{"id":4977,"date":"2019-06-19T05:00:33","date_gmt":"2019-06-19T12:00:33","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/markreads.net\/reviews\/?p=4977"},"modified":"2019-06-19T06:53:12","modified_gmt":"2019-06-19T13:53:12","slug":"mark-reads-unseen-academicals-part-5","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/markreads.net\/reviews\/2019\/06\/mark-reads-unseen-academicals-part-5\/","title":{"rendered":"Mark Reads &#8216;Unseen Academicals&#8217;: Part 5"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>In the fifth part of <i>Unseen Academicals<\/i>, everyone prepares to attend the football game. Intrigued? Then it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s time for Mark to read <i>Discworld<\/i>.<span class=\"Apple-converted-space\">\u00c2\u00a0<\/span><!--more--><\/p>\n<p>Oh, I am becoming DEEPLY OBSESSED with Nutt, and I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m reminded of Mr. Bent from <i>Making Money<\/i> here, only because there\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s such an intriguing and mysterious backstory for Mr. Nutt in this book. They\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re completely different characters, mind you, but I crave more information on Mr. Nutt just like I did for Mavolio Bent during that novel.<span class=\"Apple-converted-space\">\u00c2\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p>AND LORD, DO I EVER GET MORE INFORMATION HERE. I have a better grasp on what Nutt\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s process is because of this section. When Nutt is curious about something\u00e2\u20ac\u201dor when something confuses him\u00e2\u20ac\u201dhe seeks out knowledge. He does that by either asking a question or heading straight to the library to read about it. Then, he puts that knowledge into practice. How does it actually work? This test provides him with additional context that he\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s often missing, and there\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s a fantastic example of that within the opening scene of this split. And I really, really like that Nutt is being allowed to test these things out. In particular, Glenda\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s response to him saying something that we all recognize to be super gross and rude isn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t to lash out and scold him. She recognizes that he is coming from a place of good will and good intent, but that someone just needs to <i>tell<\/i> him that he\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s slipped up, that his context is wrong, that something is just considered inappropriate. (And now I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m thinking about how you might even be able to read Nutt through the lens of being neuroatypical, too, and how this way of setting boundaries and gently correcting behavior is way less cruel than how lots of people do it.) Because this is what Glenda does! She runs off to the library because she doesn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t know if \u00e2\u20ac\u0153fecundity\u00e2\u20ac\u009d is an offensive word, and when she returns, this is what she says:<span class=\"Apple-converted-space\">\u00c2\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<blockquote><p>\u00e2\u20ac\u02dcUm, it was kind of you to say that about me,\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 she said, \u00e2\u20ac\u02dcbut you should have used more appropriate language.\u00e2\u20ac\u2122<\/p>\n<p>\u00e2\u20ac\u02dcAh, yes, I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m so sorry,\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 said Nutt.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>Of course, there\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s additional context that Glenda gets from Nutt: Trev is the one who is mostly trying to help him learn how to communicate with others, and while Trev also has good intentions, he\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s not exactly the best person to learn from. But he\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s certainly not the worst! He knows that Nutt is perceived harshly by others, and he\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s at least trying to keep him safe as he dresses Nutt for the game. On top of it all, I also understood that to Trev, Nutt wouldn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t make sense even if he was <i>human<\/i>. At the end of the day, though, Trev isn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t trying to ostracize his friend; he isn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t trying to make him just like himself; he wants Nutt to be a part of this. Does Trev even <i>have<\/i> other friends he can count on?<span class=\"Apple-converted-space\">\u00c2\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p>I just really love culture clash stories and I get that this isn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t necessarily that <i>exactly<\/i>. But so much of the dynamic between Trev and Nutt in this section feels like that kind of story, and it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s a delight. Trev has to teach him about friendly punches! And I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m certain that Nutt punched Trev way too hard, and IT\u00e2\u20ac\u2122S ALL SO ADORABLE.<span class=\"Apple-converted-space\">\u00c2\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p>So, let\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s also talk about Glenda and her side gig. I don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t know what the big pyramid-scheme beauty supply company Pratchett is referencing with her, but here in the States, this reminded me of Avon, something my mom was briefly involved with when I was younger, but thankfully, she got out of it early. We had family members who were Avon affiliates for most of my childhood and stayed them well into adulthood. There\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s some clever riffing on capitalism here, too:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>There had always been trolls around, doing the heavy lifting and generally being there in the background if not being the actual background itself. But now they were raising families and running businesses, moving on up and buying things, and that made them people at last.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>LORD. That\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s\u00e2\u20ac\u00a6 oh, that\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s just <i>biting<\/i>.<span class=\"Apple-converted-space\">\u00c2\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p>Anyway, I feel like something huge is going to happen at this game. Glenda is there; Trev and Nutt are there; the wizards are there; it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s the first \u00e2\u20ac\u0153sanctioned\u00e2\u20ac\u009d match, so to speak, at least in the sense that the Watch isn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t really going to crack down on it existing. Hell, even the Librarian is there! Why are they all converging on one spot? PLOT REASONS, right? I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m scared!!!<\/p>\n<p>https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=QDWB3W9yibw<\/p>\n<p><b>Mark Links Stuff<\/b><\/p>\n<p>&#8211; <strong><a href=\"https:\/\/www.markoshiro.com\/blog\/2019\/5\/7\/the-anger-is-a-gift-trade-paperback-is-out-today\">The paperback edition of my debut, ANGER IS A GIFT, is now OUT!<\/a>\u00c2\u00a0<\/strong><strong>If you&#8217;d like to stay up-to-date on all announcements regarding my books, <a href=\"http:\/\/eepurl.com\/ey636\">sign up for my newsletter<\/a>! DO IT.<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>In the fifth part of Unseen Academicals, everyone prepares to attend the football game. Intrigued? Then it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s time for Mark to read Discworld.\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[451],"tags":[463,248,561],"class_list":["post-4977","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-discworld","tag-mark-reads-discworld","tag-terry-pratchett","tag-unseen-academicals"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/markreads.net\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4977","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/markreads.net\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/markreads.net\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/markreads.net\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/markreads.net\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4977"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/markreads.net\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4977\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/markreads.net\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4977"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/markreads.net\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4977"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/markreads.net\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4977"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}<!-- WP Super Cache is installed but broken. 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