The Fifth Season by N. K. Jemisin – Episode 10
The Buddies dive into N. K. Jemisin Hugo Award Winning book, The Fifth Season. The Buddies found themselves once again playing stock market advisors, helping our fellow listeners buy or sell V8, unconventional relationship dynamics, and dramatic last lines. The Buddies also played dictionariers, defining pantomime (emphasis on the pant), fulcrum, and the many meanings of lip licking.
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Transcript for SEO 🙂
All right. Welcome to Buddy Bull Club. Thanks for checking us out. I’m Dylan here with my baritone Bud Keith, to break down some best sellers today, we’re dipping our toes into some sci fantasy with the first book of N. K. Jemisin Broken Earth series. Yes, that’s right. Good, buddies, I’m talking about the fifth season, winner of the 2016 Hugo Award. If you’d like to reach out to us regarding this book or any of our past or future episodes, you can visit our website buddybookclub. Com. Slide into our DMs on Twitter or Instagram Buddy Book Club podcast, and you can listen to us on itunes, so please download and subscribe. Keith, it’s been too rusting long since I heard your selfie voice. How are you doing, bud? Now? I feel like I need to talk much lower since you said I have a deep voice. I did well, I listened to the Mike Rowbook, and he just I mean, talk about baritone. That guy really good. I mean, it just puts you to sleep in a great way. So this book has obviously a lot of moving parts, so we haven’t really dipped too deep into fantasy or Sci-Fi. Obviously, we did a little Neil Gaiman, but this is a lot of world building. I think we’re on the same page where we don’t want to get into too much exposition about what’s happening in the world itself and how that works. We could probably spend a whole pod just talking about how this world works. We like the lighter fare. So we’re going to go that route. The saga is set on the supercontinent stillness, which is seemingly misnomer since every few hundred years or so, there’s a catastrophic climate event the locals referred to as the fifth season. I don’t know if you caught that, but one of the seasons was like a teeth season. No, I had a tough time just understanding this book in general. It’s not always like a tidal wave or volcanoes exploding. It’s all of the big things locust. But one of them, they said, was like a teeth season. I don’t think they went to too much detail about it because I would have remembered that. But I am curious. I need how what you call it. Jr. Tolkien has the backstory books about different time periods and whatnot I need a backstory for this just on what happened during the teeth season. But anyhow, the stillness is kind of like an Old Testament Earth. It’s evil and fucks people up. I mean, they even say at one point, Father Earth hates us. The society, though, is made up of a few different groups of people or peopleish. Things. We have the origins. Basically, they’re Earthbenders for you. Avatar last Airbender fans out there. We have the Guardians who control the origins somehow. I don’t know. They have the power to do. So we’ll accept it. And we have stone eaters, and they’re like stone people, not the stone people. From Game of Thrones, but they eat crystals and move through rock is basically what I got. That’s the world we did. It good. Pause be out there. Obviously, it’s a lot more intricate than that, but maybe we’ll go through some of it as we’re talking through our categories. The main three stories that the fifth season is based on our focuses on are three characters, three women. It’s a young girl Damaya who has like, a Harry Potter story. You’re in origin de Maya. We have Cyanide and Alabaster. They have some sex opaids and Essun and HOA who do their take on Cormac McCarthy’s The Road and just have this walking journey where they see different things. I described it as a revenge story, a Harry Potter coming of age story and a hero’s journey master teaching apprentice story. So those three things, which I think are all amazing concepts, which in my love hate section, I put that as a love. I like the premise of all three are great. Yes. Well, let’s not get too far ahead because we got a bunch of categories to go through, but before we dive into those, we usually like to get into a libation based off the book, considering we’re all going to be sitting here enjoying each other’s company for the next half hour, 45 minutes or more. Unfortunately, this, I think, is our first book that doesn’t really have booze in it, which I didn’t realize how many books did have booze in them until we started doing this. But the only other drink Besides water that’s discussed is Safe, which is kind of a drink they share at meetings and like negotiations and whatnot basically because it changes color if anything is added to it specifically, any poison. Interesting idea, but doesn’t really fit our purposes here. So let’s just say, you know what? Pick your poison. Screw the safe. Pick your poison. Whatever is good for you. Let’s jump into. Normally, we like to put this part with our favorite character, but I would like to instead discuss your favorite storyline because it’s really those three storylines, and it’s written in kind of like a George RR Martin format where he has one chapter that’s like on someone’s journey, it kind of ends with a cliffhanger and then it goes to another journey and you read that one for a bit. So out of the three de Maya Cyanide Esun, which one were you excited when that was the next one coming up? Well, you know, for meh, I think the coming of age, the Harry Potter feel that’s up my alley. I like that. I guess the young adult section of books typically especially in fantasy, and that’s exactly what I thought this would be. I don’t think it necessarily fulfilled my quench or my desire because all I did was end up with more questions by the end of the book about what was that circle or whatever she came to. Yeah, the plug the outlet. I just didn’t understand anything that was going on there. And why do these people have control over them? Why are they basically slaves them? Nothing was answered. All I was left is like, Lost, like, season two. And you’re just like, oh, man, there’s so many questions, but can’t wait till they answer these. That’s what I got the feeling of when I got done with it, I was like, what is the Hurley bird? What is the Hurley Bird? Yeah, I’m with you there. And just kind of to add to what you were talking about with Tamia. I mean, I’m in the same way. I think it’s kind of interesting that some people don’t like kids in fantasy novels. So I wanted to like, Demiah’s story the most like, oh, cool. This is Harry Potter. We’re going to get some cool fulcrum story. She’s going to sneak into the library and learn some dark shit, and it just didn’t fulfill any of that. And to be fair, it was your idea to read the first book of a trilogy. So I feel like we have to give them the benefit of the doubt that these questions may or may be answered within the next two books, but that I don’t think it’s fair. You don’t watch a first movie and then be like, oh, yeah, I can’t wait now. I get to wait for the second and third like, no, you need to capture my attention and get me engaged. Like, Harry Potter. I know we use it all the time, but did you watch the first Harry Potter and think, oh, I’m really glad they really built this world, but I really want some more story. No, that was a full complete story. If that was set on its own, it would be fine. He didn’t need the six other books to make that a good story. I mean, Austin Powers, did you need the other two? You’re cheating. You’re just trying to get all of our secret stuff out there within the first ten minutes of the episode. That’s not fair. Got you. Sometimes apps just have to. Yeah, it’s like the picture book, and you just putting Waldo right all over the place. I don’t like that. So, yeah, Demi didn’t really fulfill it for me. I would say the Cyanide and Alabaster story was probably my favorite. I did not like the explicit sex scenes. That’s just not for me in literature. It makes me uncomfortable. Maybe it’s my prudish self or my guilty Catholicism that I don’t practice. But that stuff at the beginning was just kind of weird. But then afterwards we’ll get into a little bit of this later when we talk about individual scenes and whatnot. But that afterwards was actually like somewhat of a story that had an ending to it. I’m going to go with that. Plus, all that just seemed like a cool guy. But there’s a lot of ancillary characters in this novel some are coming quickly. Other ones kind of travel throughout the entire book. Is there anyone that jumped out to you that resonated with you at all or someone that you were like, oh, cool. I’m excited. This person is getting some, quote, unquote screen time. So first up, just for an Ancillary character, learner the Doctor who’s, like, seemingly the only nice, legitimate dude in this book. He just seems that. So. Remember in the beginning? Yeah, well, at the end of the year, I don’t remember what he said in the end, but in the beginning, I think he had a crush on, yeah, at the end he tried to come on to her. He was like, What’s going on? Yeah, whatever. It’s fine. But he was like, the only seemingly nice person he knew she was an origin and didn’t say anything about it and came and made her feel better after her child had died. So I think he was just a good all around dude. So I liked him. But my favorite of the main characters was HOA, the mysterious child that eats rocks. When we find out that what is the term for them again? Stone eaters. Stone eaters. Eat stones, I guess. Rock eaters. Yes, the never ending story. We also finished this book, like three weeks ago. So I’m like trying her all the details, but all she does is complain about having him around and being like, he’s going to wine when he doesn’t sleep enough. He’s going to complain about not having enough food, and he doesn’t complain ever. Not once doesn’t say one peep, and he has powers that protects them. This is why you treat children like just normal people because you can expect more of them. She has such a low bar for him. And he was kind of just a man, right? That’s fair. Yeah. You should have saved that for stock up, treating children like adults, because that’s a big thing of yours. I know. So you bought that stock away early. That’s fair. Now Ho was definitely the most interesting. Like, I was like, what the heck is this creature? And his introduction was very much like almost Terminator two, just like, came out of nowhere, like came out of the ground and was like, birthed and then ate some rocks. Wait, what the fuck? What the fuck is happening here? That’s some crazy shit. I like Ho as well. I think an honorable mention for me would also be donkey, he or her. I’m not going to assume the pronouns, but Tonki was like, comless, which is one of the people that doesn’t have a com that they’re in. But it turned out at the end that she was from a very rich family and had kind of been traveling, trying to find assume this whole time and definitely knows a lot more. Plus, she was just, like, dirty and smelled bad, and I just respected it. She just didn’t care. I appreciate the not give a fuck attitude. That was confusing me. Remember how she kind of disguised herself as a young origin? Yeah. I think it was to find De Maya. Okay. So was then she disguising herself as a woman when she’s a man. That’s why I was like, I’m very confused by this. No, I think she’s just trons. I think she identifies as a woman, but was born a man. Okay. If you’re in a fantasy novel where you can literally have magic going on around, you really need, can’t you just be like, I’m a woman now? Who cares, right? It just seems like they forced it in there, right? Like, who cares? I don’t know. Yeah. I appreciate the idea that you’re forward thinking, and it’s not a big deal to you. But I think the point that the author was trying to do was to have a trans person in a novel. Like, how often do you see someone that’s trans in a novel? I guess if it would be more ahead of the times if you’re like, oh, yeah, she was a man, right. But who cares? I mean, I don’t know, instead of making it a point to bring it out, but I guess it’s trying to be more inclusive. Yeah. There’s like, magic and stuff in the world, but it’s not like, abracadabra. My Dick’s gone.
Participant #1:
All right. That’s like, this world thing. People are fucking moving through rocks. Do we really care that it’s dressing up like a girl or denim? Who give the fuck, right? Yeah, I’m with you. But she has to note when she’s like, I saw her showering and she had a penis, it was like, all right. But she’s also like, I’m trying to disguise myself, but here I’m naked, by the way. And I’m Transl. It just seems like for no reason in the story. Gotta mix it up, you know, keep us on our toes. So the audiobook is like, what, 15 hours or so? It’s a pretty decent sized book. It’s a long, so lots of stuff goes on. Obviously, each person has their own journey that we jump into and jump out of out of everything you see, read or listen to, depending on how you took it in. What did you enjoy the most? Like what scene kind of jumped out to you because there was a lot of walking. There’s a lot of walking scenes. And there was obviously a lot of exposition about the world in general. But does any scene jump out to you as like, oh, that was cool. And if it was to make it to film, I’d be excited to see that this I feel it would be one of those books where if it were a movie, I feel like I’d be able to understand it better. It just was long, and it was hard to understand what was going on in the world where we need someone to almost paint it. For me. The one scene that I did really like, though, was when she decided to kill her child instead of handing it over and becoming a slave. Essentially, you know what I’m talking about when they attack? I sure do. Yeah. So that was the one scene where you kind of had some emotion where I don’t think I had a note for the first 8 hours of book. I was just like, what’s going on here? Let’s get to something. Let’s get the story going here where that actually you finally are like, all right, let’s go. This is like something where you’re actually having to think about, what would you do? There’s some emotion invoked. Whereas before you’re kind of just like almost reading a textbook being like, where am I at in this story? What’s going on? Does that make sense? I agree with you in terms of the first part. I think if it was a movie and they did it really well because some movies don’t do this. And I look to Lord of the Rings, The Fellowship as a movie that did it. Well, that just opened with that fairly epic scene explaining the Rings and where they came from. And whatnot if you did something similar to that with this movie or this book? I think that would kind of explain it pretty well if you just kind of couple of minutes just to be like, we are in the stillness and that thing. So with you specifically, was it when she smothered her child? That was your favorite scene because it’s a pretty big scene. So you didn’t discuss anything else that happened Besides her smothering her child. That scene was also my favorite, but it wasn’t necessarily the baby murdering that I enjoyed. I appreciate it. It was everything before that because it was actually like some sort of cool battle scene, like they were on this island. And it was the first time we’ve been talking about reading about these origins and Stone Eaters and all this other stuff, but no one’s done anything. It’d be like in Harry Potter feel like you’re a Wizard, Harry. But then we never saw any wizardry until the end of the book. So we finally were able to see what these origins could do Besides quelling earthquakes and moving coral reefs. So Alabaster is doing some bad shit trying to take out boats. They’re raising tidal waves. It just seemed like it would be a cool scene. Plus, then at the end, the stone eater comes up through the ground and pulls Alabaster into the Earth, which was sweet. So it’s got piracy and stones getting tossed. It was fun, which then culminated in her having to kill her own child. But I would not say that was the best part. You’re sick. Yeah, that’s right. I had two issues with that scene. One is that we knew Alabaster was alive. I don’t know why they kind of buried the lead there. So right before that with Essen. We see that. Oh, someone’s here to see you. It’s Alabaster. And then the next scene is a big fight scene. It’s like, okay, so Alabaster doesn’t die here. We kind of want that suspense. We never got it. And then also the Guardians that were on the boat. They don’t have control over those origins that are that far away, so they should be able to fuck them up, right? They just don’t like, they have powers to stop tidal waves and rocks being held at them. I was like, oh, this is an easy win. They’re just going to fucking crush them, but somehow they land and then they just start dominating. I’m like, what? How’s that possible? Like, we just saw the scene before that that she off the boat and she’s not the most powerful person there. Obviously, Alabaster is. But off the boat, she was looking down at a town and fucking moving like, shit. Like, just doing crazy shit. Couldn’t you just do the same thing on land and take fuck all those boats over? I don’t know. Don’t have Yelp that’s NK. Give her a call. I have a very specific question about this. And no, it’s not about why did she decide to murder her own child? That’s what I would have liked. It better if one of the towns people was jealous or something and turned on them and brought the Guardians there. And then 300. You’re doing a little. 300 origins are so powerful. They’re amazing. Here’s. All these boats coming. Oh, no. What do we do? What? What do you mean, fuck them up? Yeah. I think you guys are super powerful. What’s going on here? Yeah, well, they did have three boats, so they were kind of spread out. They were doing their thing. It’s not that easy. All right. And we also don’t really know because it was never explained to us exactly what their powers are. What’d she do that town, didn’t she stopped a fifth season from occurring there, like, way away from the town. You saying at the beginning at the beginning of the novel. So at the end of the novel, the reason that they come find her is because she goes to check out that town that’s been destroyed. And there’s, like, something bubbling. And basically, if she doesn’t call it, then another fifth season is going to break out. I thought that was at the beginning with her own town when she was like, that’s how she got found. Yeah, right. Because the book opens up. The book opens up with some super powerful origin, basically cracking the world in half and her town would have been destroyed. But she just automatically pushes the fault away or something like that. Hence the townspeople, even though they’re saved. They know there’s an origin or raga in the midst. Raga in the midst. There might be a good band name, but once again, we don’t really know exactly where their powers are. And it kind of happens naturally. So I don’t know. I’m not going to try to explain it to you because I just don’t know. Fair enough. Let’s get into our favorite segment, I think, which is becoming our favorite segment. Stock up, stock down. The idea being we’re buying or selling stocks in the open market that are related to this book. I’d like to give it some more explanation, but I really don’t know, and it kind of creates itself every single episode. What do you get for stock up? Yes. I think this one’s going to be a good one for you. Here to start it off here. Stock up. Comcast, customer service. This is like the bane of your existence. And also the stock is super low. Yeah. So let me set the stage here. So Alabaster and Sinai get commissioned out to go to that town. There’s so many names here I never remember. But they go to that town, essentially to solve the issue of their water being fucked up by something underneath. It turns out to be obligatory called. They travel all that way. They end up showing up like two weeks late, they show up, we find out that they’re being paid 100 year loan for this service. They show up and they’re like, how dare you treat us with this? You just showed up fucking three weeks late and we’re paying literally the most money possible to do this to do this service, which they say Alabaster is way beneath alabaster. It’s so easy. Alabaster doesn’t even need to be there 100 year loan. They’re price gouging a shit out of them because it’s a monopoly. And then they have the unmitigated temerity. You like that to say? Nice unmitigated temerity to be like, how about you treat us? So there’s some respect. Get us some of the shit. It’s like, what you show up late. This is like Comcast being like, we’re going to be in an eight hour window, showing up on our ten and then coming and being like, maybe a steak dinner while I’m here while I’m fixing your shitty thing. Oh, yeah. This is a fucking monopoly. So you can’t do shit. I’m going to do whatever I want. Bullshit. I’m still upset about it. Yeah. Let’s go. I think the one thing that you missed in your analogy was that Comcast came and all they did was unplug and replugging. You right. Yeah. But also, they’re so cocky, like this two beneath me that they blow up the town. After that, the town gets eviscerated. Everyone. They didn’t do that, though. Yeah, that would end up happening. That was what the Fulcrum did. I mean, was that a good customer service? Okay, so they showed up. They were like, oh, we found this issue here, and then their house blows up in the next day. That’s basically what happened, right? Hey, just like the Internet, we can’t make it on our own. We need the fulcrum, aka Comcast to come in and help us out so they have price control. It’s simple economics, supply and demand. It’s ridiculous that we’re trying to. Most people feel bad for Alabaster and Sinai at this point after they pull their shit, I was like, what are we talking about here? Well, to be fair, too. Like the people did try to poison them. So it’d be like, you wouldn’t try to poison Comcast if they done this shit. I would
Participant #1:
here. Comcast drink this thing. It says rat poison on it. No, it’s actually not. That’s the name of a brewery. How about you show a little spec to me after I force you to pay a hundred year loan on something that is very easy for you to do, apparently. All right, well, I don’t really understand how that stock up, but you know what? That’s kind of the name of the game. So I’m accepting it. My first stock up here will be bullying, bullying, buying. I’m buying a stock. I’m bullying. Oh, okay. Stock has been pretty beaten up recently. Pun intended. I mean, everyone’s talking about how they were bullied and also different industries and whatnot? It’s not good to be bullied. But when Demiyah goes to Fulcrum, she gets bullied by some other girls. And how do they bully her? They put booze in her juice. Yes. Bully me. Please. Bully the shit out of me. I want to get drunk at school, so I’m into it. Bully buying it. Stocks. Way up, way up. Booze and juice. Little vodka soda. Splash of crayon. I don’t hate it. This is like in Dare class when they’re like, you’ll get offered free drugs all the time. Wait, what? When does that happen? Yeah, that’s like, my favorite meme. Why was I never offered free drugs? Yes, I like it. I’m buying as well. What else do you have for stock up. Stock up wingmanning? Yeah. Stock high. Stock prices high. Everyone loves a good wing, man. How can it get better? So Alabaster and Cyanide go to that island that they get transported to. We’re not talking about poison here. It’s not Cyanide. It’s Cyanide with a T kid. I read how I read. Okay, so don’t patronize me even though I listen to it. I used to call Hermione Harmon when I read that. And Malfoy Malloy, like, Laurie Malloy. Just as a heads up until I saw the movie, and I was like, okay, noted. Give it him a loyal. That makes sense anyways, so they go to the island, and Albaster and Cyanide are both like, we want to bang this Inn dude, right? Yeah, they sure do. And then Albaster is like, listen, come on. I had to bang you. I’m gay. Come on, help me out. He’s not gay. He’s down. He’s what? He’s down, like, he’s down to mix it up. I thought he’s straight gay. He’s like, no, I don’t want to bang you. I didn’t get that vibe, but maybe. I don’t know. I thought he was like, imagine that I’ve had to produce all these kids, but I’m not attracted to females. Oh, maybe that wasn’t it. Either way. Either way and sign it’s like, all right, I’ll do. You a solid, and he’s like, okay, here’s what I’m going to do. I’m going to go back to my place. You go over to tell this innocent dude walked back to my place, and I were going to bang. He just tells Cyanide who likes the guy to go over Wingman for him. Tell him just to come back to his place to bang. Holy shit. What a request. He’s like, yeah, and then also bring some champagne back. I’m going to get some room service, just like, what are we doing here? Is this how Wing Manning works? Now you can go over a guy, that guy and also the confidence to be like, oh, yeah, that guy wants me. Go get them for me. Jesus Christ. Must be nice, huh? They both knew he was interested, but actually, I appreciate both of them because both of them did, like, if you really want him, you can have him kind of thing. And they’re like, no, if you really want them, you can have them, which we all went to College. There’s a few chicks at a party or something like that or a few guys. Whatever the case is, people usually aren’t that nice about it. It’s like, hey, I got dipped to try. Not like, you can’t just, Whoa, no blame people. You get the opportunity to go first. You know, it’s capitalism at a party, you go out there whoever’s best of the best. That’s why I never hooked up with a girl. Ever. Go on. We used to have conversations like, all right, we can try to shoot your shot, and then I’ll try to shoot mine. Okay? Yeah. Okay. I don’t really understand once again how the stock is going to be bought. But you know what? I appreciate it. I appreciate it if we’re talking about Wingmanning, the new step up is you go over a point at someone you say, bring them back to my room. That’s not even Wingmanning that’s customer service. That’s fine. It’s like finding out that cars can drive themselves now, right? It’s the next level up. If you told me, hey, you want to invest in cars and you find out that cars now can drive themselves. That’s a big investment. That’s a big advancement. Yeah. Imagine if cars could pick up chicks for you. Exactly. I mean, figuratively. That’s what I’m saying is that Wingman used to be X. It’s. Now y y is much higher valuation. You buy an X kid. Do I explain the stock market to you? Jesus Christ. Actually, you do. But I’ll get onto my next stock up, which relates to this one unconventional relationship dynamics, specifically polyamory. Okay, so we’ve had unconventional family dynamics, but we’re going with unconventional relationship dynamics. And I know the stock is on the rise right now. People are more open to, just, like, single partner relationships, but they seem to have something good going, even though this whole wingman thing is how it started, it worked out pretty well because it turns out they have this sort of love triangle between Cyanide Albaster and Inn, but they have a nice little consensual love triangle. It kind of reminds me if you want to check something fun out on HBO, Louis Thoreau, who’s a wonderful documentarian. He has a documentary episode on Polyamory, and he kind of tries to find holes in it, and sometimes it works. Sometimes it doesn’t. But, hey, if it makes you happy and doesn’t hurt anyone, God bless. And it seemed to work really well for them. And especially because Sinai and Al bastard really weren’t into each other so much sexually. But they were both into Inn. But then they also both enjoyed watching him with the other one. So without getting too graphic here, it just seemed like it was a really nice way for them to build their relationship. I’m not into you sexually, but gosh, I love when he has sex with you. So, hey, polyamory stock up, baby. I’m buying. I like, how literally, right before this, you were like, I wasn’t big into the sex stuff that was going on in this book. And then you just described the sex stuff that was going on for the last five minutes. Well, I was okay with that sex stuff. It was more the one on one. Like, Are we going to have sex tonight? And he was like, oh, he thrust inside of me. It’s like, good God, I’m not interested. Disgusting. Yeah. I just don’t like to read it. I feel like the sex stuff when it’s just casual. It makes me very uncomfortable. I like the Mr. And Mrs. Smith this big lead up. So, you know, something’s going to happen to those, like, the climax, if you will. Wow. Look at those puzzles. Nice. That’s when it’s satisfying. It’s not really satisfying. And then we had a really good relationship. I actually had one of my hates is the soap opera that was happening on the island. This is just like, here just to be here. It doesn’t really add anything for me. I was on the train one time, and I read a page of 50 Shades of Gray over some woman’s shoulder, and I was. So I read the whole book on. I was just so uncomfortable reading it. I was like, oh, my God. Is this what this book is? I was one page. It was explicit and uncomfortable, and, hey, I’m just joking around. I’m no Prude here, but it was just weird to see in text. And I just got thinking that maybe when we have our 50th episode, we do 50 Shades of Gray and both really stumbled through it. Some candles on in the bathtub potentially reading that one. Did you have any more stock up before we get into stock down? I did not. By the way, we’re on episode ten right now. So the kids are one fifth of the way there. Wow. All right. Fifth season of the way there. All right, let’s get into stockdown. What are you selling? Dramatic last lines for stock down for me. Dramatic last lines. Yeah. So I love the books, like movies or anything that have those big cliffhangers at the end. And this book really needed a big pay off because there wasn’t much story going on. In my opinion, we needed something that hook line and sinks you’re into the next one where you get those chills the goosebumps at the end of the book. Where, like, Holy shit. I got to get to the next one. You know, I’m talking about. Yup, I sure do. This ending line was have you ever heard of something called a moon? What? Like the anti? Say it again. Say it again. Have you ever heard of something called the moon? That was a line or called a moon? The moon might have been discussed, maybe one sentence in the whole book. And that was the ending after this whole big story of boil building that doesn’t really answer anything we get who the fuck’s the moon. What do I care about? Why is that the ending? I had to rewind a couple of times. I was like, no, they didn’t just say that. Is that what they’re like? The cliffhanger we’re leaving on after the 16 hours book, Neil Armstrong called. No One gives a shit. We’ve already discovered the moon, sir. All right, sorry. I’m a little upset. Well, just so you know, in case you’re wondering, the moon is a natural satellite. It orbits the Earth. It’s probably a chunk that came off the Earth that now orbits it. But that’s the moon. So I answered your question. Stock up. Do you remember that last line? I did, but I mostly only remembered it because you kind of baited me to it when you finished it before I did. Okay, I forgot it, but, yeah, I don’t know if they were trying to kind of say that this is our Earth, but they did also talk about Antarctica before that. So it wasn’t really blowing away. Or the other thing I was thinking was the moon is a giant stone. So can they move the moon? Is that what they’re going for? That’s not the moon. That’s a battle station. Stock down for me was forced reproduction. The fulcrum matches. Their job is like match origins up for them to reproduce and then takes their babies for node stations. Hence why, Alabaster is so glum the whole time because he’s had tons of babies and they’re all hooked up at these node stations, which basically they just put these kids into coms that are kind and then hook them up to machines. Kind of like neo in the egg. And it’s just really unfortunate. And they just stopped seismic activity. So I don’t know other places where they’re having forest reproduction. I can’t imagine that stock is selling pretty high, but either way, I’m selling it. Okay, well, good to know. Couldn’t some say that arranged marriages are for that purpose? So you hate arranged marriages? Demon breaking news, hot take. Yeah. I mean, I’m not a big fan of those either, but those are slightly okay. What else you got? All right, letting people live their life. So this is a big thing with this book. People telling people how to live. They kept on being like, you can’t live on this island. Are you crazy? And then you can’t live underground. Are you crazy? Just let people live. Who the fuck cares do they want to live on the island? Who cares if they want to live underground? Who cares if they’re not doing what you want them to do? Or it’s unconventional. Let them live. It was just don’t you know anything? You shouldn’t be doing this. I don’t know if you got that vibe, but I was getting so frustrated when all the talk was, like, the same thing as, like, oh, I know better than you. And this is what you should do and not do this. I didn’t care for it. If we took that mentality, then no one would live on Hawaii. And Hawaii is a beautiful place. Exactly. It sounded like the island people were the best. What’s her problem with these people? I don’t get it. Yeah, but there was also, like, a bunch of hidden origins on those Islands so they could kind of like whenever there were shifts, like, fuck them back up. But yeah, I mean, you dig troughs in case volcanic activity comes, and then it goes down a certain way. Like, whatever those people are, the happiest people there, right? Their life dies. They lived better lives in the time they were alive than everyone else did. I agreed. I like that one. All right. I have my next one. Stock down fulcrums. It was a simple machine that allowed us to gain a mechanical advantage. It’s a central aspect to so many inventions in human society. Plus, who doesn’t love a good seesaw. And now this clandestine organization had to take ownership of the word and ruin it. Archimedes is turning over in his grave. I didn’t appreciate that at all. Stock down full terms. I think you almost went above our listeners, not me. I knew exactly what a full term was before you just said it, and I didn’t have to look it up on Google right now, but, yeah, that might be a little too highbrow for the kids out here, but for sure, just Google it. I don’t know. I did Google it, but I did not know that before then. We’ll know it from now. You never played any of those, like, super fun computer games back in the day, like Gizmos and Gadgets and stuff like that. I played the submarine one where you had to do math problems. So that’s why I’m great at math. Sloppy disk. Maybe take me back. What else do you have for stock down? Yeah. Last one for me was timeline stories post Christopher Nolan stock down. I know it’s a long one, but when did you know that all three characters were the same? Because I kind of knew the second time that she was started talking in third person. I said, oh, so these are all the same people. That was obvious to me, but I feel like that was supposed to be kind of a big reveal. When did you kind of know that? Yeah, I’m a big, dumb dumb. So I don’t think I knew until ASUN had said, her name was Cyanide. I think it was one of them said that that was their name, and then I was like, oh, well, if that’s the case, then these are the same people. And if they’re the same people, then of course, Demiia has to be the third one, like the same storyline. So I didn’t know until late, and I actually enjoyed that reveal, but you’re a little bit. Kris Nolan ruins everything because all of his movies are all like, timeline and jumping, and you basically have to be on your toes. So right on that, I’m like, Why would you be talking in third person this whole time? And also a big earthquake happened in one of the timelines, and then it didn’t affect any others. So I was like, okay, so obviously these are multiple timelines. Interesting. For my last stock down, I had V eight. Are you familiar with V eight? The tomato juice, indeed. I mean, V eight is gross, and it’s already 100%. It’s already a Penny stock. Wait, is that what they put in? Bloody Mary’s? Maybe like old ones. But nowadays people have hip Bloody Mary mixes and stuff like that. Got you. But, yeah, V eight is disgusting. And it’s probably one of these new coins. It’s like V eight coin, but the shit is going to go to zero after that. Come uses it as a toxic vegetable juice to try and kill Alabaster. So from here on out, you know, it’s just bad press. So V eight was used to try and kill Alabaster plummeting. So I’m selling that stock stock down. V eight. Fuck you. V eight splash, though. That fucks noted. Yes, that’s the one that’s, like, the fruit juice, right? That’s actually. Yeah, pretty much just fruit juice. That bangs. Okay, we’re good. Let’s get into love. Hate. What did you love about this book? I already said the Killing Your Own Child thing. I like the Rings and the society concept, but I think we already have that. I have this many degrees. And here’s my title on LinkedIn. I kind of thought that was kind of already established. Yeah. So I had something similar. It was the idea of leveling up because Fulcrum origins level up by collecting rings, like Sonic or something. Yeah, exactly. Ten rings is the top, which is like, not many people have. But the thing I didn’t understand was why stop there? Why not have more like, if you had eleven rings, where would you put your 11th ring? Well, if Alabaster’s last line was, did you know they made eleven rings? I’d be like, oh, shit. Like, what does that mean? Then? I’d be more into it. But who the fuck cares with the moon? I’m so pissed about, to be honest, do you know that I actually have eleven rings? And she’s like, no way. Where is this? He drops his pants. Where is it?
Participant #1:
Okay. Yeah. I mean, we do have it in our society, although it’s less fun. It’s just like we’ve been promoted. I think I talked about this, but the concepts of all three stories were great. I think if Quentin Tarantino made this movie, I think it’d be amazing. You wouldn’t even know they’re connected, but they’re connected because this is a very, almost like, character driven. Not a lot going on. So you almost need that kind of funny dialogue. I don’t think he does stuff like this, but it’d be interesting. So for my first love, I’m going with Kakuzas so briefly mentioned, and I think Ho at one point kills one, which is like animal Crute, cruelty. Peta where you at. But Cacos are like, they’re explained as giant five footed land otters that people keep as pets. So otters are maybe one of the cutest mammals out there. So I’m down like, yes, please. I want one. And also for some reason, I said this, but they have 5ft. Why do they have 5ft? How does that work? Right? One for each season. But what do you think about pentipedal animals? Are you into them? I mean, that’s a great vocab word there. I’m trying to think of anything that has more than four or eight. So anything else? Six. Well, there’s, like, obviously centipedes and millipedes and stuff like that that have a lot more ants have six. Don’t ants have six? Yeah, that might sound right. Are starfish the only one that have odd. I don’t know if those are legs. I think technically, a Kangaroo is considered a five footed animal or pentipedo. No chance. Yeah, because their tail is considered like a foot because they use it for, like, they stand up on the monkeys. Monkeys would then have it, too. Get out of here with that. That makes sense with monkeys, but I’m pretty sure. I mean, Kangaroos. I’m going with it. So either way, Cocoa’s love them. I need more of them. I need an army of kakuzas. I want HOA to lead an army of Kakuza. Kakuzai? I don’t know. An army of Kakuza would be the right word for it. Like a Parliament of Owls. What else did you like for love or what else did you love? Let’s just stick with that. I like the world building itself. I kind of run through most minds. I thought the world building was good. I thought it was an interesting if you just describe me. Hey, it’s a world where quakes are constant. Basically, X Men, there’s bad guys and good guys that both have powers that are kind of fighting each other. And then there’s normal humans around, and it’s just crazy world with anything can happen. Yeah, that sounds great. It sounds like a cool world. I appreciate that. I didn’t really feel like it was bad guys and good guys, like everyone kind of had their shades of Gray. Even the fulcrum is, like, all origins, but they seem to be like, really horrible people. And the Guardians seem to be some of the worst people, but at the same time, they had their good moments, too. And they were like, teaching moments. So I kind of thought about the Guardians. Kind of like Matthew McConaughey’s dad. Okay. I think the Guardians were a lot worse. That’s why she killed her child. That’s how bad she thought they were. So I thought that was pretty established. Matthew McConaughey beat up that bouncer and put him in life support, let’s say, because he wants his dad’s love. So. Hey, tomato, tomato. I guess so. One of the things I loved was the reveals. I know you were onto it a little early. You snuffed it out, you gum chew you. But bean off is bean off. A little Ace Ventura, if you will. And I mean, the penis thing actually checks out with that analogy. To come to think of it, Finkel is IronHorn. Ironhorn is fungal. And then obviously the big one de Maya soon cyanide being the same person. I didn’t see it. She did a good job. She got me. And a lot of stuff that we had read of late didn’t get me, so I appreciated it. Good for you. Good for you. Well, I guess I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention the roving bands of cannibalistic children that were discussed. It was very brief, but this being the third or fourth book we’ve read that includes references to Cannibalism. I had to mention it in coincidence. Like, Keith, are you picking books strictly based on Cannibalism? What? Next week we’ll be talking about the cannibalistic societies of New Guinea. What did you hate? I wasn’t a big fan of the third person perspective. I thought it was going to be for a chapter, and then it was like, that whole story. I was like, all right, this is kind of a third person. I don’t understand how the persons work. Can you explain that to me? She’s like. And then you decide you need to eat because you’re hungry. Oh, I think that’s the second person. Whatever the fuck it is. I don’t know what person is when they’re talking about you. I think that’s second person and literally the only reason why I know that is because I read one review on this book, and that’s exactly what they said, too. They’re like, I don’t understand the second person perspective. And then I was like, I don’t understand second person perspective. Assume they did it as the reveal I didn’t care for. It wasn’t my cup of teacher, a couple of other ones I kind of discussed. But obviously there wasn’t a ton of story. And I also thought there was just a lot of facial expression descriptions, which doesn’t do much for me. And then albasters or had this look on his face and it was like a paragraph of like his face. Does she like this like that? Like he did this? Are you making fun of me? Okay, whatever. All right, here’s what it comes to. Okay, I like. And that’s not a sense. As in I love just straight to the point. Fucking right down the middle. Fast forward in the middle, young adult. Okay, there’s more going on here. My small brain isn’t able to comprehend it or whatever. Yes, you definitely hate it. That was strong. Hate. I’m going to go the equal and opposite of your world building. I’m not going to say I hate. I just didn’t really like the idea of stone lore, and really the world geometry and chemistry were never my strong suits. I’d be a trash Geomet. I wasn’t interested in a world that’s basically based on fault lines. Like, it’s a world where like, Dante’s Peak is like the Bible, like pass. So I have no idea what Stonewall is. Even after they opened up the chapter with it. Every time there are like tablets or something. I mean, if I was interested in made up stories based on Stone tablets, I just joined the Latter day Saints and read about John Smith finding some tablets. Hey, listen, let’s not attack our Mormon followers here. There’s no need for that, alright? I’ll attack everyone else too. The Ten Commandments Judaism, Christianity. What’s the celebrity religion, Dionysus, is that what you’re talking about? Or is that different? Scientology, Scientology. Oh, Scientology. Okay, those are different. Those are different than Mormonism. Jesus, you’re going to get the hate mail all hate mails sent directly to Keith. We’re going to be unfunded. Damn it. All our Morgan sponsors are pulling out, which they don’t do normally, and they appreciate the polymorris polyamory. I don’t know that word. I think polygamy is different than polyamory, but I’m not a specialist. Okay? We are crossing a lot of bridges here today. Oh, we’re losing listeners by the second. Did you have anything else that you hated about this book? I feel like hate is too strong. We might need to change this category. Love and dislike. No, I think you can hate something. That’s fine. I didn’t like the soap opera island scene. That sounds like a VH one fucking reality. Tv show. That’s what it was for, like, 90% of it. And then I didn’t take a single note for the first 8 hours. Not one single note. Yeah, that’s how much I like all my notes. I look back at them for the first half of the book, and we’re all just, like, explaining. I was trying to explain it to myself. Like, what was happening got you who the characters were. And I looked back, and I was just as confused as I was before. So that’s fair. I immediately read the plot after finishing it, like, on Wikipedia or something. Yeah, that’s fair. Did you have any quotes? Potent quotables? This wasn’t a quote, but I had two things that I needed explaining. One was that Licking lips was talked about maybe 100 times. They’re like, then she licked her lips, which I don’t understand what that does for me. As a reader, I try to list out all the things that licking lips could mean. It could be dry mouth, hungry, anxious, crazy lustful, pretending to be a snake, thinking deeply, like, there’s a million things it could be. And they just kept everything, like, then she licked her lips. Who the fuck cares? What does that mean? That just makes me think of here we go again. But Harry Potter for the movie, when they have the bad guy just lick his lips all the time, and it made no sense whatsoever. It’s like, you have to have these weird ticks and just, like, lick your lips. It’s like, what? That’s not Canon. Why is this in here? You know, the Joker in Batman was looking his lips all the time. You know, he did that because he had prosthetic lips on, and he needed to keep them there. And then there was like, just keep doing that. You look fucking insane. You heard about Heath Ledgers? Yeah. Oh, cool. Christopher Nolan tidbit. Wow. We might add Christopher Nolan to our bingo board, our buddy book club, bingo. And then lastly, I didn’t know what Pantomiming was, but they used that word 50 times. So now I do. So that’s good. Wait, that’s just like when you show people things with your hands. Are you acted out, right? Yeah. Like, if someone had set it off without any definition, I would be like, I feel like, I know that word, but now I’m like, yeah, I know what PANAMAI means, but she used it so many times. I was like, oh, yeah. Okay. Well, we know what Miming is, and then Pan, right is hand. No, it’s Pant
Participant #1:
too much too soon. Yeah, I liked it. Save that. Save that for this trailer. Let’s cast this movie. I don’t know. There’s a lot of characters. I think that probably we should focus on some of the main ones to be honest with you. And I’m going to be brutally honest with you. I didn’t have a character for Cyanide or Esun. I didn’t have an actor or actress, whatever. Either. Or I didn’t have anyone that could play those people. So what did you think about either of those, if you have. All right. What do you think of this right now? Here you are. Cyanide. Zoe Krabbits Essun her mom, Lisa Bonet. Yes. You see that they look very similar and obviously because they’re related, but yes, but would that give it away because everyone has their own preconceived notions of what the Pearson looks like. But in a movie now you know who the person is right away, right? Yeah. To be fair, I don’t know if I’ve seen Zoe Kravitz and anything. Besides, she was in, like, that Harry Potter movie, Fantastic Beasts or whatever. But I can’t think if I’ve seen her in anything else. She’s an Xmen. Wait, what? Who does she play? Xmen? She’s a side character, but she’s like a bad person. And she’s also in, I think, Hunger Games. No, maybe that’s her dad in that. Yeah, her dad’s definitely in that. Okay, interesting. I can dig it. I can dig it in your X Men vein. De Maya. I like Daphne, who plays the young girl in the Logan movies. In the Logan movie. I guess there’s only one. Did you see that picture? Yes. Okay. Yeah. She can pretty much play her character from his dark materials. The HBO show based on his dark materials, the novels. I just think she’s so good and can kind of play that like I’m rooting for her badass but also vulnerable thing. So I’m down with her. Obviously, she’s not a person of color, so I don’t know if that would work, but you know what? That’s what I went with. Okay. What do you have for anyone else? Alabaster, I had either Benedict Cumberbatch or Samuel L. Jackson. Very different people like Alabaster is a little kooky, which the thing is, it should be way different vibes. So I don’t know what you go for. So if you’re going, the more like, kind of kooky out there, better to come back to that. If you’re going for more the angry on a whim eccentric, you go Samuel Jackson. So I think you could do both or maybe a mix of them to both of them somehow. Yeah. A mix of faces, their personalities. I went with Clive Owen for Alabaster. I don’t know why, but I just wanted him for that. Maybe it’s because I’ve been watching a lot of The Nick recently. Steven Soderberg show on Showtime. I think so. Alabaster is like he’s seen so much shit go down, and he’s just kind of disillusioned by the whole situation. He’s a ten Ringer. Everything should kind of be in his hands. But every time he has a kid, he gets taken, they get taken away. He has no control, even though he has all the control. And I think that’s kind of like his character in The Nick where he has so much control. But he also has no control because he’s addicted to stuff that it just hit me. And then he was also in Children of Men, which is such a phenomenal movie. And Dystopian. And this book is going to be kind of a Dystopian novel in a way, even though it’s Sci-Fi fantasy. That’s why I went with him. That’s a really long explanation for why I went with climbing right there. But you know what? I’m sticking to it. Okay. Do you have anyone else? Hoa. I had eleven from Stranger Things. I know she’s a girl, but whatever. It doesn’t matter. You can play that character. Yeah, I think that’s. Well, obviously that’s kind of like her character thing. That’s why we’re not very creative here, but you know what? We’re on Brand. Yes. Exactly. The casting agents know it’s good. Did you have anyone for her? No, I have one more character. Okay. Sheffa and Shafa, whatever Michael Fassbender for that. Just like for sheffah. Yeah, another expense guy. But I feel like he can play the I’m fatherly to you role, but also be an asshole. He kind of does that in X Men and in Steve Jobs. I mean, you don’t have to convince me I fucking love Michael Fastbender. I almost watched that Macbeth movie, which I try to stay away from Shakespearean movies because I don’t understand what they’re saying, but I almost watched it just because Michael Fastbender was the main character. And I was like, I just want to see more of Michael Fastbender. I did have Shafa, though, and that’s where I threw in Nic cage. He’s a white eyed, badass origin. You put in a cage and a ton of makeup, and you keep his stringy hair from Connar. Like, yeah, I want him there. I could see him doling out some advice while also some abuse and being really excited about it. Last one I had was Inan Jason Momoa, who is married to Lisa Bonet. But just as a sex appeal of he could handle a Pauly Morris relationship. Polly Morris? Yeah, he could do. This is maybe your best casting. Thank you. I appreciate that because he plays that pirate role so well, and he’s, like, super sexy, so definitely would be, like, the sought after person of the group he’s married to Lenny Kravitz’s ex wife. Yeah, I’m not usually a People magazine kind of guy, but this is interesting. There’s also pictures. Now I’m looking at, like, Lenny Kravitz, the whole family together. This seems so wholesome. It seems kind of like a love triangle, like in the book. Let’s get to the meat and potatoes. Would you recommend this book to a friend or one of our wonderful listeners who for some reason hasn’t read it yet, considering we just gave away pretty much everything. No, I mean, I’m not going to read the second one. No, just hard. No, you know me. I tell it like it is. It’s just not my type of book. I mean, everyone seems to like it in reviews. And one the Ugo word, obviously. So again, maybe I just need to stick with young adult fantasy. I like the covith one where that one’s called the Name of the Wind. Yeah, that seems a little long winded too, but I thought that was better. I don’t know. I just seem like, I mean, that one was definitely long winded. It’s 1000 pages. That’s no joke. It’s probably like a 25 hours. I think that was. Yeah, but there’s more happen in that. And I follow you got more. It was more Harry Potter, but it was like a grown up in Harry Potter. I think that’s the thing with the name of the Wind was it’s like there’s a lot of time with him at school, like struggling and trying to make money and stuff. So it was actually somewhat interesting. Yeah. I mean, everyone has to eat their own poison, as they say. This might not be your PO zone, and you might want a little bit of different one. And I would say that if someone was well read in the fantasy realm, I don’t even know how this is, like, Sci-Fi. They say it’s Sci-Fi fantasy. There’s no Sci-Fi in it. Yeah, it’s like they talk about rocks, but there’s no real science. Science. Yeah, it’s not science fiction, but it’s definitely fantasy, which we both love. Take me away into a new world. I love that stuff. I would just say that if you were really well read in fantasy and you hadn’t read this, definitely check it out. It could be right up your alley. But if you were just getting into fantasy, I wouldn’t start here. I just don’t think it’s going to stick. It’s not like a wonderful kind of. I can’t wait to read the rest of them, not even saying that the name of the Wind is because I thought the second one wasn’t that great. I didn’t read the second one on that either. But go on. Yeah, but at least the point is, what you’re saying is the first one had at least some sort of an ending. Yeah, I could be talking to the second one for sure for that. Whereas this I’m like, I don’t know if I can do it. Yeah, we do a similar podcast with movies, or at least we’re jumping off a little side project. But the thing we’re talking about is like, do you pick your phone up during this movie? And like, during this book, there were several times I was like, yeah, I just need to get through this chapter, like, God, I just need to get through this chapter. It’s just not holding me at all. So I didn’t dislike it. I didn’t like it. It’s just kind of in the no man’s land of books for me if I was in prison and the guy strolled by with the book cart and there was the second book in there along with 30 other books. I’d say, like, hey, give me that. And I’d probably fucking love it. That is a low bar to set for book. This is supposed to be a yes. No. And you just somehow decide, you know what? If I was in prison and I had no intervention, I’d read this book. That’s the best you can do. I was having trouble because I really didn’t like it through the first three quarters. Then it kind of picked up at the end, and I was like, okay, maybe this will be interesting. And then it ended, and I was like, oh, well, now you’re not going to use that to pull me into the second one thing happened again. But either way, I enjoyed having a conversation with you about it. I think this was definitely through some stuff out of left field, which I’m always expecting from you, and I really appreciate it. And we have another book coming up, right? Oh, yeah. What do we got? I mean, slow down. Hold on, hold on, hold on, hold on. Sorry. This is your bread and butter. This is what brought us together here. What are we reading? The Transfer of Power buy my boy. Vinny Flynn, Vince Flynn. Rest in peace. Gone too soon. My favorite author other than JK Rowling. We’ve already started it, and it just gets your heart going. It’s an amazing book. I can’t wait to talk about it. I’m excited as well. We’re recording this on May 19. I would suggest, because this book, Transfer of Power is a total beach read. Right? 100% beach read. I would suggest that from here on out, we go straight. Beach reads until August. Okay. So we’ll read the room next.
Participant #1:
All right. Well, I’m excited to talk about transferring power with you. Keep your happy tissues around because I know you’re going to need during that podcast for all the listeners out there. Thanks for checking in. And definitely the next episode. If you want to see Keith Gosh about one of his favorite books, and I mean verbally and another way, check in. But either way, thanks for listening. Take care. Bye.
