studies from the finale

Please give me all your thoughts on the basic eight

whenever i think about this book i still feel, oh god daniel handler really did that he did that godddddd i love this book

the aesthetics, the unreliable narrator, the witty clever quotes and the metaphors, all the flannery & natasha moments, the complicated friendships between them all, all the foreshadowing all the hinting all the unsubtle hints telling you that adam’s going to be murdered on the night of halloween, and then that plot twist that stops me cold and i feel like falling like a cartoon character running and reaching the end and gravity takes over that goddamn plot twist, all the little things i felt kind of off kind of weird but did not piece them together until the reveal and suddenly they make sense

the rest under keep reading because this got long

when i got to the part about flan not remembering last night and the next morning natasha directing her to change her clothes and stuff and then everyone was shielding flannery from adam’s sister, i thought the eventual reveal would just be flan’s going to find out that natasha and the others are covering for her, that flan’s going to realize/remember that killed adam. and then while we did discover she did i totally did not expect natasha being someone flan invented being a part of her imagination and godddddd that reveal that reveal

“Who?” Douglas asked simply, blinking.

Simply. The planet turned over, and the light shone in such a way as it hadn’t for a long time, not since I don’t know when.

This part still makes me almost shudder and exhale and overwhelmed. Simply. Simply. Simply.

and then suddenly certain weird stuff that made me feel off made sense like i was always mildly irritated that flora was there (probably because flan’s was irritated at this and we’re reading from her pov) and i just kept wondering why she’s there all the time like she’s not part of the group, and then there’s flan saying the press calling flora whistle blower and part of the group the basic EIGHT being wrong and something felt off and then we discover that of course she’s part of the EIGHT because natasha wasn’t real … like goddd it was in front of me all along. and then i suddenly understood why douglas had insisted that flora’s her friend she’s part of them too and then i reread and find little stuff like natasha and flan saying same things in sequence and someone else saying “you just said that” it was right THERE ahhhhh.  and the question about who took the picture made sense. the position of natasha in the photo beneath everyone made sense. everything keep mistaking flan for natasha at the party made sense everything made sense 

and when you think about it there’s so much foreshadowing (speaking of which, the car trunk one is a favorite of mine) and flan keeps telling us how this would end with a murder and sometime when you think you know what’s going to happen but then you still get get so struck so shock at the plot twist except it’s something that makes sense and explains the weird little points you felt off 

goddddddd this book. this book.

all the flannery/natasha moments ….. their conversations, flannery’s envy of how perfect and beautiful natasha is, flan saying she missed her when typing this out in prison, flan describing her looks and her vibes, and intimate scene before the party their gazes at each other their eyes on each other studying each other closely standing closely body almost touching just…… ahhhhhhhhhh this scene THIS SCENE. i was so mesmerized in it before The Reveal and i was still mesmerized when rereading after knowing The Reveal but also a whole other bunch of complicated emotions too but also like i could understand flan doing this.

like while i haven’t actually imagined someone up in my life and deeply believing them to be real, but i think, growing up, we all have imagined up a whole imaginary world in our heads and imagined ourselves as one of the characters in this world and there’s this pretty girl with wavy brown hair and perfect features beautiful and clever and ruthless and enchanted everyone in this little imaginary world of ours naturally including ourselves in this universe and we’re close friends and i liked her and admired her and we occasionally kissed just for fun but we’re not dating dating you know it’s just for fun she lured other people boys our age fell at her feet she enchanted them she dated them but they came and went and i was there. like, yknow, just your ordinary imaginary world inside one’s head kind of stuff.

now where was i again

oh yes. flannery and natasha ….. i love them.

but i also love other characters i think especially douglas he and flan’s friendship is so so so good and i’m incredibly fond of that. lovers to friends and also mlm wlw solidarity and anyway i love them. kate is also a favorite, the queen bee, she charms me and i love how she was like “we can do this” at the end and planning and all and just. yeah. i feel like there are still a lot about other characters i find interesting and love but this is getting long and i’m getting incoherent (i say, as if i have ever been coherent at all) and i think i’ve covered quite a lot about my thoughts on this book so i think i’m going to end this here