(no subject)

[emmaco.livejournal.com]

I am re-reading The Thief (again, but the first time in ages) and remembered something about my first read that I don't think I've shared with this community. When I first read The Thief I was sure that the gender of the narrator was being deliberately concealed and we might ASSUME it was a male but in fact it was a female. For example everyone refers to Gen as "the thief". In this reading I could still see how I thought that up until about the point everyone is pulling Gen's shirt off and making him bathe etc. Then it seemed more likely he was a he.

I think I might have been told there was some trick in the book and I was being super suspicious. And I think I had just finished a story that did deliberately confuse genders just before reading The Thief. But I was wondering if anyone else was confused if Gen was a boy or girl at the start? Did I completely miss a giveaway pronoun early on?

Comments

[aged-crone.livejournal.com]

Emmaco,

I knew when I read THE THIEF that Gen was a boy because I had already read KoA, but I noticed the exact same thing you did; to the point that I was beginning to wonder if maybe this Gen wasn't the same Gen as the one in KoA.

[emmaco.livejournal.com]

I'm glad I wasn't alone :)

[peggy-2.livejournal.com]

It never occurred to me, but I first read Thief so long ago it's hard to remember my initial impressions (except that as soon as I finished it, I immediately started over and read it again. Which ended up being true for each of the books.)

[yao590.livejournal.com]

"Did I completely miss a giveaway pronoun early on?"

Yes. There is a pronoun early in the book, when the magus came to take Gen.

"All right. Take him out."(p.6)

[emmaco.livejournal.com]

Thank-you! Although now we can see why I am not an editor.

[(Anonymous)]

Not that a pronoun from the magus really would mean anything. If Gen had been a girl, he would have been masquerading as a boy. I went and looked at the early chapters again, and I agree you could read it that way. Even the bath scene starts out suspiciously, with Gen insisting on removing his OWN clothing, thank you. But then he does remove it, and no one is surprised.
-Philia

[jade-sabre-301.livejournal.com]

I read QoA first, so I didn't wonder if Gen was a boy or not...I did, however, wonder if maybe he had amnesia. In fact, I was a bit disappointed when it turned out he didn't. :-b

[(Anonymous)]

I didn't wonder about Gen's gender or amnesia, but I think what everyone was sensing is that feeling that something about the narrator is not trustworthy. I had a friend who didn't like the book because she said she wanted it to be sort of homey and pleasant and jolly, and instead she could tell the first-person character was misleading her. (I think that's a bit like going to an indie art movie and disliking it because it's not a blockbuster action flick). There's a certain level of discomfort when you can tell things on the page don't add up. Personally I love this feeling, when I know I can trust the author to make it work in the end. And I could tell pretty quickly that I did trust the author.
-Philia

[checkers65477.livejournal.com]

There's a certain level of discomfort when you can tell things on the page don't add up.

True, and there's a lot of that in all three books. I read Queen first, and I remember the feeling of the book's world shifting on me when Attolia thought something like, "when did I sink so low that I began torturing boys?" After that line I began to look at her differently and consider whether she, like Gen, might be hiding something. And she was; her feelings. Then, in King, I could enjoy the things that didn't add up, because I knew Costis was wrong about Gen, and that Gen would bring people around in the end.

[avian-xj.livejournal.com]

i think i read the back cover, and that gave it away...

[emmaco.livejournal.com]

See even the back cover of my edition just says "thief" and "Gen". And the drawing is ambiguous too!

[karatelunch.livejournal.com]

I don't think I had any doubts as to Gen's gender - I assumed early on that he was a boy, probably (like avian_xj) after reading the blurb on the back. I was completely gobsmacked at the ending, however, and it took another read to fully understand. I was eleven years old and not terribly perceptive.

[emmaco.livejournal.com]

I was an adult when I read it and was gobsmacked (I love that word) at the gift turning back up so I don't know that it was your age :)

[empmai.livejournal.com]

It was a long time ago since my initial read of the thief, but now that you mention it I do think I did at frist think Gen a girl - up until the bath scene when I went "what the hell - can they tell a girl from a boy".
I believe it was because you knew the narrator was being deceptive and so I automatically thought of the tradition twists in books - gender switched, switcehd at birth, kid of a king, magic powers, animal transformation, etc and so while I was wrong about the gender I knew that Gen was the Eddis's thief as soon as the Magnus mentioned him.

[emmaco.livejournal.com]

Yay another person who missed the first pronoun! :)

[haleysings.livejournal.com]

I knew from the start that Gen was a boy--but that's because I read Queen of Attolia first. I'm trying to remember if I had any confusion in Queen, but it's been so long since I"ve read it....XD

Oooh, wait, I know. I think I was confused about Gen's relationship with Eddis. Until they mentioned they were actually TRYING to be misleading, I thought that he was in love with Eddis/Helen, not Attolia/Irene.

[hemisofia.livejournal.com]

I am also one of those who read QoA first ^^;; (Seems to be quite a few around!) I thought I'd have more fun if I had read The Thief first, though.

[emmaco.livejournal.com]

I'm starting to wonder if ANYONE read The Thief first!

[(Anonymous)]

I did.
-Philia

[emmaco.livejournal.com]

I think I assumed that most of us had read them in order for some reason. Maybe we should have a poll :)

[mycenaeth.livejournal.com]

I did. =p