#Street Magic

[quietflorilegium]

"They never tell you some things," Briar said bitterly. "They tell you mages have wonderful power and they learn all kinds of secrets. Nobody ever mentions that some secrets you don't ever want to learn." "All you can do is learn good to balance the bad," Rosethorn told him. "Learn and do all the good within your reach. Then, if you wake in a sweat, you have something to set against the dream."

Tamora Pierce, “Street Magic”

[ttrpgbookclub]

This month, we read "i'm sorry did you say street magic", a city-building story game by Caro Asercion.

You can find "i'm sorry did you say street magic" on Caro's itch[dot]io here.

Additionally, we launched a Ko-fi this month! If you're able and want to give us a few dollars, you can find that here.

[nobeerreviews]

What others call magic realism is normal and an everyday thing to me.

-- Laura Esquivel

(Konstanz, Germany)

[mccek]

Magic or illusion? Ep:8

[checkoutmybookshelf]

The Circle Opens Quartet

There is something deep and rich about the Circle Universe that the Circle of Magic quartet illuminated but kind of didn't have space to fully explicate. That's why I am fully and forever grateful that Tamora Pierce followed up Sandry, Briar, Daja, and Tris on their adventures with their teachers after they're granted their mage credentials. Let's talk the Circle Opens quartet.

While the Circle of Magic books focus on the four protagonists as a quartet in each book (even if the plot might center on a single protagonist), the Circle Opens books see our protagonists hundreds of miles apart and truly having to stand on their own feet and grow their own strengths. They also all get their own students in these books, and seeing how their personalities, teachers, and backgrounds affect how they interact with their students makes these books very, very fun. It also makes these books feel more like true YA than advanced middle grade (which is kind of how the Circle of Magic books read, but that's not a criticism; those books are amazing).

Magic Steps finds Sandry in Emelan caring for Duke Vedris after a stroke and basically low-key running the country while her uncle recovers. On a morning ride, she stumbles across Pasco Acalon as he dances a luck spell for a friend's family of fisherfolk. After some...creative convincing...Pasco agrees that yes, he has magic and needs training. This is where Sandry learns about the condition of her new credentials: If she discovers a new mage, and a teacher with a complementary power set cannot be found, the discovering mage is ethically and legally bound to teach the new mage at least the basics.

As though teaching a reluctant 12-year-old with family baggage and a formerly unknown type of magic wasn't enough, Sandry also has to deal with a blood feud that followed a merchant family to Emelan and has turned ugly. An unmagic mage is helping two assassins commit murder, and in the process is contaminating the city with unmagic.

Unmagic is a super cool concept, because it is the absence of everything and it consumes everything it touches, especially magic. It is horrifying in that it simply is; it's not evil in and of itself but it consumes with no care or compassion, and so in practice, it tends to look evil in an implacable, inevitable sort of way. There was a sense of existential horror to the magic itself that is unusual in Tamora Pierce's work, but was highly effective when pitted against Sandry's radical hope and optimism.

Ultimately, Sandry and Pasco work together to get Pasco's magic under control and bring peace back to the streets of Emelan.

Street Magic finds Briar and Rosethorn in the great, ancient city of Chammur, working with the local Living Circle Temple and beginning Briar's side hustle as a shakkan shaper and merchant. Chammur also brings Briar's past slamming into his present, since the city has a strong gang presence--so strong that they are practically their own political and social force.

This becomes more complicated when Briar discovers that Evvy--a street rat who makes a few coins by polishing stones for souk merchants--is, in fact, a stone mage. When Chammur's official stone mage is revealed to be the world's biggest douchecanoe and Evvy--quite rightly--refuses to have anything to do with him, Briar takes her under his tutelage.

Honestly, the best parts of this book are Briar's relationships with Evvy and Rosethorn. Evvy pokes all kinds of holes in Briar's past worldview and how he sees gangs' function in society. She's also delightful on her own merits, whip smart, and a devoted cat mom.

Briar and Rosethorn's relationship is delightlfully complicated and simultaneously dead simple. After her death in Briar's Book, Rosethorn is a bit physically delicate, and Briar has quietly taken on the role of surrogate son and caretaker, even as Rosethorn is his surrogate mother and teacher. The two of them have complimentary rough edges, and as Rosethorn herself says, they've come so far beyond who owes what to who, and simply are each other's. I love these two.

Cold Fire locates Daja and Frostpine in Namorn in the dead of winter, as Frostpine continues on his quest to expose Daja to as many smiths and craftspeople as possible, broadening her already deep education. While visiting an old friend and his family, Daja discovers that their twin children are mages. Now unlike Sandry and Briar, Daja is able to find mage teachers for her young students, but neither teacher has the time or space to do the basics--so that falls to Daja to teach.

In addition to her very energetic students, Daja is wrapped up in the Kugisko community, including local firefighter Bennat Ladradun. Daja expands her already prodigious skillset to include walking through burning buildings to rescue those trapped inside. She unfortunately has to do this rather a lot, because Kugisko has a firebug.

Ultimately, Daja's story in Namorn is about compassion, patience, and learning to see things as they are, not as she might wish them to be.

Shatterglass shows us Tris and Niko at a magical conference in Tharios, right in the middle of the reign of a Jack the Ripper-esque criminal who is attacking and murdering Yaskedasi--female street dancers. In the midst of academia and murder, Tris finds herself two students: Keth Warder, a journeyman glassblower recovering from a lightning strike, and Glaki, the orphaned daughter of a murdered Yaskedasi Keth was friends with.

Poor Tris never plays life on easy mode. While she isn't the only one of the four mages to take two students, she is the only one with students with such diverse needs. Keth is a grown-ass adult who had training and a career before a lightning strike awakened his ambient magic, whereas Glaki is like four years old and an academic mage. And yet, somehow Tris manages. She looks after both her students and helps the police catch their murderer.

Overall, this quartet is a phenomenal follow up to the Circle of Magic quartet, and I love how the world expands beyond Emelan here. I also love that the tables turn and our students become first-time teachers themselves. If you are any sort of Tamora Pierce fan, I cannot recommend the Circle Universe enough.

[themysticaljellyfish]

Roach wondered if he was looking for a cute little servant boy, and grinned. Men who liked play-toys always regretted meeting him. [Sandry's Book, Chapter 1]

Do not like the implications of this! Especially the phrase 'play-toy' in regards to children. Coupled with this exchange in Street Magic:

[Evvy said,] “I’m not stealing for you and I’m not laying on my back for you, so don’t think for a moment because you’re spending money on me —” “I like them prettier, fatter, and older,” snapped Briar. He was privately ashamed that he hadn’t guessed she might think this. In her world, his old world, nobody gave anything for free. [Street Magic, Chapter 6]

Again, bad implications. There's nothing to indicate anything like that happened to Evvy or Briar, but clearly they were aware of that threat.

I also remember something Tris said, though I can't find the quote now, that her birth family always made it clear what happened to girls thrown out on the street. And that she should be grateful her family did not do that to her. So fuck Tris's birth family, too.

[scoobhead]

the novel i'm currently working on is a dissection of elitism in academia and the reality of "twice exceptional" kids in higher learning. and its sequel is like "what if you literally did not survive your toxic codependent homoerotic teenage friendship"

[kneelb4kesha]

briar managing to keep from wailing on the shitty palace stone mage by saying "i'll let rosethorn handle him. as a treat" is sooo funny. make sure your foster mother, an autistic lesbian misanthrope, gets her proper enrichment activities of tending plants and putting assholes in place ❤️

[lazarusbones]

Jenna

Click Here To Start Your Conversation.

[lutentime]

arc 2 babie!!

[jimrmoore]

VISUAL ALCHEMY The Magic Life of Jeff Sheridan

A Tribute book illustrated with photographs and essays by 14 brilliant magicians peers of Mr. Sheridans. Foreword by Lance Burton.

Hardcover, 116 pages, Color & B&W images. LIMITED EDITION.

Available in this PRESALE with a 25% discount using the word 'streetmagic' when checking out.

http://vabook.site

[byeclownguy]

[mccek]

Magic or illusion ? Ep:12

[checkoutmybookshelf]

Briar, Tris, Evvy, and Rosethorn unquestionably have the best understanding of the consequences of being mages in impossible situations. Tris, who had a body count in the triple digits at age 10; Briar and Evvy, both street rats whose very humanity was questioned by everyone until their teachers found them; Rosethorn, who raises baby birds and lovingly tends her garden to balance the horrors of healing, magical epidemiology, and an abusive childhood. Magic is wonderous, but every wonder casts a shadow.