Chapter 19 -- A Wild Mystery Woman Appears

Must keep going with this book... must... keep... going...

At least you'll be able to forget this book once

it's over, Dory...

Our protagonists are still slogging through the jungle, and despite the fact that Bramford's been lugging her around all this time Eden is the one that's "bone-tired."  Absolutely no sympathy for you, girl.  Also the buzz she got from the acai berries has worn off.  I don't think Foyt realizes that you can't get high off of acai berries -- I know they're supposed to be some kind of wonder food, but to claim they can actually substitute for oxycotin for a drug addict is ridiculous.

Eden hears a bird in the forest, a tinamou (do we get the Latin name for it?  Is the Pope Catholic?), and thinks that it's a nocturnal bird which means she's been away from home for twenty-four hours by now.  Guess what, Foyt -- tinamous are most active during the day and actually roost at night.  Next time do more freaking research on your critters than just looking up the scientific name.

Finally they reach a clearing, and Eden sees the sunset and is "humbled by its perfection, though not in a submissive way."  Um... I don't understand what you're trying to say here, Foyt...  Also apparently "if something so beautiful existed in the world, then maybe some part of her also held such beauty."  Nice to see you have to twist everything to be about yourself, Eden.

An Indian woman steps out of the forest and addresses Bramford in Spanish -- and of course her name is Maria.  Why do actual research on the Native Americans of South America when you can just fall back on tired stereotypes, am I right?  

Unlike her tribesmen, however, Maria cringed when she looked up at Eden.  Fear lurked behind her startled eyes.  (That's rather redundant...)  Was it because Eden now lacked a shed (???) of dark coating? -- p. 133

Maria leads them through a camouflaged gate and into a compound, and Eden wonders if she's the first white visitor.  And of course its made up of huts with palm-thatched roofs and a large bonfire in the middle of the compound, because stereotypes!  Eden notices that Bramford's heading for the largest hut and assumes its his, though he hasn't "branded" the door.  So apparently he's had dealings with these people before... interesting...

Eden notices two other huts -- one behind a fence without any visible door, and one that's overgrown with weeds and has a bar across the door.  Then two naked children come running out of a nearby hut because of COURSE an Indian tribe is going to have its kids run around starkers.  And one of them has a parrot on her shoulder (cue the scientific name for scarlet macaw) because of COURSE everyone owns parrots in South America.  It's not just blacks that are made to look bad in this book...

The girls greet Bramford warmly... and then proceed to freak out at seeing Eden, screaming something about "Rebecca."  That gets Bramford roaring, Maria scolding the girls, the parrot shrieking... okay, what's going on here?  This might actually be interesting...

Eden asks who's Rebecca, and Bramford gets ticked off.  Then it turns out Eden's into BDSM.

The name had struck a nerve in him.  If she said it again, he might make her pay.  He might grab her with those big, rough hands and pin her down.

Eden couldn't help herself.  "For Earth's sake, Bramford.  What did you do to this Rebecca to make the children so afraid?" -- p. 135

You're gonna get your face bit off, and 

you're going to deserve it

Bramford pounces on her and drags her toward the prison hut.  She screams at him, asking him if this is where he takes all his victims and telling him he's an animal, and starts hitting him.  He doesn't retaliate, and even throws her some nuts and berries before he locks her in the hut.

Eden slumped to the ground, humiliated.  The unfamiliar sting of tears surprised her.  She let them spill down her cheeks, tasting their salty wetness with the tip of her tongue.  She hadn't even cried when her mother died.  Emotional relief always had been an oxy-drip away. -- p. 136

To quote Linkara -- our hero, ladies and gentlemen.  Seriously, you can't cry at the death of your mother but you sob like a baby because someone's mean to you?  How selfish can you be?  And don't blame the drugs -- it was your choice to go on them.

Apparently Eden's mother refused to take oxy even on her deathbed, because she wanted to feel something, even the pain.  Her father wasn't around for her death because he couldn't handle the "chaos" of death, which is also kind of jerkish, though different people do handle death in different ways, and some people just can't handle the death of a loved one.

Eden asked her mother why she was smiling even when she was crying with pain, and she replies that it's because she has hope of life after death.  Eden apparently took a government-mandated "death experience" (I'm guessing through the World Band) and expects only a "calm black void."  Yay, government-mandated atheism, you know this is a dystopia...

Eden's mom quotes another Emily Dickinson poem ("Hope is the thing with wings...") and Eden says the poem doesn't make sense because "to which species of bird did Aunt Emily refer," which is entirely NOT the point of the poem.  

She goes back to fantasizing about how hot Bramford is, and we get another "winner" of a line here.

Eden gathered the food Bramford had left; surprised that even in his fury he'd thought of it.  It suggested that his mind was still more powerful than his raw emotions.  Therefore, from now on, she would use pure objective reason to tame the primitive creature.  -- 137

Yeeeeeeeaaaaaaaahhhhhhh... NOT the best line to include in a book that's supposed to be against racism.  Because this IS part of racism -- feeling that you're inherently superior to people of another color and it's up to you to educate them or otherwise improve their lives.  Not that white people helping people of color is inherently racist, but the attitude that a white person is morally and/or intellectually superior to a black person and must "tame" them is full of some icky implications.

At least this chapter has raised a few new points of interest -- how does Bramford know these people, who's Rebecca, where's Eden's father, is our protagonist ever going to get over herself...  I doubt we'll see answers to that last one, but at least I have something to look forward to in future chapters besides more running through the jungle and more furry romance...

Chapter 18 -- Survivor Ecuador, Let's Vote Eden Off the Island

And now we return to this sporking of Revealing Eden!  I bet you've all missed our plucky black-obsessed heroine and her jaguar enemy/boyfriend, haven't you?

Yeah, I thought not.

When we last left our... protagonists, Eden was riding Bramford like a horse -- get you head out of the gutter, she's on his shoulders -- through the jungle and enjoying the feeling of controlling him.  One could call this "Unfortunate Implications" if we thought Foyt was subtle enough to imply anything...

The mysterious maze of the jungle swallowed Eden into its dark, forbidding folds.  Like craggy monsters, an army of trees reached for her.  -- p. 125, and you're kind of mixing up your metaphors here, Foyt.  Last time I checked mazes didn't have folds, they had twists and turns.

Only Bramford's easy, confident step reassured her.  What did she have to fear when she rode on the shoulders of a mighty predator?  His instincts and power would protect her. -- p. 125

Okay, I'm aware that emotions and relationships are complicated things, and that it's fully possible that one can be physically attracted to someone and still find them obnoxious or annoying.  But this is way too over-the-top.  Eden seems to go between hating Bramford and wanting to jump his bones at the drop of a hat, with nothing in between those two extremes.  I've seen this crop up before in YA romance (usually the badly-written sort) but this is the worst case of it I've ever seen.

Eden asks how much farther it is, Bramford tells her to shut up, she keeps talking regardless, and he pinches her leg to get her to shut her mouth.  I like Bramford more and more as this book goes on.

Eden also screams and cries out every time a cobweb touches her.  Our strong, powerful heroine, ladies and gentleman...  Bramford pinches her again every time she screams, and she moans "from despair or pleasure, she couldn't say."  Um... Too Kinky To Torture, anyone?

We get some description of the forest, and Eden compares its canopy layer to the Combs back at home.  She also, of course, has to spit out the Latin name for a troop of monkeys, and wonders what they think about the "strange creature" she's riding... or if they're more startled by her appearance.  "She was the alien here, not Bramford," apparently.  Because again, it's all about her.

More jungle description, Bramford gives her water, they keep going... such a thrilling chapter, isn't it?

Yes, snakes can yawn...

Now and then, he changed direction for reasons she couldn't fathom.  In fact, her mind felt dull and spongy, entirely incapable of reasoning.  Her sanity fell behind like a trail of crumbs. 

At each mysterious croak from the dark recesses, Eden pressed her knees tight against Bramford's neck.  (She proceeded to accidentally snap his neck and kill him, and she got brutally eaten by jungle animals without her majestic jaguar man to protect her.  Oh, how I wish...)  Her fears drove her to cling to him.  -- p. 127

I "like" how Foyt insists that her character is a strong, relatable heroine willing to fight for what she wants, when so far we've just seen her act like a spoiled racist brat who always has to have someone else, usually the designated male love interest, haul her fat from the fire.  Seriously, THIS is supposed to be a role model for young girls?  I'd blame Stephanie Meyer, whose whiny and weak Bella Swan character spawned a slew of copycats, but in this case I think the blame is also, at least partially, Foyt's sheltered upbringing, which probably makes her think that throwing Latin words into her heroine's vocabulary and making them obnoxious is enough to make her strong.

To her delight, a soft, low murmur rumbled through him.  It washed over her, calming her anxiety and yet, arousing her desire.  

Tired of squicked-out Starscream yet?

If he'd confused her before his transformation, she now found him as mysterious as this jungle.  How could she even begin to understand someone as complicated as Bramford?  Or trust her instincts after suffering Jamal's betrayal? -- p. 127

Hey Foyt, show-don't-tell, okay?  Can you give us more examples as to how Bramford is complicated and mysterious?  Because he didn't seem THAT complicated before his transformation, and I doubt turning him into a furry is going to drastically alter his personality.  Also at least Eden admits her instincts suck... and her taste in men is pretty questionable.

A flock of macaws flies by -- and yes, we get the Latin name for them too -- followed by a "sharp sound" that I'm going to guess is a gunshot.  Bramford says it's nothing to worry about (dude, a GUN is something to worry about) but at least isn't letting his guard down.  Also Eden yanks his hair, which should be license to bite her arm off or something but Bramford doesn't.  Shame.

"Storm coming."  [Bramford speaking]

"What?  How can you tell?"

"A lull in the sounds, the slight drop in temperature.  Don't you feel it?"

"I'm not receiving any data, remember?  Thanks to you.  (Oh, stop whining about that already...)

"Before you would have noticed the signs."

The sound of his voice soothed her so she tried to encourage him to talk.

"Really?" she said.  "When was that?"

"About a million years ago, when you looked something like me."

"Like you?"  

Even uglier than now?  And yet, Bramford wasn't ugly, was he?  He was raw and sexy.  Maybe she wouldn't have looked so bad.

"I bet you would have been one hell of a she-cat," he said, and she was glad he couldn't see the pleasure creeping into her face. -- p. 127-128

Nice to see that despite some chance for development here -- maybe Eden finally accepting she's not going to get her Life-Band back, or exploring the fact that people of Caucasian descent did, according to most scientists, descend from African roots -- we just get hammered home with "beauty and physical appearance is everything" again.  Oh, Foyt, your message is so inspiring for young girls...

Yeah, like that'll ever happen...

Bramford offers to teach Eden how to use her natural instincts to make up for the Life-Band, but Eden just thinks that Bramford can only do that because of his new animal DNA.  I think Eden has just swapped one batch of prejudices for another here.  She randomly wonders how "Aunt Emily" Dickinson coped without a Life-Band, we get a random Emily poem ("To make a prairie it takes a clover and one bee..."), and Eden decides that taking oxy for nearly two decades means she has no imagination.  Wow, did we bounce between subjects or what?

Eden imagines (I thought you didn't have imagination, girl) that she and Bramford are one creature instead of two, like a centaur, and she bursts into giggles.  Bramford asks what's so funny, and she tells him he wouldn't understand.  Bramford decides to drop it without prying, which Eden interprets as selfish.  Excuse me, you little brat, who's the selfish one here for not explaining the joke?

It starts raining, Eden almost slips off Bramford's back, and Bramford squeezes her to "communicate something."  Eden wonders if Bramford can tune into her the same way he can tune into the world around him, and if she can "tune into him" the same way.

Maybe she wasn't alone.  She smiled as an expansive feeling floated through her.  Like a burst of fire, but soft as melting wax...

 A stiff wind rattled the leaves and filled Eden's head with his wild, tangy scent.  An irresistible urge to run her hands along his face seized her.  She clung to him, pressing her hips against the back of his neck.  His breathing grew labored, and for the first time, he stumbled. -- p. 130

Eden offers to walk if he's tired, but he tells her she'll just run away if he lets her down.  And now she's back to hating him, because this is how romance works, amiright?

"I'm watching every move you make, Eden."  

Yes, I have a song for every occasion...

She struggled against his tight grasp.  "You don't know a thing about me.  You never will."

He tossed her hand free and laughed bitterly.  "This is my world.  Nothing escapes me here."

Really?  Could he also see her absurd attraction to his beastly self? -- p. 131

Eesh... I took such a break from this book I'd forgotten how mind-numbingly boring it is.  There's no character development going on, no plot, nothing but two people bickering in the jungle.  And if I wanted to watch self-absorbed shallow people bickering in the jungle, I'd go watch Survivor.  At least that's free and usually isn't jam-packed with racism and furry fantasies...

You know a book has utterly failed when it

makes a trashy reality show look

GOOD in comparison...