#anyway. gtn posting am i right?

[tomomiisasleep]

notes on Harryanthe which I am crazy about, in HtN

this dumb little interaction just stuck with me. I mean they're almost always high-strung in the detailed plot, like in almost every one of the Ianthe-centered scenes one of them is in some kind of pain

but I know they have chill moments. mundane moments. petty arguments, like the one in the post scrips of the letter. And I so badly want to read those!!

anyways. I'm gonna start collecting scraps here.

you might have given Ianthe Tridentarius the pleasure of opening the note labelled Upon the death of Harrowhark Nonagesimus. Your only hope for that note was that it contained a single sentence along the lines of, Get what joy you can from my corpse, you devious bitch, but it was written by a previous self and you could not risk a guess.

Harrow: what if I didnt hate her and that makes me wanna have a lobotomy yeah that makes sense

Once, vilely, from Ianthe; she had ensconced you in fat and rolled you down the hallway out of danger, and still laughed whenever she thought about it.

ok this is just Ianthe being a little pest, but it also means that she talks about this and laughs in Harrow's face, which makes her a little bitch, but also like it means they often chat and Ianthe would be like: Yeah today I tried the theorem on apples again, but I tweaked it by directing the flow of thalergy from- hey Harry do u remember the time I saved your life hahahahahaha

The mockery you endured for needing her proximity was exquisitely painful, but humiliation was steadily becoming your existence whole and entire.

I want to know what exactly this mockery entails

It had been very nicely matched to the original until she had ceased using it altogether, and the difference was more pronounced each day. Unconscious of your critical eye, she scratched fretfully at the line until red hives appeared.

Ianthe squirming under Harrow's gaze for once

She was in a filthy mood, if she was wearing that thing, with her arm exposed.

Harrow has been keeping tabs on the state of her arm problem ever since she first woke up on the Erobos. Same as how Ianthe has been keeping tabs on the results of her lobotomy.

she said, blue eyed, those oily little freckles glittering almost pinkly above the dress. They reflected the red rims of her eyelids. You thought that she had been crying.

yeah stare at her eyelids Harrow, and sniff her discreetly all the time, sweat musk vetiver am I right (also have I expressed how crazy it drives me that she wears masculine perfume??????????? no well IT'S SO *faints*

You got better autopsies of her encounters with Beasts than you did from your own, as Augustine was wont to explain significantly more to her than either he or Mercy did to you.

Ugh why why why in this whole book I have not seen them talk shop with each other even once??? Except Harrow showing off after making the arm. Harrow has discussions with Pal all the time in GtN. clearly she trades notes on necromancy with Ianthe frequently. but no, gloss over Ianthe's intellect and just write her freak(fond) moments

You had once been fool enough to recommend that Ianthe take them down, at which point she had rustled up another from the bathroom and hung it in pride of place above an overpainted dresser.

love her

“Oh, heaps,” said Ianthe, who appeared not to have taken offence at your rejection. It was so impossible to tell, with Ianthe. “I made it. It’s vile.”

Maybe she really doesn't care about the rejection or even likes it, but "so impossible to tell" kinda hints that, well she might be hurt,maybe, there just isn't any proof

It was not a connection formed of any mutual admiration; if anything, the more you saw of Ianthe the less likely you were to mistake her for likeable. She made herself like an overdecorated cake: covered so thickly in icing and fondants and gums that it would take serious excavation to find any bread. As a necromancer she was a genius, though you thought she relied too much on shortcuts and circumventions. She had an exceptionally fine mind. She was not afraid of rigour.

If Harrow doesn't have the hots for her at least I do.

Honestly on my first read I took stuff like "not likeable" and "“Tell me to stop breathing,” she said. (“I have, on multiple occasions,” you said.)" at face value and actually thought Harrow genuinely hates her and is forced to interact with her because there's no one else. Which is true. But she's also very attracted to her and I kinda overlooked it at because I thought those feelings were mutually exclusive. And they're not. which I'm obsessed with.

Or she won't think Ianthe's beautiful and note details about how she dresses all the time.

Seriously Harrow's special fixation on "how Ianthe's clothes make her look" is hard to ignore.

for example:

The mother-of-pearl made Ianthe’s hair a lurid yellow and threw up all the mustard tints of her skin; her face was blotchy, and her eyes were sleepless pits. She looked like shit.

The skirts and waists were all beautifully cut for someone of a different height and body type than Ianthe possessed. They were tight where they should have been loose and loose where they should have been tight. They looked like her burial clothes, and she looked as though she had emerged fifty years after that burial.

she answered after a long, scuffling minute, with sleep in her eyes and her hair in dilute whey tangles over her neck and shoulders, wearing a bewildering short garment of violet chiffon.

The back was open, and you could see the fine dents of her spine—her bleached skin bluer and sweeter against the pallid gossamer—and the twin blades of her shoulder blades looked strangely nude and vulnerable to you.

Ianthe was training in her nightgown—a grisly floor-length concoction of pale golden lace that made her long, limber body look like a green-veined mummy

a lone wax figure in pale purple chiffon, tall and colourless—except in the greasy metal of her bone arm, which the lights rendered all the colours of the rainbow.

Ianthe rose soundlessly to her feet, and the long skirts of her nightgown—a brilliant ruffled canary-yellow silk that made her look like a formal lemon—rustled restively around her calves.

Note that Harrow focuses on Ianthe's clothes for how they shape Ianthe's appearance. in contrast:

she ignored your sister, whose pallid eyebrows had shot up so fast and so far that they were in danger of breaking the atmosphere. Mercymorn wore a long slip of peach-coloured silk, and her white Canaanite robe was tucked over her forearms and had slipped entirely off her slender, aggrieved shoulders. She had scraped her hair into a merciless and shining coil at the back of her head, and she had no eyes for either of you.

Obviously Mercy is SUPER HOT here, if Ianthe's reaction means anything. But Harrow only describes her clothing and not how she looks. Same with Augustine's party outfit.

With Ianthe, it's always: she's wearing ..., which makes her look gross. And I did not understand at first but now I know and feel stongly that Harrow is totally into her gross-hotness. well at least I am. the grosser she's described the hotter she is.

[liesmyth]

okay here's MY tlt hot take. im saying this on anon cuz i need to be put in witness protection for this.

i think harrow's overrated.

or, better put: i think harrow's fans are annoying and make me like the character less.

like the POINT of harrow is that she occupies this privileged role and does horrible things with her power BUT is sympathetic in that she undergoes her own hardships. that's fair - textually, harrow is very interesting!

but harrow fans act like the whole solar system revolves around her. like ntn makes it pretty clear that muir is doing something with the butch martyr trope (i think kiriona's life and resentment is commentary), but fans are like 'no literally all gideon was good for is dying for harrow. harrow is the saddest most special girl in the world. she's literally the single most important character who has ever existed she has done nothing wrong she is flawless and immune to criticism' and when the fandom takes the OTHER Māori characters (namely john and wake) and flattens them to 'true evil' it's annoying to see harrow get woobified! like idk harrow stans are just a specific breed of 'the world revolves around the most special girl ever'

I THINK I KNOW WHO SENT THIS. I am honoured though that you chose MY askbox to be a receptacle of such salt, I'm not worthy etc.

Ok I actually HAVE seen this opinion before. I kinda see where woobie Harrow is coming from — Harrow is sad! So many characters in-universe think she's cool and special and love her! She has a shitload of Issues that make her relatable! — but it's also just the nature of fandom things that fandom loves to pick one scrappy character to be the most specialest meow meow etc. and it sucks when you're a fan of a character who's just as much of a special woobie and gets flattened and overlooked. "Fans of X made me hate X" is a tale as old as time and 100% valid... who hasn't been there.

That said, I think it's gotten better post-Nona? Maybe? IDK, I think NtN does a good job showing us glimpses of the wider 'verse and cast of characters (many of whom are also sad in fandom-appealing way) and then there's Kiriona who's THE saddest girl in the universe, so I feel like the narrative is sort of lampshading that hey! this other girl is also sad. Though it might also be that I'm not seeing any bad takes bc my dash is great and I barely venture into the main tags

Anyway MY hot take on this is that I need Gideon to be happy a tad more than I need Harrow to be happy and I think Gideon is the biggest woobie meow meow. I love Harrow to bits but also the other day I was reading a fic set before the beginning of GtN and I was like, wait maybe Harrow lobotomising herself for Gideon is the least she could do. Maybe she was right to feel so guilty that she cut into her own brain :3

They're both fucked up! They're sad! They were dealt a shitty hand in life! But Gideon hits my sad buttons more. And I think Harrow would agree with me tbh.

[soft-dyke-omo]

Also, 7 and 10 for Judith Deuteros? (idk if you have any ocs)

7: Do they wear diapers or pullups? (alt. Do they wet the bed?)

So personally I'm just not into ABDL at all, but I am still into some diaper-play, I just bow politely and exit stage left as soon as it gets overly cutesy and childish. (Oh, the woes of someone into omo who does not love term accident, truly the most oppressed of minorities.)

ANYWAY, going off my weak bladder necromancer hc, it would make sense that cohort necromancers get issued absorbent underwear or discreet pullups. But if we're talking a post-ntn scenario (because she WILL survive speaking it into existence) she'll actually have to go out and purchase diapers, which I don't think she will be able to bring herself to do until she has one or two truly devastating public accidents.

As for bedwetting: Yes, absolutely. I think I've talked before about me loving the trope of someone forced to wet the bed while awake and conscious because they are too unwell to get up on their own, but also: she's spent a year in and out of being possessed by the wrathful ghost of an eldritch being, PLUS all the regular horros of war and becoming a prisoner of said war. You can't tell me she doesn't have some bed-wetting nightmares every now and again. You also can't tell me that she wouldn't go near-catatonic with shame when she does.

10: Do they have a spouse or partner that diapers them because of their accidents? (alt: do they have a spouse or partner? How do they feel about Judith's bedwetting?)

Further doxxing myself but I will look God in the eye and walk backwards into piss hell: I'm a jodybeth truther. They have my entire heart. I feel Judith wants to be able to take care of herself and therefore insist on taking care of the changing and cleanup process herself, but she definitely needs a bit of encouragement to even consider going out and getting diapers for herself. Coronabeth probably broaches the subject a little less than gracefully, maybe after a public accident, maybe after the third or fourth time Judith wets the bed after a nightmare. Because Coronabeth is a literal Princess, you can not tell me that she ever had to change her own sheets even in dry circumstances before, so even if she wanted to help she'd be more in the way than any actual support, and Judith getting very snappy when she's embarrassed, I think it would be A Whole Thing for them, and an even bigger thing for Judith when she realises that Coronabeth is right and it can't go on like this. In total, Coronabeth makes way less of deal out of Judith's bedwetting than Judith does in her apocalyptic mortification, but she just doesn't want to have to deal with the mess or have to get up in the middle of the night.

As a little bonus, because they did share a living space for a lot of years and Judith did have a horrible, miserable, unwise puppy crush on her, here's a little bit of Marta as a treat: Even though she had her bladder under much better control in the pre-gtn days, every once in a while, like 3-5 times a year, she has a really bad night. Not often enough that she could justify using protection on a regular basis, since it happens infrequently enough that every time could feasibly be the last. She tries so hard not to wake Marta every time it happens, but being a cavalier Marta is a very light sleeper and cottons on to what's going on pretty quickly every single time.

Marta likes Judith a whole lot, sometimes despite herself. But she's just not a particularly nurturing person - she didn't even choose being a cavalier! She was canonically more-or-less pressganged into it by Judith's father! So they usually end up extremely awkwardly cleaning up side-by-side until Marta says something like "Why don't you head to the sonic, and I'll take care of the rest. All the sooner we'll be able to get back to sleep." She tries so hard not to embarrass her necromancer, but that's a task that's close to impossible.

They pointedly do not mention what happened in the morning, or ever.

(thank you so, so much for your asks! they've been burning a hole in my inbox for the last week, but I've been SO exhausted and sleepy I usally crawl into bed straight after coming home from work. 💛)

[crepuscularqueens]

following a gtn account on twitter was a mistake because i was just forced to remember john gaius was canonically standing around naked at one point

[chaos-has-theories]

Part 1: The Eye of John

You’ve heard of „Alecto is a Resurrection Beast“, „Alecto is Gaia“ and „Alecto is a seamonster“, you’ve heard of John’s sun symbolism, now get ready for:

John is Ra and Alecto is Mehet-Weret

or less specifically Hathor, or The Eye of Ra

[Image description: A picture in the Ancient Egyptian style. It shows a large blue cow with stars along its belly. There are nine people under it, keeping it steady. An empty boat floats by its back legs, and another boat by its front legs, this one with the god Ra as a passenger. A large red arrow points at the cow and is labelled “Alecto???”.]

(More under the cut, because this shit will get long.)

First, for the record, I am emphatically not a learned egyptologist, so I might be getting things wrong here.

Secondly, ancient Egyptian mythology is a gorgeous mess. You can’t ever just say that x is the child of y, because they’re bound to also be siblings, and spouses, and x is also a and b and y is also b and c and... yeah.

Anyway, let’s do this.

---

I was rereading Harrow the Ninth with my roommates and we got to this part:

"Your sword will not rend its armour”, he said, with his back turned to them. “It’s weapons will ruin your flesh. It will not stop until it has subsumed its quarry.” (HtN p. 329)

and I thought to myself, huh, that kind of sounds like the Eye of Ra.

So let’s talk about that!

Now, the main story of the Eye of Ra is that, long ago, when the gods were still like, living on earth with the humans, people started to criticize Ra, their ruler.

That pissed off Ra, so he sent off his „Eye“ to punish them. She did, killing almost all the humans, but then Ra couldn’t really get her to stop. So the gods made a bunch of dyed beer with some blood in it, and the Eye drank it all and became drunk and docile.

So far, so good. Technically, at that point Teacher is talking about the Sleeper, but we all know that there are heavy parallels between the Sleeper and the Body. Also, there’s more where that came from.

"My lord,” said Augustine formally, “you told us the truth about Annabel–about Alecto–because she knew the truth too, and you never could control her.” (HtN, p. 478)

”Annabel Lee... was not the dying kind,” said the Emperor. It might be more accurate to say that I switched her off.” “You came to us and we asked, Is she dead?” said Mercy. “And you said, As dead as I can make her... I remember, Lord, that you wept.” (HtN, p. 479)

Neither Alecto nor the Eye of Ra are stopped by death or reason but instead kept somehow subdued.

But it gets better, and weirder.

The most famous version of the Eye of Ra is probably Sakhmet, the lion goddess. Sometimes she's a cat, Bastet; but just as often she’s depicted as a cow, Hathor.

There's a specific version of this myth called „The Book of the Heavenly Cow“ or „The Destruction of Mankind“. Here’s a translation of it.

I just learned about this myth. I learned about it under the Name of „Mehet-Weret“. Hathor and Mehet-Weret are… the same goddess? Not the same goddess? Sometimes the same goddess? They’re both cow themed, and occasionally take the same roles. Mythology is confusing, y’all.

Here’s what Wikipedia has to say about it:

Hathor was given the epithets "mistress of the sky" and "mistress of the stars", and was said to dwell in the sky with Ra and other sun deities. Egyptians thought of the sky as a body of water through which the sun god sailed, and they connected it with the waters from which, according to their creation myths, the sun emerged at the beginning of time. This cosmic mother goddess was often represented as a cow. Hathor and Mehet-Weret were both thought of as the cow who birthed the sun god and placed him between her horns. Like Nut, Hathor was said to give birth to the sun god each dawn.

Since I remembered the name Mehet-Weret and was very proud of that, that’s where I actually started my research here, and…

Mehet-Weret or Mehturt (Ancient Egyptian: mḥt-wrt) is an ancient Egyptian deity of the sky in ancient Egyptian religion. Her name means "Great Flood". She was mentioned in the Pyramid Texts. In ancient Egyptian creation myths, she gives birth to the sun at the beginning of time, and in art she is portrayed as a cow with a sun disk between her horns. She is associated with the goddesses Neith, Hathor, and Isis, all of whom have similar characteristics, and like them she could be called the "Eye of Ra". Mehet-Weret is primarily known as being the "Celestial Cow" or "Cow Goddess" because of her physical characteristics, but she contributes to the world in more ways than that. She is also the Goddess of Water, Creation, and Rebirth; in Egyptian mythology, Mehet-Weret is one of the main components in the making and survival of life. (...) She was credited for the birth of Re, also known as the Sun God Ra; she is also the one who protects Re. (Wikipedia)

SHE’S (a version of) THE PRIMORDIAL FLOOD, Y’ALL.

You said, “Teacher, what destroyed the House of the First?” “Not much,” said the Emperor, and he tried to smile. It was awful. “Rising sea levels and a massive nuclear fission chain reaction...it all went downhill from there.” (HtN p. 346)

"Even the devil bent for God to put a leash around her neck (...) But when the work was done (...) they bade him kill the saltwater creature before she could do them harm...” (HtN p. 328)

Next to you, the body said quietly, “The water is risen. So is the sun. We will endure.” (HtN p. 294)

On this same read-through I snagged on „The water is risen, so is the sun“ because it sounds so much like a quote, but I couldn’t find anything. Yes, John has sun symbolism and Alecto all that water stuff, but where is the connection?

Well, here. It’s just Ancient Egyptian Creation Myths.

The different creation myths have some elements in common. They all held that the world had arisen out of the lifeless waters of chaos (…) The sun was also closely associated with creation, and it was said to have first risen from the mound, as the general sun-god Ra.

That makes Alecto literally the First One. It makes her John’s protector as the Eye. It gives her a connection to water and and even death and the underworld. (It also gives her a connection to the sky, which always fits in a Space Fantasy.)

Essentially,

I can see two figures in Egyptian mythology that fit what we know of Alecto. Those would be the Eye of Ra, an uncontrollable creature of rage and revenge; and the flood from which the sun god rises during the creation of the world. And Mehet-Weret fits into both.

But you’re not convinced yet? Alright then. Remember how Hathor/Mehet-Weret is a cow?

"Oh, singular,” said Dulcinea quietly, more to herself than to Gideon. “Lipochrome...recessive.” (GtN, p. 106)

When she spoke at last, she sounded frozen and numb. “I see. I understand. Lipochrome. Recessive. You are the evidence.” (HtN, p. 410)

I did not know what the fuck to say to her incoherent spew. She said, ragged, peevish: “What? No tongue in your head, you–you mutant, you mistake, you great big calf-eyed fuck-up?”

If you’re like me and know nothing about biology, you’ll hop over to Wikipedia  and find this:

A lipochrome (from Greek λίπος ("fat") and χρ��μα ("color")) is a naturally occurring, fat-soluble pigment. Lipofuscin—a product of fat breakdown in lysosomes—is a type of lipochrome that is associated with the decomposition of cell membranes. Beta carotene, a lipochrome, was found in the retina, pigment epithelium, and iris of cattle eyes.

This is the entirety of the article by the way.

…and I was wondering why Tamsyn didn’t just call the eyes „Amber“.

Now you might say, but Chaos, you know they’re not really her eyes…

Yeah.

They’re John’s eyes.

They are, you might say, the Eyes of John.

---

THERE WILL BE MORE PARTS because I am LOSING MY MIND OVER THIS but this post is already longer than it has any right to be.

In the meantime, here’s an article on Mehet-Weret that I think is actually well researched and probably does a better job explaining how all these different gods fit together than I ever could.

[aeondeug]

Ok so I made a post about why I didn’t like Gideon initially and I’ve talked to others about it. And I’ve seen a lot of people having the reverse experience. Which is cool, I think. And one I’m not surprised by if I think about how the two characters are introduced initially. Like, maybe Gideon’s humor is dumb but also she’s not the one being like “Oh man, it is time to systematically destroy this woman’s hopes that she has finally done it and escaped from me and my hell planet,” at the start of the book. Harrow is though. Harrow’s intro is very...Harrow. It’s very fitting for what is learned about her later on.

Anyway. I feel a desire to like. Write about the other half of this equation. And why it was that I instantly latched onto Harrow so hard. So like I said in the first post. Harrow’s got STYLE. She’s got like bone jewelry and wears all black and has skull face paint. She uses her own blood as ink for her fountain pen (it being a fountain pen matters) and she gets said blood by stabbing herself in the cheek. Also she’s a necromancer, which is just icing on the cake. Harrow’s entire fashion statement appeals to me as someone raised by a goth who ended up like...Never goth fashion or subculture wise, but someone who was a kid that Dreamed of being goth fashion wise. Alas, I went to a boring uniform school and also was too nervous of such things.

Harrow just LOOKS cool. Harrow is the sort of person that a dumb 13 year old me would have found the coolest and have viewed as like. An Aspiration. Even though she’s kind of a dumbass and also a dick. I was an edgelord of a kid and an edgelord who knew who Bauhaus were before I could read.

So Harrow’s instantly got fashion on her side. And she’s got her attitude. Which is also important. She does things for style and looks. The narration, which is from Gideon’s perspective, describes the fountain pen filling thing as “one of Harrow’s favorite party tricks”, I believe is the quote. When asked about why there are suddenly skulls all over their room her sole answer to this question is “Ambiance”. And she clearly cares about how she looks. Her paint is often described and a point is made that Gideon’s is not as well put on hers. Also? Her outfit? She’s got like. The bone wrist circlet thingies and her bone studs and her bone choker and the fucking bone chest thing that I am forgetting the word for right now. Harrow cares about appearances.

Which also shows in like...She makes a good show of how well read she is. Takes pride in that fact not just privately, but lets people know it. She runs off and tries to stubbornly do a puzzle on her own. The thing to wake her up from her near death stupor from failing in that is something insinuating they are better than her. And she’s still half dying but takes the time to state that, no, SHE is the best necromancer. Harrow’s got an ego and that shows from early on. Through things like how she dresses, how she talks, how she treats Gideon...

And I saw that and I just kind of instantly latched on. While reading early in the book and seeing her do a bitchy thing, I once joked that “Has anyone ever hugged Harrow?” and then jokingly decided that “No. No one’s hugged Harrow before.” This was a joke that I had made as someone with a rather neglectful family in several respects. And as someone whose general well being in their home was decided by how good I appeared in comparison to the other kids. In that sort of situation, not having much else, I took great pride in my being well read. In being Smart. This eventually made me insufferable as hell and that was crushed into the dirt. Either way, depressing story time aside. I made a joke that indicated that, early on, I had pegged Harrow as someone similarly neglected. As someone with a similar lack of anything going on.

Turns out I was right. Her situation’s very different from my own because of course it is. This is a book about space necromancers, after all. But she was a neglected child. One who had to grow up far too fast and who had a very strict and overbearing religious upbringing. Does that sort of thing cause that sort of concern for aesthetics and bitchery? I dunno. But I made a guess, as a joke, and the guess appeared to be right.

Another thing that I made a bet on with this early on was like...The nature of the relationship. They are the only two of their generation on that planet. Gideon is made out immediately to be like an indentured servant of the family. While Harrow is immediately revealed to be a high status fancy nun queen with a fancy title. Harrow’s parents are dead by that point and had been dead for a while. But, I knew, that theoretically they were not dead at some point. A point which Gideon had to be old enough to remember, given some of the comments made. Based on their antagonism towards one another and this set up...

A part of me wondered if like they had in fact had like a Favorite and Unfavorite dynamic as kids. Or I guess not actively wondered but like. The thought was in mind. Because I had grown up as The Favorite in a terrible home which had an Unfavorite. And this makes you a terrible person as a kid. So I saw these very small signs at the start of a book which hides most of the cool Harrow facts and interactions in its latter sections. And was like, on some level like, “Ah. You’re a bitch to her because you’re The Favorite. In part.”

I am kind of always looking for abused and neglected Favorites in fiction. One of my favorite characters is Azula. And I’m very fond of Gamora. I have a tendency to find them and latch onto them because like...I am still working through things. A lot of things. Sometimes seeing it in the things I read makes the stuff I am working through less terrifying. Sometimes it gives me a sense of hope. Either way, seeing a thing that is at least somewhat similar helps. And I look out for it. And Harrow apparently just gave off. The Aura. From the very start.

Because lo and behold, she was neglected as fuck and, indeed, the Favorite while Gideon was an Unfavorite so unfavorited that she was viewed as basically cursed and horrifying. And then Harrow was a mean bastard of a child towards her. And then it turns out that Harrow has like 10,000 weird guilt issues. Some of which involve her treatment of Gideon now because...How on earth could you even like her when you grew up with her? Like. How.

But even before those reveals later on...I had been making my guesses. Enough so that one of my earlier jokes about the book was about how no one ever hugged Harrow and how she is out doing this shit for some sense of fucking acknowledgement for once. Because maybe if you’re acknowledged that like...Will count. As your Actual True Affection quota for the day. Harrow was not just stylish and mysterious. She also had little bits and bobs, either that she revealed herself in her few appearances in the early portion of GtN or which were revealed by way of how Gideon talks about her and acts about her, which hinted towards the basic idea of what Harrow’s deal even was.

I did not guess the exact specifics of Harrow’s deal because who the hell could divine that from the first act of the first book. But I did guess at the core idea laying behind the specifics of that deal. And the deal was that she was the neglected but favored child in a really shitty home, who has ended up with an ungodly amount of guilt issues for her behavior and general existence. And it made her mean, guarded, and protective of her image and it gave her an ego sky high. Which you can all see in the first portion of the book to an extent. Even though she is very scarce in said first portion. Which I think is either a tantalizing mystery of “What the fuck is even your problem, Harrow?” or like just enough info in just the right way for people with a similar experience to go “lol no one hugged you when you were a kid” with a knowing prescience.

[elftwink]

i know i said i would take a few weeks but i’m almost done htn lol yesterday one of my classes was delayed by like 20 mins after i already got there over half an hour early so i banged out a couple hundred pages then (side note i always forget how fun it is to read that much in a day, but also if i keep doing it i’m going to run out of books to read during my commute). i think i have a chapter or two left? maybe less if there’s stuff at the back after the story like in gtn. anyway some thots under the cut. spoilers obvs

i am a LITTLE annoyed at myself bc i was gonna post about a couple theories i had but i just kept reading and now you all just have to take me at my word that i was right about some stuff (what happened to gideon and harrow’s brain surgery that she did on herself fwiw) but anyway. gideon is back at least temporarily and omg i missed her so much. i’m like RIGHT in the middle of the final battle (confrontation? both?) so i have no idea if she makes it through... intact but i missed the quips

in general i would say that i enjoyed reading gtn a little more (i like gideon’s internal commentary quite a bit and the second person perspective, although BEAUTIFULLY used holy shit, took me awhile to adjust to), i think htn is... not better written per se but more artfully constructed [i guess??]. i think i’m almost more excited to do a reread than i am to actually finish because then i can go back over and see the big picture because htn is very good at showing you only a little bit but also making you feel like you can figure out what’s going on if you pay enough attention (you can’t, i don’t think, not all of it; harrow never has enough information at her disposal). every time things are revealed it feels like another puzzle piece snapping into place and it’s all so intentional that even when i think i don’t particularly care for an element it always ends up making total sense and being incredibly well suited to the story. 

anyway like i said i’m not done done yet and so the final resolution and explanation of everything escapes me still so this is more me rambling than anything else but iirc when the fourth kids died in gtn the writing on the wall that gideon saw was at least the same font as all the notes to harrow in this one so. i think maybe i’m just not keeping very good track of who is in what body at any given time but at that point it was just cytherea in disguise killing people. we knew she killed fifth the first time (magnus or abigail said so when harrow asked), and afaik the sleeper [cant remember her name because she had like. several? wake me up inside? though that might have been someone else. i’m always getting names mixed up. good grief. anyway] really only exists in harrow’s fake memories at the moment (well, i think she is tied to the two handed longsword. was? you can really tell i’m gonna need to do a reread to have any coherent thoughts about this all lmao) sooooo. i don’t know where i’m going with this i feel like i can’t draw conclusions without like taking notes on it all but ive connected the dots. ive connected them. what is the picture that i’m connecting the dots for? i don’t fucking know i’m just connecting them

it is imo just very fun to talk about these books and try to predict what’s going to happen next because i always guess enough that i feel self satisfied but am missing enough that every reveal still gets me. muir is an excellent author i will say that much. anyway i have class now and i’ll probably be done htn before the day is out so expect another long ass post about it lol

[zenosanalytic]

Harrow the Ninth: *Happy Viper Chair-Dance of Happiness*

So I buckled down and spent ALL OF YESTERDAY finishing Harrow the Ninth, finishing ~5pm cst started writing THIS ~7pm cst(tho I decided to rewrite it today), and you can deduce from above my feelings :| I’m very subtle so it COULD require some real ferreting out :| :| Take your time; I’m in no rush.

Good? Ok.

I’m going to be pretentious(ME?!) now and call it “Titanic” and “Olympian” and “A Masterclass in Literary Mechanics” and, if you think I’m being extravagant, I’ll just say I FEEL as if I am but humbly polishing the very merest Shoeflesh of Extravagant Praise with these deservéd words; kneeling over my meager shinebox -greasy rag clutched in my entirely metaphorical hands; newsboy cap at a Determined, yet Rakish tilt upon my head; Gigantic patent-leather shoes, absolutely WRECKED by late 1800s Urban Streets, shoved close to my ganderbulbs- buffing assiduously that stubbornly muddied Boot-toe as Mista EP reads The Times, readying itself for the full and vigorous day of honestly describing the greatness of this book which lays before it. Dear Dear Sweet, Precious, Sweet Dear Dear Readers: I implore you to read no hyperbole when I write, that parts of this book are like riding out a hurricane to Dorothyville in a glass case of Emotion :| :| :|

I cried, Dear Readers; I cried often, moved suddenly -to my core- by simple phrases plainly stating sincere emotions with all the surprise of a beam of light bursting through a thunderhead, or turning a corner to bunp your own birthday cake from the hands of a loved one you thought on the otherside of the world, to the floor. Of course as a snake my tearducts empty directly into my mouth so there was, conveniently, no public teariness to speak of; but I assure you there was much sniffling of nostril, much jittering of jaw, much trembling lip bitten and turned aside from the page as composure was summoned and mastered, much broken recitation and shaky curses of “Damn you Muir! Damn Your Cruel, Umbral Genius!!” Followed swiftly by sobguffaws at a cruelly cutting poetry joke. If I told you the gag-a-minute gore-ridden story of Juggalo!Catholic!Rose and Twincest!PastelGoth!Vriska receiving an awful and grimly abusive post-graduate education at the hands of a kismestic Donald Duck and Goofy, overseen by an Unholy mashup of Calvin’s Dad, Dr. Scratch, and Prince Charming -and, Hell, PROBABLY Sora; he’s PROBABLY SORA TOO I never played Kingdom Hearts but I BET there’s something there I couldn’t see- was one of the most powerful and sensitive examinations of Humanity, Grief, Loneliness, Mental Illness, Death, and Poetry ever written, would you believe me? You should u_u

I Laughed; I Cried; I Cheered; I Condemned; I Contemplated: I literally felt EFFERVESCENT having finished this, or perhaps like a loose, sparking wire, happily dancing its dangerous jig across the sweaty concrete floor of a poorly lit corridor. I had NO FUCKING CLUE what was going on at the end(I do now; I’ve thought about it) which I found Entirely Appropriate, in part because this book took, like 200 pages to end. The Climax ALONE has a four-act structure! It is Wonderful, and Powerful, and, as so many have said, the Pagekind Equivalent of a Marathon, and I am deeply happy it exists so that I could have read it, and I am Legit Serious about considering it a Classic Work. It kills me to think that, because of its genre and our Era, it probably will never get treated with the culture-wide seriousness it deserves. I love Gideon the Ninth and this is, like, Ten Times the book GtN is(though that’s a bit unfair since they’re VERY different). Which I didn’t think possible. Honestly, Taz is Too Powerful u_u u_u What Hath the Internet Wrought? What grease-painted beast, its hour come round at last, glomps towards Manhattan to be born?

Anyway: I initially had a huge readmore section on this post but I think I’ll leave this Fevered Declaration standing as my solitary Reaction, and write separate posts for my specific thoughts instead, to eventually be all linked together so it isn’t solitary at all.

ANYWAY!

GO READ THIS BOOK! WHEN YOU HAVE TIME!! AND THE MONEY AND OR LIBRARY ACCESS TO ACQUIRE IT!!!

I’m not even really sure if you need to read Gideon the Ninth first to get it, though I absolutely would recommend doing so since it’s a fun and meritorious read in its own right, and for its own reasons.

[abigail-pent]

look. I hate this as much as you're all going to, but if I'm right (and if @lost-islands is right) and John's "damned thing" is dealing a final killing blow to a planet that was going to die anyway, killing the 10 billion people who were on it in order to snatch some kind of vengeance-based victory out of the jaws of death, thereby creating necromancy and RBs and Lyctors, then that is actually a *perfect* parallel to Gideon's death by fence in GTN.

it also gives context to Wake's note: "the only thing our civilization can learn from yours is that when our backs are to the wall and our towers are burning all around us and we are watching ourselves burn, we rarely become heroes."

so yes -- I am convinced that John and Alecto ascended prior to the Damnable Thing, per that @theriverbeyond post, but I don't think it's the case that they were alone on earth at that time. after all, if they were alone on earth -- how old would those thighs have to be? no, I think there were still 10 billion people hanging on, probably on the Earth's surface since the trillionaires did not have the ethos of saving everybody. and John realizes, like Gideon later will, that sometimes there is no way out except to die quickly and use your death for something. so he prepares to die, and takes the planet with him, except the bond with Alecto (Lyctorhood) saves him somehow, and creates a new world. maybe I was wrong that the nuclear reaction is the quick death of Earth; maybe it's that John punched a wormhole in this dimension, opening up access to the River. (there is, after all, an interview somewhere with tazmuir about wormholes and their importance to the story.) I just think the parallel with Gideon is too compelling for it to be any other way.

ok so the whole first generation of Lyctors were people John knew pre-Resurrection. they were his coworkers in the cryo lab. and Alecto was present before the Resurrection.

Earth died, first slowly (climate change that inspired the cryo project and the wealthy men's spaceships), and then all at once (nuclear chain reaction, leaving ash in the air as they sit on the beach eating meat and drinking seawater, probably thinking they would die). So there can still be an Earth RB, potentially.

But I'm less convinced now that John caused the death of the solar system.

[thunderon]

(via @etherealacademia)

#oooh yeah this is so good#my thinking has always been that it's alecto in gideon's body for a few reasons#(sorry for just. firing off in the tags to this post! sorry!)#1. gideon's body is most likely in some sense 'alive' but not occupied -- since her soul is very much still in harrow#but based on the fact that she seems to be unkillable i don't know if it's out of the question to say that her body probably healed and#in some sense started functioning again post-GTN#which as we know from HTN would make it vulnerable to colum asht-type possession#2. given that her body is presumably with BOE (it was taken from canaan house before john got there -- presumably went with cam + corona +#+ judith who we know to be with BOE -- mercymorn saw it and she was working with BOE) and BOE definitely have a Thing about opening the#tomb (either the one on the ninth or the one on the first lol!) i don't think it's _out of the question_ that alecto could get in there#3. (this is assuming that ac-ld's ninth house tomb not containing alecto theory is right which i think it is) -- it's also possible that#her body is possessed by whatever's in the 9th tomb -- likely anastasia -- bc that also behaves like a ghost eg. running away when RB7#starts closing in#but given that the book is called _alecto_ the ninth i feel like it being alecto seems more likely. who the hell knows though dude#also -- and this is a VERY tenuous connection. and i also have not read the aeneid in four years. so. take with a grain of salt --#in the aeneid alecto tries to bring about the downfall of the trojans by taking the form of queen amata#so this idea of alecto taking someone else's body in order to enact her will is classically consistent#but also that's tenuous because i mean like that happens very very often in classical lit. it's a flimsy connection lol#anyway i am in no sense 100% sold on my own theory here and am gonna be Watching this post for others -- i'm just throwing my reasoning out#there is probably a much sounder explanation than 'gideon probably has an available body and alecto probably wants it' but! (via @cristabel-oct)

hope yall dont mind me throwing your takes on here but i thought both were good stuff! i am here for the theories!

Okay so. If gideon is the narrator in the epilogue of htn, what has happened to her memory? Why would Camilla at least not know who she is? They give her bones AND the sword as a way to puzzle it out so like. Does that mean the eyes in Harrows body are heterochromatic, one gideon eye and one harrow eye? The Body saves gideon at the end, and harrow takes up The Body's revenant bubble in the river...could it be Alecto inside there but just. Memory gone from squishing herself inside an already overly occupied body? Is the combination of a soul battery built from an actual demigod and a body created from hundreds of dead souls not be the perfect and possibly only human body that Alecto, God's demise and devil equivalent, could possess? I have so many questions!!

ah the epilogue of htn, my most beloathed chapter! im assuming you probably saw this old post of mine that puts myself in the "gideon is the narrator" camp cuz of some ~parallels~.

disclaimer: since that original post, my confidence in that theory has been shaken and ive considered other possibilities. but since it's still my preferred outcome (cuz i love gideon) let's go through it anyways!

Why would Camilla at least not know who she is? They give her bones AND the sword as a way to puzzle it out so like. Does that mean the eyes in Harrows body are heterochromatic, one gideon eye and one harrow eye?

the heterochromia IS one possibility for why camilla wouldnt know who it is. but also consider this brain teaser:

- if harrow’s lobotomy failed, harrow absorbs gideon's soul and becomes a true lyctor, meaning her body would then have gold eyes. - if harrow’s lobotomy succeeded (which it did), gideon pilots harrow's body,,,, which will now have gold eyes.

from sight alone, how would you tell who is piloting harrow's body? you wouldn't be able to! in fact, if you look at a chart i made here, why DOES gideon have her own eyes when both pyrrha and camilla have their respective necromancer's eye colors?? it doesnt make sense!!!

leading right on from that, not being able to tell if it's gideon or harrow would make perfect sense to why camilla is giving them both bones AND a sword. like "are you the necro or the cav"?

If gideon is the narrator in the epilogue of htn, what has happened to her memory?

now this is like, 100% speculation. regardless of who we suppose the narrator actually is, i dont really think we have been given enough evidence to actually theorize the reason for memory loss regardless of who you believe it is (gideon, the body, harrow, alecto, etc). so, uh, if you dont mind major conjecture ill give you my “uh mayb this could happen?” thoughts.

uhhh possible griddlehark teacher-style mix-and-match? teacher supposedly didnt recognize cytherea (or at least didnt do anything about it) so mayb he had memory issues?? memory loss side effect??? idk lol.

but you brought up some really good points in your ask!!!!! >

The Body saves gideon at the end, and harrow takes up The Body's revenant bubble in the river...could it be Alecto inside there but just. Memory gone from squishing herself inside an already overly occupied body? Is the combination of a soul battery built from an actual demigod and a body created from hundreds of dead souls not be the perfect and possibly only human body that Alecto, God's demise and devil equivalent, could possess? I have so many questions!!

like, shit, maybe! who knows! playing musical chairs with bodies and souls in this universe im sure could have "memory loss" as a possible side effect lol. i dont think tazmuir gave us much of anything else to go on with that respect! anyways anything can happen.

but gideons been our narrator for the last two books and im keeping my fingers crossed and am manifesting her as the narrator for a third time!