#gangseys all here

[squash1]

the dreamer trilogy is for the people who are left behind. it is so deeply personal i cannot even articulate it.

[billdenbrough]

fundamentally disinterested in the recurring discourse about kevin's drinking that aims to a) make it his Specific Problem To Focus On And Overcome when it is a crutch and coping mechanism to get him through a Much Bigger Problem (emotional fallout he can't square with by himself, culture shock, trauma, loss of his extremely wildly co-dependent relationship w riko, losing the structure of the nest, mourning a future he was meant to have, processing a grave injustice, anger and fear and desperate grief, all of which is his Actual Specific Fox Problem) while he builds himself back up, and b) thinks that even if it is a problem (more on that later), it's the foxes' problem to deal with.

like. it's just not.

yeah, he doesn't drink until he meets them. they gave him that habit, and in traditional terms, they're (the monsters specifically) a 'bad influence'. but these are the foxes. this is kevin day, son of exy, whose meteor is crashing spectacularly through no fault of his own. there are no traditional terms to be found here. the framework for it literally doesn't exist. neil comes into the foxes with more conventional expectations—appalled at the athletes' substance use, his horror at matt's trip to columbia, his steadfast and early repeated stance that none of the foxes should let andrew treat them the way he does, and certainly not nicky—and tends to engage with them less as the series goes on and he folds himself into the foxes. the thing about the foxes is that they've all been in pits deeper than they are tall. and some of them got a helping hand on the way—erik, andrew's extreme intervention methods, stephanie walker—and wymack was always waiting for them on the other side, ready to throw down a rope, but all the foxes dragged themselves out of their own holes. often not alone, often not without assistance, but at the end of the day, they have to do it.

there's that line neil has about aaron in that scene that got deleted when the timeline shifted around, when he thinks about how aaron got this far in life on his own, surviving on willpower and sheer desperation. that applies to aaron in a way that's a little more acute than some of the rest of them—boy who doesn't let the foxes in bc of andrew, boy who doesn't let nicky in bc he doesn't know how, boy made of flinching and seeking an escape and grieving the one who hurt him—but is broadly true for the foxes en masse.

this isn't to say the foxes can't help each other, but it's not their job. it just isn't. they'll keep kevin alive, keep him safe, keep him flanked and contained within their ranks. they'll fight tooth and nail in this battle with him, fight to get him to that championship game, fight to get that trophy in his hands. but that's all they've agreed to. that's all they're responsible for, in this covenant they've made with him. he says they can make this happen, and they're going to get him to that final game, but it's up to him what state he's in when he gets there.

like. they're foxes. they've been triaging their whole lives. they hate each other and they hate everyone else more. they're the kids with their backs up against the wall. half of them are addicts. i don't think kevin is comparable, personally; he's getting through a horrific situation with a coping mechanism. that's not the same thing as battling yourself to stop using. but that's not really the point of this. what i'm getting at here is that to the foxes, it's easy math: kevin who can lean on vodka and andrew and wymack and the foxes to stay upright when he's not ready to stand on his own two feet is still a kevin who is standing. a kevin with one less piece of scaffolding to lean on is a kevin who falls over, a kevin at risk of complete collapse, a kevin one phone call away from running back to the master, a kevin one crucial loss away from not ever making it back to himself at all. they're triaging. this is low on the totem pole of things they have the room to care about. they very much have bigger problems, both individually and even just kevin-related. if alcohol makes seeing the boy he knew best in the world and moved in tandem with his whole life and who destroyed their entire legacy and his entire life in one move — if alcohol makes facing that boy easier to stomach, then, fuck, why would they take that away? they're foxes. they've all got their demons. this is what kevin needs this year and a half to let him face his, that's all. they can understand that. it doesn't have to be pretty, as long as it keeps him in the fight. that's the priority.

i think there's absolutely space to explore this in fic and art and fandom in a way that maybe does explore it as a Problem, both that it's an active problem for kevin & that it's something to explore other foxes helping him with (there's a t&n fic that i've been gnawing at the bit to read for months that seems poised to explore this premise, and that's super up my alley)! i just think we're in different territory when we're talking about the series—and its characters and dynamics—in a conversational rather than transformational way, and end up talking about this like the foxes are responsible for kevin's choices. i love kevin day. i read these back at the start of 2015 & he's so dear to me that loving him was the blueprint for how i feel abt kageyama. but it's been pretty weird to see how the conversation has been translating Loving Kevin Day into... thinking the foxes are doing wrong by him with respect to this in actual canon. like that's just not how it operates there

[remusfinglupin]

Noah Kahan’s music and The Raven Cycle have the same vibes. I can’t explain it, they just do.

[theravenkin]

y'all should gimme some fluffy drabble prompts to get me through finals :)

[miseria-fortes-viros]

-> declan bringing ashley to monmouth. ashley, the raven boys, chapter 4. (we’re meant to look pretty for her.)

this is one of the first chapters where we really get to know a lot about our characters, and ashley being there—combined with adam suddenly being aware that they are observed when it’s clear he didn’t feel that way immediately preceding the start of the book—lead me to believe that the fourth wall is very thin here.

-> ashley, this is noah, can you see him?

ashley is one of the only characters outside of the gangsey themselves who is not only able to see noah but also to meet and interact with him.

-> (your hands are cold. (i’ve been dead for seven years.))

ashley is also the first person that noah says this to within the confines of the narrative himself. nobody is surprised when he says this, so clearly he does make these jokes a lot, but it’s significant that we, the reader, hear this for the first time when it’s directed at ashley—ashley who, like us, just got here and doesn’t (can’t) know the significance of this interaction until after everything is over.

-> adam. (don’t you feel observed? someone is looking in when they weren’t before.) the raven boys, chapter 4.

adam: wary, adam: watchful. adam feels the eyes of the reader when the others do not; adam becomes aware of us as soon as we become aware of him. no sooner is ashley named than adam is introduced; no sooner is ashley introduced than adam is wary of her.

ashley (f, gaelic: aislinn): dream, vision

-> (three ashleys) (three brothers) (three witches) (nine’s very three plus three plus three) (6:21) (3+3:+3)

-> declan started hating me first. it was all because declan loved ronan.

-> this is not the first time

declan lynch was 18 the first time matthew fell asleep (was ronan dead)

-> gansey. where’s ronan? i don’t know. something’s wrong. something’s happened to him. how do you know? i can’t explain. i don’t know. we fought. something’s wrong

he’s your dog, gansey (i can’t help him any more (i’m killing him and i don’t know how to stop))

-> he trusted gansey (he still worried about ronan (he never stopped worrying about ronan))

i want you to meet ashley. yes again it’s a different ashley (i need to check in with you) is ronan around? he shouldn’t be (we’ll fight if he’s there (i need to know how he’s doing (he’ll hate me more for hovering)))

-> ronan please just tell me it won’t happen again i’m doing everything i can to keep you both alive

the brothers lynch (a dreamer (a dream (declan)))

-> half none of declan’s surviving family was real. half a dreamer. half a dream. to lose one is to lose the other (part of ronan died when niall did (part of ronan died when his dreamer did))

ronan lynch was 18 when a demon nearly unmade him (the second time matthew fell asleep (the second time declan almost lost them both at once (was ronan dead)))

-> declan cannot let go (if he lets go who will hang on (who will live without him fighting tooth and nail to keep them))

matthew lynch was 18 when he punched his eldest brother in the face (matthew lynch was 18 the third time declan almost became the last living lynch)

-> was ronan dead

declan bringing ashley to monmouth. ashley, the raven boys, chapter 4. ashley (f, gaelic: aislinn): dream, vision. three ashleys. three brothers. three dreamers. three sleepers. three witches. three murders. nine’s very three plus three plus three

(i look just like my father (so do you (every time i see your blood on my knuckles i remember him dead in the driveway (every time i look at you i see the face of a dead man))))

-> was ronan dead

declan brings ashley to monmouth.

[one-squash-one-end]

I wrote a giant Raven Cycle analysis

Hi! Over the last year or so I've been working on a sort of essay about various themes in the raven cycle series, and I finally finished it a few weeks ago.

It is titled: "Why I love The Raven Cycle - An excessive analysis of the themes of friendship, queerness and growing up".

And since tumblr loves its meta (and bc I love peer validation) I've decided to start uploading it bit by bit here, making this the masterpost (if I can figure out the logistics of the linking lmao, bear with me)

(beware of spoilers up to greywaren starting at like 3b!)

Introduction

What even is the Raven Cycle?

Trust me, the characters are queer as fuck and I can prove it a) Blue Sargent b) Gansey c) Adam Parrish d) Ronan Lynch e) Noah f) Henry Cheng g) Honorary mentions

The Gangsey is a polycule

Analyzing the reoccurring themes a) Friendship b) Being a teen/growing up c) (Found) Family d) Magic (as a metaphor) e) Further themes I appreciate

Drawing a conclusion

Click here to start with the introductory parts!

1. Introduction

So here’s the thing: I love fiction almost as much as I love my friends. There’s something deeply comforting about the escapism, even if the book actually makes me want to scream and throw it on the floor (only one book has been thrown so far, I promise!).  Fiction is a healthy thing to occupy my thoughts with: headcanons! Quotes being on loop in my brain! Just fandoms!

And for me, if I am hooked on a book (series), it does not even need a good plot where a lot of things happen. In fact, I would say that my enjoyment of a book is made up of 30% plot and about 70% characters and vibes. If the characters are bland, if they do not make me feel much emotion, it likely won’t be more than 4 stars (additional info: I am way too nice rating books!). I really, really need to love the characters, to be able to relate to some aspects of them, or it just won’t become an obsession.

Since I have already started explaining that a bit, let’s look at this question: What is important to make a book special to me? 1. I need to cry reading it. 2. I have to think about it often, even weeks to months after having read it. 3. Obviously, I need to love the characters. 4. I need to be in the fandom! This can be hard with some books, but the internet is a whimsical space allowing you to find at least a small number of people who are obsessed with a work of fiction to a similar extent as you are.

Now, why am I elaborating on this so much? It’s because The Raven Cycle did all that for me. It is my favorite comfort book series at the moment, for all those aspects mentioned, but of course I cannot just leave it at that. No, I wrote a whole-ass analysis on headcanons and some of its themes. You’re welcome.

2. What even is The Raven Cycle?

The Raven Cycle is all I adore and live for (next to my friends). So, naturally, it’s a book series, specifically a four book young adult contemporary fantasy series by American author Maggie Stiefvater. The books in question are: The Raven Boys (2012), The Dream Thieves (2013), Blue Lily, Lily Blue (2014) and The Raven King (2016), and yes I will admit that the publishing dates are a bit of a red flag. There is also the very relevant follow-up series called The Dreamer Trilogy (Call Down The Hawk, Mister Impossible, Greywaren), but it’s a lot less easy to get into that here as I do not know these entire books by heart, so I’ll stick to the original tetralogy here.

To stick to red flags, the books are set in the fictional Henrietta, a rural town in non-fictional Virginia, US, in the 2010s. However, that doesn’t really say *that* much about the plot, so let me summarize that really quick, because I can do better than the official synopsis! (Or let’s pretend I can.)

Blue Sargent comes from a family of psychics, yet she does not have any powers of her own. Even worse, she is a bit of an amplifier for the others, meaning she is always somehow but never directly involved in the business. As if that isn’t enough for an identity crisis, every psychic she has ever met has told her that her kiss would kill her true love. Yikes.

But because she is that amplifier, she comes to a church watch on St. Mark’s Eve, where psychics see the spirits of those to die within the following year. It’s important business, but to her it’s really just staring into the dark. Until she does actually see a spirit: That of Gansey. Of course this is not a coincidence. No, to add to this teen’s mount of problems, there are only two reasons why a non-seer would see someone’s spirit: They are their true love, or they killed them. Or, in Blue’s case, maybe both.

The aforementioned Gansey is Henrietta’s Golden Boy, the son of politicians (read: he’s fucking loaded). He does not run with the Republicans though, he runs with dead Welsh kings, meaning he has been searching for the probably dead, presumably sleeping Welsh king Glendower (*1350; †1416; yikes) for the past like seven years. Why the fuck would he do that? Well, legend says that he will grant a wish to whoever wakes him, and our favorite PTSD-ridden guy really wants that favor.

Aiding him are fellow Aglionby students Adam Parrish, Ronan Lynch and Noah Czerny, plus Henry Cheng, though only a lot later in the series, but I really did not want to leave out that menace (affectionately) here. The paths of Blue and the boys cross because of Gansey’s search for Glendower, plus the fact that Blue works at a popular pizza place, but that’s a lot less whimsical. And, well, there’s the implication that Gansey might also be her true love, but perhaps she just kills him because of his bad fashion sense, it would be justified. Anyway, in true Famous Five fashion (Ronan is the dog; I won’t elaborate, the girls that get it, get it) they are of course not the only ones searching for the king, so it’s not completely a wholesome friend bonding activity all the way through.

Be prepared for: friendship and growing up, lots of treasure hunting, family mysteries, magical forests, illegal and slightly distasteful activities (our favorite of course), but most of all, heavily queer-coded (or even canonically queer) characters. Be Gay, Do Crime.

[cabeswaterdrowned]

(first was going to do all different trcverse ot3 options but there are too many so we’re starting here. similarly not including ot4 ot6 etc because too many options and I think ot6 would sweep, thus limiting to triads)

@immaterial-pearl @faewaren @romantichopelessly @catacombchrysalis @dykenav @unsettling-type-of-vibe @cowboykinggansey @robobee @crimeronan @summersinyourblood

[adamsrcnan]

I just had a vision. Walk with me here. Now i'm not sure if anyone has floated this idea before. But i would pay Maggie Stiefvater good money (i'm talking gooood money) to write about what actually happened to Glendower. For example, show me the battles he was fighting, the relationship with Gwenllian. When she stabbed the poet to prevent war and it back fired. Artemus. Just like all of Artemus and the tir e e'lintes. Glendower (i was fully abt to type Gansey lol) and his men carrying his body across the sea and across the fields (the same ones the gangsey would later be exploring) when the shield was left behind and fell to the bottom of a lake (maybe it wasn't even a lake then) what was cabeswater before it was cabeswater as we know it. How did they find the caves?? How did they build the tombs. The valley of bones they found. Gwenllian being sealed in her tomb. Glendower being laid to rest in his. The demon!!! The magic going wrong. How did the other body they found die??? What did Artemus do?? Why did he hide??

I need the whole story and how neat would it be if the characters acted as foils or parallels to the gangsey. Like how they say Gansey was a lot like Glendower but Glendower had flaws or parts of his story that Gansey did not approve of. So we could have like Glendower's knights and magicians etc paralleling Blue, Adam, Ronan, Noah and Henry. Do you see my vision????

All i'm saying is...it could really Be something

[crimeronan]

kitkat, consider this thought i had- gangsey polycule mermaid au. adam is basically his canon self, small town boy working at a local boat and jet ski mechanic's place, trying to save up enough to afford a way out of town, when he meets obscenely wealthy tourist boy gansey who's here to find mermaids, which adam totally doesn't believe exist until they both stumble upon sharkboy ronan, who's washed up during a storm. the three of them then meet blue, the local psychic's daughter who is half mermaid on her mysterious missing dad's side, as well as noah, who is (as is canon) a ghost, and definitely not that local boy who died like twenty years ago and whose murder has never been solved and is true crime podcast catnip. they all fall in love, and the overarching plot is about saving the local beach from developers who want to build an elaborate and environmentally catastrophic beach resort for the ultra-rich

REALLY GOOD. i assume henry must be brought in as the son of one of the ultra-rich developers who is supposed to spy on the locals but is won over to their cause. whose mother nonetheless has a strange affinity for mermaids that she won't explain.

[lizpaige]

Hi!!! Your I live by your headcanons and prompts, I need all of them written stat.

But you have any favorite/recs for pynch breakup/makeup AUs?

hiiiiii anon! thanks for the kind words and the ask!

i love breakup/makeup fics this is my second favorite trope right under outsider POV fics. I feel like there aren't enough of these in this fandom or maybe they just have different tags than the ones I'm searching for. I'm dying for a messy divorce fic. please someone, anyone write this.

anyway, here are some recs:

The Ties That Bind by pinkhorizon "Six years ago, Adam left Henrietta—and Ronan—in the rearview. When Gansey and Blue announce that they're getting married on the other side of the country, Adam gets stuck driving from Virginia to California with the one person he never planned to see again." 💬 Anything by pinkhorizon is great and this just was so good in its awkwardness and yearning and bah I wanna reread it now.

if prayer were the answer, I'd fall on my knees by sprigsofviolets "It’s Bare: A Pop Opera, but Ronan is Peter and Adam is Jason. Or, if you haven’t heard of the musical, it’s basically the gangsey at Catholic school with a lot of drama." 💬 I LOOOOOVE Bare and am a musical girlie so this hit the spot.

come morning light by perchancetosleep This is a wip but updates post every Tuesday and Fridays. It's a Marauders!AU which I am a sucker for. We've got Remus!Adam and Sirius!Ronan drama around the big prank. I run to my inbox to read updates here. messy and heart-wrenching.

Where does the good go? by Daisyapples after a messy breakup pynch are reunited to be godparents to a new blusey baby 🥰 fluff, lots of drama but of course a happy ending

The Only Time I Miss You Is Every Single Day by Zee Pynch break up and then Ronan visits Adam at Harvard. They fall back into their friend shenanigans and then admit some feels. super cute!

Cold Dark Earth by EtoileGarden If you haven't already read every EtoileGarden fic (they are all gold), then please do yourself a favor and do that now. This is a fave - pynch are broken up, Adam is engaged, Gansey trying to bring them back together, it's sooooo good! Such a fun read!

Honestly I'm probably forgetting a bunch that I love, so plsplspls share your own!

[squash1]

unguibus et rostro

“claw and beak” / “tooth and nail”

ronan lynch, i love you.

[ch-mrgt]

So here I was, rereading all of the Raven Cycle, and for the first time, I could annotate them because I bought physical version (so happy!!!).

And I thought : I have so many annotations rn, I could post things that myself I like to read from others on Tumblr.

So here it is, because I am going to do all the tomes, beginning by the first one.

[mossynebula]

TRC as songs from Unreal Unearth (Hozier)

EXTREMLY long post but I think its worth reading, Buckle up!!

Ronan: (De Selby part 1)

"At last when all of the world is asleep"

"to the bliss of not knowin' yourself"

"Bhfuilis soranna sorcha Ach tagais 'nós na hoíche, Trína chéile" (You’re all bright ease But you come on like night Entangled)

Kavinsky: (De Selby part 2)

"I wanna run against the world thats turning"

"I wanna run so far, I'd beat the morning"

"I dont need to know where we begin and end"

Prokopenko: (First Time)

"And the soul, if that's what you'd call it, Uneasy ally of the body"

" And some part of me must have died, the first time that you called me baby, and some part of me came alive the first time that you called me baby"

"but fighting off like all creation, the absence of itself"

Gansey: (Francesca)

"My life was a storm since I was born"

"I'd tell them put me back in it"

"I would still be suprised I could find you Darlin', in any life"

Skovron: ( I, Carrion (Icarian))

"If the wind turns, if I hit a squall, Allow the ground to find it's brutal way to me"

"If these heights should bring my fall, Let me be your own, Icarian carrion"

" I only pray, don't fall away from me"

Jiang: (Eat Your Young)

" Let me wrap my teeth around the world"

"put in front of the table, sellin' bombs and gun"

" You can't buy this, fineness, let me see the heat get to you"

Adam and Blue: (Damage Gets Done)

" Without shame, two outfits to my name"

" I heard once, it's the comforts that make us feel numb"

" You and I had nothing to show but the best of the world in the palm of our hands"

"If the car ran, the car was enough"

" That first car was like wings on an angel"

"But I know being reckless and young, is not how the damage gets done"

Swan: (Who We Are)

"Gettin' through still has a cost"

"To hold me like water, or christ, hold me like a knife"

"Chasing someone else's dream"

Noah: (All Things End)

"If there was anyone to ever get through this life, with their heart still intact, they didn't do it right"

" All that we intend, is scrawled in sand, it slips right through our hand"

"Never watched my future darken in a single tear"

(The entire choir section)

Declan: (To someone from a warmer climate)

"Uiscefhuaraithe" (water-cooled)

"all my dreamin', is only put to shame"

"There are some things that no-one teaches you, love That God in his awful wisdom first programs in"

Matthew: (Butchered Tongue)

"As a child, it was the place names Singin' at me as the first thing How the mouth must be employed in every corner of itself To say "Appalacicola" or "Hushpukena, " like "Gweebarra" A promise softly sung of somewhere else"

"But feel at home, hearin' a music that few still understand A butchered tongue still singin' here above the ground"

"And have your guarded heart be lifted like a child up by the hand In some town that just means "Home" to them With no translator left to sound"

Lynch Brothers: (Anything But)

"I'd fit all my joys and my pleasures in one perfect day I wish I was the sunlight, just sitting on the Mississippi I'd settle for a shopping trolley in the Liffey"

"I don't wanna be anything But I would do anything just to run away I don't wanna be anything like this at all"

"Look, I wanna be loud, so loud, I'm talking seismic I wanna be soft as a single stone in a rainstick I wanna be the thunder of a hundred thousand hooves moving quick If I was a stampede, you wouldn't get a kick I wanna be the shadow when my bright future's behind me I wanna be the last thing anybody ever sees"

Fox Way: (Abstract (Psychopomp))

"The feeling came late I'm still glad I met you"

"The memory hurts But does me no harm Your hand in my pocket To keep us both warm The poor thing in the road Its eye still glistening The cold wet of your nose The Earth from a distance"

"The speed that you moved The screech of the cars The creature still moving That slowed in your arms The fear in its eyes Gone out in an instant Your tear caught the light"

Gangsey and Dream pack: (First Light)

"Your eyes open, at first a thousand miles away But turning, shoot a silver bullet point-blank range And I can scarce believe what I'm believing in Could this be how every day begins?"

"The sky set to burst The gold and the rust The colour erupts You filling my cup The sun coming up

Like I lived my whole life Before the first light"

"One bright morning goes so easy Darkness always finds you either way It creeps into the corners as the moment fades A voice your body jumps to calling out your name But after this I'm never gonna be the same And I am never going back again"

[constellama]

ohoho time to cry

Llama reads TRC: Chapters 1-10 of The Dream Thieves

Prologue

Reminder that I’ve been spoiled on some things from this series

OHHH so that’s how he gets the keys

It’s so sad to see how quickly Ronan fell apart after his dad died :(

Chapter 1

Well that’s one way to open a chapter !!

“Don’t feminists have big muscles?” Gansey.

Ik Blue is gonna end up with Gansey eventually but seeing her fight so hard to love Adam is so :(((

Maybe I’m being presumptuous cuz I still haven’t finished the series but I think it’s messed up how Adam literally loses everything and he doesn’t even get the girl he likes :(

“Good thinking, maggot.” 😭????

NOAH

Sorry Noah can literally do anything and I’ll be screaming and crying I literally love him

Chapter 2

Declan ??? Oh my God is he gonna be the in between chapters

WHO THE HELL IS THE GRAY MAN

Me when I take 17 Benadryl and start seeing the gray man

what the hell is the Greywaren

Uh oh

Chapter 3

Ronan why do you know what gasoline tastes like

Ooo a man made lake,,, my brain is making theories perhaps

It seems like Ronan is a bit?? Salty?? about Adam waking up the ley line

Kavinsky?? Wait wasn’t this guy mentioned in the first book? Oh god is he gonna be reoccurring

“Him! He’s not a dirtbag. He’s an a-hole.” ok Blue !! Slay!!

Chapter 4

Ok so obviously this guy was hired to find some kind of relic that lets people take things from dreams,,,

So this guy is looking for whatever Ronan has. Although I don’t think Ronan has a relic that lets him do what he does.

DOES THAT MEAN RONAN IS THE RELIC?

I’m not being insane here right. That’s like a reasonable theory

Chapter 5

I absolutely love the descriptions in Ronan’s chapters, especially about his dreams ough

Ooo weird dream box ok

Loving the way Gansey and Ronan talk to each other it’s so funny to me

Chapter 6

Am I mean for thinking Orla is annoying. Idk I just really don’t like her

Blue is barely five feet tall,,, she really is just like me fr,,,

Blue :(

Blue is so relatable to me I love her

OK OMG Idk if it’s just me but the “it’s a wizard in a box.” “It will do your homework,” “And it’s been dating your girlfriend,” “Are you all drunk?” really reminds me of the “What’s the best way to steal a man’s wallet?” bit from Six of Crows. More evidence that the crows and gangsey (that’s what they’re called right?) would be best friends

See are you guys picking up what I’m putting down

What does Ronan know that the others don’t,,,

Blue once again slaying

Ew Kavinsky

what. what. wait. Am I being insane or does Kavinsky have the same powers as Ronan does. What.

“Is this how Noah feels?” WHA TIF I THREW U P

Chapter 7

oh THIS GUY AGAIN

oh ok that’s not ominous whatsoever

him?? please don’t tell me that means Gansey uh oh

Wait no because Gansey wouldn’t terrorize old ladies

Kavinsky ?? Maybe??

Oh so the Gray Man has a backstory,,

Chapter 8

oh God Adam chapter brace yourselves

“It was nothing, but it was Adam Parrish’s nothing” cmon we barely started the chapter :((((

Adam actually loves Blue sm I’m gonna cry

“What do you want, Adam?” “To feel awake when my eyes are open.” DAMN. WOW. OK damn I. Alright. I need a minute wow.

OK we’re back

“This was easier when we didn’t know each other” please stop my heart can only take so much <3

DO NOT KISS. DONT

BLUE. PLEASE JUST TELL HIM

PLEASE

THIS PART

OW???

“No more. Please, I can’t take any more.” Tears in my eyes Adam Parrish please spare me

OH??

YEAHHH SOMETHING HAPPY FOR ADAM FINALLY

“I don’t want your pity.” Uh oh

UH OH

ADAM

Blue is once again slaying but I’m a little concerned about Adam bc WHAT

“Was this what he fought every time he remembered I existed?” I have some very choice words for Maggie Stiefvater rn 😁 /lhj

wwwwhat

what’s happening to Adam I’m concerned for this boy

I need a shirt that says “I survived chapter 8 of The Dream Thieves” good lord

Chapter 9

Ofc they’re loitering bc they’re bored

Just silly guys doing silly things

It’s on page 69 too

Ronan. Ronan are you ok

CRYING AT THIS??

NOAH MY BELOVED

I LOVE HIM

“‘Glitter,’ whispered Noah reverentially, giving it a shake.” I’m so emotional about Noah Czerny I need a minute

I’m not gonna survive when Something happens to him oh God

IT WAS RONAN WHO HELPED ADAM

aw

WHAT

NOAH

Ronan is still mad at Gansey for,,, holding nothing against Adam?? Or treating him the same?? Not sure why Ronan’s so upset yet still helps Adam out,,,

OH?? WHAT DOES NOAH KNOW??

“It’s not my job to tell other people’s secrets.” uhhh this surely can’t end well

Chapter 10

how big is this map

“I’m not dating now.” “Except for Glendower” pffft

HAHAH

I love how Adam and Gansey are having this serious conversation meanwhile Ronan literally throws Noah out the window

I love them

Cue that one “he pushed me down the stairs!” meme

Ok so clearly a lot is happening and I have. Many thoughts. BUT. I’m ngl I’ve had this post in my drafts for a while and I’m way farther than chapter 10 but it’s kinda annoying to have to update for every chapter,,, SO

I’m still gonna update, but more of my thoughts are gonna be theories kinda and not in these super huge posts!! I’m still trying to figure out how to live-blog this series without ruining my reading experience so stay tuned 👍

[kelliealtogether]

There is something here that I am too stupid to suss out and put into words that make sense, but here goes.

One of the things I adore about the Raven Cycle is how it calls back to itself over and over again. Something something time isn't a line, it's a circle/slinky something something. There are so many scenes that mirror one another, or are the same thing flipped on its head. I think it adds to the overall vibe of the series, that kind of hazy, whimsy feeling that the books are happening both inside and outside time, at the same time. All of this is done intentionally, too, but the way Maggie Stiefvater uses it to show the relationships between characters is really, really lovely in my opinion. It's also lovely that I have read these books more times than I can count and I still manage to come away with something new each and every time.

For example, I finished listening to Blue Lily, Lily Blue again yesterday, and I picked up on this gem from the scene where Adam, Blue, and Noah are going into Shenandoah Natioanl Park for Adam to scry in the cave:

Adam is undoubtedly being reckless, not thinking about the consequences of scrying, and here's Blue getting on his ass about. Adam says, "I don't want to talk about it," but Blue doesn't let it go. She's demanding answers from him, pushing him even though he's visibly getting annoyed, telling him to let her out of the car so she can walk home.

Then we have this scene that happens not all that much later, after Adam, Blue, and Calla find Persephone dead in the attic:

Adam says essentially the same thing. "I don't want to talk." And Ronan doesn't make him. He's not demanding anything of Adam at that moment.

And...

These are both moments where Blue and Ronan fundamentally understand what Adam needs. He needs to be called out for not thinking about the consequences of scrying (a scene that foreshadows what will later happen to Persephone). And he needs to just sit with someone in silence while he begins dealing with his grief.

The Gangsey is really the friend group of all time, and what makes these kind of mirroring scenes even juicier is that, right before the scene with Blue in the shitbox, Adam thinks about how it's a surprise Blue and Ronan aren't better friends because they're made of the same impossible stuff. Boy really has a type.

Gosh, I love the way the relationships are written in these books. They're so good and feel so real. 10/10, will read this series in perpetuity until forever.