THE RAVEN BOYS

THE DREAM THIEVES

BLUE LILY, LILY BLUE

THE RAVEN KING

THE RAVEN BOYS

• Ok, today I'm live-tweeting my read of the Raven Boys. I hear from the internet it's supposed to be pretty good.

• It's going to be a lot of tweets, so followers-who-are-into-my-other-writing-that-isn't-TRC, please feel free to mute me today (PLEASE DON'T GO AWAY ENTIRELY).

• I'm also updating on Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/1330292.Maggie_Stiefvater

OK LET'S GO

• Notes: this will be spoilery for this book.

• Notes: I'm reading the US hardcover, with cover art by @adamsdoyle

• Notes: I'm listening to what I listened to while writing it, Into the Trees by @zoecello: https://music.zoekeating.com/track/escape-artist

• This is @brennayovanoff, who is still good at looking for things.

[note: I think there was a picture here?]

• Jesus, this book goes straight to true love in the first line and I haven't even put in my drink order.

• In four pages, I've learned everything about Blue Sargent except for how she broke her wrist and I feel cheated.

• All I can think of while reading this St. Mark’s Eve business is how many books I read on ley lines, corpse roads, song lines, and divination while writing this novel, and how little of it ended up IN this novel.

• "It's an all-boys school. For politicians' sons & oil barons' sons and for the sons of mistresses living off hush money."

Yes, those Virginia oil barons, Blue, those are the ones you have to watch.

• Here's a story about all-boys schools. I visited a number of them for research while writing this series, however, there is one school who turned me down because they said I would be "a bad influence."

• page 12 "Invisible, orderly spirits of not yet truly dead people were one thing. Ghosts that weren't compelled to stay on the path were another."

oh STIEFVATER you TRICKSTER you

• It's weird to think this book was written right before smart phones became a thing, back when they were something only privileged teens would have.

In 2011, Blue wouldn't have whipped out her iphone x to get a good vid of Baby's First Visible Haunting, but what would 2019 Blue have done?

• If you’re in the mood for sitting around on St. Mark’s Eve, there’s actually a third reason why a non seer would see a spirit, according to legend: ‘cause you’re gonna die yourself, bro! If you saw yourself on the ley line during the vigil, you’d be toast within the year.

• "It's me," said Gansey

*Stiefvater hurriedly changes the music playing to Vampire Weekend*

• "No," Ronan replied. "I thought you were dead in a ditch."

HOLD THAT THOUGHT, LYNCH

• I can see myself trying to not write about cars in this book and then doing it anyway; it’s like when I was little and I couldn’t stop bringing very specific dog breeds into conversation because I had memorized the 768 page American Kennel Club handbook and had no social skills.

• p. 24, "And a very old British professor had said, The world turns out its pockets for you, boy."

Oh STIEFVATER you TRICKSTER you

• CALL DOWN THE HAWK (Scholastic, 2019)

• Wait wait wait wait wait wait so Adam gave Gansey the number for a psychic and I have no memory of this. Does this mean Adam googled psychics? Does this mean there were other psychics and he picked 300 Fox Way because they were first in the phone book?

• Ah, yes, Adam thinks to himself, I will direct Gansey toward that profession known for analyzing the source of its power in a hard-headed, quantifiable way: the New Age community

I hope he at least read Yelp reviews.

• "You're a Pollyanna," Blue snapped.

Do people still even know what a Pollyanna isOMG ONE OF MY DOGS IS CHEWING MY COMPUTER POWER CORD

• A) Blue, you little sneak

B) time to write the spin off of Maura’s jilted virtual lover as we have all discovered she has exciting taste in men

• Oof, I was just forcefully reminded of how in the original version of this book, Adam and Noah were the same person.

• "1136 Monmouth ... A clue to the building's original identity was painted on the eastern side of the building: MONMOUTH MANUFACTURING"

• STIEFVATER you TRICKSTER you

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Historia_Regum_Britanniae

• ffs adam

• KEEP IT TOGETHER, MAN

• "Declan was calculating, if anything. His goal was Ashley's virtue, and every step of tonight would've been planned with that in mind"

objection your honor HEARSAY

• There are just so many instances of the word dick, capitalized, on page 43, and so many characters who are acting like dicks, lower case, on page 43

• Dick "Because I own this building" Gansey III

• I don’t know if this is a Welsh reference or a West Virginian one but honestly what is even happening in this book

• "Ronan," Declan said. "I thought you had tennis."

WHAT WAS I THINKING

• This is unrelated but I was very upset this week to find out from one of my own children how many cats died in the making of Milo & Otis (1989)

Don’t google this fact if you ever want to be happy again

• Lady, one of your students is literally spending his time dealing supernatural drugs and roofying his own mother LEAVE GANSEY’S HOBBIES ALONE

• chapter 6: soundtrack change

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WdgLMslbDuY - Beastie Boys - Make Some Noise (Official Video)

• Scale-crested pygmy tyrant:

https://neotropical.birds.cornell.edu/Species-Account/nb/species/scptyr1/overview

• I will never stop being messed up by how, in the UK edition, Gansey is "President Mobile Phone."

• "Blue used one millisecond of her time to imagine what that might be like, wading through awkward, vaguely sexist conversation."

WHO was just saying Adam had blue eyes pretty enough for a girl again?

my hypocrisy meter is on fire so I can't read the screen

• Dick "I'll talk to your manager" Gansey III

• Jesus, everyone in this chapter is a mess, I would just take Donny the manager's hand and run away into the sunset, it couldn't be any more of an interpersonal trash fire

• I wrote all this bit about dowsing in this book not realizing that months later I would be forced to confront my feelings about it, as Lover had a midlife crisis, bought a herd of cows,* and had a man come to help him put in automatic cow waterers.

Out my office window, I saw the man walking around with two little metal flags crossed over. When Lover came back up, I demanded to know what the man was doing.

• Finding where the water is, Lover said.

USING WHAT SCIENTIFIC PRINCIPLE? demanded I.

• I also asked the man to explain himself. He told me he was "witching for water."

The cow waterers work well. I don't want to talk about it.

• *later Lover named one of the petulant-looking calves Ronan and another one Declan**

**later later Declan broke through one of the fences and impregnated twenty cows before he was caught

• Maybe I take this tweet back

https://twitter.com/mstiefvater/status/1167831078398320645

• Spin off novel time

• Stiefvater, stop talking about the Volvo

stop talking about the Volvo

stop talking about the Volvo

stop talking about the Volvo

stop talking about the Volvo

stop talking about the Volvo

stop talking about the Volvo

stop talking about the Volvo

stop talking about the Volvo

• but how does the Volvo feel about Niall Lynch's death

• The Declan-Ronan fight is the first scene where I thought to myself "Stiefvater, I think you were a good writer before but this might be something else when you're done."

• The worst part of this scene is when they counted on Noah to leave a tip for the server.
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EH9meoWmAOM - Coldplay - Talk (Official Video)

• It's excruciating reading about Blue paging through Gansey's journal. I kept a journal with all of my TRB research in it while I wrote the 1st book, and by the end, it looked like Gansey's journal is described. I brought it with on tour while I was writing book 2...and lost it.

• If you're into all the Raven King jazz in the series, there's a very weird non(?)fiction book that talks about the connection(?) between Welsh princes and ravens:

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/1469829.The_Mystery_of_Jack_of_Kent_and_the_Fate_of_Owain_Glyndwr

• I would like to know if, before Gansey tried finding a dead Welsh historical figure because he couldn't sleep at night, if he also tried melatonin, meditation, not looking at blue light right before bed

• wait WHAT Ronan's GONE

that's THIS chapter?

• wait, where did he go, I don't remember

don't tell me, I'll get it eventually

• OH

OH RIGHT

OH SURE

• "Gansey had a sudden thought that he was too late and Ronan was dead after all, and that his corpse woke now only because Gansey had commanded it to."

Blue Lily, Lily Blue (Scholastic, 2014)

• On p 98, it says that Whelk has a spider in his bathtub. I don't use my bathtub, but I do have a spider in my shower. I googled it and it's a Pholcidae and its fangs aren't long enough to deliver venom even if it did bite me, so I left it, because it seemed neighborly.

• "Does this make you white trash now?" Czerny had asked

WHO in this book is pure? Truly no one. Chainsaw, maybe. The spider in Whelk's tub.

• Blue is truly the most antisocial avenger

• WTF is Persephone doing her PhD on?

• Gansey’s internal monologue is 20% Glendower, 20% panic attack hidden in metaphor, 20% fear of losing his friends, 20% wishing he was relevant, and 20% worrying that maybe he really is a lowercase d dick instead of an uppercase d Dick

• "Lynch!" the call came again. "I'm going to fuck you up."

not until book 2, darling

• Ronan calls Whelk a socially awkward shitbird which, coincidentally enough, is also my Hogwarts House.

• I still feel a little sorry about naming Barrington Whelk after a realtor who once showed us a really nice house with a good mountain view. Ok, it was a nice house with a good mountain view. Ok, it was a fine house and there were mountains somewhere, and I'm not sorry at all.

• OMG so here is Barrington Whelk also coming to 300 Fox Way for hard-hitting factual data. Everyone in this book lives their life via runes and reading the swirls in their leftover Froot Loops milk.

• Calla "Kick Him in the Nuts" Johnson 4 President

• This is now funny because as of the time of writing this loose Arthurian retelling, Guy Ritchie had not yet made his loose Arthurian retelling

• Which by the way has an absolutely splendid @DANIELPEMBERTON soundtrack: https://open.spotify.com/track/1xaoC6L7jJQOR2ommqOlMt who unrelatedly did the insanely good soundtrack for the insanely good Spiderverse.

[note: link is The Born King by Daniel Pemberton]

• Oh right, I read chapter 14 really recently, though, when I wrote the pilot for the TV show (yes, it's still in development, KEEP BEING PATIENT)

• Ah yes, Dick "You think you deserve it" Gansey III

• Dear God, these two are such terrible and good friends

youth is the worst, I look forward to cronehood

• Calla telling Maura that she sees a breakdown in her future, next to the sketchy furniture store, reminds me of the sketchy furniture store in the town where I lived while writing this book. It had a big glass front and lots of very boring furniture inside.

• At the time, I often went out with my then-living grandmother (God rest her) to keep her company and also to keep her from behind the wheel of her car, which was an increasingly perilous situation for the rest of the world.

• One day, I heard on the news someone had driven directly into the furniture store. Then my phone rang. It was my grandmother.

The first thing she said was "It wasn't me."

• DEAR GOD SOMEONE TELL ME HOW TO REMOVE DANIEL FROM THIS THREAD SITUATION

[note: this is about @DANIELPEMBERTON being tagged in all these tweets because she mentioned him earlier in the thread]

• ok OK ok Ok I've worked this out, it'll be fine: We're moving over to Part Two of the live tweet here: https://twitter.com/mstiefvater/status/1167872242643918848

• AND I WILL NEVER TAG ANYONE EVER AGAIN

https://twitter.com/mstiefvater/status/1167872242643918848

• This is Part Two, or, Now Things Are Getting Good, of my live tweeting of the Raven Boys

• I am forced to have a part two because I tagged Daniel Pemberton in the last thread and could not untag him and was not quite devolved enough as a human being to put 200 more tweets in his TL.

• Okay, where was I. Right. President Mobile Phone/ President Cell Phone has just shown up for a hot psychic take on the historical search he took up to avoid confronting his unresolved issues on being dead for .8 seconds.

• "I don't have a brother, ma'am," Adam replied. But Blue saw his eyes dart to Gansey.

oh YOU

• Calla hissed, "What are you?"

WAIT FOR BOOK 2 CALLA

• "Death." Gansey read the bottom of the card. He didn't sound surprised or alarmed.

THE RAVEN KING (Scholastic, 2016)

• I like snotty Gansey telling Maura that he knows she's lying NEARLY as well as Gansey-on-fire in later books.

• Maura's attempt to force Blue to stay away from the boys makes me think she's never read any YA novels.

• "It was clear now that the instrument wailing from the headphones was the Irish pipes"

• https://open.spotify.com/track/0IDTL6CGAaS1AVqAeK5tmk - Taimse Im’ Chodladh by Planxty

• KIRKUS REVIEWS: Stiefvater’s artful prose

ME:

• Look how tenderly Ronan is beating the shit out of this wasp for Gansey, they are such good friends

• Dick "I would take all of you anywhere with me" Gansey III

• ffs Blue

• she seems pretty fond of this tree in the backyard too, no way that could be foreshadowing, though, because that would be so weird

• I genuinely have no idea why they did not make Neeve take her shit and go stay at the Days Inn.

Seriously, she's like a local station weather forecaster that only delivers creepy predictions.

• "there will be a cold front from a place no one has come back from rolling in on Thursday"

Maura: this is fine

• "the sound of Persephone's angry PhD music was already audible"

It's WHAT

I HAVE SO MANY QUESTIONS FOR MYSELF

• Orla's resentment over a suitor painting her large nose as it was reminds me fondly of the friend I based her on, who also had more suitors than any one person required and who also despised her large nose, which was perfectly lovely.

• It's pretty touching that Adam sent Blue flowers, but I've always thought sending people flowers was pretty useless. That's why, when I wanted to do something special, I sent my first editor a potato subscription.

• I can't believe how much facial hair Ronan has in this book

• I would like to go back to past me who had her debit card turned down many times at the register before slinking back to her trailer to remember that one day it made for a pretty good scene later so it was all worth it.

• Oh, dude, Lynch, I’m sorry, I’m fetching my sad trombone now

• Dick "organic apple juice" Gansey III

• Ok, look, my favorite part of chapter 21 is that Helen Gansey turns out to be the helicopter pilot.

• I always really like writing sibling bits. I have a billion of them, countless brothers and sisters, my mother was Lilith, the mother of demons, we're everywhere. Sibling dynamics are always interesting to me.

• ALSO OMG GANSEY IS STARING AT BLUE'S THIGH

• I really didn't remember Gansey admitting internally to being physically interested in Blue so early on, at least not without later thinking something like 'she had something about Glendower tattooed there so I had to study it'

• Ronan, through the magical power of Extreme Jealousy, has made the scientific breakthrough that Blue was the voice on the recorder.

Gansey's takeaway from all this is "I am not being a dick" which he patently IS, like 24/7

• Ronan said, "I'm always straight."

which he patently ISN't, like 24/7

• I see that here in the middle of this thrilling moment when they have found an oyster-shell raven in the mountains, Ronan is taking the moment to have a piss against a tree, and, more mysteriously, everyone else takes a moment to talk about it.

• Oh, Cabeswater! this is one of the oldest bits of the series. There's a version of it I wrote when I was 19 where Gansey and Blue found a forest where all seasons were true and time didn't have meaning, and although it was in most ways a lamer book, the feeling remained.

• "She felt like she was a part of a dream this place was having, or it was a part of a dream of hers."

Oh STIEFVATER you TRICKSTER you

• I am still so, so, so here for the dreaming tree situation, I gotta tell you.

• "Okay, I'm ready—" Gansey's voice caught, just a little. "Blue, kiss me."

🎶OHHHHHhhh snap you might fall for the bro anyway, Blue?🎶

• THE DREAM THIEVES (Scholastic, 2013)

• Dick "However, I also like Jane" Gansey III

• "They were loud and triumphant and kings of Henrietta, because they'd found the ley line and because it was starting, it was starting."

do you ever feel bad for ruining people's lives because

• chapter 25

Stiefvater stop talking about the BMW

stop talking about the BMW

stop talking about the BMW

stop talking about the BMW

stop talking about the BMW

stop talking about the BMW

stop talking about the Civic

stop talking about the BMW

stop talking about the BMW

• Um yeah, but SPOILER only one of these boys gets to kiss Blue and I’ll let you guess who

• Man, I do still really like the Cabeswater chapters. I remember being worried people would find them the most boring of all.

• I think because the magic was hard — not straightforward. I thought maybe people would just get impatient with it and skim until there weren't so many trees involved.

• "I don't understand," Ronan said. He kept tracing and retracing the letters. He was badly shaken.

Don't worry, baby, you have seven whole books ahead of you to still not understand.

• Blink-182 sticker

https://soundcloud.com/blink-182/i-miss-you-album-version - I Miss You by Blink 182

• READERS: Ronan Lynch is my favorite character he's so nuanced and cool

RONAN LYNCH:

• Meanwhile I see our friend Noah is here having heaving PTSD over his actual murder scene and everyone else is like, hmm, yeah, well that was a cool time! maybe 40% creepy, 60% cool. well, 60% creepy, 40% cool

• Hooooo boy Gansey boy makes his move the second Adam goes to work, asking if Blue wants to go find that church on her map.

"Hey lady would you like to go find a holy place?"

• Now Blue's in trouble but Maura can't figure out how to punish her. I styled the women of 300 Fox Way =after myself and two friends, but I never realized until now, when I'm parenting teens, how I am just as hopeless an authoritarian as Maura is.

• Also, Jesus! When I was finding out that Milo & Otis was full of animal abuse, I also found out that the movie mentioned at the end of 27, Auch Zwerge haben klein angefangen, was in trouble for animal death. THIS IS TOO MUCH

• chapter 28

don't talk about the Camaro

don't talk about the Camaro

don't talk about the Camaro

don't talk about the Camaro

don't talk about the Camaro

don't talk about the Camaro

don't talk about the Camaro

don't talk about the Camaro

don't talk about the Camaro

• I see Blue has just discovered Gansey's Epi-Pen. WEIRD, she thinks, IS THIS A METAPHOR FOR HIS MENTAL FRAGILITY?

• The guy who has devoted his life to searching for a corpse that will grant a wish just had the audacity to laugh at Blue for saying she supposedly would kill her true love with a kiss

• Ah, yes, the romantic date of telling your crush how you were killed by hornets in the woods while you are walking in the woods

• and finding the corpse of one of your roommates, yes, good, this is v. v. intimate

• whoa whoa whoa if you're still playing Beastie Boys, chapter 29 is when you definitely need to stop because it appears this is where not only is Noah at Peak Dead, but it's also when Adam is nearing Peak Jealousy for Dad's attention.

YOU GUYS ARE MESSES

• chapter 30

Neeve Still Hasn't Gone To The Days Inn

• Oh, here's Declan again, finally. How's the herd, says Adam

• ACTUALLY what he does is give Ronan gift. What do you get the man who has everything? A very manipulative conversation with your brother to make him go away
• Also nice TRY, Adam. Adam's all 'Ronan should wallow in his own messes' while also being 'except for talking it out with his brother, I will handle that one'

• Chapter 31 Adam's Dichotomy:

Adam: i wish Ronan was dead

Adam: oh noes stop this thing that will make Ronan want to die

editor’s note: this thread accidentally got split up, (continued under a different tweet in this thread, rather than the last one in this thread) and because of it, chapter 31-end is forever lost because it isn’t in any web archives anymore:( i spent a very long time trying to find it SOMEWHERE, but i couldn’t. if someone happens to have screenshots/etc, please contact me on darcyolsson.tumblr.com!

if it helps, this thread was posted on august 31st, 2019.

THE DREAM THIEVES

• Today I'm live tweeting my re-read of The Dream Thieves, book 2 in the Raven Cycle. It will be spoilery and probably sweary. I couldn't find a single US copy anywhere in my house, so I'll be reading this UK copy instead, which means I'm mentally preparing for kerbs and colours.

• On the cover of this one, it says 'the thrilling sequel to the Raven Boys' which was true for me, anyway. TDT remains my favorite of the series. Or at least it was. LET'S SEE HOW I FEEL IN A FEW HOURS

• According to my records, I listened to "Intro" by Alt-J 157 times while writing this book, so I'm gonna go ahead and do it a 158th time now.

• Jesus, this prologue is pretty hard core. It just took my lunch money and then asked me for interest on top.

• Ronan: what was it like when I was born

Niall: the better question is how did we manage before you were born

Declan: what was it like when I was born

Niall: who dis

• Stiefvater: speaking of cars

reader: were we speaking of cars

Stiefvater: yes, so, like I said, about the Camaro

• I feel slightly bad about writing this line about boys getting bronzed outside of libraries after I saw a boy who had been bronzed outside a library.

• "Don't feminists have big muscles?"

Gansey, aren't you scheduled to die

• Wait wait wait I used a double line break to show time passing within a chapter? I do that? Why do I always forget I can do that?

• I see Blue spends 2 pages talking about Gansey, the boy she is definitely not into, before finally mentioning Adam by name on page 3, in an itemized list of all boys present in the novel at that time.

1. Gansey, gross and awful

2. Noah, smudgy and slouching

3. Ronan, ferocious and dark

4. Chainsaw, a bird

5. Henrietta, a town

6. Glendower, who is dead

7. oh right, Adam, gaunt and fair and my boyfriend definitely for sure

• "In that moment, Blue was a little in love with all of them. Their magic. Their quest. Their awfulness and strangeness. Her raven boys."

• Chapter 2: in which it becomes obvious Maggie really liked Gross Pointe Blank

• we don't have time to unpack this right now but

• Meanwhile, back on the Raven Boys ranch:

• what did YOUR father teach you

[note: there used to be a poll here, this was lost because it didn’t get saved to any

archives]

• "He didn't think Declan Lynch would baulk at shooting him."

UK EDITION ALERT

• "The ringtone was an Iglu & Hartly song that the Gray Man knew but couldn't condone"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l6d3UXuaHtQ - Iglu and Hartly- In This City

• "They tasted like petrol"

THEY WHAT

• I like how the narration seems to imply that Malory is the odd one because he only studies the ley lines as a weekend diversion, not to find the tombs of foreign leaders.

• You're not a real ley line fan, the Gangsey says. Name ten of its songs. I'll wait.

  ---

• "Beside the interstate, four black cows lifted their heads to watch the Camaro go by."

this line reminds me of this old post: https://ibuzoo.tumblr.com/post/125438619722

• "Ronan, a sinner himself, wasn't as struck by the transgression as he was by Gansey's insistence that they continue to pretend Adam was a saint."

• This inclusion of Gansey's mother's Congressional run is entirely because of the time I spent working on my father's Congressional campaign, a feat that exposed me to the nitty gritty underbelly of politics and effectively ruined it for me for the rest of time.

• I remember that troubled time in my youth when I spray painted my Evo with a knife after I wrote the Dream Thieves

• I remember that time after I spray painted my car that a reader spray painted her horse to match

THIS IS TOO MUCH POWER FOR ONE PERSON TO HOLD

• Kavinsky "mouthed something to Gansey that ended with '—unt'."

I'm sure it was "overhunt" or "headcount" or "tantamount"

• My religion remains Adam calculating whether or not they could win a street race based upon the weight the car is currently carrying

• hold on a tick

what is happening here

• currently seeking ship name for the bed and breakfast owners the Wetzels + the Gray Man, go

(top of my list is Dread & Breakfast)

• Now I can't read this book without seeing John Mulaney as Greenmantle. https://twitter.com/mstiefvater/status/1170134379227701249

• I can't think too hard about the timeline in these books or bad things happen to my frontal lobe.

• TYRE IRON

• wait, what did I do with this language box at the end of the series, where did it go

• currently hiring someone to be my external brain, wages are zero, hours are 'oh God what's happening', perks are zilch

• Second best version of Gansey.

• It says here Gansey bought this warehouse for CASH and I need to know everything about the previous owners who were happy to sell a warehouse to a teenager for cash, STAT

• "It was on its knees in the rye grass and the creeper, and he saved it"

Ronan bby you don't have to compare yourself to a building we got it you love him

• this section is reminding me of how when I first started writing this book by hand when I was 19, Gansey was an old man

• Everyone's all WHO'S SEAN

We've been over this before, Ronan was named Sean back then, then I stole Sean for Scorpio Races' Sean Kendrick and proceeded to rename Ronan via Twitter poll like the author of literature that I am.

• Gansey: ?

Ronan: hahahahhaha it's so funny because I'm not gay hahahahhahahahhahaha oh god oh noes hahahahhahahah *slaps thigh* hahahhahahhaha i wish i was dead hahahahhaha

• There is foreshadowing in this chapter that I can't tell you about because it is spoilery for CALL DOWN THE HAWK but I want you guys to remember I said it so I can look clever later.

• Get you a friend who will get orange juice with you at 3:32 am.

• It continues to be impossible to read Orla without thinking of the friend I based her on.

• ANOTHER LINE BREAK TO SHOW PASSAGE OF TIME

2012 MAGGIE WHO ARE YOU

TEACH ME

• Ronan: *is asshole to Blue*

Gansey: RONAN YOU ASSHOLE

Gansey: I am not her boyfriend though

Gansey: this is just informational

Gansey: never mind

Adam: oh I guess that was kind of out of line, Ronan, lulz

Gansey: did I mention I wasn't attracted to her

• "like many of the other raven boys, he sported . . . a small earring"

WAIT

WHT

• this is not a John Travolta movie

• "Elephant," murmured Gansey.

• On the first four pages of Kavinsky, he manages to be a misogynist on two of them, 50% misogynist, 100% douche

• I feel like I am still really processing that I implied that many Aglionby students have earrings

• me: *tours endless private boarding schools in Virginia for research, marveling at their regressive charm*

also me: *like many of the other raven boys, he sported . . . a small earring*

• I think I must have just superimposed every college fuckboy I had ever met onto him, clapped the dust off my sandals, and walked away.

• In other news, this ugly rose in chapter seven is because the roses at my home got suddenly infected with Rose Rosette Disease, also called 'witches' broom.' I was deeply traumatized and so, like most writers, played out my trauma on the page.

• This is also why Mr. Gray hates his rental car.

• How did Adam get an IKEA mattress?

• 😐

• A MOBILE PHONE

• ADAM: imma shower

BLUE: noice

ADAM: snuggle?

BLUE: noice

ADAM: kisskiss?

BLUE: AREYOUMAD

ADAM: when did you first learn to hate men

• CHURCH LADY: $2400

AGLIONBY LETTER: $2400

ADAM:

• Worstest Adam Parrish:

• "Mon dieu!" Gansey said.

• this entire chapter in the Dollar City never quits!

highlights include

•turkey wattle clock

•glitter!

•my friend's sockless ankles are hot but I'm straight what does that mean

•Ronan corrupts church ladies

•tell me then, prophet

•carrion birds

• why do people let me write these books, why does no one stop me, at some point someone's just going to put their arm across my chest and shake their head gravely

• Wait, is this the first Gansey POV on page 79? How cagey of me.

• For 79 pages we had no idea he thought Blue was a platypus because we watched him from the outside.

• "I dunno, Gansey. You've dated way more than me."

OBJECTION, YOUR HONOR, HEARSAY

• "I'm really bad at talking, Gansey," Adam said earnestly. "And you're really good at it."

OBJECTION, YOUR HONOR, HEARSAY

• Fun things to do with ghosts

•joke a lot about their deadness

•ask them to leave tips at restaurants

•throw them out of windows

• THERE IS A MISSING LINE BREAK IN THE UK EDITION ON PAGE 85

• All this stuff about smudging and sage makes me think about the sage plant I put in my back yard, thinking I'd cook with it. It got enormous and looks great but unfortunately it is now my dog Parsifal's favorite place to pee, which makes it dubiously ethical to cook with.

• (as a side note, my daughter named Parsifal after a character in Call Down the Hawk after reading it and is now banned from naming any more pets after Stiefvater characters)

• I see Declan's wounds haven't healed even though it's been 72 pages since he got beat up.

• Noah whispered, "Is crack the same thing as speed?"

we grow no wiser in death, she intoned in a deep voice

• Things to do in church if you're a Lynch Brother

•hate yourself

•hate Declan's women

•talk about drugs

•be proud of your youngest brother, who is a benevolent idiot

•sing hymns

•fall asleep

•limber up for post homily street race

• RONAN & KAVINSKY, PART 1

Kavinsky: slur

Ronan: slur

Kavinsky & Ronan: *something involving cars*

/end scene

• Look, Blue has been emotionally cheating on Adam for this entire book so far.

But to be fair, Adam has been emotionally cheating on her to with his anxiety.

• Is there a ship name for Adam x circular thoughts?

• Some quality Blue-tree foreshadowing here, just saying.

• "settling on a yoghurt"

NO

NO MORE

I CANNOT TAKE THIS MADNESS

• what the HELL is a blancmange cup and are they supposed to be kept in the fridge because it sounds like something you should insert in your bra?

• Third Best Version of Gansey:

• "She also thought: Adam. Remember Adam."

I DON'T SEE WHY YOU'D BOTHER TO START NOW

• Aw, baby Adam is studying tarot cards in this chapter.
• This bit about the psychics playing games is partially inspired by an old psychic friend of mine who would call me on the phone and quiz me what card she was turning over on her end of the line and vice versa.

• MAURA & MR. GRAY, PART I

MAURA: this corpse looks like you

MR. GRAY: you look like the murder weapon

CALLA: ffs

• look, it depends on the novel.

• Ok ok please hold, I have to go pick up my children from school.

• Chapter 15: Cabeswater is Canceled

• I had originally vowed to write the Pig breaking down every time my real life Camaro broke down but eventually my real life car broke down too many times to provide the Gangsey transportation to any adventures and I had to cry uncle.

• In which Adam begins to suspect that Blue’s narration mentions Gansey more than him.

• Declan's coming! Look casual, throw some of your body over someone else's body, that's the way to do it, no, I was always sitting like this, yes it's super comfortable, if you were in here, you'd be splayed across Adam Parrish, too

• "Thanks, D," Gansey said easily, calling Declan by a nickname Stiefvater never remembered to use ever again

• "The Pig had died, but it was always either dying or rising again."

here, have a car metaphor, the car is Gansey, GET IT, GET IT

• The "clear your mind of whimsy" line is because a guy told me that while he was teaching me to drive a car sideways at speed.

It's good advice.

• I like this mask chapter, it's super gross and angsty.

• Third best Ronan Lynch:

• pause for me to drive children to yet another place, this is what I do

• ANOTHER LINE BREAK TO INDICATE PASSAGE OF TIME

When did I stop doing this?

• Gosh, I love writing about monsters.

• This chapter with the Barns - so - I know I’ve written about this before, but the Barns was one of my recurring dreams as a child. I’d go there night after night and explore and play alone in the various buildings there (and sometimes be chased by monsters). I loved it.

• It wasn’t my only recurring dream, though. I also had vivid screaming nightmares. At some point, I read that if you wrote down your dreams, you never had them again. I began to write down my nightmares. It worked!

• When it came time to write the Raven Cycle for real, rebooting it now that I was an adult, I knew I needed to give the Lynch family someplace magical to grow up in. After warring with myself, I decided to give them the Barns.

I’ve never been back.

• Richard Campbell Gansey III: “poke its eye”

• Spin off title!

• Best Ronan Lynch:

• Worst Ronan Lynch:

• Like, fourth best Gansey:

• In retrospect, I have a lot of questions about this whole Aurora-catheter situation.

• Ronan thinking 300 Fox Way is a slippery slope to hell reminds me of the time I was reading a Harry Potter book behind the counter of the retail shop I worked at in college and a lady stepped in, saw me, said "You're going to hell," and stepped back out.

• No one ever told me I was going to hell while I was doing the proper hellish things I did in college, though.

• This aerial yoga scene was because I had just seen one of my friends doing aerial yoga for the first time and it was all I could think about. It was a little like writing down recurring dreams. I couldn't stop imagining aerial yoga until I wrote about aerial yoga.

• 300 Fox Way's Understanding of the Boys

• The Pretty One

• Coca Cola Shirt

• the Snake

Tumblr's Understanding of the Boys

• Glasses 24/7

• Coca Cola Shirt

• Reece King

• Here's Calla in this chapter, explaining the plot of the Dreamer Trilogy, thanks a lot

• Chapter Twenty Two:

https://twitter.com/badbotideas/status/910311876394930176

• At this point in my life the only will I've written is Niall Lynch's and at some point I'm going to have to change that.

• I should make my children perform several acts of skill and wisdom before legal counsel before they unlock ownership of my cars.

• omg another line break, this is out of control. This just in: Dreamer Trilogy book two will be full of line breaks.

• Chapter Twenty Three:

https://siranea.tumblr.com/post/163436905155/the-gang-ft-orla-floating-in-murky-water

• This book was written when people were doing the boot cut/ bell bottom thing, if you can remember such a dark time. I've been rewatching the early seasons of House with the other Stiefvaters and it's boot cut slacks as far as the eye can see.

• Orla, sweetie, I know Gansey SEEMS like an old man, but these boys are jail bait.

  ---

• MAURA & MR. GRAY, PART II

MR. GRAY: about that petty larceny

MAURA: ha ha le ha. are you a deadly killer

MR. GRAY: *is killer*

MAURA: call me

• MR. GRAY OWNS BELL BOTTOMS

WHO WROTE THIS DAMN BOOK ANYWAY

• No part of me remembers who these two men are that Mr. Gray is now beating up.

• WHO IS WEARING GUCCI SUNGLASSES? IS GANSEY WEARING GUCCI SUNGLASSES?

• HOW TO FLIRT

"Whatever man," Ronan replied. "I know that face. You were born in hell, you're used to it."

• We've all been that person who would rather jump out of a boat with all our clothing on than continue a conversation.

• Gansey is all kinds of titillated in this chapter. Hard to say what is frothing him up the most.

• Lag is because I just got an email with a pro journal's pukingly wonderful review for Call Down the Hawk that I can't share with you yet.

• Ok, right, where was I. The Gray Man with bodies in his rental car, talking to John Mulaney, I mean, Colin Greenmantle, on the phone.

• Look, I know you guys don't like it but I love creepy Noah reenacting his own death so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, much

• Before Blue found out who her father was, she looked to Mr. Gray as a father figure because she didn't know any better

After Blue found out who her father was, she looked to Mr. Gray as a father figure because she did

• Things Ronan has punched in this book:

• the wall

• Kavinsky

• BEST GANSEY

• RONAN & KAVINSKY, PART II

Kavinsky: imma call you a lady

Ronan: imma punch your face

Kavinsky: imma invade your personal space

Ronan: this is fine

Kavinsky: have a personal explosive device

Ronan: oh noes my kinsey scale

• Jesus, Ronan, get it together, man, you’re a mess

• I forgot Calla followed Maura and the Gray Man on their first date. Everyone should have friends like Calla.

• MAURA & MR. GRAY, PART III

MAURA: 🥰

MR. GRAY: i like poetry

MAURA: 😊

MR. GRAY: sometimes I shut off my feelings

MAURA: 🙄

MR: GRAY: my brother kills small animals

MAURA: let's make out

• I want you guys to know that I do write my books with a three act structure in mind. Not that I see it here. But it was there. Once.

• How awkward when your parent begins to date again and you find out they have been intimate enough with their new partner to exchange electronic devices.

• 'That night, Ronan dreamt of his tattoo'

• "Of course I know what a vegan is! ... Cows make butter and Italians make olive oil!" — Helen Gansey

• I love her

• Never mind, never mind, Gansey having the pigeon conversation is best Gansey.

• "Oh those are my favorite," Gansey said. "I am a fan of a good German Beauty Homer."

• Blue, upon finally admitting to herself that she has a crush on Gansey instead of on Adam, does the only reasonable thing, which is make out with a third party to clear her head.

• "Sometimes it's better with tongue."

It's best not to think too hard about the mechanics of this haunting. Just remember Demi Moore and Ghost and stuff and go with it.

• Aw CryingBlue.

• This is how bad Ronan is at sympathy. This is what he does to stop Matthew from crying

• I was just so overwhelmed with foreshadowing in one of these chapters, so damn pleased with myself with how it plays out in the Dreamer Trilogy, that I had to press the book to my chest. I can't even tell you the general vicinity of where it is because it's just too THERE.

• In fact I'm just going to go right on to chapter thirty three, otherwise known as a chapter that took me three solid 50 hour weeks to write.

• Here is how you spent 150 hours on a chapter: you look at every single word 1800 times, you completely lose your sense of humor, and then you do it again.

• The entire goal was to make the reader feel exactly what Adam was feeling without ever telling them to feel that way. I actually wrote part of this chapter in DC, sitting in view of the National Monument, sweating my ass off for the National Book Festival.

• I was so damn deep in this chapter that I remember nothing about that festival except that it was hot. The rest of my memory is as if I was wandering through this party.

• Man, it's weird to think that chapter thirty four used to be chapter one.

• RONAN & KAVINSKY, PART III

RONAN: oh no I think the racing is a metaphor for something else help

• Understated Ronan moment: convincing himself Noah is ok because he's already dead

• There's this bit in this chapter where Kavinsky slides into Ronan's mentions in the Mitsubishi sideways, and I should tell you that at one point, a stuntman taught me how to parallel park from 60 mph. I don't know if I can still do it, because it seems like a decaying skill.

But I want you to know that these books are chocked full of real truth, reader.

• Ronan: oof Kavinsky is hot I think about him 24/7

Also Ronan:

"he's ok I guess"

• CALL DOWN THE HAWK (Scholastic, 2019)

• "Ronan never took my car"

Oh Gansey, you tender young sprout

• DARK!ADAM! HULK!SMASHES! FOXES!IN!BREECHES!

• If I can possibly manage it, I always try to make both parties right as I can when I write a fight, or at least as right as they are wrong.

• Ok, hold on, I'm going to go make dinner, you guys can just listen to this song on repeat while thinking about the Adam/ Gansey struggles in this book. I did: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=27bESHiJ9cU -  Electric President - Safe & Sound

• (slow roasted chicken + green beans + roasted butternut squash)

• RONAN & KAVINSKY, PART IV

RONAN: the cars continue to be a worrisome metaphor or is it an analogy when it's one for one i never paid attention in hetero class and now I wish I hadn't cut so often

KAVINSKY: please allow these many Mitsubishis to represent my secrets

• RONAN & KAVINSKY, PART IV, CONT'D

RONAN: I still don't know much about them except what they look like from the outside

KAVINSKY: yes as I was saying

• Meanwhile, back in Blueseyland, Blue — who only a few hundred pages ago was accusing Orla of using the phone to invoke sex — is talking to Gansey in a sweet, sweet voice to make him feel better about Dark!Adam.

• Sometimes I read things — like this montage of the Gray Man finding Kavinsky's drugged out mother, examining VIN numbers, and beating up a priest — and have no idea what the thought process was that got me there.

• Do you know, I think I've received more emails about chapter forty than any other single chapter I have ever written, and I would like to go firmly on the record to say Gansey made an assumption about the ownership of the body part on his phone.

• The more likely scenario is that he is looking at something that belongs to Kavinsky

SINCE WE ASSUME HE DOES NOT HAVE THE KNOWLEDGE TO NOT RECOGNIZE THIS PARTICULAR BODY PART ON SIGHT

• I do appreciate that mere paragraphs after Gansey believes that Ronan has sent Dick a dick pic, he still thinks to himself that Ronan has charm.

• I would like for Helen to write me a joy check.

• To this day, Lover has this part of the audiobook set as my ringtone for when I call him.

• This whole situation just steams Gansey's clams so damn bad that he remembers that one time Glendower stuffed a guy in a tree. Man, he thinks, if I had a tree right now....

• RONAN & KAVINSKY, PART V

KAVINSKY: You have to know what you want

RONAN: 404 page not found

• Gansey’s worst fear:

• This entire chapter is a study in Genteel Repression.

• Aaaaaaaaaand scene

• Gansey's thinking: you aren't my real parents, Glendower and Henrietta are

• RONAN & KAVINSKY, PART VI

KAVINSKY: here's another gay joke

RONAN: ok but actually this is getting old

KAVINSKY: sometimes I drug my mother

RONAN: well—

KAVINSKY: also I killed my father

KAVINSKY: whooo! ah we should have done this ages ago!

• RONAN & KAVINSKY, PART VII

RONAN: ok, I'm gonna go

KAVINKSY: what

RONAN: yeah I got what I needed

KAVINSKY: what

RONAN: ohhh this is awkward

KAVINSKY: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-_wFFoj2YBU - HOLYCHILD - Over You (Official Audio)

KAVINSKY: this is fine

• ok wait I have to eat my dinner now

• Ok, I'm back. It was delicious, thanks.

• I'm just reading this chapter where Adam gets three presents from his fairy godmothers: a vest, a rubber plant, and a shitbox.

• MAURA & MR. GRAY, PART IV

MR. GRAY: unfortunately I have discovered I am looking at a problem I can neither kill nor recite poetry to

MAURA: do you think you may have more range than that

MR. GRAY: this is gonna hurt

• OMG THE UK EDITION CHANGED PART OF RONAN'S DIALOGUE

UK edition:

• US edition:

“It was,” Ronan said. “I totally was.”

• Later in this chapter, Ronan cites completely untrue historical facts in support of his case, so don't cheat off his paper.

• Also I have now learned all editions corrected that dialog of Ronan’s as a presumed typo so Ronan’s admission of being wrecked is only true in my final off, I guess.

• PDF DEAR GOD THE WHOLE THING IS BREAKING DOWN

• I forgot how many hobbies Calla had in this series. She has enough hobbies to be a Great British Bake Off contestant.

• Adam, Adam, Adam, not every third act has to be an emergency CALM DOWN

• BLUE: You two make a great couple! Kiss him!

FANDOM: we'll take it from here

• "Gansey was right. You really can be a raging feminist."

OBJECTION YOUR HONOR HEARSAY

• "There had to be some other place he hadn't been yet, some place this emotion wouldn't thrive."

aw adam bby

• I'm sorry I'm going to keep doing bad things to you for every book of your life

sorry not sorry tho

• ESPECIALLY SINCE YOU ASK BLUE TO PROVE IT WITH A KISS

SHE SAID NO, DOUCHEBAG

• So, this pie-filled chapter is because my friend Brenna, who Persephone is loosely based on, makes a lot of pies. https://www.instagram.com/p/BtbOEGBnEZb/

She may or may not also plumb the ether with her mind.

[note: sorry this screenshot is in Dutch but I’m not changing my UI language for this]

• "But if I do it," Adam started — then stopped, because the truth bit and borrowed and fit inside him, "I'll be changed forever?"

Yes, Stiefvater said, rubbing her hands gleefully, yes, that's right

• It's hard to livetweet my read of this scene because it just makes me feel excited about what I'm currently writing.

• Yes, Magician!Adam! Yes!

• Chapter Fifty One:

https://galaxyspeaking.tumblr.com/post/124519366634/so-i-read-maggie-stiefvaters-raven-cycle-in-two

• (look, I know that's actually from another bluesey scene BUT GO WITH IT)

• "Because Niall Lynch was a forest fire, a rising sea, a car crash, a closing curtain, a blistering symphony, a catalyst with planets inside him. And he had given all that to his middle son."

After I wrote this bit I walked away from my computer for a few days.

• It took me forever to write this book — really, it felt like it took forever to write all of the Raven Cycle books. Before that, I wrote drafts in 4 months and then edited for a few months after. Raven Boys took me 8 months, the Dream Thieves nearly a year —

• and a huge part of the extra time is that with this series, I had such a firm idea of where I wanted the characters to end up, and if it didn't feel earned by the end, I had to ditch it and try again.

• So it had been months of trying to steer Ronan into that chapter and when he got there, it was equal parts relieving and wistful.

MY BOY WAS GROWING UP

BLUE LILY, LILY BLUE

• This weekend, I’m live tweeting my reread of Blue Lily, Lily Blue, book 3 of the Raven Cycle. It will be spoilery & will be a LOT of tweets, so please mute me if you don’t want to see them (please don’t go away entirely!)

• The live tweet for book 1 starts here: https://twitter.com/mstiefvater/status/1167803171500150784

• And book 2 here:

https://twitter.com/mstiefvater/status/1171797726717235200

• Other housekeeping: I'm reading the US hardcover edition, which I should note you can always buy signed here: https://www.fountainbookstore.com/autograph-maggie

• And finally, before I start, a blog post about how this series nearly died at this point: https://www.facebook.com/notes/maggie-stiefvater-really-its-me/a-story-about-piracy/10154994010857036/

• I really remember little about this book except for cows and caves and an elk situation so I'm looking forward to seeing how much of that is still true and how much I'm remembering deleted scenes instead.

• Oh, you know what, I did listen to the opening of this book not that long ago on audiobook. I remembered it as soon as I opened it up, because Will Patton, the narrator, does such a funny Persephone voice.

• ADAM IS WEARING CARGO PANTS

PAGE ONE AND I ALREADY DON' TKNOW WHO I AM

• "From this angle, she looked exactly like her mother, compact and athletic and hard to tip over."

body goals 2019

• I'm momentarily distracted from this section on Calla and Blue by reading this article on psychometry: https://www.psychicgurus.org/psychometry/ which tells me that I might be psychometric if pawn shops make me feel overwhelmed.

• BLUE: what do you sense in this room?

CALLA: sex with an assassin

• I can't believe that when I originally outlined this book, it was going to take place entirely in a cave.

Entirely

in

a

cave

400

pages

of

cave

descriptions

100%

in

a

hole

under

ground

dirt

what

(somewhere

adam

is

still

wearing

cargo

pants)

• In pursuit of this cave-focused novel, I spent many hours in Luray Caverns for inspiration, strolling along and imagining cave-related scenarios. Cave action. Cave drama. Cave romance. I defined and redefined the cave genre both in my head and in thousands of deleted words.

• CHAPTER ONE:

RONAN: maybe I dreamt you

ADAM: Ronan is such a kidder mckidder no way he dreams living people *thigh slap*

• I can't believe Blue is favorably comparing Aurora to Maura because she's angry at her for leaving. This is like hugging a paper towel roll because your cat ran away and you miss it.

• so much kissing and mouths for two characters who don't get to kiss with their mouths

• RONAN: ok, Matthew, if we aren't back by 9, call Blue's house

MATTHEW: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OdKa9bXVinE - Monty Python - Dumb Guards

• This moment where Adam and Blue are both intensely confused about how Gansey might have ended up with used caving equipment is really their only true moment of romantic compatibility in the entire series.

• Look, speaking of caves, there's this really good one in West Virginia: https://www.onlyinyourstate.com/west-virginia/sinks-of-gandy-underground-river-wv/

• People are still asking me about Adam's straight teeth so HERE WE GO BREAKING DOWN THE MOMENT

BLUE: maybe we're all just dreaming Cabeswater together

RONAN: *super offended, he knows everything about dreaming* I KNOW WHEN I'M DREAMING

ADAM: I find it unlikely you know everything

RONAN: i find it unlikely your mom's face knows everything

ADAM: uh huh

• That is the meaning of that scene. So yes, to answer the probing questions I have received for years, Adam has straight teeth.

The joke is that he got them somehow, and is dismissive that Ronan has that kind of power.

• NOW WHERE WAS I

oh right Ronan was being made to whistle a jaunty Irish tune

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=04IdgICxjko - Cruiscin Lan

• Ok, but honestly, I don't want to tell you how many bagpiping competitions I performed in as a teenager.

• "Piss up a rope," Ronan said.

• doth I spy the first mention of the Murder Squash song?

• It says here that Ronan is whistling a jaunty reel so here's a brief lesson in how you can tell a jig and a reel apart. A jig is in 6/8 time and a reel is in 4/4 time.

These are jigs: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aV90v6pyK18 - The Kesh / Morrison's Jig

This is a reel: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sMCwW0TcBYk - Sean Softley - Reels (113)

• You can tell them apart by the helpful expedient of saying words out loud: you can say HOCKETY POCKETY along with a jig and WATERMELON WATERMELON along with a reel.

you're welcome, there will be a test

• GANSEY: i'm having a panic attack

BLUE: this is no time to be funny, character who is rarely funny

GANSEY: no srsly i'm having a panic attack

BLUE: get better jokes, old man

GANSEY: pa·nuhk uh·tak

BLUE: huh I forgot you had feelings

• ADAM: *fractured latin*

RONAN: keep talking bad boy

ADAM: *more fractured latin†*

RONAN: NOPE WAIT NEVER MIND LATIN IS CANCELED

†rough translation: HORNET TIME, BITCHES

• It is a peak Adam Parrish moment to be comforted by the thought that your indefatigable best friend might also sometimes be scared shitless, because you, too, are often scared shitless

• This is all anyone ever does in this series.

• CABESWATER: not to interrupt this episode of Being Poor, but I'd like to show you something

• I would like to take this moment to apologize for every ESL reader who has sent me emails asking what "Mapey neat downer" means at the beginning of chapter 3.

It is untranslatable and is just Gansey mishearing what she really says.

• ADAM: *sleeps*

GANSEY: I'm feel inadequate about my friend flying to see me

BLUE: here's some cave strategy thoughts

RONAN: https://soundcloud.com/healthnoise/judgement-night - HEALTH - JUDGEMENT NIGHT

GANSEY & BLUE: RONAN

ADAM: *sleeps*

• "never-never land of time-space fuckery"

• "what kind of books do you write?"

• "describe the plot of your latest series"

• "what's your Hogwarts house?"

• BRUSH UP LESSON:

https://soundcloud.com/david-power-piper/apples-in-winter-scully-caseys - David Power Piper - Apples In Winter, Scully Caseys

this is a jig, hear the HOCKETY POCKETY?

• This bit where Darcy and Elizabeth touch fingers in the Camaro is pretty hot

• "Let me introduce you. These are my friends: Ronan, Adam Parrish, and Jane."

yes that is a normal way to introduce people, good job, very human, such social

• same

• I don't want to tell you how long I spent researching this stupid drapery.

• "As a Honda blew past them, its occupants giving Gansey the finger"

that was me in the Honda

• eyes on the road, Gansey, GOD

• "For maximum ignominy."

• The Two Times Ronan Lynch Was Called a Shitbag and the One Time He Wasn't

• Worth noting once more that Persephone was based on my creepy writer friend Brenna Yovanoff.

• "Sleep is brain food!"

• BLUE: Congress

GANSEY: fax machine

BLUE & GANSEY: *fans self*

• I weirdly remember writing this paragraph. I read it out loud. Ceruuuuuuuulean.

• Ah, Gansey, always making jokes about Romans and pigeons to make his high school buddy laugh during hard times #guythings

• I'd like to once again take the time to apologize for the people who live at the base of Coopers Mountain/ Giants Grave, because I drove out there every time I needed to brainstorm for this book and I know I was probably creepy as I cruised around and around it.

• ADAM: I admire my friend Gansey for being both noble and a coward

GANSEY: I admire my friend Adam for being both smart and able to pee in the woods

• "I see someone just had a birthday"

I really, really, really don't like thinking too hard about timelines here or anywhere else in this series

• NOAH: not to interrupt this episode of Being Poor, but I'd like to show you something

• LESSON TIME

notice that this is a reel because you can say WATERMELON WATERMELON to it

https://soundcloud.com/tracey-mcrory/drowsy-maggie - Tracey McRory - Drowsy Maggie

• Blue's orientation:

• When did Gansey buy this washer-dryer unit? Did he pay cash? Did he buy a warranty? Was he there when they delivered it, or did he borrow a truck? I have questions.

• "poetlitical"

• A TINY MICROWAVE

HOW MANY APPLIANCES ARE IN THIS PLACE

• "He paused to locate a tiny microwave"

a tiny chafing dish

a tiny air fryer

a tiny toaster oven

a tiny hair dryer

a tiny massaging foot bath

a tiny dog vacuum

• GANSEY: water can explode sometimes

BLUE: don't believe everything on the internet

GANSEY & BLUE: *fans self*

• "i don't mean to intrude but there's a dead person under your furniture"

• I like creepy sad Noah so, so, so, so much

• NOAH: I'm already dead and now I am decaying and I also have another agenda I'm not telling you about which seems precarious when I can't stay present for very long and now I'm going to explode like water in a microwave and

GANSEY: we can talk this out

NOAH: you said I could use your energy

BLUE: not like that

• NOAH:

[note: these were emojis I think?]

• Booklist: Blue Lily, Lily Blue is "Beautifully written"

• ADAM: imma take this moment to imagine Ronan as a teacher

ADAM: just for lulz

ADAM: not that I'm into the hot teacher thing

ADAM: just cuz

ADAM: hey here's the new Latin teacher

ADAM: he reminds me of an Audi

ADAM: oh no I just remembered I think Audis are hot

RONAN: the worst thing about this Latin teacher is that he is correcting my grammar, there is no way there could be anything worse about him

• Piper Greenmantle is based on a real human who I will never cop to until my deathbed.

• "describe the plot of Blue Lily, Lily, Blue"

• You know someone's becoming a treasured moment of your family when they show you how to break an arm over a mixed drink.

• "I can show you how to unhinge my jaw, if you like," Mr. Gray said kindly.

• BLUE: u want my yogurt?

GANSEY: that you ate with this spoon?

BLUE: yes that is the spoon I put in my mouth

GANSEY: yes that is the spoon you put in your mouth

BLUE: now it is in your mouth, still a spoon, and yet now a metaphor

GANSEY & BLUE: *fans self*

• Aw, man, Gansey and Adam talking about how the presence of the ley line isn't exciting anymore because they're jaded and greedy for better wonders. I remember when they were JUST BABIES in my TRB reread.

• Ok, hold up, I have to pause to make a birthday cake. https://paleoglutenfree.com/recipes/best-paleo-avocado-chocolate-cake/

• I'm back; that took my entire life because I lost my cake pans in the intestines of my house.

Where was I? OH RIGHT GANSEY BREAKDOWN

• I'd just gotten to this bit where Adam thinks how even though he personally can't be bothered to feel bad about Kavinsky's deadness, he finds it charming that Gansey possesses empathy for human beings.

• NOOOOO GODDAMNIT DO NOT READ AND BAKE

• "Gansey, his best friend, his stupid and kind and marvelous best friend."

  ---

• BLUE: I prefer my unicorns non gendered

ORLA: I think it's crazy how you're in love with all those raven boys

this miscommunication is why these two are not friends

• KINDS OF FRIENDSHIP

ORLA: one day, when those fancy men are at Harvard and you are here marrying Mr. Unicorn Penis Drawing in a status appropriate wedding with four examples of livestock as a wedding party you will forgive me at the altar

Page 105 Blue: I can't believe how classist my cousin is

Page 106 Blue: there are two kinds of rednecks but they aren't usually born into the same litter

• Page 107 Blue: You better wait in the car with your fancy face.

Page 107 Gansey: *sigh Adam was right my face IS fancy I wish I could pee in the forest*

• JESSE DITTLEY

• I want 40 fan arts of this

• "I don't so much mind about curses," Gansey said.

• I am super proud of myself for writing so little about the Camaro in this book so far. There has been a totally reasonable amount of car content in comparison to all other books in the series.

• Malory is complaining about walking a long distance to look at a standing stone that looked like a dog in certain lights, which reminds me of the time I was in Wales and two guys found out what sort of books I wrote and wanted to give me insider info.
• I had the stomach flu so I was draped over a rack in this Welsh surplus store while they gave me very convoluted directions.

• At the end of it, bewildered and barfy, I asked them where these directions were supposed to take me.

"To a church that if you stand in front of it and look at it, it makes you feel funny."

• BEEN IN IT BEFORE FOR MY DADDY'S BONES

• time to write The JESSE DITTLEY Story

• Stiefvater, this is a CHILDREN'S BOOK

• CHILDREN'S BOOK

• THE GRAY MAN: *exits stage right through a door*

GREENMANTLE: isn't that a closet

PIPER: it's the door to the garage, you piece of shit

GREENMANTLE & PIPER: *fans self*

• We've all had those friends who, like Cabeswater, make all the lightbulbs explode and the shadows in the room grow deeper until you understand what they really want deep down inside.

you know, like Ronan

• We also all have those friends who don't realize you really, really don't find their enormous gross dog funny, especially when it's actually a giant beaked greasy night horror

• RONAN: allow me to slide into your mentions real quick

ADAM: you scared me shitless

RONAN: by the way you should quit school

ADAM: losers quit school

RONAN: ur a loser

ADAM: no ur a loser

RONAN: fuck you!

RONAN: *breaks into car to leave lotion*

RONAN: nailed it

• ADAM: i miss him already

• Meanwhile, back in Monmouth, Doodwegen if you believe the Dutch

• I see Gansey and Noah are having a conversation over a child's toy that begins in the shape of a man and slowly melts away to nothing I'm sure that's not a metaphor or anything.

• NOAH: what I'm going to do is just tell you all the plot twists up front and you're going to stare at me

GANSEY: *stares at him*

• I see that in chapter 17, Blue has become a living poltergeist. Is there a name for that?

• Is there another name for when you bitch about having to go to community college to someone who worked hard to go to one?

• You know you've failed at polite conversation when you have to give up and talk with the hit man in the back yard instead.

• NARRATOR: Blue did not realize in that moment that she was actually thinking about BOTH of her parents

• LESSON BREAK

• https://soundcloud.com/user-538888226/banish-misfortune - Steve Ochoa - Banish Misfortune

note that this is a jig! hear the HOCKETY POCKETY?

• GANSEY: duck fact

BLUE: another duck fact

GANSEY & BLUE: *fans self*

• RONAN: I heard this great song

GANSEY: I have not historically enjoyed your music but ok

RONAN: https://bit.ly/IqT6zt - yeah you're gonna have to click this one yourself

• Twinsies

• THE RAVEN BOYS' STAR SIGNS

• Scorpio

• Cancer

• Caucasian with Great Hair

• Corpse

• NARRATOR: Later Richard C. Gansey III would think back upon these moments and understand

• DATE IDEA

take him home

feed him some fruit

show him some of your dad's junk

be casual

do not tell him it's a date

repeat

most important rule of date is that you don't talk about it being a date

a low level hum of confusion and anxiety is how you know the date is going well

• ADAM: so Ronan is checking me out

ADAM: but Ronan is also an asshole

ADAM: but he is an aesthetic asshole

ADAM: note to self give this more thought

RONAN: speaking of cattle

• You know, I remembered this book being full of caves and cows and so far it is not letting me down one bit.

• metaphor time

love urself Adam Parrish

• Too bad Gansey is off being a Gansey and actually unknowable while his boys are on a date, thinking they're unknowable, talking about how they worry about Gansey being stung to death.

• "Bovine the boy wizard"

i have no idea what I was thinking

• page 164 is basically the plot of THE DREAMER TRILOGY

• ADAM: this dream stuff is terrifying

RONAN: no shit

ADAM: *is terrified*

RONAN: *is terrified*

ADAM & RONAN: *fans self*

• oh this chapter is making me insane for the Dreamer Trilogy again I HAVE TO SIT DOWN WHERE'S MY FAINTING CHAIR

• "Every memory Adam possessed of Ronan and his younger brother reframed itself."

I TOLD YOU THAT'S ALL THAT HAPPENS IN THIS SERIES OVER AND OVER

• In light of the Lynch brother revelation in this chapter it seems time to link to a Lynch brother story: https://maggiestiefvater.com/a-raven-cycle-holiday-short/

  ---

• REVISED DATE PLAN

take him home

feed him some fruit

show him some of your dad's junk

frighten him with raw dreamstuff

whisper about blackmail

tell him he's so, so smart

• definitely still do not say that it was a date

that part remains the most important part

but look into his eyes when you talk about the blackmail

• ADAM: he kind of has a good laugh actually

• That stupid chapter took me 14 years to write.

• GANSEY: Floorboards remind me of Blue's skin

NOAH: I know what you're thinking

GANSEY: highly doubt it

• CHAPTER TWENTY TWO

• I honestly can't think of a better co-pilot for a new driver than someone who's already dead.

• I wish JESSE DITLEY had been Blue's father

• I LVOE CREEPY NOAH

• It took me a billion years to figure out how to write this chapter where Jesse tells Blue about his curse. Every time I tried to write the dialog it looked completely wrong. It was probably attempt #8 when I hit upon the idea of the photo album as a means to convey backstory.

• No part of me remembered that Jesse Dittley was married.

• *LOUD POUNDING NOISE*

Blue, a psychic: Is it coming from the mirror?

Jesse, a redneck: it's the front door

• JESSE: SHE WAS ALL RIGHT
• GANSEY: pa·nuhk uh·tak
• 

• BLUE: sooo you guys should know we have foretold Jesse Dittley's death

BLUE: no one else's

BLUE: really that's all I meant to say

BLUE: no one will die but Jesse

ADAM:

[note: this tweet originally had a GIF attached to it which was lost, sorry!]

• Man, this chapter also took me 1400 years to write. I'm so bad at these sort of THE GANG GETS TOGETHER AND DISTILLS WHAT WE'VE LEARNED sequences.

• "His heart was a grave"

• that's my lizard son, finally getting in touch with his emotions

• DATE IDEA

use a car as a metaphor

• "Maybe it wouldn't hurt if I kiss you," he whispered. "Maybe it's only if you kiss me."

that doesn't sound very much like a Stiefvater novel, Gansey

• Oh, if only Book 3 Blue throwing her fit about Henry could see Book 4 Blue

• CHAPTER 27

Gansey Is Upset Because He Has to Wear His Brown Sweater

• MALORY: I don't suppose you have any tea

JESSE: EARL GREY OR DARJEELING?

MALORY & JESSE: *fans self*

• What's weird is I remember writing this chapter, so, so well, and I remember how depressed I was writing it, because it was the first scene where it really occurred to me that at some point I WOULDN'T be writing the Raven Cycle.

• So Gansey's feelings in this chapter, of the looming end of the quest, of what it was supposed to feel like — that was all balled up in my head, too. This is about when I started whining to all my friends that TRC was only going to be 4 books instead of 5.

• 2020 Give Me Permission to Write Horror Campaign

• page 210, I write about Gansey's testicles

CHAINSAW: HAHAHAHHA

GANSEY'S TESTICLES: RETREAT!

• "Cut me free, raven prince"

• So, Glendower supposedly had an actual illegitimate daughter named Gwenllian, which in itself is a name with some good Welsh adventuring attached to it: https://rhapsodyinwords.com/2017/04/30/remarkable-women-the-life-and-times-of-gwenllian-ferch-gruffydd-warrior-princess-of-wales/

• But I do still feel a little bad for implying that Glendower let his daughter get buried alive now that I found out he's my ancestor. Sorry, great great great great great great grand prince of Wales. :(

• Also the Gangsey emerges to see a comet blowing across the sky. There was a comet seen in Glendower's time, too, in 1402: http://www.jonesbryn.plus.com/wastronhist/histobs.html that was taken as a sign of his greatness.

• Coincidentally, another comet, one of the brightest ever, was seen from the deck of a ship called Owen Glendower in 1843: https://www.space.com/17918-9-most-brilliant-great-comets.html

• GWENLLIAN: blahblahblahblahblah little mongrel blahblahblahblahblah

ADAM:

GANSEY: good woman that is my friend Mr. Adam Parrish and I would exhort you to call him by his full title and his full title only

• Ronan "Mad As a Cow's Tit" Lynch

• Really, the most fantastical part of this entire book is that Calla told Ronan and Adam to go shopping and they did.

• NEW DATE IDEA

put him in a shopping cart

(let yourself get ordered into a shopping cart)

get a running start

(protect your more vulnerable body parts)

bounce him off your car

(pretend you didn't like it)

be happy

(notice he is)

• BLUE: I don't want you to feel uncomfortable

MALORY: that ship sailed

• DON'T GIVE ME THAT VACUOUS PREP BOY STARE
• 

• MALORY: it is not the outside of people that bothers me, but the inside

SAME

• MALORY: sometimes Gansey had these screaming nightmares

BLUE: are you trying to tell me Gansey has feelings too because this is book 3 and I'm still trying to wrap my head around it

• mATThew Lynch took organ lessons!?

• /church stuff
• 

• Here's that long thing I wrote about Chapter 31 back before I deleted my Tumblr: https://the-raven-babes.tumblr.com/post/139303029817/chapter-31-the-church-scene-of-bllb-ends-with

• "Adam couldn't imagine, though, the strange, wild kingdom that Ronan might rule"

BUT I CAN

• page 237, the Raven Boys

• page 253, Blue Lily, Lily Blue

• Adam bby no

• There was zero part of me that wanted to write this scene with Robert Parrish coming to Adam's apartment, even though all parts of me generally understood that I had been promising it was going to happen eventually.

• I still can't read it without a certain level of fury for the victims I've known who were bullied and manipulated out of following through on court cases.

• So Adam was crying here, and my eyes were burning and my teeth were clenched as I was typing it out —

• And there was intense catharsis in that creepy thorn stabbed into Robert Parrish's hand.

• Oh, to have the power to produce that thorn in every abuser who mocks their victim's tears.

• Ok, I'm back, I had to be sad and vengeful for a little bit.

Where was I?

Right, caves & cows.

• find you a book that can do both

• PAUSE FOR A LESSON

https://youtu.be/msBp_DFrS-I?t=80 - Réalta - Paddy Ryan's Dream - Clear Skies, link redirects to the 1:20 mark

WATERMELON WATERMELON

• what kind of tune says WATERMELON WATERMELON, boys and girls?

[note: there was a poll here]

• "Holes in the ground were, in Greenmantle's opinion, the very best place to throw dog crap into."

• There are two cold hot dogs in this book because Chainsaw ate one earlier and now Gwenllian is.

• Finally Orla and Blue are bonding.

It feels important to tell you that the reason this sentence exists is because once I got it into my head that my red Camaro really needed to be orange and I had it painted a custom color called Tangerine Kandy.

• It was a pretty fancy sort of paint job, with different color layers so that it would be all, like, multi-faceted and shit in the sun, and it was pretty flawless until Lover accidentally hit my car with a snow shovel.

• The wound revealed the multiple layers of color and bare metal.

have you ever bitten into an M&M?

have you ever bitten into a tangerine kandy?

• I'm reading the part where Blue finds out that the way to get information from Gwenllian is to host an impromptu poetry slam.

"Gwenllian and vacuum, exit stage right," Blue said.

• Aw, remember when the Gray Man had to eat at the drug store by himself, like, 600 pages ago.

• I FORGOT WHAT HTE HELL IS COMING OUT OF THE CAVE IS IT SOMETHING BAD I DON'T REMEMBER

• what is it with me and multiple heads?

• oh right righ tright right don't tell me, I remember

• "It could be argued, Blue thought, that Blue was ONLY a friend to men, but she didn't feel it was useful to bring it up"

some people have noticed even though you didn't, Blue

• A few days ago, my heart was endlessly warmed when a mother reported that she'd read the series with her daughter and now this was how they ended conversations with each other.

• PIPER: we could get a dog

GREENMANTLE: and sacrifice it to activate the demonic doll we bought off eBay

PIPER: marry me?

• that's not exaggerated dialog, that's just chapter 36

• dialog? dialogue? talking

• Truly this love affair is blossoming.

• Magician!Adam!Rises!

Good!yes!good!

• PastStiefvater, give me a high five through the time-space fabric.

• mothercrapper, PastStiefvater, why did you delete that Persephone scene before chapter 38

I'm taking that high five BACK

• CALL DOWN THE HAWK, (Scholastic 2019)

• "Adam could see that he was a little out of breath. Ronan, behind him, was as well. They had run. For him."

YOU GUYS ARE ALL SO STUPID JUST ACCEPT THE LOVING AND CHERISHING

• Here is the most searing thing Adam Parrish says in this entire book:

"Your fuel door's open, by the way."

• page 28 Adam: in a car at Skyline drive, alone and penniless

page 304 Adam: in a car at Skyline drive, with an exgirlfriend, an exliving person, and a mix tape from someone who tenderly ordered him to check a sleeping cow for a pulse just a few chapters before

• sigh

• Dream Thieves Ronan vs Blue Lily Adam:

• There is not very much of this book left and I feel like the bad guy is still so alive. GET TO IT STIEFVATER

• CABESWATER: here are the kinds of friendship with other magical forests that I would like to have, as a magical forest

• Oh shitballs, I gotta frost that birthday cake

brb don't make any bargains with forests

• Right where was I

Oh yes, this seems like a concept that requires a trilogy

• I’m so glad Blue finally got to use that switchblade.

• You know, PresentStiefvater, you’d like this transition to chapter 40 a lot better if you’d fixed that previous Persephone chapter PastStiefvater deleted.

• This general store does really exist, though, near a really exemplary waterfall.

• Aw, look at how Adam is all “gansey would like it”. See, lizard son, you DO know how to be a good friend!

• Hold that thought, Adam Parrish.

• I totally forgot all this super excellent mirror magic that you shouldn’t try at home.

• I know readers think I am a cold blooded killer but I really don’t get to kill characters that often (BUT I DO LIKE IT).

• “And now there would forever be two Blues: the Blue that was before, and the Blue that was after. The one who didn’t believe, and the one who did.”

• NEW DATE IDEA

Stand like horror movie twins

Bring an envelope of body parts

Just sort of smile creepily

That’s it

That’s the date

• Oh noes Jesse Dittley

Get out of there! I’ve killed once and I will kill again-

• NEW DATE IDEA

go into a hole in the ground

look winsome and brave

SQUASH ONE, SQUASH TWO

• OH I HAD FORGOTTEN I WAS WAITING TO READ ABOUT BONES

• Oh badgercrap, I have to take a pause to eat birthday cake. Brb

(To be continued tomorrow)

• Ok, I'm back!

(it was my father's birthday party)

• Where was I?

Oh, right. Cave of bones. Magicians.

• Right, so PresentMe had completely forgotten how much PastMe really wanted the contents of this book to be a mirror, just like the title, but it's all coming back as I see that I have put the Gangsey in the same caving situation as they were in in the beginning.

• They're all kind of still preoccupied with the same things, too, but through a mirror. Ronan and Adam are still thinking about how to keep Gansey safe, but they're now also thinking very intently about each OTHER.

• Which means they're now working together in a way they weren't before. Adam, who has seen himself erroneously for most of the series — as a chilly, selfish, broken person, not as imaginative as Ronan, or as noble and human as Gansey — has now begun to rethink himself.

• Likewise, Blue, who's always thought of herself as a passive battery, now knows she has a measure of control . . . and if Gwenllian is to be believed, maybe some truly active magic as well.

• And Gansey has began to realize that the group WANTS him to be the voice, the head, the band leader with the microphone, so that they can feel more purposeful with their guitar solos.

• So now they find themselves in a giant puzzle that mirrors their first challenge, only they have to be proactive versions of themselves, not reactive.

• Book 1 Gansey

• Book 2 Gansey

• Book 3 Gansey

• Sometimes you just need a good front man to pull the band together, you know?

• BOYS: ok, um, now what

BLUE: RIDE AN ELK

• "So you know what?" Ronan asked Blue. "Fuck magic."

• Page 22 Blue

• Page 364 Blue

• Aw, the Acid Twins are hugging and crying together.

• "This isn't Cabeswater anymore," Ronan replied. "This is underneath. The lake belongs to something else."

HOLD THAT THOUGHT, RONAN LYNCH

• People have asked me for years what Ronan Lynch's Hogwart's house is and his House is standing in a cave of nightmares and giving Blue his only source of light as she leaves him behind.

• Now that Blue has used that switchblade once, it's out in every scene.

• She's met her father and his, like, third action is to mansplain her mirror magic to her.

• I'm Team Gwenllian.

• PIPER: *has gun*

BLUE: *exists*

MR. GRAY: NOOOOOOoooooooooooooooo I SACRIFICE MYSELFFFFF

PIPER: ok but I wasn't even going to shoot HER

• MR. GRAY: I've earned this. This is how I've lived.

imagine living your life so that what you've earned is dying in a hole next to a supernatural creature whispering promises while a white lady pistol whips your psychic girlfriend next to a guy who is a tree

• BLUE IS SO STABBY

• *strongbad_arrowed.gif*

• Well, that was a lot of CaveAction.

• OK brief pop quiz!

At 1'02 of this track I wrote for one of my other books, is it a reel or a jig?

https://soundcloud.com/maggie_stiefvater/nuala - Maggie Stiefvater - Nuala

[note: once again, there was a poll here]

• I'm so proud of you guys

• GANSEY: thanks for coming did you have a good time?

MALORY: no but honestly I didn't expect to

• "He still sounded anxious to Adam, even though there was nothing inherently anxious about the conversation."

Gansey didn't change in this book, not really, but Adam has, and now that he feels awake in his skin, he can see Gansey more truly. (I think this is true of everyone)

• HOW DID I FORGET ABOUT FARGING NEEVE

• PIPER: your name is stupid

NEEVE: so is yours

PIPER & NEEVE: *decide to be queens together*

• INSECT SLEEPER ACTIVATE

  ---

• "Wake up."

/fin

THE RAVEN KING

• Today I'm live-tweeting my reread of book 4 in the Raven Cycle, the Raven King!

• It's gonna be a ton of tweets & last all day & be spoilery SO please feel free to mute me/ this conversation until tomorrow (but not forever, please!)
• 
• Housekeeping! Here are the links to the previous live tweets.

TRB: https://twitter.com/mstiefvater/status/1167803171500150784

TDT: https://twitter.com/mstiefvater/status/1171797726717235200

BLLB: https://twitter.com/mstiefvater/status/1175391811814252546

• Backstory on my brain while writing this book: http://maggiestiefvater.com/the-years-without-words/
• I tossed my entire house looking for a copy of the Raven King before this reread and discovered I'd donated every extra copy of my books I had to Goodwill this summer and ended up having to go to my local Books-A-Million to buy a paperback.

• A brief delay as I got settled to read because I was mauled by a dog

• Man, you can tell this author read all her prologues out loud when she wrote them.

• There is enough Arthurian imagery in this opening to offend even the most gauche of medieval scholars.

• Oh GOD I am remembering with horror how the first printing of this book had the wrong date for St. Mark's Eve. I am now also remembering with horror that the first printing of CALL DOWN THE HAWK will say October in the early chapters, and second printings will say November.

This is why being an author is the worst job.

• THIS WAS THE YEAR HE WAS GOING TO DIE

• Time to write that mortician AU we’ve all been waiting for

• I secretly want to do one of these giant multi deck readings that happens in chapter one, although I also know that with that many cards, you can make it say whatever you want to. 'this spread here says readers are crowd-funding a Ferrari for you, Stiefvater'

• "They were so close to the situation that it was difficult to tell whether or not they were the situation."

• "when Jimi had punched Calla"

wait what

• Brief moment to imagine a reality where he WAS, though

• Honestly, this part where Adam Parrish internally loses his shit because the school bell rings 2 minutes late due to incompetence is everything you need to know about me.

• BUT RONAN IS NOT THERE, ADAM

• Is or is not the symbol of Gansey's old crew team the same as the hunger games salute

• https://www.16personalities.com/intj-personality

• True friendship is understanding that your best friend has cut a deal with the headmaster based upon said headmaster subtly giving your best friend the hunger games salute from the top of the stairs.

• Moments later, true friendship is when Gansey is like 'you swooned bro what was that'

• It is endlessly interesting to me that Ronan's relationship with the Barns is like a Rorschach test — what readers tell me he feels or doesn't feel about it and if it's healthy or not always tells me more about the reader than Ronan.

• "Chainsaw bit him, but not as hard as the morning cold."

• "Ronan Lynch loved to dream about the light."

• HuffPo tells me this dream Ronan has of being back in school is a very common one: https://www.huffpost.com/entry/meaning-of-dreams_b_4504512

• 'The "lesson" or "test" we face inside the school or classroom is frequently one we need to learn from our past -- which is one reason these dreams are often reported by people who have long since finished school.'

LOOK I HAVE HAD THESE DREAM AND THIS IS UNTRUE

• For a hot second, this phrase was on the list of potential titles for CALL DOWN THE HAWK.

• Ronan, we don't have time right now to unpack how Adam and Declan were the same person in your dream but I'll summarize GET HELP

• This section here about how Ronan dreamt this deer which helped him tame the other ones reminded me of how, two days ago, a deer jumped out in front of Lover's car on a windy Virginia road, rendering both deer and car undriveable.

• I set out in my car to pick him up, and by the time I got there, only Lover and his car remained. A girl in a pick up truck had stopped mere minutes after the accident to point at the deer and say "are you going to eat that?"

he was not

• I'm gonna take a brief moment here to imagine Gansey in this Elton Johnesque protective apparel

• OMFG I completely forgot what happened at the end of this chapter

• me, to me: but what is he looking at beneath the end table?

Things I genuinely considered it might be

- a night horror

- Mr. Gray

- a different Elton John super suit

• Chapter Five: In Which Noah Really Is a Dead Aglionby Boy

• NOAH: So you get a trailer. Not an Adam trailer

Blue, to herself: hmm have you considered despising boys

as, like, an alternative to kissing all of them

• oh god I've become Gwenllian

• LOOK I KNOW YOU GUYS DON'T LIKE HIM BUT DEADEST CREEPY NOAH IS MY FAV NOAH

• BLUE: whoa you are shockingly dead in this light

NOAH: yeah

BLUE: like basically a wormy corpse

NOAH: yeah

BLUE: and I kissed you

NOAH: sorry

BLUE: nah no worries I dug it anyway

• genuine possibility that Blue is deadsexual

• good, Blue thought, just my type

• the closer he gets to dead the less she can contain herself

• Back up the motherfunding tulip truck! Is this the first time Gansey has dropped an f bomb in this series?

• AGAIN WITH THE HUNGER GAMES SALUTE

Is it two fingers? Three? hold on doing a gif search

• goddamnit there are so many people on Gansey's crew team

[note: once again, there was a gif here]

• BLUE *sees character development on the horizon*: do not want

• "Oh sure," Gansey said, still cold and annoyed. "God forbid young men display their principles with futile but public protests when they could be skipping school and judging other students from the backseat of a motor vehicle."

how elegantly he sums up tumblr vs twitter

• Oh right, this is the chapter where Gansey is disappointed to discover that his non dirtbag friend finds his dirtbag friend's dirtbag jokes funny.

LOOK, kid, when you lie down with dogs, you rise with fleas

• ADAM: soooo DreamKnob brought back a hoofed innocent

ADAM: if it were uglier we could have just killed it

ADAM: pretend I never thought that

ADAM: let's go on a road trip

ADAM: hahaha everything's fine

ADAM: FINE

ADAM: this is my dad's fault

• what the

is Adam peeing outdoors AGAIN?

does he HOLD it until he is outside

• ADAM: hey, so, boobs

BLUE: what?

ADAM: oof i meant bloobs

ADAM: Bloo

ADAM: Blue

ADAM: i'm not objectifying you, we're having a conversation

• CALL DOWN THE HAWK (Scholastic, 2019)

• "These days, they all had their hands thrust into the sky, hoping for comets. The only difference was that Ronan Lynch's wild and expanding universe existed inside his own head."

• I remember I was driving and pulled over to type this paragraph on my phone so I wouldn't forget it.

• Honestly, thinking back over my health stuff while I was writing this book, it is totally unsurprising how hard I leaned into Adam's thought exercises with Cabeswater in this book.

• CABESWATER: choose happiness not beef

ADAM: what is happiness

CABESWATER: look inside yourself

ADAM: ah, yes, Ronan's techno

• page 63, the precise moment Ronan Lynch thought to himself "you might have a shot here, boy"

• ADAM *scooby voice*: ruh roh

• "Aurora shrugged. Her problem solving only went as far as finding someone else to solve the problem."

we all know an Aurora

• ADAM, chap 7: perhaps we can kill this hooved thing and get on with our lives

ADAM, chap 8: here, child, have my watch, my only possession, allow this to symbolize the fickle nature of time in this place and indeed in our lives, take it, be whole

GANSEY: this is normal and fine

• BLUE: I love this dying tree

BLUE: it reminds me of Noah

BLUE: another dying thing I am attracted to

BLUE: why am I so horny and sad

GANSEY: if only I'd made different life choices I could hold her hand right now

GANSEY: death choices really

• everyone in this chapter needs therapy

• I do, however, enjoy that this is the chapter where Gansey is beginning to accept that his words have actual power whether or not he knows how to wield that power deftly, the whole lesson made concrete through a magical metaphor.

being an author is the best job

• Compare and contrast with Book 1 Gansey: "My words are unerring tools of destruction and I’ve come unequipped with the ability to disarm them."

• Aurora said, "Don't be sad, Ronan"

I'm sure everything will be fine, Aurora.

• I'm still awfully fond of the bathtub wisdom scene.

• "I don't believe in true love," Orla said. "It's a construct of a monogamous society. We're animals. We make love in the bushes."

vs

"She just wanted to keep being best friends with Gansey forever, and maybe one day also have carnal knowledge of him."

(instagram vs. facebook)

• HOW DID I FORGET PIPER WAS LAUMONIER'S DAUGHTER

WHO WROTE THIS BOOK

• It says here that Gansey stripped and swam at the Aglionby indoor athletic complex and although I understand all of those words in a grammatical sense what I don't understand in a practical sense is if he is swimming naked in his school pool after dark.

• Meanwhile, Adam is getting off work and experiencing some Lite Body Horror

[note: lost gif, you know the deal]

• Oh, man, this Ronan nightmare about ripping Matthew's face off was just one of my childhood nightmares repurposed. It's grosser than I remembered.

• Chapter 12: Headmaster Child Gives a Speech

[note: once again, lost gif]

• NOAH WOULD HAVE BEEN TWENTY FOUR IF HE HAD BEEN SAVED INSTEAD OF GANSEY

• people who are 24

Gigi Hadid

Post Malone

Melanie Martinez

Troye Sivan

Jimin

Shameik Moore

Zoey Deutch

Noah Czerny

• Creepy Death Gansey is also one of my favorite Ganseys.

• I remember when I first told my critique partners I was putting a toga party into this book they didn't believe me. They thought it would be a metaphorical toga party.

• brb where is that creepy Adam eyeball fan art for chapter 13?

• DAMMIT I cannot find it, just know that it was animated and his eyeball went all around by itself, and I thought, yes, good, being author is best job

• Adam x Cabeswater OTP

• OH YES HERE WE GO

https://the-ronan-cycle.tumblr.com/post/182961411515/the-raven-king-chapter-13

• OK lunch break

• Ok I'm back!

"She could feel herself hurtling toward self-awareness, and she wasn't sure she liked it"

• ADAM: so, about how you love Gansey and are going to kill him with your mouth

BLUE: what

BLUE: no

BLUE: you've got that wrong

BLUE: I don't

BLUE: have a mouth

• I somehow also managed to completely forget that Mr. Gray was in this next chapter. So far the entire process of rereading this book has been like having a vivid dream featuring everyone I know in it.

(oh, past Maggie brain, where were you)

• I guess it goes without saying that I am such a fan of ghosts. I like pretty much every sort of ghost story except for the easy ones, the ones that discount the fact that the spirit in question is DEAD, and that changes things. Noah gets to be all different kinds of ghosts.

• I have to also admit I'm pretty proud of keeping the Automotive Content™ of this book to a reasonable level apart from chapter 17, where Gansey lets Blue drive the Camaro because he thinks it'll improve her mood.

• NAKED is that what you mean

• I haven't been this overcome with my past literary wardrobe decisions since I found out Kavinsky has an earring

And Adam's in cargo pants

who was I

who was I

• HENRY: my car and I

GANSEY, flirtatiously, to BLUE: his ELECTRIC car

• Also in this chapter: Gansey, being aware that his death is looming, but also being really worried that he was impolite to not source flowers for Mrs. Woo.

• I have not read Chapter 18 in years, however, readers have quoted the opening paragraph at me so often that it feels like only yesterday.

• RONAN: ok ok just be cool

RONAN: ok he's staring into headlights

RONAN: ok remember be cool

RONAN: parrish

RONAN: that was cool ur doing it ur being cool

RONAN: ok let's do this let's help him up good job you

RONAN: o god og od hand-touch o god o god og d

• This part where Adam lets Ronan examine his hand for signs of infirmity reminds me of when I was a kid and I desperately wanted a slinky.

• I remember this memory acutely because it involves a lie, thing I consider pretty antithetical to my being.

In the midst of my massive desire for a slinky, a fellow 4th grade acquired one and paraded it around the halls.

• One day, she bent part of it and wailed that it was broken.

"I can fix it," I said, with desperation and untruth in my voice. "Hand it over."

• Heart in my throat, I waited until she handed it over, and then, with ferocious pleasure, I merely toyed with the slinky until she snatched it back.

YOU WERE NEVER GOING TO FIX IT she shouted

That's it, Adam's hand is the slinky.

• the hooligan in question

• I think it's time for Adam to admit that he has a thing for EDM. https://soundcloud.com/mees-salome/mees-salome-ya-amar-original-mix - Mees Salomé - Ya Amar (Original Mix)

• CALL DOWN THE HAWK (Scholastic, 2019)

• TOGA PARTY, PART 1

GANSEY: I came out to have a good time and honestly I'm feeling so attacked by having a good time right now

• TOGA PARTY, PART 2

HENRY: I'm actually angry all the time

BLUE: omg me too

HENRY: best-

BLUE: -ies

HENRY: 5

BLUE: ever

• TOGA PARTY, PART 3

• TOGA PARTY, PART 4

• ur going down boy

• This pool of acid in chapter 19 looks the way it does because of the Devil's Bathtub in Jefferson National Forest: https://www.hikingupward.com/JNF/DevilsBathtub/

• RONAN: ask me if I'm a god lowercase g

ADAM: are u a god lowercase g

RONAN: apparently

ADAM: oh my God capital G

RONAN: I KNEW YOU WOULDN'T TAKE IT WELL I SHOULD'VE NEVER OPENED UP TO YOU

• RONAN: also hold that thought gotta go dive into acid

ADAM: hold that thought you ain't the only lowercase g around here, dude

• I have been asked many times why I chose 6:21 for the time-slipping in this book and I'm sure at some point I had a reason, but I regret to inform you that that reason has since been lost to written history.

• "The thing that was Noah suddenly gazed up"

YES RISE MY CREEPY SON

• There sure is a lot of possession in this book, and I don't mean in the 'let me hold you darling' way

• https://www.booklistonline.com/Guest-Speaker-Nothing-Is-Impossible-Stiefvater-Maggie/pid=8850596

• To me, horror and fantasy are such wonderful siblings. They share parents: Broken Rules and Possibility. If you break the rules of the world, all kinds of things become possible, and if they are good, we call it magic, and if they're bad, we call it horror.

• Also, ok, I know the big ticket item of chapter 24 is that Blue nearly gets her eyeball scratched out by the WormFood she previously made out with, BUT

• The part that is actually important is where Gansey uses his words correctly, for basically, like, the first time in the series.

• For three books, he has wailed that people don't understand him, that Adam and Ronan don't listen to his good ideas for their lives, that he is a creature of privilege and that it's wasted on him, a bumbling tactless soft thing.

• Now he has begun to learn that his words have real and actual power, started by raising the bones in the cave of skeletons. He tries to use this power here, helped by Blue's mirror magic, as Noah struggles against the possession.

• "Noah, you're stronger than this."

"Noah, you can do this."

But they don't work — why? It's the same thing Gansey's always tried. Adam, you can leave. Ronan, just push through it.

• Noah's not stupid. Like he's not trying?

So what works?

When Gansey reaches for Blue's mirror magic and says, simply, "Be Noah."

• Real power, he's learning, isn't telling other people his ideas or what he would do. Real power is amplifying the individual strength and identity the other person already has, which sometimes looks wildly different than anything he would choose for himself or for them.

• I mean, also her damn eyeball gets clawed, which is cool.

• Chapter 25:

https://twitter.com/KMayquist/status/1185598135663583239

• DEMON: I am a demon

PIPER: are you organic? I only deal with organic demons

• I readily admit this was written by an introvert.

• GANSEY: words are beautiful and have meaning when used with intention

RONAN:

• Also please note that Chapter 27 is when Gansey officially loses patience with being called Dad.

• GANSEY: I should tell you all now that Blue and I have been seeing each other

EVERYONE:

GANSEY: I'm sorry it was a secret

EVERYONE: we're sorry you thought it was a secret

• Chapter 28: Deklo Lynch

• This young man needs more therapy than anyone else in this series and I'm really excited for you guys to see just how much professional help he really needs in the dreamer trilogy.

• I'm still angry that that meme came along months afterward and rendered the beginning of chapter 29 unintentionally hilarious. this is why being an author is the worst job.

• "n'y a pas de quoi fouetter un chat"

ok Gansey

• "There was a lot of night in those days behind him, and he preferred to turn his face into the sun."

ok Gansey

• HENRY: hm, how to cement a new friendship

HENRY: coffee meet up?

HENRY: share a past memory maybe

HENRY: oh GOT IT

HENRY: scare the everloving executive function out of him in a dark hole

HENRY: this is how I have so many friends

• If you cannot be unafraid, be afraid and happy.

• It is pretty humbling to know the number of people with 'If you cannot be unafraid, be unafraid and happy' tattooed on their bodies is above double digits.

• Possibly when reading about Henry and Gansey became friends you should know that the last major friendship I entered happened because I told them "we're going to be friends for life now."

(we are)

• do NOT think about an additional spin off, Stiefvater, siT dowN

• (let's see how Dreamer trilogy does first, Stiefvater)

• Now is probably a good time in this live-tweet to admit to you guys that I dropped out of high school.

• I went on to college after a GED, though, and Ronan went . . . a different way.

• (I went on to hate college just as much, though, so . . . the short version of the story is I'm better left to dreaming in rural areas)

• RONAN: I hate this place and everything in it

RONAN: burn it down

RONAN: awful

RONAN: useless

ADAM: hey

RONAN: school is better than I remember

• I will never stop being pleased with the magic trick of showing Declan being a pretty good older brother over and over again while having Ronan's POV insist that he's a bag of blunted dicks, and watching readers mostly believe Ronan.

• READERS: declan is such a tool what is his PROBLEM with Ronan

RONAN:

• "I was actually thinkin' of being a farmer."

• RONAN: once, Adam and I did a blackmail

DECLAN: hmm it's Adam Parrish appreciation hours

• "so she stood there like a prickly old lady, hunched over in a long mutilated hoodie she'd made into a dress"

Blue, we need to talk about old ladies

• "She wanted to live in a world where she was surrounded by one-thousand-year-old condescending brats."

finally Blue has begun to realize who she really is

• A STUDY IN BENEVOLENT ASSHOLISM

HENRY'S CAR: *is a Fiskar*

STUDENT: is that a Ferrari

HENRY: It's a Bugatti

HENRY: jk man it's not

HENRY: it's totally a Ferrari

• Henry doesn't have to clarify that he's not Blue's type; he's nowhere near dead enough.

• i FORGOT GANSEY PULLED UP RIGHT AFTER SHE PRETENDED TO BLOW HENRY OFF

• I think it's time for Adam to admit that he has a thing for the Barns.

sure, right, 'the Barns' ok Adam

• this paragraph made possible through an author who lives with the letters O, C, D

• This memory of Adam's was one I overheard on a bus while doing trash pick-up. The guy said it about his kid so casually that I felt the words sear straight down to permanent bedrock memory.

• I often think about how the small things shape you, define you, tell you the size and shape of your world, and I couldn't stop thinking about the shape of that kid's world.

• So I put it here, in this scene, where Adam is thinking about how wanted and loved the Lynch brothers are, because this entire series he's been learning what he thinks love is and whether or not he was unsubscribed from that newsletter at birth.

• "He was ever so slowly moving himself out of that trailer."
• Here's the song I listened to while writing this bit: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-Zxikc7g_h0 - Horse Feathers - Curs in the Weeds (Lyrics)

• "He was pretty sure he had just been Ronan's first kiss."

• Who hasn't climbed on top of a building after kissing their crush really

• Declan "Cognitive Behavioral Therapy" Lynch

• Hell, this demon chapter kind of goes hard, doesn't it

• Oh saying 'hell' was kind of punny, in a Catholicish way

• Yes, how does that feel, Gansey?

• My favorite part about the Gansey scenes from here on out is how many times he thinks about making sure things will be ok after he dies

and by my favorite part I mean

muahahha being an author is the best job

• MAN TALK TIME, PART 1

ADAM: so you know your FemBro has a curse, right?

GANSEY: I'm on it

ADAM: only applies if you're in love though

GANSEY: right, said I was on it

ADAM: like love, love, not like 'i love gelato'

GANSEY: right yes still there

ADAM: ok but you really like gelato

• MAN TALK TIME, PART 2

ADAM: theoretically how did you know she was different than gelato

GANSEY: don't get hungry in the middle of the night like i do with gelato, it's the sugar rush thing I think, she

GANSEY: waaaaaaaaaait a second we aren't talking about gelato are we

• MAN TALK TIME, PART 3

ADAM: Ronan and I are also superior to gelato

GANSEY: jesus christ please remember gelato melts

ADAM: no worries Gansey I am an ice cold customer

• It is almost like he was trying to fill a gaping hole in his life with a legendary figure who was never going to emotionally fulfill him and once he learned how to be a human being he realized the Holy Grail is really more of a coffee table decoration than a way of life

[note: i’m not 100% sure this is the right picture!]

• I'm aware, as I read this chapter about Mr. Gray kidnapping Henry, that I adore telling chapters this way. I don't know what it's called. It's like, through a window, around a corner, from the wrong point of view, making the reader autofill what they almost certainly know.

• I do it later in this book, too, when something *cough* super bad is happening to Ronan and I pick a camera that can't see him.

I DON'T KNOW WHY I LOVE IT, BUT I DO

• There's something so bittersweet and burny and excruciating about it when done right.

• The most touching part of this book is when the Gray Man examines Blue's stitches.

• There is a lot of fan art of this scene where Gansey tucks Blue inside his coat and I'm here for all of it. https://octo-kevin.tumblr.com/post/180095404355

• I want Henry's RoboBee.

• There is so much more kissing in this book than in any of the other books.

• Ok, so Ronan in Dream Thieves, banned from the Barns

• Ronan in TRK, at the Barns

• Oh man, I just reread this part about the one old tree being unmade and I remember how a reader told me in a signing line that it reminded her of her mother dying from cancer years before and now I AM THE UNMADE ONE AGAIN

  ---

• It's really not fair to Lloyd Alexander, one of the formative authors of my childhood, but every time I described Artemus' appearance, I was really just describing him.

• Dinner break

Why does this host body eat so much

• I'm back and now Blue's father is in a tree so that's where we're at

• Meanwhile Adam's doing this sort of extended 'I can see my house from here but by house I mean Ronan' chapter

• "Good save, point to the Ganseys, win for Team Good Feeling."

• I wrote this chapter about Helen finding out about Gansey bribing Child for Ronan's diploma at a service area on the Pennsylvania turnpike. It was very cold and very dark and my shirt had thumbholes which felt very important at the time.

• Except this part, which is the part I wrote first, pulling over on I-64 to type it on my phone so I'd remember it for later.

• A lot of the corruption sequences in this book were simply from my own nightmares; I have a lot of them. Horror and magic, remember?

Except in my dream it was my own hands I was eating.

• While I was writing these sequences of Cabeswater being unmade, the Cabeswater I can see from my house was also being unmade: the mountains caught fire that year. It was an eerie horizon as I wrote, the sharp edge of the horizon searing in the dark as I destroyed it in writing.

• no Ronan I changed my mind DON'T FOLLOW ORPHAN GIRL IN THIS CHAPTER GO BACK WITH ADAM

OH I AM SUCH AN AWFUL HUMAN

• well that chapter was gross

• "Back then he'd strung one gray day into another, and it seemed likely that he had lost weeks or months to this foggy dissociation."

Same, Gray Man, same

• What an acceptable amount of angst there is on page 316.
• Blue and her tree lineage have been around since . . . well, I'm ancient now, so I guess nearly twenty years? As a kid who couldn't stop imagining what life was like if you were a tree, it was a pretty appealing thought exercise.

• I used to think about what it was like to live on such a longer time line, to move your thoughts instead of your limbs. And as a kid who wasn't particularly attached to her body, the idea of trying on others was enchanting.

• And I guess, like Artemus, I've never been a fan of places "for all the things that trees could be except for alive."

• same, Artemus, same

• Find yourself a man who sleeps in the car with you when you're in a vacant state of pre-processing the horror show of your life

• find yourself a girl who is a tree, or a tree who is a girl, find yourself one who can do both

• yes, creepyGanseyNoah, yes, become one

• "The head is too wise. The heart is all fire."

• This is where Gansey thinks his story has arced to, and he's not wrong, it's just that it isn't yet the end. He knows now, though, one thing he's gotten wrong forever: true privilege means you can choose to have no agency and stay childlike for a long time.

• You can choose to let other people make decisions for you, because you can only get hurt so badly when you are loved and needed by your family and society. You can choose to ignore fixing yourself by chasing magic and tilting windmills, because the bills are paid.

• You can choose, even, to believe that your words and intentions can stay clumsy and unsophisticated, because in the end, it won't keep you friendless and alone, not if every other privileged marker is in line.

• Gansey has hidden from adulthood and responsibility while looking the most adult and responsible of all of them, and that's what he finally has come to terms with here. He is not just a king, he is no longer a kid.

• And most importantly, he realizes that he has been untrue. He hasn't found anything because he never wanted to find anything. He wanted to quest forever. Game's over.

• Purely for research purposes I took the various roads Gansey and Henry took pursuing the birds to see which were most acceptable for driving at speed at night.

• Oh, man, it is weird to read this chapter at night in the chair I wrote this chapter in at night.
• A realtor once showed us the house that the birds take Gansey and Henry too. They told me it was great for entertaining. It is true that I was entertained.

• CALL DOWN THE HAWK (Scholastic, 2019)

• See, Gansey, it was never about you dying and coming back, you were headed for this character arc no matter how you got there.

• Oh, man, it was, like, 3 am in the morning when I was writing this scene with Gansey looking into the woods where he died and I remember it like it was last night.

• I knew I was looking at the end of a series that I had been planning since I pitched it to Scholastic in 2011, but I also knew I was looking at the end of a character I had begun writing two decades before.

• One of the oldest of my daydreamed scenes, and I had been getting closer and closer to it all this time, just like Gansey and Glendower, and like Gansey, I had to ask myself if I actually ever wanted it to be over, or if the point had always been the questing.

• YES HENRY GIVE HIM YOUR SWEATER

*rubs hands*

• same, Gansey, same

• can we get some mood music in here

https://soundcloud.com/son-lux/no-fate-awaits-me-feat-faux-fix - Son Lux - No Fate Awaits Me (feat. Faux Fix)

• THE POWER OF INTENTION:

GANSEY: something beautiful! something noble!

*ronan manifests*

RONAN: you dumb shit

• And to think the poor idiot now thinks THIS is the end of his arc

• "Adam just looked at it, his hands clasped together as if they were cold"

yes I'm sure they are just cold and definitely not possessed, it will be fine, go ON

• ok seriously I'm about to spoil the whole book

• the whole series, like, look away, I'm serious for serious

• I was so sure that no reader would be surprised by this revelation, because it seemed so obvious to me. There could be no Santa Claus in this story. No pot of gold guarded by leprechauns. No last minute deus ex machina popping from a tomb.

• This was always a series about teens becoming heroes, not teens becoming excavators of heroes.

• So Glendower always had to be dead, or he had to be evil, and surely, I thought, readers would know there wasn't enough time for him to be evil on page 383.

I stared at this scene for a long time, trying to decide how to make it sting like it stung Gansey.

• And because it was never actually about Glendower, it was always about Gansey, it comes to where he actually has to be:

• He thought the thing he had to realize was that the quest wasn't the most important thing in his life.

He didn't realize that he still had yet to learn that the quest wasn't even REAL.

He is Robinson Crusoe discovering the footprint was his own all along.

• YES HE IS BROKEN AND CRYING

BEING AN AUTHOR IS THE BEST JOB

• NOW welcome to your actual arc, Gansey

• YES CreepyAdamACTIVATE

• Forsan et haec olim meminisse iuvabit, says Ronan, but you know what, I wouldn't hold my breath for that

• wait don't I have

hold on let me look in the back room a second I think I have a

• "Let's not get carried away just because you tried to kill someone," Henry clarified.

• Reading this Seondeok chapter reminds me of all the shaman stuff I read for it (only to get distilled into a single chapter) and then that further makes me think that if all my health stuff this last year means I'm a shaman now, that would make it worthwhile.

• So if any of YOU guys have shamanic powers, would you nip into one of my dreams tonight and let me know if I have gifts now? Maybe not all of you at once, but just a few, especially if you could arrive in the shape of a cool bird or something?

  ---

• "I intend to move independently into the business of luxury magical items, curating only the most extraordinary and otherworldly of crazy shit."

same, piper, same

• The Dream Thieves:

• The Raven King:

• Ok, look, I really, REALLY know it's aggravating as hell but I love the ever living hell out of blindfolded Adam narrating this scene of hell.

• "He's being unmade"

ANGST LEVEL 11

• Adam arc in 3,2,....

• Adam has to remember that he gets to choose, even if the two options look really similar. Horror and magic, right? His father or who he wants to be. The demon or Cabeswater.

• Sigh.

I wrote this in a grocery store parking lot in a rare moment of lucidity at the end, having blown by multiple deadlines, and it was very autobiographical and futile and it feels a little raw to read it right now, to be honest.

• "Is it safe?" Gansey asked.

"Safe as life," Adam replied.

• can we get some mood music

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vTpZdfm7iuk - Missio - Can I Exist

• Blue kissed him.
• "Blue Sargent had forgotten how many times she'd been told that she'd kill her true love."

• Maybe the real Glendower was the Noah Czerny we met along the way.

• "He quietly slid from time."