Billy has the lushest, most overflowing flower beds on the block. He also believes in letting his lawn grow wild and free to help the bees cross pollinate and thrive.
Steve is his neighbor, and he is a zealous minimalist. His beds are sparse. Accented with the most precisely carved shrubs and topiaries. He mows his lawn weekly. His edges are pristine.
Billy despises when Steve's lawn clippings get blown onto his precious spring buds, choking out their light. He's dumped his neighbor's moldy pile of sludge on his welcome mat. Steve didn't get the hint. Billy received a tangled mess of dandelions and assorted weeds on his own mat a few days later.
That evening Billy carved an asymmetrical line through the expertly manicured hedgerow dividing their properties.
When you're on your second read of GtN and you're starved for info about the rest of the world that Gideon doesn't give a shit about so you go digging into the Cohort Intelligence Files at the end.
Were the Second trying to form a relationship with the Fourth at Canaan House and Gideon just never saw it?
The Second, Third and Fifth are clearly the most politically powerful houses, and Judith is obviously more intimidated by Abigail than anyone else. It seems like she was planning to undermine her influence over the Fourth as a political power-move.
The affection between the Fourth and Fifth in this particular instance does seem to be genuine, but their relationship is also apparently part of a larger tradition which has been allowing the Fifth to accumulate power over the Fourth through building such relationships. The Second is not happy about one of their rivals having this power and seems to be making plans to usurp their influence.
The familial affections between Abigail + Magnus and Isaac + Jeannemary are very strong, but Isaac and Jeannemary also idolize Judith and Marta for being high-ranking members of the Cohort. Could the ploy have been successful if Cytherea hadn't been there running everything off the rails?
(Also, honorable mention for Isaac's potential arranged gay marriage 😭)
"Everyone thinks Coronabeth Tridentarius is attractive and therefore my attraction to her is normal and not at all indicative of anything"
Poor baby ❤
Nerd
This was John and no one can convince me otherwise.
We all know that from tiny acorns mighty oak trees grow, but we should add that from tiny acorns also grow deer, gray squirrels, red squirrels, chipmunks, wild turkeys, crows, flying squirrels, rabbits, opossums, blue jays, quail, raccoons, wood ducks—more than 100 U.S. vertebrate species eat acorns. In autumn and winter, the acorn is the cheeseburger of the forest ecosystem—fairly easy to find and nicely packaged. They are one of the most valuable food resources available for wildlife...