Rereading old friends

I picked up By the Sword (Kerowyn's Tale) at the library because 4yo saw it on the free shelf and decided she really really wanted to get it, without any prompting from me. It was the exact same cover of the one that I used to own as a kid.

Set in the same world as the Valdemar series, it's one of the few that I think has really held up for me over time. I've read / reread this one over a dozen times. I know this story, can feel the story beats echo in my head half a page before they actually happen.

I don't know if I'd wholeheartedly recommend all Mercedes Lackey books still (lots of the tragic gay love story stuff feels a bit... limitations of the 90s (but you can take stefan and vanyel out of my cold dead hands thank you so very much)) (and there's a lot of sexual violence which in hindsight maybe I shouldn't have been reading at 10yo). But Kerowyn holds a special place in my heart both as an unsure teen and as a much more sure and competent adult.

ALSO, I had forgotten just how much Lackey goes for the internal monologue!