 Let's get ready to run though. Watch us, okay, lesson. Welcome back to another episode of series wipeout, which is a series I've been doing this year to fish buck series on my TVR, because one of my big goals this year is to finish series. And I'm struggling to decide what series to finish. Like I've really been struggling. It's been difficult. So I decided this month we would give you the power. And what I did was I secretly posted, well, not secretly, I posted a poll on Twitter that had different emojis. No context, just different emojis. And each of those sets of emojis corresponded to a different book series. And whichever one in the poll is what we're gonna be reading in this vlog. So Twitter has secretly picked what series I'm gonna finish next. I don't mean to make you nervous that much. So let me get up my notes app, because I haven't looked at the poll since I posted it, which was a long time ago, so I don't know what's won. But let me get up my notes app and we will see what the different series I posted were. So we did a flower, a dragon, and a fire emojis for the Poppy wall, the dragon republic, and the burning guard. We did a book stack, a question mark, and an angel emoji for library of the unwritten, the archive of the gotten and the God of lost words. We did the a secret emoji, the star and the demon emoji for daughter of smoke and bone. I can't even remember what the other ones are called. Days of blood and starlight and dreams of gods and monsters, right? And then the last one with the fire, the storm, and the angry is girls of paper and fire, girls of storm and shadow, and girls of fate and fury. So those are the four options for the series I could finish, and let's go over to the poll and see what they picked. Oh my God. Not gonna lie, I wasn't hoping for that one. So yeah, you guys have picked the Poppy wall. I've got to finish the Poppy wall. I don't think I'm ready to do that. They put me through purgatory. Yeah. They put me through hell on this earth. You guys couldn't be kind and like pick girls of fate and fury where I had one book left to read or like, I don't know, any book that was quicker than this because look, they're like bigger than me. As you'll know, these are the sequels to the Poppy wall, which I have read. I think I gave it a 4.5 when really it was a five. Like that was in my very like strict era. I was very mean to books, but we have to read the dragon of public and the burning God. I already know these are gonna kill me emotionally, right? This series is notorious for being just like terrible, like being emotionally like rampage on your emotions, like just being horrible, like everyone just crying all the time. So I have no doubt that this vlog is just gonna be me crying a lot. I'm sure many of you know the plot of this, but we're following Rin who, God, there's a lot going on, but she pushes herself out of like poverty situations she's living in, pass an exam to go train at the kind of like warrior academy called the synagogue. And she starts learning about special powers that she has and the Poppy wall breaks out. So obviously my thoughts that I'm gonna give you on this series are not gonna be spoilery. I'm not gonna spoil the Poppy wall. I'm not gonna spoil all these books. It's gonna be on vibes and emotions alone as I do with all books. I never spoil books unless I like explicitly give you spoilers. You guys really want me to suffer, huh? To see you suffer would be lovely, darling. To say you suffer would be lovely, darling. No, you really wanted to see me cry. And it's just, I don't think it's fair. I guess we'll start with the Dragon Republic. I mean, that is the way this series should be read. So we'll start with the Dragon Republic and I will check in with you once I've read a bit. God, this is mean. I don't think I'm ready to sit through this emotion. Like I, this is gonna kill me. This might be the end of my channel. Okay, hello, hello. How are we doing? Ah! So in terms of Dragon Republic, we're not here to talk about this. I've only, I'm only like 80 pages in and that was a couple of days ago. So I'm gonna read some more today. I'll check in with you in a little bit. But something much more important has happened. Babel's here! Well, guess what people? I get excited about small things. There's not a more perfect video for me to unbox this in. I saw these special editions in Waterstones on Tuesday when I went there, but I didn't have too close a look because I didn't want to be spoiled. But my copy is here and I cannot wait to unbox it. Oh my God, Waterstones. Excuse me, hit myself in the chin. Okay. Oh my goodness. Oh my gosh. By the way, is it Babel or Babel? Because I said Babel, that everyone yelled at me and said, it's Babel, bitch, it's Babel. It's why I started saying Babel. And then I was watching, I watched the talk that Arif Kwan did at Piccadilly. I watched it online. And anytime someone said Babel, they were apologizing. They're like, sorry for saying Babel. And I'm like, what is the truth? Anyways, oh my God, footnotes. When she said those footnotes, yeah, maybe I'm a bit excited. So yeah, I'm so glad that I'm gonna be finishing this series off because then I feel like I can read this without guilt, without being like, bitch, do you need to riff the Bobby wall? Wow, I'm so excited. I'm gonna go read the first page now because I love to read the first page of books when I buy them or the first chapter. Like I'm usually the first page. I just love to get like an instant feel. So I'm gonna go read the first page, then I'm gonna go film a video today and then make a thumbnail for another video. And then this afternoon and evening, I have a live show for a patron book club. But other than that, what I will be doing is reading Dragon Republic. So I'm hoping to get to like page 200-ish. Oh, I think, when does part one end? That's when I'll check in with you. Because I think it's taken me these first 80 pages to really get into the book. Yeah, I'll read to page 172 and then I'll check in. It's taken me these first pages to get into it. So I'm hoping like another 80, 90 pages, I'll have like concrete thoughts to give you. Here we go. I have finished part one of the Dragon Republic. So I am finally up to page like 117. Okay, by the way, excuse my saucy sprout. I'm a saucy sprout shirt. Tonight's vibes, just rest, recuperation, comfort. And sometimes that involves wearing the saucy sprout top that you won at a holiday resort when you were 16. I think I got it by wrapping super bass on stage. Anyways. Yes and yes, yes and yes. Woo hoo. It took me those first 80 pages. When I spoke to you last, I was like, I'm not talking because I was in the trenches. Like I couldn't remember what was happening. This opens with some characters that you don't know as well, written with some characters you don't know as well. There's so many characters in this that I'm kind of gonna hope a lot of you have read the Poppy War, even if you haven't read these ones. I feel like a lot of people will have read the Poppy War. And I'm gonna be honest, I could not tell you the different countries or fractions or whatever the wars between. I will get the names wrong. I just read it and take it, let it carry me along. When I'm reading it, I can understand who is who but I would not be able to tell you now. But anyways, yeah, this book opens with characters that we don't know as well and I was like forgetting who they all were. Now I remember who they all were but at the time I was like, shit. But pretty much from the point where I spoke to you, we meet characters we know better again and some new ones, which I think always helps with a sequel, especially when you haven't read it for a while, like introducing new characters. But I was like, we're getting the gang back together. And I have quenched just right. Like God, this makes me so excited to read Babel or you can't see her. But just so excited to spend the next week or so just plowing through these books and being in this world and just like letting Rebecca do what she wants to do, you know? I'm amazed already, only 170 pages in at the depth at like how she tackles clever topics whilst also writing a way that's accessible to everyone. There's moments in this book where I'm like, this is so clever. And then there's moments where I'm reading it. I'm like, this is so simple. And like how ingenious to be able to do both of those at once, you get me? But yeah, I'm very intrigued to see where the book's gonna go. Obviously we're only really at the beginning. I would love to get to at least page 300 tonight. That's the goal. I mean, that's like the minimal goal. If I wanna read more than that. But knowing me, that probably won't happen. I don't even know what the time is. I'm gonna be honest with you, half seven if I had to make a guess. So I've got a good few hours of reading ahead of me. I'm very happy to be back with Kitay and Nez, Nezah, Nezah. I am saying that wrong. I'll look up how to pronounce it. But yeah, Kitay, I love him. He was my favourite character from the first book. And he's back. And I didn't love Nezah, Nezah. I'm saying it wrong, sorry. But I'm liking him so much more in this book. Like he's won me over all of a sudden. Like how may I admit him? And we're like, we're new people, you know? I can forgive and forget. Next evening, I am up to page, where is she? 350. So I'm like over halfway now. I've read that much, got that much to read. And I'm still loving it. You're so jealous of me. You really are so jealous of me. It's so sick. Like if you're gonna get ahold of yourself, like you'll never be me. I'm actually sprinting with my patrons right now. How cute. I found this like game thing called virtual cottage that we're using to sprint with. It's so cute. It has like those atmospheric noises and everything. So yeah, we're sprinting. And I find it a bit difficult to get into this tonight. Like not in a bad way, but I feel like every time I put this down, I don't think it's a good book to sprint with. I think it's the kind of book I need to read, like on my own, like really focused with how many breaks. Cause every time I put it down and pick it back up, takes me a second to get back into it. But I am still loving it. Every time I read a book like this, like a long epic fantasy, I remember how much I love them. Like I had the same thing with Jade Wall and Jade Legacy. Like they were five stars. Like I was standing. I love this amount of depth and time with characters and while boarding, but it takes me a long time to read it. Sometimes you know, you're just in the mood for quick thrillers, but I'm loving it. It's probably a five star for me right now. And I know this is the calm before the storm in terms of like, shit hitting the fan, probably emotional trauma and damage happening. Are you comfortable? I'm scared. Are you scared? Yeah. You should be. Something I love so much about this series is how Arif Kwang brings in, you know, real world historical events that have happened or historical ideas and like intertwines them in this fantasy world. So the Hesperians are like, I think supposed to be the British essentially or they're like the Western white figure in this book. And they are obviously Christian. And we've had a lot about how their religion, you know, opposes rins in different ways and the ways that it can appeal to rins in some regards and in other ways, it definitely doesn't. So like their God is called the maker essentially, but it's very Christian essentially. In fact, there was like one section where a nurse was describing their way of thinking to rin and it uses like the watch analogy, which I studied when I did, I did religious studies for A level, which it was mostly, basically when I did it for my A level, it was one third philosophy, one third ethics, and then one third development and Christian thought. So philosophy and ethics were not really about religion. They just didn't have anywhere else to put it, so they put it in there. But yeah, seeing something I'd studied and knew really well, like used in a fantasy setting, definitely gave me a lot of inspiration because it shows you how you can use your knowledge in different ways. I thought that was really interesting, but yeah, I'm loving the journey that rins going on on this. It does feel like the comfortable storm there. I feel like I'm about to be emotionally manipulated and I'm not looking forward to that. Like, in fact, I'm quite nervous. I don't know. It just feels like a short shit is happening. We're at war now, by the way. War is happening. And it's an interesting experience to me because I don't really love war. I don't really love battle fantasy. And so I'm enjoying it, but I feel like I'm not the best at reading it. Horrific stuff is happening. Death is around us, but it's not, I feel like it's just gonna get worse. But also in this chapter, we just learned something really interesting about a character. Not gonna say who, but I was not expecting it. And it's just such like an interesting layer and I'm crying just couldn't write. So my stretch goal tonight is to get to page 500. That's the goal now. I'm gonna go do some more sprints and then I'll probably just continue reading tonight. Cause if I get to 500, then I only have like 150 pages to read the next day. I would even like to get more than 500, but I don't think that's gonna happen. So yeah, we'll see, we'll see how it goes. Come the stars, come to shine when it's dark from so far away, show us where we are. What makes the sun go to sleep every night and what's it dreaming of? I wonder. Okay, next evening. I just keep checking in with you every evening. So drag on the public. I haven't got the dust jacket on it. Well, I'm reading it. I'm on page 500. So we're approaching the end. I'm gonna finish it tonight. It's like six o'clock. So I'm gonna go make some dinner after this. And then, yeah, it begins. The ending begins. I'm still really enjoying it. Yeah, it's gonna be a four or five depending on the ending. And I've heard a lot of people say that the ending is their favorite part. So like, actually one of my patrons, Anna, has said I have to fail my reactions like the last four chapters. So I'm gonna do that. I'll check in back with you here. You'll see me probably crying. I'm like prepared for it. Kitay can like have my life. Like I adore him. Like he's one of, I think, my favorite characters I've ever read in fiction. I love him. Like all the other characters I like, Rin is such an interesting character. You know, she's very morally gray with the stuff that she's done. I feel like this book is very much her battling with guilt and loss and feeling its immense feelings and wanting to prove her humanity at the same time as all this war is going on. But I don't feel like any other characters ever be my favorite character. Like they're too complex. I feel like, but like Kitay, I just like, he's just pure. I don't care if he kills people or like, you know, it's war, we're in war. Change the subject and change it now. He's still pure. He's still a pure soul. I love him. And stuff has happened like in this section since I last checked in with you that I could never have imagined happening. Like the stakes are so high. I feel very nervous. And it just makes me think, how does Rebecca come up with this? Miss Rebecca? And she's been promoted to Miss Rebecca. Miss Rebecca, how have you come up with this? I don't understand how a human brain can come up with this. Like how? I think she's doing a very good job as well at calling back to the poppy wall with references and characters but also making it its own book. I feel like perhaps not as much exciting stuff has happened as in the poppy wall. In the poppy wall, we have like a couple of really distinct locations that we go to whereas this one's a bit more like untangible and like, you know, floating between stuff. I don't want to spoil anything but it's not as like, you know, you go to synagogue for the first part of poppy wall. Then you go here. Then you go here. Like it's a very like clear structure whereas this one's a bit more like all over the place but I'm really enjoying it but I'm so nervous about what's going to happen. I like, I know that the whole book has been building up to the emotional distress I'm probably going to feel in these last 150 pages. Like I know that I'm well aware. I'm going to go make dinner and then I'm going to hunker down and finish this tonight. So you'll see me in a couple of hours when I'm getting to what page am I going to start filming on page chapter 34? So I'm currently about to start chapter 28. I will stop filming my reaction and I said at the start of chapter 34 is what we're going to do. And I'm incredibly nervous. The time is now. I've got a nice cozy atmosphere. I've got library ASMR on on the TV. I already say well once I film this clip and I've got like the last 60 pages of the book to read and I'm so nervous. I'm hoping I've only got 36 minutes of footage on the SD card. I'm hoping I read quicker than the speed of light and get through it in those 36 minutes. So let's go. Finish the Dragon Republic and I'm giving it five stars. Yeah. Success. The ending to this killed me. Emotionally, spiritually, physically. Like it was just horrible. But I love this book. I think, you know, you could really see I have Kwan coming more into her own as an author and a writer in this. I mean, I don't know what to... I feel like I waited to talk about it. Hoping I would feel qualified to do so. And I really don't. The journey that Rin goes on with her grief and her guilt and the dark places she goes to mentally were really interesting to read. Her and Kite's relationship, like I will defend him to the day I die. He is my favorite character in this story by far. If you don't know, Kite is very like, like studious. Everything he does, he does with this deep passion. He's very quiet, reserved, but he's funny. I love him. The ship in this, like the relationship, I was against in the first book. I was like, not for it. I was absolutely, I was like, I don't, I think I said I didn't like the other character in the ship. But like, I kind of, I kind of got it in this book and the journey that all the characters go on. It was just really good. The ending, I didn't see coming. I found kind of heartbreaking. It was not easy to read. I was literally getting emotional. I cried at one point and yeah, it was a big shock, but it was wonderfully plotted. But here's the thing, right? I don't feel like I have more to say about this because it just feels above me and I just like, I need to get into this straight away. I don't have a choice. Like Dragon of Public is already old news because I'm like, I need to read this. I'm so nervous about where this is gonna go and what I like, I already kind of know because I know, you know, the historical figure that Rian is supposedly based off of. I've read that interview from I'm crying and I'm like, you know, quaking in my boots. I clap if you have anxiety. I, it's all I can think about. I literally can't think about Dragon of Public anymore because I'm just thinking about this. My dad has read this whole trilogy and he loved the first two. And he said he really didn't like the Burning God because he just found it so depressing. So I know that that's awaiting me. I love that for me. I'm so nervous about what I'm about to read and how difficult it's gonna be. I'm gonna give the audiobook a go. I've always said that I don't like the narrator of these audiobooks and I don't know why. She's a very famous, like particularly fantasy audiobook narrator and everyone else loves her. But any book I've listened to from her, I've rated low. But there's not been many, there's maybe been two or three and I'm like, is it a coincidence? Is it a coincidence? Is it a coincidence? Is it a coincidence? I ask you, is it a coincidence? And I remember when I was reading The Poppy War, I tried out the audiobook for that and I didn't, I found myself not enjoying the book all of a sudden until I turned the audiobook off. But I'm gonna give it a go this morning. I need to do some errands, but today is basically focused on reading this and editing some of this video so far. So I think I'm gonna read to maybe like 100 pages and that you know what I'm thinking, then I'll do some editing. But yeah, I'm feeling just so nervous, really, really nervous about what I'm about to put myself through. I think there's gonna be a lot of crying with this one. I am 100 pages in. One sec, look at me. I really wanna get like more than half way through this today, but I'm quite tired. I'm like, should I have a power nap? But I know that's never a good idea. So yeah, I'm page 110 and you don't want to, oh, are you all right? Yeah, I'm sorry. I'm finding this one difficult to read. From the ending of The Dragon Republic to the beginning of this book, Rin has seems to have had a very major mentality shift. And you know, to some extent I was expecting something along these lines, but it seems quite sudden. I'm like, Rin seems quite sudden. And I feel like that has not been set up enough what is happening without spoiling anything. You know, Rin's current beliefs, mindset, approach to everything is extreme. And I just feel like a certain amount of time has passed between The Dragon Republic and this. And I just feel like it hasn't been set up. Like we haven't seen that character development. It's pretty fucking big character development. I don't know, maybe we have, but I just feel like that shift is something you wanna see happen over the course of a book, not happening in between two books. And yes, we've seen elements of it, but like I wanna see that change. I mean, I suppose we're seeing it in some ways and it's only gonna get more. I don't know, I just feel cheated out of that shift a little bit. It just felt a bit sudden to me reading it. But I'm still really enjoying it. It's just feeling like a lot. I feel like mentally I need to just finish this series because it's heavy. I mean, I'm enjoying it, but I'm glad I'm reading them back to back because I think it will make for a better reading experience, but it just feels heavy. Like my soul feels heavy. So I really do wanna try and get through as much of this as I can today, at least to page 300, if not more. I'm hoping to check in with you when I get, when's the closest chapter to page 300? Let's find out. I'll read to page 308. So that's quite a bit, but the audio book's okay. I'm like enjoying the audio book more than I have previously with this narrator. I need to make dinner in a little bit. So I'm gonna listen to audio book whilst I cook, but I feel like for my mental capacity and state, I need to just read it as quickly as possible because it's making me a little bit upset. I'm starting to understand what everyone's saying. And I've only just begun. So yeah, I'll see you page 308. The first time I saw you, I was so nervous to talk. So I actually read more than I was supposed to. I got to page like 300 last night and I was exhausted. I was so tired. And then whilst I've been doing other stuff today, like cooking and getting ready, I've actually got to page 408. And it's a lot. It's just a lot. This book is a lot. Too much drama for me. I mean, it feels heavy. It's supposed to. I actually, I think in one of the last clips, I said, I'm glad I'm reading the back to back. I retract that. I think if I could live again, I would not read them back to back in a vlog like this. I just think it's a lot to read in one go for the soul. Something I do love about this series is how it tackles colonialism and Western imperialism and encroachment. And I think it does that so well and showing the brutalities of war, which I think often people are shielded from. I think a lot of our media surrounding war is often like through a nostalgic lens. Maybe not nostalgic is the right word, but like it's strange. Like war is shown through these kind of rose tinted glasses in a way and this refuses to do that. It shows the horrors of war. And I think it shows people the origins of some wars in a very good way, in a way that I think a lot of people aren't aware of. So, you know, I love that about this series and we've been seeing elements in that and how violence causes violence causes violence. But I haven't enjoyed this last section as much. I feel like the pacing has been off. I've actually heard quite a few people say that they don't really like part two, which is what I've just read. I'm just starting part three now. So maybe it's gonna amp up and I'm gonna wanna cry because it's just gonna get worse. I lost our hope today. I'm empty. But yeah, I just felt like the pacing has been a bit off. I mean, we even met some characters again or a character in particular who's one of my favorite characters in the series. And even that couldn't, you know, save it. Not that I was not enjoying it. It just wasn't five stars like the Dragon Republic had been. And I just feel like we are, it feels to me like a lot has been cut. It feels to me like this book was originally like 1,000 pages and she was made to cut it. It feels to me like a lot of the character development other than Rin, and even then Rin's character development. But I mean, like she's, we've got a lot of her and a lot of her thoughts and motivations, but like Kitay is there throughout all of this and we're not getting much of him. You know, like character development, he kind of just seems like this blank canvas who's a bit anonymous when Kitay is usually definitely not that. Oh, I just, I need to tell you, I've been pronouncing, I was saying Nezha again. I remember I did this last time. It's Nezha. That's how you pronounce it. I did that with Poppy one. I remember I looked it up and pronounced it correctly and then I forgot again. So not Nezha, Nezha. I'm not loving this as much as probably the other two in the series. Partly because of I think the pacing was off, I feel like a lot has been cut and I feel like the book is actually suffering for that because throughout this whole series, what has made it so interesting to me is those character developments alongside war and I still feel like the development in Rin, like the change in her personality and like feelings was not sufficiently, we had, I mean, she's been like one note, I feel like, in terms of the level of like whoa throughout this whole book. And I feel like that's a missed opportunity because we've had 400 pages where it could have grown. If we just started at 100 and stayed at 100, whereas I feel like in those 400 pages we could have seen it go more when in a way I feel like the most severe elements of her shift in mentality, we saw at the beginning and I just wish we'd just seen a bit more of the growth of that on page. So I'm enjoying it, but I'm not loving it. I'm gonna record my reaction to the ending. Let me read like another 140 pages and then I will record my reaction to the ending. I'm not really looking forward to it. We'll see how it goes. I'm determined I have to finish this today. I have to finish this in the next couple of hours. Like there's no choice in the matter. So we better get reading. It made me cry. It made me cry. The ending, according to a boarder, I have to speak to anyone for like five business days. I'm aware I look crazy. I'm aware we're ending this vlog with me looking a certain kind of way, but let's just roll with it. I can't say too much obviously because it's the ending to the entire series, but I think this is the only way I'm gonna cry. I think this is the only way that this book could have ended. I think it would have been almost an insult to the series if it had ended any other way. And I think this is always gonna be the way that it was gonna end. So I think it was expertly done. I loved the ending, but I hated it at the same time. It was very hard to read, but I think it is the ending that this series deserved. And anything else would have felt like cheap, you know? My immediate reaction to the book was like, what am I gonna write it? Because I honestly didn't really like part two. Part two for me dragged. It didn't make me feel anything, but this end part three, probably my favorite, one of my favorite parts in the whole series. Actually, I would say probably tied with the first part of the Poppy War when they're at Cinegard. So like my favorite parts interestingly of the series are bookended, right? So I struggled a lot to write it because it's got one of my favorite parts of the whole series in it, one of my least favorite parts of the series. So I think I'm gonna go with a 4.5, same as the Poppy War. I gave that a 4.5, Dragon Public, obviously a five. And I think I'm gonna give this a 4.5 too. I think it was the perfect ending to the series. I just feel like a lot had been cut and I feel like the wrong stuff had maybe been cut. I don't know. I didn't feel like the plot really connected in the middle, but I mean that ending. Relax. Horrible, horrible, horrible, horrible. And obviously I don't wanna say too much. I don't wanna spoil the ending, but the way that the plot, you know, starts to unravel towards the end was just like horrific reading, horrible. So that was when I last checked in with you, I think about page 400. These last 200 pages, amazing, amazing. And it makes me so excited. Let me get her out to read Babel. I'm gonna be reading this next month, not too long away really. Yeah, I'm nervous, but I am really excited. So there we have it. We have finished the Poppy War trilogy. I'm glad I finished it. Because I'm glad this video voted for it in the end, even though I don't look it. Because I think otherwise it would have taken like 20 years to finish. I really do. I think like I never would have finished it. So I'm really glad that I did. And if you haven't picked this series up yet, please do, because I think, you know, so many people I think, I know a lot of the concept of this series through studying politics. And my boyfriend's very interested in the history of politics, so I'd learnt a lot of it through him. But I think what this teaches about colonialism and war and greed and Western greed and the reasons that certain countries are the way they are now is because of Western influence in them. I think this series does a really valuable job of teaching people about that and the horrors of war and showing the horrors of war without hesitation. So I would really recommend you pick it up if you haven't already. I don't know how much sense this vlog would have made to you because this is a very difficult series to talk about when the other people haven't read it. But I hope it was still enjoyable to some extent. Thank you guys for watching this vlog. It has killed me a little bit emotionally inside. I feel like, you know, it's taken at least this much. I would not, if I lived it alive, I would not read them one after the other actually. Like I feel like, you know, a month apart is fine, but one after the other is a lot, it's a lot. But I hope you enjoyed the vlog anyway. If you've read any of the series, the Poppy War or the whole series, please let me know what you thought. Let me know if you're excited for Babbel, Babbel, Babbel as well. If you got to the end of the video, comment the fire emoji down below. Thank you guys so much for watching as always and I'll see you very soon in another video. Bye.