I very much like how V’s presence is visually manifested in a discarnate manner via her pinkitude being displayed on Sera’s face from that cellphone-screen glow.
Also, I laughed at the Bram Stoker’s Dracula quote. Heeheeheeee!
Nice ‘catch’ there Jimmy! V is indeed ‘in the picture’ in that indirect, non-corporial way.
Say, is this colour #4 for HSS? Red, Blue Gold and now Pink?
It’s a funny line, for certain! But is Maddy still lumping all witches (including Sera) into the NOT-human catagory, like monsters and vampires?
Sera doesn’t drink booze because she weighs what? 72 pounds? Sniff the cap = drunk!
is Sera going to wind up with a tipsy/drunk Mady who may or may not try to put the moves on Sera. Or perhaps spill the beans about being put up to it, if she was. This could be very interesting
As kids, Maddy got angry with Sera for not using her powers to protect her. Then she saw Sera using her powers on the tele to fight off a psycho. Seems she is having her prejudices challenged. I am curious to see where this is going. Is she going to apologize for her reaction in high school?
That “blonde thing” was a human too. A human who went through unimaginable horror as a child. It doesn’t justify her behavior, obviously, but she is not some alien “other”. Her reaction to her circumstance was all too human.
Maddy is coming off as quite the bigot here, although she does seem to be questioning her bigotry, which is a good sign. I am curious as to what specific experiences led her to this mindset. I am also interested to know what she wants from this encounter or if she even knows herself.
but in a way can you really blame any human for being a little bit bigoted against a witch? i mean….its gotta be pretty terrifying to live in a world where people exist with such power….and as we’ve read before there are witches who have used that power to hurt the regular humans…and there isnt much that can be used to fight back against them when one of them goes “rogue” as that guy in part 2 put it…in a way i think some people feel that they are at the will of the witches…if they wanted they could probably wipe out every human on earth…
Witches ARE human. And there are plenty of ordinary mundane humans who could wipe out all humans (and most other life) on the planet. I can not see fearing and resenting them anymore than I fear and resent the people with their fingers on “the button”. Possessing power is not a reason to hate anyone, only what they choose to do with it. You can only reasonably judge people based on their actions, and thus only on an individual basis. So, yes, I can blame any human for being bigoted against witches, just as I can blame them for being bigoted against any other group. I can get why someone would be, fear and jealousy are understandable and common motivations, but understanding is not condoning.
Though I do have to worry about Maddy getting tipsy. Tipsy+bigotry= harsh time for Sera. I’m finding myself squirming with anxiety and just hoping Sera escapes her first date ever without more emotional baggage.
What if they aren’t human? We don’t really know that much about the why and how of witches, we’ve only been privy to how they affect the world around them thus far. Unless I’m way missing out on something. We didn’t even know they had black blood until a few pages ago. They could simply be exceptional human beings, or they could be like space aliens or mutants or something for all we know.
That said, I’ll agree that Maddy’s being kind of insensitive here.
Being re-born in an instant? That doesn’t sound “human” at all! It’s the very definition of “supernatural” eh? Along with other things, it causes me to doubt their actual humanity…
Call it a transfer of power. Laws of Thaumaturgical Thermodynamics. The power of the witch never dies, even if the witch currently possessing it does. When the witch dies, the energy has to go somewhere and apparently it can only exist within humans. It also apparently can not go into a pre-existing persons and thus must attach to a newborn, the very next newborn to enter the world.
And who says it is “supernatural” or non-human? For all we know the existence of the 57 witches is part of the very core of humanity. Even if the energy itself is of non-human origin, it still resides within a human. The witch is the person, not the power.
Shouldn’t it be “conception” then, not birth? Otherwise it takes an ordinary human baby and replaces it with a witch-baby. Isn’t that the Buddism thing? The glowing lights of wombs to be concieved in? Or am I mixing my mythos? Besides: “And with strange aeons even death may die…”
If it was a rebirth thing, then yes it would have to be at conception. But if it is just a transfer of power, then it wouldn’t need to be. The witch isn’t being reincarnated, the power that resided in the person just moved to someone else. A human baby is not being switched with a witchy baby. The human baby remains a human baby, it just gains power. Witchy babies are human, they just get some added power. That is my interpretation based on the information presented thus far.
also im not defending Maddy appearing anti-witch…im saying that you might be able to understand where she is coming from…she has, as she says, met far more witches than Sera has….Sera has only met 4….and from what we have seen so far…many of those examples have not been very good….Stiletta was a murder….Rivethed was a meatheaded junkie…Valentine we dont know much about him, but i didnt get a good vibe….and Vicious seems like a self-absorbed ditz….Sera might really be one in a million…or in her case one in fifty-seven….im willing to bet the antagonist in this story is not Maddy….it may very well be another witch…its fun to predict stuff
I do understand where she could get that kind of bias. Just like I understand why some people are racist. However, a history of bad experiences with members of a particular demographic is still not sufficient reason to judge all members of that demographic with the same brush. Bigotry based on experience is still bigotry.
I am willing to cut Maddy a lot of slack, since we still don’t know her whole story or even what her thought process is here. I’m just commenting on how she is coming across to me personally.
Is Maddy ‘playing with’ her missing fingers because she’s upset?
Or is she sub-consciously covering them, like people with visible scars or large birthmarks often do?
Aaron includes a LOT of sub-conscious motivations and behaviours in HSS, I’ve found. And EXPERTLY done too! IMHO…
(Sera always keeping her elbows tight to her sides = precious! kawaii!)
Yet another page where I want to hug Sera and protect her from all harm… (like she needs MY help! lolz!)
It looks more like fidgeting to me, but given that it is a still picture it is difficult to be sure. That would imply nervousness and/or insecurity. Covering them could imply a number of other emotions: embarrassment, fear, remembering the attack and its link to the “problem with witches.” There is so much subtlety in the expressions in the last few pages, so many emotions hinted at without being spelled out. It adds a real depth to the character. I am loving it.
What a world of difference:
“ugh, what am I doing here…”
“ugh, what am I doing…”
Does that ONE liitle word make a TON of difference, or do I have an over-ly active imagination.
>When I read it I was shocked! Alarms going off! Shields to maximum!
I really like “adult Maddy” so far, but this worries me…
(YES! I know she could be refering to the way she’s speaking, that could be the ‘doing here’ she’s questioning, but it’s just one possibility, and the others are… frightening)
‘I am human.’ I felt so so sorry for Serenity there. If you look through all the past three books, all she seems to have wanted to be is NORMAL. For Maddy to call her ‘almost human’ seems to me to be rather cruel. I would’ve been really upset by that if I were in Sera’s situation.
I know, right? I mean look at her expression. She looks hurt and desperate at the same time. I feel bad for her there, it is such a vulnerable expression.
I’d like to think it was a slip of the tongue and she didn’t mean it like it sounds. I don’t think she is being deliberately cruel. I think maybe she is just jarred by having her preconceived ideas about what witches are like overturned by meeting Sera and having her seem so “ordinary.” She is used to thinking of witches as “above it all” and apart from the rest of humanity, but Sera isn’t like that at all, she doesn’t fit that stereotype she has formed in her mind and it has left her not knowing what to think.
is it just me, or does Maddy seem to be talking out of the side of her mouth over the last few pages? i don’t trust people who talk out of the sides of their mouths.
both “WTTN” (vol1) and “GC” (vol2) have shown a strong “Us vs. Them” schism. through both volumes, Sera consistently pulls the Greta Garbo card (“i vant to be left alone!”) and the world (“Norms” & “Witches”) keeps demanding sera pick a side. and now, here’s maddy, talkng through the side of her mouth and trying to persuade sera to, “Join Us!”
only *Tess* has been straight-up with sera. “I. AM. YOUR. FUTURE. ASSHOLE!” Tess is one giant, red-haired, tattoo’d-and-pierced jiminy cricket with a 3-inch screwdriver shank in the top of her skull. that’s why she’s so lovable. she had no qualms taking on Viscious, and i’ll bet she won’t think twice taking on maddy, either.
yeah…i agree…out of all of the people Sera knows…i think the only ones she can really trust to be real with her are Tess, her step-mom (i forget her name), and Kelton….
Tess would die for Sera and if she swung that way I would totally push for them getting together. Kelton, too, would sacrifice himself readily for Sera, as has been demonstrated. Sera has at least three people who would unhesitatingly lay down their lives for her. That is more than most people find in life.
Tess is awesome incarnate. A loyal six-foot crimson-locked foul-mouthed raging psychotic sasquatch. Everyone should be so blessed as to have one of those in their lives.
I’m pretty sure I said in a comment many pages back that I was hoping they go to a bar. Now I’m not that sure if thats is such a good idea…. Owell, call me sinister but it would be interesting to see Sera in that environment.
No sarcasm. I’m thinking it was a bombing operation that went wrong. She played victim, mixed enough facts into the lies to fool any authorities. If Sera stays sober, then getting Maddy hammered may be useful. If her mouth runs this much sober, it will probably really run under the influence.
This is actually quite a believable possibility. It would explain a lot about the background info we have been given so far about Maddy and her ‘friends’ visiting witches far and wide. Nice theory!
I very much like how V’s presence is visually manifested in a discarnate manner via her pinkitude being displayed on Sera’s face from that cellphone-screen glow.
Also, I laughed at the Bram Stoker’s Dracula quote. Heeheeheeee!
I concur, the Dracula line was quite humorous.
Nice ‘catch’ there Jimmy! V is indeed ‘in the picture’ in that indirect, non-corporial way.
Say, is this colour #4 for HSS? Red, Blue Gold and now Pink?
It’s a funny line, for certain! But is Maddy still lumping all witches (including Sera) into the NOT-human catagory, like monsters and vampires?
Sera doesn’t drink booze because she weighs what? 72 pounds? Sniff the cap = drunk!
According to SR Vol. 1, Ms. Rose weighs in at a dainty 80lb. Of course she may have gained/lost a few pounds since then…
Ah, hum. That went real awkward real fast.
is Sera going to wind up with a tipsy/drunk Mady who may or may not try to put the moves on Sera. Or perhaps spill the beans about being put up to it, if she was. This could be very interesting
“You never do anything!”
As kids, Maddy got angry with Sera for not using her powers to protect her. Then she saw Sera using her powers on the tele to fight off a psycho. Seems she is having her prejudices challenged. I am curious to see where this is going. Is she going to apologize for her reaction in high school?
That “blonde thing” was a human too. A human who went through unimaginable horror as a child. It doesn’t justify her behavior, obviously, but she is not some alien “other”. Her reaction to her circumstance was all too human.
Maddy is coming off as quite the bigot here, although she does seem to be questioning her bigotry, which is a good sign. I am curious as to what specific experiences led her to this mindset. I am also interested to know what she wants from this encounter or if she even knows herself.
but in a way can you really blame any human for being a little bit bigoted against a witch? i mean….its gotta be pretty terrifying to live in a world where people exist with such power….and as we’ve read before there are witches who have used that power to hurt the regular humans…and there isnt much that can be used to fight back against them when one of them goes “rogue” as that guy in part 2 put it…in a way i think some people feel that they are at the will of the witches…if they wanted they could probably wipe out every human on earth…
Witches ARE human. And there are plenty of ordinary mundane humans who could wipe out all humans (and most other life) on the planet. I can not see fearing and resenting them anymore than I fear and resent the people with their fingers on “the button”. Possessing power is not a reason to hate anyone, only what they choose to do with it. You can only reasonably judge people based on their actions, and thus only on an individual basis. So, yes, I can blame any human for being bigoted against witches, just as I can blame them for being bigoted against any other group. I can get why someone would be, fear and jealousy are understandable and common motivations, but understanding is not condoning.
Nothing to add here. Very well said and agreed.
Though I do have to worry about Maddy getting tipsy. Tipsy+bigotry= harsh time for Sera. I’m finding myself squirming with anxiety and just hoping Sera escapes her first date ever without more emotional baggage.
calm down…
But…
What if they aren’t human? We don’t really know that much about the why and how of witches, we’ve only been privy to how they affect the world around them thus far. Unless I’m way missing out on something. We didn’t even know they had black blood until a few pages ago. They could simply be exceptional human beings, or they could be like space aliens or mutants or something for all we know.
That said, I’ll agree that Maddy’s being kind of insensitive here.
We know that they are born from humans. Whenever a witch dies the very next human born becomes a witch.
True, which means there is a strong possibility that they are just humans with amazing abilities. But we literally don’t know anything else yet.
Magneto was right.
Being re-born in an instant? That doesn’t sound “human” at all! It’s the very definition of “supernatural” eh? Along with other things, it causes me to doubt their actual humanity…
Call it a transfer of power. Laws of Thaumaturgical Thermodynamics. The power of the witch never dies, even if the witch currently possessing it does. When the witch dies, the energy has to go somewhere and apparently it can only exist within humans. It also apparently can not go into a pre-existing persons and thus must attach to a newborn, the very next newborn to enter the world.
And who says it is “supernatural” or non-human? For all we know the existence of the 57 witches is part of the very core of humanity. Even if the energy itself is of non-human origin, it still resides within a human. The witch is the person, not the power.
Shouldn’t it be “conception” then, not birth? Otherwise it takes an ordinary human baby and replaces it with a witch-baby. Isn’t that the Buddism thing? The glowing lights of wombs to be concieved in? Or am I mixing my mythos? Besides: “And with strange aeons even death may die…”
If it was a rebirth thing, then yes it would have to be at conception. But if it is just a transfer of power, then it wouldn’t need to be. The witch isn’t being reincarnated, the power that resided in the person just moved to someone else. A human baby is not being switched with a witchy baby. The human baby remains a human baby, it just gains power. Witchy babies are human, they just get some added power. That is my interpretation based on the information presented thus far.
also im not defending Maddy appearing anti-witch…im saying that you might be able to understand where she is coming from…she has, as she says, met far more witches than Sera has….Sera has only met 4….and from what we have seen so far…many of those examples have not been very good….Stiletta was a murder….Rivethed was a meatheaded junkie…Valentine we dont know much about him, but i didnt get a good vibe….and Vicious seems like a self-absorbed ditz….Sera might really be one in a million…or in her case one in fifty-seven….im willing to bet the antagonist in this story is not Maddy….it may very well be another witch…its fun to predict stuff
I do understand where she could get that kind of bias. Just like I understand why some people are racist. However, a history of bad experiences with members of a particular demographic is still not sufficient reason to judge all members of that demographic with the same brush. Bigotry based on experience is still bigotry.
I am willing to cut Maddy a lot of slack, since we still don’t know her whole story or even what her thought process is here. I’m just commenting on how she is coming across to me personally.
i gotta say im really liking Maddy….
Is Maddy ‘playing with’ her missing fingers because she’s upset?
Or is she sub-consciously covering them, like people with visible scars or large birthmarks often do?
Aaron includes a LOT of sub-conscious motivations and behaviours in HSS, I’ve found. And EXPERTLY done too! IMHO…
(Sera always keeping her elbows tight to her sides = precious! kawaii!)
Yet another page where I want to hug Sera and protect her from all harm… (like she needs MY help! lolz!)
It looks more like fidgeting to me, but given that it is a still picture it is difficult to be sure. That would imply nervousness and/or insecurity. Covering them could imply a number of other emotions: embarrassment, fear, remembering the attack and its link to the “problem with witches.” There is so much subtlety in the expressions in the last few pages, so many emotions hinted at without being spelled out. It adds a real depth to the character. I am loving it.
What a world of difference:
“ugh, what am I doing here…”
“ugh, what am I doing…”
Does that ONE liitle word make a TON of difference, or do I have an over-ly active imagination.
>When I read it I was shocked! Alarms going off! Shields to maximum!
I really like “adult Maddy” so far, but this worries me…
(YES! I know she could be refering to the way she’s speaking, that could be the ‘doing here’ she’s questioning, but it’s just one possibility, and the others are… frightening)
‘I am human.’ I felt so so sorry for Serenity there. If you look through all the past three books, all she seems to have wanted to be is NORMAL. For Maddy to call her ‘almost human’ seems to me to be rather cruel. I would’ve been really upset by that if I were in Sera’s situation.
I know, right? I mean look at her expression. She looks hurt and desperate at the same time. I feel bad for her there, it is such a vulnerable expression.
I’d like to think it was a slip of the tongue and she didn’t mean it like it sounds. I don’t think she is being deliberately cruel. I think maybe she is just jarred by having her preconceived ideas about what witches are like overturned by meeting Sera and having her seem so “ordinary.” She is used to thinking of witches as “above it all” and apart from the rest of humanity, but Sera isn’t like that at all, she doesn’t fit that stereotype she has formed in her mind and it has left her not knowing what to think.
is it just me, or does Maddy seem to be talking out of the side of her mouth over the last few pages? i don’t trust people who talk out of the sides of their mouths.
both “WTTN” (vol1) and “GC” (vol2) have shown a strong “Us vs. Them” schism. through both volumes, Sera consistently pulls the Greta Garbo card (“i vant to be left alone!”) and the world (“Norms” & “Witches”) keeps demanding sera pick a side. and now, here’s maddy, talkng through the side of her mouth and trying to persuade sera to, “Join Us!”
only *Tess* has been straight-up with sera. “I. AM. YOUR. FUTURE. ASSHOLE!” Tess is one giant, red-haired, tattoo’d-and-pierced jiminy cricket with a 3-inch screwdriver shank in the top of her skull. that’s why she’s so lovable. she had no qualms taking on Viscious, and i’ll bet she won’t think twice taking on maddy, either.
yeah…i agree…out of all of the people Sera knows…i think the only ones she can really trust to be real with her are Tess, her step-mom (i forget her name), and Kelton….
Tess would die for Sera and if she swung that way I would totally push for them getting together. Kelton, too, would sacrifice himself readily for Sera, as has been demonstrated. Sera has at least three people who would unhesitatingly lay down their lives for her. That is more than most people find in life.
Tess is awesome incarnate. A loyal six-foot crimson-locked foul-mouthed raging psychotic sasquatch. Everyone should be so blessed as to have one of those in their lives.
I’m pretty sure I said in a comment many pages back that I was hoping they go to a bar. Now I’m not that sure if thats is such a good idea…. Owell, call me sinister but it would be interesting to see Sera in that environment.
Anybody have any guesses about what Maddy’s “pendant-thingy” is supposed to represent (if anything)?
Tsk! Such poor grammar! “pendant-thingy” is so wrong! It’s “pendanty-thingy”… 😉 “Pendanty thing-a-ma-jiggy” is also acceptable.
It’s an elephant?
“Necklacy-dohicky” would also be fine.
It looks pretty much like a standard art deco piece, but yeah, I could see it being a stylized elephant.
I thought it was a key.
Also, Madeline has a REALLY long fuckin’ neck.
I’ve got this suspicion that Maddy is the terrorist that blew her fingers off.
Hmmn, interesting, even if you are being sarcastic? Like some kinda ‘anti-witch’-y thingy gone wrong? I don’t know. Far-fetched, but interesting.
No sarcasm. I’m thinking it was a bombing operation that went wrong. She played victim, mixed enough facts into the lies to fool any authorities. If Sera stays sober, then getting Maddy hammered may be useful. If her mouth runs this much sober, it will probably really run under the influence.
Hmn! Oooh, all these possibilities make it impossible to wait until tuesday!
This is actually quite a believable possibility. It would explain a lot about the background info we have been given so far about Maddy and her ‘friends’ visiting witches far and wide. Nice theory!