#the locked tomb triology

[wofworld]

basically the locked tomb series

[cratis]

do you guys remember that before Nona was even announced some Harrow books were already being printed with

Gideon the Ninth Harrow the Ninth Nona the Ninth Alecto the Ninth

Instead of the original 3 names of the other books and for a few weeks we were all freaking out exactly like this about "WHO THE F IS NONA" ?

Who the fuck is Nona?

[immaterial-pearl]

Recs of my fav things with mental illness/trauma/neurodiversity representation that lets their characters be unpleasant and full people:-).

These are a collection of things I personally found relateable, over the course of my life. Almost all of these are aimed at adults (but not all!) and it's okay to disagree with me on wether these are good or not, but I put them on this list because I like them and I like how they portray complex mentally ill characters.

Here’s a randomizer that picks one at random!!!

Pieta, by Nanae Haruno. Genre: josei manga (josei is manga aimed at women, usually ones in their 20's). Two girls who struggle with mental health fall in love.

Dungeon Meshi, dir. Yoshihiro Miyamjima, original story by Ryoko Kui. Genre: fantasy anime. After his sister is eaten by a dragon, a man does his best to get her body back and revive her. In order to survive he decides to cook monsters with his party, instead of trying to travel with food from outside of the dungeon. Personal note: autism meshi. My personal favourite is Kabru, because he's literaly me when it comes to Being Totally Normal About Human Interaction.

Burnt Sugar, by Avni doshi. Genre: literary novella. A woman starts losing her grip on reality as her mother starts losing her memory. My personal opinion: it's just amazing, god, one of my favourite books ever, no book ever portrayed psychosis in such a personally relateable way, even tho I differ from the protag on so many levels.

Promising Young Woman, dir. Emerald Fennel. Genre: a deconstruction of revenge films. A woman traumatised by her friends suicide tries to avenge her.

Simon Snow triology, by Rainbow Rowell. Genre: ya fantasy and romance, deconstruction of chosen one stories, wizard school. Note: the exploration of ptsd mostly happens in book 2 and 3. The first book differs both in subject matter and tone, and was written originally as a stand alone. A typical chosen one protag defies the narrative set on him. Personal note: the way trauma reflected on protag's relationship with sex was so well thought out. Reread this out of nostalgia recently and found myself stunned on how uniquely well it's written.

Fleabag, screeplay by Phoebe Waller-Bridge. Genre: dark comedy, drama. A woman who seems aware of the fourth wall tries to cope with her best friend’s death.

Revolutionary Girl Utena, dir. Ikuhara Kunihiko. Genre: magical girl anime deconstruction, fairy tale deconsturction, psychological horror. A girl who wants to become a prince gets tangled in messy drama of the student council, after she wins a duel and accidentally becomes engaged to a girl they refer to as the rose bride. Personal note: FAVOURITE SHOW EVER, a queer classic, ectetera, the most complex show ever written in my personal opinion, the entire narrative is about patriarchy's evils, and damn, no show since did it better imo.

Boy meets Maria, by Peyo. Genre: romance manga. A boy falls in love with a member of his high school's theatre, who turns out to be a boy.

The Locked Tomb, by Tamsyn Muir. Genre: sci-fi fantasy horror. In a planet system of necromancers, a girl from a planet with a single living necromancer gets picked to be said necromancers swordwoman, when she tries to become a saint. Personal note: you will not believe the amount of Insane Undead Lesbians this series has. READ IT.

Bojack Horseman, main writer Raphael Bob Waksberg. Genre: dark comedy, animated sitcom. A horse/man way past his prime still lives off of money from playing in a 90’s sitcom.

My Lesbian Experience With Loneliness, by Nagata Kabi. Genre: manga memoir. A depressed woman who has trouble with forming relationships tries to have her first time with a sex worker.

Pinky and Pepper forever, by Eddy Atoms. Genre: horror, dark comedy comic. Two art student girlfriends try to survive art school, and later meet again in hell.

A pale view of hills, by Kazuo Ishiguro. Genre: literary fiction. An imigrant woman, recalls her first pregnancy and a short friendship she had back in Japan.

Neon Genesis Evangelion, dir. Hideaki Anno. Genre: mecha anime, psychological horror. A boy is forced to pilot a robot by his absent father who runs a para-military organisation. Personal notes: second favourite anime of mine, every character is their own shade of unwell, there is a reason this is a classic.

Fight Club, by Chuck Palachniuk. Genre: thiller, literary fiction. A white collar man loses his apartment and moves in with his strange working class friend. Personal note: even if you've seen the film, read the original.

The Bell Jar, by Sylvia Plath. Genre: literary fiction, semi-memoir. A talented writer fights her suicidality and depression.

Crying in H-Mart, by Michelle Zauner. Genre: memoir. The author recalls her mother's last months and death.

My Dark Vanessa, by Kate Elizabeth Russel. Genre: literary fiction. After her ex teacher is accused of sexual assault, a woman recalls her high school romance with him. Personal note: this is heavily inspired by Lolita, and even though I've read both I kind of prefer this book, fight me.

Summer, 1993, dir. Carla Simón. Genre: drama. A young girl spends her first summer in a new home after her parents die. Personal note: good representation of a young child processing trauma is so rare!!!!

My Broken Mariko, by Hirako Waka. Genre: josei manga. After her friend's death, a woman goes out of her way to find out why she died, disbelieving her friend would kill herself.

Everything, everywhere, all at once, dir. Daniel Kwan and Schienert. Genre: sci-fi. A woman discovers multiverse time travel while trying to do her taxes, and processes her troubled relationship with her daughter.

[smaller-comfort]

Would you recommend The Locked Tomb Triology or Rook and Roses more? I have both unstarted in my Audible Library.

OH BOY. I'm slightly drunk and you've basically just activated my trap card.

Okay, these are very, very different literary experiences. I highly recommend both, but for wildly different reasons. I have listened to the audio books for The Locked Tomb, but not for Mask of Mirrors/Rook & Rose, so I can't really compare them. TLT's audio book is very well done, but the narrator does mispronounce one character's name throughout the whole thing, and that drives me slightly crazy. (Nonagesimus: uses the church Latin pronunciation. EDIT: I SAID I WAS DRUNK. IT'S THE OTHER WAY AROUND. No-na-jess-i-mus. Not It's no-na-guess-i-mus.)

The Locked Tomb series is amazing, and extremely rewarding, but it's a difficult read. The prose is dense and full of obscure and sometimes baffling references. The first book is relatively accessible as a science fantasy murder mystery; the second book is actively hostile to you, the reader, and it wants you to suffer on multiple levels. You will suffer on multiple levels. You will need to reread it at least once to actually understand what's really happening. The third book is less hostile, but it's definitely not comfortable. The series is unfinished; book 4 is still being written. Rereading the books is extremely rewarding, because you will miss things the first time around.

If you've ever read Homestuck (at least through the Scratch), then I would recommend the series unreservedly. The author is kind of famously a former Big Name Fan there. It is thoroughly, pervasively queer, but it's not really romantic; you'll see it marketed as "lesbian necromancers in space" but it's fundamentally a story about love, grief, loss, and the violence of colonialism/imperialism. (I draw a lot of parallels between it and Sea of Stars/Saboverse because of those themes.) The books are more appropriately set in the Horror genre than straight sci-fi/fantasy.

(I love the worldbuilding and the treatment of necromancy/magic as a science. Delicious.)

Mask of Mirrors/Rook & Rose is just a hell of a lot of fun. It's basically set in a fantasy eastern European city that was violently colonized by fantasy Italy, and the worldbuilding is fantastic. It also deals with themes of colonialism/imperialism, and at its core is grappling with ideas of identity and diaspora.

That's the high level themes at work in Mask of Mirrors, but I tore through the whole trilogy in less than a week because the characters are delightful, the worldbuilding is extremely tasty, and it's really about a badass con artist doing badass things. There are a lot of queer characters (including a handful of explicitly trans characters, and some implicitly asexual and aromantic characters), but the main romance is het.

(Rook & Rose magic systems are half numerology/scientific principal and half tarot/intuition, and I honestly adore it.)

With the locked tomb, it's kind of a running joke in the fandom that you can get spoiled for all the major plot points and still not have any idea what the hell is going on. With Mask of Mirrors/Rook & Rose, I really, really don't want to spoil anyone because some of those plot twists were so satisfying to experience, and I would've been so upset if they'd been spoiled for me.

Rook & Rose is a completed series, and the third book does wrap everything up pretty neatly. Maybe too neatly, in some ways, but it's still delightful. The books are long, but relatively easy reads (with the caveat that my idea of an easy read is...probably slightly distorted. I read book one in a day and a half. It's 630 pages long).

So, if you're okay with cliffhangers and being emotionally devastated (but in mostly good ways), go for The Locked Tomb. TLT also has an enormous fandom. If you want something with a definitive conclusion, swashbuckling shenanigans, and only mild to moderate emotional pain, and a fandom of like 3 people, please read Rook & Rose.

[coneyinacap]

Gideon the Ninth, but Canaan House is set up like Willy Wonka’s chocolate factory.

[1hellofacookie]

If you ever hear me say "Corona is hot" I am talking about this lady, and this lady only

[bakanekiprice]

"We do bones, motherfucker,"

[casualnerdgirl]

I can HEAR Gideon developing a crush on her necromancer and I'm like girl same but I'm begging you to think this through.

[halcyon-autumn]

@siliquasquama​ I finished it. Mercymorn is such an awful person, but I’m delighted by every scene that she’s in. And I understand why she does what she does, even if it’s awful.

[cratis]

I swear I'm not like that with every book I read

[taravangianlistenstothebeachboys]

I just realized something.

In Gideon, we hear how Harrow breaks the stereotype of sitting on a plot of grave dirt in space, to feel a Thanergetic connection. While that’s apparently the common thing to do in Gideon’s comics, while waiting to land on the first Harrow apparently decided to “skip the placebo.”

But in Harrow, during her false memory of landing on the first with Ortus, we do see her crouching on a plot of grave dirt, apparently perfectly willing to use that particular security blanket. This could mean a few things:

Feeling down on herself and despondent caused Harrow’s constructed memories to portray her as weaker and less sure of herself than she actually was,

Ianthe created that memory as part of the surgery, and DOES use grave dirt in space, so naturally assumed Harrow did the same and wrote her memories to match, or most spicy

Harrow was trying to look tough for Gideon and absolutely would normally use gravedirt if she wasn’t there to watch.

[cratis]

Signed Mercymorn the first .

[dbssh]

i guess a book is good when i only finished chapter 3 and i have that much to say about it. hm.

[coneyinacap]

So the last few days I’ve been increasingly obsessed with the cohort: specifically, how little we know about it.

We have a fair idea of the military structure. We also have the general impression that whatever this war is, it has been Ongoing.

Given the overwhelming themes of Catholicism in this series, the Cohort war strikes me as deeply referential of the Crusades. But who are they fighting? BOE was only a recent addition to the struggle, per Mercy. What is their plan of expansion?? What is the point?

I’m hoping we get more in ATN but- this is the smartest fandom I know. One of you knowledgeable people can surely pull something more from this line of thought.

[1hellofacookie]

It's a mirror!