August 2023

Gideon Nav and Harrowhark Nonagesimus from the Locked Tomb. Harrow is straddling Gideon, who is laying down, a la 'Makeup Lesbians' meme. In contrast to the original meme, Harrow is scowling angrily as she puts traditional face paint on Gideon. Gideon is similarly angry, flipping Harrow off from below, though she is not protesting her position. ALT

I’m 100% sure this has been done to death (ha) but as I’m avoiding the tags like the plague for fear of spoilers, just take this single reaction to the first few chapters as my humble token of thanks.

A collection of sketches and headshots of Harrow Nonagesimus and Gideon Nav from The Locked Tomb series.ALT

help. (don’t.)

closeups:

Gideon Nav, a butch woman with a strong jawline and a bright smile finger-guns off to the side and exclaims "Hey, Titties!" cheerfully.ALT
Harrowhark, thin and pointy with large dark eyes and even larger bags under them, steeples her begloved fingers together, lost deep in thought. She's thinking about bones. ALT
Gideon Nav, winking over her shoulder, either flirting or teasing. You can see a strip of hair that's been shaved behind her ear and around to the back of her head. The nuns once tried to shave her head fully, but did not finish the job. Her skull like face paint is slapdash at best.ALT
Harrowhark, wearing her usual robe full of bone designs but no hood. Her sharp eyes are narrowed, glaring, and heavily lined with what she hopes people will think is smeared eyeliner, though really it's the conglomeration of exhaustion and stress. She nakey, no facepaint.ALT
Harrow sits perched atop Gideon's wide shoulders, a fistful of Gideon's hair in each hand as though steering her around Ratatouille style. Gideon looks ahead through her aviator shades, smiling widely, unbothered. Harrow thinks she's driving, but Gideon is just doing whatever the fuck she wants. ALT

this is the book, right? this is the entire book?

bonus: who needs human comfort when you have b o n e s ?

Harrow peers straight ahead angrily while a skeleton gently pulls her hood up from behind. "Here u go ma'am" it seems to say.ALT

A Gideon the Ninth comic. Gideon Nav stands in a darkened hall, arms crossed and brooding about how much she "hates" Harrow. She's been pulled into this nerd contest against her will, and there's nothing to fight, and now the Reverend Daughter is ignoring her. Or at least Gideon thinks that - Harrow has been missing for over a day.
Behind Gideon, Palamedes And Camilla kneel by the hatch, inspecting the clues. Palamedes looks at some blood between his fingers. "Intravenous blood," he says. "HER intravenous blood."
Gideon starts and glances over. There is a moment of silence as the other two regard her...ALT
A gif of Gideon Nav throwing herself at the hatch with all she's got. She yanks on the handle so hard her wrists nearly pop, tries to pry it open from the side, and clangs against it uselessly with the rapier as though it were a club. She is clearly panicked. ALT

Gideon, honey, you’re not even trying to hide it.

I can't believe you and your comics are the final straw to get me to finally give in and read The Locked Tomb.

..... Actually, no, that tracks, I can believe it.

Heeeey the plan is working! (The plan is to get people to read the things I’m already drawing fanart for.)

I literally finished reading The Locked Tomb TODAY. Your fanart is amazing and it couldn't have come at a better time for me hehehe thank you for fueling my latest obsession 🩷🤍🧡

Hehehe yesssss goooood

Oh no wait... Do you mean you haven't read Harrow the Ninth yet? -Sucks in a deep breath-

You are in for such a ride, my friend.

Lmao no mates I got a hold of the one audiobook, ate through it in two days while I did lineart at my desk, and now the next book is on hold but it’ll be another……….. 2 months? Until I get it.


So in the meantime, I’m just dodging spoilers like in the matrix and drawing fanart for book 1.

Question for those of you who have finished Gideon the Ninth and have read Harrow the Ninth and perhaps even Nona.

sign: HERE BE SPOILERSALT

So as many of you may have guessed, I finished the first book a while ago. My reaction to the entire ending went something like this:

chekhov doodle goes "GASP! No!" while listening to audiobook and clutching pen dramatically.ALT
chekhov doodle goes "YESSSSS" with mad eyed enthusiasm while listening to audiobook and clutching pen dramatically.ALT
chekhov doodle cries while still listening to the audiobook, now having lost all hope. "Whuh... nooooooo..." they sobALT

So as one may guess, I have mixed feelings.

They’re not a mix of good and bad. They’re a mix of Good and Complicated Good.

I legitimately think it was a great ending… but I am also struggling to reconcile what appears to be the death of one of my favorite characters.

On the one hand, I don’t want to simply throw my toys off the table and yell ‘I WANT MORE HARROW AND GIDEON DANGIT, LOCK ME IN THEIR HATE-LOVE PURGATORY FOREVER’. On the contrary, I love the idea that we get to see Harrow’s side of things. I am fully aware that the world has not even been explored fractionally, and I want to understand more of it.

On the other hand……….. I have very few things to care about anymore. I care about Harrow, this is true. But the rest of the characters I had an attachment to (Palamedes, Camilla, etc) are all kinda. Dead.

I want to read Harrow the Ninth and consume its entire carcass, meat bone and all, almost as much as I want to push it away and hold off on starting it as much as possible. Because I want to enjoy whatever Gideon the Ninth had, because I don’t think the series will ever go back to that. I feel like from now on, it will be a fundamentally different story. And that’s not…. bad! I think I will enjoy that new story.

But I feel like clinging to the tiny bubble of Gideon the Ninth because the beyond of it all feels as unknowable and as incomprehensible as death. And that naturally kinda repels me.

So I ask you, fellow readers - are my worries justified? Did you share them?

I don’t want spoilers. I don’t want summaries. I just want to know:

Does the story’s soul fundamentally change here? Or is the soup still the same, even if the ingredients have been a little blended in the great mixer of plot?

A black and white comic depicting characters from the Locked Tomb book series.
A single black speech bubble sits at the top of the page.
"Look." 
Gideon Nav glances down from behind her sunglasses, at the form of Harrowhark Nonagesimus. She is wreathed in light coming from the curtains behind her, and although her face paint is smeared and there is blood running from her nose, her eyes are dark and clear, and she looks rather beautiful. In one hand she holds a key, but Gideon seems to barely notice this. 
"At the key, moron, not at me," Harrow snaps in annoyance, holding the key higher. Gideon flips her off, but there are hints of a blush underneath her sunglasses. ALT

whats so great about a locked tomb its probably full of spiders and cobwebs..

Worse.

thechekhov:

A collection of sketches and headshots of Harrow Nonagesimus and Gideon Nav from The Locked Tomb series.ALT

help. (don’t.)

closeups:

Gideon Nav, a butch woman with a strong jawline and a bright smile finger-guns off to the side and exclaims "Hey, Titties!" cheerfully.ALT
Harrowhark, thin and pointy with large dark eyes and even larger bags under them, steeples her begloved fingers together, lost deep in thought. She's thinking about bones. ALT
Gideon Nav, winking over her shoulder, either flirting or teasing. You can see a strip of hair that's been shaved behind her ear and around to the back of her head. The nuns once tried to shave her head fully, but did not finish the job. Her skull like face paint is slapdash at best.ALT
Harrowhark, wearing her usual robe full of bone designs but no hood. Her sharp eyes are narrowed, glaring, and heavily lined with what she hopes people will think is smeared eyeliner, though really it's the conglomeration of exhaustion and stress. She nakey, no facepaint.ALT
Harrow sits perched atop Gideon's wide shoulders, a fistful of Gideon's hair in each hand as though steering her around Ratatouille style. Gideon looks ahead through her aviator shades, smiling widely, unbothered. Harrow thinks she's driving, but Gideon is just doing whatever the fuck she wants. ALT

this is the book, right? this is the entire book?

bonus: who needs human comfort when you have b o n e s ?

Harrow peers straight ahead angrily while a skeleton gently pulls her hood up from behind. "Here u go ma'am" it seems to say.ALT

adamicoarts:

This post instantly gave me Griddlehark vibes, so I had to.

Bonus:

marceline2174:

they are teens after all😭

IMG: A comic labeled 'Things That Actually Happened'. 
John Gaius and Harrowhark sit together at one of their tea parties. He faces her solemnly and speaks of something familiar. "I had a body... and I needed a tomb," he says. "You might know of the body, Harrowhark." Harrow stares at him, the picture of innocence, nevermind the sweat on her brow. "And you will know far better of the tomb," he continues. 
Harrow glances to the side nervously, silent. Just behind John is a window to the space just outside the Mythraem. Standing beside the window, amid the curtains which are for some reason billowing without any reason for a breeze, is a tall woman with wet, ropey hair. She has sunken cheeks and soaked robes which hang off her supple shoulders. She is perhaps, dead, and perhaps only a figment of Harrow's imagination. 
"Oh, the tomb that was to be shut forever!" Harrow says, sweating some more for good measure. "With the rock that was to be never rolled away! That what was within should remain buried! Insensate, with closed eye and stilled brain. Ah, yes, that tomb!" She is definitely very convincing. ALT

Everyone, trying to warn me: Harrow the Ninth is so complicated and so hard to get through and you won’t have any idea what the hell is happening!

Me: Harrow the Ninth is peak comedy if your sense of humor is fucked beyond all sense.

omg i never thought id need to see john gaius and harrowhark in your style but im SO glad i got to!!! i always adore your comics thank you for sharing :> hope you're having a nice day

*(continued ask) WAIT I SCROLLED DOWN AND YOU DREW GRIDDLE TOO omg theyre both so Shaped in your style-ALT

Haha, thank you! I plan on drawing more >:3c

civetside:

i was gonna draw the pool scene TM for real but then i remembered i hate drawing water so i did this instead

skellulite:

Obligatory pool scene drawing

A Gideon the Ninth Comic titled "THINGS I HOPE HAPPENED".
Panel: Early morning in the Canaan House. A slightly run-down, open plan room in the breaks of early morning light. A figure stirs behind the bed canopy as birds screech over the ocean. 
Panel: Harrow, seen as a silhouette through the curtains, sits up and looks quietly at a key she and Gideon have acquired.
Panel: Harrow steps into the bathroom to wash up. General sounds of an early morning ritual follow her. She summons a skeleton to wipe down the counter. All the while, Gideon sleeps.
Panel: There's a soft click of a shoe heel as Harrow's booted foot draws closer. 
Panel: Gideon is sleeping.... semi peacefully, curled up in a blanket. Harrow's silhouette looms over her, a bit threateningly.ALT
Panel: "Griddle," Harrow snaps. "Get up." Gideon's eyes snap open. 
Panel: Instead of getting up, Gideon grumbles in reply: "You said 8 and a HALF."
Panel: Harrow sets her hands on her hips, already annoyed. "The half was for putting on facepaint," she announces. Gideon has still not moved. "Are you. Fucking. Kidding me." she grinds out. 
Panel: "Griddle," Harrow says again, with even more emphasis, leaning closer. Gideon, meanwhile, pulls a pillow up over her head. "I bargained for 8 and a half. I'm going to use the 8 and a half."
Panel: Harrow bristles, giving the Gideon lump in the blanket a solid kick. "Well after 18 years you should be able to do it in your sleep, but seeing as there's not enough wrinkles in your brain to withhold even that small byte of muscle memory--"
"We're gonna be in the nerd apartment all day!" she retorts. "No one will even see me!!"
"I'll see you!" hollers Harrow.
"OKAY, BYE!" barks Gideon. ALT
A long, open panel. "For fuck's... that's IT!" yells the Harrow speech bubble. Through the implied sounds of a struggle, Gideon forces out "Hey... what are you-- Stop that!" She continues after a beat: "Nonagesimus! Nonmmpgh...!"
"Can't believe I have to do everything myself..." complains Harrow. 
"That's what she sa--" Gideon manages, before Harrow barks "MOUTH SHUT OR I'LL PAINT YOUR TEETH TOO."
The last image is of a skinny harrow in her garb, straddling Gideon's torso and forcing paint onto her face while multiple skeleton hands spring into being at strategic points by Gideon's ankles and wrists and form into arms to restrain her. The position is compromising and somewhat suggestive.ALT

They bring a sort of Twice Divorced Energy to the Not Yet Married playing field.

How did you discover the locked tomb series and who in it is your favorite so far?

To be honest I’m not sure what exactly pushed me over the edge. I think SOMEONE on my dash reblogged it again but this time, I had the Libby app open at that exact moment so I just went and reserved the book. Just to listen to, on my way to work, because I have an hour drive each way.

That morphed into me then listening to it while I lined some pages, because I need brain activity while I do menial tasks like that.

Which then morphed into me staring at a blank screen while I devoted my full attention to the book, as I fell deeper and deeper in.

And now every day I’m very nearly drawing comics for it because… Yeah.

Harrow the Ninth half-alive-blog (part 2)

You know how this goes. Apologies to those who were expecting anything more in depth than just me rambling. I realize I skipped many good parts, but the way I was reading, I did not always have the access to Discord, and anyway, I get distracted.

Chekhov — 08/19/2023 7:34 PM
......................hello Camilla.
Chekhov — 08/19/2023 7:52 PM
she's been carrying around Palamedes this whole time, hoping. :( this is.
I love how despite Harrow constantly - CONSTANTLY saying she is a witch and hating herself and saying how she would kill in an instant, as soon as she forgets to be Evil she is sitting down, vulnerable, and going under to look for Camilla's necromancer on a wild goose chace
BY THE BONES, HE'S ALIVE (citation needed?)
...............good lord these kids are all geniuses in their own right.ALT
Chekhov — 08/19/2023 8:08 PM
..............................................................
(Screenshot of passage: "But you were always too quick to mourn your own ignorance. You never could have guessed that he had seen me.")
...........is that
Is that Griddle
(GIF of a man clasping his hands over his mouth in realization)ALT
I had assumed that the book was a narration of The First Harrow to the post-lobotomy Harrow
But now I'm wondering if it was Gideon all along
I'm in agonyALT
Chekhov — 08/19/2023 8:17 PM
(Screenshot of passage: "The final staring inhabitant was not a person. It was an enormous flimsy poster in a chipped frame, the only sign of decoration in that untidy little shuttle. A head and shoulders photograph of an unsmiling, adamant person, in all assumption a woman, stared fixedly at you as though calculating how much effort it would take to snap your neck. She was dressed in black to the chin and her red hair cured thickly about her neck and shoulders. Thick, itchy streams of blood began to ooze down your sinuses.")
more agony
I'm not sure what the HELL is going on
why does that description sound like Gideon's MOM??? Am I just assuming everyone with red hair is now related to Gideon?? Am I that far gone??? ALT
Chekhov — 08/19/2023 9:01 PM
I'm mildly surprised that Harrow has not caught on that ALL of the Lyctors are conspiring against the Emperor. THEY were the ones that jumped on the chance to distract him. THat was their OWN plan that they were working out. Mercy AND Augustine both gave away their hands.ALT
(Screenshot of passage where the lyctors all sound off with their initials. "AA, calling in, all clear." "GP calling in. All clear." A pause. Then you heard Ianthe's cool, detached tones, as if she hadn't even been asleep: "No one has yet seen fit to grave me with a callsign, but nonetheless, all clear." Augustine: "You're IN, of course. Harrow's H.... Yes, Harrow's H." "HO, calling in," you said instantly, and you ignored Ianthe. "All clear. What's going on?")
the names of ........ them and their Cavaliers. Ironically, Harrow did not catch on quickly enough to translate Gideon's initial into the replacement. That's kinda hilarious.
JG though..............John................... whomst
John God????ALT
Chekhov — 08/19/2023 9:11 PM
The Body has to "go away for a while". as the Revenant Beast is approaching. And the Revenant Beast repels ghosts in the River. So is the body also just a ghost? Not really a hallucination but an actual ghost?
I once again apologize for giving you paragraphs to dredge through but
(Passage: "The greatest portion of the fight will take place here, as normal," she said, emphatically underlining EPIRHOIC. "We must use the bank as much as possible. Once the Beast tires--you'll know because it will try to run--we wrestle it down to the mesorhoic layer, then the bathyrhoic, and then to the Batharon. Once we're there, the stoma will open--and we push it through. Simple!")
this makes it kinda feel like. The river is. A stomach. As opposed to. A river. A digestive system. Of life and death. Almost like the universe itself is a gargantuan incomprehensible beast and all the living and dead things upon it are merely a part of that singular system.
And that's baller.ALT
NOT THE MEMES AGAIN
"...speak languishing in Hell! It's a Resurrection Beast, honey! Thank you! Next!!"ALT
Chekhov — 08/20/2023 1:23 PM
"None Houses with Left Grief" took me out
Can't tell if I hate John or love him.
....
Also, Harrow hearing one (1) adult say they wanted her for a daughter and just completely breaking down and confessing that she went into the tomb is the most enthralled I've ever been in a book. So many scenes of this story are draw-able. I'm in agony not being able to draw it as fast as I read it. 
I would like to grab the author by the shoulders and shake her until an animated series is conceived, and then I would like to take that animated series in my teeth and shake it like a dog toy
(Screenshot of a passage: "You were rendered down to your incoherent parts. You wanted to say I saw the Body, you wanted to say, I saw the tomb, but you were seized, all over again, by doubt in the face of fact. The uncertainty of the insane. The conviction of the mad. Nobody had seen you walk through that door. Nobody had watched you leave. What he saw in your face you had no idea.")
BUT GIDEON SAW HER BUT SHE DOESN'T REMEMBER GIDEON OHG  ODS
(GIF of the skeleton Papyrus from the game Undertale, his jaw open in shock, shaking on a red background)ALT
(Screenshot of passage: "Then God's eyes widened fractionally, and his voice became altogether different when he said: "Harrow, who the hell's been tampering with your temporal lobe?" ")
GIF of a scene from the office, wherein the characters rush around in a panic and one yells OK IT'S HAPPENING!ALT

Spongebob Narrator Voice: It was not, in fact, happening.

Chekhov — 08/20/2023 2:25 PM
Harrow is crumbling faster than the foundations of the Canaan house
And now the fix it fic has been abandoned in favor of a Harrow-the-Cavalier AU
(Screenshot of Passage: "No," she said. "I hope she gets boiled alive in oil. I hope she falls into a hole with a crowd watching. I hope someone takes a large pair of secateurs to the muscles at the back of her heels. I so genuinely and wildly long to see that. I would buy tickets." Ortus said tremulously, "But you know she quite--" "No." "And they say she is petitioning for--" "Continue that sentence," she said, "And I'll make it to the pain.")
the implications of these two unfinished statements
oh my godddddddd
:catyell:
(Screenshot of Passage: "To be honest," said Abigail, "I'm quite sorry to crash this one, as I would love to see where this mixer goes.")
Abigail Pent, from inside Harrow's head: my dear, I do love this particular AU but you gotta admit it's still too OOC
Chekhov — 08/20/2023 2:42 PM
wait is thi
is thisdfg
is  this a fuckin
a gfuckin
OCFEESHOP AU
Chekhov — 08/20/2023 3:07 PM
screaming.ALT
Dragon — 08/20/2023 4:11 PM
Muir really gave me what my fanficcers heart desired
Chekhov — 08/20/2023 4:29 PM
I'm still yelling as I read but I'm on the part where they all confront the Sleeper
Also, holy fuck it never occured to me that Harrow had actually been talking to GHOSTS
I was wondering how her brain has convinced itself to do POETRY to maintain the act that was Ortus
turns out it was all Natural Grown Organic poetry all along!
Meanwhile Gideon is swinging the sword around in Harrow's body, going 'I TOLD YOU TO WORK OUT YOU STUPID--ooops, it ate your thumb! I'm SO sorry, that was a COMPLETE accident'
Harrow the Ninth is a comedyALT
(Screenshot of Passage: "This can't be happening." "She's not even into you, okay? It's just the bones. She's into BONES." "One of the many aspects I possess that you now tragically lack." "Get down here," I insisted. "Fight me.")
I am shaking with laughterALT
Chekhov — 08/20/2023 7:36 PM
("Hi, Not Fucking Dead," he said. "I'm Dad.")
there's no reaction that I can give here that does this line justice
I swear the author aligned multiple plotlines together all for the sake of this one joke.ALT
I uh
hm.
pain
(Screenshot of passage: "...you and choked you till your eyes bugged out. I told you that my mother had probably loved me a lot more than yours loved you. You clawed my face so bad that my blood ran down your hands; my face was under your fucking fingernails. When I let you go you couldn’t even stand, you just crawled away and threw up. Were you ten, Harrow? Was I eleven?
Was that the day you decided you wanted to die? You remember how the fuck-off great-aunts always used to say, Suffer and learn? If they were right, Nonagesimus, how much more can we take until you and me achieve omniscience?")ALT
Chekhov — 08/20/2023 10:26 PM
(GIF Image of a child hanging onto a marry go round while it drags her along the floor)
Chekhov — 08/20/2023 10:39 PM
I don't understand. If Gideon is in the river. And Harrow is back on.............the Ninth????? (Or IS SHE????) then what
WHAT
Dragon — 08/21/2023 12:22 AM
The blurred lines between comedy, tragedy, and horror
JOHN'S DAD JOKE
Dragon — 08/21/2023 12:23 AM
Great questions
Dragon — 08/21/2023 12:40 PM
anyway welcome to the end of book 2
for an accurate experience wait like, what, two years before reading the nextALT

I understand I’ve skipped a lot of parts here, but I was quite literally tearing through the last bit faster than anything so…there’s that.

I will likely hold off a bit before reading Nona. I want to sit on this and digest it a bit. Thanks for reading~

your comics about tlt got me to check out Gideon the ninth, and now I have to read the whole thing, especially after the end of the first book; that shit hit me like a building collapse: I thought I saw what was coming, and then very abruptly if floored me. already checked out Harrow, excited to read your liveblog when I've gotten through it

Haha, I’m really humbled by the fact that my lil comics are pulling others in. Enjoy the chaos!

Hey hi I just wanted to know. Since in your post where you asked if you should read the rest of the series after gtn...you asked if it's "the same soup"... Can you say now that, after all, it was the same bone-filled soup all along? 😎

……………………………………. yeah I. Hm. Yep.

IMG: A very skrunkly digital drawing of Harrowhark Nonagesimus, a near murder victim and utterly sleep deprived. Her exoskeleton makes her look extra spikey and her facepaint is smeared. Her hair is growing a big. She clutches a large pot of soup, looking over her shoulder nervously. The text above reads simply: SOUP. ALT

IMG: A Locked Tomb comic. In the first panel, Palamedes Sextus and Camilla Hect are looking on from afar as Gideon Nav holds Harrow bridal-style, rather tenderly, while they are both visibly yelling at each other in annoyance. Palamedes leans into Camilla and mutters 'I would like to put both of them in a jar and study them like bugs.'
A black bar below the panel reads: OVER A YEAR LATER... 
The next panel is a meme-like image of Camilla with her arms crossed, looking... well... cross. She then throws up her hands in defeat and yells "I GUESS!"ALT

so I may have started reading Nona the ninth.

I'm going so crazy with joy at you reading the locked tomb series!!! But please I need someone to acknowledge it!!! Have you stumbled across the friendship bracelets 0v0

A bit confused about which specific thing you’re referring to, and I don’t want to inadvertently spoil it for anyone BUT

If you mean the fact that I accidentally drew Gideon with a woven bracelet after reading the first book and then FINALLY realized the fact that it becomes relevant in the funniest fucking way in the third, then……….yeah. I uh. Yeah.

puffywiz:

A digital illustration depicting a prehistoric creature from the precambrian period called a pikaia. It is an aquatic animal with a long slender body and pronged head with two protrusions at the end, resembling a slug. It floats gently in an ocean void, with a few small bubbles framing it. There is a small text bubble at the bottom corner of the illustration which reads "I love you."ALT
A digital illustration of a table setting viewed from above. There is a plate being set out in front of the viewer by someone with dark skin and reddish arm hair. The plate contains two eggs and a few slices of fruit, placed in such a way that resembles a smiling face. There are two cups on the table, one with water, and another with coffee. There is an ash tray full of cigarette butts, a pair of glasses, three multicolored hair elastics and several notes and papers strewn across the table. The plate is being set on top of a children's illustration, drawn in crayon. It seems to depict a crude sketch of a saber toothed cat. There is text in the corner of the illustration which reads "I love you."ALT
A digital illustration depicting an Albertaceretops and its young walking together in a grassy field. The larger animal is a darker brown with gradiants of cream on its underbelly, and striping on its back, face and tail. It has some facial scarring and is missing the end of one of its horns. It's young is about a third of its size, with a paler taupe color palette and less pronounced facial tusks and horns. There is a speech bubble at the bottom corner which reads "I love you."ALT
A digital illustration depicting a little brown haired boy snugged up in bed with his grandmother. They are reading the children's book "The Very Hungry Caterpillar" together, while the dim light from an old fashioned lamp illuminates the corner of a bedroom. The little boy is holding a barbie doll in one hand as he looks down at the pages. His grandmother is a round-faced woman with golden hoop earrings, pink nailpolish and a distinct blueish facial tattoo on her lips and chin. (This is called a moko kauae, a traditional Māori tattoo for women) Both characters have a medium brown skin tone. There is text on the bottom corner of the image that reads "I love you."ALT
A digital illustration of a beach scene. The sky is a sickly color of blue, tinged with smog. There is a blue orb in the sky which obscures the natural light. In the foreground there is a character from the locked tomb series - a six legged white dog named noodle. He is looking at the viewer playfully. There is text on the image which reads "I love you."ALT
A digital illustration set in a dark glittering cave. There are strings of glow worm egg trails that glow an eerie turquoise. The foreground of the image depicts a lazily outstretched hand with a tiny glow worm on the end of the persons finger. The figure has a medium skin tone, chipped fingernails, and a rosary of bones wrapped around their wrist. They are wearing a sparkling white cloak that hangs off their forearm. There is text on the bottom corner of the illustration that reads "I love you."ALT
A digital illustration depicting three jellyfish, floating in a blue void. The jellyfish are a combination of blues and pinks, surrounded by bubbles. There is text on the image which reads "I love you."ALT
A digital illustration featuring a character from The Locked Tomb Series. Paul stands with their naked back to the viewer. Their eyes are obscured, and their body is smoking. There is text on the image which reads "I love you."ALT
A digital illustration depicting a creature from the early Eocene called Archicebus achilles. It is a small primate with a hunched back, large round eyes and distinct, long digits on its hands and feet. It is coiled on a treebranch, shaded from a rainstorm. There is text on the image which reads "I love you."ALT
A digital illustration depicting a scene described in The Locked Tomb Series. A little girl in skull facepaint looks down toward the viewer with an expression of shock. She is wearing a black robe adorned with fragments of bone. She is leaning over a stone slab, looking down. The image is framed as if the viewer is looking up from a resting position below her. There is blood under the little girls fingernails. There is a speech bubble in the corner of the drawing which reads "I love you."ALT
A black image with the text "I..." ALT
A digital illustration depicting two characters from The Locked Tomb Series. Kiriona, covered in blood, looks desperately at Ianthe who is feircly focused and looking down at the viewer. The image is distorted, as though the viewer is dizzy and unable to focus. There is text which reads the word "still"ALT
A digital illustration depicting a hand reaching out to stroke the face of a woman. The hand is battered and bloody, and the thumb leaves a smear of blood on the woman lips. The woman's eyes are obscured, her face is pale and cracked, with ice dusting her features. She is haloed by a large swath of blonde hair. Her neck is manacled. The image is distorted like the one above it, as though the viewer can't focus well. There is text on the bottom corner which reads "love y-"ALT
A black image.ALT
A digital illustration depicting Nona from The Locked Tomb Series. She is standing against a background of pale pinks and oranges, illuminated by yellow light. She is turned toward the viewer with her braids billowing in the breeze. She is saying, "I love you."ALT

“It’s finished, it’s done. You can’t take loved away.”

- Tamsyn Muir, Nona the Ninth

💝 Thank you for 1k. Special thanks to my lovely friend @sessjudoodles for helping sketch the line work for the Albertaceretops :)

After seeing it on my dashboard several times, and constantly thinking ‘oh that’s lovely’ I finally see this again and recognize it as Nona art. Ironically (or perhaps appropriately) I had purged its details from my mind until I came back to it again, with eyes wide open. 

This is beyond lovely. 

I have purchased Gideon the Ninth and I blame you for this. Thank you. This is a very good book.

>:)

what did you think of nona?

You will find out, in great detail, starting tomorrow. :)

Hay! You starting to read The Locked Tomb series has made me really want to read it (I even bought the first book) but I'm still kind of on the fence about reading it since the trigger warning lists I found where so full.

I'm in a kind of crazy time in my life rn and I would like to read a fun, lore filled adventure book - in your opinion, would you say it's a good book for that? I spasificly find it hard with nihilistic stories (anxiety and all that)

Regardless if you answer or not, love your art and hope you have a fantastic day!

I would say it really depends on what you’re looking for.

Are you looking for disassociation or catharsis?

Gideon the Ninth is definitely fun and lore-filled. But it’s also quite heavy in places, and most of those places only get heavier towards the end.

I don’t know what sort of things you’re on the lookout for. It definitely depends on what you mean by ‘nihilistic’. But if you mean that you don’t want to feel sad because it all feels like it was for nothing, then maybe hold off until you’re in a more emotionally stable place. This is, after all, a book about necromancy, and death is a very forefront subject that’s deeply interwoven with the story itself.

Then again, I ain’t the boss of you and I can’t tell you what to read or not read. Maybe it’ll end up helping you instead. Who knows!

(warning for TLT spoilers)

IMG: A memelike image on a white background. Gideon Nav and Palamedes Sextus are both embracing Harrowhark, who hands limply between them, looking very small. Both of them are kissing the side of her head in tandem. The text reads: "WHEN YOU ARE GOD'S PERFECT KILLING MACHINE... BUT YOU ONLY WEIGH 8 LBS AND PEOPLE KEEP PICKING YOU UP AND KISSING YOU."ALT