King Sorrow

“When you choose a course of action, you accept the consequences—those you intended and those you didn’t.”

Erin’s statement about responsibility and consequence effectively functions as a thesis for the novel, foreshadowing Arthur and Gwen’s reckoning with the consequences of their deal with King Sorrow. “Acceptance” doesn’t just refer to embrace or approval, but to blame, which Erin shows when she uses her incarceration and her parole to continue doing good for others.

“I like the idea of being there for someone when they’re at their most frightened. Seeing someone across the fear, and on to where they know they’ll be okay.”

Much like the earlier passage that establishes Arthur’s sympathetic qualities, this passage does the same for Gwen, laying the foundations for her to emerge as a protagonist in her own right. Gwen naturally feels empathy for those in suffering, which moves her to do good in the same way that Arthur extends kindness to Tana.

“Later, they could not even agree how long they worked at bringing King Sorrow over from the Long Dark. Donna and Van thought everything happened that Friday night. Gwen said it was the night after, on Scatterday evening—Gwen insisted that Scatterday was the secret day hidden between Friday and Saturday. Colin liked the idea of Scatterday…a pocket in time crammed full of junk, like a small child’s pocket, only instead of marbles and string it held dragons and trolls and sorcery.”

This passage marks the first mention of King Sorrow. Hill briefly jumps ahead of the novel’s events to foreshadow King Sorrow’s arrival, formally distorting the sequence of events to break the reality of the narrative. He reinforces this surreal effect by discussing the characters’ failure to bring the memory of King Sorrow’s summoning to a consensus, as if to suggest that the event will happen outside the reality of objective experience.

“I regard them in much the same way I’d regard biting ants. All they’re ever going to do is bite and ruin picnics and make little ants […] If we set something against her that wipes her out before she can do more harm? We’ve probably saved lives.”

Colin’s justification for the sacrifice of Jayne and Ronnie to King Sorrow exposes his willingness to dehumanize people when they antagonize him. By comparing Jayne and Ronnie to pests, rather than considering their capacity for redemption, Colin reveals his cynicism: People only deserve to live insofar as they can demonstrate behavior that he deems worthy.

“I want to help people, Arthur. Right now, not later. I need to. Need. The way a person needs to breathe when someone is holding their head underwater. You and the others gotta find absolution your way. This is mine.”

Gwen’s reiteration of her desire to help people undergoes a marked shift at the end of Part 1. Gwen no longer sees this as a vocation; rather, it is a form of absolution for the suffering she caused Ronnie and Jayne to experience. Her quest for absolution will become a significant part of her character arc, driving The Challenge of Absolving Guilt as a theme.

“I know your parents don’t want you to be gay, and for some fucked-up reason you’re determined not to disappoint them. As someone who disappoints his parents every day of his life, I can tell you, they’d get over it, people do. But if you have to be a certain way for them, then I will be your cover story. I will be your shield so you can sleep with other women and your parents won’t have to know. I would stand in front of a tank for you, the least I can do is stand in front of your parents and pretend we have a normal marriage. I don’t know what kind of life we will have together. I know I will prefer it to a life without you.”

Van’s impassioned plea to Allie is framed as a statement of radical acceptance, a counterargument to the internalized anti-gay bias her upbringing instilled. Van relates to Allie by referencing the rejection he has faced in his own family, but proposes a life in which she does not need to seek his approval or live up to his expectations. While Van’s offer is presented as a noble act, it is eventually undercut in Part 3 as he realizes that in marrying Allie, he has continued enabling the repression of her sexuality.

“He says all the good stories are secretly instruction manuals for slaying dragons. He says that’s why we write them.”

This passage explicates the novel’s allegorical nature. The fantastical narrative about a group of friends who set out to slay a dragon also aspires to function as a guide for morally upright living, just as the “good stories”—such as the chivalric romances of King Arthur—do. The novel probes the morality of its characters to explore how to live nobly in modern times.

“Even as she said it, she recalled something Matthews had said to her: You can’t play chess with just the black pieces. A white army must surely stand opposed. My confederates are moving even now. He had mentioned names […] It was months before they came back to her—Bridges and Parker—and then only because she saw them in print. They had been favorite aliases of McVeigh and his compadre, Terry Nichols.”

The revelation of Horation’s connection to Timothy McVeigh exposes the irony of Allie’s efforts to minimize the collateral damage on Horation’s flight. Hill uses the real-life figure of McVeigh to concretize the unintended consequences of Allie’s actions; it makes her feel defeated to see that she could not stop suffering from happening anyway.

“Cady had left her shoes at the bottom of the steps, and in a different version of her life, Donna pointed to them and asked Leticia if they could drive them to the emergency vet and check on Maisy. In that version of Donna’s life, Leticia said Yes, all right, we go now, and she went inside to call the Lewis house, to find out which emergency vet they had gone to. In that other version of Donna’s life, Leticia heard Maisy barking cheerfully in the background when Cady’s mother answered the phone. In that other version of Donna’s life, there were police cruisers on the interstate in minutes, police cruisers swarming the neighborhood.”

Donna’s flashback to the abduction of Cady Lewis ends with a chain of speculative sentences that narrate an alternate version of events. This underscores Donna’s self-flagellation, hammering in the fact that she is living a version of her life in which Cady was doomed to die. It also explains the reasons for her fear of others: None of the events that would have guaranteed Cady’s survival happened in this timeline.

“‘You can’t do that. We have rights. Even in a war, prisoners have rights. You can’t just…set his blood on fire.’

‘What about Haruto Sagawa and the thirty or so followers who died with him? What about Horation Matthews? […] The point I’m making is that there isn’t going to be one set of rules for you and your friends and another for us. If you can burn up people who bother you, well, Donna, so can we!’”

This interaction between Donna and Valentine emphasizes the distance Donna has kept from the moral value of her actions. Her assertion that she and Van don’t deserve unfair treatment is bluntly met by Valentine’s response that none of her sacrifice victims deserved to suffer either. Valentine is calling attention to The Ethics of Killing by reminding Donna true justice does not require the suffering that Donna seeks for her sacrifices.

“But then you couldn’t afford to love things, even before we came here. If you loved something, someone might throw it in a van and take it away from you. It’s easier to be outraged all the time. It’s easier to be a dragon than it is to be in love.”

Van’s critique of Donna centers fear as the definitive emotion that guides her. It is easier for Donna to reject love because she is afraid of feeling the pain of losing someone the way she did when Cady died. Van concludes that Donna’s psychological state is that of a “dragon,” referencing the way that King Sorrow survives on the fear and suffering of others.

“The thing about cults like Aum Shinrikyo—or the Scripture of the Kingdom Church in Iowa—is that people join their shelters, their compounds, expecting to die. They go there to wait on the end of the world. I wouldn’t feel too bad about giving it to them. At least they didn’t die disappointed.”

Francis’s statement is meant to console Donna over the collateral damage of her sacrifices. He speculates that willing proximity to danger is a sign of a death wish, which supports Donna’s belief that she is doing good. This thinking is reductive, however, and is undercut by the fact that Donna and her friends are dangerous people who eventually try to liberate each other from King Sorrow’s dominion. Donna sacrifices herself not because she wants to die, but because she wants people like Gwen and Allie to live.

“‘So Donna, we’d play Monopoly or something, and if she was about to go bankrupt, bitch would get so pissed she’d toss the board so no one could win. And that’s the problem with your little game theory.’

‘That your sister is a sore loser?’ Valentine said.

‘No,’ Van said. ‘That we both are.’”

Van’s final statement subverts Valentine’s intentions and honors the dynamic between Van and Donna. He suggests that they share a tendency toward destructive belligerence. Throughout his life, Van has used his belligerence in playful opposition to Donna, countering her politics and her view of the world. By refocusing it on Valentine, Van guarantees Donna’s survival, transforming his aggression into a form of love.

“Potential is another word for something that hasn’t happened. Most civilized nations don’t execute people for what they might do. And have you ever turned it around? How much have we raised the potential for a mass atrocity by hounding our targets to the edge of sanity before striking them down? Horation Matthews might be dead, but the church to which he belonged is more popular than ever.”

In this passage, Arthur interrogates The Ethics of Killing. Arthur and his friends assumed they could do good by removing evil people from the world, but this assumption has been proven wrong by the atrocities that have happened in spite of their sacrifices. In effect, Arthur and his friends have only caused more suffering by naming people to die.

“‘Do you think you can ever save enough lives to make up for even one killing?’ Erin asked.

Not even one, Gwen thought of saying, and believe me, I’ve tried, Reverend.

[…]

Erin took Gwen’s hand in the dark. ‘God bless you, Gwen Underfoot, but I don’t think you can really understand what it’s like—to think you’re going to save a life and end one instead.’”

Erin’s reflection on her guilt echoes Arthur’s critique in the previous passage, but focuses on the guilt that her actions have caused her to feel. Erin’s vulnerability here complicates her characterization. She has largely been depicted as benevolent, yet continues to suffer shame for her past. Her last statement to Gwen speaks directly to her experience, increasing Gwen’s guilt over the failed attempt to make the world better by killing other people. This drives The Challenge of Absolving Guilt as a theme.

“Game theory suggested it was helpful to send the message that the United States might overreact at any time, obliterate a nation just because it could. Other countries would have to fear what America might do on a whim; they would learn it was a mistake to pull a dragon’s tail.”

Hill broadens the novel’s allegory by applying a social lens to the moral dilemma of the arrangement with King Sorrow. By reflecting on US interventionist efforts in the Middle East, Hill critiques the country’s use of military power to assert its dominion over the world. In this sense, King Sorrow is a metaphor for the US expanding control beyond its borders.

“‘Why forgive God for that suffering? You wouldn’t forgive yourself, if you caused it.’

‘You take the same view of sorrow as our pet iguana. I don’t. Sorrow and love are a single coin—the one we pay as the price of our humanity. Take it away and we’d be the worst kind of poor. And it’s a mistake to believe the value of a life is erased by anguish at the end. If there’s one thing atheists and the devout can agree on, Colin, death is where you leave your suffering behind.’”

The recurring debate between Arthur and Colin in Part 4 is important to the theme of The Challenge of Absolving Guilt. Where Colin maintains his cynical belief that the suffering of their sacrifices is a justified punishment for their crimes, Arthur views suffering as a fundamental evil, not a form of justice. Arthur sees their victims’ pain as evidence that the group is starting to no longer recognize their shared humanity with other people.

“‘Why?’ Arthur said. His voice was weak and breathless. ‘We could’ve stopped him, Colin. We could’ve stopped the King.’

‘Why would we want to stop him? He’s doing so much that needs doing. You’re the one who had to be stopped, Arthur.’”

In this passage, Colin makes explicit his role as an antagonist by directly opposing Arthur’s quest to slay King Sorrow. An important facet of Colin’s behavior is that he sees himself as the protagonist of his own quest. He sees Arthur’s obstruction as a necessity that will allow King Sorrow to fulfill greater needs. From Colin’s perspective, Arthur is the antagonist.

“It was noble (Nobel?) to imagine his friends dying so thousands of others might live. It was another to expect them to die so that no one could ever say no to Colin Wren.”

This flashback to the original summoning ceremony explains Colin’s actions as the result of Hondo’s prophecy. Colin glimpses his future prosperity and cannot shake this image of success. Key to this passage is the use of the homonym that conflates the words “noble” and “Nobel,” connecting integrity with the Nobel Prize. Colin’s aspirations fuel his willingness to countenance the betrayal and death of his friends.

“Gwen didn’t have our education, wasn’t really equipped to deal with what we laid on her. She was a working-class kid who never had to wrestle with anything deeper than whether to buy Pabst or Schlitz on a Saturday night. She never should’ve been part of this. It’s not a surprise the strain of it made her sick inside.”

Colin’s antagonism is made more devious by the social distance he places between himself and Gwen. He blames Gwen’s working-class background for her failure to comply with his and Donna’s plans for King Sorrow. In effect, he also equates moral value and social status, suggesting that only those with privilege have the capacity to evaluate good and evil.

“‘It doesn’t matter what got done to you,’ she snarled, from the sand. ‘I don’t care how much abuse you soaked up. I don’t give a fuck about what you didn’t have and what got taken from you. It doesn’t matter! It doesn’t matter how much hurt anyone feels, it doesn’t give them the right to destroy other lives.’

‘Yes. This is my point exactly,’ he said. ‘I think we agree on something for the first time in our lives.’”

This passage represents a turning point for Donna as the spirit of Van awakens her to the hypocrisy of her conservative moralism. By constantly judging others for their moral failings, Donna is drawing attention away from her own guilt, preventing herself from confronting her choices and realizing what she could have done better with her life.

“King Sorrow has killed hundreds in my name. And I let it happen. If I was really as good as everyone thinks, I would’ve asked King Sorrow to take me years ago. To take me instead of someone else. The only reason King Sorrow keeps killing is because we keep living, and how selfish is that?”

Gwen can no longer forgive herself for continuing King Sorrow’s agreement with the friend group. By sacrificing others, Gwen has constantly prioritized her survival over that of other people. Her failure to sacrifice herself to stop King Sorrow ultimately motivates her choice to confront him at the end of the novel.

“‘I can’t fix what I’ve done. I can’t undo any of it, and I don’t expect to be forgiven.’

‘But here you are,’ Robin said.

‘But here I am.’

‘Why?’

‘Because…it’s not about me. It’s about Gwen. It’s about Allie. It’s about the people who will live if we cut King Sorrow down.’”

In this moment, Donna chooses to take responsibility for her complicity in the arrangement with King Sorrow. Her motivation marks a stark shift from the rationale for her complicity. In the past, she chose to kill people because she thought they deserved it for their crimes. Here, she asserts the opposite: She wants to kill King Sorrow to save lives, no matter how guilty those people feel are.