The only water in the forest is the River

Something I love about the romance in The Locked Tomb is how Gideon as our first POV narrator is like "this is Harrowhark Nonagesimus, she thrives on scorn and ambition and death" and as a seasoned enemies-to-lovers fan, my first reaction was "I love it, I support women's rights and wrongs, and I can't wait to see this cold evil character discover feelings eventually" but then the plot twist is actually that Harrow is a pathetic desperate emo who barely needs an excuse to say the most romantic shit imaginable. Which is already a good payoff and the characterization is superb, but then you see inside Harrow's head in the next book and discover that despite her trauma and 35 mental illnesses, she is so much of a fucking soft marshmallow simp that not even her DIY lobotomy can keep her from indulging in a coffeeshop AU (?!?!) to soothe her yearning soul. Which makes rereading GtN delightful because now you can read between the lines and realise like "oh wow, she was down bad the whole time and Gideon just didn't notice". It gives so much lesbian Pride and Prejudice that you can only fully appreciate during a reread. I adore it.

No offense but I think some of you would be a lot happier writing a fictional atlas or encyclopedia instead of a narrative story

Concur! Go forth and write your Dragonology and your Guidebook to Fairyland! Write a traveler's diary of a setting! These are fun and legitimate things to do!

I love books that are literally just this!

Harrow the ninth is simply:

unexpected accurate understanding of the Ancient Greek gods

love love love how tactile palamedes's expressions of affection are. hugging harrow so wildly he lifts her off the ground. touching his forehead to camilla's. holding gideon's hand after she recounts her traumatic past. kissing harrow's forehead, cam's knuckles, dulcie's hand. he might be the only man ever

The LIBERAL Tomb

if Gideon ever wants to talk about her mom, would John be like 'ah yeah, Wake Me Up Before You Go-Go' or 'do you wanna talk about Wake Me Up When September Ends?'

Straight romance books:

Rose likes John, but oh no, Rose also likes Mike

Lesbian romance books:

Rose has asked her toxic coworker, who kinda has a crush on her, to give her a lobotomy with an Icepick so she can forget about her situationship, who she killed and canibalized, and focus more on the love of her life: A corpse that is at least a few hundred years old.

tazmuir could simply rerelease gideon the ninth over and over again but from the perspective of all of the different characters at canaan house and i would be tuned the fuck in. like the drama of all of their different expectations and relationships…. coronabeth living her hot girl summer… judith experiencing Sapphic Hell…. isaac and jeannemary on the world’s weirdest family vacation…. palamedes living out a deeply repressed regency era romance…. silas filled with loathing for every single person there…. delightful. canaan house drives me crazy. it’s like if love island was survivor

rip gideon the ninth you will ALWAYS be famous 😿

this one part from harrow the ninth always made me really upset. so i made a four page comic out of it!

Close enough welcome back cover of alecto the ninth

I got to marry my wife, and our pupper was our flower girl. 2.5 years ago this wasn’t possible, as it wasn’t legal in Australia. It rained our whole wedding day, but was so worth it in the end with our phenomenal photographer.

op this looks absolutely magical

I forgot homophobia was a thing and i spent about 5 seconds wondering why it was ever illegal to have a dog as a flower girl

The Pal/Cam knuckle kiss thing from Nona the Ninth has me so fucking UNWELL I am SICK over it it's so SWEET AND TENDER

Bonus: