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October Daye / Inheritance - Essay Series Part Five: Long Series and How to Read Them

Hello Patrons and general audience members! Welcome to another Books That Burn essay by Robin. Thank you to Case Aiken, who receives a monthly Patron shoutout. [Full Audio Available Here] This is the fifth and final entry in a five-part essay series discussing two long-running book series by queer authors: October Daye by Seanan McGuire, and Inheritance by A.K. Faulkner. I chose these series because I love them both, they were intended from the start to be long series, neither of them are finished yet, and the authors have different structural approaches to developing each series across so many volumes. Purely coincidentally, they are both long-running contemporary fantasy series mainly set in California in or near the 2010's, with major characters named Quentin, and whose fast-healing protagonists have a tendency to quasi-adopt a gaggle of magical teenagers. After a brief moment in the 1990's, October Daye begins in earnest in 2009 and has reached 2015 as of the eighteenth boo...

Animorphs Book 33: The Illusion by K. A. Applegate

Tobias volunteers to be captured in order to trick the Yeerks, knowing he might be tortured. He accepts the unsettled nature of his existence and gains a piece of his heritage. This closes the several-book AMR arc for the team.

This book contains depictions of psychological torture, extended sequences of it. It's a tricky bit of world-building, because the nature of the torture involves using painful memories alternating with pleasant memories, most of which haven't been specifically shown in the books. It puts more detail into Tobias's backstory without being sudden revelations, and I think it manages the balance well.

A hawk (Tobias) turns into a blue centaur-like alien (Andalite)

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