The Lies of Locke Lamora Read Along Week 2

Week 2 Everyone!

This week was great.  We keep getting more and more of Locke’s background, which is another way of saying it's just getting better and better.  For whatever reason,  most of my answers this week contain predictions.  This week I was able to correctly predict that it was a Gentleman Bastard who snuck into Don Salvara’s room and told him to cooperate with The Thorn of Camorr.  Maybe this read along is helping me to realize my latent soothsaying talents?  Cool.

1) Do you think Locke can pull off his scheme of playing a Midnighter who is working with Don Salvara to capture the Thorn of Camorr? I mean, he is now playing two roles in this game - and thank goodness for that costume room the Gentlemen Bastards have!

Honestly.  If everything works perfectly for him, I’m not sure it would be much of a book.  I don’t think whatever trouble he has will result from too many roles or schemes running at once though.  It seems clear though that when the other Gentleman Bastards are warning him so strongly it must be setting something up.  Then, of course, we all remember that if there is one thing that Locke has a history of, it is not being circumspect.  This seems like a perfect time for those old tendencies to come bubbling to the surface.

2) Are you digging the detail the author has put into the alcoholic drinks in this story?

Most of the beverages sound like they would burn the hairs from my chest and kill me.  Am I excited about that?  YES J

3) Who is this mysterious lady Gentlemen Bastard Sabetha and what does she mean to Locke?

Well, I don’t really know but it sounds like Locke has some pretty strong feelings. I find this kind of weird and I haven’t really been thinking about it much because Locke is not a very sexualized character but Nazca alluded to Sabetha being the only woman Locke will ever love.  Oh well, I guess we’ll be finding out sometime and maybe he just loves her like a sister?  Doubt it though.

4) Are you as creeped out over the use of Wraithstone to create Gentled animals as I am?

I have been creeped out by so much in this book that I guess I’m already becoming inured to the terrible things that happen there.  What I did like was the way that that Lynch introduced gentled animals early in the book with just enough information to get a vague sense of what they were until he finally explained them in all their horrible glory.

5) I got a kick out of child Locke's first meeting with Capa Barsavi and his daughter Nazca, which was shortly followed up in the story by Barsavi granting adult Locke permission to court his daughter! Where do you think that will lead? Can you see these two together?

I hadn’t thought about this much, but now that you bring it up… I think the easy assurance from Nazca could be hinting at some future problems there…  Perhaps they’ll actually fall in love, just before Sabetha returns and Locke will be caught between two loves?  Whatever happens, it will assuredly not be good.

6) Capa Barsavi is freaked out over rumors of The Gray King and, in fact, us readers are privy to a gruesome torture scene. The Gray King is knocking garristas off left and right. What do you think that means?

Well, either Lynch is demonstrating that Barsavi is not all that competent or brave a leader, or Barsavi is savvy to some information that we are not…likely he has reason to believe The Gray King is one of his own?

7) In the Interlude: The Boy Who Cried for a Corpse, we learn that Father Chains owes an alchemist a favor, and that favor is a fresh corpse. He sets the boys to figuring out how to provide one, and they can't 'create' the corpse themselves. How did you like Locke's solution to this conundrum?

I was really surprised by how simple and straight-forward his solution was.  I did laugh nearly hysterically when Father Chains asked what had happened to cause everyone to throw money at him.  Probably not safe to drive while laughing so hard…