Melissa Sullivan > Recent Status Updates

Such a perfect spooky-lite September read. Very nostalgic as the characters are basically me and my nerdy friends in high school. Less Bass, more Beasties and Pumpkins.

(My only gripe: ain’t nobody had a Nokia in the late 90’s in a *small town*. Hell, I was in CA at the time and most folks didn’t get one (even the rich kids) until at least 2000. But the rest of the details were a balm to read.)

Crap. How do I get any work completed today when book 3 is here? I need the ability to stop time. Where is Sasha when I need her?? 😭

So it’s my third time through with this book and I finally caught something about the textual module. And their lives.

I don’t want to spoil it but if anyone has read this and knows what I’m referring to I’d love to chat about it. (Who is Orion?)

Holy shit, you guys. I’m pretty sure Reddit wrote this book. There’s so many sub isms that it is making me double take whether I’m in the app or not. Like, is he actually following me? Do I have a stalker? How exciting!

But no, I think I may just be too online. Also, wow this dude totally gets me. 🥰

I got about half way and lost my mojo. I’m pretty sure right before the big reveal is about to happen, the end of the drum roll as it were. But it was that very drum roll - something that had been drumming for what felt like forever - that made me not want to turn the page.

Is there a word for when there is too much pressure? I think I hit it. Halp.

OMG so frustrating. Our author is using the most annoying trope there is and I can’t even tell if it’s intentional. It’s that trope where the MC lives through all these super weird coincidences and doesn’t question a single thing. Like, if I could suddenly do some snazzy magic - and shortly thereafter someone kills themselves, I would f’n ask myself (and others) why.

I’m such a sucker for dark academia. But I gotta say, I can vividly see the inspirations coming from both The Magicians and Vita Nostra, big time. Shoot, there’s even Dark Matter’s box/hallway of worlds going on. Why hasn’t anyone mentioned this yet?

It’s feeling a little too comfy for me, as someone who rereads all three of those series every year. I hope the author can surprise me soon…

I’m in the first chapter and just had the thought, ‘I forgot how good they [dear authors] are at writing’. Which is wildly absurd. I’ve read the Expanse series twice before, I love their writing. But I forgot specifically how good they are at writing about *people*.

Ps. The thank you to Le Guin and Herbert was classy.

This could’ve been so much better had a couple more alpha readers jumped in. This is going to be very hard to review.

I have a feeling I’m going to lose an entire Saturday to this book.

Okay I totally cheated. I’m at a certain fight at the end - and from reading reviews that were devastated at the book’s end - I panicked and checked the wiki to make sure my favorite fighter lived past the book’s end.

Honestly, I don’t feel the slightest guilt. That war saw sounds terrifying.

I just found myself agreeing with Atlas about something and I am horrified. It was about how the greater the trauma the longer the peace. It’s true though. I often think about the fact that post-WWII we saw such a long peace that our people now seem to crave war. We are easily manipulated into it, yes, but why is that? Why are we such a violent species?

Shit, I’ve turned into Roque.

I’m not trying to be an AH but is this entire book just an excuse for the writer to showcase how quirky they can make the characters?

The hype feels…unearned.

‘For fuck sake, Brad, the world doesn’t need you to be the Monsanto of annelids.’

Jesus. I might actually hurt myself from mirth.

This just turned a corner and got super philosophical (which I love). Central question: what is life, truly, in the end? What is deserving of agency?

Can we talk about how DOPE this cover is? Like, do we think the designer pulled this off in just procreate? And without looking, I’m going to guess it’s the person that did the Lore cover. Just because the shadow work is so gd impressive.

I’m always surprised when our current politics suddenly becomes part of the plot in post apocalyptic fiction. It’s been happening in a lot of what I’m reading. It was a throw away line but a reminder that the weird shifts happening all over the world today aren’t happening in a vacuum and we are all scared of the near future.

(Please vote.)

I have no idea what has been lost in translation to English but Julia Hersey has done such an amazing job that I can’t imagine I am missing much.

I sincerely believe that this series should be the benchmark for all dark academia. It is sheer perfection.

Ms Hersey, please (🙏🏼) hurry with book 3.

That was a helluva first chapter.

I don’t know who Emily Hamilton is but I don’t think I’ve ever requested an Arc this fast before.

Bummer about the suffering white man trope. I was getting into the story until that part.

It’s like Wexler wrote a Princess story for me personally. It’s so sarcastic, including the in page references. When talking a thing I hate in all ‘new-world’ set fantasy (linguistic synchronicity), she throws her hands in the air and basically says ‘a wizard did it’. Even she admits it makes no sense.

He’s written a fantasy for cynical assholes like me. I want to have his sarcastic babies now.

I’m just on the intro and already loving our MC.

The translation of this is so lovely. There’s a rhythm to it that feels like it wants to be poetry - or a dear chaotic cousin - but it’s still completely narrative. I don’t know how to explain it.

Ps. A ‘limited budget’ would not compel MIT leadership to ignore potential data breaches. It would just mean Gabe wouldn’t be able to present his data the way he wished. Instead they would likely share a simulation of their data to the audience. Google OSATT. You think they’d let a strategic partner have *full* access to their research for *cheap computing power*? You must be high.

Sigh. I wish the author had run this through someone who does research admin. A huge company would never have backdoor access to MIT research data. Ever. Data integrity is the #1 focus of research IT.

Don’t let creativity get in the way of reality if you’re using reality based rules in your creativity, authors.

‘But you know what they say, you get the government you deserve, am I right?’

Also, *you’re*. I’ve literally had one sip of coffee so far today. Mea culpa.

Authors: This is really dumb, BUT. I must insist.

If you’re trying to pretend your a local paper, do ask someone who lives there. We don’t call ourselves ‘North California’. We aren’t the Carolinas. We are Northern California or NorCal for short. Please and thank you.

If the author and publisher ever do a future rerelease, they should definitely contract out with a graphic designer. Some scenes are just too hard to mentally understand and it would’ve been a real boon to *see* what the author intended (for instance, the external reef system). The world building in this is wonderful!