*snaps In Enthusiastic Agreement*

"I don't care what Nora says, Andrew heals!!!" Ok but where did she say he doesn't??? I see people complaining about "Andrew not healing" all the time. Please point me to where she says that because there are several times she talks about him getting better.

(If anybody says it's because Andrew and Neil don't say I love you, get married, or have kids I'm going to scream. Which I know is probably the reason but can we please use our brains and think beyond the stereotypical story of healing)

Yes. That’s all.

It's so satisfying to know that Riko, out of all the people that were supposed to be in the perfect court, was the worst player overall (if the others played at full potential).

Like, we know for a fact he was worse than Kevin, that's explicit.

Then we have Neil, who is like... both an amazing striker AND backliner just by having trained for it for the grand total of like...2 years. He knows both roles and plays them top of the line. He is also always the fastest player on the court, and has enough endurance to play full games... he is so well rounded it's scary.

Andrew is just...out of the league when it comes to ability. He is out of any chart canonically. He just never tries -but when he does? To be able to choose how many shots he wants to let go through, to again play full games and letting only what 16 shots in out of HUNDREDS against the ravens?? He is overpowered, nora gave him depression because if he had the passion to play frfr he'd be court by like 19. No college needed.

Jean is able to be one of the best backliners while playing with broken fingers, broken/bruised ribs, being 2 years younger than everyone else, sleep deprived, tortured...the list goes on. He is still out there blowing everyone out of left field. He is big and coordinated, steady on his feet. And unmovable object. In saner and safer conditions he'll shine so hard the fans will need sunglasses. He's harder to point down as objectively better than Riko but like,, you see my point. Even if they were to be equal players he'd still win in the physique department, making him overall better.

Just. I love this.

actually so upset we didn't get to see andrew's reaction to neil going "oh he's gay? so i guess him and kevin..." like andrew who has been ruthlessly attracted to neil the whole time and trying to ignore it only to find out neil immediately thought he was with kevin...the crash out would've been memorable...

They really do…just two traumatized guys struggling through life and unintentionally falling into found families.

Also I love that my newest hyperfixation series and my longest obsession series are COLLIDING!!

Kit Herondale and Neil Josten have the same energy and you can't convince me otherwise

I’M OBSESSED WITH THIS

My Kink Is Karma - AFTG ANIMATIC

he is the moment 😩

artists: @cassandrajean, @parcai and @aliceduke



Andrew Minyard doesn’t recover

And that’s okay- here’s why

Many people have been angry about the extra content through the years, but by far the thing that I see the most people being pissed about is this, “Andrew and Neil doesn’t get married” and the “they never say I love you”

But let’s talk about this for a minute

Because just because he doesn’t recover, doesn’t mean he doesn’t get better

He does, he keeps a stable relation to his brother, cousin and Kevin after graduation, something he wouldn’t have before

He let’s himself care for Neil and the cats

He starts finding some sort of joy in Exy with the people he cares about and who cares about him

He gets well enough to sleep in the same bed as Neil and have sex with him

He gets well enough to go on mundane dates with his partner on the beach, FaceTime Nicky on schedule and cuddle up with the cats at night

He gets a lot better

Don’t relate “full recovery” to “getting better” because they’re wildly different

He shows that even if you do not recover completely from the trauma you’ve suffered, from the hurt, you can still live and be happy with the people you love

So if I see one more person saying that he’s “bad mental health rep” I might actually have to fight them

THISSS!! Ugh bro that is perfect analysis and I am OBSESSED with it!!! you took the words right out of my mouth :))

You know what my actual favourite Andrew Minyard line in the whole series is? It's not his sentimental lines like, "...from now until May you are still Neil Josten...". It's not even the best love confession in all of literature line, "Doesn't mean I wouldn't blow you." It's when he says "I'm not as smart as I thought I was."

That one line tells you so much about Andrew's character. That's the line that spells out for the reader that Andrew is smarter than he chooses to let on. That's the line that shows you just highly Andrew thinks of his own intelligence and how much he's been relying on it to survive and to keep his promises.

Consider that up until that point Andrew has presented himself with nothing less than the domineering kind of toughness you'd expect to see in a prison scene in a movie. He openly talks about breaking Neil, threatens multiple people with knives and makes everyone work around him. His "tough guy around town" persona and his ability to inflict violence is clearly something he prizes. AND YET. The first time he admits to any kind of dissatisfaction with himself, it's about his intelligence.

That is the point where the reader realizes that Andrew, in his own mind, is an intellectual. He doesn't actually pride himself on being the toughest guy in the room. He's aware that he's all of 5-feet-nothing and he knows at any given moment there's likely to be someone bigger and stronger than he is. What he's counting on in any given situation is being the smartest guy in the room. Fix any issues before they worsen, anticipate and eliminate any threats before they surface, think his way out of any problem that comes up. His intelligence is what he relies on to keep his promises.

That's the moment Andrew realizes that he's been letting his feelings get the better of his logic. He clocks Neil as dangerous from day one. But he's been telling himself that he's letting Neil stay for Kevin's sake or at least just until he can definitively prove Neil is dangerous. But the real reason he let Neil stay and get away with all his sketchy behaviour is because he let the fact that he likes Neil as a person, overcome his logic.

It makes you think, OH, THAT'S WHY Andrew was so interested in Neil in the first place. For someone who prides himself on his intelligence and KNOWS that no one else can match his smarts, Neil figuring out his twin switcheroo trick is the same as Neil throwing down the gauntlet and challenging him to a battle of wits. Andrew keeps trying to trip Neil up and Neil keeps batting his attempts aside and Andrew ends up helplessly charmed by Neil. Because Andrew LIKES that Neil is able to outsmart him sometimes, that Neil is his intellectual equal. And somewhere along the way, he's let himself forget that he "knows better" than to get emotionally attached, than to let someone else best him at his best quality- than to act like every other idiot in love that he's ever met.

You then realize that Andrew hasn't once thought of himself as brawny jock. That off-putting delinquent/school-shooter vibe and "psycho" reputation is a carefully calculated form of self-defense. It's self-defense in the literal sense of scaring off people who might want to fuck with him, but perhaps also in the sense of protecting himself from being seen. It makes sense, right? If people were to actually try to get to know him with an open mind, they'd soon discover that he IS difficult to get along with in ways they thought they could handle, but can't. Better to act the volatile asshole than suffer the disappointment of people changing how they treat him. And in the unlikely case that people find out that he isn't as tough as he presents himself, they might pity him. And that would be even worse. Much better to be as un-fuck-with-able as possible.

First time reading the book, I was taken in by Andrew's jock-ish façade. But the moment he admitted maybe he ought to be disappointed in himself for not being as smart as he thought he was, I had to set the book down and rethink every assumption I had made about Andrew as a character. The timing of that revelation is so perfect, because it happens just before the Thanksgiving mess. And so as the reader, you're suddenly coming to terms with the fact that Andrew is so much more vulnerable than he's ever portrayed himself to be at the same time that Andrew is being hit with probably one of the worst moments in his life. Like, that absolutely TOOK ME OUT. Which is why, that's one of the best lines in the whole series to me.

I’ve been in burn out since the beginning of march, but it doesn’t matter because I have to finish the semester, so I’m crashing out in small increments 🫠🫠🫠