I Wanna Say That Every Part Of King Of Attolia Is My Favorite Part But Possibly My Favorite Part Is When

I wanna say that every part of King of Attolia is my favorite part but possibly my favorite part is when Attolia goes “Relius. You are my oldest and most trusted advisor, who helped me keep my throne and committed your life to me. But you made a mistake, so I’m going to have to kill you.” And Relius goes “My queen, you are incredibly correct, that is 100% the right thing to do” and Gen is standing there like “wtf is wrong with you people, I thought I was the one with poor coping mechanisms”

i just want to remind everyone that, since the grishaverse is kinda sorta based on the victorian era, and since wealthy victorian families dressed their toddlers (girls or boys) in dresses, and wylan was very wealthy growing up, there are definitely family portraits in existence of baby wylan wearing one of those goofy ass victorian baby dresses

Costis at the end of King of Attolia: pick your battles. Pick fewer. Put some back. Wait you can’t fight every single guard- PICK FEWER YOU IDIOT

I love breaking down hunger games and analyzing it, and I've thought a lot about the love triangle. Particularly how there isn't really one. How the love triangle was really just marketing, but it was always peeta and katniss. And also, Gale was always borderline toxic and possessive. If I compare that to TSITP...gale becomes Conrad imo, the way gale assumes that there is some attachment due to his care/protection/ whatever from the past, having issues that make the FMC feel needed and responsible to help, (I actual started writing this in June of 2023 and just stumbled upon it in my drafts so I'll try to finish what I was talking about) saying things to make the FMC feel guilty about choosing the other guy (even in small things, not even dating the other guy, but like talking to him), letting/making the FMC feel as though she's the only one who knows him/what's going on for him.

The thing about The Hunger Games for me is that Suzanne Collins was pointing out how powerful people are (and have always) pointing attention towards entertainment, and especially romance, to distract from serious issues. In the books, the love triangle is hardly present (again, IMO) but the movies proved the point by drawing out the relationships and marketing the movies for the love triangle, which led many people to believe it was just a dumb storyline about a teenage girl who can't choose between two guys uwu, when in reality it was a social critique, told from a teenage girl without criticizing or belittling girls in any respect, and taught a generation about activism.

That is the crucial different between the two, to me. Hunger Games was meant as a social commentary in ya fiction form, which got marketed as a love triangle. Summer I Turned Pretty really is about the love triangle.

Belly in the first episode is reading the Hunger Games, in the 4th episode in the flashback we see she's watching the movie, do you think there's a connection with TSITP love triangle?

Wow , great question. Unfortunately, I haven’t seen the hunger games… it wouldn’t be fair for me to make an analysis, but I’d like to think that Jenny never does anything unintentional. In season 1, Cam and Belly went to watch Sabrina at the drive in and the plot of the movie represents the triangle between Belly, Conrad, and Jeremiah. There’s connections everywhere. My sister has seen Hunger Games and she said that there’s not even a love triangle that present. I know that Jere loves Belly, but it’s not as present and deep like I think Conrad’s love is. From what I heard, it seems like Katniss and Peeta’s relationship had the main focus and the third person of the triangle was there to spark things up between them. Same goes for TSITP, Belly and Conrad are beyond teenage love. They’re represented as a love that will always find their way back, no matter the obstacles, they’re meant for one another. The gravitational pull between Conrad and Belly is infinite, the light shines most on them. Jeremiah and Belly’s love is platonic, as teenagers and young adults that can get confused with being in love, but when it doesn’t feel right—you’ll just know. I’d love to hear your theories and connections.

i was watching a youtube video about the three main character deaths you can use in a story (physical, professional & psychological) and consequently the three main threats that can hang over a character’s head, and i realised one of the reasons eugenides’s arc is so interesting in the queen’s thief is that he suffers all three.

the physical aspect is fairly self-evident (*insert hand pun*). obviously, he never actually dies, but the threat is ever present and he does suffer quite a lot of physical harm which deeply affects the plot and his character arc.

this goes hand in hand (i swear i wasn’t actually trying to insert a hand pun) with the professional death, because the loss of his hand means, to him, that he can never steal anything again. he overcomes this, but it’s terribly hard, and he goes through a lot of development because of it. then he gets himself into a “disaster”: he becomes king. and he can’t be the thief anymore, not like he used to. he can’t be independent, he can’t do whatever he wants. even though he can still work in the shadows, he’s in the light and everyone is looking at him, and all those eyes expect things from him. the king of attolia is about him reconciling his identity as thief and his identity as king, about him stepping into his new role.

of course, he’s not just a thief, he’s the thief. in the last book, the figure of the thief acquires a darker meaning. it’s threatening, and terrifying, a slippery slope. gen is always at risk of tripping, of falling, of completely losing his humanity. he suffers a lot psychologically through the series, but i’d say this is the main psychological death looming over him. and he doesn’t die, because a lot of people love him, and a lot of people are ready to catch him. “saved him from what? saved him from becoming the thief, the murderous figure sitting alone with his dead.”

AND ANOTHER THING ABOUT THE KING OF ATTOLIA:

what. exactly. was eugenides' plan to get costis on his side?? i know that we're unlikely to actually see most of it, because costis is our narrator and gen's manipulation wouldn't work if costis could see it, but it was mostly like:

step 1: goad costis into punching me in the face

step 2: ???

step 3: profit.

i'm guessing costis was meant to interrupt gen during his Homesick Hours (TM) and see Gen crying, and that is a turning point for costis. but every other part of this book is just costis being like: "the king made me run from one side of the palace to the other so i wouldn't be late. the king made me stand outside his room for hours. the king is going to cost me and my friends our lives / jobs. Damn it, the king got stabbed and i think i sort of like him now." how did this plan fucking SUCCEED.