(no subject)

[antediluvian]

I still haven't read The Raven King. I pre-ordered it the moment it was possible to do so, and then two weeks before it arrived I decided to embark on a re-read of the entire Raven Cycle, because this will be the last time I can read it speculatively... and speculating about the end of the Raven Cycle has formed the backbone of my fannish activity for the past year and a half. 

This means I've been dodging spoilers like bullets.

But now it's time. I finished my re-read of Blue Lily, Lily Blue this morning. The sun is shining and a blanket and my neighbour's cat are in the garden outside, so there's where I am going to start my reading of The Raven King. I can't imagine better circumstances! 

I've put some of my speculations and hopes for The Raven King below the cut - there are spoilers for the rest of the Raven Cycle, if you haven't read it yet.

• Ashley! I've had so many conversations with blindmadness, KL and Kim about how sure we are that Declan's super WASPy girlfriend must be some kind of gun waiting to be fired. Adam and Gansey both notice in The Raven Boys that she seems to be paying a lot more attention to things when she thinks no one is watching her, and when Ronan has that spat with her outside the church in the Dream Thieves her personality seems to be so constructed that I feel she must be some sort of undercover person. Top speculation is that she's somehow related to the Greenmantles.

• Gansey as Glendower. I remember feeling so smug about this theory when I coined it during one of my re-reads, and then the rest of fandom caught on too. The Death card in tarot represents transformation more often than it represents actual death, and so I feel as though Gansey "awakens" as Glendower in some way and ceases to be Gansey as we know him. There are also multiple references throughout to Gansey seeming somehow ageless etc etc. Plus Maura feels like Blue was the outcome of some kind of ritual with Artemus, and what if the outcome of that ritual was to create a key to waking Glendower - Blue's kiss kills Gansey as we know him and transforms him into Glendower. The other option is that Adam somehow transforms him as per Adam's horrible vision.

• Persephone comes back in some way. There have been a lot of conversations about how the women of Fox Way re-use time and Persephone talks to Adam about how "they" (assuming Maura and Calla) don't always know what to do with her since she came back, which implies that Persephone is somehow different to Calla and Maura and that it is the result of something that happened. 

What I am really, really hoping for - aside from a mostly happy ending and some decent kisses for all my OTPs - is a satisfyingly cyclical end to things. I feel as though Blue and her boys are the culmination of a circular pattern which included Maura and her women (and Artemus) along the way and Glendower and his people at the other end. I want to see the outcome of Adam's courtcase and I want a happy ending for him and Ronan. I want Declan Lynch to get the family he deserves because he certainly didn't get the parents. I want Blue's heart not to be broken. I want Gansey to live, in some way.

This series has been incredibly important to me for the past four and a bit years. I've made some really good friends for it and felt fannishly enthusiastic about something for the first time in ages. 

Now I am going to go to my garden and start reading The Raven King.

Comments

[isis]

I shall not spoil it for you! But I will say that I both enjoyed The Raven King, and also felt disappointed. Stiefvater is a very good writer on a micro level, not so much on a macro level.

(And hey, you kind of described my last Raven Cycle story here :-)

[antediluvian]

I am tremendously excited that I have described your last fic - I need to read that one and have been holding off during my re-read. I think it will be a treat post-TRK! *_*

I have decided to just try to finish my own fic after reading TRK and possibly changing my planned ending if Stiefvater has massively jossed me, which I suspect she will have done. It serves me right for being so slow!

[antediluvian]

also gosh Isis as soon as I finish TRK I will probably need to send you an email full of thoughts! or a comment full of thoughts! *_*

[isis]

Hee, you bet. You can look at my Wednesday review (though I don't think I really got too specific other than in comments) and see if we agree!

Stiefvater jossed everyone, I think!