{"id":4481,"date":"2018-03-09T05:00:45","date_gmt":"2018-03-09T13:00:45","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/markreads.net\/reviews\/?p=4481"},"modified":"2018-03-04T11:00:31","modified_gmt":"2018-03-04T19:00:31","slug":"mark-reads-night-watch-part-13","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/markreads.net\/reviews\/2018\/03\/mark-reads-night-watch-part-13\/","title":{"rendered":"Mark Reads ‘Night Watch’: Part 13"},"content":{"rendered":"

In the thirteenth part of Night Watch<\/i>, Vimes is reminded of the importance of his work. Intrigued? Then it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s time for Mark to read Discworld<\/i>.<\/p>\n

Trigger Warning: For talk of police brutality<\/b>.<\/p>\n

You know, this is a little unorthodox for a time travel book, and I kinda adore it, y\u00e2\u20ac\u2122all. In the midst of this strange journey, Vimes seeks out the people who he perceives as orchestrating it all, and he basically says, \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Yeah, I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m out. NO THANKS.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d And it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s incredibly<\/i> in character for Vimes, while also existing to remind us of the \u00e2\u20ac\u0153rules\u00e2\u20ac\u009d of this book. Those rules aren\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t as perfectly defined as Vimes would like them, and that\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s why Lu-Tze agrees to give Vimes an anchor of sorts.<\/p>\n

But before I get to that\u00e2\u20ac\u201dand I don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t have a guess as to what that thing is\u00e2\u20ac\u201dI wanted to examine what it meant for Vimes to confront the time monks as he does. From a craft perspective, it does<\/i> help ground the reader in the weirdness. It\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s like Pratchett\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s way of saying, \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Hey, remember that Vimes\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s presence is vital and important, but I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m giving you no guarantee that this will turn out like you want it to.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d Already, this is changing! The details of this revolution have already shifted into a new reality, and it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s here that Pratchett finally spells out what\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s really<\/i> going to trigger the bloodbath that\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s going make this day so infamous in the future. So, Vimes\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s confrontation has another meaning: he is exercising agency. He is telling Lu-Tze and Qu that he cannot expected to sit by and let history happen exactly as it did, especially when he can save lives.<\/p>\n

In short: Vimes refuses to be a pawn or a patsy or a bystander. AND IT IS THE MOST VIMES-Y RESPONSE IMAGINABLE.<\/p>\n

So what does<\/i> this mean? Once Vimes lets the time monks know that he\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s gonna do what he wants, not what is expected of him, he\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s faced with a change in command: Ronald Rust. Who we haven\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t seen since Jingo<\/i>, where he was pretty much the worst!!! EXCEPT HE\u00e2\u20ac\u2122S ACTUALLY THE<\/i> WORST HERE, Y\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ALL. Oh my god, there are few things worse than men who believe so wholly that they are right and perfect that they try to bend the world to their whims. Of course, he\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s interacting with Vimes throughout this, so there\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s a lot of fun to be had as Vimes manipulates him. But that only goes so far, right? For every snappy insult that flies over Rust\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s head, Rust pushes the Watch ever closer to a confrontation with the citizens of Ankh-Morpork.<\/p>\n

It\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s here that Pratchett once more touches on an uncomfortable reality. There are too many people in positions of power who think of others as Rust does. He views \u00e2\u20ac\u0153ordinary\u00e2\u20ac\u009d citizens through a lens of disgust. They are beneath<\/i> him. There\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s no attempt whatsoever to understand why<\/i> there is a mob, or why the Watch Houses were targeted. Rust only cares about order. He wants the chain of command to merely be a chain of obedience, and he wants those agents of the Watch to do what he wants and nothing more. So even if Rust wasn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t originally in this story in this capacity, he\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s still pushing towards the same bloody confrontation, just in a different way.<\/p>\n

I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122M SCARED.<\/p>\n

https:\/\/youtu.be\/2IB_PZ2mPTs<\/p>\n

Mark Links Stuff<\/b><\/p>\n

– My YA contemporary debut, ANGER IS A GIFT<\/a>, is now available for pre-order!\u00c2\u00a0<\/strong>If you’d like to stay up-to-date on all announcements regarding my books, sign up for my newsletter<\/a>! DO IT.<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"