 20.4k wip    After falling on Mustafar, Obi-Wan awakens to the dubious reality of being trapped in the cloned body of his child self, and now has to cope with the reversed father/son relationship fostered upon him by the new Sith Lord.Darth Vader redemption story. ✦ Disjointed by Ha_neul, obi-wan/anakin & luke, 2.1k    Returning to Tatooine to erase his past, Vader reunites with his old lover and their son. ✦ closing in by SpaceTimeSkywalker, obi-wan/anakin, 1k   Anakin and Obi-Wan were already long gone at that point, as their souls had perished together in the lava and amidst the acrid smoke; and all there was left was their shells, empty, remembering fragments of happier times that had long since passed. ✦ Obikin Drabble by fn_6969, obi-wan/anakin, ~1k   Anonymous prompt: “fic idea- darth vader thinking about obi-wan oh no”✦ we were born for better days by FireflysLove, obi-wan & anakin & ahsoka, 3.6k wip   Obi-Wan attempts to save Vader from the Dark Side, but the Rebellion, especially Bail Organa and Ahsoka Tano, are not going to believe that after a decade of terrorizing the galaxy, Anakin Skywalker can possibly be saved.✦ Sear me pale sun by liv_k, obi-wan/anakin, NSFW, bittersweet themes, 9.8k   “So here we are, a failed Jedi, a Sith, and our imminent deaths. I leave it to you to choose how we will meet our demise, whether fighting or doing something else entirely.”✦ my heart is an echo chamber by Burning_Nightingale, obi-wan/anakin, 3.4k   Obi-Wan Kenobi and Darth Vader don’t meet again until their final confrontation on the Death Star. Not in person, at least.✦ They rhyme by liv_k, obi-wan & anakin, 5.2k   Past and future, darkness and light, despair and hope meet one last time.FORCE GHOST ANAKIN FIC:✦ can’t carry it with you by irnan, obi-wan & anakin, 2.2k    So oneness with the Force is found in a field now? ✦ The Moment You Know by tricksterity, obi-wan/anakin & luke & leia, ~1k    A short, alternative ending to Return of the Jedi and the appearance of certain Force ghosts on Endor. ✦ The Last Temptation of Anakin Skywalker by theascetic, obi-wan/anakin, 4.9k wip    Obi Wan gives, and Anakin takes. ✦ Ghosts Can Become One by Lilly_Thoo, obi-wan/anakin, 1.3k    Anakin and Obi-Wan bicker a little bit. ✦ Complexities of Love by agentjedi, obi-wan/anakin, nsfw, 7.5k    Anakin comes to terms with his new existence, and learns new lessons in the Force in a most unusual way. ✦ Salvation by Spongyllama, obi-wan & anakin & cast, 6.8k    Following his death, Anakin isn’t quite sure if he’s in heaven or hell. Not that he’s ever really believed in either. ✦ i wake up more awake than i’ve ever been before by ShakyHades, obi-wan/anakin, 1.1k    He missed their bond and camaraderie, the times they trusted each other with their lives. It hurt, seeing Obi-Wan and remembering how Anakin was the one to destroy everything the other had held dear, including himself. ✦ Dig the Grave and Let Me Lie by de_corporis, obi-wan & anakin, 1k    “Anakin,” says Obi-Wan again, and slides one hand up to cradle Anakin’s cheek. “I am so very proud of you.” Obi-Wan welcomes Anakin home. ✦ Died last night in my dreams by SquaresAreNotCircles, obi-wan/anakin & qui-gon & yoda, force ghosts, 2.2k    Obi-Wan sipped his tea and stared morosely out into nothing. “Become a force ghost, he said. It’ll be for the good of the universe, he said.” ✦ Strange Meetings by gilestel, luke & ahsoka & anakin, 2.9k    Luke almost didn’t notice the figure cloaked in white who stood before the charred remnants of the pyre in which he had cremated his father’s empty armor.✦I Never Knew You by Ibelin, anakin & kylo ren, 3.8k   After the defeat at Starkiller, Kylo Ren is on his way to Snoke to complete his training and, during meditation, he gets a visit from someone he’d always wanted to meet. It doesn’t go as well as he’d hoped. Be careful what you wish for - especially when what you wish for involves Darth Vader.✦ I Never Knew You by Ibelin, anakin & kylo, 3.8k   After the defeat at Starkiller, Kylo Ren gets a visit from someone he’d always wanted to meet. It doesn’t go as well as he’d hoped. Be careful what you wish for - especially when what you wish for involves Darth Vader. ✦ Let the Past Die by Ibelin, anakin & leia, 2k   Anakin’s Force ghost has scared Kylo Ren. When he visits Leia next, it’s his turn to be scared.✦ we are here and it is now by victoria_p (musesfool), anakin & rey & luke, 3.5k   “So either you’re not here or you’re not living,” she says. “I’m definitely here,” he replies, and there’s amusement in his voice.✦ And There Shall I Find by ambiguously, anakin & leia, 5.6k    After her shuttle crashes on a desolate world, Leia has only one person to keep her company. ✦ Drowned in Moonlight by scarletjedi, anakin & leia & cast, 3k    Leia Dies. What, like that was going to stop her?✦ learn to live with what you can’t rise above by victoria_p (musesfool), anakin & leia, 1.9k     Leia doesn’t have time for the ghost of her dead father, except when she does.

[dagenspear]

Basic Plot Redo of THE LAST JEDI

I don't particularly hate TLJ, but I think the movie is not well done, to me, and I think I had different references for. I think they could've stood to have Rey be Luke's daughter and structure a story about the burden of legacy in TLJ. Lord willing, these are the ideas that God blessed me with:

First, an exploration of backstory:

I don’t fully mind what they did with Luke. In concept I like it, but I think there’s things left out that could round out the character and explore his characterization and reasons for his actions. Luke began a new jedi order. He married Mara Jade, they have a daughter, Rey, but then the emergence of a new dark side force begins, the first order rises and Luke doesn't understand why this has happened again. Anakin destroyed the sith. It should be over. While I don’t know if I’d go for this, but Mara Jade is killed in battle defending her daughter in the midst of a raid by the first order, maybe even the Knights Of Ren do it.

Luke, tormented by this, furiously digs for information about why this has begun again, and finds out the meaning of it, that the balance is a cycle, not a single event. When he senses the dark side in Ben, senses Snoke’s influence, he feels it all happen again, the fall of the jedi, the rise of the empire, the destruction of the family he has left. In that moment of fear and pain, shaken by the perception of his family being destroyed by a rise of another Vader, he allows his fear to drive him, and considers killing his nefew, maybe even in a way to almost spare him the pain that his future could bring him, taking out his lightsaber, but not igniting it, realizing that it would be wrong to do, maybe even seeing his robot hand, reminding him of the events of ROTJ.

But Ben senses that and lashes out in rage. The new jedi order is burned, his daughter gone, her dead he thinks and his powers gone. Luke sees this as almost the force punishing him for what he did. Casting out those remaining, among them a partner in his training Lor San Tekka, sending R2D2 with him.

Luke himself not realizing that Ben had taken Rey, feeling tempted to kill her to avoid a threat to his rightful Skywalker lineage, but being unable to kill his cousin, he wiped her mind of any training she’d gotten by Luke and abandoned her on Jakku. Lor San Tekka discovered Rey and that’s why he was there and was willing to reveal the map to Luke at this time. He believed the knowledge of his daughter being alive, would reignite the spark of hope inside him, a message he never had the chance to relay to Poe, before the first order attacked. Han considered this to be the case as well after meeting her and Leia sensed it after they met as well. Kylo began to see it after hearing about it.

Luke over the course of the movie does grow to rediscover his goals by the end. Through finding out that Rey is his daughter and connecting to her and admitting what he did with Ben, feeling like he's disconnected from the force as a punishment, seeing him considering killing Ben as not much different than what Vader had done when killing the younglings. He sees his 2nd chance in Rey. But this is hurt when Rey discovers that Luke didn't try to find her after she was taken. Luke is in shame by this, as Rey leaves. Luke is then confronted by either Yoda or Obi-Wan (or both), who explain to him that he's seen Vader in himself and thus saw his failure as if he would be like him, saying that Luke has lost sight of what made him him, and it wasn't being a jedi. Them telling him the folly of not seeing his own humanity, underneath being a jedi, confronting him with truth of what happened to Padme, who Luke has no memories of and hasn't connected with (seeing only the Vader/Anakin in himself), telling him that they sensed in her that the children were beginning to die in the womb, but she gave up every ounce of life force she had left to keep alive, in spite of not being a jedi or force sensitive. In the midst of this Luke realizes that he cut himself off from the force in his shame and self loathing, he wasn't being punished. He reaches through the force and out to Padme, seeing her after she's given birth to him, even in the present feeling the touch of her energy on his face, seeing her and Anakin. Luke resolves to go after Rey.

Leia still grieves for the loss of Han, but almost refuses to see her son as gone, this building to her outright attacking a first order village raid to try and lure Kylo to them, her confronting Kylo and practically daring him to kill her. He can't. But Kylo is forced to bring Leia to Snoke. We'd also develop Leia having trained as a jedi with Luke.

Rey was never raised, to her knowledge, with the idea of what potential she had. Into adulthood, she's confronted and dragged into that potential. After meeting Luke, she thinks he must've left her on Jakku. But Kylo, still through their link, tells her that he didn't do that and that he took her to kill her, but couldn't. Now, after discovering the pain and loss that comes with being a Skywalker, to the point of feeling abandoned and betrayed by Luke, her dad. After finding out that Luke didn't come looking for her, out of fear of finding her dead, she lashes out at him, angry and hurt, feeling abandoned and betrayed, telling him he has nothing to teach her. Then hunting down Kylo for the death of Han and Finn being hurt.

On the flipside there's Ben, someone who was raised in the Skywalker family, with knowledge of his potential, of his legacy, the idea that his bloodline has potential power that he thinks is his birthright, but it's just out of his reach, and he becomes bitter and feels cheated out of what he sees as rightfully his. And when tempted by the darkside, he doesn't choose to resist, seeing it as his way to get the true power of a Skywalker. He could resent Han for being normal, a mere pilot, seeing him as apart of his weakness. After killing his dad, his pain is crippling, something he takes out on his fodder, in the midst of his final training with Snoke. This grows to a rage and resentment against Snoke and the first order, as he and the Knights Of Ren are used as a weapon to invade worlds and plunder children, and particularly after Snoke forces Kylo to bring Leia to him.

Finn may be more committed to Rey, but he himself also has begun to see what these people are dying for, and does decide to help Poe and the resistance, when Leia gets herself captured as a way for them to pinpoint a location of Snoke. Helping them break into a stormtrooper training facility to use their network to track Kylo's ship to Snoke, them seeing children being taken by the first order, and him deciding to try and help them, only to fail when Phasma, rather than let the kids go free, has some of them killed. Leading to Finn seeing the unfortunate side effect of caring, the pain of failure and loss. Him reacting badly to this and in a rage hunting down and killing Phasma.

With Poe, detail his backstory as almost someone with a death wish, whose looking to die in a blaze of glory in his mind. His parents, former rebels, killed by the last remnants of the empire, him becoming someone who doesn't get particularly attached. His arc being him finding something to live for, instead of die for, as he and Finn try and rescue the children taken to be indoctrinated by the first order. When pinned in some rubble, he cuts his hand off to ensure, he can protect the children and secure their way out.

All of these plots begin to converge on Snoke's ship. Leia is brought to Snoke by Ben. But Leia shocked to discover that Snoke is a force projection.

In a reveal, we'd see that Ben, seeking the power he felt he deserved as a Skywalker, tapped into the dark side and in mental disconnection, it has manifested itself as Snoke, the darkest parts of Ben's mind given life by the dark side energy he'd absorbed.

It pushes Kylo to kill Leia, as she tries to reach him. He lashes out in a rage and kills the Snoke manifestation, taking it into himself and taking in all the power of the dark side.

Rey charges Kylo in her rage, and tries to kill him, but Kylo defeats her. His powers outmatching hers, tossing her off to the Knights. Luke arrives in time, brandishing his green light saber, facing Kylo and (though this is more a suggestion) but Luke taking Anakin's lightsaber and passing it off to Leia, to assist. As Rey steals one of the Knights weapons and tries to fight them off. Them both battling Kylo and trying to reach him. Kylo exclaiming that he's building a legacy, beyond the Skywalkers now. Luke and Leia firing back that all he is another dark sider leading a stormtrooper army.

Kylo, realizing they're right, uses his powers to turn all the ships of the first order on eachother, stating a new path, "No more stormtroopers, no more death stars, no more empire." Making the statement of the dark side being the only thing left, and using the ships weapons to destroy eachother, even Snoke's ship, Kylo casually protecting himself from the destruction. Rey is the first the recover and tries to catch Kylo off guard, who stomps her, wounds her and in a petty slash of vengeance, slices the lightsaber over Rey's left eye, blinding her in it and scarring her. He lifts his lightsaber up and brings it down as a final blow, but Leia takes the hit for Rey. Kylo, for all his villainy, is still enraged at this and tears the already damaged ship apart in his pain and anger. This allows Luke and Rey to escape with a dying Leia. (I did this in the hindsight of Carrie's passing.)

Leia tells Luke she knows what happened and she forgives him. Luke apologizing for Han and what he did, promising he won't give up again. Rey, devestated at what she sees as her fault, tries to help, refuses to believes there isn't a way. Luke holds her off, her crying, as she apologizes to Leia. Who simply reminds her that they all make mistakes and apart of her believes her son isn't gone. Luke reaffirming that with the no one's ever really gone line. And with that Leia peacefully passes away.

And with that we end the movie:

Luke having re-established his goal of heroism and maybe even left as a resistance leader.

Poe, seeing himself as having found something to live for.

Finn being driven by a desire for revenge upon any remnants of the FO.

And Rey, as she stands out in front of the forcefield of the x-wing bay, in the starship, over looking an ocean of stars, holding Anakin's lightsaber. She, in a rejection of the Skywalker legacy and the pain and death that comes with it, throws the lightsaber into space.

The movie ending on her standing in front of that ocean of stars.

THE END

Please review and tell me what you think!

[necroarchy]

Father’s Day

   SUMMARY: In the wake of the Second Battle of Light’s Hope, the Lich King contemplates his Deathlord in a strange, rare moment of camaraderie. Except not really.

   OR a conversation that doesn’t end with anyone dead for once, but just barely.

    NOTE: Reposting 'cause we live that life around here and also it’s got lines I needed to find.

   WARNING: This is from Arthas’ perspective, so it’s just all kinds of awful. Mental and emotional abuse, as well as references to past physical abuse. Manipulation, intimidation, victim-blaming, etc. etc.

     “ What’re you doing, Lich King? ”

     The unsettlement of air announced his Wraith just before her voice, the syllables carrying with them the distinctive sensations that made up the patchwork of her presence - the whisper of ice, of shadow, of wolf’s teeth and bottomless hunger. He did not turn to the child as she leaned irreverently against the balustrade that wrapped around the overlook they stood upon, the hollow thunk of saronite striking saronite muffled by the material of her coat. He had forgone his helm for a short while today, and she stood just at the edge of his peripheral vision if he focused on her. ( He didn’t. ) The wolf, cleverly, settled between Lord and King. While the barrier of fur and bone and blood would not be enough to make Arthas so much as hesitate should things edge towards violence, it would stop Zoen in her tracks.

     Idly, he wondered why she was here.

     “ Observing. ” Beneath them, knights-in-training battled furiously against one another while instructors waded fearlessly amidst the fray, shouting threats and criticisms. The din was almost pleasant, yet another form of background noise to join that of the endless clamor of murmuring souls that echoed through Arthas’ skull. “ You could benefit from doing the same. ”

     He heard the shift of metal and leather as she turned to split her attention between him and the knights. “ They’re awful. ”

     “ You were worse. ”

     She scoffed in disdain, and he glanced at her just in time to catch her unconsciously raising a hand to rub at where her throat had been sawed open barely a week following her rebirth. He did not try to suppress his smirk. “ Inaccurate, and not the point. ”

     “ Isn’t it? ” He tilted his attention further to her, both approving and condemning how she rocked back on her heels away from him.

     Wariness of him was smart, was right in a knight of his, no matter their errancy - especially due to their errancy. The Ebon Blade yet had treasons to atone for, sins whose punishments he’d flay from their souls as soon as they had returned, properly, to the heavy fold of his sovereignty. Amusing though it was to watch Acherus’ children scurry around doing his bidding while stubbornly clinging to their delusion of independence, he ached for when they’d kneel in reverent, dutiful loyalty at the foot of his throne, minds reconnected to the grand nexus of the Scourge and the chains of their wills wound firmly around his wrist.

     From beneath came an especially loud shout, followed by a gradual decrease of noise. Arthas looked down and saw a rough circle of acolytes forming around what appeared to be a newly-disarmed initiate who stood clenching his lone fist whilst an instructor shouted at him. At their feet lay a severed, leaking limb. The instructor roared for a few more moments before apparently dismissing the acolyte, who took the chance to snag his arm off the ground before stiffly making his way towards the doors that would lead him to the nearest necromancers’ hall. The clamor from before rose back up, knights fighting knights with renewed vigor.

     “ See? ” Zoen murmured, tone edging irritatingly similar to smug. Was she closer than she’d been before? “ Awful. ”

     “ If any of them surpass you, Deathlord, I’ll replace you. ”

     “ If any of them surpass me, Lich King, I’ll deserve it. ” She twisted around to rest her back fully on the railing, dismissing the knights below with silent contempt. The consequence was that she now no longer had anything to really focus on save Arthas himself, which she seemed to only truly understand at the end of her little rotation. To his entertainment, she seemed incapable of regarding him for any protracted length of time, as though he were the sun and to look directly at him would burn her eyes. No, not the sun, he thought. A god, his divinity too darkly radiant for a creature of such profound imperfection as Zoen Mith to gaze upon without suffering vastly for it. The idea pleased him enough that he magnanimously declined to call out the weakness for what it was.

     The moment extended awkwardly --- for the girl, of course, not Arthas, who really couldn’t care less about her dilemma except the ways it may compliment him --- wherein Zoen shuffled between gazing down at her dozing wolf and sending furtive, disturbed glances at the sculpted skull of his right pauldron. Her eyes dropped to her feet and her hands fell from the railing to inside her coat’s pockets. She pulled out what looked to be an old, brass pocket watch and frowned briefly at it before curling her fist tighter around it and jamming them both back into her coat.

     They fell into silence, leaving one another to their distractions: Zoen her growing unease, Arthas his supervision of his knights’ training. Nothing so gruesomely inconvenient as dismemberment plagued any of the remaining acolytes, though such mercy could not be attributed to hesitancy or consideration on behalf of their brethren; indeed the tide of their ferocity and bloodlust seemed to rise higher in concurrence with the growing length of time that their mock battles stretched on. Except mock began to seem too trite a word, now that he thought about it, its connotations almost too passive for the crashing violence that swept across the floor below - as though it was not a legion of fallen, desecrated heroes pitted in a dozen vicious wars but a pack of squealing children artlessly swinging sticks at one another. Puerile, even - and of course thoughts of puerility inevitably drew his attention (and eyes) toward the child leaning artlessly against the balustrade at his side, one of her hands curling loosely around the hilt of her overhyped stick.

     It dawned, suddenly, that he had never before shared any moment of remarkable length with this child of his that did not involve violence of either a physical or mental capacity. He would not call what they dwelled in currently peace, aware as he was of the literal and proverbial wolf slumbering between them, and the blades they both carried at their sides should the metaphorical beast awaken. But it was not violence, nor teeth-clenched toleration that would only last the very bare minimum of time until they could hastily part ways. It was, temporarily, a state of coexistence.

     Arthas seized the opportunity to really, truly look at Zoen. His child was a mess of poor construction, avian bones wrapped up in lambskin with shark’s teeth jammed into a too-small mouth, her own weak jaw muzzling her better than any man-made contraption. Lordship had settled heavily on her shoulders, rounding them until he wondered for a moment if they had been wrenched from the sockets. He could see the tension in her neck, how the tendons were taut as bowstrings beneath the skin. The dark shadows that clung to her eyes spoke of an exhaustion she could not even experience anymore. Her cheekbone was splattered with the telltale discolorations of a nearly-healed bruise, and below her jaw, just above the line of her coat’s collar, a sloppy row of stitches ran diagonally down her throat.

     “ You look atrocious. ”

     Candid, but he had never been the liar between them. She grinned sardonically, and at the corner of her mouth he could just make out the faint, silvery line of where a blade had broken through the skin long ago, trailing from the edge of her lips to the swell of her chin. The scar was unnotable enough on its own, but compounded with his intimate knowledge of the mutilation that destroyed the other side of her face, its inconsequence was practically insulting. Arthas entertained the thought of taking a blade and digging through that pathetic blemish, turning it into another emblem of ruination. Another lesson.

          Perhaps this time, she would learn it.

     “ Do I? What a shame. ” Her voice was a desert. “ Somewhere between slaughtering demons and leading armies I suppose I let my skincare regimen fall to the wayside. ”

     “ If you crumble, child --- ”

     “ Yes, you said, ” she snapped, and he so dearly desired to reach forward and pluck out those teeth she dared turn against him. Petulance could be amusing, and spite had its charm, but little mitigated such outright disrespect. “ You’ll replace me with one of your pets. I’m very sure they’ll have better luck attacking the paladins than I did. ”

     “ That would not be difficult. ” He rounded on her, paying no heed to the growl building up in the wolf’s chest as it scrabbled to its feet and backed up against his Wraith, its fangs bared uselessly at him. “ Your failure was a spectacular display of the incompetence characteristic of your Ebon Blade. ”

     Below them, the din of battle lessened as distracted knights turn from their combatants to the storm quietly brewing on the overlook. Arthas lashed out at their minds in painful chastisement, disgusted at such a large-scale lapse on their part. He would not allow his loyal servants to succumb to the same weaknesses that crippled his traitors - crippled his daughter, who for all her snarling, sputtering outrage could inspire only a swell of disgust in the Lich King.

     “ We aren’t --- ”

     “ Maxwell Tyrosus and Liadrin were at your mercy, ” he spat viciously, “ and rather than bring them into --- ” my “ --- your fold, you chose to leave them crumpled on the ground, battered but alive. Tirion Fordring rests peacefully in his grave still, because you were too weak to claim him. Time and again, you are given chances to prove yourself, and time and again, you fall short of expectations. You disappoint me. ”

     The effect was immediate; Zoen reeled back, face crumpling in a way that brought to mind Archimonde’s destruction of Dalaran; the experience of watching something vaunted be brought down by a power so totally beyond its scope that resistance was completely inconceivable. She built herself back up, brick by brick --- swept away her horror and dismay behind a curtain of rage and hatred, but he could still see it through the gossamer threads, he still knew how fragile the foundations of her construction were.

     “ I disappoint you, ” she sneered, shaking her head, as though that might bolster the illusion enough that he couldn’t see through it. “ I disappoint you how, Lich King? ‘Cause I didn’t slaughter my way through Light’s Hope? ” And he could kill her for the ghost of guilt he saw cross her face. “ It only took me four knights and a handful of ghouls to reach their Sanctum. You sent ten thousand soldiers and you didn’t even get through the door! ”

     “ Tread lightly, ” he warned softly, taking a step toward her. His Wraith almost tripped over herself in her attempt to not mirror him with a step back, and this was godhood, was sovereignty, was power, this ability to dominate with nothing more than a twitch and a breath. “ Mograine died for you, Deathlord. Don’t throw that sacrifice away out of petulance. ”

     But godhood, sovereignty, power --- none would be nearly so gratifying if the whole world simply rolled over, quavering in fearful submission, meekly accepting his dominion without giving rebellion a fleeting thought. Zoen tilted her chin up, the line of stitches across her throat stretching, and Arthas delighted in the defiance as much as he loathed it. There was incredible satisfaction in possessing something that had once fought tooth and nail against being owned.

     “ I’m right, though, ” she said coldly, hollowly. The lack of arrogance ensured that his loathing did not outweigh his delight for now. “ Other than bringing back Tirion, we’ve done everything right. Got the weapons, got the Horsemen, got a couple mountains’ worth of dead demons behind us, got a… glowy, floaty, singin’ thing hangin’ out in the corner of Acherus that I should probably throw back into the ocean or something ‘cause it’s giving everyone a headache and it clashes with everything and we’ve got a bloody aesthetic to maintain --- ”

     The wolf chuffed, breaking the flow of Zoen’s ramble. She spared it a blank, indecipherable look before returning her gaze to Arthas.

     “ So --- so you could kill me ‘cause I’m petulant, and replace me with one of those --- those unborn brats down there, and see how that goes. Or you could… not kill me, and not replace me, ‘cause so far that seems to be working out pretty well. ”

     “ Is this a plea for mercy, Deathlord? ”

     A laugh tore its way out of her throat. “ Mercy’s a sin. I’m asking you to be practical. ”

     It was not pride that unfurled, sleepy and disoriented, beneath his rib cage, but its precursor. The acknowledgement that pride could exist within him, that one day it might settle in his bones, that looking at his Wraith would not inspire frustration and betrayal and and a sinking, clawing feeling that he could not name. And if she could scrabble her way towards such glory as the Death God’s approval, imagine what the rest of her brethren could accomplish, those whose only disappointments had been betrayal.

     A crooked grin crossed the Lich King’s features, and that precursor must have bled through because Zoen lowered her chin, looking somewhat disturbed. “ Then consider yourself forgiven, Deathlord, ” he said with all proper magnanimity of a god. She wasn’t, really, wouldn’t be for a long while, but if she could offer candor, he could offer lies. “ I’d suggest returning to your knights before you need seek it again. ”

     His Wraith, for all her faults, was not quite foolish enough to dare stay when a clean exit was offered; and thus with a short whistle to her wolf, she lurched away from the balustrade, hands raised and wreathed in shadow as she wrenched open a death gate. The wolf padded obediently through the portal, and she had nearly taken her first step through when:

     “ Though I do wonder, Zoen, why you came here today at all. ”

     With her back to him as she stood before her gate, Arthas could not see what sort of emotion might have twisted her features, but he knew enough from the stiffening of her shoulders, the way her hands curled into fists before she shoved them into her pockets, that it would have been interesting. And as the silence grew between them, festering like an infected wound, he began to consider reaching forward, yanking her around that he might find out.

     “ It’s Father’s Day, ” she said at last, and that strange, sinking feeling clawed at his insides. “ Thought about just sending a card, but I’m pretty sure the postage would’ve bankrupted me. Suffer well, Arthas. ”

     And then she was gone, the gate sealing neatly behind her, nothing left behind to indicate she had ever been there at all. Arthas found himself staring at the space she’d occupied for a moment too long before finally returning his eyes to the knights training below, clashing in their mock battles like a pack of children.

    Father’s Day.

    The claws sunk deeper.

    He should have carved up her face again.

[discord-trolls]

A new old friend (a soft reboot drabble)

Ponyville was as unfortunately ordinary as it could be. The sky was it’s usual blue, birds chirped the same monotonous tunes and the pony folk all ran their usual little rat races that day. Such an environment was not becoming for the lord of chaos.

Discord was in the marketplace to collect snacks. It seemed that Twilight Sparkle and the girls were going on a ‘friendship retreat’ meaning the castle would be empty and free for a rousing guy’s night of Ogres and Oubliettes. He asked Spike why he wanted him to buy the snacks rather than conjure them with his magic, the dragon said store bought tasted better. That didn’t sit well with Discord to say the least.

He perused through the different shops, a hint of grumpiness to his step as he collected everything on Spikes list. Even after Discord would have been done gathering the refreshments, it’d still be a long agonizingly dull day before guy’s night got started. He silently prayed for some form of excitement. A bugbear attack. An earthquake. He’d even settle for a thief chase.

He soon got his wish in the form of a powerful shiver that shot through his body.

Being the spirit of chaos came with a fair share of abilities. One of them being the power to sense magical imbalances. Such a distinct surge registered on his metaphysical radar then and there, snapping himself out of his daze. His amber eyes, wide with surprise and curiosity, turned to the source of the disturbance. It wasn’t far. Just a few miles from Ponyville, in the heart of the Everfree Forest.

Being too intrigued to resist, Discord snapped his eagles talon and willed himself to the source of the surge without hesitation. What he found was quite unexpected, and that’s saying a lot.

“Listen to your Queen!” Chrysalis bellowed. “We must retrieve the Elements of Harmony!”

The shouting returned Twilight’s attention to the changeling. This wasn’t the Princess Twilight Sparkle the rest of a Equestria knew however. This was a dark double. Brought to life not a moment ago by a single piece of hair and a dark spell conjured by Chrysalis. She, along with the copies of Applejack, Rainbow Dash, Rarity, Fluttershy and Pinkie Pie were created with the sole purpose of harnessing the power of the Elements of Harmony in the name of the Changeling Queen.

From the looks of her ‘colleagues’, however, this Twilight could see the plan was off to a bad start. Their lazy, idiotic self serving behavior seemed to be too much for even the ‘her Majesty’ to control. ‘Twilight’ walked up to her, disdain and disrespect very prevolent in her approach.

“Why didn’t you just attack them!?” she demanded.

“Excuse me?” Chrysalis asked, venom dripping from her voice.

“You got close enough to pull hair from their manes! Why not take your revenge then?”

“They defeated my army. I know better than to strike alone. I need....”

“Friends?” ‘Twilight’ finished her sentence with a smarmy tone.

”... Servants!” Chrysalis growled back. “And the power of the elements.”

“Right.”

‘Twilight’ Examined their surroundings once more. “So where are these ‘Elements of Harmony’?”

“The location of the most powerful magic in Equestria isn’t something made known to just anypony. I learned they were hidden somewhere in this forest.”

“Yeah well, it is a big forest.” the clone shot back before walking away. She was not impressed with their master Chrysalis in the slightest. So much so, that as they finally started to get on with

their mission, an ulterior motive was already brewing in her mind.

Discord looked down at the scene with surprise and amusement. It would seem that Chrysalis was rather ambitious with the revenge she swore onto Starlight Glimmer after she had freed her changeling hive from the Queen's’ control. Her plan to use copies of Twilight and the girls to harness the element’s power was a bold, if horrifically flawed plan.

What caught his attention most of all was the Twilight. He could see in her eyes there was something especially special about her compared to the other five. Her composure, her snark, the gears he could see turning in her head. It was the version of Twilight he had always hoped to see.

Now, a responsible ally to Equestria would swooped in, done away with the copies and apprehended Chrysalis promptly and without hesitation. Of course, while Discord is many things, responsible is not often the first descriptor that comes to mind. He kept his distance and continued to observe the group as he considered what he should do next.

It had been hours since this mission had begun and they had barely made any progress. ‘Twilight’ all but stomped through the forest looking for her companions. “Keep it together. You can do this,” she told herself through gritted teeth. “You need those imbeciles if your plan is going to come together.”

“You’re plan, eh?” a voice called out.

‘Twilight’ stood at attention, looking around for the source of that unfamiliar voice, readying herself for if she needed to fight her way out of something. Soon, her eyes fell upon one of the strangest things she had ever seen laying on a tree branch. A grotesque, patchwork amalgam of different creatures with a distorted equines head at the top. It stared at her with asymmetrical amber eyes and a long, toothy grin.

“What? Who are you!?” she demanded.

“Ah, so you don’t have her memories,” the creature noted. “Excellent. I love fresh starts.”

It swooped down from the branch and landed before her. “Discord. Spirit of Chaos and Disharmony. Hi, how are you?” he greeted, extending his lions paw out to her.

The alicorn grimaced, starting to turn around. “I don’t have time for this nonsense, monster. I have things to do!”

“Yes so I noticed. You and Chrysalis both seem dead set on finding those elements.”

She froze. ”... What do you know about the elements?”

“More than you do. That much is certain.”

“And I suppose that you intend to stop us?”

“I don’t have to,” Discord corrected, laying back in mid air. “Because I know you’re going to fail.”

‘Twilight’ just stood there puzzled for a moment. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Well let me answer that question with a question. Your boss Chryssy told you that Princess Twilight and her friends had the ability to wield the elements but did you ever tell you why?”

She narrowed her eyes at the smug creature before finally answering. ”... no.”

“Figured as much. She doesn’t know either.” he chuckled. “It’s because those six ponies in fact embody the qualities required to wield such a power. Honesty, Laughter, Generosity, Kindness Loyalty etc. See, that’s the part most people seem to miss about how they work.”

Discord twirled a single claw of his eagle’s talon in the air, causing the area around it to twist and change until a small rift opened up. The rift showed Princess Twilight, back when she was a unicorn standing with her friends before the lord of chaos.

“You see, like your Queen, I was once enemies with those girls as well. I knew they weilded the only thing in Equestria that could defeat me so I needed to remove them from the equation. So with a few choice words, and a dash of magic, I was able to turn those ponies into the exact opposite of the elements they embodies. A liar, a grump, a hoarder, a brute and a drifter to name a few.”

He turned his gaze from the visual aid back to ‘Twilight’, an even wider grin on his face. “Sound familiar?”

She looked down, thinking back to the other five. Their behavior, coupled with the creatures explanation caused worry to begin flooding her system.

”... You’re bluffing.”

“Sure, let’s go with that.” he replied, trying hard not to laugh.

”So what? Are you trying to say the elements won't work for us because we aren’t goody goods?”

“Oh them not working for you is the best case scenario,” he explained. “It’s equally as possible that the Tree of Harmony will know you and the others are just tainted copies and possibly purge from existence.”

Her knees began to wobble slightly. Only now was she considering the very serious chances of failure and to say she didn’t like it one bit was the say that the sun is a bit toasty.

“Why? Why are you telling me this?” she asked.

Discord shrugged. “Well maybe it’s just my gentle loving heart, but I would hate to see the worst happen to somepony over a doomed revenge scheme.” He lowered himself down until he was eye to eye with the clone. “Besides, I like you. You’re filled with ambition, cunning and a refreshing lack of crippling neurosis. You have potential. And if there’s something I love doing it’s realizing potential.”

He extended his paw out again. “So, dark Twilight,” he said cheekily. “Do you want to carry on with her Majesty’s already failed plan, or would you rather come with me and truly make something of yourself?”

She frowned, knowing full well this was the illusion of free choice. Whether or not this creature was telling the truth, the fact remained that there were too many rogue variables to take that chance. Whether by this Tree of Harmony or Chrysalis herself, she risked oblivion, Begrudgingly, she lifted her hoof, accepting his paw.

“Fine.”

“Excellent!” Discord beamed. “Shall we go gather your compatriots? They seem fun.”

“No,” she responded flatly. “If what you say is true, then they’re useless to me.”

Discord whistled. “My you are as cold as they come aren’t you. I knew I liked you for a reason.”

‘Twilight’ scoffed and eyed Discord with an unamused glare. “Well, shall we?”

“Indeed,” he said with a smile, raising his lion’s paw up. “You’ll likely need a place to stay, I imagine. I hope you like lava beds.”

“Lava wha-?”

With a snap of his fingers, the two vanished from the forest.

[dargeereads]

COMPLICATE is live! Deliver series is complete.

AMAZON | APPLE | B&N | KOBO | GOOGLE| GOODREADS

The heart-pounding conclusion of the DELIVER series.

Cole Hartman is a mystery. He works alone, sleeps alone, and satisfies his aches…alone. He hasn't touched a woman in seven years. No one will ever compare to the one who broke his heart. Until he stares into the seductive eyes of his enemy. He finally meets his match in the redheaded Russian spy. But she's a dangerous risk. His obsession with her leaves him only one choice.

If you love something, let it go. If it doesn't kill you, hunt it down and take it.

This is Cole Hartman's story. But it's not his beginning. The twisted, heartwrenching story of Cole, Danni, and Trace starts in the TANGLED LIES trilogy.

You don't have to read TANGLED LIES, but if you want to read it, do so before reading this book.

RECOMMENDED READING ORDER

ONE IS A PROMISE (FREE) TWO IS A LIE THREE IS A WAR DELIVER (#1) (FREE) VANQUISH (#2) DISCLAIM (#3) DEVASTATE (#4) TAKE (#5) MANIPULATE (#6) UNSHACKLE (#7) DOMINATE (#8) COMPLICATE (#9)

Start Reading ONE IS A PROMISE for Free

Start Reading DELIVER for Free

Each book in the DELIVER series is a different couple (HEAs / no cliff-hangers), but they must be read in order.

📚 ebooks (all retailers worldwide): ONE IS A PROMISE | TWO IS A LIE | THREE IS A WAR DELIVER | VANQUISH | DISCLAIM | DEVASTATE | TAKE | MANIPULATE | UNSHACKLE| DOMINATE| COMPLICATE

🎧 Audio: ONE IS A PROMISE | TWO IS A LIE | THREE IS A WAR DELIVER | VANQUISH | DISCLAIM | DEVASTATE | TAKE | MANIPULATE | UNSHACKLE | DOMINATE COMPLICATE audio coming April 13

ONE IS A PROMISE - FREE

One promise. One forever.

One look and I knew Cole was mine. My dark rebel in leather. My powerhouse of passion, devastating smiles, and impulsiveness. When his job sends him overseas, he promises to return to me. A promise that's destroyed in the most irrevocable way.

Two years later, an arrogant suit invades my heartbroken loneliness.

Clean-cut and stern, Trace is everything Cole wasn't. At first, he's a job that will rescue my dance company. But as he intrudes on my life, our hostile relationship evolves. He knows I'm still in love with Cole, but his dedication is my undoing.

Then a catastrophic moment changes everything.

Promises resurface. Lies entangle. And an impossible choice shatters my world.

I love two men, and I can only have one.

TWO IS A LIE

Two lies. Two men who don’t share.

I never stopped loving Cole. Not when he left me. Not when he disappeared for three years. Not when he crashed back into my life in a violent explosion of testosterone and fury. His sudden reappearance questions everything I thought I knew, including how I came to love another man.

Trace is an intoxicating breeze of seduction over ice. My rock. My second chance at forever. And he’s committed to annihilating the competition.

The battle that ensues wrenches me back and forth between them. Fighting and f*cking. Resisting and submitting.

Together, they entangle me in a web of lies, rivalry, and desire that weaves as deeply as their devotion to me.

I love two men, and if I can only have one, I choose none.

THREE IS A WAR

Three means war. Three sides vying for forever.

Cole. My first love. The bad boy with the dangerous smile and passionate temper draws attention like a lit fuse on dynamite. But his dark molten eyes spark only for me.

Trace. My second chance. Over six feet of Norse god in a tailored suit, he calculates every move and seizes my hungry breaths with an iron fist.

Me. The free-spirited dancer, torn between two men with no resolution in sight. I tried leaving, staying, refusing, and surrendering. What options do I have left?

I love two men, and I do the only thing I can. I fight.

DELIVER, Book 1 - FREE

His name was Joshua Carter. Now it’s whatever she wants it to be.

She is a Deliverer.

She lures young men and delivers them to be sold. She delivers the strikes that enforce their obedience. She delivers the sexual training that determines their purchase price.

As long as she delivers, the arrangement that protects her family will hold.

Delivering is all she knows.

The one thing she can’t deliver is a captive from slavery.

Until him.

And her stubborn slave thinks he can deliver her…from herself.

VANQUISH, Book 2

Her life is like a prison cell. A self-made, to-hell-with-the-free-world existence that locks from the inside. Stop judging. Her agoraphobia doesn’t define her. It simply keeps her safe.

He belongs in a prison cell. The 6x8, make-me-your-bitch variety that locks from the outside. But he’s free. To hunt. To take. To break. And he just found a sexy new toy.

Capturing her is the easy part. Her fucked-up mind, however, makes him question everything he does next. But he’s a determined bastard. If all goes his way, this will hurt like hell.

DISCLAIM, Book 3

Camila was seventeen when Van Quiso kidnapped her. Ten years after her escape, the shackles refuse to release her. Not while there are still slave traders preying on her city. She will stop at nothing to end them. Even if that means becoming a slave again.

Returning to chains is her worst fear—and only option. They won’t know who she is or what she intends to do. She’s prepared for every complication. Except him. The one who decimated her sixteen-year-old heart.

Matias is charming, gorgeous, and dangerously seductive. He’s also untrustworthy and enshrouded in secrets. After years of no contact, he finds her—on her knees, wrists bound, in the clutches of her enemy. Will he sabotage her mission by needlessly saving her? Or will he keep her in chains and never let her go?

DEVASTATE, Book 4

“What is the price you’re willing to pay?” “Money isn’t an issue.” “I’m not talking about money.”

Tate is on the hunt to find his best friend’s sister. Eleven years ago, Lucia Dias was abducted. Presumed dead. He never met her, so why does he care? Some might call his efforts noble, but his motivation is more perverse, bordering on obsession.

When he follows a chilling lead to Venezuela’s Kidnap Alley, what he finds is neither a corpse nor a captive.

Amid poisonous lies and crippling depravity, the price of love is devastation. And he pays. With his body, his blood, and her life.

TAKE, Book 5

He’s a notorious crime lord, a kidnapper, and an artist. Scarification is his outlet, and he just captured a new canvas. Kate refuses to surrender beneath his blade or the cruelty in his beautiful eyes. But she’s drawn to the man inside the monster. A man who makes her ache with his touch. Who owns her with his kiss. A man who worships her as deeply as he hurts her. She can run, but there’s no escape from a bond carved in scars.

MANIPULATE, Book 6

Tula Gomez is in the most ruthless prison in Latin America.

She only drove to Mexico to help her sister. She did nothing wrong. But her quiet life changed in an instant.

To survive the violent, cartel-controlled prison where men blend with women, she pledges her loyalty to the notorious leader in exchange for the one thing she needs most. Protection.

When she agrees to seduce the suspicious new inmates, Martin Lockwood and Ricky Saldivar, she doesn’t expect to enjoy it. Sure, they’re gorgeous, irresistibly alpha, and insanely talented with their hands and mouths. But they’re the enemy. She can’t fall for them.

Torn between her cartel loyalties and two men who want her as deeply as they want each other, she questions who is manipulating whom. Her search for answers leads to a passionate ménage, a soul-crushing secret, and an impossible choice.

UNSHACKLE, Book 7

No woman can resist Luke Sanch’s chiseled features, honed physique, auburn hair, and intense green eyes. While deadly in combat, he’s an indomitable weapon in bed. He can coax an explosive release with only his mouth and annihilate with insidious, mind-blowing pleasure. When he infiltrates La Rocha Cartel, he must seduce Vera Gomez to determine whether to rescue her. Or kill her. Nothing can distract his icy, lethal focus. Except the cartel’s most feral captive. The nameless, raven-haired beauty is his key to dismantling Vera Gomez. But the ferocious little fighter challenges him at every turn and unknowingly battles her way into his heart. A battle that delivers him, physically and emotionally, into shackles.

DOMINATE, Book 8

There are many reasons to jump off a bridge, but Rylee Sutton only needs one. Her husband’s betrayal. Just before she leaps, she receives an email from a stranger. The boy’s message is meant for his dead girlfriend, but his anguish speaks to Rylee. It saves her life.

Over the next decade, Tomas Dine continues to email his dead girl. As he evolves from a teenager into a hardened, vicious criminal, Rylee is there, reading every intimate word. He doesn’t know she exists.

When she comes forward, he despises her, his cruelty unforgivable. But she doesn’t back down. In a carnal battle of punishment and passion, hatred dominates. Until he loses her. Amid looming danger and unsolved murders rises a devotion forged in strife. Love is lethal in his ruthless world. To survive it, they must fight for answers—and each other.

COMPLICATE, Book 9

The heart-pounding conclusion of the DELIVER series.

Cole Hartman is a mystery. He works alone, sleeps alone, and satisfies his aches...alone. He hasn't touched a woman in seven years. No one will ever compare to the one who broke his heart. Until he stares into the seductive eyes of his enemy. He finally meets his match in the redheaded Russian spy. But she's a dangerous risk. His obsession with her leaves him only one choice.

If you love something, let it go. If it doesn't kill you, hunt it down and take it.

AUDIOBOOKS

ONE IS A PROMISE: Audible | Narrated by Lisa Zimmerman TWO IS A LIE: Audible | Narrated by Lisa Zimmerman THREE IS A WAR: Audible | Narrated by Lisa Zimmerman DELIVER #1: Audible | Narrated by Teddy Hamilton and Abby Crayden VANQUISH #2: Audible | Narrated by Ryan West and Jo Raylan DISCLAIM  #3: Audible | Narrated by Christian Fox and Emma Wilder DEVASTATE #4: Audible | Narrated by J.F. Harding and Tracy Marks TAKE #5: Audible | Narrated by Soren Gray and Kate Genevieve MANIPULATE #6: Audible | Narrated by Christian Fox, Aiden Snow, and Lila Summers UNSHACKLE #7: Audible | Narrated by J. Tipstone and Lacy Laurel DOMINATE #8: Audible | Narrated by Matthew Holland and Samantha Summers COMPLICATE #9: Coming April 13 | Narrated by Joe Arden and Lisa Zimmerman

PAM GODWIN

New York Times, Wall Street Journal, and USA Today Bestselling author, Pam Godwin, lives in the Midwest with her husband, their two children, and a foulmouthed parrot. When she ran away, she traveled fourteen countries across five continents, attended three universities, and married the vocalist of her favorite rock band.

Java, tobacco, and dark romance novels are her favorite indulgences, and might be considered more unhealthy than her aversion to sleeping, eating meat, and dolls with blinking eyes.

Instagram

Facebook

Amazon

Bookbub

Twitter

Goodreads

  BOOKS BY PAM GODWIN

Trails of Sin Series KNOTTED (#1) - FREE BUCKLED (#2) BOOTED (#3)

Tangled Lies Series ONE IS A PROMISE (#1) - FREE TWO IS A LIE (#2) THREE IS A WAR (#3)

Deliver Series DELIVER (#1) - FREE VANQUISH (#2) DISCLAIM (#3) DEVASTATE (#4) TAKE (#5) MANIPULATE (#6) UNSHACKLE (#7) DOMINATE (#8) COMPLICATE (#9)

Trilogy of Eve HEART OF EVE - FREE DEAD OF EVE (#1) BLOOD OF EVE (#2) DAWN OF EVE (#3)

Stand-alones DARK NOTES BENEATH THE BURN DIRTY TIES INCENTIVE SEA OF RUIN KING OF LIBERTINES - FREE

[preserving-ferretbrain]

Across the Face of the Bored

by Dan H

Wednesday, 15 April 2009

Dan feels like he's kicking a puppy.~

Ferretbrain regulars should already know about my sordid love affair with Trudi Canavan, an Australian novelist whose work I am guiltily fond of (I'm anxiously looking forward to the paperback release of the Black Magician prequels). Trudi writes wonderful, pacey books about spunky heroines with magic powers which are amazing fun and never get boring (well, Last of the Wilds sagged a bit if I'm honest). It was on her recommendation (well, her blurb, which isn't quite the same thing) that I picked up Russell Kirkpatrick's Across the Face of the World. 

I'll admit, I was also attracted to the sheer old-school nature of it. It's called “Across the Face of the World” for a start, and the cover depicts five people on horses riding in front of a gigantic moon. There are no fewer than five maps at the front, and at the back is a glossary which is only two pages shorter than the first chapter. It's the product of “fifteen years of careful worldbuilding” and when I say “worldbuilding” I mean “this guy is a professor of geography and boy does it show.”

So I kind of knew what I was getting into when I started it. But it came with the Trudi Canavan seal of approval, so I figured it would be slightly cheesy but good fun.

It was not good fun.

Oh, spoilers, FYI.

The story concerns a boy called Leith who lives in a remote village where he isn't terribly popular because he's slightly smaller and weaker than the other children. He has a crush on a girl called Stella (yes, Stella) but she is betrothed to another boy called ... Druin? I think? Not really sure. He is miraculously cast opposite her in the Midwinter play, and gets to do flirty improv theatre with her, before getting dragged away by his mysteriously-returned father, who has brought Terrible Danger with him.

So Leith's father and mother get kidnapped by the Lords of Fear (I kind of feel that I should have bolded that. I mean dudes: Lords of Fear) and Leith, his crippled brother Hal, the village “Haufuth” (think elder or headman) and a Simple Farmer Who Is More Than He Seems named Kurr set off to find them, and to warn the people of Faltha that they are about to be invaded by Bhrudwo.

Finding the names confusing yet? Just wait.

Stella stumbles upon the council of war, and since Leith and Hal are supposed to be dead, and they can't have anybody spreading rumours about their plan, they decide to take her with them (why no, she doesn't get any say in this, why do you ask?) when they head out to do their mission.

They pursue the Bhrudwans across the face of the ... well you get the picture. They do this very, very slowly. Very, very, very slowly.

Kirkpatrick has mapped out his world in exhaustive detail, and he leads you through every inch of it. Down every glaciated valley, past every erratic boulder, up every fold mountain and over every waterfall into every plunge pool. The single biggest impression you get from the text is “gosh, this person knows a lot about geography.” The second biggest impression you get from the text is “gosh, this dialogue is terrible and stilted and these characters are wooden and poorly realised.”

Sorry, that was bitchy of me, and I feel genuinely bad about saying it, because Russell Kirkpatrick comes across as a lovely man who has a genuine enthusiasm for his world and his story. The flyleaf informs us that:

“Russell Kirkpatrick's love of literature and a chance encounter with fantasy novels as a teenager opened up a vast number of possibilities to him. The idea that he could marry storytelling and mapmaking (his other passion) into one project grabbed him and wouldn't let go.”

How sweet is that? Unfortunately while Kirkpatrick's love of mapmaking has translated into an ability to draw pretty good maps, his love of storytelling has failed to yield similar results.

Where to begin.

Destiny Is Not A Virtue God Damn It

Throughout Across the Face of the World there is talk of “The Right Hand of God” (not to be confused with the Left Hand of God, which is Hugh Jackman). This is a dude who is totally destined to rise up and unite the disparate kingdoms of Faltha and fight off the evil Bhrudwans and defeat the Destroyer and generally be Awesomeness Personified.

The Right Hand is pretty clearly Leith. There are gigantic hints about this, almost to the extent of people coming up to him and saying “Leith Mahnumsen, You Are The Right Hand of God”.

It does not, in fact, bother me that nobody works out this extremely obvious fact. It does not bother me that Leith remains totally oblivious to the idea that he might be the Right Hand, despite meeting (a) a seer who says “you have a great destiny and will become a great leader of men” and (b) a bard who says “Hi, I'm looking for the Right Hand, who is destined to be a great leader of men, I think he might come from your home town.”

What bothers me is the fact that I am expected to give a crap.

I really hate destiny in fantasy. It's so often used to avoid explaining how a character was actually capable of achieving something. I don't mind the young orphan boy being able to pull the sword from the stone. I do mind him being able to use the damned thing without any training.

Leith has nothing to recommend him as a character. He's mopey, miserable, self-pitying and indecisive. He doesn't have hidden leadership qualities (or if he does they are fantastically wellhidden) he doesn't even have tremendous compassion (his adoptive brother Hal does, but he's clearly an angel which is kinda cheating) or unusual courage. Hell, he doesn't even get described as possessing any of these quantities. All he does is mope about the fact that Stella seems to fancy somebody else and display a vague determination to get his parents back.

I wouldn't object to this if I thought it was deliberate, if I thought somebody was going to sit Leith down and say “seriously dude, stop being such a douche” and he was going to realise that dag nammit he had a kingdom to save I'd be okay with that, but it seems very unlikely at this stage.

The thing is I do understand why you get so many fantasy heroes like this. He's an everyman or, more precisely an everygeek. He's the speccy outsider who isn't very good at sports and is no good with girls, but who is secretly special because of some innate quality which is never really explained, and which he never has to demonstrate. The recognition and validation of your individual special-unique-snowflake-ness is basically every geeks ultimate fantasy (hell it's why I write these articles, I fully expect to be given a column in the Times any day now) and like Leith we expect this validation to come not as a result of anything we have done but in recognition of who we are. It's the slightly tragic result of being picked on at school.

Where was I? Oh yes: Leith is boring, self-pitying and has the leadership potential of a pillow with an anxiety disorder. He's going to wind up saving the world and I really don't care.

Stella By Starlight

Across the Face of the World almost avoids making it onto the Fantasy Rape Watch list, but not quite. I'm not going to talk about that quite yet, though. Instead I'm going to talk about Stella.

Since pretty much forever, there's been a strong tradition in literature (particularly heroic literature – including fantasy novels and action movies) of female characters whose sole function is to act as a reward for the hero. The fact that I'm not particularly squicked out by the fact that our society sees “getting the girl” as a natural consequence of “killing the baddies” (rather than anything the “girl” has – y'know – a choice about) is one of those things which makes me rather ashamed of my own internalised prejudices. It's a trope that comes up time and again in pretty much every book you've ever read and every film you've ever seen. It should bother me more than it does, frankly, and for some reason it really bothers me here.

Maybe it's because I really didn't like Leith, but the idea that this girl had been created purely so that, at the end of the series, she could complete the protagonist's wish-fulfilment fantasy by winding up with him had me beating my head against the wall. I wouldn't mind but he isn't even particularly nice to her. He shows no actual interest in her as a person, they don't have a relationship, he sees her as a trophy just as much as Druin, the boy she's betrothed to and terrified of.

Oh yes, about that.

Stella starts the story being abducted by the company because they want to keep her quiet. This is, itself, all kinds of fucked up. I mean, I get that it's better that nobody in the village know where you're going (they say it's for the safety of the village, but seriously, when has ignorance protected anybody from anything – if Dark Lord Psychopathus thinks you know something, he'll torture you to death, period) but seriously, you guys were the ones who had a secret meeting in a public building with no locks on the doors. The fact that they won't trust her not to tell anybody (because her mother's a gossip, apparently) is also a bit iffy, it's got slight overtones of “women need to learn to keep their mouths shut” - sorry, I'm Minority Warrioring again – so, yes, abduction.

Stella does not get a choice about joining the company on their quest, but she goes along with it in the end because the alternative is to marry Druin, and be subjected to a lifetime of socially sanctioned marital rape. Being the courageous, self-actualising fantasy heroine that she is, Stella sees her abduction by the company as an opportunity to throw herself at somebody else, so she can be subjected to a lifetime of socially sanctioned marital rape by somebody less horrible.

It doesn't occur to her that she could – y'know – make a life for herself in the enormous cosmopolitan city they're going to. I know she's a girl from a small village and was probably raised with a very narrow view of her future, but I think once you've broadened your prospects to include “saving the world” I really don't think “living without a man” is too much of a stretch.

Ethnic Jokes Are So Uncouth

So the basic plot of AtFotW is that the proud lands of Faltha are home to the First Men, the chosen of God who screwed up n-thousand years ago but who are destined to reclaim their rightful place as the Chosen of the Most High and redeem the world and stuff.

Anybody want to guess what their defining racial characteristics are? I'll give you a clue, it isn't dark hair and brown eyes.

The enemy of the First Men is the evil empire of Bhrudwo. Now I'll admit here that I've not seen much actual description of Bhrudwan ethnic characteristics but they do seem to live in a desert, is all I'm saying.

Now I know making allegations of racism about a fantasy novel is, as a great man once put it, about as difficult as putting on a hat. But when your novel has as its premise that some races of people are better than other races of people, you need to be really careful before making your chosen people look quite that much like Nazi poster children.

This again probably wouldn't bother me as much as it does, but Kirkpatrick seems to have actually noticed the problem and sort-of-not-quite tried to address it. There's quite a lot of evil races in his world (the Bhrudwans, the Widuz), but Kirkpatrick keeps making embarrassingly perfunctory efforts to pretend that they are not, in fact, totally evil. Mahnum (the protagonist's father) explains at great and patronising length how the common people of Bhrudwo are really excellent people no different from you or me, before explaining how he was captured by them, tortured by them, then rescued by one of them who, when said rescuer discovered that he was not as rich as he had pretended, betrayed him to the Lords of Fear. Similarly, when the Companions encounter the Widuz, we are told carefully that they have been cruelly treated by the other people of their land, and driven ever further into the most inhospitable parts of Faltha, only to be subjected to a sequence in which the Widuz line up dozens of naked, drugged captives and throw them into a dormant volcano to appease a hungry god. And lest we forget, there is only one God that canonically exists in the setting, so while they're ill-treated they're also violent, barbaric and wrong.

Now I admit, I've only read the first book, and it's possible that it will defy all my expectations and preconceptions. It's possible that Leith will grow the hell up and show some kind of leadership qualities. It's possible that Stella will learn that she doesn't actually need to get married, and will reject Leith on the grounds that she doesn't fancy him. But I'm unlikely to find out because I'm unlikely to want to wade through another twelve hundred pages of tedious geography for the privilege.

And finally:

Fantasy Rape Watch

Approximate Number of Named Characters Who Travel with the Company: 12

Of Which Female: 3

Of Whom Have Dialogue: 2

Of Whom Motivated by Past Sexual Abuse: 1

Of Whom Motivated by Fear of Future Sexual Abuse: 1

Of Whom Die: 1

Total Deaths Among Company: 2

Number of Women Abducted by Villains: 1

Number of Women Abducted by Heroes: 1

Number of Societies Encountered in Which Women Are Treated Literally As Property: 1

Number of Male Characters Who Object To This: 0

Number of Female Characters Who Object To This: 0

Reaction of Party Member On Being Told That His Wife Is Now The Property Of Another Man: “Oh good, he'll look after her until I get back”Themes:

Fantasy Rape Watch

,

Books

,

Sci-fi / Fantasy

,

Judging Books By Their Covers

~

bookmark this with - facebook - delicious - digg - stumbleupon - reddit

~Comments (

go to latest

)

http://serenoli.livejournal.com/

at 12:00 on 2009-04-15Lol the last line. Like, seriously?

permalink

-

go to top

Rami

at 13:52 on 2009-04-15I was mostly struck by the resemblance of the cover to

a Wheel Of Time book

, when I first saw it...

permalink

-

go to top

Arthur B

at 13:57 on 2009-04-15Hey, I remember that cover - it was on the only

Wheel of Time

book I ever attempted to read.

I got halfway through the prologue before I gave up.

permalink

-

go to top

Rami

at 14:26 on 2009-04-15Don't worry, you won't have to miss out entirely -- it's allegedly coming to the big screen in 2011!

permalink

-

go to top

Wardog

at 16:00 on 2009-04-15They're making a movie from The Wheel of Time? Wtf?! It isn't even finished... and it's really boring...

permalink

-

go to top

Arthur B

at 16:07 on 2009-04-15The long and boring nature of the Wheel of Time is actually helpful there: if they film everything then they'll still be on schedule even if the final book isn't published until 2050...

permalink

-

go to top

Rami

at 16:14 on 2009-04-15You never know, they could do something miraculous and tighten it up a lot (like the LOTR films, for instance, were tightened up) into a reasonable story...

permalink

-

go to top

Shim

at 16:19 on 2009-04-15I can see that. I mean, if you cut out most of the characters and all the sitting around angsting, it would be manageable.

permalink

-

go to top

Guy

at 16:22 on 2009-04-15I understand that, since Jordan is now writing generic fantasy for the angels, they have found someone else to finish the Wheel for him. Who was intending to write one book, but, haha, said that there was far too much stuff to wrap up in just one book so he is going to write a concluding *trilogy*.

permalink

-

go to top

Dan H

at 20:16 on 2009-04-15

Lol the last line. Like, seriously?

Seriously, but deliberately taken out of context for maximum d'oh value. Said character is, in fact, a member of the treats-women-as-property community (albeit an adopted one) so it's not like his wife was just snatched away from him by people they met on the road, and he does know the guy she's given to personally so it's not completely psychotic. So the line is more "I know X will take good care of her". It's still kind of messed up though.

permalink

-

go to top

Dan H

at 20:38 on 2009-04-15

there was far too much stuff to wrap up in just one book so he is going to write a concluding *trilogy*

You know what's going to happen, don't you?

He's going to write books one and two, and then die horrifically, at which point somebody else will get brought in to finish the trilogy, and decide that actually they'll need to divide the final volume into two parts, finish the first part and then they'll die as well at which point somebody else...

It'll become this terrifying horror story about the fantasy series that kills anybody who touches it.

permalink

-

go to top

Guy

at 03:56 on 2009-04-16I thought you were going to say, he's going to write books one and two, then realise that one book just really isn't *quite* enough to wrap up everything that needs to be wrapped up, so he'll extend the series by just a few more books... &c... but I like your version too. :)

permalink

-

go to top

http://pozorvlak.livejournal.com/

at 11:51 on 2009-04-16I just wanted to say that Leith is the name of where I live. I don't know if that's a coincidence or further evidence of Kirkpatrick's deep love of geography, but it made the review rather confusing for me to read.

permalink

-

go to top

http://sistermagpie.livejournal.com/

at 21:02 on 2009-04-21Awww. It really is kind of a textbook fantasy book. I find myself liking the author even while cringing at the thought of reading the book.

permalink

-

go to top

Rami

at 10:54 on 2009-04-22

liking the author even while cringing

Yeah, me too. If he spends that long lovingly building a fantasy world I get the feeling it'd be really fun to be sitting there exploring it with him, just riffing on ideas like what the people in the desert kingdom to the south wear.

On the other hand, that has very little to do with actually writing a good book :-(

permalink

-

go to top

Dan H

at 13:31 on 2009-04-22There's a rather cute bit on his website where he says that writing his books takes roughly 500 hours to write, with a further *thousand* hours of worldbuilding...

permalink

-

go to top

Wardog

at 14:38 on 2009-04-22Sigh. I'm pretty damn sure it should be the other way round ...

permalink

-

go to top

http://scipiosmith.livejournal.com/

at 18:23 on 2012-04-03

Now I admit, I've only read the first book, and it's possible that it will defy all my expectations and preconceptions. It's possible that Leith will grow the hell up and show some kind of leadership qualities. It's possible that Stella will learn that she doesn't actually need to get married, and will reject Leith on the grounds that she doesn't fancy him. But I'm unlikely to find out because I'm unlikely to want to wade through another twelve hundred pages of tedious geography for the privilege.

Kind of, as far as Leith goes. Instead of displaying any fantastic qualities book 3 becomes a rather hilarious deconstruction/parody of the idea of the Chosen One, as he leads his followers from one epic fail to the next before God and Hal save the day at the last possible second.

Stella on the other hand is treated rather savagely; by the end of the trilogy she's been seduced by the Dark Lord's trusted lieutenant (whom she does, in fairness, cause to be killed by the Dark Lord), then prematurely aged and palsied down one side by the Dark Lord during his enslavement of her, develops kind-of Stockholm syndrome before being rescued by God, and still marries Leith at the end.

permalink

-

go to top

Dan H

at 18:11 on 2012-04-04

Instead of displaying any fantastic qualities book 3 becomes a rather hilarious deconstruction/parody of the idea of the Chosen One, as he leads his followers from one epic fail to the next before God and Hal save the day at the last possible second.

Obviously I've not read the book, but based on this very loose description, I'm not sure that constitutes a parody or deconstruction, so much as a fairly straight implementation of the trope. Sometimes it's authorial fiat, rather than a literal divine intervention, but the way the Chosen One narrative usually works (in my experience) is that they fuck up continuously for most of the story, then have everything come out alright at the last possible minute.

c.f. John Sheridan, Harry Potter, later Buffy, and so on.

permalink

-

go to top

James D

at 20:10 on 2012-04-04Yes, a better deconstruction of the trope would have the "Chosen One" be actually worthy of the title, but simply lose because the enemy is better at fighting and it was stupid to expect to win or even try to fight. The bad guys end up being magnanimous in defeat and things go back to the way they were, which wasn't so bad anyway, minus a bunch of warmongering rebels. The End. Maybe throw in a dash of how the former Confederate US is with its "The South Will Rise Agin!" mantra, playing up big gubmint being evil, states' rights being good, and conveniently lionizing the rebels while whitewashing the whole slavery issue. I guess the protagonist could be some sort of impressionable youth who buys the whole story.

There are probably already a hundred authors who've deconstructed the trope at length, to the point where its deconstruction is itself a trope. Such is modern fantasy. To be perfectly honest though, it just doesn't seem like a particularly interesting trope to deconstruct, because once examined at all it becomes so transparently stupid that hardly any deconstruction is required to lay that inherent stupidity bare. As mentioned in the review, the concept of a "Chosen One" is just more bald-faced adolescent wish-fulfillment fantasy.

permalink

-

go to top

http://scipiosmith.livejournal.com/

at 17:45 on 2012-04-05

Obviously I've not read the book, but based on this very loose description, I'm not sure that constitutes a parody or deconstruction, so much as a fairly straight implementation of the trope. Sometimes it's authorial fiat, rather than a literal divine intervention, but the way the Chosen One narrative usually works (in my experience) is that they fuck up continuously for most of the story, then have everything come out alright at the last possible minute.

I think the difference is one of textual support. You can read the later Harry Potter books as the story of someone bumbling from one disaster to another, but that is not supported by the text which insists that Harry is a Hero with capital H to the point that even after his apparent defeat and death people remain loyal to his memory.

On the other hand, when Leith is loudly called out for every mistake he makes, called out for sulking about getting called out, and by the end of the war is getting pissed on by the common soldiery for his suckage (even Charlie Brown thinks he's a loser by this point) it's hard to argue that 'Leith is Useless' is not what the text expects you to take away.

It's also possible to interpret that Hal, who bears his brother's accusations of treason without complaint, dies in Leith's place and then comes back to life temporarily in time to save the day, was the real Right Hand of God all along, but then Leith was the one hearing God's voice in book 2 so that would be strange.

permalink

-

go to top

Tamara

at 23:08 on 2014-01-28How geekily-particular is it that what bothers me about this review is the implication that geographers make for tedious worldbuilding? I'm not-so-many credits away from a geography degree and love it to pieces, and it's totally obvious to me that the use of a solid foundation in geography in fantasy worldbuilding should be one of experimentation and exploration of spaces and landscapes that can't exist in reality, not the fussy construction of super-accurate worlds. The City and The City or The Half Made World is my idea of a great geography porn genre book, not something with really nicely mapped drainage basins. Just needed to say that, oh very old article about a series long since off the radar.

[necroarchived]

                                               𝔉𝔞𝔱𝔥𝔢𝔯'𝔰 𝔇𝔞𝑦

     Summary: In the wake of the Second Battle of Light’s Hope, the Lich King contemplates his Deathlord in a strange, rare moment of camaraderie. Except not really.

     OR a conversation that doesn’t end with anyone dead for once, but just barely.

     Characters: Arthas Menethil, Zoen Mith, Tiris, and a bunch of death knight acolytes who are Trying Their Best.

     Warning: This is from Arthas’ perspective, so it’s just all kinds of awful. Mental and emotional abuse, as well as references to past physical abuse. Manipulation, intimidation, victim-blaming, etc. etc.

     “What’re you doing, Lich King?”

     The unsettlement of air announced his Wraith just before her voice, the syllables carrying with them the distinctive sensations that made up the patchwork of her presence - the whisper of ice, of shadow, of wolf’s teeth and bottomless hunger. He did not turn to the child as she leaned irreverently against the balustrade that wrapped around the overlook they stood upon, the hollow thunk of saronite striking saronite muffled by the material of her coat. He had forgone his helm for a short while today, and she stood just at the edge of his peripheral vision if he focused on her. (He didn’t.) The wolf, cleverly, settled between Lord and King. While the barrier of fur and bone and blood would not be enough to make Arthas so much as hesitate should things edge towards violence, it would stop Zoen in her tracks.

     Idly, he wondered why she was here.

     “Observing.” Beneath them, knights-in-training battled furiously against one another while instructors waded fearlessly amidst the fray, shouting threats and criticisms. The din was almost pleasant, yet another form of background noise to join that of the endless clamor of murmuring souls that echoed through Arthas’ skull. “You could benefit from doing the same.”

     He heard the shift of metal and leather as she turned to split her attention between him and the knights. “They’re awful.”

     “You were worse.”

     She scoffed in disdain, and he glanced at her just in time to catch her unconsciously raising a hand to rub at where her throat had been sawed open barely a week following her rebirth. He did not try to suppress his smirk. “Inaccurate, and not the point.”

     “Isn’t it?” He tilted his attention further to her, both approving and condemning how she rocked back on her heels away from him.

     Wariness of him was smart, was right in a knight of his, no matter their errancy - especially due to their errancy. The Ebon Blade yet had treasons to atone for, sins whose punishments he’d flay from their souls as soon as they had returned, properly, to the heavy fold of his sovereignty. Amusing though it was to watch Acherus’ children scurry around doing his bidding while stubbornly clinging to their delusion of independence, he ached for when they’d kneel in reverent, dutiful loyalty at the foot of his throne, minds reconnected to the grand nexus of the Scourge and the chains of their wills wound firmly around his wrist.

     From beneath came an especially loud shout, followed by a gradual decrease of noise. Arthas looked down and saw a rough circle of acolytes forming around what appeared to be a newly-disarmed initiate who stood clenching his lone fist whilst an instructor shouted at him. At their feet lay a severed, leaking limb. The instructor roared for a few more moments before apparently dismissing the acolyte, who took the chance to snag his arm off the ground before stiffly making his way towards the doors that would lead him to the nearest necromancers’ hall. The clamor from before rose back up, knights fighting knights with renewed vigour.

     “See?” Zoen murmured, tone edging irritatingly similar to smug. Was she closer than she’d been before? “Awful.”

     “If any of them surpass you, Deathlord, I’ll replace you.”

     “If any of them surpass me, Lich King, I’ll deserve it.” She twisted around to rest her back fully on the railing, dismissing the knights below with silent contempt. The consequence was that she now no longer had anything to really focus on save Arthas himself, which she seemed to only truly understand at the end of her little rotation. To his entertainment, she seemed incapable of regarding him for any protracted length of time, as though he were the sun and to look directly at him would burn her eyes. No, not the sun, he thought. A god, his divinity too darkly radiant for a creature of such profound imperfection as Zoen Mith to gaze upon without suffering vastly for it. The idea pleased him enough that he magnanimously declined to call out the weakness for what it was.

     The moment extended awkwardly - for the girl, of course, not Arthas, who really couldn’t care less about her dilemma except the ways it may compliment him - wherein Zoen shuffled between gazing down at her dozing wolf and sending furtive, disturbed glances at the sculpted skull of his right pauldron. Her eyes dropped to her feet and her hands fell from the railing to inside her coat’s pockets. She pulled out what looked to be an old, brass pocket watch and frowned briefly at it before curling her fist tighter around it and jamming them both back into her coat.

     They fell into silence, leaving one another to their distractions: Zoen her growing unease, Arthas his supervision of his knights’ training. Nothing so gruesomely inconvenient as dismemberment plagued any of the remaining acolytes, though such mercy could not be attributed to hesitancy or consideration on behalf of their brethren; indeed the tide of their ferocity and bloodlust seemed to rise higher in concurrence with the growing length of time that their mock battles stretched on. Except mock began to seem too trite a word, now that he thought about it, its connotations almost too passive for the crashing violence that swept across the floor below - as though it was not a legion of fallen, desecrated heroes pitted in a dozen vicious wars but a pack of squealing children artlessly swinging sticks at one another. Puerile, even - and of course thoughts of puerility inevitably drew his attention (and eyes) toward the child leaning artlessly against the balustrade at his side, one of her hands curling loosely around the hilt of her overhyped stick.

     It dawned, suddenly, that he had never before shared any moment of remarkable length with this child of his that did not involve violence of either a physical or mental capacity. He would not call what they dwelled in currently peace, aware as he was of the literal and proverbial wolf slumbering between them, and the blades they both carried at their sides should the metaphorical beast awaken. But it was not violence, nor teeth-clenched toleration that would only last the very bare minimum of time until they could hastily part ways. It was, temporarily, a state of coexistence.

     Arthas seized the opportunity to really, truly look at Zoen. His child was a mess of poor construction, avian bones wrapped up in lambskin with shark’s teeth jammed into a too-small mouth, her own weak jaw muzzling her better than any man-made contraption. Lordship had settled heavily on her shoulders, rounding them until he wondered for a moment if they had been wrenched from the sockets. He could see the tension in her neck, how the tendons were taut as bowstrings beneath the skin. The dark shadows that clung to her eyes spoke of an exhaustion she could not even experience anymore. Her cheekbone was splattered with the telltale discolorations of a nearly-healed bruise, and below her jaw, just above the line of her coat’s collar, a sloppy row of stitches ran diagonally down her throat.

     “You look atrocious.”

     Candid, but he had never been the liar between them. She grinned sardonically, and at the corner of her mouth he could just make out the faint, silvery line of where a blade had broken through the skin long ago, trailing from the edge of her lips to the swell of her chin. The scar was unnotable enough on its own, but compounded with his intimate knowledge of the mutilation that destroyed the other side of her face, its inconsequence was practically insulting. Arthas entertained the thought of taking a blade and digging through that pathetic blemish, turning it into another emblem of ruination. Another lesson.

     Do not give in to mortal weakness.

     Perhaps this time, she would learn it.

     “Do I? What a shame.” There were deserts less dry than her tone. “Somewhere between slaughtering demons and leading armies I suppose I let my skincare regimen fall to the wayside.”

     “If you crumble, child -”

     “Yes, you said,” she snapped, and he so dearly desired to reach forward and pluck out those teeth she dared turn against him. Petulance could be amusing, and spite had its charm, but little mitigated such outright disrespect. “You’ll replace me with one of your pets. I’m very sure they’ll have better luck attacking the paladins than I did.”

     “That would not be difficult.” He rounded on her, paying no heed to the growl building up in the wolf’s chest as it scrabbled to its feet and backed up against his Wraith, its fangs bared uselessly at him. “Your failure was a spectacular display of the incompetence characteristic of your Ebon Blade.”

     Below them, the din of battle lessened as distracted knights turn from their combatants to the storm quietly brewing on the overlook. Arthas lashed out at their minds in painful chastisement, disgusted at such a large-scale lapse on their part. He would not allow his loyal servants to succumb to the same weaknesses that crippled his traitors - crippled his daughter, who for all her snarling, sputtering outrage could inspire only a swell of disgust in the Lich King.

     “We aren’t -”

     “Maxwell Tyrosus and Liadrin were at your mercy,” he spat viciously, “and rather than bring them into -” my “- your fold, you chose to leave them crumpled on the ground, battered but alive. Tirion Fordring rests peacefully in his grave still, because you were too weak to claim him. Time and again, you are given chances to prove yourself, and time and again, you fall short of expectations. You disappoint me.”

     The effect was immediate; Zoen reeled back, face crumpling in a way that brought to mind Archimonde’s destruction of Dalaran; the experience of watching something vaunted be brought down by a power so totally beyond its scope that resistance was completely inconceivable. She built herself back up, brick by brick - swept away her horror and dismay behind a curtain of rage and hatred, but he could still see it through the gossamer threads, he still knew how fragile the foundations of her construction were.

     “I disappoint you,” she sneered, shaking her head, as though that might bolster the illusion enough that he couldn’t see through it. “I disappoint you how, Lich King? ‘Cause I didn’t slaughter my way through Light’s Hope?” And he nearly killed her for the ghost of guilt he saw cross her face. “It only took me four knights and a handful of ghouls to reach their Sanctum. You sent ten thousand soldiers and you didn’t even get through the door!”

     “Tread lightly,” he warned softly, taking a step toward her. His Wraith almost tripped over herself in her attempt to not mirror him with a step back, and this was godhood, was sovereignty, was power, this ability to dominate with nothing more than a twitch and a breath. “Mograine died for you, Deathlord. Don’t throw that sacrifice away out of petulance.”

     But godhood, sovereignty, power - none would be nearly so gratifying if the whole world simply rolled over, quavering in fearful submission, meekly accepting his dominion without giving rebellion a fleeting thought. Zoen tilted her chin up, the line of stitches across her throat stretching, and Arthas delighted in the defiance as much as he loathed it. There was incredible satisfaction in possessing something that had once fought tooth and nail against being owned.

     “I’m correct, though,” she said coldly, hollowly. The lack of smugness in her voice ensured that his loathing did not outweigh his delight for now. “Other than bringing back Tirion, we’ve done everything right. Got the weapons, got the Horsemen, got a couple mountains’ worth of dead demons behind us, got a… glowy, floaty, singin’ thing hangin’ out in the corner of Acherus that I should probably throw back into the ocean or something ‘cause it’s givin’ everyone a headache and it clashes with everything and we’ve got a bloody aesthetic to maintain -”

     The wolf chuffed, breaking the flow of Zoen’s ramble. She spared it a blank, indecipherable look before returning her gaze to Arthas.

     “So - so you could kill me ‘cause I’m petulant, and replace me with one of those - those unborn brats down there, and see how that goes. Or you could… not kill me, and not replace me, ‘cause so far that seems to be workin’ out pretty well.”

     “Is this a plea for mercy, Deathlord?”

     A laugh tore its way out of her throat. “Mercy’s a sin. I’m asking you to be practical.”

     It was not pride that unfurled, sleepy and disoriented, beneath his rib cage, but its precursor. The acknowledgement that pride could exist within him, that one day it might settle in his bones, that looking at his Wraith would not inspire frustration and betrayal and and a sinking, clawing feeling that he could not name. And if she could scrabble her way towards such glory as the Death God’s approval, imagine what the rest of her brethren could accomplish, those whose only disappointments had been betrayal.

     A crooked grin crossed the Lich King’s features, and that precursor must have bled through because Zoen lowered her chin, looking somewhat disturbed. “Then consider yourself forgiven, Deathlord,” he said with all proper magnanimity of a god. She wasn’t, really, wouldn’t be for a long while, but if she could offer candor, he could offer lies. “I’d suggest returning to your knights before you need seek it again.”

     His Wraith, for all her faults, was not quite foolish enough to dare stay when a clean exit was offered; and thus with a short whistle to her wolf, she lurched away from the balustrade, hands raised and wreathed in shadow as she wrenched open a death gate. The wolf padded obediently through the portal, and Zoen had nearly taken her first step through when:

     “Though I do wonder, Zoen, why you came here today at all.”

     With her back to him as she stood before her gate, Arthas could not see what sort of emotion might have twisted her features, but he knew enough from the stiffening of her shoulders, the way her hands curled into fists before she shoved them into her pockets, that it would have been interesting. And as the silence grew between them, festering like an infected wound, he began to consider reaching forward, yanking her around that he might find out.

     “It’s Father’s Day,” she said at last, and that strange, sinking feeling clawed at his insides. “Thought about just sending a card, but I’m pretty sure the postage would’ve bankrupted me. Suffer well, Arthas.”

     And then she was gone, the gate sealing neatly behind her, nothing left behind to indicate she had ever been there at all. Arthas found himself staring at the space she’d occupied for a moment too long before finally returning his eyes to the knights training below, clashing in their mock battles like a pack of children.

     Father’s Day.

     Do not give in to mortal weakness.

     He should have carved up her face again.

[neonoires]

Game of Thrones 7x02: Stormborn

These are my thoughts. They’re not exactly refined or anything because I could honestly talk about this show for days but here we go. These are purely show based opinions. I’ve read the books so I’m trying to keep them out of this.

Daenerys: I’m worried about her. I’ve been hearing the rumors of her potentially being the final “villain” in Game of Thrones and this episode confirmed it for me. I’m not mad at this because I still think that the show whitewashed (mary-sued) her a bit. But that’s the thing. They literally made her damn near perfect so now that she’s apparently showing signs of potentially being a dark character, or at least grey, it comes off as uncharacteristic. The show should have done more to prepare viewers for that. I’m not saying there weren’t any signs because there were like: watching her brother get killed with no remorse, taking everything she has by conquest, and even threatening to burn cities to the ground in season 6 before Tyrion had to tell her to calm down lol. Even in this episode she said she wanted to invade Westeros because of her fire power and army and Tyrion said “you don’t want to be queen of ashes.” She even responded to that in a way where she had to remind herself not to do too much. Also, she literally threatened to burn Varys alive which sounded bad ass but her obsession with arson is getting out of hand. Especially since the “diplomatic” way to do a treason killing seems like a clean head chop. I’m glad she talked with Lady Olenna but I’m afraid she might take what she said literally.

Cersei: I love Cersei, she’s a great complex character but I feel like most Kings Landing scenes are kind of pointless in the grand scheme of things. I understand Cersei rallying allies but it just makes for boring tv. Maybe Randall Tarly and the rest of the lords of the Reach will doing something other than provide random screen time. The show is continuing to screw over Jaime’s development. The comment Jaime made about Lady Olenna aligning with savages didn’t sit well with me either because I thought it was stupid... Of course she doesn’t trust Cersei, she blew up her entire family and destroyed Olenna’s legacy which SHOULD piss Jaime off considering he killed the Mad King for threatening to use that exact same method. I cringed at the scene of Cersei with that creepy little man in the dungeon with that weapon for dragons. I really don’t want to see a dragon go down like that...

Jon: I understand that Jon and Daenerys have to meet but I agree with Sansa and the rest of the Northerners. Even as I type this I find it interesting because all of the Northern lords and ladies were against Jon going south. I know I’m being extra but it reminded me of what Petyr Baelish said last season about why Jon shouldn’t be considered King in the North because he was born in the south. It also showed that the North is truly it’s own wild kingdom since they didn’t even want to align with Daenerys against the Long Night and Cersei. I think Jon made a wise decision to give the North over to Sansa but I got the feeling that will be the last time he’s in that position. I think Sansa is pretty much the QITN until the show is finished. Also, why TF hasn’t anyone from the Wall sent a letter to Jon about Bran, his crippled brother who they all presumed dead being so close to home. Anyway, next week Jon meets Daenerys and I can’t wait to see how that turns out because I think they’re both really comfortable in their positions of power.

Arya: It was truly great seeing Hot Pie as well as her running into Nymeria’s pack. Maisie Williams did a great job in these scenes because it showed that Arya is still in there and she’s not just a killing machine. I also came across some confusion on twitter about Arya saying “that’s not you.” But then I remembered an earlier scene with Arya and Ned and she was saying that the life of being a lady who marries someone and rules over a piece of land “isn’t her.” Arya asking Nymeria to come with her back to Winterfell and leaving her pack isn’t Nymeria anymore. Then if you look it’s almost as if Arya is proud of Nymeria instead of sad. It’s like Hot Pie said, “I’m like you, I’m a survivor.” Nymeria survived after all this time as well as Hot Pie. I just love Arya and Maisie so much! 

The Missandei and Grey Worm scene gave me life. I wish we got more throughout the series. Also.... WTF AT THE BATTLE OF CASTERLY ROCK HAPPENING? JFC. I can’t wait to see Casterly Rock though so...

Theon: The show is trying really hard to make this version of Euron a thing and I’m just not seeing it for him. I felt like Euron overtaking them so easily was kind of lame actually. I’m also wondering if there’s someone spying on Daenerys because how TF did Euron know where to find them? I can’t believe this has to be said but people should give Theon a break. He’s a torture survivor and say Euron’s men chopping off bits and pieces of people. He has PTSD and doesn’t want to be captured by anyone ever again. I think that abandoning ship is smart for him because he’s still not as weak as Euron thinks he is. I anticipate Theon getting some help for Yara or even their cause but we’ll have to see. I hear he’s due to meet Jon Snow again. PS. RIP to the Sand Snakes?

Next week’s description: “The Queen’s Promise” Daenerys holds court; Cersei returns a gift; Jaime learns from his mistakes.... whatever this means.

[ciathyzareposts]

Game 36: Battlestar (1979)

Quite some time ago I played through a text adventure called Aldebaran III, which has a pretty good claim on being the first adventure game to be explicitly based on an existing property. Today I’m writing about another of those, although exactly what property it’s adapting is up for debate because… well, there are a few of them.

Before I get into all of that though, I have to get this out of the way: the author of this game is given as His Lordship, the honorable Admiral David W. Riggle. A bit of googling has turned up nothing on this supposed Lord/Admiral, so I feel like we might be dealing with a Richard Garriott/Lord British situation here. Regardless, the creation of the game started in 1979, written in C on a PDP-11 mainframe. The Admiral worked on it until 1984, but as with most of these games I’m taking it from the year the game was first available to play.

Obviously the mainframe version isn’t available any more, but the source code is out there and it’s been ported to DOS and Amiga. The DOS version has a lot of problems with the starfighting sequences in the middle (yes, the starfighting sequences), so I opted to go for the Amiga version. Even with that I had problems with the same section, but I was able to blunder my way through. (Jason Dyer over at Renga in Blue apparently got the source code to compile in UNIX, but that’s well beyond my capabilities; setting up an Amiga emulator was hassle enough.)

The source code comes with some instructions; I’m not sure if they were present with the original game, but I’ll reproduce the little bit of flavour text that sets the whole thing up:

In the days before the darkness came, when battlestars ruled the

heavens…

Three He made and gave them to His daughters,

Beautiful nymphs, the goddesses of the waters.

One to bring good luck and simple feats of wonder,

Two to wash the lands and churn the waves asunder,

Three to rule the world and purge the skies with thunder.

In those times great wizards were known and their powers were beyond

belief.  They could take any object from thin air, and, uttering the

word `su’ could disappear.

In those times men were known for their lust of gold and desire to

wear fine weapons.  Swords and coats of mail were fashioned that could

withstand a laser blast.

But when the darkness fell, the rightful reigns were toppled.  Swords

and helms and heads of state went rolling across the grass.  The entire

fleet of battlestars was reduced to a single ship.

It’s a little cryptic to begin with, but it does all make sense eventually. Those who were alive in 1978 and/or 2004 will recognise that we’re dealing with some elements from the sci-fi property Battlestar Galactica here. I’m not the best person to tell you how accurate any of this is, because I’ve never seen more than a few minutes of either show.

The start of the game

The game begins with you aboard the Battlestar mentioned above, a space station that is under attack. The situation seems grimmer the more you explore the ship: there are corpses everywhere, including the president, and the sick bay is overflowing with the wounded.

What also becomes apparent is that moving about in this game is hell, at least until you get used to it. Rather than the usual NESW cardinal directions, Battlestar goes for relative movement: Ahead, Left, Right and Back. I’ve played a few games like this now, and it’s always annoying and frustrating to map. As I said, you get used to it eventually, but it seems like a needless complication. Unless the creator wanted to make the game difficult to navigate, I guess, in which case I say mission accomplished Admiral!

You have thirty moves until the space station blows up, so there’s not a whole lot of time to explore. You can’t even really interact with any of the people or the scenery, beyond filling your inventory with items. Speaking of, you begin the game with nothing but the pajamas you are wearing. Searching around the station (with many deaths by explosion interspersed throughout) I was able to find an ornate robe, a couple of knives, a laser pistol, some matches, a meat cleaver, some coins, a grenade, a nuclear warhead (!), and an amulet. Picking up the amulet gives the following message:

“Purl” is a real word that means “flow with a swirling motion and babbling sound”.

Most of these items can be ignored, and it’s impossible to get them all anyway. The only ones that are absolutely necessary are the pistol and the amulet, though I usually grabbed the knife, coins and matches as well. The game has an inventory limit, but it’s a bit more complicated than restricting you to a set number of items. Each item has weight and encumbrance, and the items you are holding in your hands are tracked differently than those you are wearing. Wearing items is less encumbering than carrying them, but you can’t use them unless they’re in your hands. It’s probably the most realistic encumbrance system I’ve seen in one of these games yet.

The goal of this section of the game is to get off the station alive, which you can do by finding a starfighter called a Viper and flying it off into space. Nobody stops you, so I guess you have some kind of authority on the station, if not any concern for your fellow man.

At this point you are flying in space, which still uses the same movement commands. Mostly this elicits a lot of “You are in space” room descriptions, with the odd “You are flying through an asteroid field”. Inevitably, though, you will be attacked by another fighter and will have to engage it in combat.

Looks like a malfunction in my visual scanners…

As you might have guessed, this is not what it’s meant to look like. I had the same problem with the DOS version as well. Here’s the screen as it should appear, courtesy of Renga in Blue:

The goal is to maneuver the enemy ship into the center of the screen and shoot it with a torpedo. I don’t think the ship fires back, but you are in danger of running out of fuel or torpedoes. Needless to say, I never got to properly experience this facet of the game. I managed my way around it by hitting Q, which ends the battle with a victory for the enemy. It also leaves you with a number of injuries, and on the DOS port it dumps you back onto the space station. Luckily the Amiga version leaves you still in space, so I was able to continue flying around.

Injuries like those above can stack up, and will kill you if you suffer enough of them. Mostly they affect your ability to carry things, and can render you stationary if you’re carrying too much. If you’re injured enough, you might find yourself unable to move even if your inventory is empty: there’s nothing to do then but restart or return to a previous save. (The game does have a save feature, but with only save game file, so it requires some renaming of files whenever you want to have multiple saves.)

There are two planets that can be found in space. One is shrouded in fog, and if you descend into its atmosphere you will be hopelessly lost with no recourse but to restart. The other is a tropical planet, and when you descend you’ll find an island paradise where you can land.

Before that, though, you can fly about just over the land and do a little scouting: doing that I saw beaches, jungles, a village, a house and gardens, a lagoon and an extensive fruit plantation. Eventually, I landed my Viper on the beach and set about exploring the island.

This was made difficult by the use of relative directions, but somewhat mitigated when I later got my hands on a compass. Not that the compass allows you to use NESW, as I would have liked, but it does let you know which direction is north, and I found that just enough of a help that I could make a decent map.

One of the first things that happened after I stepped into the woods was that I was attacked by an elf, wielding a halberd and a shield. The game has a melee combat system, with some wonderfully evocative descriptions of gore, but in practice it involves nothing more than typing KILL round after round until someone is dead. Looking at the code I can see that there are a lot of factors going on, mostly involving the weapon wielded and your encumbrance, but none of that’s really evident to the player. Regardless, for most of the game you can ignore it by shooting your enemy with the laser pistol.

There are also hostile woodsmen who are similarly vulnerable to laser fire, but it’s more satisfying to blow away elves.

Exploring further inland I found the native village, although it was deserted. Inside the house I found some Levis, though, and a diamond ring. North of the village were the fruit plantations where I found fields of pineapples, mangoes, coconuts, kiwis and other tropical fruit. You can eat these as long as you have a knife to cut them with (my knife was taken from the dead body of a maid, but you can find a less morbid one elsewhere).

Past the village I found a seaplane dock, where many people were milling about and enjoying the island lifestyle. None of them reacted to anything I had to say or do, though. At a nearby lagoon I found a friendly native woman, and I’m ashamed to say that the words FUCK WOMAN were pretty quickly typed into my keyboard. Hey, it worked!

North of that I found a house, which had a bulky two-handed sword in the drawing room, as well as a potion that healed all of my injuries when I drank it. Next to that was a garage, where I found the aforementioned compass as well as a Plymouth Volare with the keys in the ignition. With dreams of tearing across the island in that bad boy I turned the key, only for it to explode and leave me with crippling injuries. Time to reload!

In the same area was a stable with a horse inside. I rode the horse, but it just dumped me in a forest somewhere. There was also a clubhouse, which was crowded with dancing people and a one-eyed man with no money at the bar.

Behind the house was a garden, but like most of the areas in the game there was nothing there, at least not at the time I visited. You need to explore some areas more than once, because time passes from day to night in Battlestar, and certain events only happen at the right time. It also keeps track of your fatigue, and if you get tired enough you’ll drop wherever you are and fall asleep. You can sleep voluntarily to regain strength, and eating food does the same.

The game isn’t overwhelmingly large, but it still took me pretty much a whole afternoon to map. And although it has well written room descriptions, you can’t interact with most of what’s described. It’s much more a game of walking about and seeing what’s there than one of puzzle solving.

There is a score, though. The game tracks your Pleasure, Power and Ego. Power is increased by killing things. Pleasure is increased by performing uhhhhh certain activities. Like fucking natives. Your Ego goes up and down based on doing good deeds or fulfilling certain parts of the plot. Killing people generally lowers it, except for the elves and woodsmen. Burying dead bodies can earn you points, as can giving items to the right people. There doesn’t seem to be a maximum score to aim for, although the game does give you a rank at the end based on which of your scores is higher. And it’s possible that certain events only trigger when your scores are at a certain value, although I’m not sure about that.

I mentioned at the start that this game is adapting several properties. It’s already a weird mash-up of elements, what with the space station, the starfighters, the elves, the natives, the Plymouth Volare, and the tropical resort holiday-makers. It all got  a little bit weirder when I went to the village at night.

A man in a white suit and a dwarf, eh? I have to admit that I was thrown off at first, because I was thinking of the dwarf in a traditional fantasy sense, what with the elves I’d already encountered. Still, I had my suspicions, and when I opened fire with my blaster those suspicions were confirmed.

This was a fantasy, but one of a whole different variety: a Fantasy Island! Those of you too young to know can find out here, but by this time I had realised that I was standing in front of Mr. Roarke and Tattoo from the TV show. I couldn’t interact with them aside from doing a murder, though, and I never did find a use for them. They don’t even factor into the plot, except to suggest that none of what’s happening is real (the set-up of the show being that various guest stars would go to the island to have their fantasies fulfilled, usually in a way that taught them a lesson of some sort).

Speaking of the plot, I wasn’t even sure there was one at the beginning. The first thing I accomplished was to give some coins to the old man at the bar – he gratefully provided me with a map to the catacombs.

I never was able to get the map to display completely, but the clue about the shoes was enough to find the place, an area of very thorny forest. Heading down from there uncovers a secret entrance into the catacombs, but there’s not much to find unless you go at night because the tunnels are flooded at high tide. There’s also a cave in the cliffs near the beach where I landed my Viper, and that also leads into the catacombs, so the map is not exactly necessary. It’s dark in there as well, but there are plenty of kerosene lanterns scattered around the island.

In the catacombs I found some mines and a tomb, as well as some impassable tunnels, but of more interest was this:

A caped Dark Lord with a laser sword who can deflect laser blasts with his hand? Yes, it’s our third mash-up property, Darth Vader from Star Wars. I suspect that certain elements of this encounter might be a later addition to the game; sure, Vader was in the 1977 movie, but he wasn’t shown being able to deflect lasers with his hands until 1980’s The Empire Strikes Back. Regardless of when he was added to the game, my laser pistol wasn’t going to finish him off, and he made short work of me when I took him on with my knife. It looked like I’d need another weapon.

There are quite a few options. The first one I tried was a grenade, which actually did the trick – the area he was in was left scorched, and the Dark Lord was nowhere to be seen. It didn’t feel all that satisfying though, so I tried some others. The elf’s halberd and the woodsman’s mallet were no good. I found a mace and a rusty broadsword in the forest, but they didn’t work either. I found a fancy sword in a tomb, along with some armour and a helmet, and I was sure that those would work. Nope. There was one last weapon to try: the two-handed sword.

The two-handed sword was so bulky that I couldn’t carry anything else in my hands. So I’d have no light source, and no laser pistol. The lack of a laser pistol made it a little difficult to get back to the catacomb unscathed, but I was able to manage it. Having no light source made things a little tricky in the catacombs, but with my map I was still able to navigate. The first blow I struck against the Dark Lord sheared his arm off, so I knew this was the right weapon, and sure enough I was able to kill him.

Vader was dead, but I had nothing to show for it except a lot of injuries. I wandered around the island for a while, seeing if any encounters would trigger, or if Mr. Roarke might congratulate me or something. Or if, I dunno, Captain Stubing from The Love Boat would show up for some reason. Nothing. I was either stuck, or I’d exhausted the possibilities of the game. It was time to delve… into the source code!

The first thing I discovered was that I could USE the amulet that I’d found back on the space station. Doing so took me to a hidden valley, where I met a goddess bathing in a stream. She led me into a cave to her throne, where I gave her a diamond ring and laid a little kissin’ on her, and I finally got some exposition as to what the hell’s going on with this game.

Okay, so I now had two of the amulets (one of them called a medallion so that the parser can differentiate them), and I had to get the third one from Vader.  I did a little more exploring, found my way out of the valley, and triggered another encounter at the Seaplane Dock: a woman took me aside and told me to meet her at midnight in the Garden. I went to the garden, waited around, and got the following scene.

I recognised the place she was describing: it was a canyon past a tunnel leading from the goddess’s throne room. I took the rope back there and went to the edge of a chasm where it said I might be able to get down with a rope, but try as I might I wasn’t able to find the right command to make it happen. With a little frustration, I jumped down, and survived albeit with many injuries (which I was able to heal with the potion I was carrying). At the bottom I found a pit with no exits. On the ground were a bar of gold, a block of diamond, and a pot of jewels. I took them all, but it made no difference to my score. Despite the lack of exits I was able to climb out with my rope, by typing THROW ROPE UP first. Alas, it doesn’t work in reverse. I tried giving these treasures to the goddess, and it did raise my Ego a little bit, but nothing else happened.

After that I went back and killed Vader, but he didn’t drop the third amulet, and the goddess didn’t react to his death.  Diving back into the source code, I noticed that there’s some text where Vader snatches the amulet and runs away from you. It’s triggered when you try to retreat from him after weakening him a little. So I went back, chopped him up a bit, retreated, and sure enough the scene triggered and I was able to chase him through some secret passages into another area: the bottom of the pit where the treasure is. (You should make sure to do this while only holding the amulet. If you have the amulet and the medallion, Vader becomes all-powerful and kills you instantly.)

This time when I killed Vader (which is a little more difficult since you effectively have to fight him twice) he did indeed drop the third amulet – this one called a Talisman. Using my rope (which you can wear, meaning I was able to keep it with me while holding the two-handed sword) I went back up to the goddess and gave her all three of the amulets. Cue the victory screen!

So that’s the ending of Battlestar, dubious gender politics and all. Piecing the plot together, it looks like this: the Island King made three amulets for his daughters. The Empire and Darth Vader came along, killed one goddess and took her talisman, and captured the other. That one escaped, somehow ended up aboard the Battlestar space station, and the Empire followed her there and attacked. That’s where the game began, Our Wife-Murdering Hero found the amulet, and made his way to the island to defeat Vader and yada yada yada.  Oh, and all of this might be a dream, because Mr. Roarke is hanging around. To be honest, given the ending I kinda hope it is, though I’m not sure what lessons were learned here.

But wait! There’s more! The source code also revealed to me that you can become a wizard if you have all three amulets. I’m not sure how it happened, but I wandered around for a bit after finding them and eventually got the following message.

Being a wizard is pretty cool. You can summon any object in the game into your hand, out of thin air. You can fly around over the island, just like when you’re in your spaceship. You can even fly all the way up into outer space and survive. And when you use the magic word SU (mentioned in the game’s backstory that I included above) you can teleport to any location in the game, as well as set a number of variables (time, encumbrance, fuel and torpedoes for your ship). The game keeps track of how many of its locations you’ve visited, and I used this ability to get 100%. Given the time limit at the start of the game before the station blows up, becoming a wizard is the only way to do it. I mean, there’s no point to doing it aside from personal satisfaction, but I did it anyway.

So that’s Battlestar in the can. It was disappointing that I had to do so much code-diving to beat it, and that I couldn’t do the space battles, but for what it was I enjoyed it. I mean, a text adventure mashing up Battlestar Galactica, Star Wars and Fantasy Island? I wasn’t expecting that. It’s a little light on puzzles for my tastes, and the movement system grinds my gears, but I still had fun poking around in its various weird corners.

FINAL RATING

Story & Setting: Despite the very weird mash-up of elements, the story to this game hangs together pretty well for its vintage. I could actually describe it above, which is more than can be said for a lot of the text adventures I’ve played. And there was more to it than hunting for treasure! As for the setting, the weird mash-up of elements was kind of what made it for me. From an opulent space station to a tropical island, and yet somehow it works. Rating: 3 out of 7.

Characters & Monsters: With elves and woodsmen, Roarke and Tattoo, and Darth Vader as the final villain, it’s tempting to give this game a higher rating than it deserves. It certainly has more well-written characters than most of the games I’ve played for the blog. That said, a lot of those characters are window-dressing, and any interaction with them is minimal at best. Rating: 2 out of 7.

Aesthetics: This game was written for a mainframe, and has less restrictions than those written for personal computers, and it shows: the writing for this is very good, with evocative room descriptions and scripted events. It’s still a text adventure, with all the aesthetic limitations of the genre, but it’s an atmospheric one with high quality prose. Only Zork rivals it to this point. Rating: 3 out of 7.

Mechanics: The parser works well enough, although I had a few places where I had to struggle for the right words (giving the coins to the old man in the bar being one, and using the rope to get out of the pit another). The day/night cycle is well done, and the realism of the encumbrance system is impressive (even though it can be frustrating to juggle at times). I can’t really rate the space combat, because I couldn’t get it to work, but that’s a problem with the ports rather than the original game. Regular combat is tactically non-existent, and livened up only by the vivid descriptions. I was tempted to knock this down for using relative movement, but the room descriptions adapt impressively well to your positioning, so I couldn’t do it. Rating: 4 out of 7.

Challenge: This is hard to rate, because there really aren’t a lot of puzzles to solve. Most of the game is exploration, and the difficulty only comes when you’re trying to figure out how to trigger the endgame. Most of those actions were things that players would stumble into eventually. So even though I had to delve into the source code, I wouldn’t call it difficult exactly. Rating: 3 out of 7.

Innovation and Influence: With the day/night cycle, more realistic encumbrance and fatigue, this game is doing a lot of things that other games of its vintage weren’t. That said, it’s hard to say how many were innovations given the long creation period of the game, but I’ll give it some points for those. It’s not really a historically notable game, though, so I can’t rate it too highly. Rating: 3 out of 7.

Fun: I like exploring game worlds, and I like game worlds that have loads of weird things in them. This game delivered on both of those counts, although the weird things were perhaps not as frequent as I’d like. The frustrations with movement drag this category down, not that it would have been super-high to begin with. There are things to see in this game, but perhaps not many to do. Rating: 2 out of 7.

The above scores total 20, which doubles to a surprisingly high score of 40. I doubt I’ll play Battlestar again, so it doesn’t get any bonus points. That gives it a Final Rating of 40, placing it equal 12th overall, and 6th counting just the adventure games. That’s a pretty good showing for a game that I never quite loved, but I guess it didn’t have any weaknesses either. It’s just a solid, well written text adventure for its period.

NEXT: Something called Burial Ground Adventure for the TRS-80, which looks to be another treasure hunting text adventure written by a 13 year old.

source http://reposts.ciathyza.com/game-36-battlestar-1979/

[dargeereads]

DOMINATE is live!

AMAZON | APPLE | B&N | KOBO | GOOGLE| GOODREADS

There are many reasons to jump off a bridge, but Rylee Sutton only needs one. Her husband’s betrayal. Just before she leaps, she receives an email from a stranger. The boy’s message is meant for his dead girlfriend, but his anguish speaks to Rylee. It saves her life.

Over the next decade, Tomas Dine continues to email his dead girl. As he evolves from a teenager into a hardened, vicious criminal, Rylee is there, reading every intimate word. He doesn’t know she exists.

When she comes forward, he despises her, his cruelty unforgivable. But she doesn’t back down. In a carnal battle of punishment and passion, hatred dominates. Until he loses her. Amid looming danger and unsolved murders rises a devotion forged in strife. Love is lethal in his ruthless world. To survive it, they must fight for answers—and each other.

Start Reading ONE IS A PROMISE for Free

Start Reading DELIVER for Free

Each book in the DELIVER series is a different couple (HEAs / no cliff-hangers), but they must be read in order.

📚 ebooks (all retailers worldwide): ONE IS A PROMISE | TWO IS A LIE | THREE IS A WAR DELIVER | VANQUISH | DISCLAIM | DEVASTATE | TAKE | MANIPULATE | UNSHACKLE| DOMINATE| COMPLICATE

🎧 Audio: ONE IS A PROMISE | TWO IS A LIE | THREE IS A WAR DELIVER | VANQUISH | DISCLAIM | DEVASTATE | TAKE | MANIPULATE | UNSHACKLE

ONE IS A PROMISE - FREE

One promise. One forever.

One look and I knew Cole was mine. My dark rebel in leather. My powerhouse of passion, devastating smiles, and impulsiveness. When his job sends him overseas, he promises to return to me. A promise that's destroyed in the most irrevocable way.

Two years later, an arrogant suit invades my heartbroken loneliness.

Clean-cut and stern, Trace is everything Cole wasn't. At first, he's a job that will rescue my dance company. But as he intrudes on my life, our hostile relationship evolves. He knows I'm still in love with Cole, but his dedication is my undoing.

Then a catastrophic moment changes everything.

Promises resurface. Lies entangle. And an impossible choice shatters my world.

I love two men, and I can only have one.

TWO IS A LIE

Two lies. Two men who don’t share.

I never stopped loving Cole. Not when he left me. Not when he disappeared for three years. Not when he crashed back into my life in a violent explosion of testosterone and fury. His sudden reappearance questions everything I thought I knew, including how I came to love another man.

Trace is an intoxicating breeze of seduction over ice. My rock. My second chance at forever. And he’s committed to annihilating the competition.

The battle that ensues wrenches me back and forth between them. Fighting and f*cking. Resisting and submitting.

Together, they entangle me in a web of lies, rivalry, and desire that weaves as deeply as their devotion to me.

I love two men, and if I can only have one, I choose none.

THREE IS A WAR

Three means war. Three sides vying for forever.

Cole. My first love. The bad boy with the dangerous smile and passionate temper draws attention like a lit fuse on dynamite. But his dark molten eyes spark only for me.

Trace. My second chance. Over six feet of Norse god in a tailored suit, he calculates every move and seizes my hungry breaths with an iron fist.

Me. The free-spirited dancer, torn between two men with no resolution in sight. I tried leaving, staying, refusing, and surrendering. What options do I have left?

I love two men, and I do the only thing I can. I fight.

DELIVER, Book 1 - FREE

His name was Joshua Carter. Now it’s whatever she wants it to be.

She is a Deliverer.

She lures young men and delivers them to be sold. She delivers the strikes that enforce their obedience. She delivers the sexual training that determines their purchase price.

As long as she delivers, the arrangement that protects her family will hold.

Delivering is all she knows.

The one thing she can’t deliver is a captive from slavery.

Until him.

And her stubborn slave thinks he can deliver her…from herself.

VANQUISH, Book 2

Her life is like a prison cell. A self-made, to-hell-with-the-free-world existence that locks from the inside. Stop judging. Her agoraphobia doesn’t define her. It simply keeps her safe.

He belongs in a prison cell. The 6x8, make-me-your-bitch variety that locks from the outside. But he’s free. To hunt. To take. To break. And he just found a sexy new toy.

Capturing her is the easy part. Her fucked-up mind, however, makes him question everything he does next. But he’s a determined bastard. If all goes his way, this will hurt like hell.

DISCLAIM, Book 3

Camila was seventeen when Van Quiso kidnapped her. Ten years after her escape, the shackles refuse to release her. Not while there are still slave traders preying on her city. She will stop at nothing to end them. Even if that means becoming a slave again.

Returning to chains is her worst fear—and only option. They won’t know who she is or what she intends to do. She’s prepared for every complication. Except him. The one who decimated her sixteen-year-old heart.

Matias is charming, gorgeous, and dangerously seductive. He’s also untrustworthy and enshrouded in secrets. After years of no contact, he finds her—on her knees, wrists bound, in the clutches of her enemy. Will he sabotage her mission by needlessly saving her? Or will he keep her in chains and never let her go?

DEVASTATE, Book 4

“What is the price you’re willing to pay?” “Money isn’t an issue.” “I’m not talking about money.”

Tate is on the hunt to find his best friend’s sister. Eleven years ago, Lucia Dias was abducted. Presumed dead. He never met her, so why does he care? Some might call his efforts noble, but his motivation is more perverse, bordering on obsession.

When he follows a chilling lead to Venezuela’s Kidnap Alley, what he finds is neither a corpse nor a captive.

Amid poisonous lies and crippling depravity, the price of love is devastation. And he pays. With his body, his blood, and her life.

TAKE, Book 5

He’s a notorious crime lord, a kidnapper, and an artist. Scarification is his outlet, and he just captured a new canvas. Kate refuses to surrender beneath his blade or the cruelty in his beautiful eyes. But she’s drawn to the man inside the monster. A man who makes her ache with his touch. Who owns her with his kiss. A man who worships her as deeply as he hurts her. She can run, but there’s no escape from a bond carved in scars.

MANIPULATE, Book 6

Tula Gomez is in the most ruthless prison in Latin America.

She only drove to Mexico to help her sister. She did nothing wrong. But her quiet life changed in an instant.

To survive the violent, cartel-controlled prison where men blend with women, she pledges her loyalty to the notorious leader in exchange for the one thing she needs most. Protection.

When she agrees to seduce the suspicious new inmates, Martin Lockwood and Ricky Saldivar, she doesn’t expect to enjoy it. Sure, they’re gorgeous, irresistibly alpha, and insanely talented with their hands and mouths. But they’re the enemy. She can’t fall for them.

Torn between her cartel loyalties and two men who want her as deeply as they want each other, she questions who is manipulating whom. Her search for answers leads to a passionate ménage, a soul-crushing secret, and an impossible choice.

UNSHACKLE, Book 7

No woman can resist Luke Sanch’s chiseled features, honed physique, auburn hair, and intense green eyes. While deadly in combat, he’s an indomitable weapon in bed. He can coax an explosive release with only his mouth and annihilate with insidious, mind-blowing pleasure. When he infiltrates La Rocha Cartel, he must seduce Vera Gomez to determine whether to rescue her. Or kill her. Nothing can distract his icy, lethal focus. Except the cartel’s most feral captive. The nameless, raven-haired beauty is his key to dismantling Vera Gomez. But the ferocious little fighter challenges him at every turn and unknowingly battles her way into his heart. A battle that delivers him, physically and emotionally, into shackles.

DOMINATE, Book 8

There are many reasons to jump off a bridge, but Rylee Sutton only needs one. Her husband’s betrayal. Just before she leaps, she receives an email from a stranger. The boy’s message is meant for his dead girlfriend, but his anguish speaks to Rylee. It saves her life.

Over the next decade, Tomas Dine continues to email his dead girl. As he evolves from a teenager into a hardened, vicious criminal, Rylee is there, reading every intimate word. He doesn’t know she exists.

When she comes forward, he despises her, his cruelty unforgivable. But she doesn’t back down. In a carnal battle of punishment and passion, hatred dominates. Until he loses her. Amid looming danger and unsolved murders rises a devotion forged in strife. Love is lethal in his ruthless world. To survive it, they must fight for answers—and each other.

COMPLICATE, Book 9

The long-awaited, heart-pounding conclusion of the dark and dangerous DELIVER series.

This is Cole Hartman's story. But it's not his beginning. The twisted, heartwrenching story of Cole, Danni, and Trace starts in the TANGLED LIES trilogy.

You don't have to read TANGLED LIES, but if you want to read it, do so before reading this book.

📚 ebooks (all retailers worldwide):

ONE IS A PROMISE | TWO IS A LIE | THREE IS A WAR DELIVER | VANQUISH | DISCLAIM | DEVASTATE | TAKE | MANIPULATE | UNSHACKLE| DOMINATE| COMPLICATE

AUDIOBOOKS

ONE IS A PROMISE: Audible | Narrated by Lisa Zimmerman TWO IS A LIE: Audible | Narrated by Lisa Zimmerman THREE IS A WAR: Audible | Narrated by Lisa Zimmerman DELIVER #1: Audible | Narrated by Teddy Hamilton and Abby Crayden VANQUISH #2: Audible | Narrated by Ryan West and Jo Raylan DISCLAIM  #3: Audible | Narrated by Christian Fox and Emma Wilder DEVASTATE #4: Audible | Narrated by J.F. Harding and Tracy Marks TAKE #5: Audible | Narrated by Soren Gray and Kate Genevieve MANIPULATE #6: Audible | Narrated by Christian Fox, Aiden Snow, and Lila Summers UNSHACKLE #7: Audible | Narrated by J. Tipstone and Lacy Laurel DOMINATE #8: Coming | Narrated by Matthew Holland and Samantha Summers COMPLICATE #9: Coming | Narrated by Joe Arden and Lisa Zimmerman

PAM GODWIN

New York Times, Wall Street Journal, and USA Today Bestselling author, Pam Godwin, lives in the Midwest with her husband, their two children, and a foulmouthed parrot. When she ran away, she traveled fourteen countries across five continents, attended three universities, and married the vocalist of her favorite rock band.

Java, tobacco, and dark romance novels are her favorite indulgences, and might be considered more unhealthy than her aversion to sleeping, eating meat, and dolls with blinking eyes.

Instagram

Facebook

Amazon

Bookbub

Twitter

Goodreads

TikTok

  BOOKS BY PAM GODWIN

Trails of Sin Series KNOTTED (#1) - FREE BUCKLED (#2) BOOTED (#3)

Tangled Lies Series ONE IS A PROMISE (#1) - FREE TWO IS A LIE (#2) THREE IS A WAR (#3)

Deliver Series DELIVER (#1) - FREE VANQUISH (#2) DISCLAIM (#3) DEVASTATE (#4) TAKE (#5) MANIPULATE (#6) UNSHACKLE (#7) DOMINATE (#8) COMPLICATE (#9)

Trilogy of Eve HEART OF EVE - FREE DEAD OF EVE (#1) BLOOD OF EVE (#2) DAWN OF EVE (#3)

Stand-alones DARK NOTES BENEATH THE BURN DIRTY TIES INCENTIVE SEA OF RUIN KING OF LIBERTINES - FREE

[dargeereads]

COMPLICATE releases on Mar 9, 2021

AMAZON | APPLE | B&N | KOBO | GOOGLE| GOODREADS

The long-awaited, heart-pounding conclusion of the dark and dangerous DELIVER series.

This is Cole Hartman's story. But it's not his beginning. The twisted, heartwrenching story of Cole, Danni, and Trace starts in the TANGLED LIES trilogy.

You don't have to read TANGLED LIES, but if you want to read it, do so before reading this book. ONE IS A PROMISE (book 1) is free.

RECOMMENDED READING ORDER

ONE IS A PROMISE (FREE) TWO IS A LIE THREE IS A WAR DELIVER (#1) (FREE) VANQUISH (#2) DISCLAIM (#3) DEVASTATE (#4) TAKE (#5) MANIPULATE (#6) UNSHACKLE (#7) DOMINATE (#8) COMPLICATE (#9)

The books in the DELIVER series are standalones, but they must be read in order.

Start Reading ONE IS A PROMISE for Free

Start Reading DELIVER for Free

Each book in the DELIVER series is a different couple (HEAs / no cliff-hangers), but they must be read in order.

📚 ebooks (all retailers worldwide): ONE IS A PROMISE | TWO IS A LIE | THREE IS A WAR DELIVER | VANQUISH | DISCLAIM | DEVASTATE | TAKE | MANIPULATE | UNSHACKLE| DOMINATE| COMPLICATE

🎧 Audio: ONE IS A PROMISE | TWO IS A LIE | THREE IS A WAR DELIVER | VANQUISH | DISCLAIM | DEVASTATE | TAKE | MANIPULATE | UNSHACKLE

ONE IS A PROMISE - FREE

One promise. One forever.

One look and I knew Cole was mine. My dark rebel in leather. My powerhouse of passion, devastating smiles, and impulsiveness. When his job sends him overseas, he promises to return to me. A promise that's destroyed in the most irrevocable way.

Two years later, an arrogant suit invades my heartbroken loneliness.

Clean-cut and stern, Trace is everything Cole wasn't. At first, he's a job that will rescue my dance company. But as he intrudes on my life, our hostile relationship evolves. He knows I'm still in love with Cole, but his dedication is my undoing.

Then a catastrophic moment changes everything.

Promises resurface. Lies entangle. And an impossible choice shatters my world.

I love two men, and I can only have one.

TWO IS A LIE

Two lies. Two men who don’t share.

I never stopped loving Cole. Not when he left me. Not when he disappeared for three years. Not when he crashed back into my life in a violent explosion of testosterone and fury. His sudden reappearance questions everything I thought I knew, including how I came to love another man.

Trace is an intoxicating breeze of seduction over ice. My rock. My second chance at forever. And he’s committed to annihilating the competition.

The battle that ensues wrenches me back and forth between them. Fighting and f*cking. Resisting and submitting.

Together, they entangle me in a web of lies, rivalry, and desire that weaves as deeply as their devotion to me.

I love two men, and if I can only have one, I choose none.

THREE IS A WAR

Three means war. Three sides vying for forever.

Cole. My first love. The bad boy with the dangerous smile and passionate temper draws attention like a lit fuse on dynamite. But his dark molten eyes spark only for me.

Trace. My second chance. Over six feet of Norse god in a tailored suit, he calculates every move and seizes my hungry breaths with an iron fist.

Me. The free-spirited dancer, torn between two men with no resolution in sight. I tried leaving, staying, refusing, and surrendering. What options do I have left?

I love two men, and I do the only thing I can. I fight.

DELIVER, Book 1 - FREE

His name was Joshua Carter. Now it’s whatever she wants it to be.

She is a Deliverer.

She lures young men and delivers them to be sold. She delivers the strikes that enforce their obedience. She delivers the sexual training that determines their purchase price.

As long as she delivers, the arrangement that protects her family will hold.

Delivering is all she knows.

The one thing she can’t deliver is a captive from slavery.

Until him.

And her stubborn slave thinks he can deliver her…from herself.

VANQUISH, Book 2

Her life is like a prison cell. A self-made, to-hell-with-the-free-world existence that locks from the inside. Stop judging. Her agoraphobia doesn’t define her. It simply keeps her safe.

He belongs in a prison cell. The 6x8, make-me-your-bitch variety that locks from the outside. But he’s free. To hunt. To take. To break. And he just found a sexy new toy.

Capturing her is the easy part. Her fucked-up mind, however, makes him question everything he does next. But he’s a determined bastard. If all goes his way, this will hurt like hell.

DISCLAIM, Book 3

Camila was seventeen when Van Quiso kidnapped her. Ten years after her escape, the shackles refuse to release her. Not while there are still slave traders preying on her city. She will stop at nothing to end them. Even if that means becoming a slave again.

Returning to chains is her worst fear—and only option. They won’t know who she is or what she intends to do. She’s prepared for every complication. Except him. The one who decimated her sixteen-year-old heart.

Matias is charming, gorgeous, and dangerously seductive. He’s also untrustworthy and enshrouded in secrets. After years of no contact, he finds her—on her knees, wrists bound, in the clutches of her enemy. Will he sabotage her mission by needlessly saving her? Or will he keep her in chains and never let her go?

DEVASTATE, Book 4

“What is the price you’re willing to pay?” “Money isn’t an issue.” “I’m not talking about money.”

Tate is on the hunt to find his best friend’s sister. Eleven years ago, Lucia Dias was abducted. Presumed dead. He never met her, so why does he care? Some might call his efforts noble, but his motivation is more perverse, bordering on obsession.

When he follows a chilling lead to Venezuela’s Kidnap Alley, what he finds is neither a corpse nor a captive.

Amid poisonous lies and crippling depravity, the price of love is devastation. And he pays. With his body, his blood, and her life.

TAKE, Book 5

He’s a notorious crime lord, a kidnapper, and an artist. Scarification is his outlet, and he just captured a new canvas. Kate refuses to surrender beneath his blade or the cruelty in his beautiful eyes. But she’s drawn to the man inside the monster. A man who makes her ache with his touch. Who owns her with his kiss. A man who worships her as deeply as he hurts her. She can run, but there’s no escape from a bond carved in scars.

MANIPULATE, Book 6

Tula Gomez is in the most ruthless prison in Latin America.

She only drove to Mexico to help her sister. She did nothing wrong. But her quiet life changed in an instant.

To survive the violent, cartel-controlled prison where men blend with women, she pledges her loyalty to the notorious leader in exchange for the one thing she needs most. Protection.

When she agrees to seduce the suspicious new inmates, Martin Lockwood and Ricky Saldivar, she doesn’t expect to enjoy it. Sure, they’re gorgeous, irresistibly alpha, and insanely talented with their hands and mouths. But they’re the enemy. She can’t fall for them.

Torn between her cartel loyalties and two men who want her as deeply as they want each other, she questions who is manipulating whom. Her search for answers leads to a passionate ménage, a soul-crushing secret, and an impossible choice.

UNSHACKLE, Book 7

No woman can resist Luke Sanch’s chiseled features, honed physique, auburn hair, and intense green eyes. While deadly in combat, he’s an indomitable weapon in bed. He can coax an explosive release with only his mouth and annihilate with insidious, mind-blowing pleasure. When he infiltrates La Rocha Cartel, he must seduce Vera Gomez to determine whether to rescue her. Or kill her. Nothing can distract his icy, lethal focus. Except the cartel’s most feral captive. The nameless, raven-haired beauty is his key to dismantling Vera Gomez. But the ferocious little fighter challenges him at every turn and unknowingly battles her way into his heart. A battle that delivers him, physically and emotionally, into shackles.

DOMINATE, Book 8

There are many reasons to jump off a bridge, but Rylee Sutton only needs one. Her husband’s betrayal. Just before she leaps, she receives an email from a stranger. The boy’s message is meant for his dead girlfriend, but his anguish speaks to Rylee. It saves her life.

Over the next decade, Tomas Dine continues to email his dead girl. As he evolves from a teenager into a hardened, vicious criminal, Rylee is there, reading every intimate word. He doesn’t know she exists.

When she comes forward, he despises her, his cruelty unforgivable. But she doesn’t back down. In a carnal battle of punishment and passion, hatred dominates. Until he loses her. Amid looming danger and unsolved murders rises a devotion forged in strife. Love is lethal in his ruthless world. To survive it, they must fight for answers—and each other.

COMPLICATE, Book 9

The long-awaited, heart-pounding conclusion of the dark and dangerous DELIVER series.

This is Cole Hartman's story. But it's not his beginning. The twisted, heartwrenching story of Cole, Danni, and Trace starts in the TANGLED LIES trilogy.

You don't have to read TANGLED LIES, but if you want to read it, do so before reading this book.

AUDIOBOOKS

ONE IS A PROMISE: Audible | Narrated by Lisa Zimmerman TWO IS A LIE: Audible | Narrated by Lisa Zimmerman THREE IS A WAR: Audible | Narrated by Lisa Zimmerman DELIVER #1: Audible | Narrated by Teddy Hamilton and Abby Crayden VANQUISH #2: Audible | Narrated by Ryan West and Jo Raylan DISCLAIM #3: Audible | Narrated by Christian Fox and Emma Wilder DEVASTATE #4: Audible | Narrated by J.F. Harding and Tracy Marks TAKE #5: Audible | Narrated by Soren Gray and Kate Genevieve MANIPULATE #6: Audible | Narrated by Christian Fox, Aiden Snow, and Lila Summers UNSHACKLE #7: Audible | Narrated by J. Tipstone and Lacy Laurel DOMINATE #8: Coming | Narrated by Matthew Holland and Samantha Summers COMPLICATE #9: Coming | Narrated by Joe Arden and Lisa Zimmerman

PAM GODWIN

New York Times, Wall Street Journal, and USA Today Bestselling author, Pam Godwin, lives in the Midwest with her husband, their two children, and a foulmouthed parrot. When she ran away, she traveled fourteen countries across five continents, attended three universities, and married the vocalist of her favorite rock band.

Java, tobacco, and dark romance novels are her favorite indulgences, and might be considered more unhealthy than her aversion to sleeping, eating meat, and dolls with blinking eyes.

Instagram

Facebook

Amazon

Bookbub

Twitter

Goodreads

  BOOKS BY PAM GODWIN

Trails of Sin Series KNOTTED (#1) - FREE BUCKLED (#2) BOOTED (#3)

Tangled Lies Series ONE IS A PROMISE (#1) - FREE TWO IS A LIE (#2) THREE IS A WAR (#3)

Deliver Series DELIVER (#1) - FREE VANQUISH (#2) DISCLAIM (#3) DEVASTATE (#4) TAKE (#5) MANIPULATE (#6) UNSHACKLE (#7) DOMINATE (#8) COMPLICATE (#9)

Trilogy of Eve HEART OF EVE - FREE DEAD OF EVE (#1) BLOOD OF EVE (#2) DAWN OF EVE (#3)

Stand-alones DARK NOTES BENEATH THE BURN DIRTY TIES INCENTIVE SEA OF RUIN KING OF LIBERTINES - FREE

[dargeereads]

DOMINATE releases on Jan 26, 2021

AMAZON | APPLE | B&N | KOBO | GOOGLE| GOODREADS

There are many reasons to jump off a bridge, but Rylee Sutton only needs one. Her husband’s betrayal. Just before she leaps, she receives an email from a stranger. The boy’s message is meant for his dead girlfriend, but his anguish speaks to Rylee. It saves her life.

Over the next decade, Tomas Dine continues to email his dead girl. As he evolves from a teenager into a hardened, vicious criminal, Rylee is there, reading every intimate word. He doesn’t know she exists.

When she comes forward, he despises her, his cruelty unforgivable. But she doesn’t back down. In a carnal battle of punishment and passion, hatred dominates. Until he loses her. Amid looming danger and unsolved murders rises a devotion forged in strife. Love is lethal in his ruthless world. To survive it, they must fight for answers—and each other.

DELIVER SERIES

Start Reading DELIVER for Free

Each book is a different couple (HEAs / no cliff-hangers), but they should be read in order.

📚 ebooks (all retailers worldwide): DELIVER | VANQUISH | DISCLAIM | DEVASTATE | TAKE | MANIPULATE | UNSHACKLE| DOMINATE| COMPLICATE

🎧 Audio: DELIVER | VANQUISH | DISCLAIM | DEVASTATE | TAKE | MANIPULATE

DELIVER, Book 1 - FREE

His name was Joshua Carter. Now it’s whatever she wants it to be.

She is a Deliverer.

She lures young men and delivers them to be sold. She delivers the strikes that enforce their obedience. She delivers the sexual training that determines their purchase price.

As long as she delivers, the arrangement that protects her family will hold.

Delivering is all she knows.

The one thing she can’t deliver is a captive from slavery.

Until him.

And her stubborn slave thinks he can deliver her…from herself.

VANQUISH, Book 2

Her life is like a prison cell. A self-made, to-hell-with-the-free-world existence that locks from the inside. Stop judging. Her agoraphobia doesn’t define her. It simply keeps her safe.

He belongs in a prison cell. The 6x8, make-me-your-bitch variety that locks from the outside. But he’s free. To hunt. To take. To break. And he just found a sexy new toy.

Capturing her is the easy part. Her fucked-up mind, however, makes him question everything he does next. But he’s a determined bastard. If all goes his way, this will hurt like hell.

DISCLAIM, Book 3

Camila was seventeen when Van Quiso kidnapped her. Ten years after her escape, the shackles refuse to release her. Not while there are still slave traders preying on her city. She will stop at nothing to end them. Even if that means becoming a slave again.

Returning to chains is her worst fear—and only option. They won’t know who she is or what she intends to do. She’s prepared for every complication. Except him. The one who decimated her sixteen-year-old heart.

Matias is charming, gorgeous, and dangerously seductive. He’s also untrustworthy and enshrouded in secrets. After years of no contact, he finds her—on her knees, wrists bound, in the clutches of her enemy. Will he sabotage her mission by needlessly saving her? Or will he keep her in chains and never let her go?

DEVASTATE, Book 4

“What is the price you’re willing to pay?” “Money isn’t an issue.” “I’m not talking about money.”

Tate is on the hunt to find his best friend’s sister. Eleven years ago, Lucia Dias was abducted. Presumed dead. He never met her, so why does he care? Some might call his efforts noble, but his motivation is more perverse, bordering on obsession.

When he follows a chilling lead to Venezuela’s Kidnap Alley, what he finds is neither a corpse nor a captive.

Amid poisonous lies and crippling depravity, the price of love is devastation. And he pays. With his body, his blood, and her life.

TAKE, Book 5

He’s a notorious crime lord, a kidnapper, and an artist. Scarification is his outlet, and he just captured a new canvas. Kate refuses to surrender beneath his blade or the cruelty in his beautiful eyes. But she’s drawn to the man inside the monster. A man who makes her ache with his touch. Who owns her with his kiss. A man who worships her as deeply as he hurts her. She can run, but there’s no escape from a bond carved in scars.

MANIPULATE, Book 6

Tula Gomez is in the most ruthless prison in Latin America.

She only drove to Mexico to help her sister. She did nothing wrong. But her quiet life changed in an instant.

To survive the violent, cartel-controlled prison where men blend with women, she pledges her loyalty to the notorious leader in exchange for the one thing she needs most. Protection.

When she agrees to seduce the suspicious new inmates, Martin Lockwood and Ricky Saldivar, she doesn’t expect to enjoy it. Sure, they’re gorgeous, irresistibly alpha, and insanely talented with their hands and mouths. But they’re the enemy. She can’t fall for them.

Torn between her cartel loyalties and two men who want her as deeply as they want each other, she questions who is manipulating whom. Her search for answers leads to a passionate ménage, a soul-crushing secret, and an impossible choice.

UNSHACKLE, Book 7

No woman can resist Luke Sanch’s chiseled features, honed physique, auburn hair, and intense green eyes. While deadly in combat, he’s an indomitable weapon in bed. He can coax an explosive release with only his mouth and annihilate with insidious, mind-blowing pleasure. When he infiltrates La Rocha Cartel, he must seduce Vera Gomez to determine whether to rescue her. Or kill her. Nothing can distract his icy, lethal focus. Except the cartel’s most feral captive. The nameless, raven-haired beauty is his key to dismantling Vera Gomez. But the ferocious little fighter challenges him at every turn and unknowingly battles her way into his heart. A battle that delivers him, physically and emotionally, into shackles.

DOMINATE, Book 8

There are many reasons to jump off a bridge, but Rylee Sutton only needs one. Her husband’s betrayal. Just before she leaps, she receives an email from a stranger. The boy’s message is meant for his dead girlfriend, but his anguish speaks to Rylee. It saves her life.

Over the next decade, Tomas Dine continues to email his dead girl. As he evolves from a teenager into a hardened, vicious criminal, Rylee is there, reading every intimate word. He doesn’t know she exists.

When she comes forward, he despises her, his cruelty unforgivable. But she doesn’t back down. In a carnal battle of punishment and passion, hatred dominates. Until he loses her. Amid looming danger and unsolved murders rises a devotion forged in strife. Love is lethal in his ruthless world. To survive it, they must fight for answers—and each other.

COMPLICATE, Book 9

The final book in the series Cole’s story Coming Mar 9, 2021 Preorder now Add to Goodreads

Audiobooks

DELIVER #1: Audible | Narrated by Teddy Hamilton and Abby Crayden

VANQUISH #2: Audible | Narrated by Ryan West and Jo Raylan

DISCLAIM  #3: Audible | Narrated by Christian Fox and Emma Wilder

DEVASTATE #4: Audible | Narrated by J.F. Harding and Tracy Marks

TAKE #5: Audible | Narrated by Soren Gray and Kate Genevieve

MANIPULATE #6: Audible | Narrated by Christian Fox, Aiden Snow, and Lila Summers

UNSHACKLE #7: Coming | Narrated by J. Tipstone and Lacy Laurel

DOMINATE #8: Coming | Narrated by Matthew Holland and Samantha Summers

COMPLICATE #9: Coming | Narrated by Joe Arden and Lisa Zimmerman

PAM GODWIN

New York Times, Wall Street Journal, and USA Today Bestselling author, Pam Godwin, lives in the Midwest with her husband, their two children, and a foulmouthed parrot. When she ran away, she traveled fourteen countries across five continents, attended three universities, and married the vocalist of her favorite rock band.

Java, tobacco, and dark romance novels are her favorite indulgences, and might be considered more unhealthy than her aversion to sleeping, eating meat, and dolls with blinking eyes.

Instagram

Facebook

Amazon

Bookbub

Twitter

Goodreads

  BOOKS BY PAM GODWIN

Trails of Sin Series KNOTTED (#1) - FREE BUCKLED (#2) BOOTED (#3)

Tangled Lies Series ONE IS A PROMISE (#1) - FREE TWO IS A LIE (#2) THREE IS A WAR (#3)

Deliver Series DELIVER (#1) - FREE VANQUISH (#2) DISCLAIM (#3) DEVASTATE (#4) TAKE (#5) MANIPULATE (#6) UNSHACKLE (#7) DOMINATE (#8) COMPLICATE (#9)

Trilogy of Eve HEART OF EVE - FREE DEAD OF EVE (#1) BLOOD OF EVE (#2) DAWN OF EVE (#3)

Stand-alones DARK NOTES BENEATH THE BURN DIRTY TIES INCENTIVE SEA OF RUIN KING OF LIBERTINES - FREE

[dargeereads]

FROM EVIL: Box Set

Release Date: Dec 29, 2020

AMAZON | APPLE | B&N | KOBO | GOOGLE

Also coming in print and audio

The Deliver Series continues with three dangerous romance thrillers from New York Times bestselling author, Pam Godwin: Devastate, Take, and Manipulate.

Time to meet your next book boyfriend.

Tiago Badell might be the scariest villain you’ve ever encountered, but he’s also the sexiest. The notorious crime lord worships his new captive as deeply as he hurts her. She can run, but there's no escape from a bond carved in scars.

Each standalone is a different couple with its own dark love story, all interconnected in a dangerous underworld of murderers, kidnappers, and cartels. You’ll be glad there are over 1000 pages of addictive romance and vigilante bad boys.

Are you ready to binge the continuation of the Deliver series?

More than 200,000 copies sold and thousands of 5-star reviews. No cliffhangers. Available in digital, print, and audiobook.

DELIVER US Box Set includes Books 1-3: Deliver, Vanquish, and Disclaim

Each book is a different couple (HEAs / no cliff-hangers), but they should be read in order.

DELIVER, Book 1

His name was Joshua Carter. Now it’s whatever she wants it to be.

She is a Deliverer.

She lures young men and delivers them to be sold. She delivers the strikes that enforce their obedience. She delivers the sexual training that determines their purchase price.

As long as she delivers, the arrangement that protects her family will hold.

Delivering is all she knows.

The one thing she can’t deliver is a captive from slavery.

Until him.

And her stubborn slave thinks he can deliver her…from herself.

VANQUISH, Book 2

Her life is like a prison cell. A self-made, to-hell-with-the-free-world existence that locks from the inside. Stop judging. Her agoraphobia doesn’t define her. It simply keeps her safe.

He belongs in a prison cell. The 6x8, make-me-your-bitch variety that locks from the outside. But he’s free. To hunt. To take. To break. And he just found a sexy new toy.

Capturing her is the easy part. Her fucked-up mind, however, makes him question everything he does next. But he’s a determined bastard. If all goes his way, this will hurt like hell.

DISCLAIM, Book 3

Camila was seventeen when Van Quiso kidnapped her. Ten years after her escape, the shackles refuse to release her. Not while there are still slave traders preying on her city. She will stop at nothing to end them. Even if that means becoming a slave again.

Returning to chains is her worst fear—and only option. They won’t know who she is or what she intends to do. She’s prepared for every complication. Except him. The one who decimated her sixteen-year-old heart.

Matias is charming, gorgeous, and dangerously seductive. He’s also untrustworthy and enshrouded in secrets. After years of no contact, he finds her—on her knees, wrists bound, in the clutches of her enemy. Will he sabotage her mission by needlessly saving her? Or will he keep her in chains and never let her go?

FROM EVIL Box Set includes Books 4-6: Devastate, Take, and Manipulate

Each book is a different couple (HEAs / no cliff-hangers), but they should be read in order.

DEVASTATE, Book 4

“What is the price you’re willing to pay?” “Money isn’t an issue.” “I’m not talking about money.”

Tate is on the hunt to find his best friend’s sister. Eleven years ago, Lucia Dias was abducted. Presumed dead. He never met her, so why does he care? Some might call his efforts noble, but his motivation is more perverse, bordering on obsession.

When he follows a chilling lead to Venezuela’s Kidnap Alley, what he finds is neither a corpse nor a captive.

Amid poisonous lies and crippling depravity, the price of love is devastation. And he pays. With his body, his blood, and her life.

TAKE, Book 5

He’s a notorious crime lord, a kidnapper, and an artist. Scarification is his outlet, and he just captured a new canvas. Kate refuses to surrender beneath his blade or the cruelty in his beautiful eyes. But she’s drawn to the man inside the monster. A man who makes her ache with his touch. Who owns her with his kiss. A man who worships her as deeply as he hurts her. She can run, but there’s no escape from a bond carved in scars.

MANIPULATE, Book 6

Tula Gomez is in the most ruthless prison in Latin America.

She only drove to Mexico to help her sister. She did nothing wrong. But her quiet life changed in an instant.

To survive the violent, cartel-controlled prison where men blend with women, she pledges her loyalty to the notorious leader in exchange for the one thing she needs most. Protection.

When she agrees to seduce the suspicious new inmates, Martin Lockwood and Ricky Saldivar, she doesn’t expect to enjoy it. Sure, they’re gorgeous, irresistibly alpha, and insanely talented with their hands and mouths. But they’re the enemy. She can’t fall for them.

Torn between her cartel loyalties and two men who want her as deeply as they want each other, she questions who is manipulating whom. Her search for answers leads to a passionate ménage, a soul-crushing secret, and an impossible choice.

Preorder FROM EVIL: Books 4-6

AMAZON | APPLE | B&N | KOBO | GOOGLE

PAM GODWIN

New York Times, Wall Street Journal, and USA Today Bestselling author, Pam Godwin, lives in the Midwest with her husband, their two children, and a foulmouthed parrot. When she ran away, she traveled fourteen countries across five continents, attended three universities, and married the vocalist of her favorite rock band.

Java, tobacco, and dark romance novels are her favorite indulgences, and might be considered more unhealthy than her aversion to sleeping, eating meat, and dolls with blinking eyes.

Instagram

Facebook

Amazon

Bookbub

Twitter

Goodreads

  BOOKS BY PAM GODWIN

Trails of Sin Series KNOTTED (#1) - FREE BUCKLED (#2) BOOTED (#3)

Tangled Lies Series ONE IS A PROMISE (#1) - FREE TWO IS A LIE (#2) THREE IS A WAR (#3)

Deliver Series DELIVER (#1) - FREE VANQUISH (#2) DISCLAIM (#3) DEVASTATE (#4) TAKE (#5) MANIPULATE (#6) UNSHACKLE (#7) DOMINATE (#8) COMPLICATE (#9)

Trilogy of Eve HEART OF EVE - FREE DEAD OF EVE (#1) BLOOD OF EVE (#2) DAWN OF EVE (#3)

Stand-alones DARK NOTES BENEATH THE BURN DIRTY TIES INCENTIVE SEA OF RUIN KING OF LIBERTINES - FREE

[dargeereads]

UNSHACKLE is coming!

Release Date: Nov 30, 2020

PREORDER NOW

AMAZON | APPLE | B&N | KOBO | GOOGLE

No woman can resist Luke Sanch’s chiseled features, honed physique, auburn hair, and intense green eyes. While deadly in combat, he’s an indomitable weapon in bed. He can coax an explosive release with only his mouth and annihilate with insidious, mind-blowing pleasure. When he infiltrates La Rocha Cartel, he must seduce Vera Gomez to determine whether to rescue her. Or kill her. Nothing can distract his icy, lethal focus. Except the cartel’s most feral captive. The nameless, raven-haired beauty is his key to dismantling Vera Gomez. But the ferocious little fighter challenges him at every turn and unknowingly battles her way into his heart. A battle that delivers him, physically and emotionally, into shackles.

DELIVER SERIES

Start Reading DELIVER for Free

Each book is a different couple (HEAs / no cliff-hangers), but they should be read in order.

📚 ebooks (all retailers worldwide): DELIVER | VANQUISH | DISCLAIM | DEVASTATE | TAKE | MANIPULATE | UNSHACKLE

🎧 Audio: DELIVER | VANQUISH | DISCLAIM | DEVASTATE | TAKE | MANIPULATE

DELIVER, Book 1 - FREE

His name was Joshua Carter. Now it’s whatever she wants it to be.

She is a Deliverer.

She lures young men and delivers them to be sold. She delivers the strikes that enforce their obedience. She delivers the sexual training that determines their purchase price.

As long as she delivers, the arrangement that protects her family will hold.

Delivering is all she knows.

The one thing she can’t deliver is a captive from slavery.

Until him.

And her stubborn slave thinks he can deliver her…from herself.

VANQUISH, Book 2

Her life is like a prison cell. A self-made, to-hell-with-the-free-world existence that locks from the inside. Stop judging. Her agoraphobia doesn’t define her. It simply keeps her safe.

He belongs in a prison cell. The 6x8, make-me-your-bitch variety that locks from the outside. But he’s free. To hunt. To take. To break. And he just found a sexy new toy.

Capturing her is the easy part. Her fucked-up mind, however, makes him question everything he does next. But he’s a determined bastard. If all goes his way, this will hurt like hell.

DISCLAIM, Book 3

Camila was seventeen when Van Quiso kidnapped her. Ten years after her escape, the shackles refuse to release her. Not while there are still slave traders preying on her city. She will stop at nothing to end them. Even if that means becoming a slave again.

Returning to chains is her worst fear—and only option. They won’t know who she is or what she intends to do. She’s prepared for every complication. Except him. The one who decimated her sixteen-year-old heart.

Matias is charming, gorgeous, and dangerously seductive. He’s also untrustworthy and enshrouded in secrets. After years of no contact, he finds her—on her knees, wrists bound, in the clutches of her enemy. Will he sabotage her mission by needlessly saving her? Or will he keep her in chains and never let her go?

DEVASTATE, Book 4

“What is the price you’re willing to pay?” “Money isn’t an issue.” “I’m not talking about money.”

Tate is on the hunt to find his best friend’s sister. Eleven years ago, Lucia Dias was abducted. Presumed dead. He never met her, so why does he care? Some might call his efforts noble, but his motivation is more perverse, bordering on obsession.

When he follows a chilling lead to Venezuela’s Kidnap Alley, what he finds is neither a corpse nor a captive.

Amid poisonous lies and crippling depravity, the price of love is devastation. And he pays. With his body, his blood, and her life.

TAKE, Book 5

He’s a notorious crime lord, a kidnapper, and an artist. Scarification is his outlet, and he just captured a new canvas. Kate refuses to surrender beneath his blade or the cruelty in his beautiful eyes. But she’s drawn to the man inside the monster. A man who makes her ache with his touch. Who owns her with his kiss. A man who worships her as deeply as he hurts her. She can run, but there’s no escape from a bond carved in scars.

MANIPULATE, Book 6

Tula Gomez is in the most ruthless prison in Latin America.

She only drove to Mexico to help her sister. She did nothing wrong. But her quiet life changed in an instant.

To survive the violent, cartel-controlled prison where men blend with women, she pledges her loyalty to the notorious leader in exchange for the one thing she needs most. Protection.

When she agrees to seduce the suspicious new inmates, Martin Lockwood and Ricky Saldivar, she doesn’t expect to enjoy it. Sure, they’re gorgeous, irresistibly alpha, and insanely talented with their hands and mouths. But they’re the enemy. She can’t fall for them.

Torn between her cartel loyalties and two men who want her as deeply as they want each other, she questions who is manipulating whom. Her search for answers leads to a passionate ménage, a soul-crushing secret, and an impossible choice.

UNSHACKLE, Book 7

No woman can resist Luke Sanch’s chiseled features, honed physique, auburn hair, and intense green eyes. While deadly in combat, he’s an indomitable weapon in bed. He can coax an explosive release with only his mouth and annihilate with insidious, mind-blowing pleasure. When he infiltrates La Rocha Cartel, he must seduce Vera Gomez to determine whether to rescue her. Or kill her. Nothing can distract his icy, lethal focus. Except the cartel’s most feral captive. The nameless, raven-haired beauty is his key to dismantling Vera Gomez. But the ferocious little fighter challenges him at every turn and unknowingly battles her way into his heart. A battle that delivers him, physically and emotionally, into shackles.

DOMINATE, Book 8

Tomas’ story Coming Jan 2021 Add to Goodreads

COMPLICATE, Book 9

The final book in the series Cole’s story Coming Mar 2021 Add to Goodreads

PAM GODWIN

New York Times, Wall Street Journal, and USA Today Bestselling author, Pam Godwin, lives in the Midwest with her husband, their two children, and a foulmouthed parrot. When she ran away, she traveled fourteen countries across five continents, attended three universities, and married the vocalist of her favorite rock band.

Java, tobacco, and dark romance novels are her favorite indulgences, and might be considered more unhealthy than her aversion to sleeping, eating meat, and dolls with blinking eyes.

Instagram

Facebook

Amazon

Bookbub

Twitter

Goodreads

  BOOKS BY PAM GODWIN

Trails of Sin Series KNOTTED (#1) - FREE BUCKLED (#2) BOOTED (#3)

Tangled Lies Series ONE IS A PROMISE (#1) - FREE TWO IS A LIE (#2) THREE IS A WAR (#3)

Deliver Series DELIVER (#1) - FREE VANQUISH (#2) DISCLAIM (#3) DEVASTATE (#4) TAKE (#5) MANIPULATE (#6) UNSHACKLE (#7) DOMINATE (#8) COMPLICATE (#9)

Trilogy of Eve HEART OF EVE - FREE DEAD OF EVE (#1) BLOOD OF EVE (#2) DAWN OF EVE (#3)

Stand-alones DARK NOTES BENEATH THE BURN DIRTY TIES INCENTIVE SEA OF RUIN KING OF LIBERTINES - FREE