I just got done with my MN reread tonight. The first time I had read it was when it had first been published, and for whatever reason, I had just never gotten around to reading it again.
I am glad I did. I enjoyed it a lot more on the second read...not that I didn't enjoy it the first time around -- but on the second I got a lot more out of it.
The first time around I remember feeling a bit confused and even a bit frustrated about all of these new weird people and places Terisa gets flung into and among...on the second reading this wasn't so jarring -- and I think SRD actually wrote the book that way on purpose -- so that you could feel empathy for Terisa as she is thrown into the cauldron of plotting strangers that is Orison...
Being part of the group read also helped, as I have done quite a few chapters as the read leader, so I really had to slow down and read the chapters again and again -- Donaldson deserves to be sipped like a rare fine wine. With each reading of a chapter I came to understand Terisa and her gradual growth a bit more...
Maybe just having more life experience has helped, too. Just as I get more out of the TC books as an adult, and with further rereads, I got a lot more out of MN, too.
I am still nervous about the Gap, though. I remember my one and only read of the Gap as being very disturbing...yet I wish to try to reread it before Elohimfest... ******************************************************
Our lives are the songs that sing the universe into existence.~David Zindell <i></i>
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