Everybody should feel free to post and ask questions–it’s what makes book clubs fun! But please do not post until you are familiar with Spoiler Courtesy!
Spoiler Courtesy
Please follow these rules to avoid inadvertent ネタバレ. If you’re unsure whether something should have a spoiler tag, err on the side of using one.
Any potential spoiler for the current week’s reading need only be covered by a spoiler tag. Predictions and conjecture made by somebody who has not read ahead still falls into this category.
Any potential spoilers for external sources need to be covered by a spoiler tag and include a label (outside of the spoiler tag) of what might be spoiled. These include but are not limited to: other book club picks, other books, games, movies, anime, etc. I recommend also tagging the severity of the spoiler (for example, I may still look at minor spoilers for something that I don’t intend to read soon).
Any information from later in the book than the current week’s reading (including trigger warnings that haven’t yet manifested) needs to be hidden by spoiler tags and labeled as coming from later sections.
Instructions for Spoiler Tags
Click the cog above the text box and use either the “Hide Details” or “Blur Spoiler” options. The text which says “This text will be hidden” should be replaced with what you are wishing to write. In the case of “Hide Details”, the section in the brackets that is labelled “Summary” can be replaced with whatever you like also (i.e, [details=”Chapter 1, Pg. 1”]).
Hide Details results in the dropdown box like below:
Example
This is an example of the “Hide Details” option.
The “Blur Spoiler” option will simply blur the text it surrounds.
This is an example of the “Blur Spoiler” option.
Posting Advice
When asking for help, please mention the page number, and check before posting that your question hasn’t already been asked. As the threads get longer, it becomes more convenient to use the Search function, which is located in the upper right corner of the forum. It is the magnifying glass which is near your profile picture! The best way to search is usually to type part of the sentence you are confused about, and select “in this topic”. This will show you all posts within the current thread which has that string of text.
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This week was really dense! It’s basically some more character introductions, but the main plot is also getting laid out.
For now, 香君 pretty much seems like a normal human, I’m looking forward to finding out more about her. I’m also curious how she thinks about this “controlling other nations through rice” thing. Does she want to help the Empire, or does she want to help all people regardless of boundaries? What would become of her if the rice lost its importance?
Oh, and now we know the rice is poisonous. I wonder if アイシャ’s grandfather suspected that? Or was he just concerned about independence?
Stopping her recollection of the “we found the 香君” ceremony just before it actually happened was a bit of a cliffhanger, especially with the later hints that the カシュガ family are picking the next 香君 for political purposes rather than actually finding a reincarnation of the old one…
I agree about the density! Especially the second half was a bit of a challenge. I read through the list of characters again to ensure I get everything right, and to my surprise I see that we’ll have even more characters coming.
Wow, so many people know Aisya’s background! But they are all from the same family at least…
About 香君, she felt less of a talent in terms of an ability to smell of she didn’t notice another person in the room. Now I vote that Aisya becomes the next 香君, but who knows.
Yes, I understood the same, so as long as it is healthy in this properly fertilized way, then it should be fine? I mean, if it saves people from starvation and minimizes conflicts…
I really don’t know what to think about this book. When I’m reading, I find it quite engaging, I especially liked chapter 2.2 and I’m interested in finding out about the incarnation of 香君. And while challenging, all the 敬語 is good practise.
On the other hand, once I’ve closed the book, I wonder exactly why I’ve just spent one hour reading about fake politics about a fake crop fertilizer for a fake and possible dangerous miracle crop…
Also, this is shaping out to be massive in terms of characters and politics : I’m worried reading only the first book (or first 2 paperbacks) whill leave us right in the middle of the mystery with no explanation in sight.
Guess you don’t read much fantasy? It kind of comes with the territory.
That’s very likely considering it ends in the middle of a chapter. As in the official book club is reading to chapter 4.6, and the next book starts with chapter 4.7. I assume many of us will continue to read the rest, maybe after a short break or something.
You said yourself, it is engaging. But you know, sometimes I wonder why I know everything about politics in some imaginary world, but don’t even remember names of the top 5 parties that represent the parliament in the country where I live.
I would expect such. I’m already mentally prepared to read all the books. Luckily, it is just another 1-2 books, not a series with 30+ volumes
I would say yes. I checked usages in the book, most often ゆえ stands a the end of the sentence or a part of the sentence. In this case it feels like から or because to me.
Can anyone summarize the key points from these chapters? I finished it yesterday, but I had trouble following the relationships between the characters, and I’m sure I missed a point or two about the world.
Here’s my attempt at a summary, running through the chapters in order:
オリエ seems like a nice person.
Up until she was “found” as the 香君 she didn’t have any sense of being anything special. She was a daughter in an aristocratic family in one of the provinces.
ラーオ師 manages to sneak up on her, so at minimum her sense of smell is much less acute than アイシャ’s. (ラーオ師 is head of the 旧カシュガ; we don’t in this conversation get to see what he’s thinking, though, so we don’t have that much insight into him yet.)
There’s a worrying unknown set of insect eggs on the crop in オゴダ.
The 香君’s forecasts of the crop conditions are not really from her – they’re drawn up in advance by the imperial bureaucracy.
There’s some historical background on p127-129 that traces how the 旧カシュガ family control the 香君宮 but the 新カシュガ family came to be in control of a newer bit of the government which is in control of livestock, fisheries, trade and production in general. The 香君 as an individual no longer seems to have any direct power or influence.
The emperor fell ill last year; オードセン is the crown prince so should be next in line, but his younger brother has a lot of support at court and might be planning a bid for the throne. イール カシュガ (head of the 新 branch of the family) is clearly a major political power player here; he thinks in terms of being able to pick which brother gets to succeed, and wants one who is competent but also essentially willing to comply with the direction the カシュガ family wants to go. His choices are “smart and serious but too nice and not cunning enough” and “sneaky and clever but might be too ambitious to be satisfied with going along with カシュガ aims”, so he hasn’t made his mind up yet.
There’s a hint in this conversation that the government effectively picked a 香君 in a politically advantageous region, rather than merely going out and finding where she had reincarnated.
イール’s motivations seem to be quite externally directed, in terms of securing and maintaining the empire. (If he’s essentially the power behind the throne this makes sense.) He has knowledge about the オアレ稲 that the crown prince has no idea about. There’s a specific political issue here involving a province that’s hoping to become more independent and is secretly trying to experiment with producing their own fertiliser: it’s the same province as the one where the unknown insect eggs were found.
ユギル is イール’s son; he also is correctly informed about オアレ稲. In their conversation p143-150 we learn that there’s a lot of deception involved in the crop: the fertiliser isn’t as important a secret as people think, and there are some strong hints here that the 香君 isn’t actually divine, but it’s important to the empire (and the カシュガ family) that the populace believe that. イール is deadly serious about not letting even a hint of that get out.
Thanks, it’s a big help! I wanted to skim through those chapters again, but ended up reading ahead instead. Though it seems I didn’t miss anything important.
To be clear, the other candidate is the brother of the current emperor.
But you know, sometimes I wonder why I know everything about politics in some imaginary world, but don’t even remember names of the top 5 parties that represent the parliament in the country where I live.