Kerry Allen

I gave up on the UF I’d been struggling to read for over a week because the protag is irredeemably, infuriatingly oblivious.

Let’s say… you’re in a situation in which someone is launching attacks against you that are becoming increasingly hazardous to your health. Around the fourth or fifth such attack… your left arm is magically turned into Skittles. You seek magical medical attention from a powerful sorcerer-type dude who’s on the same side you’re on but doesn’t like you very much, and the feeling is mutual. The powerful sorcerer-type dude who doesn’t like you very much never asks, “Hey, putz, how’d your arm get turned into Skittles?”

Would that not cause you to wonder at some point why powerful sorcerer-type dude who doesn’t like you very much DIDN’T ask what happened? Even if you’re such a little pissant to him, he can’t muster an inkling of curiosity about your peculiar affliction, wouldn’t you think an explanation would be helpful toward CURING it? Wouldn’t you think the lack of asking indicated some preexisting knowledge, like, I don’t know, the sort of preexisting knowledge that might arise from being in cahoots with the one who Skittlefied your arm?

For that matter, rewind a little bit. If your left arm got turned into Skittles, wouldn’t you be telling as many people as possible, “Dude! LOOK what that crazy sumbitch Bob did to my friggin’ arm!”, without even being asked?

Which brings us to another problem: repeated failure to share information between characters. The very first time it happened, I rolled my eyes because it was so blatant. Flashback: Gee, if only that waiter hadn’t interrupted us that time my mentor was infodumping about just this scenario, I’d know how to get out of it now that it’s happening to me. How inconvenient that we didn’t resume that incredibly important conversation after he capped off our coffee. By the fourth or fifth time, it was obvious the big mystery could have been solved and all the trouble resolved by Chapter Three if protag would just divulge information to the people who are far more capable of handling the situation than he is, so the continuation of the story is entirely dependent upon one character or another’s inability to complete a sentence.

But let’s get back to the obliviousness for a second, shall we? When repeated attempts have been made on your life, would you think it’s remotely a good idea to have sex with and sleep in the bed of and consume food prepared by a total stranger? See, for me, any one of those things would require at least a smidgen of trust, which I would have some trouble manufacturing on a stranger’s behalf right then, given the circumstances of multiple recent near-death experiences.

But why would the protag worry? He’s exhibited all the reasoning skills of a houseplant for the last 200 pages and come off none the worse for wear, except for a few Skittles. Clearly, nothing really bad is going to happen to him.

And even if something really bad DOES happen, IT’LL BE OKAY! Because someone more powerful, more knowledgable, and generally more competent will be along shortly to save him, like they have for the last 200 pages every time he’s aimlessly wandered into some potentially fatal situation 10 seconds after being warned about just such a potentially fatal situation!

I suppose it could be worse. At least it’s a male character being TSTL for a change.

I find it completely implausible that the villain has any interest in the protag because the protag is useless. You don’t become the Badass Evil Overlord by exterminating the village idiot.

And, contrary to how I suspect the rest of this book goes, the village idiot does not miraculously defeat the Badass Evil Overlord in the final minute of the darkest hour.

I’m going to imagine his dog does and spare myself further irritation by tossing this one in the donation box.