The Worlds of Katherine Kurtz

The Deryni Series => The Heirs of Saint Camber => Topic started by: BishopCullen on April 11, 2007, 11:32:22 PM

Title: Joram MacRorie
Post by: BishopCullen on April 11, 2007, 11:32:22 PM
I have read the series dozens of times.  I am very curious as to what took place in 948 that lead to the death of Joram MacRorie and so very many others.
Title: Re: Joram MacRorie
Post by: Braniana on April 12, 2007, 09:32:34 PM
So are we all.  It's on KK's announced list of books she plans to write, and my fingers are crossed it'll be the next Deryni book after CM #3 and the HD rewrite.
Title: Re: Joram MacRorie
Post by: derynifanatic64 on May 18, 2007, 03:45:26 AM
The Codex seems to hint that a vicious plague swept through Gwynedd in 948.
Title: Re: Joram MacRorie
Post by: BishopCullen on May 18, 2007, 07:10:32 PM
Agreed.  That's what took the life of Bishop Alfred of Woodbourne in 948.
Title: Re: Joram MacRorie
Post by: vvincent1 on June 25, 2007, 07:30:03 AM
Isn't 948 the year that Marek of Festil tries to reinvade Gwynedd again? It sounds like a combination of events occur around that timeframe, with the plague just being one of them.
Title: Re: Joram MacRorie
Post by: BishopCullen on June 28, 2007, 06:52:39 PM
Very true.  Many major and minor characters die in 948, either due to the plague or Marek's aborted invasion of Gwynedd.
Title: Re: Joram MacRorie
Post by: the Bee on June 30, 2007, 06:24:54 PM
Do you suppose Marek could have been waging an early form of germ warfare? :-\
Title: Re: Joram MacRorie
Post by: Elkhound on July 24, 2007, 12:27:29 PM
An interesting bit of speculation.  I suppose a Healer could do it, although I can't imagine how any would.  I have visions of the Gabrielites--or even the Varnarites--having vapors over the very idea.  Of course, Torenthi healers might have different canons of ethics.
Title: Re: Joram MacRorie
Post by: Historian on November 19, 2007, 08:17:08 AM
In mundane history there was a case of an entire besieging army being decimated by the flu and food poisioning. Not to mention leaving the bodies outside a city, or flinging them over the walls. Plus rats and mice are carriers of lots of illnesses. Blankets used by people who died of the pox were given to others, who then died of it. An early form of germ warfare, perhaps unknowingly, but there. And it could have been a flood or drought year, bringing famine. It will be interesting.
Title: Re: Joram MacRorie
Post by: Adam on December 22, 2007, 10:12:42 PM
While I agree that I would love to hear what happened to the so many characters that died. I have to assume it was more due to the war than the plague. The Joram led moevemnt would definately not have stood still to see all the sacrifice of his family go to waste with another festillic King.
Title: Re: Joram MacRorie
Post by: tenworld on January 04, 2008, 12:23:55 PM
I have always imagined 948 as ending with some major magical duel that culminated with a number of good deryni including Joram dying in a sacrificial act to eliminate or stop a group of bad deryni (from destroying Rhemuth or some other major target like a large group of humans.

A plague would be a factor in creating the circumstances the led to the duel with some of the characters dying of it, and armies being decimated.

Even involving Camber perhaps to the point that he (or his manifestation) was too weak to interact until the time of DR.  Also the reason the Camberian council evolved into the wimpy form that we first meet.

:)and leaving room for the secret inner council to start, perhaps consisting of survivors of the duel who wished or had no choice but to vanish from human sight.
Title: Re: Joram MacRorie
Post by: mikebell90 on January 20, 2008, 02:06:07 AM
Boy, I don't want to appear rude, as a first post, but I think doing 948 is an awful idea, though it's likely to happen given Katherine's interviews on the matter.

Here's the problem, and IMO it's been a problem with HofSC and with the CM trilogy too:

1. We know too mcuh
2. We know it ends for the most part badly
3. It ends up being in many ways just a death march.

Now, don't get me wrong. I enjoyed Harrowing. I then took 10 years to read King Javan's Year - because heck, what's the point. We know Javan is doomed. And makes very little of a meaningful difference. I still have yet to read TBP, but the synopsis on Wikipedia makes it sound similar in tone.

As for CM, I've read In the Kings Service, and it felt like a litany of "and this trivial thing happened. Then this. And a brief moment of hope. then such and such died. Then such and such". Sigh

I like KK, I've read all of her books (including the Adepts), with the exception of CM and TBP. But since the beginning of the 90s, with the exception of KKB, we are treading water here, I feel. I still enjoy the books, and like the characters, but I always just feel detached, and sad when reading them. They feel like they've become just a litany of doom....

Title: Re: Joram MacRorie
Post by: Braniana on January 21, 2008, 12:09:11 AM
Certainly no argument that a book on 948 would be a 'bad' one to read.  Definitely would be depressing to watch all those well-beloved characters die.  But I do hope that KK does write it.  While we do know the skeleton of what would happen, we know almost nothing about how it happens.  Do the characters die of old age, in the Plague, in the Festillic invasion?  I'm just as interested in the how and why as I am in the what and when.
Regarding KJY and TBP, I can empathize.  I actually discovered TBP first, and the sought and read all the other Deryni books.    I'd encourage you to go ahead and read it, mikebell.  While it has a lot of sad/depressing parts, there are some uplifting ones, as we see that things can and will change, and that everything the brothers have endured won't be for nothing.  KJY was actually the last of the 'previously published' books that I found.  And in the 9 years I've known the series, and the 5 or so that I've owned KJY I've never been able to bring myself to read it all the way through.  I usually don't get much past Javan's coronation (the farthest being Father Faelan's fate).  I know that it's due to having read TBP first, and knowing what Javan's fate [can't bring myself to actually read it, as he's a favorite character].  Maybe one of these days.
While the CM books haven't been as good as some of the others, I've still enjoyed reading about another period in Gwynedd's timeline. 
Title: Re: Joram MacRorie
Post by: mikebell90 on January 21, 2008, 12:51:13 AM
>>and knowing what Javan's fate [can't bring myself to actually read it, as he's a favorite character].

Yep, certainly a problem. I mean, he's the most effectual and coolest character in the first two books. It's really hard not to just scream!

Title: Re: Joram MacRorie
Post by: mikebell90 on January 21, 2008, 12:54:17 AM
Re: 948

Strikes me a bit like a car crash. You know bad things are going to happen. You watch fascinatedly. Sigh.

Ok, well, just to help out KK, I'll name her next trilogy and novels for her

KillingFord the Trilogy

Volume I: We meet lots of people we like
Volume II: They all die
Volume III: We attempt to pick up the pieces. Some people fail and die. A couple struggle on.

;)
Title: Re: Joram MacRorie
Post by: tenworld on January 21, 2008, 12:13:35 PM
I agree that a 948 book might be too much like watching the 9/11 based movies

but we do need closure.

I would like to see the series end gracefully with a book set sometime after KKB, that tells the story of 948 but within a more positive setting

eg.  Morgan, Duncan and Kelson all finally learn that they are descendants of St camber, Camber's spirit gets to finally rest, and while they wont live happily ever after (this is the middle ages after all), at least they all go on to fulfilling lives. And Arilan gets rid of his smug look regarding "half breeds ;D

Title: Re: Joram MacRorie
Post by: derynifanatic64 on January 21, 2008, 12:35:20 PM
I would like to see Teymuraz finally brought to swift justice for trying to kill Liam.  However, I would like to have a single novel that takes place in Gwynedd in the 21st Century.  Also seeing if Gwynedd has evolved in a similar manner as our world and how human/deryni relations have been doing in the centuries since KKB.
Title: Re: Joram MacRorie
Post by: Gyrfalcon64207 on September 12, 2008, 12:53:43 AM
I've read King Javan's Year all the way through several times, and there's something about it that makes me keep reading once I've started, maybe the closure they mentioned.  I get anxious and frantic, and seriously ADD until I finish it, but still I end up finishing it.  The Bastard Prince ends on a ray of hope.  Rhys Michael was naive, but how dense could he be to stay naive after the way his brother died?  And the more immediate things that he saw at the end of that book?  Seriously.
For closure, I also would be curious to read a book on 948, even knowing that Joram and a lot of others were going to die at the end.  The how and the why of it all is what would draw me.  He's the one who survived the persecutions, it would be interesting to see the conflict that finally kills him--as long as it isn't something anticlimatic like dying of plague or old age.
Title: Re: Joram MacRorie
Post by: BishopCullen on September 27, 2008, 10:44:27 AM
Knowing the how and the why was the reason i asked this question.
Title: Re: Joram MacRorie
Post by: JulianneTK on September 28, 2008, 06:54:53 PM
HI, Mikebell

--your synopsis made me snortle! Thanks!
Title: Re: Joram MacRorie
Post by: Marko on July 09, 2011, 12:56:52 PM
I like the idea of a 948 book, but would like to see it from the perspective of Kelson, Alaric, Duncan, Dhugal along with the Servants of Saint Camber discovering what happened.
Title: Re: Joram MacRorie
Post by: derynifanatic64 on July 09, 2011, 02:09:58 PM
It would have to be the discovery of a private journal by someone who was a chronicler/librarian from that time.  But definitely a interesting idea for a novel.
Title: Re: Joram MacRorie
Post by: lenni on October 29, 2011, 05:38:29 PM
I kept hoping through KJY that maybe Javan would "die" (read disappear) instead of die. He could have had to disappear due to circumstances, but not actually die. Maybe flee to the Michaelines or ...

Hey, hope springs eternal! And I *AM* an optimist!

PS. I'd LOVE to read about a) 948 (or anything about Joram MacRorie) and b) Kelson / Morgan / Duncan / Dhugal discovering that they are (how they are!) descended from Camber / Evaine / Rhys.  :D
Title: Re: Joram MacRorie
Post by: ReikiDeryni on September 04, 2019, 09:47:35 PM
It is not about "oh the train wreck" it is about what details lead to the train wreck. it is called fleshing it out. Some of the comments here sound like the Star War fans that hated the prequels. Everybody knew what would happen (for 20+ years) and were mad about the movies because it happened.
Title: Re: Joram MacRorie
Post by: Laurna on September 05, 2019, 10:57:16 AM
I enjoyed reading some of the earlier comments, which had been made some eleven years ago.

I agree that though I want to know the happenings of 948, I am not sure I want to read about so many of our remaining characters passing on. Not only do we loose Joram in 948 but we loose Tieg and his wife too.  Although I would dearly love to know more about Tieg's children.

I am picking out this one quote because I thought it was kind of prophetic. Mikebell90 suggested that KK write about Killingford next. That was back in 2008. How cool is that.

Quote from: mikebell90 on January 21, 2008, 12:54:17 AM
Re: 948


Ok, well, just to help out KK, I'll name her next trilogy and novels for her

KillingFord the Trilogy


;)
Title: Re: Joram MacRorie
Post by: ReikiDeryni on September 06, 2019, 11:21:19 PM
Haven't been a member of the group for long, but a fan of KK's books since the first series. I happen to stumble upon this post and Joram is such of an enigmatic character/person, as is that time period. Also, I love when she fills in the history of the eleven kingdoms. such a momentous time should be written about
Title: Re: Joram MacRorie
Post by: Avisa on October 23, 2019, 09:23:51 PM
Every now and then I reread KJY ad TBP somehow hoping that Javan and Rhysem will survive, and I keep being disappointed and sad. That's good writing, eh?

I do think that new books ought to cover something more properly unknown - hasn't Orin and Jodotha been put forth as a possible topic? Or I'd love to read something that takes place after KKB, which was actually the very first Deryni book I ever read.
Title: Re: Joram MacRorie
Post by: DerynifanK on October 24, 2019, 02:27:36 PM
I agree that I would love to see something after KKB, to tie up a lot of loose ends and to see how KK sees what becomes of Gwynedd and all the characters we love. Maybe something like a Jubilee celebration for Kelson's reign
Title: Re: Joram MacRorie
Post by: Marilyn on October 25, 2019, 02:38:41 AM
I, too, would dearly love to read something about Orin, Jodotha and the magic that was lost by Kelson's time.  That has fascinated me for years.
Title: Re: Joram MacRorie
Post by: Kareina on October 25, 2019, 11:37:55 AM
Quote from: Marilyn on October 25, 2019, 02:38:41 AM
I, too, would dearly love to read something about Orin, Jodotha and the magic that was lost by Kelson's time.  That has fascinated me for years.

Me too!  Not only how the magic of that time would have been better understood/more developed than at the start of Kelson's time, but at the same time the tools and technologies commonly used wouldn't have been.
Title: Re: Joram MacRorie
Post by: Lochiel on November 02, 2019, 01:33:04 PM
All good stuff, can never get enough of the Deryni Universe. For me, I never got closure for Joram, Ansel, Tieg, and co. That would be my wish. Of course 948 is a big part of that.
Title: Re: Joram MacRorie
Post by: ReikiDeryni on November 04, 2019, 10:41:59 PM
 i totally agree. This period needs a trilogy!!!