Bound by Blood Retrospective · 9:17am Nov 26th, 2023
With another Blueblood Papers story completed comes another retrospective. I'd like to start by stating that I think Royal Blood, the one that came before it, is the best story that I've written in this series, and after finishing Bound By Blood and looking back on this latest story, I still think that. That's not to say that I'm unhappy with how Bound By Blood came out, of course, but difficult I think it would be for me to top Royal Blood.
Spoilers ahead, of course, if you hadn't finished Bound by Blood.
I knew that by this point I couldn't rely on the old 'incompetent officer ruins everything and Blueblood has to fix it' plot that had served me so well in previous stories. The Equestrians have finally gotten their act together and are taking this war seriously. Even then, military incompetence is eternal and even the best officers will screw up once in a while, but I knew it wouldn't make narrative sense for the Equestrian military, having undergone intense reform in the previous story, to allow the likes of Scarlet Letter, Crimson Arrow, or Second Fiddle anywhere near a Princesses' commission. Besides, it's good to shake up the formula, and I think I pulled that off, if I might say so myself.
I also wanted to explore the Changeling side of things a bit more that were merely hinted at by Odonata in Royal Blood, especially in the scene where Blueblood eavesdrops on a meeting with Chrysalis. It was always my intention to demonstrate the inherent instability of charismatic dictatorships, that while they present a front of perfect order and efficiency, under that facade they are anything but. Competence becomes secondary to loyalty to the leader, fanaticism overrides reason and good sense, and officials fight with one another to curry favour in a system where the boundaries of authority are blurred and overlapping. As the Equestrians sort themselves out and the Royal Guard becomes an efficient machine of 'modern' war, the precise opposite happens to the Changelings; competent officers such as Chela are sidelined in favour of whatever shiny new thing has the leader's attention. As ever, I plagiarised was inspired by history. Some commentors pointed out that the character of Ommatidium, Chrysalis' head of secret police and internal security, was likely based on Himmler, and they would be correct. To be precise, I based him on Donald Pleasance's performance of him in the film The Eagle Has Landed.
Readers have often commented on wanting to see what's going on in other theatres of the conflict. I've always wanted to maintain a tight focus on what Blueblood sees and experiences, and that mentions of things taking place elsewhere are there to fill out the background to hint at the greater conflict taking place. It's only natural that readers will want to know more about that, and I've considered doing a few blog posts about examining parts of the war that aren't covered by the story - maybe a lore Q&A? So, I knew Blueblood had to leave the Badlands front for once, but it was a matter of picking where exactly. The Burma Campaign, the so-called 'forgotten' front, of WWII has fascinated me because of its relative obscurity, so I decided to use that as inspiration, and once I'd decided on that, picking the Changeling-occupied city of Marelacca was a natural next step, and not least because I have personal history with Malaysia as a large chunk of my family come from there and I spent quite a bit of time in Kuala Lumpur and Penang. I'd gone through a few iterations of trying to find a ponified name for Malaya - Malhaya, Ponang, Singapony - before deciding on Marelacca, as it needed to be a port city on a vital trade route. Other readers have pointed out similarities between my depiction of Chrysalis' regime and Japan's Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere (I think due to their policies of extracting whatever resources possible from occupied lands while telling the people they're being 'liberated'), so that contributed a little towards that decision. In doing this I found out that a not-insignificant amount of readers are Malaysian, and I can only hope that I portrayed Marelacca and its ponies and kirins well in that.
I ought to address the ending. Yes, it was rather abrupt, and readers are naturally interested to know what happens to Spring Rain. I take this as a good thing that people liked the character so much (her personality is based on a number of aunties I know). One of the restrictions on this type of storytelling, using memoirs as a framing device, means that I am restricted to Blueblood's point of view (barring interjections from Celestia), and just like in real life, characters will enter and leave his life. I could have added an interjection from Celestia revealling her fate, but I felt that such a thing warranted more than a mere footnote, and there's every possibility that she might return.
So, is there anything that I might have done differently? I think I could have shown a 'normal' prison camp to better contrast Camp Joy. I also considered a scene where the kirins refer to Blueblood as a 'grass mud horse' in Cathaynese but thought that might be too obscure a reference (comment below if you do get it). Hardscrabble could have done with more characterisation, perhaps, but that will come later as Blueblood returns to his regular posting.
For now, however, I'm going to take a short break while I plan out the next story. I don't want to give too much away here, but once again I'll be trying something a little bit different. It may also be a bit shorter than the previous two novel-length stories, but I'm aware I've said that before, so we'll see. Anyway, Blueblood will return soon in The Blueblood Papers: Old Blood (name subject to change if something better pops into my head).
The only thing I really didn’t like (and it’s extremely minor btw) was how little we actually heard of what the public’s reaction to blue bloods capture was. I feel like it wouldn’t have been kept secret that he even warned market garden she was walking into a trap and while marching into that trap was necessary for them to beat chela it would be a tough pill to make digestible for the public to swallow.
It's always nice to see authors take inspiration from their experiences, people they know and places they visited.
About Spring Rain, I think one of the reasons people want to know what happened to her and her family unlike some other previous characters Blueblood made personal connections with (that didn't die within the same story) is that he made a promise to her and it feels unlike him to fulfill it. Sure he made a political movement for the independence of the country but he promised her money, which I know feels a bit impersonal given what they went through together but it was the nature of the promise.
I think it fit Blueblood luck to have been stuck in such an oddly peculiar prisoners camp and while having Blueblood escaping some kind of a more traditional prison would be fun, perhaps in another story.
As for trying something new next story, I am all for it! I do hope we get to see Blueblood visit somewhere before returning to the fromt, maybe Canterlot, a return to Ponyville or perhaps another Equestria city. And I hope we will get to see more scenes at the front as well before he get sent somewhere else or do something else, Blueblood made enough off-mention of other battles he went through that it feels like it would be sad if we didn't get to see them. I think I remember a line how trench warfare would make a comeback while assaulting a Hive but they aren't there yet. Maybe guarding a convoy? Attack on a train? Guarding the team that are building the new tracks through the Badlands? Or how about a different type warfare like sea battles?
Anyway, this book was great and I am eagerly awaiting the next one. Thank you and good luck.
while royal blood also remains *my* favorite 'book' overall, bound by blood really was a good change of pace from the previous entries. aside from the brutal battle of hill 70 (at least that i remember), it turned into a political drama and 'jailbreak' story (from both camp joy and marelacca, really) by the second half that i really enjoyed. or at least, aside from that explosive finale (lol)
as for a lore Q&A, i would personally love to see that. youve built a very interesting world and i have a feeling you have a lot more written out for it than the story necessarily needs to show or explain
Oh and about the Lore that you have built, how about instea of Q&A, you write mini stories with Blueblood memoirs where he rambles about small parts of his career or maybe he is complaining and you have Celestia you comes in to fill the blank with even more book references and her own comments on things where she is especially frustrated with her nephew with his lack of context details about people's like fellow soldiers, ennemies, battles, locations, events or he is rambling too much by jumping from one subject to another.
It could be like a compilation of chapters about his memoirs that didn't warrant a whole chapters or even were part Blueblood considered minor and didn't write much about but Celestia felt the need to fill in the blank because of the impact he had on the conflict, the politics or simply because he was there and didn't think of mentioning it.
Perhaps for an in-character lore Q&A or compendium, frame it as Blueblood's equivalent of Cain teaching commissar cadets at a Schola Progenium? Or possibly from the perspective of commissar cadets going through such a program, learning from several different instructors about the history that Blueblood casually drops while instructing them?
I just want Blublood to be happy :<
Let him at least have a relationship that isn't just sex. I wanted Twilight but now I want it to be Square Basher.
The thing with Spring Rain is the nature of their relationship must have changed somewhat after she saw how Blueblood acted in actual battle, and I think that would have shaped their interactions going forward somewhat differently. However, we didn't really ever get to see the fallout of that. Though it makes logical sense that she would stay behind, it kind of ignored the set up for me. You set up how they interacted in times of peace before she knows what Blueblood's like as a soldier, she only knows his far less courageous playboy side(though, toned down due to the position he's in). I was hoping to see what that is like now that she likely has more respect for Blueblood. Some anger on her part for how he managed to get her to go Nirik would have been funny too. Naturally, if she shows up again in a future book than we could see that, but as it is Spring Rain is pretty much right where where she started despite all the works she put in.
We didn't even get clarification on if she was paid by Blueblood after all this, which was the initial promise that he gave to secure her help. I know she cares more about freeing her home and family more, but Blueblood promised her cash and she doesn't strike me as the type to forget about that! Her story just feels incomplete to me as it is.
Aside from that though, it was a really fun ride, had so many twists and turns, and I loved the jail break followed by laying low in a South East Asian inspired setting. Never really read about that part of the world before, so seeing a setting inspired by it was really good!
I think you should stick to focusing mainly on Blueblood.
A lot of storied have so many plots at the same time you just get confused.