I think my favorite reaction to HtN from first-time readers is “omg Harrow is going insane!!!!!”
did you not read the first book. this bitch has been insane since the day she was born. her first appearance in the series was her confronting Gideon after staying up all night to dig up bones and hide them in the floor so she could kick Gideon’s ass for trying to sneak off the planet. when did you think she was being normal. when she stayed awake for days on end obsessively trying to figure out the first trial in Canaan House. how about the time she got so dehydrated and exhausted that she made herself a bone cocoon to sleep in. I could go on
“every portrait that is painted with feeling is a portrait of the artist, not of the sitter. the sitter is merely the accident, the occasion. it is not he who is revealed by the painter; it is rather the painter who, on the colored canvas, reveals himself.”
— oscar wilde, the picture of dorian gray
“i hate you” is so overused and means nothing anymore. “i hope your best friend turns your favorite twink into a bathroom stall wisdom-spouting redpilled alpha male” is better. it’s real. its terrifying. it happened to basil hallward.
Close enough welcome back cover of alecto the ninth
ok i'm sleepy and having emotions and i'm not gonna grab my copy to pull the specific quotes but. you remember that scene in htn where mercy and augustine are arguing. i think it's the "you have rendered yourself unlovable" one. and augustine tells her that he could kill her if he wanted. he could do it without a second thought, could stub her out like a cigarette beneath his shoe, and john would forgive him? john would understand? augustine is his favorite, and they all know it, to such a degree that mercymorn ceases to matter in the slightest?
cool great. now remember that time when john killed mercy? without a second thought? stubbed her out beneath his shoe? and then he turned to augustine and he said, you understand why i did that, right? you know that you're my favorite? you know i love you? she doesn't matter. we can put this behind us. augustine, can't you forgive me?
and augustine says no, john. no, i can't.
cause i'm thinking about that and i'm tearing my hair out. i'm eating the drywall. her death was too far. it was too far and augustine couldn't forgive him. he was right about john, probably more right than he realized, but he could never have brought himself to do it. it was unforgiveable.
started reading aftg and don't tell my twitter mutuals but i also went on the ao3 page because i can't contain myself
baru cormorant strap sucker. lesbian. relapsed twitter user
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