Yayyy you're alive!! I'm honestly kinda scared now bc I wouldn't know if you weren't... BUT ANYWAYS OFF THE DARK TOPICS FOR NOW!

Why does Babel sound so familiar... WAIT R.F. KUANG?!? THAT Babel?!? Is it good? Have you read The Poppy War? I have it in my room right now and whenever I look at it I feel so guilty bc I want to read it so badly but Ik it'll probably be next year by the time I can even open the first page because that's how buried I am under books right now.

Ha yes The Priory of the Orange Tree is big and you should've seen the librarian's expression when I thumped it on top of her desk to check out XD... she literally asked me "are you sure about that? That's a BIG book!" and I was like "YESSSSSSS!!!!" One of the best decisions I've ever made. I definitely recommend reading it when you have time (even if that's like after you retire or whatever, it's SOO GOOD)

NO WAY RIGHT WHEN I READ THAT I LOOKED IT UP AND IT SOUNDS SOOOO GOOD!!! Yes it sounds dark. But I MUST HAVE!!! RIGHT NOW!! Anyways, I'm honestly pretty dark anyway, as you can see from like the first sentence of this post. I actually wrote an article for my school newspaper and my parents and the whole newspaper crew vetoed it cuz it was too dark (they said it was rly good though!! :D). But yay, The Girl from the Sea!! It was so good I read it in one afternoon one sitting, yes partly cuz I couldn't put it down, but also cuz ackk it's so proudly LGBTQIA+ and I love that but that also means I can't have anyone at home seeing I'm reading that so I have to finish the whole thing before I get picked up from school... *sigh* but at least it was really easy to read it all bc ACKK IT WAS GREAT! :)

I think it's really cool that Molly Knox Ostertag and Noelle/N.D. Smith are married though!! I LOVED both of their books so much!! Have you ever read Nimona?

This is getting super long so I just want to ask... have you ever read I Am the Messenger?

It's fine! I'm extremely patient, take however long you need :)

Andd now I want to read Babel too... fun fact: in the time since I last talked to you, I haven't finished any of the books I was reading... what did I do instead? Start 6 new books and restart 1 book, oc! 

But, I mean... to be fair, 3 of those books are a few pages away from finishing bc I did a lot of reading when we went to Tai Wan for winter break recently (so so so so great!! Haven't been there since I was like 6 and couldn't remember anything, so this was awesome. And I would rant more but off-topic!). So.

Etymology! Btw, National Word Nerd Day was yesterday, so, uh, Happy belated National Word Nerd Day! And Happy National Houseplant Appreciation Day today! But anyways. I don't know too much about etymology, I must admit it never really caught my interest as much as other word-related things did, but did you know the etymology of the word "nice"?!? :0 I kinda love it. As in super duper totally love it. And so unrelated but I also love the way "etymology" looks... it's super pleasing in a weird way (and so so so unrelated but when you look up etymology it says "commonly confused: etymology and entomology" which I find so funny and also kinda love for some reason?? As someone who wanted to be an entomologist until recently when I decided that science was simply too much work for me XD.)

As for colonization... never much thought about it... besides, you know, the basic things. Would you be interested in elaborating more about etymology and colonization? I'm actually sorta interested in them now, cuz they aren't topics I usually think/know about, and would love to learn more!

And see how I turned your 1 paragraph into 5 paragraphs... :/ But anyways! Actually, if we want to be technical about it, (which technically is if I want to be technical about it, as I am the one deciding whether to be technical or not, but technicalities aside... (I mean, like, not technically aside bc it's technicalities aside to talk about more technicalities.. or wait but is it bc in this situation "technicalities" is describing the technicalities of that particular case, which doesn't really automatically apply to the other- ARGH ok but moving on you know what I mean!)) it's a bit of a paradox then bc how will I ever read Babel if I have to finish my TBR stack in order to do so, but Babel being in my TBR stack... unless you mean my literal stack, which is more of a scattering of books around my r- BUT now I'm being a know-it-all sorry just found that really interesting what I meant to say in this paragraph was - I AM TOTALLY reading Babel after I'm done!! :DD Which at this rate doesn't seem likely to be anytime soon... *sigh* the trials we readers have to face...

Haha that is great! And what a great gift!! And yeah I get that... long books are, well, long! Funny sort of related story... my brother used to only read graphic novels and comics, which, nothing wrong with that, I do too, but he would NOT read chapter books!! Like, just because they're chapter books?? And when you try to make him give them a try, he just becomes even more insistent that he doesn't like them. And then, last year we went on vacation and he got sick and was basically isolated in a hotel room with nothing to do but read... and he read Wilderthorn!. A few weeks later, he'd finished the whole trilogy, and started Alex Rider. And so after that? A few diary of a wimpy kids, and then The Inheritance Cycle! XD (he's on like book 3/4 rn). But anyways. Hope you do get around to reading Priory, and best of luck with committing! And doesn't matter how long it takes you, as long as you enjoy the journey! I sure wish I had more time with Priory... the heft of it sitting on my lap was oddly reassuring. Like a dog. Idk that comment was weird. Plus how big it was made ppl ask about it which gave me a chance to recommend it (plus had some great conversations with teachers! It helped me to socialize more lol)! But I'm back to the shorter and lighter books now, which, while great is just... not what I've gotten used to.

Now trying desperately to make everything short as possible! As in, that sentence was way longer than necessary... as is this sentence, which doesn't even to exist, but still does anyway?

I need to watch Nimona!!

And The Book Theif. Which was put on my TBR list... about 2 years ago. :/

And yes you should totally read I am the messenger when you have the chance!! Speaking as a person who still has not finished it despite having it for 6 months now... but SO GOOD!!! And I can't rant fully cuz this is supposed to short but it's just so unique and thought-provoking and necessary and- well, yup. Read it! :)

Like a Charm sounds really cool! I also love the title, it seems like it hints at another, more literal meaning than what we normally think of...? Do you like it? Well. The books I mentioned above at least are:

The Jumbies (which was fine, I liked the story, the writing was a bit tell-not-show but I personally felt it did the trick, plus it sorta fit with the bigger font) - almost done

The Missing Piece of Charlie O'Reilly (from Peri; recommend) - almost done

The Good, Good Pig: the extraordinary life of Christopher Hogwood (recommend) - almost done

The Hawk's Way (recommend, same author as the above book, basically recommend anything by her) - halfway through

Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality (from Hex; reccomend, Idk if you've read this before? Sometimes your location says Flourish & Blotts, so I assume you like Harry Potter?) - like chapter 6?

plus, at school we just started The Library Book which is SO GOOD AND INTERESTING I thoroughly reccomend (and also want to irrationally hit all my classmates who complain about having to read a book for school) 

Also, pls don't feel the need to write very long responses if you don't feel like it or something in the moment! If you want to, great! And if you don't want to, also great! Plus, I do tend to lengthen things up quite a bit...

And sorry, another comment, but more credit-

Artemis recommended I Am the Messenger

Peregrine Falcon recommended The Hawk's Way (though I already knew Sy Montgomery before)