This post contains some spoilers, so do not read it unless you've read this book.
Shannon Messenger has already revealed many clues to the big secrets but has obfuscated so well that many fans don't realize that we can most likely conclude who Forkle is as well as the identity of Sophie's father. She's continuing this pattern in Unraveled.
I read the book all the way through on December 3 and 4. It was over the course of around 30 hours, roughly. I always read fast. I noticed certain things but didn't process everything. The clear takeaways were gaining information about two characters: Alvar Vacker and Ethan Benedict Wright II.
On my first reading, I felt like what was revealed meant that I was completely wrong about Ethan Benedict Wright II. My theory has been that Ethan is Forkle's fifth identity. The book ostensibly makes it very clear that Ethan is a real person, a human, with a human daughter, Eleanor. There's no way that he could be Forkle.
On my second reading, I realized that Shannon obfuscates all through the entire Ethan and Eleanor reveal. Shannon is a master of misdirection. She appears to have revealed that Ethan was a human. But was he really? Some of what Eleanor says is incomplete or strange. There's a lot we don't know. I will expand on this in future posts.
Regarding Alvar, I want to believe that he's sincere, but I suspect that he's going to give in to temptation and do something bad yet again. I'll also cover Alvar in a separate post.
The rest of this post covers various things I noticed, aside from the Alvar, Ethan, and Eleanor content.
On page 17 in a memory, Lady Gisela tells Keefe that anger is important. When Keefe heals Alvar, he pulls from the energy that he has reserved from his anger.
Elysian can take power away. Keefe can return it. Keefe's power might come in handy in the aftermath of the cliffhanger for #9 Stellarlune.
Page 55 There had to be at least sixty years' worth of sketchbooks...
Lord Cassius was drawing decades before Keefe was born, and Keefe is better than he is. No wonder Lord Cassius is jealous of Keefe.
Page 102 "Life is a very long game, and you have to play by the rules before you can break them. Prove you're someone worth trusting, so that no one watches you too closely."
Lord Cassius worries about appearances, and he doesn't like that Keefe continually draws attention to the family.
Page 104 "You're forgetting that your mother will only show herself when the timing is right for her."
I think of Lady Gisela's sudden appearance at the end of Stellarlune. She shows up at exactly the perfect moment.
Keefe gets pep talks from both his father and from Alvar. Here's Lord Cassius.
Page 110 "No matter what your mother claims—or what you discover about your new abilities—you'll always have a say in your future."
Lord Cassius also says that the Black Swan were correct to have Sophie grow up with humans so that she would gain that perspective.
In Book 5 on page 351, Sophie says that the Neverseen created Keefe to stop Sophie. If anything, it would be the other way around. Keefe is older than Sophie and was born first. Sophie would have been created by the Black Swan in order to stop Keefe, who was first created by the Neverseen.
Here's another quote from Shannon's December 5 talk with Roshani Choksi, sponsored by Brookline Booksmith:
"I never give spoilers of any kind but... The reason I wrote this book is because we need to know Keefe's secrets, and secrets always have a way of coming out. Obviously, all of the big reveals in this book and even some of the small reveals that you might think were just kind of a casual little 'toss-in there detail' kind of thing like...
There's a lot that's coming that's going to tie into this, and so I've actually given you quite a few clues. You may just not realize yet, and so it's really going to be fun over these next months to kind of see how readers speculate that it's all going to come together. And I do have a plan! My characters have a way of ruining my plans, but I have plans of how it's all going to tie together.
And I am hard at work on plotting that all out and diving in and starting at that horrible cliffhanger that I left you on in Stellarlune and starting to give you those answers."
Whether we recognize them or not, this book has important clues in it. We must read carefully to unearth them.
All of my past Keeper posts are linked from this page:
Keeper of the Lost Cities Summaries, Reviews, and Theories
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