Cold Days - final impressions
Oct. 1st, 2013 05:27 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
cammehfoxp03 replied to your post “Finally getting around to reading Cold Days. I’m about a third of the…”
I finished, btw. Final impressions:
1) OMFG PARALLEL UNIVERSES ARE NOW OFFICIALLY CANON, WHEN IS THE MIRROR-VERSE BOOK GOING TO HAPPEN, WHEN WHEN WHEN GIMME GIMME GIMME /FROTHES AT MOUTH
2) I remain intensely intrigued by Demonreach and Merlin, sob. TELL ME MORE. How did all those prisoners get jailed up in there, dammit?!
3) MIRROR VERSE. WHEN. ALL MY WANT. NOW.
4) I miss Harry’s magical accoutrements. :( I understand that Butcher wanted him stripped down to just himself and his new Winter powers, but the 24-hour time-frame and Harry’s lack of any of his tools or the ability to make more made it feel sort of…hmm, rushed? A little limited in the realm of possibilities, since he literally didn’t have much to work with? Without any room to maneuver, it kind of became an information-hunting game where he went around to various people, and then threw together a last minute plan that only really worked because Kringle/Vadderung (eeeee I was so thrilled at that reveal) and the Erlking (who is supposed to be holding a grudge against Harry, wtf?) allowed Harry to take over the Wild Hunt. Outsiders, high stakes, etc., I know, but still.
5) M I R R O R V E R S E sob why is it not in the next book sobsobsob
6) The Winter Knight’s mantle and everything it did to Harry was severely gross, and I really did not enjoy having to read from the first person perspective of someone who was having to hold himself back from physically and sexually assaulting all the women of his acquaintance every thirty pages or so. >_> I hope Butcher finds some way to mitigate/balance that in whatever future books where Harry remains the Winter Knight, because…ew. Ew. Ew. Ew.
7) *screams from the highest mountain* MIIIIRRRORRRR VEEEEERSSSE!!!!!!!
8) Did I miss something, or did they ever actually explain why the Outsiders wanted to blow up the Well? *squints* I know they want to get into our dimension for an as-yet-unspecified reason, but what was the connection between that goal and the action of blowing up the Well? Was that going to blow a hole into our plane or something?
9) *morosely draws arcane symbols into the sand with a stick* mirror verse… mirror verse… wherefore art thou mirror verse?
10) Can Molly please get over her ‘crush’ on Harry already, or can the narrative acknowledge that it’s more than that and treat her feelings with respect instead of having Harry see-saw back and forth between patronizingly dismissing them, struggling not to take advantage of her (ugh), and acknowledging that he’s not going to feel the same way (so TELL her that already???)? It’s the least interesting and most clumsily done aspect of her character, to me. To call it ‘holding a torch’ is juvenile, and it’s been made very clear over the past few books that Molly is a very mature young woman. I’d like to see her get a dashing, badass love interest of her own, tbh, but being the Winter Lady kinda makes that difficult. Dammit.
11) (whispers) Mirrorverse. (vanishes into the night)
12) OKAY WHAT IS UP WITH MAC. TELL ME ALREADY. “I’m out”, Outsiders recognizing him, he “chose his path” a long time ago, aaaargh. There wouldn’t be such a big deal made about his mystery if he were just a former wizard or something, right?? He can’t be a former Outsider, they’re completely foreign and alien, right??? He didn’t seem to have any special powers, so is he bound or just abstaining or was he stripped of them or did he never have them or - or - or - /HEAD BLOWS UP
13) Mirror - YEAH YOU KNOW WHAT IMMA SAY.
14) It felt like there were a lot of instances in this book of Butcher retconning things in previous books to make them fit into a newer Grand Scheme of Things. That’s not necessarily bad, one doesn’t expect an author to have EVERYTHING thought out from the get-go, and at least it was done somewhat understandably in-universe when Harry would mention that he hadn’t been experienced or knowledgeable enough at the time to understand something correctly, but still. It felt noticeable.
15) …..one more time say it with me MIRROR VERSE okay okay I’m done.
16) I missed tons of people in this book, lol. The woes of an ensemble cast. It’s getting so big that it’s hard to fit them all in, I guess. I hope Butcher comes out with more side stories featuring the side characters, though.
EDIT 17) I hope that the reveal of the virus/evil plague/corruption thingy doesn’t mean the Black Council is retconned out. Like…they still exist, right? It’s not just that evil is coincidentally on the rise all over the place because of the Outsider infection thing, and Harry and the white hats mistook the pattern for the work of a dastardly organization? It’s also that some powerful people infected by that evil joined up to form the mysterious group we know as the Black Council, right?? RIGHT?!
8|a There’s probably more but that’s all I can think of at the moment.
*cackles* Keep reading, my friend! And when you’re finished we can rave and conjecture wildly together! In the meantime…dang it! I am now desperately trying to unplug from the Dresden Files wiki and go to bed. No luck so far. This is your fault!
I will not apologize, because now all your knowledge is fresh and detailed and I can poke you enthusiastically, MWAHAHA. >:3I finished, btw. Final impressions:
1) OMFG PARALLEL UNIVERSES ARE NOW OFFICIALLY CANON, WHEN IS THE MIRROR-VERSE BOOK GOING TO HAPPEN, WHEN WHEN WHEN GIMME GIMME GIMME /FROTHES AT MOUTH
2) I remain intensely intrigued by Demonreach and Merlin, sob. TELL ME MORE. How did all those prisoners get jailed up in there, dammit?!
3) MIRROR VERSE. WHEN. ALL MY WANT. NOW.
4) I miss Harry’s magical accoutrements. :( I understand that Butcher wanted him stripped down to just himself and his new Winter powers, but the 24-hour time-frame and Harry’s lack of any of his tools or the ability to make more made it feel sort of…hmm, rushed? A little limited in the realm of possibilities, since he literally didn’t have much to work with? Without any room to maneuver, it kind of became an information-hunting game where he went around to various people, and then threw together a last minute plan that only really worked because Kringle/Vadderung (eeeee I was so thrilled at that reveal) and the Erlking (who is supposed to be holding a grudge against Harry, wtf?) allowed Harry to take over the Wild Hunt. Outsiders, high stakes, etc., I know, but still.
5) M I R R O R V E R S E sob why is it not in the next book sobsobsob
6) The Winter Knight’s mantle and everything it did to Harry was severely gross, and I really did not enjoy having to read from the first person perspective of someone who was having to hold himself back from physically and sexually assaulting all the women of his acquaintance every thirty pages or so. >_> I hope Butcher finds some way to mitigate/balance that in whatever future books where Harry remains the Winter Knight, because…ew. Ew. Ew. Ew.
7) *screams from the highest mountain* MIIIIRRRORRRR VEEEEERSSSE!!!!!!!
8) Did I miss something, or did they ever actually explain why the Outsiders wanted to blow up the Well? *squints* I know they want to get into our dimension for an as-yet-unspecified reason, but what was the connection between that goal and the action of blowing up the Well? Was that going to blow a hole into our plane or something?
9) *morosely draws arcane symbols into the sand with a stick* mirror verse… mirror verse… wherefore art thou mirror verse?
10) Can Molly please get over her ‘crush’ on Harry already, or can the narrative acknowledge that it’s more than that and treat her feelings with respect instead of having Harry see-saw back and forth between patronizingly dismissing them, struggling not to take advantage of her (ugh), and acknowledging that he’s not going to feel the same way (so TELL her that already???)? It’s the least interesting and most clumsily done aspect of her character, to me. To call it ‘holding a torch’ is juvenile, and it’s been made very clear over the past few books that Molly is a very mature young woman. I’d like to see her get a dashing, badass love interest of her own, tbh, but being the Winter Lady kinda makes that difficult. Dammit.
11) (whispers) Mirrorverse. (vanishes into the night)
12) OKAY WHAT IS UP WITH MAC. TELL ME ALREADY. “I’m out”, Outsiders recognizing him, he “chose his path” a long time ago, aaaargh. There wouldn’t be such a big deal made about his mystery if he were just a former wizard or something, right?? He can’t be a former Outsider, they’re completely foreign and alien, right??? He didn’t seem to have any special powers, so is he bound or just abstaining or was he stripped of them or did he never have them or - or - or - /HEAD BLOWS UP
13) Mirror - YEAH YOU KNOW WHAT IMMA SAY.
14) It felt like there were a lot of instances in this book of Butcher retconning things in previous books to make them fit into a newer Grand Scheme of Things. That’s not necessarily bad, one doesn’t expect an author to have EVERYTHING thought out from the get-go, and at least it was done somewhat understandably in-universe when Harry would mention that he hadn’t been experienced or knowledgeable enough at the time to understand something correctly, but still. It felt noticeable.
15) …..one more time say it with me MIRROR VERSE okay okay I’m done.
16) I missed tons of people in this book, lol. The woes of an ensemble cast. It’s getting so big that it’s hard to fit them all in, I guess. I hope Butcher comes out with more side stories featuring the side characters, though.
EDIT 17) I hope that the reveal of the virus/evil plague/corruption thingy doesn’t mean the Black Council is retconned out. Like…they still exist, right? It’s not just that evil is coincidentally on the rise all over the place because of the Outsider infection thing, and Harry and the white hats mistook the pattern for the work of a dastardly organization? It’s also that some powerful people infected by that evil joined up to form the mysterious group we know as the Black Council, right?? RIGHT?!
8|a There’s probably more but that’s all I can think of at the moment.
