Kristin Cashore

Seasparrow

Cassidy Nolan

I lay there for a while, watching the white sails above me catch the wind and propel our ship across the changing sky.

oh my god she found it. a crumb of self awareness

I’m not very good at forgiveness. Or gratitude either, or apology. Even Kera has mocked me for it: 

Do you express your regrets easily, Hava?

 I’m not good at the things humans do to stay attached to each other. I don’t want that attachment. Or anyway, that’s what I tell myself.

“This seems like one of those moments when you’d normally call me a brat.”

why are you so determined to see the worst scenario!!!

More importantly, I was beginning to understand Bitterblue’s urgency better. “You’re prioritizing it because it suits 

 I said. “It’s one of the cogs in the wheels while you build the world.”

oh my GOD you’re being so MEAN for no REASON

“Hava,” Bitterblue said, “I’m tired and irritable. I acknowledge it. It’s probably making me defensive. But I feel like you’re challenging everything I’m saying as a matter of course. Is that true?”

“All right,” she said, putting her hands flat on her desk and focusing her clear gray eyes on me. “Where do you want to be?”

“You look terrible,” I said, a headache beginning to form at the base of my skull. “You look like you never sleep and you’ve hardly put on any weight. And I can tell you have a headache.”

 put on weight,” she said. “And I’m tired and wrried, but I don’t have a headache. I’m fine, Hava. Truly. You can talk to my doctor if you like, or Giddon; they’ll tell you I’m fine. I want to know what 

“No you don’t!” I said indignantly. “You want to use me however it suits you!”

“Hava!” she said, her voice finally growing sharp. “I understand that you’re angry. You have plenty to be angry about, you always have. But I am not your enemy! If there’s something I can do for you that will help you, tell me what it is! Do you want a different job? Different rooms? Do you want to leave?”

I don’t really care what any of the other nations do. I just wish Bitterblue didn’t always have to carry so much on her small shoulders. Maybe I’m mad at Linta for that.

But it was also that I don’t like these reminders that Linta wasn’t merely trying to fathom the world. She was shaping it too, forcibly, just like Bitterblue.

They’re like a family that’s been reunited. I’m on the periphery.

i am so tired. of her short-sighted selfishness.

It sounded like I was never going to have Linta all to myself again.

First it was just a couple of greeters, galloping toward us from the south, swift, but alone. But they weren’t just any greeters. They were Bitterblue’s Lienid cousin, Prince Po, and of course Lady Katsa, both of them crying their Graceling eyes out and hugging Bitterblue so passionately that they kept pulling her right up out of her saddle.

hava. you are so incredibly self-centered.

Like everyone in our party but me, Kera was wearing a beautiful new coat. Every time she crossed my line of sight, indignation rose within me. I’m not saying that if they’d asked me “Should Kera get a coat too?” I would’ve necessarily said no. But she’s my would-be murderer. Couldn’t they have run it by me?

i’m so happy they got to grow old and be happy :’) ily brigan

I spun around to find a white-haired old man looking back at me, through gray eyes lit like the sky over the northern sea. He was brown-skinned, straight-backed, slight, like Linny. He had a nice face.

Lady Bir and her husband came into the wing where our group was staying this morning. Lady Bir was wheeling Liel in a chair. Ladybug was in Liel’s lap.

When Lady Bir’s husband - Prince Brigan - caught my eye, he gave me a small, secretive nod.

i would be rooting for this more if hava would own up to her behavior and apologize to people!!

He gave me that smile, the one I haven’t seen in a while that transfigures his face. It was like warmth, and food, and dry feet. “No roofs or ceilings at sea,” he said.

I needed a minute to recover from that smile.

on the contrary. hava has been a massive brat literally this whole time.

Giddon looked straight at me, his eyes bright. “Hava,” he said, “you’re not a brat. You’ve never been a brat. I think I’m going to stop calling you one.”

, and it’s also the name of a famous Dellian hero, a woman with scarlet, pink, and coppery hair who’s half human, half monster. She has the mind-controlling abilities of a Dellian monster, but the conscience of a human. A kind human. I saw her once, years ago. She’s terrifying and beautiful, and very, very old.

“All right,” he said diplomatically. “Well, you look like you sprang from a fairy tale about righteous heroes who screw the heads off of tyrants, which is usual. And also like you’re trying to keep your expression blank so that I can’t tell what you’re thinking or feeling about anything. Which is also usual.”

The goat, quite reasonably, doesn’t understand why the snow to the south is always more preferable than the snow we’re already standing in. And apparently she doesn’t do things she doesn’t understand.

“This ordeal is going to make all of us irritable,” she said.

“Each of us has a responsibility to keep from lashing out,” she said.

After an eon, I reached a pebbled beach slick with ice where the others were gathering, trying not to fall. Shivering but smiling, even laughing together. Idiots. Land is not a reprieve.

Isn’t it nice, how much easier it is to have a flexible attitude when you’re getting what you want?

“Please remember you have my life in your hands, because if you kill yourself, Bitterblue is going to kill me.”

There’s nothing he’d rather be doing than cheering her on while she eats a. crumb. If I’m ever that fawningly devoted to someone, I hope someone will put me out of my misery.

“I’ll leave you to it, habpva,” she said.

I said nothing, just watched her climb back up to the wheelhouse. Something fills my throat when people use that name. It’s not a bad feeling, exactly. But I can’t respond.

First of all I loved the size of the chapters! It made it very easy to read. I liked that we also got to see Hava’s side of the story in this series and I liked how she was interested in sailing. I liked that about the whole series, how each character had completely different interests I think it made it relatable to more people. I also loved all the details about the foxes I think it added a needed amount of humor since the first parts of the book were kind of heavy. I also enjoyed the survival in an arctic environment and it reminded me in a way the first book and the part where Katsa and Po survived in the woods. I also liked to see Bitterblue from a different point of view. I personally related a lot to Hava cause in a way everyone is learning how to behave in society just like she was hiding. You learn to become someone that might not necessarily be someone you like. You end up feeling empty, invisible and not knowing who you are. I liked how she progressed and we saw her go through this. I’d say this was a good book and a good series I’m looking forward for possible next books in the graceling realm!

Seasparrow

Reviews

Highlights