Huh...This...wow what a chapter. It's quite a mind f**k seeing Littles essentially role-playing their capture willingly, and to imply that it's a common-enough occurrence that they have folks ready with mops. And then there's Clark. What be happenin'? Had me thinking for a second there he was babbling instead of actually speaking, but it's something else. Not sure that I buy quite yet these theories Maturosis is being revealed as a thing, but there was certainly a dynamic change in those last moments there!
2023-09-29 05:42:07 +0000 UTC
Another great chapter. The construction and cops and robbers game was good fun but then that last part is sobering. The realization that you spend your life trying to fit into a world that was never made for you to fit in how you would like to. I'm curious now about what's going on in Janet's head there at the end as she clearly senses a change in Clark. Does she like it? Does she even know? As for how this all ends I had a few theories. In one Clark proves he was set up and doesn't have maturosis and is freed. He then leaves Oakshire to start over fresh away from it all. Another is he simply escapes and leaves Oakshire. Another is he can prove he doesn't have maturosis but the law doesn't care and his adoption is irreversible. In this case he would either be allowed to "escape" by Janet or would come to some arrangement where he more or less lives how he wants with her. Finally, Clark doesn't prove anything and just remains with Janet, albeit happily.
2023-09-25 21:52:46 +0000 UTC
Oh my! This chapter just got to me. (I even started to think that it could possibly be an ending to the entire story, with Clark finally realizing the truth of what was in his head.) I honestly don't think it matters much whether maturosis is real or a self-justifying invention of Amazon psychologists: maturosis or Stockholm Syndrome, it amounts to the same thing in the end.
I was enjoying the chapter because it was a return to Clark's imaginative, fun, manipulative moments that didn't harm anyone...and then came the last place. At first, I honestly did not understand it. Giving Littles a chance to "play" at former lives is one thing, but providing realistic spaces for them actually to experience them again seems either extremely cruel (not impossible for Amazons) or utterly counterproductive. And then you pulled the rug out from under it and revealed it for what it was: another playland.
Clark's reactions in this section are his most significant of the entire novel. His reflections on his own adult life as a Little in the Amazon society offer us insight and details we had not known before. (If you ever described the specifics of how he lived before, with all of the accommodations added to Amazon-sized buildings so he could make a home in them, I either missed it or it has vanished into the ether of my memory. In my mind, until now, he and Cassie lived in what would have been a Little-sized apartment building...but of course this chapter's details make much more sense.
I agree with what TamatheNormal said: the actual end of the story seems closer than ever. And now my earlier prediction that Clark and Janet figure out how to be happy *together* feels more and more likely. This chapter, in which he rediscovers not only his adult self but also his inner child—and simultaneously confronts difficult truths about where his life has taken him—makes such a "happy ending" more possible.
Thank you for yet another remarkable chapter!
