#some guy was trying to tell us that we ‘shouldn’t be normalizing our psychotic episodes’ and we hadn’t even done that yet

[non-dys-sys]

Shout out to my fellow plurals with psychosis y’all are doing great

[rosiehunterwolf]

This request is the result of a very awake mind at 2 am. How about a part crack, part tooth-rotting fluff fic about and interview with characters of your choice.

I tried my best with this... it's difficult to do crack in such a short piece (hence this one ended up being a little longer) and although I think writing crack is really fun, I have no experience in the field XD. So... hope this is what you were looking for XD.

The Case of the Forgotten Birthday Gift

Summary: When the ninja are invited to the Ivory City of Shintaro for Princess Vania’s birthday, they find themselves in the most devastating predicament of all- they forgot to bring a birthday gift for Vania. In a panic, Cole offers her a chance to interview them as compensation. Not everyone is thrilled about the idea.

“We thank you for attending Princess Vania’s birthday,” King Vangelis said, hovering before the ninja with two winged guardsmen at his sides. “We ask that you leave any gifts on this table.” He gestured towards a table that was practically groaning under the weight of all the presents atop it.

“Um.” Cole blanched. “Gift?”

“Cole!” Jay whispered harshly in his ear. “Don’t tell me. That you didn’t bring a present for the princess. On her birthday.”

“I didn’t bring one? Last time I checked, we were all invited! Why didn’t you say anything?”

“Well, I didn’t, so you better come up with something now or they’ll never invite us back here again!”

“Uh…” Cole’s brain felt like it was whirring a mile a minute, and he reluctantly turned back to the king. “Thank you, your majesty, but our gift to the princess is not something material.”

King Vangelis raised an eyebrow. “No?”

“No, it’s a… it’s um… we’re giving you a free interview.”

“What?!” the other ninja all yelped, at the same time that Vania beamed, clapping her hands together.

“I get to interview the ninja? The ninja? Truly, this is the best birthday present ever!”

“Cole,” Kai groaned, putting his head in his hands, “what have you done?”

---

“When I told you to come up with something to give the princess, this wasn’t exactly what I had in mind,” Jay grumbled from where he was sitting stiffly in a chair next to Cole. “Did you really have to offer the girl who’s obviously a bit bonkers about us an interview?”

“I didn’t see you coming up with anything better,” Cole snapped. “Besides, she may be a bit obsessed, but she seems nice enough. Just go along with it. She’s like any other fan.”

“Any other fan, you say? I wouldn’t be so sure!”

Cole sighed, glancing back at where Lloyd was standing atop his chair, glaring down at them. “Lloyd, sit down.”

“She’s no normal fan, I’m telling you! I don’t trust her! She was too excited about this interview! She’s out to get us, she just wants to trick us into giving away information so she can exploit our weaknesses!”

Kai glanced back and forth between Lloyd and Cole. “Seriously, does no one else see what an obvious cry for therapy this is?”

“Lloyd!” Cole hissed. “For the last time! Sit. Down.”

“Don’t worry, Lloyd,” Zane said as the teen plopped down grumpily in his seat. “The odds of our team member’s princess girlfriend turning out to be the leader of a criminal gang for the second time in our lives are practically nonexistent! Under seventy percent, at least.”

“She’s not my girlfriend!” Cole snapped.

Zane blinked. “Well, then whose is she?”

“Not mine,” Jay told them, grabbing Nya’s hand. “I’m already engaged!”

Kai laughed. “No thanks, she’s not my type. Plus, I already have a girlfriend who stabbed me in the back, although luckily for me, mine came around, eventually.”

“For the last time, Vania is not going to betray us!”

“It’s not our fault we have trust issues,” Lloyd sniffed. “You’d think someone would book us therapy, but apparently that’s not a priority.”

“Well, if she herself isn’t evil, maybe she’s related to someone evil!” Kai said. “Skylor’s evil, psychotic father influenced her to turn on me. Do you think Vania has an evil, psychotic father?”

“Definitely,” Lloyd agreed, at the same time Nya said “No way.”

Nya shook her head. “Do you know how ridiculous you guys sound? How many evil, psychotic fathers can there be out there?”

“Um. There’s Chen, Milton Dyer, Skales, my father- need I go on?”

“Don’t forget Nadakhan’s evil djinn father!” Jay chimed. Lloyd blinked at him. “Who?”

“See? That’s barely any!” Nya exclaimed. “Besides, like half of those people are good now, so they don’t count.”

“But they were, which means there’s a high chance of King Vangelis being evil and psychotic-”

“Who’s evil and psychotic?” A cheery voice interrupted them as Princess Vania pushed open the doors.

“Oh, uh… just an old villain we faced,” Cole covered quickly.

“Oh, you must tell me all about them!” Vania smiled, pushing the doors closed behind her and clicking the lock.

Kai blinked. “Did you just lock us in?”

“Of course! I can’t have anyone else breaking in here and trying to eavesdrop on my very special interview!”

“Do people break into your room often?” Nya laughed.

“Not at all! Only a few times a week.”

“Um… you do realize that we’re crime-fighting ninja, right?” Jay told her. “We have lots of enemies. Maybe you should have some people guarding us while we’re here.”

“Oh, don’t worry! If anyone attacks you, Chompy will scare them off!” The ninja looked to where she was pointing to see a tiny dragon snoozing on Vania’s bed.

“Oh, how reassuring,” Kai said dryly. “The overgrown gecko can keep us safe.”

Vania raised an eyebrow. “You’re lucky he’s asleep. Mr. Chompy does not play nice when he’s angry.”

“Oh yeah, I’m so scared,” Kai grinned, leaning back.

Vania narrowed her eyes at him. “He killed a dire bat once.”

“Yeah, well, we fought off an entire flock of them from our ship.”

“First of all, it’s called a colony of bats, not a flock. Second, I know that a squadron of our guards had to go save you.”

“We didn’t need saving! They interrupted us just as I was about to use my mighty fire powers to burn them to a crisp!” “Chompy would knock them out of the sky before you could do that.”

“Yeah, well, I could squish Chompy under my foot.”

“Chompy could gouge out your eyes.”

“Oookay, as fun as this is,” Cole interrupted, pushing them apart, “Let’s just get this interview over with. Vania, what questions did you want to ask us?”

“Hold on.” Vania jogged over to the wall and pulled over a small table, setting up a camera on top of it.

Jay stared at it. “What is that.”

“I need to record this, silly!”

“What’s the point of locking us in here and not letting anyone else listen in if you’re just going to broadcast this whole thing to everyone, anyway?” Nya asked.

“Because seeing it live isn’t half as fun as watching a recording!”

“Then why record it at all?”

“How else am I going to rub it in all my friends’ faces that I met the ninja?”

“This is a non-consensual violation of my privacy,” Jay grumbled.

“Oh please, your face is over half the city,” Cole sighed.

“Welcome back to Truthful Tidbits! I’m your host, Vania, and I’m here with an exclusive episode today- with me, I have the famous ninja!” “What,” Lloyd said slowly, “are you doing?”

“It’s for my TV show,” Vania whispered.

“You have a TV show?” Nya spluttered.

“Wait, no one told me this was going to be on TV!” Kai yelped. “The camera’s not getting my good side!”

“Wait, if this is a TV show, shouldn’t we have makeup artists or something?”

“Jay’s right!” Kai agreed. “I can’t go on television without a makeover!”

“My database shows no recollection of the show ‘Truthful Tidbits.’”

“It’s not on mainstream television,” Vania grumbled. “I just show them to my videography class.”

“Oh.” Jay relaxed in his chair. “That’s it?”

“What do you mean, that’s it? People are still going to see me without makeup! Just because it’s a small group doesn’t make this any less of a disaster!”

“I’m hoping to change that,” Vania beamed. “This is the big break I need! An interview with the ninja? Everyone will want to see it!”

“Andddd we’re back to privacy invasion again,” Jay groaned.

“Wanna bounce, Jay?” Lloyd asked.

“Do I ever-”

“Count me in, guys, I’m not doing this without a proper makeup job-”

“If you guys are all leaving, I’m not going to stay!” Nya insisted. “Zane?”

“It seems futile to stay if you all are leaving.” “You can’t leave!” Vania cried. “This is my present! Besides, you’re locked in here!”

Lloyd stared her dead in the eyes. “I will literally jump out the window to get out of this.”

“Are you kidding me? You’ll die!”

“Then tell Chumpy to catch me,” he told her, already climbing into the window.

“It’s Chompy!”

“Oh no, you don’t.” Kai reached out a hand, snatching the back of Lloyd’s gi before he could jump. “I don’t want to spend the rest of our stay in a hospital. What did you think was going to happen, you were going to sprout wings?”

“I’m part dragon,” Lloyd grumbled. “It’s not entirely out of the realm of possibility.”

“I have a much less life-threatening way. Stand back.” Kai’s fist lit up in flames.

“I swear, Kai, if you burn down anything, we are never coming back here,” Cole warned.

“A little arson never hurt anyone.” Hurtling a fireball at the door, it burst into flames. Quickly, it burned a human-sized hole in the door, and Kai, Jay, and Lloyd quickly darted through.

“What about my interview?” Vania protested. “You promised!”

“Technically, Cole was the one who promised you the interview,” Zane pointed out. “He never specified which of us you would be interviewing.”

“And since Cole’s staying, we’re technically not breaking that promise!” Nya added.

Cole blinked. “I’m what?”

“Staying. Have fun, you two!” Nya waved, and the two of them shot out the door, spraying ice and water as they passed to extinguish the flames.

“Sorry about that, princess,” Cole said, scratching the back of his neck.

Vania narrowed her eyes. “This better be the best interview ever.”

Cole grinned. “Mark my words, it will be. Fire away.”

“Speaking of fire, you’re paying for my door.”

“... Yeah, I figured.”

[mcdynamite]

[Spoilers] I think GoT 8.05 made perfect sense, and here’s why:

 Hello people of Tumblr! I’ve seen a lot of people bashing the most recent episode of Game of Thrones for a number of reasons and I want to step up to the plate and go to bat for the show. To clarify, I dislike D&D as much as pretty much everyone else who watches the show. I think the writing has been lazy, the dialogue has been lacking, and the lead in to some of the things that have happened this season could definitely be better. But everything that happened in 8.05 makes sense, and I actually liked the episode. This is why.

Cersei’s Demise is kinda perfect.

I know a lot of us, myself included, were looking forward to a brutal, sadistic death for a brutal, sadistic woman. But here’s the thing... in its own way, it was a totally brutal way for her to go out. Think about it, Cersei has spent pretty much her entire life talking her way out of things, manipulating people, and in general feeling more powerful than everyone else around her, including her family. She died finally realizing that she was completely helpless and all hope was lost. She died knowing that her arrogance and often unnecessary brutality was what had cost herself, her children, the man she loves, and even her own father their lives. 

She couldn’t sass the collapsing rock to death. She couldn’t stall and wait for The Mountain to come to her aid. She couldn’t do anything but break down and cry and tell Jaime she wanted their baby to live, trapped in the same underground passages where she vowed to destroy all three of Dany’s dragons. Cersei wasn’t publicly executed in front of thousands of onlookers. She died UNDERGROUND, unthought of and uncared for by anyone else in the world but Jaime. She died the same death as all of the innocent citizens who died that day in part because of her own arrogance. It wasn’t special. It was lonely, hidden, and desperate - a fitting end for a woman who’s lived her whole life believing in her own importance.

And speaking of Cersei, even Jaime’s apparent regression makes some sense.

Ah, Jaime Lannister, one of the most emotionally complicated men in all of Westeros. I’m not gonna lie, this disappointed me because I had hoped for better for Jaime, but not because it didn’t make sense. We were ALL rooting for Jaime to ditch Cersei, become the noblest man in the whole world and just be with Brienne, who clearly loves him. But if you take a minute to think about it, while Jaime’s character development has been significant, it never really veered away from loving Cersei. 

He’s always been doing what’s best for her, and yes, that includes when he left her to head North. Jaime did that because humanity was in danger, and as such, Cersei was in danger. Barely over a season ago in 7.03, Jaime tells Olenna Tyrell that his love for Cersei has grown beyond his control. He openly admits it and tells Olenna that he doesn’t believe people will care how Cersei took the throne once they’re living in the world she built. He clearly still loves Cersei here, and while he’s tempering some of her most heinous ideas, like flaying Olenna alive, he’s still carrying out her orders. “For Cersei,” as he always says.

Jaime’s love for Cersei went far beyond his control. It was almost more like an addition than true love. His love for Brienne was pure and kind, but even the purest love can’t sway the grasp of an addition. Cersei was all Jaime had ever known, so even if he loved Brienne, even if he knew Cersei was hateful, even if he knew she was doing unspeakable things to the people of Westeros, it STILL makes sense that he went back. It’s legitimately not at all different from some abusive relationship in real life. One partner may realize that the other is abusive and hateful, but they can’t bring themselves to walk away, and when they do, they may go back. That doesn’t make them bad people, and it certainly doesn’t “undo” all of Jaime’s character development over the course of the series. 

Jaime Lannister is an immensely complicated character, and this is GAME OF THRONES we’re talking about. It’s a very human show. So frankly, if he has genuinely left Cersei without a second glance, that would have been immensely disappointing. It’s just not how people work, not after admitting how deep in the relationship he was literally just 9 episodes prior and only leaving to protect mankind from being destroyed.

And finally, let’s talk about the psychotic break of Daenerys Targaryen.

First, just a quick reminder at how utterly human this show is. We’ve got all sorts of realistic depictions of human nature in Game of Thrones. We have very real depictions of PTSD (looking at you, Theon and Sansa), realistic depictions of the horrors of slavery, realistic depictions of racism and ableism, the list goes on for miles. It’s made abundantly clear throughout the series that the Targaryens have a strong family history of mental illness, so here we go people. Let’s talk about mental illness.

Obviously, there are no therapists in Westeros to diagnose Dany with any particular illness, but it’s reasonable to hypothesize that Dany is experiencing psychosis, also known as a “psychotic break”. Something important to not about psychosis: it’s sort of like a break from reality, so the way someone behaves during a psychotic break is not at all who they normally are as a person. And here’s another thing about psychosis: YOU DO NOT SHOW SIGNS OF IT YOUR ENTIRE LIFE, especially not major ones. Not every person who commits a heinous act of violence grew up murdering small animals and saying sadistic things to family members and friends as a child. I’ve seen a lot of anti-Mad Queen Dany arguments online, and I’d like to debunk a few of them with regards to how mental illness often actually works.

1. Dany was an abused child, why would she hurt children?

Yikes, you guys. This is a really weak argument. Many studies have shown that childhood trauma is associated with greater disposition towards psychosis later in life. Obviously not everyone who has gone through a childhood trauma will experience psychosis, but it can actually be a direct contributing factor to a psychotic break.

2. Dany has always showed compassion to innocent people like the slaves across the sea, so why doesn’t she now?

Again, psychosis is not a direct reflection of who someone is as a person because it represents a break from reality. You don’t have to be an intrinsically horrible person to do something bad when you’re not in control.

3. The warning signs were there, but they were too weak to justify what happened to King’s Landing.

When a person experiences psychosis, the EARLY warning signs (let’s just say for the purposes of this argument are things that happened prior to the start of season 8) are often subtle or even unnoticeable until you’re looking back retrospectively. These can include things like spending more time alone than usual (check), suspiciousness or uneasiness with others (check), and having no feelings at all (check, remember when she ended things with Daario and the show made a big deal out of how she didn’t really feeling anything about it?).

The slightly later warning signs (so, this season) include strong and inappropriate emotions (check, she wants to have sex with her nephew not too long after she accused him of trying to steal her throne), social withdrawal (check), odd beliefs (check, her belief that she was sent by god to change the world), and suspiciousness (check). The warning signs were there and frankly exactly what one would expect to see in someone in the prodome (or very early stages) of psychosis.

4. It just happened so suddenly, the build up wasn’t enough.

Actually, it SUPER was enough. Recently, Dany has lost two dragons, her most trusted advisor, her best friend (who she watched be beheaded) and has arrived in a country where nobody likes or trusts her. All of these are pretty freaking traumatic, and a traumatic event can trigger psychosis. Boom. Bang. It makes sense.

Don’t get me wrong, I understand why people are upset about this. We were all rooting for Dany, our hero who walked out of the flames all those years ago with three baby dragons clinging to her. What happened in 8.05 was devastating to watch, but it wasn’t unrealistic. It was actually very well done from a standpoint of how things actually work in the real world. You can be frustrated with how things turned out, you can be devastated by the destruction of King’s Landing and Dany’s break, and you can be pissed about the lazy writing of this season, but you shouldn’t be angry with the show runners for Dany’s descent into madness. It was actually remarkably well done.

Thank you for coming to my TED talk. Valar morguhlis.

EDIT: Obviously not everyone who goes through a period of psychosis is violent. It is an INCREDIBLY small percentage who actually inflict harm on others during a psychotic break. With that being said, rare as it may be, it does happen, it is a real thing that happens in real life, and cases in which a violent outburst happens are pretty spot-on similar to the way it happened to Dany. As someone who has experienced psychosis myself, I of all people know that not everyone becomes violent. But the portrayal of Dany throughout the whole show does align with the prodome of an exceedingly rare, but real, type of psychosis. I’m sincerely sorry for not clarifying this in my original post 💙

[someoneandnoone-blog-blog]

Here is another book review, because unlike my coworkers I listen to audiobooks and podcasts instead of music while baking. I’m the weirdo in the store and I full admit that.

The Last True Poets of the Sea is written by Julia Drake and Narrated by Tania Gilbert.

Let me just make one thing extremely clear before I get into the nitty gritty. This is a very negative review, and I don’t care if you don’t read this review, becasue it’s super negative. The book has a four star rating on the app I am using and I think that is extremely generous. When I was reading the synopsis for the books (which yes I almost always do when picking my next book) I didn’t think this book would be anything like this. I was expecting something more fluffy and fun with a good life lesson its marketed as young adult which I typically prefer over romantic books marketed toward adults, sue me. And while there are good (I guess if you are going through something similar) life lessons, this book was completely different that I originally would have anticipated and let me be clear: I would have not picked up the book if the synopsis would have said ‘teenage angst ahead’ ‘sucide attempt with an eating disorder’ ‘panic attacks and melt downs every couple of chapters’ instead ‘epic, funny and sweepingly romantic’, becasue in my opinion, it wasn’t.

I would like to be crystal clear when I say I don’t believe we should romantize scenes of 12 year-olds getting drunk having their first kiss with people much older than them (I can’t remember the age of the person she makes out with, but it was enough to make me uncomfortable), whether that person is in high school or not. Let me be clear, YOUNG TEENAGE GIRLS GET SEXUALIZED ENOUGH EVEN WITHOUT IT BEFORE NORMALIZED IN MEDIA MARKETED TOWARD US. LETS NOT HAVE SCENES WHERE FULL ASS GROWN ADULT MEN TALK ABOUT HOW GROWN UP A 12 YEAR OLD FEMALE IS NO MATTER THE SITUATION. NO. SOME MEN MIGHT BE LIKE THAT, BUT THAT IS DISGUSTING AND IT SHOULD HAVE BEEN MADE CLEAR THAT IT IS DISGUSTING AND UNCONFORTABLE WHEN THAT LANGUAGE IS USED AND IF IT MAKES YOU COMFORTABLE YOU SHOULD TELL SOMEONE BECASUE ITS NOT OKAY. SHIOULDN’T BE NORMALIZED AND A PART OF GROWING UP FEMALE’ BECAUSE ITS DISGUSTING AND THE FACT THAT SHE DIDN’T THINK TO TELL ANYONE MAKES ME ANGRY. NO MATTER THE CIRCUMSTANCE.

And while I understand that this is coming from the perspective of the young female and that is the experince of many, the fact that it was glossed over so smoothly and the fact that it never got any negative connotations really makes me angry. I understand that its in a flashback scene, but put in something that clear states that, that behavior is not okay and how the character actually feels. When that kind of language was being talked about me at 12 I knew what they meant and it was uncomfortable. and maybe that’s not every experince, but that was mine and I don’t like being reminded of that in a book marketed as ‘epic, funny and sweepingly romantic’

We should not call a book romantic when when the teenage protagonist has more sexual experience/party experience/drug experience/alcohol experience than 50% of my adult age friend group. As a previous teenage girl, those kinds of topic being marketed as the normal, as the ‘typical high school experince’ it is detrimental to mental health and honestly adds societal pressure to go out and do those things, even if it makes us uncomfortable. ‘But I read it in such-and-such book and its marketed as romantic’ not its not. Its the sexualization of teenage girls perpetuated in our mass media. As a 25 year old adult and I would not have picked up with this book, read it, and turned around I would not give it to my teenage coworkers knowing that half of them have admitted to being sexually assaulted while at parties they didn’t want to go to but were pressured into/attempted suicide in the past because their brains feel like they’re on fire from the pressure and been told its the normal and we have to deal with it becasue of books like this.

THE MAIN CHARACTER CLEARLY STATING ‘I KNEW ONE OF US WAS GOING TO ATTEMPT SUICIDE I JUST DIDN’T KNOW WHICH ONE’ that is a paraphrase from a letter she was writing (but didn’t send thank god) from the main character to her brother whose was in treatment for a suicide attempt. WHAT THE FUCK ABOUT THAT IS EPIC, FUNNY OR ROMANTIC?!? SHE WROTE THAT TO HER BROTHER WHO WAS IN TREATMENT FOR A SUICIDE ATTEMPT. THAT’S FUCKED.

This might be the normal for young girls, yes I know the statists BUT IT SHOULDN’T BE. THOSE SCENES SHOULD NOT BE GLOSSED OVER by calling this book romantic, becasue in my opinion it romanticized and glossed over some of these major issues. I get it. I was young, sexualized by peers older than me, and suicidal once, but how about no? How about we don’t gloss over those topics and call them out for the bullshit they really are. Make it clear that those situations should not happen and there is better in this world.

The one thing I will say about that 12 year old kissing scene is that as soon as the older guy realized how young she was, he left without saying another word. But it was clear that, that experience was her first of many that young. We should also not normalize a 16 year old going to a bar with a fake ID with an adult that has sexual intentions with them. As soon as the chapter “Fun’s Night Out” happened I was so done with the book and again I’m glad it had the ending it did where she was able to get away from him thanks to the help of the bartender. I’m sorry, I’m old and that stuff makes me uncomfortable and extremely angry.

This book gave me the same feeling I got when I realized I agreed that Ariel should not marry Erik becasue she is a 16 year old child. At some point during part 1 of the book it dawned on me that the main character was a sixteen year old girl. Honestly, I would have been a lot happier and I would have some, but not as many qualms with the book if it weren’t for the fact. Honestly age her up even to college level and I’m not as angry. Seriously, authors need to stop making these topic about teenagers. Now, I understand that this book is marketed for teens, but honestly the sexualization that went on in the book of this young girl living in New York just turned me off almost immediately. I understand the statistics with that kind of thing, but that just wasn’t my life experience and I hope to live in a future where thats not a statistic my child or their children have to deal with. I couldn’t related to the main character becasue of it and I kind of hated her through the entire book not becasue of those glossed over experiences. Honestly, it probably has a lot to do with the fact that you don’t realize those things are bad until you find yourself in therapy or talk to your friends much later in life and go ‘oh, that’s what’s wrong with those situations.’ I can’t blame the main character, but I can blame the author.

With that said around the time I realized I was old I also realized the only reason I got through part 1 and 2 was strictly because of the narrator. There was almost no vocal difference between her other female characters, but the consistancy she kept with Violet’s voice and the fact that this book is written in first person and calls for that kind of acting really drove home. I loved how she acted out the panic attacks, it honestly sometimes felt like I was about to have one. But again, would not have read the book if it came with warnings of any kind. Every single scene I liked it was strictly becasue of Gilbert. I would have set down the book and not picked it back up if I was actually reading it.

With that being said, things I genuinely enjoyed about the book. There was no major coming out scene. I enjoyed that a lesbian relationship was written and done as naturally and as smoothly a heterosexual couple. Honesly before I realized this was about a sixteen year old and that everyone was in high school I loved how naturally I could ship the lesbian relationship without anyone coming right out and saying their sexual orientation. That was very well done and it was kinda well done in the broadway flash back scene when she realized how long she had been gay. I have had plenty of those moments in my life that I look back at and I’m like “oh that happened becasue I like girls too’, but again that scene made me really uncomfortable for other reasons.

How the brother’s suicide/eating disorder/psychotic episodes was written really annoyed me. Again, I understand that this book was written in first person and that’s how the character feels, but how about no? I guess in the author’s world teenage girls are full of themselves and can’t see othe people’s struggles? That seems ageist and overdone to me. Teeange girls aren’t one dementional. However, that’s how they characterized the character and I’m not going to knock the writer for sticking true to their character (no matter how much I insist teenage girls are more that that). However, there were moments that I wish the book would switch prospective and give a neutral point of view so all the facts could be laid out on the table. I find it so hard to listen to someone complain about their brother (whom I also didn’t realize was younger than the main character in teh book until very late in the book), with no real insight (that I remember again i listen to these books while at work I probably miss 15% of the book) as to why he did it. It almost dehumanized that character for me in a way. But again, that is coming from someone that at one point in their life really wished they weren’t here anymore and honestly if I would have picked up this book while going through that period I would have taken the main character’s perception as the perception of the people trying to help me and it wouldn’t have gone good. Strictly a personal opinion again.

The entire synopsis is about finding the Lyric, the sunken ship her grandmother survived being on. And honesty, it was wrapped up kind of nicely, but not in a way that had much forethought in my opinion. My main oven at work broke while I was listening to the main climax of the book, so in all honesty I don’t know how the got their final piece of evidence to figure out who S is. That work drama and me dealing with that during the end of the book is probably why I didn’t feel like the book wrapped up well. So, I’m not going to comment on the ending much more because honestly, I didn’t like the book enough to sit and listen to the final three chapters again and give an honest opinion about them. I did get the feeling that her brother was magically cured from his depression, but I could be wrong...

Overal: I am an full fledged adult that agrees that Disney Princesses cannot marry the man they just met and I don’t have the will power to listen to a book filled with teenage angst and compromising morals from adults. This is why I wish the app I used had a section for New Adult instead of just the normal classifications of Young Adult and Fantasy, becasue teenage angst isn’t my thing and I can’t listen to books with smut in them while at work. Next book on the list is a book on astrology, becasue my coworker is insterested, and when I showed her my birthchart she said, ‘makes senes’ and now I’m concerned. Then its ‘Call Me Maybe’ by Cara Bastone. Wish me luck that the next book goes over better.