#galaxy stern

[james-farrow-did-nothing-wrong]

Leigh Bardugo said today at an event that all the diverse characters she portrays come naturally at her because the world is diverse. She's not looking for a black character, a disabled one nor a queer one, they are just part of the world so they are part of the worlds she creates. She also said that what is not normal is having a story full of white hetero and abled people, reality is diverse and so are her stories.

When she was explaining this she had to stop a few times because the auditorium kept cheering at her. Hope she felt all the love the audience was trying to show.

[purplebass]

2024 books - hell bent by leigh bardugo (alex stern #2)

Welcome home. Welcome back. We missed you. I missed you more than I should have, more than I wanted to. I went to hell for you. I’d do it again.

[rosiethorns88]

Dropping the latest Sketch-a-Wish, voted on by my lovely Patreon members for January! Featuring a tense scene from Hell Bent by Leigh Bardugo!

Spoilers for Hell Bent below!

This is one of the few examples of me putting in the WORK for the background, only because it's such a character itself. Il Bastone is a real world setting from Ninth House / Hell Bent, and even though they are scant, there were luckily a few interior photos available for me to reference to create the Virgil bedroom, where Alex and Darlington are having a tense conversation in this scene. I took some liberties on the design but a lot of the structures, accents and patterns were either pulled from the interiors or exterior facade of the Anderson Mansion. (especially the stained glass windows and painted tile fireplace!).

I spent a ridiculous amount of time on the painting over the fireplace to capture a small world-building segment from Hell Bent that I think has a modest symbolism of Alex's and Darlington's new relationship here. A fun little puzzle for those who want to try to research it!

[twobitzz]

i love when authors write women who engage in self destructive behavior to claw their way to esteem in an elitist environment when they already have twice the character and skill than those around them

[she-posts-nerdy-stuff]

“How was Spain?” “Hotter than expected”

Oh this man, I love this man

[i-read-and-then-i-draw]

“He’d told himself he was giving her a chance, being fair to this girl who had washed up on his shore. But he’d let himself think of her as someone who had made all of the wrong choices and stumbled down the wrong path.

It hadn’t occurred to him that she was being chased.”

another year, another reread of Ninth House

[academtits]

Darlingstern moments that play in a ceaseless loop in my head, Vol. I

The fact that Alex was sweaty as fuck the first time they met and made Darlington roll up her sleeve to check for track marks

Darlingtons prudish shock when Alex takes her shirt off in front of him

The fact that they got shitfaced and broke a bunch of Lethe glassware??? Like she got Mr. Lethe to be like “fuck the rules”? And they passed out in the parlor???

Alex’s foot/hand/arm fetish

When Darlington complimented her Queen Mab costume, then said “didn’t someone say love is a shared delusion?” And “two people reciting the same spell”

Darlington getting annoyed when some guy hits on her

The “incident”

His heart hurting for the wanting of someone

The fact that Alex literally has constant imaginary conversations with him and everything reminds her of him and she always assesses how he would feel about her actions

[lilithh6]

okay but why are Ninth House and Hell Bent literally so underrated????????? i need to find my people to lose our mind together over darlingstern

[butchcaseyjones]

i love the ninth house fanart where dawes looks beautiful and put together but cmon. look me in the eyes. she's got debilitating anxiety, can't talk to people, and has been writing the same dissertation for six years. this is how i pictured her for the entire book (affectionate)

[breathofstorm]

This is where you belong. This is where you were meant to bloom. Don't roll your eyes, Galaxy. Not every flower belongs in every garden.

— Leigh Bardugo, Ninth House.

[slightlysadfilter]

There is something so comforting about Ninth House by Leigh Bardugo, despite the abundance of trauma, gore and eerie stuff.

Take Il Bastone; the existence itself of a sentient house that worries about you, in a world where magic is grotesque and raw.

Dawes's warming meals.

The architecture! The beauty of New Haven, the art.

For how fucked it is, you never see Alex complaining because she has met worse. Because even among demons, and bloody rituals, and uptight professors, she's at least surrounded by beauty and comfort. That same feeling passes unto the readers, it truly is magical to read Ninth House.

[flashbastardsramblings]

Hell Bent posed a very important question which is “Is Darlington still fuckable now that he's part demon?” To which the answer is, of course, yes.

[toads-treasures]

Hi hello I devoured Ninth House and Hell Bent by Leigh Bardugo in approximately 72 hours and I don’t think I’ll ever stop thinking about Them.

[daughter-of-lethe]

Ninth House 3

[zarasaurus-studios]

“You killed them,” he said. “All of them. Leonard Beacon. Mitchell Betts. Helen Watson. Hellie.”

The silence stretched. But all she said was, “Not Hellie.”

[wingedshadowfan]

obsessed with how we started from alex being unable to understand 99% of darlington's references and feeling like a total imposter (which she was), and we reached

She wasn’t sailing through her classes, but she was passing, a steady stream of Cs and Bs, a cascade of hard-won mediocrity.

followed by

I’ll beat thee, but I should infect my hands. Alex couldn’t remember what it was from, but she was tempted to text it to Eitan.

and then later

“My heels are fetter’d, but my fist is free,” she whispered to no one. Or to Darlington, she supposed. Samson Agonistes. But he wasn’t there to be impressed by her Milton.

and finally

“You didn’t let the demon in the door. Sandow did. The societies did. When the time came, you stood between the living and the dead. Hoplite, hussar, dragoon, remember?” “You’ve been paying attention. I’m both delighted and unnerved.”

immediately followed by

He’d been prepared to speak, a quote from … His demon mind couldn’t manage it. He remembered Alex with her book of poems. Hart Crane. He grasped at the words.