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Land | Eden's Shore by Oisín Fagan | Review · Bookies' Favourite

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Hello hello, welcome to the club bookies favorite book club.
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We discuss award-winning authors, nominated novels, best
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selling books, bookshelf stories, and recently released
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reads. This episode is the second in
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our Read along chapter by Chapter of Eden Shore by Oshing
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Fagan. This episode we're discussing
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Part 1, Chapter 2 Land Now. This episode contains
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discussions about slavery, sexual assault, and sex work, as
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well as graphic depictions of sickness and injuries.
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You have been warned. We also may have Oshing on the
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podcast once we've wrapped up this read along so you can send
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us your questions for. I'm our resident radio
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journalist Aaron and my eye is being plucked out of my skull.
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This chapter I have listened to re listened to twice by
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audiobook. I didn't get to physically read
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this with the book. I feel like there's less themes
1:16
and stuff to go through in this, or at least less themes that I
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understood compared to chapter 1, but I enjoyed it.
1:23
What about you? Hi, I'm Lucy and I've just been
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shot in the chest by my second in command.
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And this week I actually finally caved and listened to parts on
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audiobook, which may shock you, Aaron.
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I did read the whole thing because I, I double back on the
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bits that I'd listened to, but I actually found it really
1:43
interesting because it does make you think about different
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things. It's a different experience and
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I feel like the way the narrator like puts emphasis and different
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things made, made me go back and think about other things.
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So I kind of, I regret not listening to the whole thing
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audio book and then also reading along with that.
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But it was a really good experience which I was surprised
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at. So to start us off, here is a
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quote from Land. You've lost heaven and what has
2:12
happened but elsewhere, For orphans like you and me, that
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elsewhere was always the Americas.
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We used to have other heavens, but they're gone now.
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Maybe this place should have remained a dream.
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Though I cannot imagine the Americas discovered and not
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moving towards them. I cannot imagine a continent
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untaken, the seas unsealed, the plains unblighted by riders, the
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mighty storms unwitnessed by those of us who dared to venture
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out. Once it is there, you must go.
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So I went and I was standing right in it, but at the same
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moment I had lost it. I couldn't see the Americas
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anymore. And so I made them.
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I made them until I could see them, and now I am them.
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I am an artist and I am creating the Americas and it is heaven.
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And if you let me, I will show you.
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Spoil a warning from this point onwards if you haven't read the
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book yet and you're planning to come back to this discussion
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after you've done so. In land we find Angel and Flores
3:12
have washed ashore and are living with an indigenous town.
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Though the town shun the man, one girl, ESA, looks after the
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two. Unfortunately, the surviving
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crew of the Atlas are not far away, living on the shore.
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Using Flores connections with the town, the crew destroy the
3:28
town and kill most of its inhabitants.
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With the town destroyed, colonizer Chuck Benjamin appears
3:34
ready to mine the town of its resources.
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Flores is saved by Isa when she drags him up a tree.
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The chapter ends with Flores and Isa at a Tavern and brothel by
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the sea. Let's start things off by
3:46
discussing the the main plots. I think the main plot is based
3:52
around Flores this time, rather than Angel.
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Flores seems to be our main protagonist, but he's not
4:00
present for every single scene, which I find interesting.
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I think we've also kind of come to the conclusion that this
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probably is Brazil. No, I think it's definitely 100%
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not Brazil. What?
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It can't. It can't be Brazil.
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I think we know for a fact it can't be Brazil.
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They never mention the Portuguese.
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It's a Spanish colony and the Spanish were not in Brazil.
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And at the end when he goes to the Tavern, he says something in
4:25
Portuguese and the guy says to him, speak Spanish.
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He says to him in Spanish, are we not in Brazil?
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And everyone laughs at him. So basically your man Chuck.
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He says we're in the cold front of three warring empires.
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I'm 100% sure one of them is Spanish, which probably rules
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Brazil out because Spanish were never in Brazil and very
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specifically they talk about the Spanish landlords.
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I'm assuming it's the Dominican Republic.
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What is not the Dominican Republic?
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The French are on one side, Haiti, the Spanish are on the
4:55
other side. And then there's possibly
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Portuguese, though they've I don't think they're really
5:00
mentioned because the crew aren't sure where they are so
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they think they could be in Brazil.
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So they're speaking a mix of Portuguese and Spanish.
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But actually when they talk to anybody in the land, everyone
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speaks Spanish, which is confusing because they crossed
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the line, which means they must have come back up above the
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line. Or they're further South than
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Brazil. But I don't see how they could
5:20
be further South than Brazil and still be like a warring colony
5:24
thing. Yeah, I don't think they're
5:27
further South, but could they not be in like Guatemala or
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Honduras? They could well be in other
5:36
spaces. I was just thinking based on the
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fact that I think the French become very involved and the
5:43
French weren't, well the French Guiana actually, so could well
5:47
be there or some. Do you know what?
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I really don't know. I just think the clue that the
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slavership in the first part in SEA is a Benjamin owned slaver
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that is going to San Domingo which is in what is now known as
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the Dominican Republic. Which was known as.
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Hispaniola. I also was looking at the
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original people who used to live in Hispaniola before the Spanish
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came and they were the Taino people.
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And there were some things that I read on my Wikipedia level, in
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depth research of them that I thought were interesting.
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So they would have lived separately from not lived
6:28
separately, but men and women would have been kind of
6:30
separate, which is something he they discussed.
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And they would have all lived in one building if depending on the
6:36
size of the tribe. And that made me think like
6:42
could could this be? But then I didn't look at any
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other indigenous people. So there's probably a bit of a
6:49
like bias there. But I also looked up like, were
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there like big amounts of Chinese people in the area?
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And there were from my, again, Wikipedia level in depth
6:59
research, I could find no, like Chinese people.
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But is 300 Chinese people a lot of people not necessarily enough
7:08
to write something on a Wikipedia article.
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So maybe. And there is a coastline and
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then there's a mountain and then there's a Santa Maria in the
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Dominican Republic currently. There's a Santa Maria in Brazil
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currently. But again, this could all be
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like a Santa Maria is all over the show in South America.
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I wasn't thinking about any of these things when I read it the
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first time. So I'm like this will probably
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they'll be like a complete light shed in Colony or the next one
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where I'll be like, this is completely wrong.
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But then again, it could all be fictional and it could just be a
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random island and a complete is what I mean.
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I was like, I'm spending way too much time thinking about that.
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So Flores is under the care of this young native girl.
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We get the indication that she is caring for them to become a
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woman and it seems to be some kind of ritual, but he doesn't
8:02
completely understand that. He thinks there might be a
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mistranslation. She says to Flores that she has
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to protect them so she can grow up.
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And Angel is present as well. But Angel has grown very, very
8:15
sick of spending time with Flores, and they've been butting
8:20
heads with each other. It's never been a month since
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Chapter One has come to a close, so they've been living on the
8:28
peripheral of this town. So yeah, they've been living in
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the granite granary in on the side.
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So it's like the town is is like it's got a big central building
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where everyone in the town seems to live, but then they seem to
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do things in the buildings that are outside.
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So it's like the Town Center bit is like they're sleeping
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quarters and then all the buildings around are functional.
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They are quite a peaceful town very, very quickly.
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Angel is like he kind of won 80s on the whole idea of having a
9:02
colony. He hates it.
9:04
He doesn't understand that the people aren't immediately really
9:06
nice to him. It takes him completely by
9:08
surprise. He doesn't like being I'll so
9:10
much and he immediately wants to leave the town and go to a more
9:14
an inverted commas civilized town where they speak like
9:17
European languages. So he he pretty quickly in the
9:21
story leaves to go to Santa Maria or.
9:24
He disappears. Well.
9:26
Disappears. It's obvious where he goes.
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He goes SI think is the indication.
9:31
Oh, really? Given.
9:32
I. Think he just went straight to
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well, he doesn't really know the way to Santa Maria.
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So we we've no clue that, but he wants to.
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He hears that there's a like a village somewhere and then he
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wants to draw down his money that he has left to get
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immediately back home to Dublin. You have Flores, who it was
9:51
established in the last chapter that he speaks.
9:53
What was it, 5 languages? And so he's using the knowledge
9:58
that he has and trying to learn this language with the children
10:02
of this town. And it's very slow, but he does
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seem to be getting somewhere. Angel is dead set against it and
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thinks that he's completely making all of this up and that
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he's misunderstood different words and now he's gone way down
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the wrong track. But it does.
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As time goes along, it seems like Flores does understand bits
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and pieces with his communication.
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I love when angels like why can't you teach them to speak
10:33
English instead of Flores learning to speak their
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language? If your first language is
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English, you just expect everyone to speak English.
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But yeah. What did you think of the town?
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Like the times people aren't described that closely.
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I mean, Isa is probably the the person that we get the most of.
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And we don't even get a lot of Isa because we don't understand
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what she's doing. We don't know why she's.
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So she's completely stunned as well from the rest of the the
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town. So we don't really know what's
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going on with her other than that she is protecting Flores.
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And she seems present, but she's also very silent, and she
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doesn't seem to have much agency in terms of the plot itself.
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The only other characters in this town that we like have any
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kind of significance is the king, which he's called.
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This was really wrecked for me because when I read it, I just
11:29
read Ian. Then when I listened to the
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audio book, it was like almost. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
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Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. That's right.
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But yeah, I read that as Ian the whole time they've come across
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the world just to find King Ian. But something that I think is
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kind of interesting about Isa is like she's doing all this stuff
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to like, like I really helped Flores and she saves Flores life
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at the end to great personal cost to her and the rest of the
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times people. But you don't really even get
11:58
the sense that she likes him that much.
12:00
Like you don't get the sense that she's like, oh, listening
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to him loads. And like, you just kind of get a
12:06
sense she's hanging around making sure they're OK, but
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she's not. It's a strange bond.
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I don't know, I understand it. They don't like, there's not
12:15
much to say about their relationship apart from the fact
12:17
that they hang around together. They don't know anything about
12:20
each other. We, we don't know anything about
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ESA apart from the fact she just hangs around and, and that's
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maybe a criticism that I have of this chapter.
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I wish that we had more of these indigenous people.
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I would really enjoy their perspective.
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But I think that that come like comes with the next part.
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I don't know. I think it's important because
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the story is told from the perspective of the people coming
12:48
over, especially at Part 1. Part 1 is very much the colon,
12:52
like not the colonizers, but like it's very much Europeans
12:57
setting adrift. It's the adventure story of
13:00
these people. And I think that for them, even
13:04
if they like the tone, like so Flores is one of the people
13:07
that's like kind of he cares. He he almost wants to be
13:10
enlightened enough and he wants to be more modern.
13:12
So he wants to like learn the language and like respect the
13:16
people, but he doesn't really care that much about them really
13:19
on a he's also grieving his mother and all all these other
13:23
things are going on in his life. But I think it is from the
13:26
perspective of people who don't care about this time in any
13:31
meaningful way. And I think that what Austin is
13:34
doing is the is that he's like obscuring things.
13:38
So like Angel in the 1st chapter is like seasick a lot.
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He's always in his cabin. He doesn't understand things are
13:44
going on. He's a bit a bit thick.
13:46
And then Flores is starts drinking in this and he's not
13:50
well. So I think that obscures what's
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happening. And I don't think he ever wants
13:54
you to know, especially in the part that you're reading, what's
13:58
actually happening, which is why we're debating so many things.
14:02
And I think if we knew things from the at this point in time,
14:06
if we knew things from the point of view of the townspeople, it
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wouldn't be a mystery. He's trying to tell a story
14:13
about colonialism, but he's not trying to tell it necessarily
14:19
from the perspective of the colonized because I don't know
14:22
that he can really tell that story.
14:24
I get it. So it is a criticism.
14:25
Definitely. A lot of them die.
14:27
Most of them die. Most of them die horrifically.
14:30
Yeah, really. Oh, it is horrible.
14:32
Like this is definitely the most violent chapter I think in the
14:37
whole thing. Well, yeah, I, I just, I
14:39
honestly just wish that we had got to know this town a little
14:45
bit better, because it doesn't to me, it just doesn't feel
14:49
lived in. I don't know what it is.
14:51
I understand that the characters that we're following aren't
14:54
necessarily living in it. They're living on the outskirts.
14:57
So maybe it is getting its point across.
15:00
But I just, I feel a disconnect with the town and I wish that I
15:06
I had a bit more of a connection with it.
15:09
But I, I just think you're supposed to, like you're
15:13
supposed to have disconnected the time.
15:15
You're certainly not supposed to understand things from their
15:18
point of view. But yeah, moving on to what
15:20
happens next. The sailors arrive, have arrived
15:23
as well from the Atlas. They've been camping out on a
15:27
beach where they've been killing a colony of seals, which I
15:31
imagine has some reflection on because I mean it's a seal
15:35
colony and they are just destroyed every seal.
15:38
There's probably something there.
15:41
Laugh patio is still alive high, not 100% sure, but he's he's
15:47
extremely badly injured and is dying still.
15:50
They can't go to the European town Santa Maria at the moment.
15:54
They have to wait because if they're going to get.
15:57
Insurance. Yeah, if they're going to get
15:59
insurance in the boat, it has to be in a long enough period that
16:02
they know it's definitely shipwrecked because the slaves
16:05
mutiny is not an act of God. It needs to have been an act of
16:08
God. So if they can go in in like a
16:10
couple of months and be like, oh, we were shipwrecked, no
16:14
one's going to know where that boat is.
16:15
So it's it's grand. Any part where this, the sailors
16:19
in the Atlas are involved. It is just extremely violent to
16:23
animals, to locals, to everyone, and it's just chaos.
16:27
They're drinking constantly. They're just fighting amongst
16:29
each other. They're exactly what you would
16:32
imagine a bunch of drunken sailors would be doing if they'd
16:36
arrived and couldn't go to a town or couldn't get any money.
16:40
So with the Steelers showing up again, Marianne Lynch plays a
16:45
very vital role in this chapter, I would say, and he's very much
16:50
the person who's shifting the plot along and he has a
16:57
conversation with Angel, and that's why Angel leaves pretty
17:02
early in this chapter. He then seems to almost torment
17:06
a Flores and then we also have him.
17:11
He basically is the the glue. I would say I don't even know if
17:16
glue is the right word because he's not holding everything
17:18
together. He's kind of making, he's the
17:21
oil, He's making everyone slide past each other and slide away.
17:25
He's spends a lot of time with La Lafcadio and with Jacques and
17:31
Cricklow. He's just very important in
17:34
this. We can get more into what
17:36
exactly he does, but I just wanted to connect the dots there
17:39
between the plot of Flores and Angel Anissa and the plot of the
17:45
Sailors. Yes, yeah, Because the sailors
17:47
after a while, kind of, I think as Marianne Lynch goes to speak
17:50
to Angel and Cricklow goes to speak to Flores, they know that
17:56
the town has alcohol and provisions and things that they
17:59
all want and they've been just living on the shoreline for the
18:02
last month. So they plan to take the town,
18:05
but they want Flores help to take the town.
18:08
Obviously, Flores is not happy with the whole thing.
18:11
Um, he goes to meet Lafcadio, who has kind of organized for
18:14
it. They do attack the town and it
18:17
is horrific. So the sailors move on to the
18:20
top into the town. They don't seem to get much of A
18:23
uprising from the townspeople at all.
18:27
But I don't know if we just don't see it because Flores, I'm
18:31
pretty sure has drank a lot and is just like woken up and he
18:34
goes out of the granary and he just sees all of the sailors are
18:38
in the town. They start to say lightly that
18:42
Angel is missing now. Angel, we assume, has tried to
18:46
go off to Santa Maria or any European city and has left the
18:51
area. But for some reason, in a very
18:54
theatrical pantomime way, the sailors have started all going
18:58
and looking for Angel, who they've all of a sudden become
19:02
very, very curious about his whereabouts.
19:05
And you are kind of reading it going, what's going on here?
19:07
These people couldn't have given a crap about Angel at any other
19:11
point in this book so far. They're all screaming like, oh,
19:14
Angel, my love, like he was so important to us.
19:16
He means so much. He's such a great, great guy.
19:19
What a lovely boy kind of thing. And they're all screaming that
19:22
eventually they find Angel, and Angel is dead.
19:27
And he is. They're all around him,
19:30
kneeling, praying, crying. And Flores goes to look and he
19:34
realizes it's not Angel, it's the cabin boy Jacques, who is
19:38
dead. And he can see lines around his
19:42
neck. And also he's noticed in the
19:45
forest that a there was a nurse and that he believes someone has
19:51
hung themselves on him. It's mentioned as being very
19:54
high. Basically the sailors use
19:59
Jacques slash Angel's death as a impetus to attack the the
20:05
village people because they they try and convince the other
20:09
sailors that Jacques has been cannibalized, he is missing a
20:13
foot. Camacho who is the instigator of
20:15
the whole thing has found a a big like cauldron with loads of
20:21
the floors that the village people have and also Jacques
20:25
slash Angel's foot in it. So this is.
20:29
Proof that they were going to cook and eat Jacques slash
20:32
Angel. So they use this as their reason
20:36
to destroy the town. They kill everybody.
20:39
They kill them in horrific ways. Do we believe that any of them
20:43
believe it's Angel? The only one that I think is
20:46
actually potentially convinced is Geronimo.
20:51
But. Jeronimo seems to be so
20:54
emotionally out of it and drunk this entire chapter that I think
20:59
he just actually has no idea what's going on.
21:02
So I think with Jeronimo in this chapter is that he has found out
21:07
in not the end of the last chapter, he has found out that
21:10
Flores mother was one of the slaves.
21:13
Because throughout this whole chapter he just is crying to
21:16
Flores. Every time he sees Flores.
21:18
He is like he obviously feels this extreme amount of guilt,
21:22
like extreme amount. And he he's the only one of the
21:25
five that are still in it that seems to seems to have genuine
21:32
remorse. I think to an extent, Laugh
21:35
Cardio has some form of remorse because he wants a duel with
21:40
Flores and that will make his conscience feel better.
21:43
He was one of the 5 though. Well, I think he was, no, not
21:51
one of the five, but I think he was one of the original.
21:54
I think that based on what Laugh Cario says to Marianne Lynch,
21:58
that he was involved in assaulting the slaves and then
22:01
find out Flores was on board, had a moral crisis around the
22:06
idea that this was a real person and these were real people.
22:10
And told the other man with his position has been higher than
22:13
them that they could no longer assault the the slaves.
22:16
Which is why all of a sudden Camacho is like, why has he
22:20
asked me to give it up? And also it makes the five men
22:25
be such a revolt against Laugh Cardio that he has to then hang
22:30
them from because they've obviously been doing it
22:32
throughout. So why all of a sudden are is
22:36
Laughcardio going, I need to punish them?
22:39
And I think those five men were going, we're going to do this
22:42
like, you know, you're not going to stop us.
22:44
And then Laughcardio does stop them.
22:47
But I think it's interesting because his guilt doesn't seem
22:49
as it doesn't seem as like serious as Geronimo.
22:53
I think he's like, because he says to Flores sometimes he's
22:57
like, he obviously feels bad about it.
22:58
And he's like, I want to have a jewel with Flores so that Flores
23:01
has like the chance to kind of get revenge on him.
23:03
But at the same time, he also is like, it's not my fault your
23:06
mother's a slave. Like, you know, you, you like,
23:09
they're slaves in Africa. This isn't this isn't me my
23:12
doing kind of thing. And, you know, it's he kind of
23:17
pushes the blame on to other people.
23:19
And it's not actually 100% his fault.
23:21
But if he was involved in assaulting them and he's
23:23
involved in the slave trade, he does have some kind of moral
23:28
thing. But obviously Geronimo takes it
23:30
very seriously. I think that he's very much a
23:33
man of honor and, or at least that's how he tries to see
23:37
himself. And so he is adhering to all of
23:43
the like traditions of if you've wronged someone or if you're
23:49
having issues with someone, this is what you do to resolve it.
23:53
So he's like, look, you can kill me, let's do it as a jewel with
23:59
each other. Yeah, it it feels performative,
24:03
but in a way that he is very closely tied to and is just part
24:09
of like his actual. Belief system almost, yeah.
24:12
It's, it's honor. It's all those kind of things.
24:14
They're all wrapped up in it. And the idea that he knows he's
24:18
done something wrong morally and he's like, this is, this is how
24:22
it gets squared up. And it can be like it can be
24:25
tied up in a nice little package, you know, when he can
24:28
be done with it, you know, either Flores loses and he's
24:31
he'll be grand. But yeah, I know it is really
24:33
interesting. And also it's something that we
24:35
didn't really touch on. But in the last chapter, Angel,
24:39
when he finds out Flores has his mother is in the the hole, also
24:43
has this massive pang of bills. And he talks in so vivid terms
24:48
about like how he's going to make it up to Flores.
24:50
And I think this seems to be an idea amongst most of the men.
24:54
Even Fuchs, who is the Swedish Carpenter, like, tries to tell
24:59
Flores the story about how his mother was assaulted.
25:01
I don't know, just trying to make himself to be more human to
25:03
Flores. All these things mean nothing to
25:06
Flores. Flores is not looking to forgive
25:09
them. Yeah, he's not looking to
25:11
understand them, but they're all trying to, I think for their own
25:16
sake, trying to justify. It Oh totally.
25:18
It's not they. They're not helping Flores in
25:21
any way, shape or form with any of their actions.
25:23
So we have an introduction of an another new character in this,
25:29
which is Chuck Benjamin. He is one of the aforementioned
25:33
Benjamins. He seems so out of place here,
25:37
but he seems to very much be acquainted with this town.
25:42
I don't know if they necessarily have directly interacted with
25:46
each other, but we get many indications that he exists
25:50
before we actually are introduced to him.
25:53
The very first line of this chapter, his dog has a dead
25:57
pigeon in his mouth, and that's what Flores sees.
26:01
And Flores is like, why is there a white bulldog here?
26:05
Angel sees a man with a cane with a phoenix on it walking
26:09
through the forest as well very early in the chapter.
26:12
Does he think that that's a ghost, or does he believe that's
26:15
a real person? Because I don't.
26:16
Think, I don't think it's real, but I'm assuming if he saw a man
26:20
with a cane that has a phoenix or a sword with a phoenix on it,
26:23
he's seen a Benjamin Benjamin brother, but I don't know that
26:26
he's been able to be like that Definitely happened, but I'm
26:29
assuming it definitely happened. No, no, I think it definitely
26:32
happened as well, but I just, I can't figure out if Angel is
26:37
thinking he's seeing a ghost because he talks about it being
26:40
a ghost of a conquistador. Oh, yes, yeah, he thinks it's
26:44
Yeah. No, I remember that noise.
26:45
But I but he also said this man's going to come back for
26:49
this town, so we got to leave before he comes back.
26:52
So I just don't really understand.
26:54
Yeah. If he thought of it as a as a
26:57
haunting or a hunting Chuck Benjamin shows up with a little
27:02
boy. I bought 10.
27:04
Year old Chinese boy. Like a servant boy?
27:06
Almost, yeah. Shagon, Lee.
27:09
Yeah, Jagon Lee. And he wants to mine the town
27:16
for its guano. And since so many birds are in
27:20
this area, the ground is very fertile.
27:24
So he wants to ship that back to Europe and help fertilize the
27:28
the land back in Europe. He strikes up this deal with
27:31
Camacho. Well, Chuck is American, we find
27:35
out later. So I'm.
27:37
Assuming oh, I find out immediately from his accent.
27:44
In the book, it's I don't know if it's, I can't remember.
27:46
It's clear I knew it just because I've read the whole
27:48
thing. But they are both American.
27:50
There's two brothers, Chuck and Osgood, but there's also their
27:53
mother. There always seems to be this
27:55
like silent guiding hand of the mother in this, which is
27:59
probably a big mothers. I think is such a big theme,
28:02
which I didn't think of massively when we read the first
28:05
part, but I think like it's compounded as we've read how
28:09
important mothers have been, even though they're completely
28:13
much like the the townspeople, women are not really
28:17
represented. But I feel like it is important
28:20
possibly for the story that much like at the time, these people
28:26
were not considered important at all and their views and their
28:29
voices were never considered important.
28:31
But they are extremely important and they are like the crux of
28:34
the story. Do we think that Jacques killed
28:38
himself or do we think that Jacques and was killed?
28:42
So I think there's there's a lot of like, there's a lot of points
28:45
that go either way. Yeah.
28:47
But he has just had a conversation with Marianne Lynch
28:50
and it was quite a horrific conversation for a little
28:53
Jacques. Also, Little Jack is so is
28:57
continues to be the sweetest little creature on this planet.
29:02
Whenever he's there at the shore, he's wrapping up
29:06
Lafcadio's wounds. And then whenever he shows back
29:11
up into this town and Marianne Lynch is like, oh, well, what
29:16
are you going to do? Like, what's your plan?
29:18
And it was it. I feel like that was a weird
29:21
interaction because of course, she's just going to stay with
29:23
everyone else until they actually get to civilization.
29:26
Yeah. But Jacques was like, I'm going
29:29
to live here with my best friend Angel, and we're going to live
29:33
with these Native people. And Mariam Lynch was like, no,
29:37
you're going to kill them. You're going to breathe on them,
29:40
and you're going to pass all of your dirty germs, and that's
29:42
going to kill them. And Jacques is distraught about
29:47
this and then the worst thing happens where he sneezes like 3
29:52
times and then looks up to like the sky and that's the last that
29:58
we like hear from Jacques while he's alive.
30:00
So it's like, well, did he kill himself or?
30:03
So basically Jacques, we are assuming is the person who was
30:08
in the nurse and died. That's how he died, with the
30:11
marks around his neck. I think the conversation that he
30:14
has with Marianne is so like, it's so Jacques just to be that
30:18
innocent and naive and sweet and like that.
30:22
He's like, I'm going to kill 20 million people just because I'm
30:25
breathing. So therefore and he he is good
30:28
to a fault in the way that the rest of them are just not.
30:30
And the, I think it describes as well this kind of like he's like
30:36
he, it goes back to describing him when he was at home in, in
30:40
France. And it's like he has all these
30:42
religious experiences and he meets all these animals and
30:44
stuff. And it's like, and you said
30:46
like. Snow White, yes, because there's
30:49
a part where he he like gets like hypothermia or something.
30:52
I don't know what he gets, but like he's out in the snow and
30:55
because he's trying to get to the church or something, he's a
30:58
little orphan boy and he's been left behind because he's got a
31:01
temperature. And then a deer and it's baby
31:06
start following him. And then like ducks start
31:09
following and there's a whole trail of animals that follow him
31:13
and keep him warm until he like gets into the church or
31:16
something. It's such a weird, I'm thinking,
31:19
is that a dream he's had little like a little hallucination that
31:24
Jacques has had. But yeah, there's something
31:26
there's something very otherworldly about him and
31:30
Marianne Lynch. I think throughout this book
31:32
there's something so like, are there people that nice and are
31:36
there people that weird for Marianne?
31:39
The reasons I'm thinking that he maybe didn't and was murdered
31:42
was they did need a reason to sack this time.
31:46
There's two things in that. See, the part where Flores finds
31:50
the rope is that it's up very high.
31:53
And Jack is described as being like 1415.
31:56
So I'm kind of like, is he not tall?
31:58
Is or am I? I don't know.
32:00
Nothing about his height is really alluded to.
32:02
Maybe it is, I can't remember. And the other thing is that it's
32:05
a sailor's knot that's used for the nurse.
32:08
He's a cabin boy. He probably would have access to
32:11
the knowledge in some ways, but does he know enough to be able
32:15
to do that? But I think that the method as
32:17
well, the fact that he stopped like it chokes you from being
32:20
able to breathe, was very poignant in the sense that he
32:23
didn't want his breaths to be killing people.
32:26
Well, I'm I do have the theory that this could be where
32:31
Marianne Lynch got his name from because he might have actively
32:36
lynched Jacques. I can see it being a bit of
32:40
both, where Marianne Lynch might have literally tied the noose
32:45
and handed it to him and basically like led him to the
32:49
point of like hanging himself. Marion Lynch likes to keep his
32:54
hands clean, and we've seen that in the last chapter.
32:58
But he is also. Instigator.
33:01
At the instigator, yes, no, he he does get his hands a little
33:05
dirty in this chapter, which I was surprised about, but.
33:08
I think he did that to stop other things happening when they
33:12
are all crying and being very upset about dead Angel Flores is
33:17
there going This isn't Angel, this is Jacques.
33:20
This this man has not been cannibalized.
33:23
He's being the voice of reason and he's screaming it out.
33:25
And Marianne Lynch from the minute Flores enters the scene
33:28
keeps saying to him, leave, get out, leave.
33:32
He knows that. I think he knows Flores is going
33:35
to tell the truth and scream it out.
33:37
He then knees him in the face, but to the point where he breaks
33:42
most of the bones and everything in his face.
33:44
But Flores still, it's a horror. It's like I'm describing it very
33:47
nicely. But then slightly later on, I
33:51
can't remember if it's much later on, but Flores gets up
33:54
again and he's trying to stop everything from happening again.
33:57
And he keeps saying that he can see everything.
33:59
And there's a lot of theme around eyes in this chapter.
34:02
And he's like, I've seen this and I'm a witness to this.
34:05
And Marianne Lynch takes a dagger or a knife or a blade and
34:10
cuts Torres's eye out. His eye is like, kind of
34:12
dangling out for a bit of time there.
34:16
So I'm assuming Marianne Lynch knows Flores is a dead man or
34:21
he's missing an eye. And I think he has to do
34:23
something brutal to stop them from killing Flores because it
34:27
has to be horrific. Marianne Lynch is such an odd
34:30
character because I'm still trying to figure out what his
34:32
motives are. He does seem to want to save
34:36
Angel and Flores, so he sends Angel off.
34:41
It's almost like he's indoctrinating him or something.
34:46
He approaches Angel, who's in a body of water, he says.
34:52
But let's begin how it has always begun, with a breath and
34:56
a baptism. Yeah, so I have that underlined
35:00
and I was like, what? There's significance here, but
35:02
what is it? Which is what I do with most
35:05
Marianne Lynch lines this go prompting to this.
35:08
I don't know what it is, but you could be right with that
35:10
indoctrination thing. It's like he's he's changed
35:13
Angel. Something has happened to Angel
35:15
from this point onwards. It's also the last we hear of
35:18
Angel in the chapter. Also reminded me of the fact in
35:21
chapter 1 when the crossing of the line happens and they throw
35:27
Angel into the water. I'm pretty sure it was Marianne
35:30
Lynch who said no go get him. He he hasn't.
35:34
He's like a virgin to the water. It's almost like he baptized him
35:38
before by having him thrown into the water, and now he's in the
35:41
water again and he's going to baptize him a second time.
35:44
Well, there's something so interesting about Marion Lynch
35:47
in the sense that he seems to know everything and he seems to
35:49
be so educated and he's like a standard crew member in a
35:52
sailing ship who doesn't really have that much power.
35:55
But he seems very well educated. When he speaks.
35:58
He seems to have some kind of philosophy behind him.
36:02
He just, he seems to know a lot. And he also seems to always the
36:06
skirting between different factions on the the ship.
36:10
And he admits to laugh Cardio that he betrayed him in the in
36:14
the last chapter. And laugh cardio says something
36:18
quite cryptic back to Marianne and he says, I know what you
36:22
are. So laugh Cardio was for this
36:24
whole chapter is dying. But he's kind of going in and
36:28
out of things that make sense and don't make sense.
36:31
And he, he seems to say that he knows, he's not really angry
36:35
with, with Marianne Lynch because he knows what he is,
36:39
which made me think about your theory about Marianne Lynch not
36:42
being human. So adding on to what we had
36:46
discussed previously about Marianne Lynch seeming to be
36:50
some kind of demon or devil and having some supernatural stuff
36:55
happening, I now have a theory that he might be a puka, which
37:01
is a figure from Irish mythology.
37:06
He's Irish and the puka is a shapeshifter that would often
37:12
shapeshift into animals and it brings good luck and bad luck.
37:18
Let's listen to Emma from Real Life Ghost Stories.
37:23
Napuki can bring good luck, they can bring fortune, they can
37:26
bring good health, they can bring prosperity and protection,
37:30
But they can also bring terror and pain and suffering, and they
37:35
can also be with you. And guess what?
37:37
They're also shape shifters. They can take the form of cats,
37:40
dogs, goats, hares, horses, etcetera, but they can also take
37:44
the form of humans. But these humans will generally
37:47
have an animal characteristic, like they might have animal ears
37:51
or a tail. Because the puka was seen as a
37:53
trickster entity and people didn't know whether it was going
37:56
to bring good fortune or whether it was going to bring bad luck,
37:59
people generally believed that it was safer to avoid the puka
38:02
at any cost. One of the most famous forms
38:05
that the puka takes is the form of a horse that generally only
38:09
appears to really drunk people who are on their way home from
38:13
the pub. It's amazing how the puka and
38:15
copious amounts of punching are so inexplicably linked.
38:18
The puka was also linked to superstitions around the
38:21
harvest. There was a belief that if you
38:23
didn't harvest your crops before Halloween, on the 1st of
38:26
November, your crops would die and it would be the puka that
38:28
would do it. Specifically, some of the
38:30
legends would say that the puka would sit all over your crop.
38:33
There was one story about a man who met the puka on a really
38:36
cold night and offered the puka his coat.
38:39
And as a result of that, the puka would come in the middle of
38:41
the night and mill the family's corn into flour.
38:44
And the family were really prosperous and their soil was
38:47
really fertile. I think that last it's really
38:49
good because I think like he is well, he is ambitious and it
38:54
does seem like he brings good fortune to people and doesn't
38:56
like he brings bad fortune. But this whole part, like this
38:59
whole part land. It seems like he is constantly
39:03
trying to make Flores, who never drank before drink and he's
39:07
always insisting it's from like his flask and it's like you
39:10
don't know what it is. And it seems also like Flores
39:13
only trusts Marianne. Well, I suppose maybe it's in in
39:16
contrast to the five men he knows went to the whole.
39:19
But yeah, it's it's interesting. Yeah, I get what you mean.
39:23
On top of the alcohol stuff, there's a couple of other points
39:27
there that that are reflected. So whenever Marianne Lynch is
39:31
reintroduced in this chapter, he's sitting on a branch above
39:38
Angel. But he seems to have come out of
39:40
nowhere. And it's like, what's he doing
39:43
up on a branch? Like, where did that come from?
39:47
There's also a monkey that has been following around Cricklow
39:52
who goes missing but shows up at different points and seems to be
39:56
very human. He shows up at the very end, and
39:59
he's, like, sitting, like, drinking a beer at this bar.
40:03
Yeah. So I think that that monkey is
40:09
Marianne Lynch. I think that he is shape
40:12
shifting and that is why we we don't hear from Cricklow that
40:19
Marianne Lynch has gone to Luck for Angel, but we hear from
40:22
Marianne Lynch that Cricklow has gone for Flores.
40:27
So we never hear anyone refer to where Marian Lynch is, but we
40:33
hear him refer to, he seems to know what's happening.
40:36
And This is why I think that he, I think he's a shapeshifter.
40:41
I think that he's following a quick, low round.
40:46
Also, whenever he jumps off the branch, it's described that he
40:49
lands like a cat. And I know that that is just
40:51
like a small tiny thing. Any animals but.
40:55
The fact that that he does have an animal description attached
40:59
to him, no, I wish that there was more.
41:01
It's not like every time we see him that they talk about his
41:04
whiskers or like anything like that.
41:08
But I I still think that there is something to this.
41:12
If the puka is known to show up and basically poop all over your
41:17
land and make it fertile, that is another big plot point in
41:22
this chapter where Angel first of all has some kind of terrible
41:29
guts problems happening. You were going to bring this up?
41:34
I was like, I don't want to talk about this.
41:36
I'll talk about eyes being removed.
41:38
Fine. This is where they they
41:41
reconnect with each other and, and then that leads on into the
41:45
guano and how this town is going to be mined for its guano and
41:50
because it's extremely fertile. I just think that the puka,
41:54
there's so many points to the puka that we can't ignore it.
41:57
And Marianne Lynch is 110% of puka.
42:01
I was going to come and counter this with two points.
42:03
So I had one in favor of you and one against you.
42:07
But you've already preempted my one against you, which is the
42:10
fact that at the same time, Crickley, when his monkey are
42:14
going to speak to Flores and at the scene and what we presume is
42:18
the same time Marianne Lynch goes to speak to Angel.
42:21
But I guess they could be different times.
42:23
But one point that I have in favor of you is that when I was
42:28
because see at the end, when the monkey, the monkey sitting in a
42:30
bar drinking, he's got like a bottle of beer that's like this,
42:35
like this, like half his size. And and he's kind of just seems
42:39
like an ordinary, like he just he's described as being a
42:42
customer, the only customer in the bar.
42:45
But something that I find interesting was he's always
42:48
described as being silver, like a silver monkey.
42:51
And again, this is my Wikipedia level research because I didn't
42:53
look too much into it, but I was like trying to imagine in my
42:57
head what that monkey would look like.
42:59
So I googled like a silver monkey.
43:01
And they're only the only ones that really exist that would be
43:06
that size are in the like near like Thailand, Malaysia, that
43:10
kind of area, Indonesia, that kind of area.
43:13
There wasn't any when I searched for like the South, the Americas
43:17
at all. So I was like, either Crickloo
43:19
has brought this on a boat somewhere because it's very,
43:23
it's very clearly described in multiple places as being silver.
43:26
I don't think he would have taken them.
43:28
I feel like we would have got a description that this monkey
43:31
existed before now if he had rotted.
43:35
With on the boat, yes, that was my thought there as well.
43:38
I was like, you do make me think of like the most different
43:42
things. Do you think I'm onto something
43:44
with this theory or? Do you know what I do?
43:47
I begrudgingly think that you're onto something.
43:50
I hate it. Marion Lynch is, to me, the most
43:53
interesting character and I have no, I didn't expect that to be
43:57
the case, especially after the first reading.
44:00
And but I'm very interested in asking Austin Vegan questions
44:06
about this. Yeah, he might be like, that's
44:08
just a man that's not to be trusted.
44:11
An Irishman being in Egypt overseas, have you never met
44:15
one? Like come on, he'll be like
44:18
Marianne Lynch is based on me. These are normal things I say
44:20
and do in every life. So Shuagong Lee is a 10 year old
44:25
Chinese boy who is doing the bidding of Chuck Benjamin,
44:28
Benjamin. And even from he's much more
44:30
fleshed out later on. But even from this point, we do
44:33
see how much he's Chuck trusts him because he asks him to scout
44:39
and he trusts that what he's seeing.
44:42
So basically they think there's a commotion somewhere so they
44:44
send Lee out to to find see what it is.
44:48
And Lee goes out and he sees Isa and Flores missing his eye and
44:53
he tells Chuck that there's nothing there.
44:56
So lies to him, but he's given that trust in the 1st place and
45:00
obviously Chuck believes him. Is this the first time that Lee
45:03
meets Isa? Because it seemed to me like he
45:06
that's such a big risk to help ESA and Flores.
45:09
And this is also the point at which ESA starts crying.
45:13
And I don't know if this is like, because she like, I mean,
45:19
everybody in her like, family in town has died or is dying or has
45:24
been tortured. But it seems in there's
45:27
something there. And he, Lee winks at ESA.
45:32
We're assuming that Lee has gone out to this area to scout it
45:35
with Chuck a points at different points with the dog.
45:38
He must have said he probably has seen her before and she has
45:41
been outcast from the village for like probably and I think
45:44
it's again said later on she has been outcast from the village a
45:48
good while before Flores and Angel show up.
45:52
So does she has she met him? Does she know him and has this
45:57
bond already been formed? Was something that I I kind of
46:01
was surprised at because they're like, he's possibly one of my
46:05
favorite characters in the whole thing.
46:07
So I was like kind of excited when I heard him.
46:10
And he's quite a funny character because he immediately when
46:14
Chuck goes to like, talk to the, the, the sailors, he starts
46:19
playing cards with the sailors and drinking and smoking with
46:21
them. He's like 10 and he's like
46:23
beating them, winning. Yeah, he's getting loads of gold
46:26
and stuff. And he's just, yeah, he's a
46:28
great character. Something that I thought was
46:30
kind of interesting was the significance of eyes.
46:34
Eyes kind of appear throughout it.
46:35
Angel, when he's talking to the children of the town, he draws a
46:38
picture of an eye randomly. There's also the main building
46:41
in the center of the town has like a kind.
46:44
Of the the. Dome with like a bit missing
46:49
that's causing like this elliptical like optical illusion
46:52
and it's creating like an eye. And there's a lot of things of
46:56
like seeing and witnessing as themes throughout the chapter.
46:59
And also Flores's eye is taken out by Marianne Lynch, which is
47:03
a pretty big thing about eyes. And so I think is this to do
47:07
with like witnessing what's happening to the town.
47:11
And a lot of the stuff with the the roof in the the main town
47:16
building is like talked about when the sailors are sacking the
47:21
time. It seems to be a big theme of
47:22
like how the light is showing and how moonlight is appearing
47:25
and all that kind of stuff. So that's something that I
47:27
thought was quite interesting. Yeah.
47:30
We'll talk about jellyfish. Let's talk about the jellyfish,
47:33
because it's brought up at another point.
47:36
The very. At the very end of this chapter,
47:39
yes, yes, yes. Whenever Angel draws the eye for
47:42
the children, Flores is like, is this jellyfish?
47:45
And that completely sends Angel over the edge.
47:49
He, like, has to walk away because he's so angry.
47:52
Then yeah at the end Flores and Yusa make it away from this
47:59
village that's being completely murdered.
48:02
They end up at this bar that has like 5 different women added and
48:09
all the women seem to have have different ethnicities.
48:13
I mean, it's a, it's a brothel. I'm pretty sure you'd want.
48:16
You'd want. You'd want variety.
48:18
Yes, yes, I guess. I guess he was.
48:20
There's the ugliest woman that Flores has ever seen.
48:23
A Scottish woman. Which can I just say this is a
48:27
bit of foreshadowing her name. OK, Because this was something
48:30
when I first read the book because I was something we've
48:33
not really mentioned, but there is a letter at the start of this
48:37
chapter and the start of every chapter in which a, I'm assuming
48:40
child writes to their father in extremely poor English.
48:45
Definitely an originally Spanish speaking writer because a lot of
48:48
the punctuation is Spanish. They sign off the letter with
48:51
the initials BT, which is something I was like completely
48:55
when my first read was like, I need to find this person.
48:57
And the first time anyone appears in this book with the
49:01
initials BT is this ugly Scottish sex worker.
49:06
Her name is Biddy Tanner. This does become relevant.
49:09
Flores is in terrible condition. His face is basically half of it
49:13
is missing because his eye was cut out of its socket.
49:18
They get looked after by these women and specifically by Biddy
49:22
Tanner. Flores wakes up in the morning
49:26
and ESA is gone. He hears some noise underneath
49:29
the bed, so he goes rummaging and finds a baby in a basket.
49:35
The baby's like four months old, but he's looking for ESA, he's
49:39
not looking for this baby, so he just kind of leaves the baby
49:42
bee. It's been fine so far, so.
49:47
So he goes searching along the shore.
49:50
As he's searching, he comes across all of these seashells
49:55
and he starts collecting them because he thinks ESA will think
49:59
that they're really pretty. And then he comes across a
50:02
jellyfish that has Jelly babies. Not, not Jelly babies.
50:07
Yeah. Jellyfish babies.
50:08
This. Sweets from the UK.
50:11
Yeah, it was. But yeah, there, there's
50:14
jellyfish babies there as well, which I just, I can't even
50:18
picture jellyfish babies. What what do you think about the
50:21
the jellyfish? I thought nighttime.
50:23
MMM. Which nighttime is very not
50:27
referenced in this chapter. There's one Geronimo mentions it
50:31
by name. It wasn't as heavy on nighttime
50:33
that I thought it was. There's definitely one part of
50:35
this book that's very heavy on nighttime.
50:37
I almost felt like the jellyfish were like the people of
50:42
nighttime because they go into the depths the creature and it's
50:46
projects progeny and disappeared beneath the deeper water.
50:52
And I kind of thought that the way he described the innumerable
50:55
children and the creatureness of it, it just reminded me of when
51:00
he like talks about night time in the book.
51:02
It always seems to be this like a lot of creatures in the depths
51:07
kind of like going down deeper and not really showing
51:11
themselves. And it I, I don't know, I think
51:14
I'm reading way too much into it.
51:15
So there's a poem that Flores has translated into English that
51:18
his mom originally wrote in Arabic.
51:20
One of the parts of it says, and the sea is always whispering
51:23
that she will not be loved until all her floors are given back to
51:27
her. And there's part of me that's
51:28
kind of like almost like the sea wants everyone to come back to
51:33
it. And that's kind of what Night
51:35
Town is to some degree. It's like everyone going back
51:38
into the sea. Also it mentions flowers and
51:40
flowers are also throughout it. Flowers are a huge theme in this
51:44
chapter. Pink flowers in particular.
51:46
That's why this village or this town exists in the 1st place
51:50
because they're located close to where these flowers bloom and
51:54
they trade with the settlers once a year.
51:58
And we also found out the floor is his chosen name Flores,
52:04
because obviously his original name is Muhammad and his chosen
52:07
name Flores is because he liked flowers.
52:09
The only other time that I remember pink flowers being
52:12
mentioned was right at the very start of chapter 1 when Angel
52:17
has the vision of the dark skinned girl and who has like an
52:25
injury in her guts and there's pink flowers that are like
52:28
growing in her wound. I'm like, in awe.
52:34
Yep. Her gut had been torn open,
52:37
exposing a Meadow of pink flowers in which roamed a pigeon
52:41
that moved like a sea creature. It's always pigeons.
52:44
Let's continue speaking about the birds.
52:47
And so phoenixes have become particularly important in this
52:51
chapter. And because Chuck Benjamin is
52:54
walking around with a cane that has a phoenix and that's like
53:01
shaped at the head of it. When the sailors are burning
53:05
down the town, a couple of pigeons fly out from this hole
53:09
in the the ceiling of the central building and they're on
53:14
fire and like the sailors think that they're actual phoenixes
53:19
that are flying around. Phoenixes are pretty easy to.
53:23
Understand reference like. New birth and the ending of one
53:27
thing and the the start of another.
53:29
Well, it is like the tone is ending and the new camp, the
53:33
mining camp is going to be this kind of time for the European
53:37
town. Yeah.
53:37
This chapter in particular really reminds me of the TV show
53:40
Lost. Like, there's not that many
53:43
similarities, but there is. That's about a plane crash onto
53:47
Magical Island, and I'm pretty sure there's a phoenix just
53:51
sticking with the birds as well. The sailors, when we're
53:54
reintroduced to them on the beach, they have slaughtered all
53:59
of these seals and they've built towers.
54:01
Was it just to show how barbaric they are?
54:03
And I'm assuming that you're going to be talking about the
54:06
chickens because they torture the chickens.
54:08
Yeah, well, even all of these seals they've killed, whenever
54:13
Floors gets to the beach, there's a couple of pups that
54:16
are going around, seal pups, and he witnesses them literally like
54:21
having their, like, skulls bashed in.
54:23
Seal pups are so cute. Yeah, and they're so innocent
54:27
and they're like trying to get away and.
54:29
It's describing them as having like little puppy dog eyes and
54:32
all and I was like, no. And then their heads are just
54:35
stove in. Like so, so horrible.
54:38
I think if you're able to kill a seal pup, you're a psychopath.
54:41
They're ensuring that this colony of seals will never exist
54:45
into the future. Like they're not going to have
54:47
children, they're not going to have anything in the future.
54:49
Then this gets replicated, like you said, whenever they turn up
54:53
to the town. I don't know if chickens
54:55
necessarily produce guano, but they're birds and these sailors
55:02
just show up and completely slaughter all the chickens, but
55:05
not not in a humane way. They're like using them for
55:08
target practice and like exploding their heads.
55:11
Yeah, they're like digging holes, putting the chickens in
55:13
so only their heads are visible, and then shooting up them
55:17
because it is horrible. It is horrible, but I think it,
55:20
it sets the scene for the slaughter that's going to happen
55:24
of the people in the town and it just shows, as you said, how
55:27
barbaric these people are. I did want to point out that we
55:31
have had guano, uh, in Chapter 1 as well, in the captain's
55:37
quarters in his bird cage for the pigeons, There's a
55:41
description of a tower of guano that has built.
55:44
I don't think it's described as guano.
55:46
So I know I've already broken our streak of me baking
55:50
something from each chapter, but in this chapter there isn't
55:53
really much food discussed. There's a lot of alcohol
55:56
discussed, but not much food. They do have the granary that
55:59
has lots of maze in it and there is one part where some of the
56:04
women are and baking a cake in the ground, but we have no idea
56:09
what kind of cake it is. We don't know what ingredients
56:12
they use. So it just felt like I would be
56:14
making something that is not properly described, but you come
56:18
to us with a beverage. Yeah, I decided to make an Eden
56:22
Shore based cocktail. I'm going to call it the Eden
56:25
Shore special or the Flora special.
56:28
So Flores obviously starts drinking and I was thinking what
56:30
do sailors drink it around this time?
56:32
And there's, there's multiple descriptions of like clear
56:34
liquid or like not clear liquid and we don't really know.
56:37
But I'm just assuming rum, put a bit of rum in a glass with ice.
56:42
And then I added some football special, which is on offer and
56:46
little at the moment. If you're in the Belfast area, I
56:49
think it's marrying the Caribbean or Central America or
56:53
Brazil. You ever know where we are with
56:57
Ireland? Nobody will be able to follow
56:59
the recipe and make this because I'll have to order it from like
57:03
Donegal. I'm pretty sure Ashley and
57:05
Fagan, not being from Ulster, will have no idea what a
57:08
football special is. But I don't know.
57:09
I don't know has it been? You know, I don't know if a
57:12
football special. Yeah, if it makes its way down
57:15
to 20 minutes. We didn't even get into the
57:17
slugs and the snails. Oh, the snail.
57:20
The snails. To summarize that, I think it's
57:23
got to do with finding a new home and like being nomadic.
57:28
Now let's give this chapter a reading out of five.
57:31
I, I feel like you're very excited for my reading and I
57:33
think it's quite obvious. I think it's like 5.
57:35
Like I really enjoyed it, but now you're making me think I, I
57:38
love anything at sea. So I do think the minute they
57:42
landed, there's a there's a thing in my head that's like,
57:44
this is disappointing that they're now not on sea.
57:47
But I, I think it's still great. Like I think, I think I'm so
57:51
invested in all the characters and I'm so invested in what
57:55
they're doing and what's happening.
57:56
I think as well, it's kind of really compartmentalized almost,
57:59
you know, because there's the feeling of isolation and like
58:01
the ship is completely separate to the rest of the world.
58:05
I really feel that way. Even though we know that there's
58:07
like a little time, it does still feel very quarantined and
58:11
very like they're in this area and they can't really leave.
58:14
But Chuck seems to be a person that's the one between.
58:17
I'm going to give this chapter a four.
58:18
I think that might be down to me rather than the chapter itself.
58:22
I think because I'm lacking the actual connection to the Yes
58:28
community here and that's what's missing for me.
58:32
I still love it, yeah, it's just not hitting the same way that
58:36
Chapter 1 is for me. If you want to, if you're
58:40
reading along and you want to get in on the conversation too,
58:43
then you can send your thoughts to us on Instagram.
58:45
We are at Bookies favorite book club.
58:49
You can also e-mail us at bookiespiritbookclub@gmail.com.
58:52
We'll be uploading an episode each week until we've finished
58:56
all 5 chapters of Eden Shore, so remember to send us your
59:00
thoughts and questions for Ashley and Fagan as well.
59:02
Next week we will be discussing Part 2, Chapter 3 Colony.
59:06
Subscribe on whatever podcast platform you're listening on so
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59:11
Sure, this episode was a book lover you think would like this
59:15
book? Read the podcast. 5 stars and
59:18
let's end on a quote from Land. I must say the Americas have
59:24
been a huge disappointment. Bookies are.
59:28
Goodbye. Bye.