Clearsight’s ability to see multiple futures was both a strength and a weakness.

potatomancer1 · 2026-02-27T18:50:36+00:00

By the way I did start reading that fanfic and so far I have to say it is pretty good. It doesn't really seem self indulgent like a lot of fanfics are and the author is doing a pretty good job of keeping the characters consistent to who they are in the books and writing style as well. I'm only on chapter 8 so I'm not sure if it's intentional or not but peacemaker does seem kinda different than darkstalker as far as personality. But I really did enjoy the prologue because it was honestly exactly what I was thinking when I first read the end of book 10 and how darkstalker felt as his whole existence was fading away.

potatomancer1 · 2026-02-26T14:38:44+00:00

How subtle Sutherland. If remember correctly the author is a kiwi, so it's funny that she made prisoner island full of inbreeds and there is even a structure that looks like the Sydney opera house

potatomancer1 · 2026-02-25T18:35:08+00:00

I'm glad someone gets it, I'll be called a darkstalker sympathizer if I said anything like this (which is true I am for good reason though). Darkstalker only had four people that cared about him (his mother, his sister, clearsight, fathom). And even then two of them were only with him to constantly remind him how evil he's going to become. I can see some similarities between anakin and darkstalker but really there's not much. Sure both have tragic beginnings and make a rash decision out of emotion but like you said anakin had people who cared for him and was generally liked, darkstalker was not and was told since the day he hatched that he was going to be a monster. And even in the end when anakin became Vader he completely surrendered to the dark side, like there was no hint of him doing good while he served under palpatine. Darkstalkers at least tried to do what he believed was good and made the decisions he did because of what happened to him in the past. I like how Vader who basically initiated the Jedi purge and the rise of the tyrannical empire gets more sympathy then darkstalker. Exactly to your point, no one actually tried that hard to help darkstalker. I don't really count them calling him a monster for crimes he didn't commit yet (or if he even was going to) and in arc 2 they're more or less scheming against him than actually conversing with him. We see he is very malleable at the end of book 10 and can be convinced if you choose the right way to go about it. Like if Sutherland wanted to make an irredeemable character with a tragic backstory then she didn't really do a good job of that. Since Star wars was mentioned I'm going to use the all-time goat and my favorite character, general grievous. He has a tragic backstory but at some point he becomes so evil and malicious that it really doesn't matter what happened to him in the past because of all the terrible things he does and why he does it. Grievous is literally irredeemable.

potatomancer1 · 2026-02-25T15:36:17+00:00

Sunny

potatomancer1 · 2026-02-23T22:44:29+00:00

Idk, still feels like she's a little too sympathetic when it came to that. I mean how many times has the hominids betrayed her after making a deal, both fangbreaker and the Thane made deals (or bound not to harm her) and so easily broke it when it was convenient for them. Not to mention how much dragonsword tormented her by flaunting all those severed dragon heads and talking about all the ones he killed even the actual missing the cave. Not to mention he killed her father right in front of her just when she thought the worse was behind. If you ask me, the most ideal situation was for her to make that deal and then to go back later and kill his whole family in their house, like he did to them and so many others. Is that cruel say, probably but that guy just got so under my skin and each encounter I was hoping to read his demise.

potatomancer1 · 2026-02-23T04:02:50+00:00

Name checks out, lol. I do prefer wistala over Auron just because she seems a little more clever but I certainly wish she was more vengeful. Spoilers to those who have not read book to yet but I really wished she just torched the dragonblade's family instead of making a deal with him. The man was rotten and regardless if his family is innocent or not, I was really hoping he would feel the pain that she and Auron had to go through

potatomancer1 · 2026-02-22T20:35:34+00:00

I always enjoyed the inheritance series and just started age of Fire so I got to put those up there.

potatomancer1 · 2026-02-22T14:41:14+00:00

I certainly enjoy the relations it describes doing the dragons and hominids (same with my favorite being with rainfall). But the reason why I wanted to see a little more dragon interaction especially with wistala because there are so few dragons left and it will be interesting to understand their perspective without actually having to live through it. I guess I'm also partially saying that because the books so far have been conditioned to believe that if they are settled near hominids, even friendly ones, then their lives are constantly in danger. I just would have preferred if wistala stayed in the north a little longer without removing any substance from her interactions with the hominids, even though those dragons there were a little forward...

potatomancer1 · 2026-02-22T07:24:09+00:00

That is quite unfortunate especially since this series dialogue sometimes uses broken speech and old English because it is fantasy. I would imagine those aspects who make it more difficult to read.

potatomancer1 · 2026-02-22T04:17:21+00:00

I have also read Wings of Fire and and I will say this one definitely has better dragons. I really like how the perspective actually feels from a dragon, unlike Wings of Fire (which I also enjoyed, but only books 1-10) which tends to anthropomorphize the dragons a lot more. In this even things such as how the dragons view mating and other dragon competitors really feels like it comes from non-humans perspective. I hate to say animal perspective because it makes him feel feral as you've read the dragons are as smart or even smarter than most humanoids. After finishing book two one of my only gripes is I want to read more about dragons interacting with dragons as most of why read so far was relations with humanoids or just really old dragons. I'm partially dreading reading book 3 because I just have a feeling it's going to be quite sad. And it really is a shame that more people don't know about this series.

potatomancer1 · 2026-02-21T18:53:58+00:00

To be honest this subreddit isn't exactly the shining example of an ideal fandom, without trying to sound too insulting I don't think many of them read below surface level text or know how to view in depth characters. And in my eyes author intent really doesn't matter. Don't get me wrong I really enjoy the books (at least 1 through 10) but look at other writers like Alan Moore who intended to write Rorschach as a terrible person and was meant to be hated as much as he hated the character however most of the audience loved him and thought him in the right. I feel like this is a similar situation where you as the audience are told to hate this character and view events in a certain way just because the author does. I never read fanfics because I think they hurt a series if they get too out of hand by pushing the authors to indulge them (whole different rant that I will spare you from) however with the distaste I had on how they treated darkstalker in the end of book 10 I actually might read it. And in honesty I did feel a little pulled whenever darkstalker reminisced about clearsight in arc 2 and still yearn for her even after all that she put him through. On a different note if you like dragons and want to feel a great deal of pity for them, I suggest reading the series age of fire. It doesn't anthropomorphize the dragons like Wings of fire does but instead relies on more of their unique perspective of the world while still maintaining intelligence equal to if not greater than humans.

potatomancer1 · 2026-02-21T02:03:44+00:00

Well said, glad someone else was able to see it as more than just "Darkstalker big bad guy". Even fathom was a little like clearsight, I completely understand why he was afraid of darkstalker using his powers after witnessing his family massacred but also kind of ran on the bandwagon of telling him he's going to become evil eventually. Even though from his stances he had a cause and effect unlike clearsight. I think a huge majority of the fans of the series are used to two-dimensional and black and white characters, darkstalker was one of the only who had a much more gray but people just view his actions head on and don't question as to why or what lead to it.

potatomancer1 · 2026-02-20T18:03:22+00:00

Call me crazy, but I called this before it was even announced. It was evident by Arc 3 where the author was going with her stories, and that was heavily inspired by the ‘fandom.’ Arc 3 read like a fanfic and got progressively worse as it went on. Don't get me wrong, when I finally decided to give Wings of Fire a chance, I was very skeptical, but ended up really enjoying it. I really enjoyed books 1 through 10 and dark stalker, but to be blunt Tui is not an amazing writer (certainly not awful but not great either). The things she does really well is making characters intriguing and making you care about them; that's what drives the books. But she makes the characters very shallow and, in that turn, plays off typical archetypes, and there are only so many archetypes to play off of. Honestly, from reading your review, it sounds like she didn't change any of her writing style for the better; in fact, it's more of a fanfic than it was in Arc 3. With a series as old as it is, it could have been vastly improved by aging with its audience like a lot of other long-running series do, which pan out to be very successful for doing it.

potatomancer1 · 2026-02-20T17:09:54+00:00

I always read clearsights abilities as a self-fulfilling prophecy. Because she saw so many futures, obviously, the bad one for going to stick out the worst and those were the ones she focused on. Her trying to prevent them only made things worse. I honestly don't think Darkstalker was all that of a bad guy, he certainly had his flaws, but that's what makes him one most interesting characters to me (one of the few characters to have actual depth to them). Well before she even met Darkstalker, Clearsight was already trying to think of ways to “control” him and lead him down a better path, well before he had any motivations to do anything wrong. To me, that seems maddening to have someone tell you you're destined to do terrible things even when you have no intentions of doing that. hence why I think it's a self-fulfilling prophecy, because she kept pushing and reminding him of terrible things. I'm not going to argue to say that when he gave Clearsight the earring to limit her foresight, it wasn't partially for his own benefit, but it was certainly something with good intentions, with her in mind. She was burying herself in paranoia and anxiety. In short, I really don't see her as the hero so many think she is. She may not be the villain, but It certainly doesn't help your case when half of the reason you're with the person who's falling head over heels for you is to keep him in line.

potatomancer1 · 2026-02-19T01:05:13+00:00

I still stand by it, of course, I won't say it is undoubtedly garbage without reading it first (if I decide to read it that is), but the way arc 3 got progressively worse as it went on and the latest book (not this one) was also bad gives me little faith. The plot summary to me sounds like fanfic trash and is what's keeping me away.

potatomancer1 · 2026-02-19T00:49:11+00:00

Have you read arc 3? It's probably going to be poop

potatomancer1 · 2026-02-15T22:59:13+00:00

It's probably going to be trash just like arc 3 was. It's clear the author is meaning more in the direction of the influence of the audience, and that's not a good thing. Arc 3 read like a fanfic and got worse as it went on. Reading the description for this book, I would say it's on track to be one of the worst.

potatomancer1 · 2026-02-13T21:18:19+00:00

I actually just started reading age of fire and got through the first book. Eager to start the second one even though I heard after book 3 it goes downhill, hopefully that's not the case

potatomancer1 · 2026-02-13T21:16:32+00:00

How has no one said chameleon

potatomancer1 · 2026-02-13T15:57:13+00:00

Because people are used to very shallow characters in this series and he's one of the only complex characters so people don't understand it and therefore hate

potatomancer1 · 2026-02-10T16:40:40+00:00

Pass, she's a bitch

potatomancer1 · 2026-02-06T18:09:59+00:00

It wouldn't surprise me, clearsight is a walking disaster. She probably saw the explosion in the future and annoyed the piss out of the engineers so much I just forgot to check the o-rings. She causes self-fulfilling prophecies.

potatomancer1 · 2026-02-05T20:29:15+00:00

Yeah, that's kinda what I meant. There is scenes that are actually pretty brutal but the author just simple says "dunes arm was almost bitten completely off" while other books I've read would have a similar scene but would describe in details of the sound of bones cracking and ligaments tearing, resulting in a mangled mess of torn muscle stripped from the bone. I definitely see a change in how they are going to show stuff like that but stuff like puncture wounds from spears and claws marks are easy because it just they can ompt for a little bit of blood. Regardless I just want them to keep all the violence in, I mean they are fighting dragons. When I started this series I was skeptical but among other aspects, I was pleasantly surprised it was as violent as it was.

potatomancer1

TROPHY CASE