I've been including a variation of that warning on a majority of posts for this book in particular, haven't I? Still, considering this series is full of potentially triggering subjects handled very poorly, I prefer to be on the safe side here and try to warn where possible!

Oh yeah, you're doing the right thing. I was referring to it being so depressingly necessary, sigh.

I mean, people have been praying to it like it's something that can actually hear and respond to them for this whole trilogy... seriously, the shallowness of these people's religious beliefs is just one of many glaring holes in the worldbuilding, but it's one that bugs me personally quite a lot.

And rightly so; given how massively important religion and spirituality is in every human culture, skipping over it like this is one of the worst worldbuilding mistakes you can make.

Gambling, clearly;). Though it does make me think (again) that Newcomb just jams the cliches together without thinking through if they actually fit or not. So we have obviously stereotypical upper class bad guy hanging out in obviously stereotypical dive bar full of pirates.

Yeah, in reality a rich guy would be gambling with his rich buddies, not flaunting his wealth in the middle of a den of professional thugs and robbers; he's BEGGING to get mugged or kidnapped for ransom. Like what does Newcomb think pirates even do?

And he's about to be turned into the bad guy, after which he'll be treated as if he'd embraced evil by his own choice and is someone our heroes can fight with zero guilt! Seriously, Wulfgar draws one of the shortest straws in this thing, and it's frankly disturbing.

FFS! Ihis is just Murtagh all over again.

"I've been forced to serve the bad guy."
"OMG HOW COULD YOU YOU'RE EVIL JUST LIKE YOUR EVIL FATHER LET ME KILL YOU."

What is with these bad authors and victim-blaming? It's disgusting.

Good... goood...

Anyway, watch this commm tomorrow, since I have a side project coming up and this makes me think of it!

"Let the hate flow through you..."

I feel like Newcomb is trying to course-correct on the misogyny... emphasis on trying. He is not succeeding.

Indeed; his attempts at being not-sexist are just making him look even worse.

At least I'd rather spend time with Marcus, Becca and Geldon than almost anyone else in this mess of a trilogy?

Poor Geldon gets such a raw deal. I'm not looking forward to him being randomly and callously killed off. Let me guess; the kids randomly die at some point too?