Nova’s playlist: From cinders to tiara: princesses of earth volume I

There is some unsuffusing thing beyond thee, thou clear spirit, to whom all thy eternity is but time, all thy creativeness mechanical.

Relatable Character Ahab, Moby Dick

introduction

Call me naïve, but I don’t feel the same resentment towards AI as much as some people in my circle seem to. As long as your technological horrors run locally on my machine and don’t pose a threat to society, I’m not militantly against it. It’s just another tool, and tools are a great way to simplify the things I don’t like doing.

Case in point, I have a plex server full of random videos in a lot of random languages I’d like to have captions for–videos too obscure for their captions to be floating around on the Internet–and I don’t want to go through the pain of uploading them to YouTube. A bit of research led me to one of these new AI tools that spits out captions for any video in just about any language, and can run with my machine on airplane mode.

So I install it, get it running, and feed the model a video.

My terminal lights up.

Not some complicated code, not an error, just one sentence, over and over:

“I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m sorry. There’s nothing at all. I’m sorry…”

No one says this in the video. The timestamps imply that it all happens in the few couple seconds (something like 20 I’m sorrys per second). But by the time someone actually starts speaking, everything’s transcribed and synced perfectly. The wonders of modern technology!

Something about this experience struck a very dissonant chord deep within me, for reasons I don’t think are completely obvious.

You see, in the broadest strokes, I’d obtained the video by means I’m not proud of. Don’t worry–I never broke any laws, the video is completely safe for work, and I hurt no one in getting it. But what I did was immoral or at the very least creepy.
So when my robot freaked out and started apologizing to me over and over, I ascribed a sort of magical thinking to it–was this a warning glare from Karma? Did the AI somehow know how reprehensible its task was?

I realize this sounds like a bad creepypasta. And if I were a better writer, I’d turn this into some kind of digital horror story. Something about a remorseful transcription AI used by a serial killer who films his victims. I don’t know; it’s not my genre. Idea’s all yours if you want it.

But I digress–there I was, scrolling through the transcription, trying to process what it meant on a technical level (as if I know anything about AI). I can only liken it to a record player’s needle skating on its way into the track, creating a split-second cacophony. Just for a second, I’d caught a glimpse of the dark and calamitous void beneath a paper-thin gloss.

This fundamentally changed the way I view technology. A machinery so advanced that it seems almost sentient is reduced to a senseless, confused maelstrom the split second something goes wrong. I’m starting to realize it’s not just AI. Record players. Power grids. Economies. People. All of these systems are predicated on everything falling perfectly into place. If anything is even slightly out of order, there’ll be hell to pay.

A day later, I start Laura M. Davis’s Nova’s Playlist: From Cinders to Tiara, for the nex episode of my podcast. My friend had told me there was BookTok drama about the AI and racially insensitive tweets. Something about copyrighting the sun. I don’t know the full story at time of writing; I’m trying to keep my opinions focused solely on the actual book.

The main character Avryll’s a servant or whatever; she refuses to do something, and her boss threatens to dock her wages. This is how she responds:

“No. No. Neh no no no. No.”

There it is again. A split-second reminder of the void.

I’m going to risk being mean to Lauren for a moment: This is not a good reflection of speech. This is not even a good transliteration of stammering. A human did not write this, because no human would come up with this, and no human would see this and think it’s a good idea.

I understand how insignificant this seems in comparison to other things wrong with the book or the author’s actions on social media. But I chose this one line of dialogue as the novel’s emblematic passage because I think it illustrates the emptiness and numb horror of reading this book. “I’m sorry,” says Lauren Davis’s robot who “helped” her write this book. “I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m sorry.”
I wonder if this is some quirk of language learning models (too lazy to look it up; more fun to speculate) where they might get stuck in a loop at the beginning or end of a “track”. Or maybe this is that “dreaming” phenomenon that happens when the robot doesn’t have all the information it needs, and just draws from short-term memory. As the old saying goes: garbage in, garbage out.

So let’s get some garbage out.

After almost 400 grueling pages, I’ve finally finished reading this book, and feel compelled to put together summary/review in addition to the (at time of writing) upcoming episode. My reasons are twofold:

1. I’m not on TikTok. Everyone on BookTok seems to know about this, and solely about the controversy, but currently there are very few reviews of the actual book and no YouTube content I can find (as far as I can tell), no plot breakdowns or even summaries. I don’t want this book to fade into the ether undocumented. In a just world, this would reach Empress Theresa levels of fame.
2. I have a lot to say about this book and want a central place to write down my thoughts in case J gets me on a tangent in the episode (spoiler alert: they did).

Plot breakdown

From Cinders to Tiara by Lauren M. Davis is an episodic fantasy adventure novel in which our hero, French peasant Avryll Louisette, travels through a variety of magical realms, as well as various time periods in the “real” world. This section is an arc-by-arc plot summary of the book, with commentary interspersed. This taxonomy is my own design, done because a lot of chapters contain 50% of one arc and 50% of another. I wrote this mostly for posterity; skip it if it gets dry.

1. prologue

Nova (our in-universe author) describes Lydia Trace, intern of some nebulous company, stepping into a virtual reality room to beginning playing the game Time Visitor. That’s pretty much it.

Conceptually, this is the right way to use prologues; the reader will ascertain that the events in the book are part of the game (if they remember this one page of the deluge to come). Despite the conceit being established, I’m going to critique this book as if the events are “real”, both because (spoiler alert) they are, and because it’s more fun this way.

2. Life in France

We begin our story close on Thomas Quent, a man who does not matter, paying a surprise visit to his niece, Avryll Louisette in Calais, France. It’s the year 1788, Avryll is a 17-year old handmaiden and actor. She lives with parents, Martha and Brett, in some nebulous poverty despite her uncle owning a “manor”.

Avryll goes to her job serving a girl her age named Priscilla Naughtley. Priscilla receives an invitation to the Chevalier family’s party at “Infinite Glen Circle”, whatever that means. Through a stupid contrivance, Avryll gets to go, and meets a carousel of characters: the creepy Lord Fordyce, Rebecca Fairchild, “Chipper DuBois”, and the dark and mysterious Vincent Chevalier, scion of the household. Vincent and Avryll flirt a bit, he saves her from bandits after the party, he saves her from falling at another party, all the while telling her to stay away from him. There were a couple moments where he would come up to her at random times and tell her to stay away. All the men love Avryll, which makes Vincent jealous, but in a sexy kind of way.

Avryll overhears some mysterious conversations about “six realms”. Vincent plays coy about this, and she invites him to her performance at the theatre.
At the cast party afterwards, her (very specifically and often mentioned) Arabic friend, inexplicably named William Sage, makes an unwelcome pass at her, letting Vincent save her once again.

Avryll goes to church, where the vicar talks about John 3:16 (because of course) and then launches into a (for what it’s worth) deeply heretical sermon about other sons of God and other gods existing. Lines are drawn from this to Vincent’s apparently-supernatural nature.

Avryll participates in a “Ladies’ Auxiliary Benefit” bake sale and ends up selling her entire stock to a a bunch of sailors. She ends up locked in the ship by Vincent, who’s the captain of the boat (because of course). I’m pretty sure he straight up attempt to actually kidnap her, but I have no idea. He gives her earrings–this will actually end up mattering.

Avryll joins Vincent for dinner, with a “merchant” who reveals he intends to join the trans-Atlantic slave trade on Vincent’s dime. When Vincent refuses this, the merchant kidnaps Avryll and Vincent’s best friend Cirrus and throws them on his slave ship, bound for New Orleans. Cirrus and Avryll are both explicitly white; the racial implications of this are never even alluded to.

3. the New orleans arc

Avryll arrives in New Orleans and is auctioned off. When the auctioneer struggles to come up with selling points, Avryll curtsies lists off her employable skills. Holy crap.

Cirrus and Avryll are both bought by the household–that of the Spanish Military Treasurer, Don Vincente Jose Nunez. While being carted off, Avryll doesn’t think about her family, friends, or the fact that Vincent kidnapped her and despite having magical powers, let her be kidnapped and sold into slavery. She’s disappointed that she didn’t get a cooler slave job!

Avryll inexplicably can speak English and Spanish despite being French. Nunez creeps on Avryll, and bites her wrist to drink her blood like he’s a vampire. Avryll tries to resist, a fire starts, Cirrus rescues her and flies away with wings “wider than an eagle’s, but not longer than a griffin’s”–wings that he could have presumably used at any time hitherto. “His bright, colorful wingtips looked almost tribal.” No, he does not belong to a non-racist fantasy tribe that uses bright colors. “Tribal” is to be understood as a singular, unified style.

As the fire rages and threatens the city, Cirrus lands in a “building” full of nuns to treat Avryll’s wounds. Vincent is there, so unceremoniously described that I thought Davis got confused between him and Cirrus.

It’s revealed that Avryll has silver blood, which not even she knew. She says “I’ve never had a reason to bleed.” She is an active seventeen year old–and a girl, if we really have to get into this.

This revelation, and the fact that Nunez apparently is able to track Avryll, brings Vincent to desperate measures. He teleports her by means of a “ferrydoor” to…

4. Cythera (sic)

Now in the celestial realm of Cythera, which is apparently Vincent and Cirrus’s homeworld, Avryll stumbles on the court of King Eli, revealed to be Vincent and Rebecca’s father. There’s some talk of a brewing conflict with the neighboring(??) nation of Floren.

Avryll is recognized as an outsider by virtue of her heartbeat. Rather than explain anything that had happened to get her here, Avryll mouths off to the king and gets arrested.

Vincent appears, once again unceremoniously, and vouches for her so that she can get a job as the protege of a noblewoman, Diana Kade. All I remember about her is that she was dismissive of Avryll’s desire to go home.

There’s some court intrigue–rumors of a traitor to Cythera, and Avryll experiences visions of Nunez. Apparently, he’s “marked” her and isn’t a vampire, but some kind of demon. Okay, sure. Cirrus is charged to protect her, Liam from Fourth Wing style.
Avryll learns ballroom dancing, piano lessons, horseback riding from a man named Nicholas Snicket. Rebecca teaches her swordfighting by night.

There’s some worldbuilding here about how this realm interacts with the mortal/real world and the world of the dead; I want to copy a small section because it really pissed me off:

“Is he a dead mortal like Nicholas too?” Avryll asked.
“We call them Transcenders. Yes.”
“Transcender? As in conqueror – of what? Death?”
“Yes. Transcenders have passed through the Shadowlands and emerged victors.”

No definition of “transcend” implies “conquering”, and it really bothers me this is just taken for granted. I guess this boils down to a pet peeve, but still.

The earrings Avryll got in the France arc are magic charms that allow you to speak any language seamlessly. That’s cool. But the earrings are described as “ancient talismans from ancient Babylonia”, which is stupid.

Part of Avryll’s education involves her learning to control her elf magic. Davis opted for a Harry Potter-style “magic words” system–nothing wrong with that, but while Harry Potter used hokey Latin-based words, here Avryll just says the Japanese word for whatever she wants to happen. The characters acknowledge this is Japanese, but there’s no actual connection between elves and the Japanese as a people or Japan as a reason. It’s just “the language that ignites Elven powers”. God, I would have even been okay with the first elves being Japanese or whatever–but no, it’s just something about that language specifically.

The investigation into the traitor’s identity continues, leading to the murder of a minor character Lord Ramsey. Avryll & co. discover the scene and are falsely accused of the murder. The queen (Vincent’s mother) knows that Avryll didn’t actually kill anyone, but still fires her for “not being mature enough.”

A ferrydoor randomly opens, and Avryll takes it in the hopes of getting back home. She winds up in…

5. New Orleans Arc II: Civil War

Avryll ends up in New Orleans during the American Civil War, 1861. The racial implications of this time period versus slavery being a fact of Avryll’s life is not even alluded to. Avryll does not react in the slightest to everyone she knows being dead.

The nuns of this era take her in and get her dressed up, only to task her to do chores. Cirrus appears, climbing a tree, and reveals that Nunez is a gargoyle. Okay. Avryll learns of a Sword of Immortal’s Bane, which can somehow get her back to her time. The only problem is, it belongs to someone named Zachary, a Cytherean believed dead.

Nunez, functionally immortal, has become a Confederate general, and is still inexplicably pursuing Avryll. She joins minor character Meghan as a Union doctor, Cirrus and Meghan make out, Nunez’s Confederate gargoyle forces attack.
Avryll escapes to Cythera, and Vincent and Cirrus protect her from invading gargoyles. Unable to kill Avryll, Nunez teleports her to the desert. This kicks off…

6. The wild west

Avryll is promptly attacked by what might be the most racist Native American stereotypes conceived of in the 21st century, with such names as “Hunting Owl” and “Panther Rose”. I cannot overstate how deeply uncomfortable this segment is–how little I wanted to read the phrase “Your scalp will decorate the inside of my wigwam”.

Panther Rose is the chief’s daughter, and captures Avryll, and takes her to her father, Pela Rose. While awaiting trial, almost the entire tribe is gunned down by a group of cowboys, led by a man named Fletcher. They’re looking for a “totem charm”. Panther Rose, having survived the onslaught, surrenders the charm–it’s a ring that “makes anything you touch afflicted with fierce amnesia”. J says this comes back at some point, but I do not believe them.

Despite not liking or trusting them, Avryll agrees to accompany the cowboys by train to California. At the train bar, she gets drinks with Fletcher and wakes up with a hangover.

In California, Avryll helps the cowboys do cowboy stuff and Fletcher makes a pass at her. They kiss, but Avryll isn’t 100% into it.

One day, they’re attacked by cattle rustlers. In the fray, Avryll finds the Sword of Immortal’s Bane. This (apparently) means that Fletcher is the one who let the Gargoyles almost kill her back in Louisiana. Somehow this also means he’s in league with Nunez. But Fletcher renounced Nunez because Avryll was too beautiful.
One of the random ranch hands turns out to be Vincent. Says that Nunez is dead–and yes, this main Act 1 villain literally dies offscreen and the news is given in one line.

All of this was happening during the skirmish with the rustlers. One of the rustlers gets a drop on Avryll and hits her in the back of the head with a rock. This kills her.

7. Avryll’s Death, Resurrection, and Loss of Soul

Yes, like literally kills her. Vincent takes her to Cythera and Fletcher comes with, despite being from Floren (the nation almost at war with Cythera). Vincent takes her to the “Pool of Preservation” and asks his father for help, even though to help her would be against the Laws of Nature.

He gets the power of life or whatever, but when he goes back to find Avryll’s body, there’s a bunch of dead angels strewn around and a weird-looking figure holding Avryll’s soul in a vial. They fight, Fletcher saves him in the nick of time, and they resurrect Avryll and the angels. Yay.

Avryll having lost her soul means that if she dies again, it will be as if she’s never existed. This is (allegedly) a huge raising of the stakes.

But oh man Zachary is alive! And we care! He was attacked by Morguors, which are humans(??) who rove around and kill people with poisoned nooses. That’s pretty neat, I guess. Apparently this adds to the court intrigue.

A voice lures Avryll to the library, where she encounters a hologram of her mother. It’s something like a cross-time Google Earth for stalkers. No, this never comes back.

Vincent’s mother is there, and charges her with rescuing Rebecca from Floren–she was captured offscreen. To do this, she needs to find the bearer of the Crown of Immortal’s Bane, which is currently owned by an Atlantean in Hawaii. Avryll, who will cease to exist if she is killed, accepts this dangerous task that won’t benefit her in the slightest.

8. Rescuing Rebecca- Hawaiian Cop Vacation

Before embarking, Avryll has one last meet-cute with Vincent. She plays a drinking game with him to ask him some very superficial questions, and directly acknowledges getting drunk is a crutch for her anxiety. She and Vincent pointedly do NOT do it, and she sneaks off back to Earth.

She arrives on Earth in modern(ish?) times, and wanders to a highway, where she’s almost run over. A couple cops come pick her up, and she uses her magic to convince them she’s actually from the 1700s.

Since she has no ID, no history, and no family, the sheriff’s office decides to HIRE HER! WHY DOES THIS KEEP HAPPENING?? She hangs out with some cop named Amy; to get her ready for her exciting carer in law enforcement, they enter her into a kayak race and teach her how to drive.

Cirrus appears, and for some reason Avryll is hesitant to leave her life as a cop. Cirrus flies away. End scene.

Avryll only later decides that she needs proves to Amy that magic is real by making a German Shepherd puppy appear. Amy is all for this. The dog’s name is Holly. Amy, Holly, and Cirrus fly to Hawaii, where they find the Atlantean Nicole, bride of Lord Simon (some Cytherean who they were kinda suspicious of).

More exposition that doesn’t matter. So, they can’t go with the crown plan because the Florentines would rather kill Rebecca than lose her. Since they can’t use the crown plan, they decide to sneak in as a band, deputizing Fletcher on account of his Florentine blood. Okay, sure, whatever.

Nicole offers Avryll the crown anyways, even though this represents the forfeiture of her immortality, because she wants the full experience of growing old with Lord Simon. Avryll nobly refuses this. Cirrus is a football fan. The plot continues.

Vincent appears when Avryll goes for a swim and reveals he has time travel powers, meaning he could but has chosen not to use them to help Avryll get home. Because he wanted her to himself. So this is literally kidnapping–again. But no, Avryll’s invested in saving Vincent’s sister, so she’s invested now. They make out. Cirrus and Amy also make out, they all say goodbye, and then return to Cythera.

9. Rescuing Rebecca II- The Squeakuel

Avryll, Vincent, and Fletcher form a musical group known as “The Perils”. They rehearse, sneak into Floren, and perform for the court. Floren is an oddly modern place–there are loudspeakers, (specifically) LED lights, and Rebecca is being kept in a cell with a biometric lock. I thought that was kind of interesting. One society doesn’t need to advance technologically due to having magic powers, while the other has to compensate. Cool stuff.

The dance is a microcosm of their dumb love triangle. They rescue Rebecca in maybe a sentence or two, bivouack in Toath (which is another place, apparently), and briefly fight with Morguor.

Back at Cythera, Fletcher becomes a knight and gets the cognomen “Wolf Trickster” (he fooled werewolves in the rescue sequence; I didn’t mention it because it doesn’t mater). Avryll becomes Lady Louisette. Zachary gives her the Sword of Immortal’s Bane and a bracelet from Rebecca which I thought might end up being important but never came back up.

Victorious, Avryll teleports back to the harbor in Calais, now with a sword and STILL WITHOUT HER SOUL. She arrives just in time to see uncle Thomas before he leaves.
Avryll turns 18. In a sentence so short I almost missed it, her mother reveals that she knew they had elf blood and to just keep it a secret.

One day in December, Vincent appears, gives her a dress to wear for Rebecca’s holiday party.

10. Santa Claus, Lord Fordyce

They arrive just in time for Father Christmas to give gifts to everyone. Santa gives Avryll a gift from Nicole–the crown, which she did thrice refuse like 2 chapters ago.
After the party, a reindeer appears to Avryll, apparently as foretold in a dream that I skimmed over. The reindeer TALKS, saying he has another gift, and transforms into Santa. Who is apparently an evil shapeshifter.

It’s Lord Fordyce, a man I mentioned once because he was mildly creepy at the party in the first arc and never does anything important again. But now he’s evil and a shapeshifter and every mysterious animal she’s encountered this whole time. He wants elven blood, and he’ll give her her soul back for it. If she betrays the pact, he’s put a “warlock’s curse” on her soul. She has to live with him too, and is taken to his weird castle. This is like the fifth or sixth time Avryll has been captured and enslaved, for those of you who are keeping count.

Vincent is there in her quarters at the castle, offers to help her escape. Avryll sends him away because he’ll… turn them against each other. Somehow?

Lord Fordyce summons her for an audience. The doctor who’d helped her with her gargoyle bite is here as well, he doesn’t support treason, but he doesn’t want someone as beautiful as Avryll to be marred with numerous bite scars. While preparing her for a blood transfusion, he sneaks her a note that says “The only way to break the warlock’s curse is to end the life it was meant to take. The shadowlands await you.”

Along with this is a poison pill. Avryll takes it just in time for the castle to be under attack.

There’s a dragon ridden by Vincent, Rebecca is there, Fletcher is there wielding an M-16 and a shotgun, some wizard named Neillel who Davis seems to assume I know about, and then Amy the cop with her semi-automatic pistols. I guess this is what’s supposed to be the climax.

Still beholden to the warlock’s curse, Avryll is forced to help Fordyce, I guess because of the lagtime for taking the poison. Fordyce morphs into a dragon and makes Avryll ride him and commands her to slay Vincent. Avryll and Vincent fight, and he DUAL WIELDS KATANAS LIKE IT’S A SOULSBORNE GAME. Before anyone could do significant damage, Avryll succumbs to the poison.

11. Dino Danger

The death realm is this nebulous starscape with a pit of fire full of dark creatures–demons? Avryll reaches a gate to the Shadowlands with a bunch of “turbaned nomads” (which isn’t SUPER problematic but it raised an eyebrow knowing who wrote it) sitting out front, telling her she needs to solve a riddle told by a goblin.
The goblin asks a riddle for babies, Avryll correctly answers it, and the goblin gets angry and accuses her of cheating. This happens like 3 times. In true Rumplestiltskin fashion, she guesses his name: Death. I actually think that portraying Death as a silly goblin and not a cloaked grim reaper or skeleton actually opens up some interesting philosophical possibilities–none of which are developed here.

The gate opens to a jungle full of tropical animals. Pixies inform her that the good witch can get her out of the Shadowlands. Mermaids tell her that the good witch lives on Kane’s volcano, a two-day’s trek away, and to beware of nightfall.

When night does fall, Avryll and the nomads are attacked by velociraptors. Actual Jurassic Park-style velociraptors. Avryll tries to run, but gets caught in a snare.
She manages to free herself, but the velociraptors are still there and she’s suspended too high up. The velociraptors get bored and she falls asleep.

Avryll dreams of the gardens of Helix (a place which exists, apparenty) with Zachary. He informs her there’s been a truce brokered with Floren, and then just vaguely warns her not to die. He says he has something to tell her about Vincent, but the dream ends right before he can explain.

Avryll wakes up to a man riding a brachiosaurus, who helps her get away. This is Robert Louis Stevenson, the real-life author of Treasure Island, whom Avryll apparently knows of, stuck in the Shadowlands all these years. “Mortis Capers” is apparently the reason he’s stuck here–he controls who departs from the shadowlands. The good witch is his mistress.

In a cave with all the other people stuck in the Shadowlands who refuse to serve Mortis Capers, Avryll has a dream of Vincent dying, being chased by a T-Rex, Vincent coming back to life but having to swear to love the woman who owned the T-Rex and then the woman eating Avryll’s heart.

The next morning, news comes that king Mortis has promised freedom to anyone who can interpret a nightmare he had. If they cannot deliver the true dream and its meaning, they will be sentenced to death. Avryll undertakes the journey with Robert, believing her nightmare to be related.

They meet Karneevo “The Hangman”, some kind of dignitary of King Mortis. He makes them tell him the dream but doesn’t believe them? But it’s okay, because one of the guards turns out to have been King Mortis the whole time. Mortis gives her power through his blood and lets her and Louis leave the Shadowlands. They fly pterodactyls out and part ways. On her journey back, Avryll encounters a blnd beggar and attempts to heal him with her new powers. This is revealed to be Vincent, who promptly asks her to marry him.

12. And they Lived Happily Ever After… OR DO THEY???

They have the wedding after Avryll turns 19 so that uncle Thomas can attend. King Mortis dies offscreen, and Avryll chugs champagne. Avryll’s father is there at the ceremony, as is every single character introduced in the entire freaking book. I can’t get over how stupid all the names are in this book.

Then the next morning, Avryll is crowned princess of Cythera.

And then, in case you forgot the prologue (like I did), plot twist: the simulation ends.

13. Lydia

I thought the book would be over by now but nope, here’s Lydia Trace’s entire freaking story.

She gets out of the simulation and talks to her coworker and fellow gamer about the meta of the book we just read. She’s the first person to beat Time Visitor, apparently, at Stellar Enterprises Inc. in Sacramento, California.

Apparently superheroes are real?? And zombies?? She disinterestedly watches a news broadcast about a superhero named “Knight Stalker” who can control the undead.

The next day, she’s summoned by Troy Chevalier, the designer of the game. Aside from the surname, he’s the spitting image of vincent. Lydia critiques the plot of the book, and the speed at which they fall in love.

Later, she goes hiking with her family, and drops very casually that she gets delusions where she can see the souls of other people.

There are other people in the forest, wearing cloaks. They’re elves, like from the game. Her dad is apparently from Daleway, and fathered a child with a mortal woman. Divinity Trace is her mom’s name, which I think is very funny. But she’s not Lydia’s birth mother.

Divinity (an Isruesian vampire) tries to defend him, saying that Xander is a “Light Keeper” (no, we’re not told what his means. J says we are but I still do not believe them), but Xander accepts his execution.

Divinity charges Lydia with finding her birth mother. If not, then “what is buried may never rise again, and the world will be free to do as it pleases”. The elf who killed Lydia’s father warns her that gods will throw themselves at her and try to force a relationship with her.

Then she just drives back to her internship and goes to work “glum and angry”
So at this point, I’m furious, thinking that all of this was for nothing and ends with what basicaly amounts to “it was all just a dream”, but it’s okay, it’s real–Troy’s mother is Avryll Louisette, and the entire story is true.

Lydia’s true birth mother is Nicole Simon (the Altantean who had the crown) and apparently this matters. What about Lord Simon, then? Is what I would ask, if I cared.

At her job, she’s partnered up with Altair, a dark, curly haired guy with “sun-kissed skin and a strong build”. He abruptly shoulders into her upon seeing a black widow spider on her.

Meeting him makes her magically realize where an… analysis report is. She gets a call from someone named Kade Fletcher, tells him her parents have had an emergency, he offers her a weekend job at a lighthouse that her parents own??? Kade’s last name is Fletcher. Ugh.

Altair and Lydia go to the lighthouse. Altair goes to get groceries, and Troy and Nicole appear. Troy and Lydia jetski together.

Apparently, Troy and Altair grew up together, but Altair developed dark powers. Altair drank his mother (Avryll’s) blood for more power or something.

Suddenly, a meteor strikes the water, and Lydia and Troy are swept away by a wave. They all get saved by Knight Stalker, who when asked how he knew to save them, replies “Ghosts tell me things”. Which I thought was funny.

They need to stay at an “inn” because the water’s too high. They need some kind of MacGuffin in Atlantis, I literally don’t care anymore. Altair warns her not to go, Lydia confronts him about the elf blood thing, which he dismisses. He slips her a note that says he suspects Troy of both putting a black widow on her and the meteor.
She goes to her dorm, Troy enters, she confronts him about Altair’s accusations. In response, Troy asks her out and she accepts.

She wears a little grey nothing dress to their date and drive a motorbike to a rich people party or whatever. There’s an earthquake, Lydia almost falls into like hell or something, and then Knight Stalker saves her AGAIN. Warns her to stay away from Troy until she learns to master her abilities. She starts flirting with Knight Stalker, and they make out. Kade calls, says a ghost repaired all the damage to the lighthouse. A lieral ghost. Great.

Troy tries to kidnap her, Knight Stalker comes back AGAIN. She kills Troy with a bunch of rocks or something, he vows to get out of the Shadowlands and kill her.

Knight Stalker reveals he has some kind of connection to the six realms: “My father married a banshee from the shadowlands after he became president.” They make out some more then fly away.

14. Epilogue

In the epilogue, Nova (explicitly described as a white woman and never told to have sun powers) describes her PENS in grueling detail, heads out into New York City to run errands. I’m serious–nothing interesting happens. She notices she’s being followed by someone in blue, and it turns out it’s KADE FLETCHER FROM THE LYDIA CHAPTERS OOOOOH

And thus ends the biggest fever dream of a book I’ve ever read. Hope this helps the literary scholars of the future. I may expound/liven up the commentary at some point but for now I have 5 hours of discussion to edit for the episode, which I really want to come out sometime next week.

Andrew