I would kill for a small short story book from Roshani about TPQ because there’s SOOOO much she could talk about:
- Kara’s adoptive family before she got taken away
- Suyodhana and Krithika pre-Aru being born
- Brynne, Nikita, and Sheela during the EoT era when everything was frozen besides them?? (I think it was confirmed in SoD that they, at least Brynne, weren’t frozen when everything else was??? Or am I misremembering- still good story potential though)
- Kara’s adoptive family before she got taken away
- MORE HIRA STUFF PLEASE MORE HIRA ANYTHING (I would LOVE to see a story with her and Mini and their brother though)
- Aru and Aiden. Just them. Thats it.
- Hira beating Brynne in a fight because that’s Brynne’s type
- (Aiden POV chapter of Chapter 34 in NOI)
- More self indulgent but I need a story so bad in the POV of some random bystander seeing the Potatoes’ shenanigans
- MINI AND RUDY IN THE CATACOMBS
- DID I MENTION KARA AND HER ADOPTIVE FAMILY BEFORE SHE GOT TAKEN AWAY???
- The two months that Aru was gone. What was going on during then.
One of the many things TPQ does so wonderfully is that these are all characters who have their own depth and their own stories. We see the story through Aru, but the other characters are never once a one dimensional side character who exists just for the sake of the plot. They all have such depth which gives so much to explore that we only got a glance at in the TPQ books! I wish we could revisit the world and see more of the things we didn’t in the series :(
The Last Tale of the Flower Bride - Roshani Chokshi
A retrospective tale of a man trying to untangle the story of his wife’s childhood.
Things I liked
The representation of the intensity of female relationships, the way you can spend every second together and still want each other’s company, the way you get into each other’s minds.
The magic sparkling in the storytelling.
The character of the house. I always like houses as characters in books and this one’s particularly powerful. In the end, it’s where most of the magic lies.
“what was the deepest and saddest part of the books?”
and arguably I was thinking it was the sleeper’s death bc listen hear me out, the sleeper’s death affected EVERYONE, bc in his final moments everyone but his family would think of him as the sleeper, but his family—his cause, his love--would think of him as suyodhana and no one else.
and like think about it, we’ve seen him from different perspectives, and we’ve seen how different he is to everyone bc while we mainly followed arus pov and saw how she really did love him but he was her enemy but he was her dad who gave up his life if it meant he could be her dad, we saw kara’s pov too and we saw how that love slowly morphed into fury but deep down, we love those who wrong us because they made us stronger.
that was kara’s case.
and she did love him, he’s her father. and no matter what he’s done, he still loved her in those years and for a character who was deeply and tragically written like kara’s, the fact she was the one who killed him was very well written on rosh’s part.
let’s just clap for that for a second 👏
ok and we’ll keep the family aside, the sleeper’s death affected ALL of us. you could hate him, you could love him, you could not care, but you can’t deny his death affected you because in those last moments before he was killed, he was ready to change. he was ready to fix his mistakes for the sake of his family. in fact, he was ready to do anything for his family, and before he was dead, he was going to take krithikas’ hand, was so well written on rosh’s part bc she wrote it in a way it would sadden and affect us too bc he was going to change. he was going to become suyodhana again.
and in those last minutes, in his final breath and final heart beat, he was suyodhana shah. and you know what? that’s who he was.
“because in the end, suyodhana’s eyes never left krithika shah”
krithika was his first love, the first person who truly loved him.
suyodhana shah was a great man before he lost himself. he was orphaned, he was not loved, but he believed. and belief was the strongest thing.
and he tried to do more good than evil, so perhaps that matters the most?
he was never the sleeper, he was a man ruined by his fate.
I’m still confounded that there’s barely any art of the Sleeper, aside from the graphic novel. SO, here’s my take on him; a bust shot anyway. It’s a mixture of what I had in mind, kinda, the graphic novel depiction, and basically a blue-skinned Tiefling, which the latter was not intended! But it does look badass either way.
Just finished watching Disney’s Percy Jackson. SOOOO much better than the movie!!!!….
1) CGI is kept to a merciful minimum, with plenty of cool practical effects and set design.
2) The few CGI scenes looks pretty realistic, one of the rare cases where barely-visible CGI actually makes the story better. Adds a layer of extra mystery. The Minotaur scene gave major Jurassic Park vibes.
3) The Camp Half Blood cabins are god-tier set design. Each one has a bold unique look , on the inside and outside. It reminded me of the different magical rooms from Encanto. You could easily tell just by looking which god each Cabin represents, without being told. 
4) There’s a much greater sense of danger when the monsters look more real (again thanks to minimal CGI) and the kids in danger are much younger than the 17 year olds in the movie.
5) Percy’s godly abilities being much more ambiguous helps strengthen the author’s intended neurodivergence allegory. Is Percy really a demigod? Or is Percy just seeing things? And unlike the movie, we see his godly powers long BEFORE finding out he’s half god. Which means just like Percy, we’re also wondering what the heck is going on.
6) HUMOR. I actually laughed out loud. Especially during Episode 2.
7) Sally Jackson is a badass with a personality !!! Unlike movie Sally who sounds like she’s just reading her lines all in one take, Sally shows so much real emotion in every little tone and action. She’s not going through the motions, nor is she overacting. When she says she understands and cares about her son, she SHOWS that. Also a major badass in how she not only stood up to Gabe, but also helped defeat the Minotaur. Movie Sally’s “sacrifice” was just being in the wrong place at the wrong time. This Sally truly sacrificed herself , by deliberately putting herself in danger as it’s the only way to keep her son alive. (Seriously this is how I want Mary Penelope Windsnap to be played too).
7) None of that rushed contrived enemies-to-lovers BS between Percy and Annabeth. This show cleverly subverts the trope. While Percy dislikes Annabeth, Annabeth likes and helps Percy but only for her own selfish reasons.
8) Gabe is a much more subtle asshole. He’s still an asshole, but no immediate threat to Percy or Sally so it’s easy to see why Sally stayed married to him. In the books she married him to keep Percy safe, but that’s hard to believe in the movie version when Gabe gets physical with Percy.
