seanan_mcguire | CHAOS CHOREOGRAPHY open thread!

To celebrate the release of Chaos Choreography, here. Have an open thread to discuss the book. Judging by the comments I'm seeing, some of you have had time, and I'd really, really rather book discussion (sometimes including spoilers) didn't crop up on other posts.

THERE WILL BE SPOILERS.

Seriously. If anyone comments here at all, THERE WILL BE SPOILERS. So please don't read and then yell at me because you encountered spoilers. You were warned. (I will not reply to every comment; I call partial comment amnesty. But I may well join some of the discussion, or answer questions or whatnot.) I will be DELETING all comments containing spoilers which have been left on other posts. No one gets to spoil people here without a label.

You can also start a discussion at my website forums, with less need to be concerned that I will see everything you say! In case you wanted, you know, discussion free of authorial influence, since I always wind up getting involved in these things.

Have fun, and try not to bleed on the carpet.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

It makes perfect sense that Verity would be in a competition called "Dance or Die" I'm only surprised that it took until the sixth season for someone to actually die!

Broadcasting a Snake God slaying live on TV, and Verity outing herself to the Covenant was somewhat of a shock. I'm eagerly looking forward to how this will play out in the next book(s).

Verity potentially came out to a lot more than just the Covenant. At the moment, we don't know just how much of what happened actually aired. The cameras were still running -- because their operators very wisely chose not to waste time shutting them off before they ran away when the giant snake appeared -- but was the signal still being transmitted? Exactly how much was broadcast live is a bit ambiguous at the end.

That's what I want to know, too. I mean if -I- saw a giant snake thing on tv like that my first thought would be 'wow, where'd they get that big a snake?' because I grew up in South Florida and big reptiles were part of everyday life, and I'd simultaneously want to pet it and stay very far away. But yeah, there's gonna be a lot more speculation on the internet and cryptids (at least some) might have to be outed sooner than expected.

There's the bit about the 'special effects' mentioned later- but how they're going to explain all the deaths to the families, and then cover that up, and deal with the inevitable reddit thread and Anonymous investigation, I dunno.

Yeah, special effects and the death coverup....special effects are good but not -that- good. And reddit, Fark (lots of scientists on Fark I've noticed, myself included. Some of the biology discussions get -intense-) and tumblr and just....social media is gonna make the coverup a lot harder. Might be easier to go "Look! Frickens are a thing!" and hope that distracts people? Maybe not. But the tailypo is out of the bag, so to speak.

Like I said, it depends a lot on how much actually aired. Verity said the ratings were "spectacular" but that probably wasn't due to the incident; while it seems long in narrative form, it probably was over in less than five minutes, and even with people blasting out tweets to their friends to 'check out Dance or Die, there's a giant snake!' it's not likely enough could have tuned in to affect the ratings. It's entirely possible someone in the control booth cut to commercial as soon as Adrian went psycho. But the people fleeing the theater would have been jamming 911 with their calls, and the police response would have been pretty quick, and everything was recorded. Maybe we'll learn that there's a government entity out there that works to keep cryptids off the radar.

*Cue X-Files theme*

Maybe they were on a heavy tape delay due to Anders' cussing? But yeah, the cops are gonna have a field day. As will the families of those killed. I see some sort of negligence class action suit ongoing. And I think the entity working to keep cryptids off the radar....well, I work for the government (technically two governments) and I'd bet there are cryptids in the upper echelons of at least some departments. But government agencies.... hmmmn.

Now I'm imagining a secret USDA-ARS agency designed to do just that. That'd be kinda cool!

Ok, now I'm kinda imagining something like the ATI, only for cryptids, and they've known about the Covenant for years, and have been secretly fending them off of US shores...

That's exactly what I was thinking. Planting rumors on social media to steer people away from the truth. Showing up with stories about 'not actually jackelopes, it's a tumor-inducing virus outbreak, nothing to see here'. That'd be awesome.

This had me so confused. I was trying very hard to figure out what government agency had the acronym ATI. Then the pieces slowly fell into place and a light bulb went off in my brain. Now I feel really foolish.

Heh heh heh.

Yeah, a similar organization would probably be a great idea to have, under the circumstances.

Loved the book -- but, yeah, there are a couple of plot holes in the end.

In my mind, it is manifestly obvious that the live feed would have almost certainly been cut when Adrian pulled the knife, and definitely would have been cut off when he cut Lara's(sp -- don't have the book handy) throat. So the footage of the snake and fight didn't go out live. Someone suffering a psychotic break at an elimination ceremony is the kind of thing that any reality show would plan and perhaps even practice for, so the odds that panic would have prevented them from reacting properly would be quite low. The giant snake might well lead to panic, but there looks to be a gap of ~30-60 seconds between the murder and the snake arriving -- plenty of time to cut the feed, call the police, and so forth.

But....

The fact that a giant snake was summoned and a massive battle occurred would have gone out within minutes -- live studio audience, remember, that evacuated? Given that the show was intended to be live, there would have been no reason to confiscate cell phones (which I assume would be standard issue for taped shows), so it is highly likely that there would have been tweets describing the action, quite possibility with photos and / or video, within minutes of the action. One assumes that the Covenant has people and programs looking for events that might have reveal the presence of cryptids -- they would be aware of it within an hour, possibly within minutes.

And the cameras would definitely still be running: even if the show can never air the footage, the police would definitely be interested in the footage. And we know, from earlier in the book, that all the shows footage is stored in a vulnerable cloud (Artie broke into it earlier, remember?) It seems likely that the Covenant would have the full footage available to them within no more than 4 hours of the event occurring while it would take days or maybe even a week before all the footage would be rounded up and placed in a more secure environment.

So, while Verity's explanation in the book is incorrect, her challenge to the Covenant is absolutely appropriate -- her cover is blown and the Covenant may well be coming.

On the other hand, I'm a bit mystified about one thing: Alice's continued existence and survival is a known fact -- the "evil judge" accuses Verity of hiring a "skilled interdimensal mercenary", which implies that her existence is widely known in the appropriate circles, and obviously the Covenant may not be happy about this, but they aren't attempting to wage widespread war to kill her, so... Perhaps Verity overreacted a bit, forcing a confrontation that could have been avoided?

I don't see how any of this would improve the ratings of the show, as the remainder of the episodes in the current season are obviously not going to occur. At least, I certainly hope not... :)

"I don't see how any of this would improve the ratings of the show, as the remainder of the episodes in the current season are obviously not going to occur. At least, I certainly hope not... :) "

Wasn't it the finale?

CHAOS CHOREOGRAPHY open thread!

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