In the fifth chapter of Tris’s Book, Sandry and Tris both get surprising visitors. Intrigued? Then it’s time for Mark to read Circle of Magic.
Trigger Warning: For discussion ofÂ
BRIAR AND TRIS, BEING FRIENDLY TO ONE ANOTHER AND TALKING HONESTLY ABOUT ROSETHORN AND THEIR GROWING POWERS. Y’ALL. IT’S HAPPENING RIGHT HERE, RIGHT NOW, AND I CAN’T DEAL WITH IT AT ALL. These two characters are probably the ones I’d say had the hardest time making friends with anyone, let alone each other. But both of them have now seen Rosethorn’s tenderness, they’re both the first to open up about the new magical experiences they’re having, and they do it with significantly less snark and sass than before. (Though I don’t expect either character to give up said attributes. I HOPE THEY NEVER DO.) It’s significant because I think they’re starting to accept that they are, more or less, part of a team. All four of them are linked together, and there’s nothing they can do to change that. That’s not to suggest that this is some awful, miserable arrangement. They’re gaining advantages quicker than they know how to use them, but even I can see how beneficial this is. Daja was able to see the cloaked ship, and Briar witnessed someone sneaking into the Hub. (BRIAR, PLEASE TELL SOMEONE ABOUT THAT.)
But nothing fills me with emotion more than the scene of Tris teaching Briar to read and seeing how utterly excited he was to learn. THANK YOU FOR CRUSHING ME.
Vedris
So much of the Tortall books dealt with the nobility, so it’s very neat to me that the Emelan books basically keep this entire subset of society far away from the main plot. When Duke Vedris visits Sandry, I suddenly remembered that she came from nobility. In her day-to-day life? I don’t even think about it. That’s fascinating to me because Sandry was born into privilege, but I don’t know that she’s in a place where she benefits from it anymore. Her family is dead, and she doesn’t have access to what she used to. That doesn’t mean it’s completely gone, and I commented on how great it was that she did use her nobility in the last book to stand up for what she saw as an injustice.
But it’s through Vedris’s very raw comments about Sandry’s parents that this book both smashes my heart to pieces and gives us yet another parallel between two characters.
“My nephew and his wife were sweet, but I cannot deny they were totally useless.” He held up a hand to cut off her protest. “My dear, they lived for their own pleasure, doing nothing to help those whose work gave them the money to do so. You, on the other hand – I have a feeling that you may achieve enough in your lifetime to make up for the emptiness of theirs.”
Well, I DID NOT EXPECT THAT. It’s so refreshing to me that in two instances within Tris’s Book, Pierce has characters express disapproval of parental figures. I’m so used to a culture where parents are meant to be venerated and respected that I found it hard to relate to fiction that supported this concept. I’ve written over the years about my complicated relationship with my mother and the problems I had with my father while he was still alive, so I’m not going to rehash them here. But I fear that we aren’t helping people who don’t have a positive experience with their parents if we don’t give them a space to vocalize that. Sandry’s parents probably were nice people, but it’s clear that they were also very selfish. We know that they didn’t care about Sandry’s own desires, either! So why shouldn’t they be criticized for that?
Aymery
I bring that up because it’s so vital to Tris’s story in this chapter. While there’s clearly a ton of MAJOR plot twists dropped here (OH SHIT, THE PIRATES ARE COMING), I was completely distracted (in the best way possible) by the sudden introduction of Aymery, Tris’s cousin who she hadn’t seen in two years. Again, I’m not really interested in going into extreme detail concerning my own history here. That’s not because I don’t want to talk about it, but I always worry about sounding repetitive about this stuff. What’s important to me about what Pierce does here is that she puts Tris in a situation that highlights how awkward and miserable it is to have to explain why your parents rejected you. Actually, I’d say it even goes beyond that; Tris becomes increasingly furious because Aymery doesn’t seem to understand that she doesn’t want to be back in her parents’ lives. When the other Discipline kids are asking about him, Tris just barely touches on her complicated rage, but it’s when Aymery confronts her that she nearly loses control of her powers again.
He brings the news that her father is most likely dying, and he urges her to go see him, and the problem is clear as day to me:
“The last time I saw him, he told a stranger that he and my mother didn’t want me back. Not ever!”
“You can’t let that stand in your way,” Aymery insisted. “Go home while you can – that’s what I’d do.”
Well, of course that’s what you’d do. Your parents didn’t reject you and send you off to live with someone else because they couldn’t love you. When I ran away from home at the start of my junior year of high school, I had to have this exact same conversation or some variation of it hundreds of times. Practically no one – not even some of the people who supported me! – could understand that I truly didn’t want to go home. I wasn’t hiding it under grief or sadness. I wasn’t secretly wishing I could just go home and put aside my pride. Every ounce of me hated that place, and I was never happier than when I was on my own. And yet, teachers, administrators, my coaches, and the vast majority of my friends insisted on telling me, sometimes multiple times a month, that I just needed to put aside my feelings and be with my family. Did they mean well? Sure, but what did that actually do to help me? Their intent made them feel better, but it had the unintended affect of making me feel like no one was listening to my own concerns and fears.
Aymery is not listening to Tris. It is easy for him to say that she should go home because he hasn’t had to deal with this, and he can’t empathize with the experience. If Tris decides to go home, that is her choice and her choice alone.
The original video contains use of the word “mad.”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WwYi83QQ3ME
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