her weird, wonderful brother

a sequel to a primer for the small weird loves. part 2 in the limericks and love songs and letters series.

5 times that Emma Keener learns something new about her brother plus 1 time she realizes that he’s still the same Harley that she grew up knowing and loving.

he’s gay

he goes to college in new york

he has a boyfriend named peter

he reads and writes poetry

he worries a lot

and, of course:

when he loves, it’s with everything he has

ft. harley’s sister growing up and realizing that maybe him suddenly moving to a different part of the country despite only being fifteen probably matters more than their mom originally let on, an outside perspective of the growth harley has gone through via his time in new york and the love of his support system, and a peek into the future—including some moments from harley and peter’s wedding.

first chapter (which is what the moodboard is for) is now being written. i am currently planning to have it posted by the end of october.

i got caught up with this not because i did better but because i’ve had no time/watched some tv

War for the Oaks, Emma Bull I began reading this book at the same time as The Innkeeper's Song, listed below. I started out dragging my feet on this one and racing through TIS. But one book got progressively more amazing while the other book got progressively less impressive and my better book is this one. This was the roomie's first brush with urban fantasy, and one of her friends got her a second-hand first edition paperback, and so she talked about it a lot until I finally picked it up and she said "Uh but also I haven't read it in forever so I uh. Don't know how it holds up." (She rightly fears me because as you will have noticed I am a Very Particular Reader.) Reasons I disliked this book at first: - fashion choices that scream "1980s" and fashion choices that scream "lesbian" are incredibly similar and guess which of the two I am not getting, seeing as this was published in 1987. - Eddie is breaking up with her garbage boyfriend which is good but she has an incredible amount of chemistry with Carla which is disheartening given that I know I won't get sapphics and Eddie will end up dating some other boy with whom there is no chemistry. - This is a book about rock-n-roll bands I don't know any of these songs (okay I might know these songs but I don't know artists or titles so I may as well not know any of these songs) it's kinda wasted on me. - oh boy I'm so excited to watch her and the phouka fight like Kagome and Inuyasha or any other pair with this dynamic yaaaaay /sarcasm Reasons this came to be a Good Read: - Everyone dresses so goddamn queer in this book that you know what, everyone except that jerkass Stuart is queer. He's garbage so he can be straight or whatever. It's my reading experience I do what I want. There's no way these people aren't bi. Also it's canon because everyone takes one look at the phouka and assumes he's gay. …………………………with slurs but still. - Good supporting cast. - I both failed to give the phouka a deep voice and also to sustain a Stereotypical Gay voice (which, the dialogue will totally 100% support), but I did accidentally voice him with Tatum's dub of Tomoe from Kamisama Kiss which was completely appropriate in the "vaguely gay vaguely British unambiguously prissy" department, and also entertaining because it reminded me of the dynamics in that anime but, y'know, better. - I almost gave up when the romance hit hardcore but it turned out later that was actually a fake-out that was meant to be garbage and set us up for the endgame much later, by which point Eddie and the phouka actually had the same level of chemistry as Eddie and Carla, so I could actively enjoy the ship. A win! Anyway it was fun. It may not have aged the best in the sense that it strove to be accurate to time and place (see: homophobic slurs), but the character dynamics held up pretty dang well. I would definitely read this again and enjoy myself; in fact I plan to.

The Innkeeper's Song, Peter S. Beagle I was very excited to read this because I was so blown away by The Last Unicorn but the more I read the more disappointed I got. Half the time I feel like that weeb who is like "hello I only like your fanfic you wrote when you were 13 and high on pixie stixs, all your stuff now sucks", and half the time I tell myself, "Maybe there is a reason I've only ever heard of The Last Unicorn and had no idea he'd actually written other books." As you have probably picked up by now, I have a knee-jerk dislike of first person PoV where it must prove itself worthy to me first, despite the fact that I like plenty of things written in first person. I also have a knee-jerk dislike of "I will change the narrator every chapter and announce loudly who it is instead of doing it subtly but unmistakably in the content of the text itself." This book had both. Despite all my harsh judgment, it would be incorrect of me to say that this writing choice is not valid. That this writing choice cannot be used to amazing effect. I do not believe that is what happened here. I did not feel it was adding much to the story to begin with (other than being the shortest and straightest path to advancing a narrative with many fronts), and I was definitely unimpressed when we got to the string of chapters, all of them less than a page and some no more than a paragraph, during the orgy scene where the 3 women have sex with 1 teen boy who's been thirsting after them, and they pay him a lot of worshipful attention in the orgy even though none of them actually like him, and also this is when we reveal one of the women is a man in disguise in the most confusing way possible so my cringe got even deeper as I waited for Beagle to fuck up a trans storyline. (It was literally just "I'm on the run so I'm magically dressing as a girl" but it took a really long time to clarify that after.) In addition to not liking the narrative structure, I just wasn't interested or invested in the actual plot. It didn't feel very urgent or important and at the end I was like "what even happened and also why did it happen." I was underwhelmed. I was definitely the wrong audience for this book. Oh also because I was not enjoying myself I started to get really irrationally annoyed by the way fantasy fauna and flora would have fantasy names and they would be italicized. In a first person PoV. Where the narrator is literally speaking the language that this word is native to. It half felt pretentious, and half highlighted what felt like a loose thread: everyone is literally narrating to someone (presumably collecting the story, after everyone has gone their separate ways) and this has all been woven together into a proper narrative, but our story collector is absent despite addresses to such a person. What purpose does this serve? Does it make it more ~authentic~ fantasy? Because I don't buy it. Now my suspension of disbelief is snapped; I'd have preferred it was either left out entirely, or made into a brilliant framing device like in The Name of the Wind.

Giant Bones, Peter S. Beagle This one was short stories "set in the same universe as The Innkeeper's Song", which basically meant some city names were reused, as well as all those italicized fantasy names and the "I am narrating my story to an audience in-story" frame. You know, all the things I didn't particularly care for. I pressed on to see if there was anything I might like, but since I can't remember, I assume there wasn't. Because this left me wanting, and the title was Giant Bones, I went to reread Conservation of Shadows by Lee instead, starting with "The Bones of Giants," which was greatly preferable, so much more my speed. That's when I did the write-up for the last round of books lol.

Nimona, Noelle Stevenson This has been on my list for Forever but I'm bad at reading new books. Anyway! Nimona was very good!! It felt, hm, very self-indulgent in the way that is amazing, where the creator gives themself whatever they want and the work turns out brilliantly because of it. I didn't think I was into friends to enemies to lovers but apparently I love it wen Stevenson handles it (see: She Ra reboot). Speaking of She Ra, I probably would have figured out where the end game was going if I'd read Nimona before looool. I know people referenced it when they talked ships but I just….didn't...pay enough attention. There was found family stuff I enjoyed, dad stuff, I'm finding that I am liking a lot of takes on monster girls, etc. Anyway it gave me a lot of feelings, it was funny, it was good, I need to get a copy.

The Dragon Pearl, Yoon Ha Lee The first time I talked about this book I mentioned something about the pacing and suspending disbelief or whatever, but I want to note that this time the pacing felt perfect and the plot didn't seem weird at all, it flowed very smoothly. I don't know if that's because it was a reread and I knew where it was going, or because I just read it awkwardly the first time. Anyway. Something that stood out to me this time is that, near the end, I realized this story is a bit animated Disney Mulan. There's even the "you broke this you broke that you impersonated a soldier but also you saved China so thanks" bit. Where The Dragon Pearl is wildly different from other Mulan-type stories that I like (see: Monstrous Regiment) is that it is entirely ungendered. (There are some mentions of gender in the book. These amount mostly to, "most foxes choose to be female because Tradition but one of my cousins decided to be male like my brother and no one mocks him for it" and "official name tags also include handy signifiers of which personal pronouns a person prefers.") What I'm trying to say is, a lot of other stuff when dealing with/trying to deconstruct gender stereotyping, ends up reinforcing it in a way. In order to illustrate why the stereotypes are wrong, they end up repeating the stereotypes a lot in order to argue against them. The Dragon Pearl, on the other hand, is genderless in a way that doesn't reinforce the gender binary. There are no gendered clothes. There are no gendered bathrooms. There are no gendered hairstyles or accessories. There are no gendered actions or emotions or stereotypes. There are no gendered bodies (the differences highlighted between Min and Jang-who-she's-shapeshifting-into are of build ie, height, center of gravity, not of private bits). No plot points revolve around the maleness of the person Min is impersonating; no plot points revolve around the femaleness of Min. And they/them? It's never explained why any person uses that pronoun. They just do so that's just how it is. I just think this is amazingly neat and I wanna applaud Lee for this finesse.

The Gentleman's Guide to Vice and Virtue, Mackenzi Lee I put this on my list because Queer and people were recommending it, but it was not well-advertized to me. I was expecting shallow teen romance, but dressed in historical clothes and unsubtly, unabashedly, unashamedly GAY. So I was expecting some gay. I was not expecting gay pining I actually enjoyed, I was not expecting call-outs for privilege of wealth and class and sex and color, I was not expecting the drama of the romance to not be stupidly fabricated misunderstandings but instead be driven by the need for character development and personal growth, I had forgotten I was expecting people of color, people with disabilities, badass women, I was not expecting a nuanced call-out of ableism ("I don't believe I need to be well to be happy", etc). I was not expecting a reversal of gender stereotypes that avoided saying "X gender is bad." Like, Monty is the team weakest link. Monty faints at the sight of blood. Monty is romantic and emotional and swoons at the slightest provocation. Monty uses his wiles to seduce people, that's the main skill he actually brings to the party. Monty cries. Aside from probably Monty's asshole dad who hates him for being gay, no one else nor the narrative calls these traits out as being Feminine (And Therefore Bad). Like, haha, We All Know These Are All Stereotypes Of Women At The Time, but no one says it. I find there's something really nice about no one saying it. Meanwhile, Percy and Felicity are competent and cool and I heart them. (What the hell, I heart Monty too. He really grows on you. He's so soft and in love and pathetic.) Anyway going back to the privilege thing, I love that Percy and Felicity and others constantly call Monty out on his privilege and refuse to coddle him over it. But they also care about him and they are very tender to him, not because of his privilege, but because he is a person who deserves basic person things, when he has his own issues. Your issues don't excuse your behavior, but yikes we deeply underestimated the sheer depth of your PTSD and we're gentler with you because of it. So try to stop being an ass. This book is just super wholesome and I can already tell this will be one of my new go-to's when I need a comfort book. Like Ancillary Justice etc.

The Gentleman's Guide to Getting Lucky, Mackenzi Lee This is not a fanfiction in the sense that is it written by the author and not a fan, but you need to understand, as part of me selling this to you as earnestly as I can, this is a fanfiction set after The Gentleman's Guide to Vice and Virtue which involves hijinks as Monty and Percy try and fail hilariously to have their first time having sex together, Felicity tries to wingman, there are miscommunications and nervous breakdowns and tender resolutions and it is absolutely a perfect indulgence. Because it was written by the actual author everyone is 100% in character and the narrative voice is spot-on. Kudos!

The Lady's Guide to Petticoats and Piracy, Mackenzi Lee Ace/aro Felicity???? ACE/ARO FELICITY!!! TBH I only vaguely remembered the descriptions for this one, ie "this time it's lesbians," and I was reading this going "there is a suspicious lack of lesbians but so much platonic vibes and also…..maybe…..maybe…????" and like I got both lesbians AND ace/aro Felicity????? Lee wrote this book? As a gift? For me???? I cannot believe I was blessed with "not like other girls"!Felicity as a vehicle for calling out the internalized misogyny inherent in the Not Like Other Girls mindset, and it is glorious. You can like pretty dresses and running around doing science, or you can hate dresses and only love science, or you can only like pretty dresses, or you can like whatever the heck you want in whatever combo, doesn't matter you're still a girl you're still valid and this shit isn't mutually exclusive. Much as I don't wear makeup (I've slowly learned to wear dresses again) in real life, gosh I love Johanna for being like "I love dresses and I love science and what if I was a badass adventurer but also got to be rescued a lot" because that was bitty me. Gimme a princess dress and a sword and a bow and arrows but also a tower to be rescued from and then various adventures. I want it both ways! And that's okay!! Also this is a critique I have apparently wanted since at least 3rd grade, see this proof from my daily journal prompts, I apologize for my lack of attention to spelling and forming letters: "Girls are what ever girls are. Girls like different things so I con't judge them all. Some girls like barbies. Just becaus you my not like barbies dosn't mean those girls aren't girls, it means they like more things that hove barbies. I like nintendo and I'm a girl." Apparently I was a Not Like Other Girls who thought Other Girls were still extremely valid. (that's kind of hilarious though because like, child, you had Barbies and didn't hate Barbies, you are just bad at playing with dolls and props. You're also bad at playing Nintendo.) Other stuff specifically, hm, it was refreshing to not have "I am skinny and perfect and clearly ugly" or even "I am legitimately ugly." Instead we have, "You do realize my torso is a solid rectangle, it laughs at this corset which I guess we are going to put on anyway, also my football player shoulders are going to literally pop the sleeves off that dress" and "I am built like a corgi dog, this is simply a fact of my proportions." Like, Felicity definitely has Issues with her traditional femininity and lack thereof, but I feel like it was never specifically tied to "my body shape is ugly." Also to go back to this book being written for me personally. You know they always say to write things that only you could write, that are self-indulgent, write what you want to see? It's really hard to do without a template to follow. Right before I picked up this book I realized that maybe The Thing Only I Would Write would be saying "a Skadi-and-Njord marriage is in fact a valid happy ending," but I've never seen that before and I don't know what it would look like even if I kind of understand the concept. All the media I consume, if not ending in romantic soulmates, is at least found family. If you are a loner, if you like being alone, your happy ending is to get a manic-pixie-dream-anything (girl, grandson, grandma, dog, whathaveyou) and integrate back into being social. There are no happy endings where a loner stays alone, where you get married but live separately and see each other very rarely because you love them but can't stand to live with them and you need to be alone to exist as you. And Mackenzi Lee just up and wrote it. It's valid to want to live in a house by yourself filled with bookshelves and have friends. It's valid for a girl to marry another girl who is a pirate and sails around most of the time and only comes to visit on occasion so you don't get sick of her and you keep loving her. This is an okay thing for an ace/aro to want, and it's valid to be happy with this. I can't even, y'all. I'm still marveling. I finally have seen a picture of the life I know would make me happy, and it's finally been acknowledged that I can be happy. (The amount of time I've spent, knowing I hate being social, and wondering--how many years down the line, when I'm living alone and content, will the switch suddenly flip? How many bridges will I have left behind when it turns out that I actually feel loneliness, and I'm miserable and unable to make friends and it turns out there are no manic pixie dream whatevers in real life and I fucked myself over forever because I was wrong and I should have been maintaining these social ties now and turning into someone I'm sure I'm not? What if people like me, who don't really get lonely without people, don't actually exist??) Anyway representation matters. Also Felicity being blindsided with Callum's proposal was, wow, okay I should have caught on to ace!Felicity then because that was so very accurate to my life experience minus people cutting fingers off. Look I was quoting stuff at the end to a friend and she was like "maybe that's why there's aces on the cover" and I am a very stupid ace okay. Felicity and Johanna's intense queerplatonic friendship that they keep trying to take up again in among the same sort of "you need character growth" drama that Monty needed re: Percy is also just, chef kiss, god I love this book. I need to buy this book. I haven't yet so what I did is I renewed all the books so I could immediately reread them after I finished them the first time.

I was reading your excellent writeup on Sansa's soft power. I was reminded of another instance where Sansa convinces Joff to not run over a woman w/ dead baby;instead to show her mercy&charity (Tyrion POV) There's also contrast b/w how Cersei's&Sansa's response. Cersei's advice provokes. Sansa shows noteworthy exercise of soft powers&maneuvering and influencing through her wits&words throughout the series

Hey Anon, thank you so much! I am really glad you enjoyed it :)

I have a lot of issues with how GRRM writes, treats, and represents females in his stories. But one of the things that I find myself being really fascinated by is the sheer variety of types of women he writes and how dynamic their characters and personalities are.

Like I talked about in my last answer a little bit, I think its easy to view the hard vs. soft power dichotomy as very gendered, with men employing the former and women the latter. It’s even easier to see these stereotypes in a setting like Westeros, which is a patriarchy and therefore inherently an extremely and prescriptively gendered society. And in many ways, the series DOES play into the implied male and female constructs of hard and soft power techniques. But in some subtle and really interesting ways, GRRM kind of flipped that on its head with female characters who have no trouble making threats and using coercion, intimidation, or force (for e.g. Cersei, Dany, ect.); and with male characters who are completely at ease manipulating and co-opting others, and relying on intellectual tactics as opposed to physical force (for e.g. Petyr Baelish, Varys, Tyrion, ect.).

The scene that you brought up is a really intriguing and enlightening one . You’re definitely right about the difference between how Sansa and Cersei react to the situation; its a really striking outsider perspective of the stark contrast between their characters. 

They crossed Fishmonger’s Square and rode along Muddy Way before turning onto the narrow, curving Hook to begin their climb up Aegon’s High Hill. A few voices raised a cry of “Joffrey! All hail, all hail!” as the young king rode by, but for every man who picked up the shout, a hundred kept their silence. The Lannisters moved through a sea of ragged men and hungry women, breasting a tide of sullen eyes. Just ahead of him, Cersei was laughing at something Lancel had said, though he suspected her merriment was feigned. She could not be oblivious to the unrest around them, but his sister always believed in putting on the brave show.Halfway along the route, a wailing woman forced her way between two watchmen and ran out into the street in front of the king and his companions, holding the corpse of her dead baby above her head. It was blue and swollen, grotesque, but the real horror was the mother’s eyes. Joffrey looked for a moment as if he meant to ride her down, but Sansa Stark leaned over and said something to him. The king fumbled in his purse, and flung the woman a silver stag. The coin bounced off the child and rolled away, under the legs of the gold cloaks and into the crowd, where a dozen men began to fight for it. The mother never once blinked. Her skinny arms were trembling from the dead weight of her son.“Leave her, Your Grace,” Cersei called out to the king, “she’s beyond our help, poor thing.”The mother heard her. Somehow the queen’s voice cut through the woman’s ravaged wits. Her slack face twisted in loathing. “Whore!” she shrieked. “Kingslayer’s whore! Brotherfucker!” Her dead child dropped from her arms like a sack of flour as she pointed at Cersei. “Brotherfucker brotherfucker brotherfucker.”Tyrion never saw who threw the dung. He only heard Sansa’s gasp and Joffrey’s bellowed curse, and when he turned his head, the king was wiping brown filth from his cheek. There was more caked in his golden hair and spattered over Sansa’s legs.

—ACoK, Chapt. 41, Tyrion IX

The part I highlighted is also one that I have always found interesting… It’s true that Tyrion is Cersei’s brother and therefore likely knows her better than most; but regardless, it’s even clear to other people that Cersei is putting on a display. It’s a display where Cersei is saying “We are in control here. We are in charge. We have the power. The unrest around us doesn’t matter.” I don’t know if Cersei’s reaction was necessarily intended or designed to provoke, but it was definitely reflective of her perception of the situation at hand. She doesn’t think she needs to watch what she says around these people because in her mind they have no power here. That’s one of the things about Cersei, she has such faith in (hard) power that she views it as essentially indestructible; and in a way, she views herself as indestructible in turn.

I think it can be really tempting to view “hard power” as power exercised by traditional means and through overt acts. For example, with the use of physical force, violence, bribery, ect. But the distinction isn’t that cut and dry. You can really see that in ASoIaF where power manifests itself both as tangible (money, military force, ect.) and coercive means, and in contrast more conceptually as the ability to inspire and attract others in non-violent ways (through manipulation, collusion, intellect, ect.).

Soft power is all about making (or letting) other people think/know that THEY have the power. Its the ability to influence others with out threats, its getting others to want the same outcome you want, its planting the little seed of an idea in their mind and then telling them ~what a brilliant idea~ it is when they come to the conclusion on their own, its co-opting people instead of coercing them. Hard power is all about telling (or showing) other people that YOU have the power. Hard power strategies include a wide range of measures geared toward coercing or threatening others into compliance.

Cersei is pretty clearly a fan of hard power and hard power displays; and she’s not illusive or inconspicuous about it. It’s like she tells Sansa, “[t]he only way to keep your people loyal is to make certain they fear you more than they do the enemy” (ACoK). And I know that this is a show example, but that “Power is Power” scene between Cersei and Peter Baelish was such a classic hard power demonstration. Yes, Cersei is obviously capable of using manipulation and machinations to get her way. But her instincts usually seem to be more toward outright expression and exhibitions of power and intimidation. 

I think one of the clearest examples of Cersei’s gravitation towards and preference for hard power is how she basically weaponizes the Faith of the Seven and restores the Faith Militant/Warrior’s Sons in A Feast for Crows. Yes they technically serve the will of the High Septon, but the High Septon was directly aligned with Cersei. She hopes that this new religious army will help her fight enemies like Stannis Baratheon, the northmen, and potentially the Tyrells whom she is highly suspicious of. The Faith Militant is clearly a military power: they are armed forces, they use violence and strength to enforce the law of the Seven and to punish those who they deemed to have broken it. They also created their own tribunals where the they utilize the practices of the Inquisition: imprisonment, isolation, threats, torture and public confession. Cersei sees this as the best strategy, she sees this as the most effective means by which she can achieve her desired ends.

Do you hear that, Lord Stannis? Cersei could not help but smile. Even her lord father could have done no better. At a stroke, she had rid King’s Landing of the plague of sparrows, secured Tommen’s blessing, and lessened the crown’s debt by close to a million dragons. Her heart was soar-ing as she allowed the High Septon to escort her back to the Hall of Lamps.

Lady Merryweather shared the queen’s delight, though she had never heard of the Warrior’s Sons or the Poor Fellows. “They date from before Aegon’s Conquest,” Cersei explained to her. “The Warrior’s Sons were an order of knights who gave up their lands and gold and swore their swords to His High Holiness. The Poor Fellows … they were humbler, though far more numerous. Begging brothers of a sort, though they carried axes instead of bowls. They wandered the roads, escorting travelers from sept to sept and town to town. Their badge was the seven-pointed star, red on white, so the smallfolk named them Stars. The Warrior’s Sons wore rainbow cloaks and inlaid silver armor over hair shirts, and bore star-shaped crystals in the pommels of their longswords. They were the Swords. Holy men, ascetics, fanatics, sorcerers, dragonslayers, demonhunters … there were many tales about them. But all agree that they were implacable in their hatred for all enemies of the Holy Faith.”

Lady Merryweather understood at once. “Enemies such as Lord Stannis and his red sorceress, perhaps?”

“Why, yes, as it happens,” said Cersei, giggling like a girl. “Shall we broach a flagon of hippocras and drink to the fervor of the Warrior’s Sons on our way home?”

“To the fervor of the Warrior’s Sons and the brilliance of the Queen Regent. To Cersei, the First of Her Name!”

—AFfC, Chapt. 28, Cersei VI

Obviously it doesn’t work out ~exactly~ how Cersei had planned… But that’s another important thing about both hard and soft power: they both have their fault lines and limitations. Neither is an infallible or unbreakable institution. 

Rereading ITFOTN

Some notes from my rereading of In the Forests of the Night. I’ll be using this as a guide for the re-write and will add links as I address some of the notes in separate posts.

The Good

I like that it’s so concise. Seriously, not a single word is wasted and there’s no weird purple prose. In the span of only a hundred or so pages, it achieves exactly what it set out to be- a very focused character study that serves as a compelling introduction to a larger world.

We learn a lot about this world very quickly. While ‘Show, don’t tell’ is the general rule, it isn’t always the best choice.

The back and forth between past and present is very well done. Each section leads seamlessly into the next and it’s arranged in a way that builds tension and keeps the pace up. It’s so tightly woven, that I can’t even imagine how I’d ever be able to make any change to it without having to change 3-5 other things.

Having it all be in first person was really clever in that it let the readers get to know Risika while keeping her solitary. I also enjoyed her narrative voice. You get the sense that she’s so done with everything. She’s no longer the ‘ingenue’ that we typically see in YA vampire lit, it’s like she’s a deconstruction of that (or she would be if this had been published recently).

Most of all, I really loved that this is a YA vampire book about a female vampire and that it lets her be cynical and monstrous. The story is completely about her getting revenge and learning to accept herself as she is, it doesn’t revolve around a love interest. In so many ways, it was not only ahead of its time, it’s ahead of current/recent YA vampire lit.

The Not-so-good

Even though I liked how concise the book was, it still left something to be desired. Even with the book being focused on Risika and told from her pov, I still feel like the intricacies of her personality could’ve been pushed further. It goes by so fast that we don’t actually see the character development that got Risika from being afraid of Aubrey to brazenly challenging him.

Upon rereading, I realized that the main reason why it goes by so quickly is that there wasn’t actually much of a plot- it’s missing a second act. The story is mostly lots of exposition and then the final showdown. In fact, most of it is told in flashbacks, which, because it dovetails so well with the present-day parts of the story, kind of distracts from the fact that there isn’t that much that happens between Risika finding the rose and her fight with Aubrey.

While this is clearly a story about Risika getting her revenge, I kind of feel like there’s no real driving force. Even with how she even got into this situation of having to confront Aubrey just felt like an accident.

A general criticism that I have about the series is that so much of the information we get about it is Word of God and not in the actual text. I would really like to see more of the world in the text through showing and not just Risika telling us about everything. I also noticed a few moments where the first person narration oversteps. Like, Risika would be telling the reader all these things that would make more sense coming from an omniscient narrator.

There were definitely a few cringe moments befitting a debut novel written by a teenager. These include:

That whole mirror trick for having characters describe what they look like.

Alexander’s notes to Risika being soaked in tears.

Risika giving herself chunky highlights as a symbol of remembrance and defiance.

Risika burning Aubrey’s note and leaving the ashes on his territory as a ‘Take that!’ while also consciously avoiding hunting there is also really lame.

I don’t really like some of the names.

They’re fun for what they are, but I’ll probably leave them out of my rewrite.

This is probably nit picky, but there are also some weird sudden changes in verb tense.

Plot holes

The original text implies that Risika’s been in Concord for the entire 300 years she’s been a vampire. I find this very unlikely.

That said, if she only recently returned, what prompted her? This sounds like it could be an opening to expand the story with a bigger plot line that affects/reflects the state of the vampire world.

Why did Alexander wait 300 years to come find Risika? What ultimately caused him to go in search of her? I feel like it’s very unlikely that he just had no idea where she was and coincidentally never bumped into her. If he wanted to find her, and he knew where she would be (in order to send her the that last note at the zoo), why didn’t he just stick around a little longer to talk to her in person?

Word of God says that Aubrey was the one who convinced Ather to change Risika and that all of his interactions with Risika were to help her, but that still doesn't answer the question as to why he would do all that in the first place.

How did Risika not know that she was on Aubrey’s land (especially if she had spent the past few centuries actively avoiding him)? Risika said that she’s hunted in the area before but hasn’t experienced any trouble. If Aubrey’s so powerful and influential, why did it take so long for him to realize that she had been trespassing? If he did realize before, why did he wait to warn her off?

Did Ather and/or Aubrey know about Risika’s true heritage and what became of her mother? Did anyone? If so, how does she still not know? Did Alexander find out? If Lila lives in New Mayhem (according to Word of God), how has she never run into Risika? If no one knows about this...how?

All in all, it’s a very good starting point, but there’s so much room to expand.

Things that could be expanded upon

Risika’s relationships - I get that she’s really solitary and the whole point is that she’s sequestered herself away from vampire society, but I do think there’s still a way to do that without cutting her off from all contact completely. And also, the other characters are really interesting and would offer additional insight into the world.

Aubrey - I think everything would make a little more sense if they had interacted more than three times. There’s also that ambiguity about his motivations regarding Risika that’s really interesting.

Alexander - I think we should go more in depth with how much of a dick he is. I really want to see the signs that their relationship isn’t actually so great and to see that deterioration because there are a lot of moments even in the flashbacks that could be taken as tension points between them.

Ather - I just want to see what Ather’s up to these days and also to challenge everyone’s dismissal of her as being someone weak who tries to sire much stronger fledglings in the hopes that they’ll protect her.

Jager - He’s really interesting in that he comes across as the only sane man, the flaneur old timer who’s amused by what all these youngins are doing, but at the same time you can’t help but suspect that he might have a hidden agenda.

Lynette - I’m cool with her not having a big part in the story, but I think it would be a better use of her character to have her serve as a foil for Risika and also to highlight Risika’s sense of alienation even while she was human.

Peter - Again, he can stay a side character, but Word of God says that he knew about the twins’ heritage and I really want to explore that angle and what kind of tension might exist between him and his children.

Lila - So much of her story is Word of God, which kind of sucks because it adds such a different dimension to Risika’s story.

Risika’s coming of age story - This is mostly a revenge tale, but I also see it as a story of Risika coming to terms with who she is.

The world - Like I said before, some of the plot holes relating to why the story even started in the first place leave an opening for us to see some of the larger political or societal conflicts of nyeusigrube.

I’ve been debating switching the first person narration to third person. I might end up going with third person narration because it’ll force me to actually rewrite and not just edit. But if I stay with first person narration, it would be cool to play with the idea of Risika as an unreliable narrator (probably by bringing in first person povs from other characters).

It's a little too monochromatic for my taste (and needlessly so). I’d really like to find a way to add some melanin here.

I also noticed some parallels with the Persephone myth, which might be worth exploring.

Also, wouldn’t it be cool if Risika’s witch powers had also manifested while she was human?