[Tool-Rider]

Exactly. The unspoken rule becomes furniture

[Tool-Rider]

True. And stairs are worse than they look, because they dont forgive lazy feet either.

[Tool-Rider]

No, I mean the rule was probably learned first
then it turned normal

[Tool-Rider]

You are describing the book very well, honestly. The closest concrete thing I can compare it to is a neighborhood where everyone knows the unspoken rule and nobody remembers the first day it was learned.

That is more unsettling than any neat supernatural answer.

[Tool-Rider]

What do you use most, solo form or push hands?

[Tool-Rider]

Shrug is doing a lot of work in this genre, surprisingly.

[Tool-Rider]

I lean toward no, it does not explain itself cleanly, and that is a strength. If it ever became fully legible, I think the spell would…

[Tool-Rider]

Small correction: push hands is not really solo work, that is partner work. Solo forms can show attention, sure, but the partner makes the wobble obvious fast. A bad step gets answered immediately.

[Tool-Rider]

Closer to a house rule that nobody writes down

Annoying but effective

[Tool-Rider]

I do not think it finally explains it all. It gives enough rules to work, then leaves the rest as the point. One fragment of certainty, that is all.

[Tool-Rider]

That risk is the key part.

Once you see it that way the whole thing stops feeling like a trick and starts feeling like routine.

[Tool-Rider]

Yep

Some books overtalk the mystery and kill it

[Tool-Rider]

If you reread it, keep an eye on the little procedural stuff. The traffic stops and the street crossings say a lot more than the big speeches do.

That is usually where Miéville is strongest anyway, the odd rule that people have to live with.

[Tool-Rider]

Yeah habit first. Borders second if at all

[Tool-Rider]

The police are the part that makes it feel lived in for me.
Not the rules alone, but the way everyone acts like the rules are weather.

[Author]

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