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• As I'm reading, this story just confirms my delight in the Uncle's sister.

• Marvellous as usual, I read straight through, and I have to say I am no TYOP reader. I didn't see any

  • Sue, did your copy have the table of contents listed twice at the beginning, or was it just mine?

    • Yes it did have two table of contents.

• I was excited to actually be able to buy the eArc in good time to maybe be among the mighty tyop hunters, but life is being difficult right now. We shall see if I Get Time. There was one section of dialogue where I wasn't sure who was speaking, but I'm going back to look and see if it was just me being obtuse.

  Meanwhile, the book was great at my first read, although I have to wonder if anyone else was a little perturbed at Anthora drinking a lot of wine whilst pregnant.

  I dearly love the tree deciding who is family! The fact that Anthora can heal that horrid whistle call is super brilliant. There was lots of the plot that really went well for me.

  Thank you for making a spoiler space available for me to make these comments!!

  • I hadn't particularly noticed Anthora drinking wine but thinking about it now, I assume she would, as a talented healer, be able to protect her child against the ill-effects of alcohol. Or perhaps this particular effect of alcohol doesn't occur in Liadens.

    • I think that the "humans" in the Liaden Universe have been so heavily manipulated genetically that they just don't react the same way to environmental influences as we poor control naturals do.

      I've noticed that Shan seems to always have a glass in his hand, sometimes just before heading to the bridge.

      • I think planetary divergence is also an issue. It seems that most humans are planet bound. Which must have some effect on the genome.

  • I had some difficulty tracking who was speaking as the POV jumped around.

    I quite enjoyed the story and the vision of the station being so beautiful, unlike every other station in the series.

    And we finally got Uncle's full name.

    The Uncle's sister was great. I was hoping that when she extracted Joyita when he got lost chasing the virus, that she should have downloaded him into a blank body.

    I felt that Lorith could have been more rounded out as a character. She had been subverted by Tinsori Light when she pulled out her knife, but then she seemed to disappeared from the story until the rack and tiles were destroyed.

    I will read it again to look over that part in particular. While I am at it I will look for TYOPs.

    • That niggles me too. And what was she working so hard on, in secret?

      • As I read it:

        Lorith got a new set of memory beads that the Light had corrupted.
        She was manufacturing tiles in her workroom to contain software from the Light.
        She then placed those tiles in the faristo room where they were used for the new rack & tile system, giving the Light a new home, which Jen Sin destroyed with the bowli ball.

    • Re-reading this book was a delight. My difficulty tracking was about me, my lack of paying close attention. The story is great.

• Delightful first read. Now comes the "work" part...

• What a -satisfying- read. From the first chapter to the last, I was fully engaged. Reading the authors' afterword, I understood my delight. Sharon said: "The characters on Tinsori Light deserved better from their authors. They deserved not only hope, but help. They deserved a reason to believe in good things again. They needed reasons to go forward." Ah, hope--isn't that "the thing with feathers," or in this case, merely mimicking things with feathers. ;)

  I too found a couple spots that would benefit from use of a name instead of an ambiguous pronoun; those will be included in my own TYOPS report. RE: Anthora drinking wine while pregnant, I would have assumed, had I thought of it, that she was more than able to "heal" the harm in the alcohol as it touched her lips.

  • Thanks for reminding me of the comment about hope. On my re-read I am noticing the mentioning of love, joy and innocence.

• Early on in my reading, I guessed, wrongly that Bechimo would download one of his stored personalities to be the station, nice curveball/screwball.
  For the last several mainline books I have been hoping we might find out woh will be the trader in Theo'\s crew. My guess have expanded to include the Uldra-Joenz family Others are Vanz Careens-Denobli . Gordy and lastly Padi. I think that Padi and Theo in the same book would blow the covers off it. Hpw-so-ever I think OBA (Our Beloved Authors) could make it work but might not survive the effort unchanged or even intact so to speak.

  • Another possible is Trader Isfelm from Redlands.

• I really enjoyed this book, but that was not surprising. Glad that I got to finish it on my birthday! A great indulgence. My only disappointment was that I would have liked Gordy to make an actual appearance. I confess to wanting to know what kind of adult and trader he has become, beyond just his letter. I really enjoyed getting to know Jen Sin and Catie--and of course seeing all the folks we know already. Have submitted my TYOP report. I only had to go back once or twice to figure out who was speaking.

• Film writers are often advised to watch Hitchcock and note how he cuts between two competing plot perspectives races as a way to build tension. I have not gone to count how many perspectives are in play here. The authors had my attention anyway.

  Is there a foreshadowed love interest for Jen Sin?

  Now that we have more details on the origins of Bowli ball, it warrants more description in the wiki.

  I did get distracted with noticing where Light Keeper was capitalized and where it was not.

  • Re: the capitalization, I noticed that too, but I think the usage is consistent, following the rule of capitalizing when the title immediately precedes the name or is used as direct address, and not otherwise. Dealing with titles and melant'i is a bit complicated in this book, given diverse professional identities and relationships. To Tochol or Jen Sin, for example, Theo can be Captain, Theo, or Cousin. And melant'i can shift within a conversation.

• Random Musings
  Stuff I liked : avians/birds. Anthora and Ren Zel becoming active, more tree cousins,
  ldra-Joenz on the scene, all the strong women, Ren Stryker, Disian, distinct charater voices,
  Catalinc station becoming and freeing Tochol.

  Just off the top of my head.

  • Tolly and Haz becoming a couple too.

  • Slow thinker here.
    This came to me today.
    Tolly and Haz are a/the reflection of Cantra and Jela.
    Genders and all, mirrored.

• The three great works
  In the chapter entitles Bechimo En route
  The three great works are mentioned. Tinsori being one.
  My stab/guess is that Daglyte Seam where the DOI Commanders were promoted/infused was another.
  I have no clue as to the third.
  Anyone have a guess. speculation or recollection ?

  • There was a World Eater somewhere ... which had been distroyed by the hero Ahab-Esais.

    I always thought of Naratha’s Shadow as something else - maybe something construted specially to distroy a Great Work - and therefore dangerous in itself.

  • Do you happen to recall which book or story that event was in ?

    • Naratha's Shadow is one of the storrys, and the World Eater Glyeth was mentioned in the book acceting the lance, right after mentioning recruiting station at Hols Senneth.

      • Many thanx.

  • Aberthaz ferry names three of the, in the previous book.