hippogrif

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Welcome.

This is a thread for discussing the Girl Genius novelization Agatha H. and the Clockwork Princess, as well as all Girl Genius in general. The subject matter is the property of Phil and Kaja Foglio.

No spoilers are required in this thread. The assumption is you've read the material already. That is why this thread exists--to provide a place for people to talk without having to try to avoid giving away secrets.

I own this account. If you're rude or a jackass, I will delete your post. If you're debating in good faith and not annoying the natives, I won't. If people really can't behave, I'll delete the whole fershlugginer thread.

Have fun. Talk at will. If you don't want spoilers, run away now.

Hippogrif.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

From:

lightningnettle.livejournal.com

We also get a lot more information about Geisters.

They have multiple, probably non-overlapping castes. You can tell how tight the castes are when the cell Geisters refuse to even try to use the lockpick, as they aren't artisens.

Then the half comment about not even their daughters being exactly like their mothers; makes me wonder if they're parthenogenic.

Their Goddess clearly has several aspects and they seem to be quite willingly subservient, even when she looks like she might kill them all. The segue from the End of the World to the start of a new world was rather disconcerting to me. It must be a well-established possibility in their mythos. Sort of a The King is Dead, Long Live the King! type of thing.

I was dismayed when Vrin stated that they failed to protect the Holy Child despite knowing when, who, how and with what abilities they would be attacked. It smacks of more time travel to me, and that's just not something I'm fond of. I also wish she'd given some detail on who exactly did the attacking since she knew who it was. Must be a deliberately hidden card. I would guess Bill and Barry, but GG is full of wonderful surprises.

And Geister cheese! Love Tarvek learning about it.

From:

hippogrif

Yes. Very interesting.

My take on Geister society: bees. Granted, I've thought that for awhile and said it before, so I'm pre-biased in favor of that perception, but the daughters-not-sons thing, the rigid roles, the inability to think very creatively even presented with the facts in advance...they all make me think of a hive.

I've wondered for some time if they're not a mixed race full symbionts with the wasps. My take for some time is that somehow Lu got herself linked into something that allowed her to shanghai the Giesters for her own purpose, stepping into the Goddess role.

I don't know if she just lucked out and had the right vocal frequency to match their Lady's natural voice, or if something else went on. But... I still think the Geisters have a lot in common with bugs.

And, yes. The cheese. Reminds me of a story of my great grandmother and a blue-bottle fly in the soup. She was very unhappy to learn about that fly just a bit too late.

From:

lightningnettle.livejournal.com

Could Geisters be Elves?

There's a distinct suggestion that Lucrezia was gone a horrifyingly long time in her reaction to Tarvek's question about leaving and not knowing when you'll come back. The Geister's clearly live in an alternate dimension like elves, perhaps time runs differently there?

Traditionally there are male elves; but they usually do have a queen. Tall, slender, uncreative, capable of subverting people's minds? Maybe.

Oh, Summer Court and Winter Court; Skifandrians and Geisters?

From:

lightningnettle.livejournal.com

Um. I forgot to put in that I wonder if Lu's utter shock at The Baron Got Back, is because Skifander is also in an alternate dimension. Or that she thinks it is, at least.

From:

lightningnettle.livejournal.com

Another idea, did Klaus have to leave Skifander with Gil, not because anybody there would have killed him; but because Skifander itself was inhospitable to him? Perhaps Zeetha's green hair indicated that she got the proper genes from her mother to thrive; and Gil's brown hair indicated otherwise. Klaus could have been an exception because he's a construct, or because he was willing to shorten his own life, but not his son's.

He brought a changling child back from Faerie.

Still Klaus thought Zeetha was sent to kill Gil. A misunderstanding on his part?

From:

hippogrif

I do think the Geisters may be a very rough, approximate "elf" parallel. I'm less convinced that they're in an alternate dimension where time runs differently. I agree that Lu's been gone a long time without being human: I'm still guessing she got herself tangled in a machine of some sort. Or possibly in a "Queen Bee." Or both: there's still room for "The Lady of Crystal" to be both Queen Bee and mecha.

I think whatever happened in Skifander it was at least partly a misunderstanding on Klaus' part. Zeetha mainly seems amused at the idea that she might be there to kill Gil. I'd tend to think it's one of Klaus' few, but horrible mistakes: he saw/heard something that led him to jump to a false conclusion.

Having Skifander and Geisterland both prove to be faery parallels works, though, as a literary trope.

From:

sffcorgi

It also echoes the Christmas panto with the ant farm schtic.

From:

sffcorgi

...I can't edit my spelling?! FOUL!

From:

lightningnettle.livejournal.com

Ooh, yes it does, it does indeed. Happiness!

From:

murgatroyd666

My take on Geister society: bees. [...] I've wondered for some time if they're not a mixed race full symbionts with the wasps.

Hello! Murgatroyd here. I've been lurking for a couple of days ... I had intended to refrain from commenting since I haven't read the book yet, but I'm dying to to add something here that might reinforce your suspicions:

In Othar's Twitter feed, once tweet shortly after Oslaka's death mentioned that they had "no children, of course." Why "of course"? Because Othar didn't want to bring more sparks into the world? Or might it be that normal humans and Geisterdämen aren't interfertile? (Ack! Did I just call Othar "normal"?)

Back to lurking ... Bye!