Alright HtN final thoughts

Similarly to the last book, I’m overstimulated to all hell and back. Gideon is my favorite protagonist of all time, no question. The sheer endorphin rush I get reading her cracking jokes and being insufferable is just bonkers. I started this book with 2 spoilers, without which I might never have even started this book: 1) there was Gideon content in HtN, and 2) there was multiple Gideons content in HtN. On the first point, I’m more than satisfied; I’m currently buzzing with how ecstatic that was as a reading experience. On the second, Gideon 1.0 was a boring lump of dude lmao, the only interesting thing about him was his bodyswap poly relationship with Better Gideon’s mom, which, wow. What a 10,000 year old soap opera. So that was disappointing, but you know what, one Gideon is really enough.

The vast majority of this book was a miserable slog and it genuinely hurt to read to the point where I don’t know that I can recommend this experience to anyone who isn’t already a huge fan. Yeah, the payoff was massive and I was played like a perfect little fiddle, but I don’t approve of the tune. I think Muir could’ve cut out a good third of the book and at the very least 50% of the relentless torture she put Harrow through and it would have still been effective. I still have a bad taste in my mouth. I don’t have a problem with difficult or hurtful stories and I’m not trying to invoke any moralistic outrage here, but that wasn’t what I expected or frankly could have prepared for coming out of the (drastically tonally different) first book and I do believe it was excessive. It was blow after blow after blow to an isolated, terrified, pointedly disabled protagonist with no single moment of relief, comfort or connection until the fucking reveal and I don’t want it, thanks.

Okay that’s enough about that. Now the rest of it.

I really tried to care about the new characters, but no dice. God had his moments, but we haven’t really seen him do too much interesting shit. Ianthe was fucking excellent, though I really really didn’t want her to be. The rest were dead boring, I’m sorry. The blasphemous makeouts were their only redeeming moment. When we finally got some Palamedes and Cam, I could have cried. Wish we could have spent more time with them, but I have high hopes for the next book. Ortus, surprisingly, was awesome! I wish him a happy afterlife with his poetic legendary husband. Also he did nothing wrong and all that nonsense about finally fighting for what’s important yada yada was pure military propaganda, let the man write lengthy poetry about his ghost boyfriend in peace. Dulcinea was a fucking badass! So happy she got a chance to shine, and to say ‘nyah!’ Abigail was also fantastic. Well that whole section of the book had me swimming in endorphins so maybe it isn’t saying much, but I fucking loved them, I fucking loved how much Harrow cared about them, Harrow, who had been an emotionally depleted husk throughout most of the book, now showing the most heartrending vulnerability and care for this little found ghost family and practically rotating through them one by one to apologize in the most terrible, gutpunching way, and finally being told not everything in the whole fucking world is her goddamn fault. This is the only reason I was able to accept no Gideon reunion, not even a single word between them. I’ve been yearning for hundreds of pages for Harrow to find human connection and care, and I’m so happy these are the people she found it with.

Gideon. I’m like tearing up right now just thinking about this. After the endless tedium, suffering, emotional disconnect to the point where characters dying horribly seemed insignificant against the backdrop of unrelenting despair, to have that vibrant, wonderful, dumbass motherfucking voice back—it was beyond cathartic. I reread every single line multiple times and I still don’t think I’ve wrung em fully dry. It was amazing. The personality dripping off the page, the immediate chemistry with any character living or dead or dull as rock, the blatant, beautiful disrespect for the sombre self importance of the whole preceding narrative. It was my favorite character crashing into one of my least favorite books, and making it awesome. I think a lot of people try to write a Gideon, and most of the time the result is completely unbearable, and I’d posit there’s 2 reasons for this: 1) they tragically, mistakenly make their Gideon a man, and 2) they just aren’t funny. Of course an unfunny Gideon would be unbearable. Of course a funny but emotionally vacant Gideon would be dull. But this Gideon is a fucking delight with a real heartfelt gooshy selfless vulnerable yearning center, and every line I got to spend with her was a rush.

Harrow and Gideon. Oof. I’ve been going back and forth on whether I shipped them, whether I even could, whether it was the intention at all. But like, come on. This is clearly a love story. It’s a love story from start to finish, and it’s cool that it got me to doubt that so sincerely when it’s just this level of ride and die, jump into hell, carve out your brain, share a body and preserve its modesty against your every instinct and not even make any jokes about it, universe crossing, death defying, soul melding level of mushy ass romance. Harrow fucking kept Gideon’s shitty sunglasses wrapped in a love note. She did find&replace on her whole personality. She kissed Ianthe. I remember the first time I watched Revolutionary Girl Utena, where almost every other episode would begin with a lil fairytail backstory recap telling you about the little girl who saw a prince and was so enamored she decided to become a prince too. And you believe that narrative, because why wouldn’t you? It’s a stylized repetitive fairytale at the start of a show. Why would it lie? And then you find out, at the very end, that it wasn’t the cool manly prince who precipitated all of this, but baby Utena witnessing another young girl in pain, and deciding then and there that she was going to grow up and help her. And she does, even if she can’t remember why.

This was that level of paradigm shift for me. Harrow and her pile of letters and rules and her obsession and her nauseating work ethic, what was she doing?? Saving the world? Fixing a broken timeline? Trying to unlock unlimited power, bring back the corpse in the locked tomb, serve her god and emperor? Nope! She was just trying to keep her big beautiful dumbass girlfriend a little bit alive. 

Yeah. It’s a fucking love story.

Random thoughts: I liked Harrow’s grudge against food and the word ‘pommel’. I liked the diminishing ages Mercy inflicted upon her. I liked the first/second person shenanigans, tho really, there’s no way that was Gideon’s voice, first of all, there was way too much anatomical knowledge there. (Gideon’s secretly a time traveling bone doctor, calling it now). I liked the fanfic AUs, and very sad we didn’t get a fake dating one or like a nice “there was only one bed”. Not gonna mention soulmate AUs cuz that’s just canon.

That was a ride. Coulda done without some parts of it, but don’t regret it one bit. Let’s see what kinda nonsense the next one brings!