"I think we're just figuring out how to survive a world on fire..."

Help, this is scary relatable right now.

“You’re hot,” she’d said, before he could even open his mouth. “Are you seeing anyone?”

Feyi wasting no time with pleasantries. i admire a girl who gets straight to the point and goes after what she wants.

i love witnessing a yoink-chain on the feed!! it’s just so fun to be able to see where it starts and where it goes like cotton eye joe and wonder who else yoinked the book beyond your field of view! what other little whimsical pagebound experiences have people witnessed or been a part of??

I’d like to ask for some respect for Molly, just because she’s eccentric and hates the government doesn’t mean she’s crazy, and those seem to be the only reasons people keep giving for why she is.

I've had this book lightly on my radar (a couple weeks until release as of this writing) since reading the author's memoir I'm Glad My Mom Died, but I was mostly curious, not exactly chomping at the bit for it. I'm certainly chomping now - I just listened to an interview of Jennette McCurdy by Alex Cooper on her podcast Call Her Daddy that has shot it right to the top of my most anticipated list.

In McCurdy's words:

"I'm really interested in themes of desire and power and the things that we desire being confused for some form of power." "underneath, [this book is] really about desire, and loneliness, and why do we desire things that might not be good for us, and why do we so desperately paw at the things that we desire even if we know deep down they're not good for us, why do we still pursue them so relentlessly, so exhaustively, at the expense of, often times, our own self esteem, our own self worth?" "I hope it sparks conversations around desire and power [...] and also loneliness."

So basically, key themes here are desire, power, and loneliness, wrapped in the package of a high school senior relentlessly pursuing her teacher despite her own internal conflict. Okay Miss McCurdy, say less. I'm there.

She shares in the interview some of her personal experiences in an inappropriate age-gap relationship (which readers of the memoir did get a look into) as well as other unhealthy relationships, and says that despite being fiction, this book is very much infuses her own self into the narrative since her writing processes her lived experience. She says it "can't not be" a personal work. Some things she spoke to in particular where I expect to find echoes of herself in the MC (Waldo):

• Going along with the discussion of desire and power and loneliness in the book, in her own experience of feeling insecure in relationships where her needs weren't being met, she says "I'd really crave sex, I'd really want sex. Sex for me was a means of finding commitment, was a misguided means of assuming I'd found commitment, a misguided means of assuming I'd found attachment, a misguided means of assuming I'd found safety, but the second that the two of us cum, it's gone. It's fucking gone."
• She says Waldo is who she wishes she could have been at 18. Bolder and braver than herself. McCurdy can say and do things through her that she may not say or do herself because fiction gives her that opportunity.

The interview is phenomenal and I'd highly recommend it especially for those who have read her memoir already. There are plenty of other great peeks into her writing process, like discussions on when this idea first originated for her and her decision on whether to include an epilogue or not. Also - she wants and plans to keep writing fiction!!

Hello! Can I request adding Keeper of the Lost Cities series in this? I think they are iconic enough to be added here haha

Okay I jumped over to the Newspeak essay at the end and I am just absolutely RIVETED. I'm sure there's a dedicated post about this that isn't a reading update (which I will absolutely go find after finishing the book) but wanted to put this here to make sure others can know the appendix exists and I feel like it'll be a great service to have read it as I proceed through the book.

Won't go too much into the actual details of that essay (again, feel that's likely taking place in a separate post) but it is absolutely terrifying how so many of the principles described there can immediately parallel what's happening with language and vocabulary under Trump in the US. If you replace legitimate language with snappy terms that stand in for a broad concept affiliated with a political ideology, it's amazing how quickly people just throw them around and stop thinking about what they mean.

Also just want to be add as well that just a few pages in I'm wildly impressed with how fast this world has taken shape and in such a degree of detail. I'm totally pulled in.