I thought the last book was terrifying, but this one is way, way worse. Although both books involve both mankind making bad choices as well as supernatural forces, this one is one that is more likely to happen in real life. Because it is mentioned in the first paragraph or two, I do not feel like it is a spoiler to say that this book involves Cleric Chih going to gather stories from a town that suffered from an incredible famine some 11 years prior.

After twelve weeks of training, I did my second open-water triathlon at the Tarpon Springs Triathlon in Tarpon Springs, Florida.

The Lead-Up

I flew in 4 days before the race. That day I put together my bike and (after a bit of an adventure to get a pump that could pump to 109 PSI), I did a very swift test ride to make sure everything was working on the bike.

This story starts quite abruptly, a change from the usual Singing Hills novellas. I noticed, but figured it was Vo wanting to try something different fore the 5th entry. I should have paid a bit more attention.

This story seemed to me to be a mix of a European folktale and asian mythology, but there are also a lot of themes that seem to be universal among humans. For example, I just learned today of a historical myth around one of the big samurai families that involves a swordsman meeting a monk at a bridge and engaging in battle that is reminiscent of Robin Hood. As usual, it’s hard to talk too much about the story or themes of these novellas without ruining the twist (they almost all have a parallel story structure to a mystery story). I would say that another clue things are off within this narrative is that Chih doesn’t quite ever get the stories she seeks.

A very different environment for Cleric Chih, but no less about stories than the other entries in the series. We even learn a bit more about Signing Hills and the neixin. A great story that has hit me extra hard this year due to some family stuff, but I don’t want to spoil the story.

As always, I love Nghi Vo’s magical realism version of China. The cleric Chih and their mission to document all the knowledge reminds me somewhat of Sazed from the first Mistborn trilogy, another favorite character of mine. This time she’s in the Riverlands, which seems to be a kind of asian version of the American wild west (at least as depicted in movies and tv shows). It also introduces (I think…I don’t remember seeing it before) some wuxia into the Singing Hills series.

Story

Session 07

We start off on a hill overlooking The Mossback Raiders village (the evil Trollkin). The party splits up with Yeahm and Scrabble going west to make a distraction while Ghada, Treb, and Miralou headed south towards a tower.

Flint heads towards a house and spots Trollkin in there, but fortunately is not spotted. Then he heads to the tower and tries to scale it. He is able to scale the Tower and surprises the Trollkin in there. With just one incredible deft move, he fells the guard there.

I think this book is my second-favorite of the Secret Novels (or Hoid novels), after Tress, and potentially tied with Yumi or just ahead of it. Like many of the Secret Novels you can get through most of it without knowing too much of the Cosmere, although, like many of the Secret Novels, portions of the climax and falling action might sound like nonsense to you if you aren’t caught up with The Cosmere. Although if you’ve read up to Stormlight 5 you’ve likely read all the rest of the Cosmere, if you’re one of those Cosmere readers that reads each series in order rather than in publication order, Stormlight 5 has the many relevant connections to what’s going on in this story. I would also say that Isles of the Emberdark would also be highly relevant to this story.

If you read this blog regularly, you know I love retro dice. A year or so ago I backed the Kickstarter for a set of 80s D&D Adventures and character options and I finally got the dice that were the one physical item I backed. I absolutely love the design:

I especially love the cassette tape for the 20 spot on the d20. I’m now torn on my favorite retro dice. The VHS dice form 1985 games has the best case. I love the Miami-style dice as someone who grew up there, but these dice epitomize the color scheme of the early-to-mid 80s. Reminds me of the colors I would see on clothes and building decorations.

I just posted the following to my Github profile about AI usage in my programming projects. Sharing here to document my current thinking on the subject:

AI Usage

I know that opinions on AI usage are very divided at the moment. Some people I respect, like the hosts of Fallthrough and Mike Kennedy of Talk Python don’t see any issues with using it as part of the development process. (Although the Fallthrough hosts are against AI Slop, especially in communications ). Others won’t touch any repo that has included AI contributions.

Tim Pratt has done it again. They have taken a TTRPG setting and turned it into a fun adventure. This book has a similar framing device as the previous one - in the present Dae and Chk Chk are reading the journal of Tyrcell the Android which takes place about 20 years before. The past portions of the book take place about 3-4 years after the events of the first book. Things have calmed down a bit since the events of The Gap and The Society (what eventually becomes the Starfinder Society) has been formed. The main portion of that story has to do with an attack on Absalom Station by Eox, a planet of undead.