#unnatural magic

[morhath]

it's honestly shocking that I've never seen people posting about Unnatural Magic by C.M. Waggoner on tumblr, given how much everyone on here seems to want large, muscular women to step on them

[k-she-rambles]

most underrated tsira/jeckrun scene in unnatural magic imo is the one where she sends him back into the bar to go punch the guy who insulted him. so much going on here!

• we were JUST in Tsira's POV as she was thinking about how hot gloveless boxing is, and here she is, telling jeckrun to go punch that guy.

• push-pull of Jeckrun not liking to be told what to do vs Jeckrun's subby crush on Tsira

• it not occurring to Jeckrun to punch the guy because of years of just having to swallow microagressions about his (relative, in this setting) queerness and antisocial tendencies. He's used to people not liking him! He doesn't like people much himself.

• tsira could have and would have punched the guy on Jeckrun's behalf! But she recognized it was good for Jeckrun to do it, and recognized it as "taking good care of your vahn"

• Jeckrun who is used to having his needs forgotten and ignored having someone say to him, basically, even if people don't like you, how people treat you matters. It matters to me and it should matter to you.

• the joy and delight of Jeckrun and Tsira running home laughing about it

[newnamesamecharlotte]

Tsira lay still and rested. Her baby rested, too, safe and warm on her chest, tired out from screaming.

She was tiny and angry and perfect.

Unnatural Magic by C. M. Waggoner

[evenaturtleduck]

Inigo Montoya + Fezzik, Blackthorn + Grim, Valery Kolkhanov + Konstantin Shenkov, Jeckran + Tsira, Samuel Pipps + Arent Hayes: romantic or platonic, Small Intense Person + Tall Scary Person Who's Smarter Than They Seem is becoming one of my favorite relationship dynamics.

[bi4bihankking]

We Are the Ants Summary:

Henry is periodically abducted by aliens, who give him a choice: push a button to save the world, or let it end in 144 days. With all the pain he's lived through, he's all for letting it end, but Henry decides to take his time to weigh the pros and cons of life, reflecting over bullies, grief, forgiveness, and the people just now entering his life who he isn't ready to lose just yet. The novel follows Henry over those 144 days as he struggles to decide the fate of the world as he begins to fall in love with the new boy in town.

The Unnatural Magic Duology Summary:

Gender doesn’t have to exist on the binary we think it does. Poverty can do more to people than we like to admit. And genius little girls and their eccentric mentors WILL take over the world if we let them.

[dragonfly-wings1]

Rereading Unnatural Magic and I continue to be Completely Normal about Tsira, thanks.

Where's MY big buff blue girlfriend, universe?????

[bookcoversonly]

Title: Unnatural Magic | Author: C.M. Waggoner | Publisher: Ace (2019)

[aleatoryw]

I've passed my goal of reading twenty books for the year! And so, allow me, with a brain full of cool books, to recommend you something to read next year. presenting...

Books Wrapped 2022!

#3: Fortune Favors the Dead and Murder Under her Skin, both by Steven Spotswood

These murder mysteries follow Will Parker, a plucky sharpshooting bisexual tomboy in 1940s New York City, as she gets a job assisting a famous but aging private eye. In the first one, the detectives take on the case of a murdered heiress at a fortune-telling party, with every guest a suspect. If you like investigations, murder attempts, and a touch of noir, give these a shot! (the third one, Secrets Typed in Blood, was just released as well! #1 on my 2023 list.)

#2: Unnatural Magic and The Ruthless Lady's Guide to Wizardry, both by C. M. Waggoner

Two fantasy novels set in the same Victorian-inspired fantasy universe (and connected via some characters but - spoilers!) where magic is commonly practiced via mathematical parameters and trolls and humans live alongside one another in relative peace. The first follows Oona, a determined and talented young wizard as she attempts to solve some murders and get admitted into magic university, and a will-they-won't-they pair that flips gender and romance expectations on their heads and had me putting the book down to pace the room and go "oooooh my god. oh my god this is everything."

#1: Gideon the Ninth and Harrow the Ninth by Tamsyn Muir

There's no way a tumblr user in the year 2022 hasn't heard of these but the hype is real. Sure, there are lesbian necromancers in space, but more crucially, the writing is as fast and sharp as the swordfights within, perfectly balancing the stakes in Gideon the Ninth between finding clues in the creepy ancient mansion before getting murdered, and Gideon's glorious inner monologue and emotional development. Harrow the Ninth is a twisting adventure unlike anything I've read before featuring fucked up necromancy shit and weird, one stop ahead of the reader action. The third one, Nona the Ninth, is out now, but shhh! I haven't read it yet!

[reviewsthatburn]

UNNATURAL MAGIC explores sexism and racism in a fantasy setting, following a human girl trying to learn magic when her brilliance is seen as threatening rather than extraordinary, a troll trying to figure out what she wants (given her mother's expectations) and the human man she finds in the snow and nurses back to health. Eventually, they all end up working to try and stop a series of murders of trolls by humans, which is a recently brutal escalation of long-simmering resentment between their two peoples. 

Onna's storyline involves sexist expectations of her as a girl, not quite yet a woman. The whole reason she leaves her home country is because she was denied entry to a magical academy  because the examiners dismissed her as a village girl. Her class was less of a factor than her gender, but the combination of the two meant they ignored her on a technicality.

This is the first book in what is thus far a set of two books in the same world. This one doesn’t seem to be specifically setting up anything to be resolved later, but I suspect that if and when I do read the next one I might realize things I didn’t notice on this read through. For now, this functions as a stand-alone book and can be treated as such. It resolves its own major plot points and while it gives an idea of what the characters may do next, it's in the broad strokes of the trajectories of their lives, not in way that specifically teases a sequel. There’s been a series of murders of trolls, spread across a pretty large area, but it seem that the humans of various regions don’t know that the problem is more widespread. While  wealthy and well-connected trolls are at the highest levels of society with a great deal of control, individual trolls are being seemingly randomly murdered and their bodies mutilated for some unknown purpose. Onna becomes involved in the investigation as part of pursuing her magical studies. Tsira (who is half-troll and half-human) and the human she rescued end up working together to try and track down the murderers after someone close to Tsira is killed. 

Full Review at Link.

[desdasiwrites]

– C.M. Waggoner, Unnatural Magic

[persephinae2]

Me:

[morhath]

talking to my friend about Unnatural Magic like "okay so what you need to understand is that HE'S an effete city boy with no useful skills besides talking and punching and SHE'S a large grey blue* troll who thinks it's sexy when men are pathetic and useless. and she's also good at punching."

*she's blue I just have Homestuck poisoning and made an error in the original post

[k-she-rambles]

I realize the unfinished vibe/making good things out of bad circumstances/life goes on and is even pretty good even when you haven't ENTIRELY resolved your issues bit is kind of the point of the resolution in Unnatural Magic.

But.

Real missed opportunity IMO for Tsira to be even more gravely injured in the final battle than she was and Jeckrun to not be normal about it at all.

I mean, the parallel of Tsira telling Jeckrun "Don't you leave me" as she's nursing him back to health in the very beginning vs the messy, sexy & grieving way at the end is delicious.

But Jeckrun telling Tsira "don't you leave me" after the several months long revenge quest and nearly dying herself?

Also delicious. Plus the catharsis of nearly dying but ultimately living as a metaphor for surviving grief, and extra bonus Jeckrun without the POV filter of his own self-loathing or Tsira's protective feelings.

[newnamesamecharlotte]

Jeckran had always classed listening to anecdotes from other people's childhoods as one of the more detestable possible uses of his time,

but the thought of Tsira having ever been a child who had eaten honeycomb filled him with sensations of such tenderness that he was quite embarrassed by himself.

It was a confoundedly uncomfortable thing to be in love.

Unnatural Magic by C. M. Waggoner

[evenaturtleduck]

That feeling when I'm halfway through a book and really enjoying it but also really antsy to start these two other books on the table next to me that I'm super excited about. But if I start one of these others that means I have to put down the one I'm currently reading, and there's still the third book waiting. Why can I only read one book at a time? 😭

[penguinsblues]

The choice is yours.