I was in a library where in order to get from the YA section to the rest of the library you had to pull yourself up through a hole in the ceiling.
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“An intense horror-action game—like Jumanji but Japanese-inspired and really disturbing.” —Kendare Blake, #1 New York Times bestselling author of the Three Dark Crowns series
WHAT’S IT ABOUT
Set in a nightmarish underworld, an estranged group of friends return to an evil game to try and save the boy they thought they killed in Kristen Simmons's masterful breakout horror novel, Find Him Where You Left Him Dead.
Four years ago, five kids started a game. Not all of them survived.
Now, at the end of their senior year of high school, the survivors—Owen, Madeline, Emerson, and Dax—have reunited for one strange and terrible reason: they’ve been summoned by the ghost of Ian, the friend they left for dead.
Together they return to the place where their friendship ended with one goal: find Ian and bring him home. So, they restart the deadly game they never finished—an innocent card-matching challenge called Meido. A game without instructions.
As soon as they begin, they're dragged out of their reality and into an eerie hellscape of Japanese underworlds, more horrifying than even the darkest folktales that Owen's grandmother told him. There, they meet Shinigami, an old wise woman who explains the rules:
They have one night to complete seven challenges or they'll all be stuck in this world forever.
Once inseparable, the survivors now can’t stand each other, but the challenges demand they work together, think quickly, and make sacrifices—blood, clothes, secrets, memories, and worse.
And once again, not everyone will make it out alive.
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The Quartet That Started It All
As followers of this blog will note, this is not actually the quartet that started it all for me, but it DID launch author Tamora Pierce's career in the 1980s, and Alanna remains absolutely beloved among Pierce's heroines. Let's talk the Song of the Lioness Quartet.
In a classic case of "if I can't do this as a girl, then I'll do this as a boy and I have a handy twin brother to go full Twelfth Night with," Alanna of Trebond begins The First Adventure by dressing as a boy to train as a page in Tortall's royal court. This book introduces all our main characters and establishes Alan the page amongst his peers and Alanna as she finds herself and her place in chivalry.
One of the other amazing things about Alanna's story overall is that she begins it absolutely terrified of her own magical gift. Her arc includes learning to work with her magic rather than to fear it, and that's a twist on magic users that I really appreciated. We often get overly confident magic users--indeed, we'll get TWO of them later in the series--but it's rare that we get magic users who are fully aware of their powers and are still absolutely terrified of them. So of course, the story and the world and Pierce herself keep throwing Alanna into situations where she has no choice but to develop and use her gift. It's so, so good. This first book covers Alanna's page years, and we move into her squire years in book two.
In the Hand of the Goddess really expands on Alanna's key relationship with Prince Jon on Conte, Duke Roger of Conte, and Geroge Cooper. Alanna moves into a wider world of adult politics and stakes in this book. From being able to defeat an older, stronger, and more experienced opponent in a duel to developing her healing skills when a wound puts her out of commission during a war, Alanna cements her skills, connections, and position in society. This culminates with unmasking Roger as an attempting regicide and the accidental reveal of her gender.
This book is really, really good, and extends Alanna's childhood fear of magic to her fear of Roger specifically in a really natural, logical way. I could say more about the details, but these two books have an episodic vibe to them, so I won't spend too much time exploring every single key plot event.
The Woman Who Rides Like a Man sees Alanna spending her first year as a knight in the desert, with a Bazhir tribe. She becomes their shaman by way of self-defense; she murders their first shaman when he tries to murder her for "being unnatural." Then it falls to Alanna to train three magic users for the tribe, and this is where we see more nuance into how different magic users relate to their powers, from sheer hubris to fear to "this is just part of me, let's do this." It's a phenomenal experience for Alanna, and she learns as much from her students as they do
Book three also sees Jonathan bitching to hell and back about having to be king, which is not a great look, and it's one Alanna calls him on. He spends most of the book alternating between pitching a hissy fit, begging Alanna to marry him, and training to take over as Voice of the Tribes. The interesting thing here is that Alanna refuses to marry Jon. He is trying to fit Alanna into his own fairy tale, and she very much goes "That isn't our relationship, I can't do that. We aren't meant to be like that, and that's ok." If I could inject that lesson into humanity's collective head, I would. It's well done and it's great.
Lioness Rampant picks up on Alanna's travels after she leaves the Bazhir, and eventually sees her return to Corus with a magical artifact to help secure Jonathan's position as king.
There's also the teeny tiny complication that Alanna's twin brother, Thom, has resurrected Duke Roger. Absolute chaos ensues, and Roger almost manages to take out the entire court during Jonathan's coronation. Nobody should have to kill an evil sorceror twice, but Alanna did.
If you want to dive into Tamora Pierce's Tortall Universe, starting with Alanna is absolutely a good choice. These books hold a very soft spot in my heart, and they're never not engaging.
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hi! I just got my crow plush and it is the cutest, softest lil guy. I'm so glad I was able to snag one! your crow time comic is one of my favorite comics to read and follow!
I'm popping in to ask you if I could draw the crows from six of crows in the style of how you draw your crows. with proper credit, of course.
this may be obvious, but absolutely no worries if you say no! thanks!
I haven't read Six of Crows yet! I've been meaning to. I actually bought the first book last year and then straight up lost it on the subway lol. I did see a part of the tv series but I'm told it's a mish mash of several books so I'm not sure who the actual crows are. That sounds like a really cute idea for after I read it.
Thanks for buying a boi!!!
EDIT: I totally misread that, I thought you were asking me to draw them. Anybody can draw them! Go for it.
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