{"id":5224,"date":"2020-07-01T05:00:58","date_gmt":"2020-07-01T12:00:58","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/markreads.net\/reviews\/?p=5224"},"modified":"2020-06-22T16:12:32","modified_gmt":"2020-06-22T23:12:32","slug":"mark-reads-the-fifth-season-chapter-10","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/markreads.net\/reviews\/2020\/07\/mark-reads-the-fifth-season-chapter-10\/","title":{"rendered":"Mark Reads ‘The Fifth Season’: Chapter 10"},"content":{"rendered":"

In the tenth chapter of The Fifth Season<\/i>, I am once again experiencing what it is like to have my soul ripped out of my body. If you\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re intrigued, then it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s time for me to read The Broken Earth<\/i>.\u00c2\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Trigger Warning: For discussion of grief, homelessness<\/b><\/p>\n

What the fuck.<\/p>\n

WHAT THE FUCK!!!<\/p>\n

Okay, we\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ll get to The Thing in the second half of this. I have other things I want to also discuss. This first thing is heavy, but this book<\/i> is heavy, too. I am appreciating the chance to get to talk about some of this stuff outside of therapy, too, because grief often feels so terribly lonely. Even when other people are suffering, it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s one of those emotions that often makes a person perceive a loneliness that\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s intense and all-encompassing. But The Fifth Season<\/i> is written in a way that it acts as a reminder: grief can be a shared experience, one across time and space, fiction and reality.\u00c2\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

In particular, there\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s something cutting about the opening of this chapter. I expressed something to my therapist in one of my early sessions: I felt like I was living someone else\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s life. I was going through the motions of life, but that life was not mine. Everything was wrong and strange and complicated and distant. And I came to understand that I was in a transitory state: that I was changing, that I was adjusting into a new person, one who had to live a life without someone else. Death can do that, especially when the death is sudden, especially when the death is of someone so young, especially when the tragedy of it all is so inescapable.\u00c2\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

We have to change. I<\/i> have to change. But I resonated with this part a lot:<\/p>\n

So you must stay Essun, and Essun will have to make do with the broken bits of herself that Jija has left behind.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

That\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s what it feels like when someone you love dies. It\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s a way of personalizing the trauma: this<\/i> person left a broken version of you behind. There is also a textual reason for this, though, that I don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t want to ignore that. Essun is dealing with a husband who murdered her son. So there\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s an intentionality here: He did<\/i> literally leave her with a broken life, and is now heading somewhere with their surviving daughter. It\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s providing the determination for Essun, too:<\/p>\n

As long as nothing important breaks, right? You\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ll get by. You have no choice. Not as long as one of your children could be alive.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

And then we cut to Essun and the child. The child who makes no sense (though I have a theory I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ll get to), the child who constantly bewilders and frustrates and amazes Essun. Again: not lost on me that she no longer has a son, but has strangely inherited Hoa. More on Hoa in a second, because we have to talk about dread and terror and how quickly Jemisin is able to turn the tone of this book. Everything already feels off by default. Part of that is Hoa\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s presence, but it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s also how well Jemisin conveys the imminent end of the world. For example: the image of hundreds of people, all strangers, sleeping outside that roadhouse, gives us so much understanding of desperation. Of exhaustion. Of the unspoken terror that exists between these people who are all trying to survive, but are frightened that they will not be able to be. Then: something attacks. And we, as the readers, have most likely accepted the chaos of this scenario anyway. Literally anything could happen at this point, right? The world is ENDING. So what is it this time? Bandits? Warriors? We don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t know, and until Essun and Hoa turned back for supplies, I actually was expecting that we\u00e2\u20ac\u2122d never know. That was the point: the unexpected would happen constantly<\/i>.\u00c2\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

There are a few interesting moments that unfold before The Thing happens, too. Hoa\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s anxiety over Essun\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s well-being fascinates me. He let her sleep because he knew she was tired; at one point he\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s concerned about the stitch in her side; he is instantly<\/i> protective whenever there\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s a perceived threat. Yet Essun notes this:<\/p>\n

The boy only watches. If he worries about you, he doesn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t let it show on his face.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

I think he shows it through his actions<\/i>, though. And why is that? I think that\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s related to something he says later.<\/p>\n

And then there are the commless. I made a note (you\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ll see it below) that it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s not often that I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ve seen representations of homeless populations in fantasy at all, though I admit I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m not as well-read in this genre as others. Generally, you might see beggars, but there\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s so much more thought put into the commless here. We get to meet a commless woman here, the only person in the roadhouse. The moment is tense for reasons mostly unrelated to the woman being commless, though that is part of it. Mostly: Essun has no idea what happened at the roadhouse, and she doesn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t know if this woman was a part of it. It becomes clear, though, that the woman is taking advantage of the situation to get water.\u00c2\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Well\u00e2\u20ac\u00a6 there\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s the geomest thing, too. I can\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t say I totally understand what a geomest is? It sounds like an orogene-lite, and the text describes them as:\u00c2\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

They\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re everything people think orogenes are when they\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re feeling charitable: arcane, unfathomable, possessed of knowledge no mortal should have, disturbing. No one but a geomest would know so many useless facts, so throughly.\u00c2\u00a0<\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

So they do<\/i> have some sort of power? There\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s that moment where the woman seems to sense something that Essun does not. So maybe? Is it common for geomests to be commless? But there\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s also this line, where the woman denies being a geomest:<\/p>\n

\u00e2\u20ac\u0153I know better than to pay attention to those fools at the University. I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m not stupid<\/i>.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d\u00c2\u00a0<\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

So maybe they\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re academics, not orogene-lites? Hmmm. HMMMM. Still not sure. I want to know about her, and there\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s a chance that I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ll see more of her, given the ending. For now, though, it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s time to talk about The Thing. Not just the kirkhusa, but what Hoa does with one that attacks him. First: HI, WOW, THE KIRKHUSA ARE NIGHTMARES. They are domesticated pets UNTIL they taste ash\u00e2\u20ac\u201dash that only comes with a Season\u00e2\u20ac\u201dwhereupon some instinctual nature is activated in them, and they become monsters who feast on anything around them. That<\/i> is what attacked the people at the roadhouse, and that\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s what attacks Hoa, and then\u00e2\u20ac\u00a6 y\u00e2\u20ac\u2122all<\/p>\n

Y\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ALL.<\/p>\n

I almost can\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t believe this, except\u00e2\u20ac\u00a6 didn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t we just<\/i> see an orogene with the ability to manipulate on the molecular level? This part is what gave me the idea:<\/p>\n

Then the kirkhusa\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s fur starts to move. (What?) You frown, squint, but it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s easy to see, close as the beast is. Each individual hair of its fur waggles, seemingly in a different direction all at the same time. Then it shimmers. (What?)<\/i> Stiffens. All at once you realize that not only are its muscles stiff, but the flesh that covers them is stiff, too. Not just stiff but\u00e2\u20ac\u00a6 solid.\u00c2\u00a0<\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

He\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s an orogene\u00e2\u20ac\u00a6 right? Or\u00e2\u20ac\u00a6 something else? What the fuck, y\u00e2\u20ac\u2122all?<\/p>\n

Hoa seems to remember his arm, belatedly.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

THE ARM THAT THE KIRKHUSA ATE<\/i>, Y\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ALL. Like, his arm! Is inside the kirkhusa\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s stone mouth! WHICH HE THEN SHATTERS WITH NO EFFORT.<\/p>\n

He lowers his eyes. \u00e2\u20ac\u0153I hadn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t meant for you to see this, yet.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n

Okay. That\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s\u00e2\u20ac\u00a6 something to think about later.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

NO, LET\u00e2\u20ac\u2122S THINK ABOUT THIS NOW. What the fuck<\/i> is he planning? Clearly there is some intention operating here, but what the hell<\/i> is it? When had he meant<\/i> for her to see this unreal ability of his?<\/p>\n

None of you say anything because there\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s nothing to say.\u00c2\u00a0<\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Except WHAT THE FUCK IS GOING ON!?!?!?!?!<\/p>\n

NOTES<\/b><\/p>\n