The Truth Shall Make Ye Fret - 4: Bury Our Bones in the Midnight Soil by V. E. Schwab

Episode Date: June 9, 2025

The Truth Shall Make Ye Fret is a podcast in which your hosts, Joanna Hagan and Francine Carrel have emerged from Discworld and are now exploring the worlds of speculative fiction. This week, a review of V. E. Schwab’s new book - Bury Our Bones in the Midnight SoilToxic! Lesbian! Vampires! Find us on the internet:BlueSky: @makeyefretpod.bsky.socialInstagram: @TheTruthShallMakeYeFretFacebook: @TheTruthShallMakeYeFretEmail: [e-mail]: www.patreon.com/thetruthshallmakeyefretDiscord: https://discord.gg/29wMyuDHGP Want to follow your hosts and their internet doings? Follow Joanna on BlueSky @2hatsjo and follow Francine @francibambi Things we blathered on about:Bones | Explore Immortal Destinies — Author V. E. SchwabAuthor V. E. Schwab on toxic lesbian vampires and being a messy gay  @OddPride on TikTok "I couldn't help it I was only hungry"Music: Chris Collins, indiemusicbox.com

wondering whether you should dunk yourself in the pond to be safe. Yeah, well, I was thinking about it because you cut a square and then you cut the square into triangles and then you turn the triangles into a parallelogram and then you cut lines on the parallelogram that are the width of what you want your binding to be and then you sew the parallelogram together but offset and you end up with one continuous spiral when you cut along the lines. It does sound like the devil taught you this. It feels like devilry. Goody hagen. On the list of things I've done that would have me burned or hanged as a witch, I do

feel like this is actually quite low. That's true but they always get you with the weird one, don't they? It's like the drug lords in the tax evasion. Oh yeah, that. Oh, he couldn't get up after the summoning the demons on the podcast for some reason. Did something really fucking weird with fabric. When I've harvested the potatoes, if it's pretty soon, I'm going to plant some courgettes. Exciting. And then you will end up with many courgettes.

So if you'd like some courgettes in a few months. I went through a phase of really not fancying courgettes ever and then I suddenly fancied a courgette and whip, it was a courgette and whip feta tart. It was bloody lovely. And now I'm really into courgettes ever and then I suddenly fancied a courgette and whip feta tart. It was bloody lovely. Now I'm really into courgettes again. Lovely. My courgette era. Are we dull? I was about to wonder something along those lines, but possibly yes, but I do think we'll live longer this way.

Yeah, that's probably true. In the days we had terrible things to report after a week. Yeah, I feel like this is better, unless I get attacked by a rogue raspberry or a mole. Or a mole. I'll tell you what, we're going out tomorrow. So listeners, if we remember to update you. We shall. We shall.

In the meantime though, should we make a podcast? Yeah, let's make a podcast. Hello and welcome to the Tree Shall Make You Fret, a podcast in which we were reading and recapping every book from Jo Pratchett's Discworld series and now we are wandering around the broad fields of speculative fiction. I'm Joanna Hagan. JG And I'm Francine Carroll. GW And today is the first of our new book review episodes and we're talking about Bury Our Bones in the Midnight Soil by V.E. Schwab.

We are, which has been very cool because I had no idea about this author and Joanna did and now I'm a massive fan. This is very exciting for us. Also, now I can lend you some of the other ones and I'm definitely going to do that. Oh, exciting. So spoiler warning, not really much in the way of Cherry Pratchett spoilers, although based on the subject matter of this book, we probably will mention Carpe Joculum here and there. Yeah.

Because also I can shoehorn a mention of Carpe Joculum into anything. And she does. And I do. As for Bury Our Bones in the Midnight Soil, as this episode is coming out on release day for the book, we're splitting this episode into two parts. We will have a spoiler-free review of the book and then we will warn you very loudly before we jump into our spoiler section. Not much to follow up on apart from lovely, lovely responses to our recent Gender on the Discworld episode, especially our lovely section in the middle of that. So listeners, no, just as you all got very emotional listening to that part of the episode, we all got very emotional

reading your responses to that part of the episode. That's very true. So everyone's had a good cry. Yeah, everyone's had a nice cry. And yes, thank you once again to all the wonderful people who contributed both to the fund and to the messages of support in the middle of the last episode. Good stuff. Yes, excellent human beings all around. Well done, everyone. And happy Pride, Joanna. And happy Pride. Oh, it's Pride. This is such a good book for Pride month.

Isn't it though? Goodness me. I didn't realize quite how good for that it was going to be. The main thing I knew about this book when I suggested that we review it was Toxic, Lesbian, and Vampires. It did not disappoint. That's not a spoiler, by the way, guys. That's like just the premise. Yeah. While I was reading it, I did think I see now why Joanna was insistent we did this for her birthday episode. Yes. Oh yeah, this episode's coming out on my birthday. Yeah, birthday and launch date. It is thanks.

Thank you very much. Clearly, V. Schwab notes that I'm a huge fan and specifically chose to bring out a book about toxic lesbian vampires on my birthday as a gift purely for me. But genuinely, thank you for sending us the pre-release copies because that is still cool. I still love that. Something we should say before we dive in, thank you specifically to lovely Olivia at Tor Books. We did get advance copies of the book, which just made us feel very cool for one thing. But just so you know, the fact that we were sent copies by the publisher, we are not obligated to be nice about the book in any way, shape or form.

So you are still getting very much our unbiased thoughts. It's just that we happen to like it, unsurprisingly. Yeah, because I'll be honest, I'm not sure I'd have read a 500 page book if I didn't like it. Well, there is that. And that would have made this a really shit episode. Just me logging on going DNF, turning off my webcam. Just me monologuing, which I'm capable of doing about something I really like, but it would get dull eventually. So for those who are unaware of V. Schwab and this wonderful new book, a little introduction. As I mentioned, V. Schwab is one of my favourite authors. She's written over 25 books spanning all the way from middle grade up to more adult stuff like this. It's all fantasy and

sci-fi and genre stuff. Lots of really good things including the villain series, the Shades of Magic series, which was my introduction, which is a really wonderful fantasy series. And more recently, The Invisible Life of Adi La Rue, which was Locus nominated and spent 37 consecutive weeks on the New York Times bestseller list. MS. Which would you suggest I read next? MS. Invisible Life of Adi La Rue, which to be honest I was going to bring with me and unto you tomorrow if you wanted to read it. Oh yeah, super, thank you. Yeah, it is an excellent book. So Burial Bones of the Midnight Soil. This is not quite our

usual fare. I was a bit worried about suggesting this as the first of our new review episodes because it's not very Pratchett adjacent. No, barely. Beyond being in the genre space. That is the space of the genre, not the genre colon space. We've got a twist for you. But I think there's enough shared DNA there and I think our listeners will enjoy coming on the journey with us trying something new. Well, no, do you know what, that's the thing. It's been years since I read anything like this for obvious reasons and it's been a really nice change, not to ever suggest I was sick of Disquevel because I wasn't, but just reading

this I felt like I was in my early 20s again, because it's the stuff I read a lot more of then. Yes, very much so. So a quick blurb from the website. I was on the inside of. Fine. But please, Karen. Okay, the quick blurb that was physically in the book, but I still got it from the website. Oh, it's on the inside of. Fine. But please, Karen. Okay. The quick blurb that was physically in the book, but I still got it from the website. 1532, Santo Domingo de la Calzada. A young girl grows up wild and wily. Her beauty is only outmatched by her dreams of escape, but Maria knows she can only ever be a prize or a pawn in the games played by men. When an alluring stranger offers an alternate path, Maria makes a desperate choice, and she vows to have no regrets.

1837, London. A young woman lives an idyllic but cloistered life on her family's estate until a moment of forbidden intimacy sees her shipped off to London. Charlotte's tender heart and seemingly impossible wishes are swept away by an invitation from a beautiful widow, but the price of freedom is higher than she could have imagined. 2019, Boston. College was meant to be a fresh start, a test of growth. It's why Alice has moved halfway across the world, has thrown herself at a new future. After a one-night stand leaves her with an unfamiliar appetite and an uncanny sense of change, Alice throws herself into the hunt for answers. It's the story of a lifetime if she could only decide to be the main character after all. Or in short, toxic lesbian vampires. There's a very interesting interview with

V.E. Schwab on Pink News, which I'll link to the whole interview. But one interesting bit I wanted to talk about was V.E. Schwab answering the question, why did you want to write this book and this subject? And they're part of, in the wake of Adi La Rue being so successful, I wanted to have a bit of confrontation with myself about what you do with success. If success doesn't make you more authentic, ambitious, bold, more unapologetic, I think you're wasting it. Then later on she was saying, I also was thinking about the ways in which horror and romance coexist for some bodies. There are bodies that move out into the world and by simple virtue of how they appear, they invite violence and we're endangered by simply existing. Because of that, I thought that one of the

greatest forms of liberation that a queer person, a fan-presenting person, a person in a non-cis white male body would feel would be going from prey to predator. I wanted to explore the inherent queerness of the vampire lore. Nice. Yes. One other bit from the interview I just want to mention because it's something that I have been saying for a long time and wholeheartedly agree with was V. Schwab's take that vampires are inherently bisexual because you just- You have been saying that for a long time actually. You just don't stay straight for that long. So should we dive into our spoiler free review

once I remembered how to speak? Yeah, of course and take as long as you like. In no rush. Opening snapshot. Did you like the book? How much did you like the book? Yeah, I really enjoyed it. It's been a while since I read a new book that I read that easily without any like, attempts at distracting myself. Excellent. Which for someone with ADHD in particular is very impressive. And I was reading it at nights and the meds had worn off. That is 100%.

Beats ADHD, there's a cover quote. How about you? I had an absolute delight of a time with this book, which I thought I would. I went in very excited, which is sometimes not a good thing because you go in excited and you get disappointed. But in this case, I think it helps in that I was just absolutely ready to have a delightful time. Yes. And then it absolutely didn't disappoint. I've got to say, I went in with literally no expectations. I think you told me some stuff before I read it, but I'd forgotten that. So that was cool. I'll be honest, it was a few, it was longer than it should have been before I remembered it was vampires. I was like, what's going on here?

All right, yeah. I love the way the order in which you remember information sometimes. But yeah, I mean, it's very delicate and descriptive prose, isn't it, for something that gets a bit heavy subject-wise. Quite visceral, yeah. Yeah. And very sense-filled, which I think is one of the reasons it grasps you so well. It's full of very good descriptions of smell and touch and sound. Yeah, it's one of those books that you feel really like sinking into it. Yeah. Immersion.

So yeah, what were your sort of expectations going into this considering you'd forgotten 90% of what I told you? Literally none. I thought Joanna usually recommends good books. This will probably be great. I'm really glad that wasn't, I didn't know that was your only expectation going into it because I would have just spent my entire time reading it going Oh God, I hope Francine likes this. Oh, right. Yeah. No, I mean, I was I was a little intimidated by the length of it. Because her that's what she said. Sorry. Because we've been reading 200 300 paid books for a little while for the podcast. Yeah, I've got so used to Pratchett and I do obviously read other books in my spare time,

but recently I've been on a bit of a reading slump and I found the best way to get myself out of that is to read stuff on Kindle and you don't see how big books are on Kindle. You don't? Well, that's it. I actually don't know how long Titus Grone was. I think I made the right choice not buying a physical copy of that. Yeah, I did slightly regret buying the physical copy, although that was mostly to do with having to carry it around. Yeah, I did enjoy Titus Groen, obviously I did, but this is, I'm not going to lie, been a much easier journey.

Some things are easier to comprehend than Mervyn Peake, specifically. Specifically, yes. So you came in with high expectations, obviously. any. Some things are easier to comprehend than Mervyn Peake specifically. Specifically, yes. So you came in with high expectations, obviously. I came in very, like, I wouldn't say high expectations, but like really optimistic. I didn't think V. Schwab could write something I wouldn't enjoy based on my experience reading her books. And I haven't read all of her books because there's lots of them. And I like that there are still a lot of those delights waiting for me. It was our dear friend Kate who got me the first of the Shades of Magic books. I knew from Adi La Rue especially, which like I said was sort of my favourite, that things can be a bit more vibes

than plot, which is not a bad thing. Aaron Moggaston, The Night Circus is one of my favourite books of all time and that book is definitely more vibes than plot. To clarify, this is a really good story from the very beginning, but it's a really good slow burn and it's a match, as you were saying, it's really sensory. It's about going through the experiences with someone as to what those experiences are. Yes, definitely. We do enjoy a perspective. We love a perspective. Yes, it was very well built and all-encompassing perspectives. It's one of those books where you're sort of like,

I quite happily read this because I just want to continue hanging out with this person. Yeah, yeah, yeah. As much as I want to know what's going to happen to the person. Obviously things are going to happen to the person, but I also just kind of want to hang out with them. Yeah, the pacing I thought worked well, even it was a slow burn and worked well for me because I didn't really, I was happy to see like if we switch perspectives and I could find out what was happening over here now, but equally I was happy to turn the page and see another chapter on the perspective we were going through because yeah, each of them, I think the information was eked

out in a very satisfying way, but it was supported by the fact that all the characters were interesting and good to follow. I should also say quickly as well, it's worth getting a physical copy of this book because the physical copy is beautiful, not just the colour but the sort of little inset pages you get when it changes perspective have really beautiful artwork on them and I really enjoyed that. I like a pretty book, which is why I've got stupidly big shelves of... I was going to say, if I buy physical copies of all of V. Schwab's books, I don't have a room.

That is fair. That is fair. And yeah, I was hoping for a modern gothic vibes. I haven't read anything very gothic for a while because again, we've been in sort of Pratchett Web and outside of Carpe Jugulum. Yeah, I was just about to make an argument for Mervyn Peake, but actually we couldn't decide whether it was or not. It was. It was and it wasn't. But it wasn't my favourite flavour of Gothic. This had more of the dark and the sexy and

the feeling like you're constantly in this weird liminal space, like morally as well as physically and emotionally. I very much like all of that and I had to squeeze in a reference to the liminal. Also, I was really excited to just read something really gay because I haven't done that for a while. I've not been reading enough queer fiction and it's just very nice to read something so incredibly gay. Can't say much for the eyebrow content, but definitely gay. Yeah, actually, I don't know much about any of their eyebrows. I've got to admit. If I had one criticism. However, it's very few things that meet Joanna's quota for either eyebrow or gay. So meeting one

of them is fantastic. Yes, I will accept just one. Both when possible, but generally just one. Any loincloths? Any helicopters? Sorry. I did not spot any loincloths or helicopters, but it's not to say they weren't there bubbling underneath the Gothic surface. Oh God, bubbling loincloths, that's not a mental image any of us need. That's odd. So yeah, we've touched on this already, but how well did the book grab you and make you want to not put it down?

Yeah, I mean, pretty much right away actually, which again can be a bit unusual. Sometimes I'll need to force myself through a few chapters or something before I get really into it. But this was, yeah, you like the character straight away that you've opened with. You also see that her way of thinking is different enough from the usual to be really interesting and you want to follow it. And yeah, no, it was just yeah, from the beginning really, I read this in three nights. Yeah, which I know would be pretty normal for you, but 500 pages for me if I'm not on holiday. This is three nights after work.

Yeah, no, that is very impressive. Sorry, that's an epatronizing. That's not how I meant that. No, no, it's fine. I'm secure in my reading speed. I just know it's not as fast as yours. Yes, it's impressive by the author, I would say. Yeah, I mean you? It was really fun to read a book that I did not want to put down because like I said, I've been in a bit of a slump recently and haven't had that for a while. And this was one I picked up and I was like, oh, yeah, I'm just gonna, just gonna bin off some other tasks. Yeah. Maybe have it in my hand while I'm stirring dinner. Yeah. Maybe have it in my hand while I'm stirring dinner.

Yeah. Although there are advantages to having Kindle copies of the books we're reading, and that's what I did for most of the Discworld probably, just the difference between being able to switch off a screen and picking up a book instead of switching to a different screen, I think is helpful. It is nice. Yeah. And I think, yeah, especially for books I've not read before.

So yeah, for the Discworld, obviously it was, you know, I know this book. Didn't fill it full of, full of post-it notes. Made notes separately at least, but. I resisted the urge to post it for this one, but it was nice. I, you know, we had nice weather, I got to sit and read it in the garden, actively choosing to pick up the book and read it rather than doing other things, which like I said, hasn't worked for a lot of, especially new books recently, I've struggled to make myself pick them up even once I've started them. None of that happened with this. Did not want to put the fucker down. Especially there's a spot about halfway through, which

I'll talk about more in the spoiler section, where it kind of ramps up and goes from maybe being a bit more vibes than plot to, oh, plot. And from that point, I very much just didn't want to put the book down. I'm going to try and guess in my head what it is before we get there. Awesome. There was also, I did get in trouble for trying to read it while playing D&D the other day, but they were doing maths. What are D&D going?

Not bad. Not bad. Killed some stuff. About to go and argue with the teenage dragon, which I'm sure will go really well. Oh, cute. And Malachi, the twink bunk, still keeps ending up wearing fish as cod pieces. Twink monk. Nice.

Twink monk. Twink monk Malachi. Twink monk sounds like another invention from the factory that brought us two sweets. Close enough. And yeah, so where are we? If you were going to recommend this to someone, and obviously we are by doing this episode very much recommending the book to all of our listeners, who would you recommend it to and how would you go about recommending it? I would recommend it probably to people more or less like us, which is a bit of a cop-out thing to say, but I'll try and explain myself. Being people who do like reading, I probably wouldn't recommend it to somebody who was trying to get into reading. I have a couple

of friends who are just starting their journeys really with literature and I'm like, okay, I'm going to give you this to ease you in and this to ease you in. Although it was very easy to follow. I feel like the kind of the yeah, the immersiveness of it, I'm not sure would hey, here's your first big fantasy book. And I'm going to sound like a right snob here. But I one thing I would have worried about going into this, if you hadn't been the one recommending it to me, yeah,. Be that it was something that Booktalk was really into in the way where they give just those three or four bullet points of chemistilabas.

Yeah, racing it three chili peppers out of five. Yeah, and complain about anything that isn't explicitly spelled out. Yeah, yeah. And complain about anything that isn't explicitly spelled out. Yeah. I know it's easy to be snobbish about Booktalk, but I feel like Booktalk has brought that on itself. Yeah. There are some parts of TikTok that have some great book reviews and stuff like that, but I think specifically there is a- Romantic Booktalk. Yeah. There was a core Tumblr in a way that was separate from all the cool little blogs on Tumblr. Yeah. I don't want to call out any specific book series by name, but Four Swing and Akatartic Top. That's what we're being mean about. Yeah, I think pretty much. And I've read

any of that, so it's really unfair of me. But you know what? I have actually read them. And they're not like, you'd think they'd be worse considering the way they're talked about online. They're not that good the way they're talked about online. They're not that good, but they're not that bad. Jessi People who I, whose opinion I respect have enjoyed them. So I know they're probably not terrible, but it's just, it's one of those things you get put off by the fan base, don't you? Chantelle Yeah, you know, like you've seen what happens

if I'm near an open container of Twiglets and then all the Twiglets kind of go without me ever really engaging mentally with them. Reading Akita felt like that. Yeah, yeah. I didn't really at any point turn my brain on, but I definitely read all of it and felt a little bit sick afterwards. Yeah, like you really exceeded your salt for the day. Yeah. Anyway, sorry, back onto good smut. I think, well, I'm smutty, but the smut that's there is very well done. Literally, my next bullet point was I would also be able to reassure people that although I say it's a romantic horror, it's not gratuitous in either of those senses. It uses it when it's needed and does it well. Yes.

I had a couple of sort of enjoyable fanning myself moments, but it wasn't like, oh, God, I'm very... Gosh. No description of genitalia needs to take up three pages moments, which is one of my sort of criticisms of some flavors of smut. Let's just leave it on A03, man. But again, that's me being a snob. I'm not even a snob, a prude, I'm afraid. How about you? Give me your recommendation. If we were coming in blind and your recommendation wasn't, this is good, we're going to read it for the podcast, what would it be? Or who would you approach?

Well, obviously, I'd recommend this to my friendly neighborhood toxic lesbian. Do you know? I feel like it would be calling them out. Yeah, I know. I feel like that's a really good passive aggressive way to call someone out. Oh, no, you're like. They are actually doing like toxic lesbian vampire tote bags as match for the book and Oh, beef. Okay, cool. Good. I was I was worrying we were going to offend somebody there.

Yeah, no, no, leaning into that. Okay, good. They're leaning into that. I want one. I might buy myself one. But no, like I have a lot of queer friends and as a queer person myself, I get endlessly frustrated by the limited queer representation in fiction. Queer stories tend to be endless coming out stories and stories about queer pain and stories where queerness is really the central defining thing about the character and the rest of their personalities and afterthought. For the people who are frustrated with that kind of thing, I would really recommend this one, which gets to be about so much more than just that. And just another quick bit from that V. Schwab interview at Pink News, she talked about wanting to write queer villains and wanting to

make them all lesbians. So it wasn't a case of just, ah, this person is evil and a lesbian and therefore lesbians are evil. But these three particular characters happen to be lesbians and also varying the flavors of evil. And she said, I wanted to write a lesbian villain so badly, because I want to be a villain. And I thought that was a great line. So yeah, very much that anyone who supports women's wrongs, obviously, as we all should. And also anyone who God forbid a woman have a hobby, etc. Very much the vibe of this book. God forbid a woman I want to snag.

That's all I'm going. No spoilers, but God forbid, quite literally, God forbids. But also anyone who sort of finds themselves going into a bit of a rut in genre fiction. Like I said, this is quite far away from most standard Pratchett stuff. I know you do that for a bit. I get into reading Pratchett and then it's like, I want to read lots of things that are this flavor and that have a bit of comedy to them and a fantasy. Like at the overwhelming urge to reread all the Robin Hobb books and all the Trudy Canavan books every five minutes.

This is a really nice way to get out of the rut because there's a lot of that same good stuff with there. It's subverting tropes and investigating the human experience and there is humor there as well. There were some moments that really made me giggle in the book, but in a very different package. So I think this is a nice way to broaden horizons and get out of a rut a little bit. The trope subversion thing actually has a really good point that kind of underlines why I would recommend it to people who already love reading. You appreciate it a lot more if you're like, you tricked me. I think this book is a lot more fun if you've read pretty much like any vampire book ever

or even I think even if you've watched Buffy. Yeah, no, absolutely. Yeah, it just consumed vampire media to be fair. It doesn't even need to be a reading thing. Yeah, which is very difficult not to have got to any stage in your life and not ended up consuming some vampire media. Yeah. Or is that just me? I know. So absolutely. No, you've got to if nothing else like, you know, the camp from Sesame Street. Oh, yeah, that's a good point. Oh, God, they're really indoctrinating children. He does subvert his own tropes. But still, I'm worried about the vampire indoctrination happening to our youth. I want to talk about this book a lot

more, but I feel like there's not much else I can say where I won't end up massively spoiling it. I'm second guessing everything I'm saying, which is worrying me. Dear listeners, we are going to move into the spoiler-filled part of our review. So if you haven't read the book yet, sirens, loud clacks and noises going off. If you haven't read the book yet, do go away and come back. And... Emma Cunningham Having read the book. Emma Cunningham Having, yeah, don't just go away.

Emma Cunningham Don't just take some of your, don't try and get around it. Emma Cunningham Don't just turn the podcast off for five minutes and hope all the book has gone into your brain virus-mosis. Emma Cunningham That does fix us sometimes. Emma Cunningham No, sometimes we do have to be turned off and on again. But yes. Merge us in a bowl of rice, go read the book,

then come back and see if things are better. So hopefully now, if you're with us, you are ready to be spoiled on the book. Either you've read it or you're one of those people who likes knowing lots of spoilers before you read a book, which I support wholeheartedly. Yeah. So should we start with specific moments,

because we can be specific now that we really loved or possibly even didn't love. Yeah. Do you want to start with yours? Yeah, I had lots. I mean, jumping back, talking about that big turning point through the book that had me go, oh, plot, did you guess where it was for me? I thought I had, but then I remembered you said halfway through. I thought it was going to be when Sabine was turned. No, it was a bit later than that. This is Sabine 2 kind of this is when Maria becomes Sabine.

Yes. Yeah. Basically, I just thought it was metal as fuck that she immediately killed her father. Yeah, no, that was badass. No, it's when Alice is confronting Lottie. She's been you know, she's met Ezra. She's been taken to the room and she's met Lottie and she's going, how the fuck, what the fuck, why did you turn me into a fucking vampire? Rude. And then the chapter just ends on Sabine. Yes. Sabine is still around and doing messed up shit. And I thought that was where it really ramped up plot wise for me.

Yes. Yeah. Like, oh my God, what's she doing? Where is she? What about you? The first bit I kind of wax lyrical about in my notes while I was reading was when Sabine is drinking chocolate in the widow's shop. Oh, that was such a good scene. That was so nice. So she drinks the chocolate and it kind of coats her mouth and she holds it for a second. And then that kind of ties into stuff later as well, which I didn't realize at the time, but I still loved it. A, anyone who can write chocolate well. I immediately loved Joanne Harris. Heather Mammoliti Yeah, obviously.

Heather Mammoliti We love good food writing anyway. I think that one did very well. Heather Mammoliti Weirdly, considering that the three main characters cannot actually consume human food or drink for 90% of this book. This book writes food and drink really well. Yeah, yeah. And there's a lot of symbolism in them as well, which is cool. You know, the cherry pits and the blackness of the fruit she's eating and all of that. And also, I think it's very clever to be able to write how it feels to taste something for the first time when it's so familiar to us. Yes. And especially with the context as well of that being chocolate was this super rare

luxury and it really feeling like it, to the point where it almost feels like a sacred moment, like she's taking some kind of sacrament. Yeah, yeah, and it should be, I think, chocolate. It certainly was in its native land, wasn't it? Yeah, there was... In some of its forms. Francine, this is a question you shouldn't ask me because I will go on a very long tangent about the history of chocolate and some of my favorite fun facts and the fact that it got a reputation as a rebellious drink of sedition purely because of its chemical structure. I think you've done a PowerPoint on this for me.

I have done a PowerPoint on this. This is one of our overhauls, but it remains one of my favorite topics. Patrons, you'll remember this. on this. This is one of our Robert holes, but it remains one of my favorite topics. Patrons, you'll remember this. You know how I get weirdly intense about the social political impacts of foods. Yeah. But yeah, chocolate being written like that. And then tying into what I think I want to talk about a bit later when we're talking about vampirism and how it's handled here, but just the immediately then feeling unsatisfied part of it as well, I thought was good. immediately then feeling unsatisfied. Part of it as well I thought was good. And such a really good thing for Maria's character the way, you know, before she

becomes Sabine she is always hungry and unsatisfied. Yeah. And how it really builds into who she becomes as a vampire. Okay, give me one of yours. I'm gonna sneakily pop in a little one that goes into my next one which is just Maria planting the cherry bits in the olive grove. Yes. Did we see the cherry trees later? I wasn't sure if I'd actually read over that. No, I don't remember actually seeing the cherry trees, but it mentions they do start coming up

because the husband gets very annoyed at them. I don't know. Something about planting cherry pits as an olive grove is an act of rebellion. Delights me. It is, yeah. It's very childish in a way, which is nice because that's what she is at the time. Yeah. I was going into a bigger moment I enjoyed and in a kind of weird way, this is the difference between enjoying something and actually saying this is a morally good thing. But the scene where Maria, when she has not yet named herself Sabine, kills her husband when she's newly turned and drinks him. Because obviously, A, Maria's just killed the original

Sabine and B, murder in general, a bad thing. But there's something, this one, I get it, I do get it. And he's not even evilevil, he's just that horrible, low-grade evil that exists in a society that fully permits that kind of evil to go on. Niamh Yeah, I think he is evil-evil but he's not standout evil. Clara Yeah, yeah. He's evil but he's not a villain. But I'm also really interested in the idea of a reader or a viewer of something kind of being complicit in rooting for an act that is inherently morally bad.

Yeah, yeah. Like I've been thinking about this a lot recently, because obviously The Last of Us has been on and that's very much something that encourages you to do that, especially because, you know, when you're playing the game, you have to sometimes do nasty things to just continue the story. It's very, you know, press square to stab this person in the neck, sort of thing, whether or not they deserve it. Yeah. So yeah, something about kind of encouraging the viewer to be complicit in rooting for Maria killing her husband, because I don't think like, it's difficult to read that and not root for her to kill her husband. Yeah, I don't think it was a bad thing to do, frankly. Even though I think there's lots of bad things Sabine did, I don't think that was one of them.

Yeah, in the moment I really- I think it's good for a man who treats a woman like that to die scared. Yeah, no, I really enjoyed it and I enjoyed this being the big moment really. Sabine turns her but this is the moment where she frees herself from the life and claims this power. And yeah, very much rooting for it in the moment. And the thing about afterwards is like, how do I feel about rooting for someone getting their throat ripped out? I like the book puts me in that morally gray area. I like as well that gradually, it's frog in a hot pan, frog in a boiling water thing with Sabine because you get that bit obviously and that seems fine. And you know, you're like, maybe you

didn't burn down the whole house, whatever. And like, you're like, oh, maybe, you know, with the widow, that was kind of that was an accident, obviously, even though she doesn't seem to feel that much credit about it. And then she goes to that farmhouse, the first farmhouse and the man is, you know, a creep, like fine, yeah, you're just going to be punishing horrible men, seems fine to me. But then she kills the wife who's being kind to her. Yeah. And he's like, ooh, you are still just taking whatever you feel like interesting. But even then I feel like you can kind of sympathize a bit because she's had a life

where she's never really been able to take what she wanted for herself without it being immediately stopped and enforced and restricted in some way. So even then there's a sense of, oh, you're figuring out you can now have what you want. I don't support you killing an innocent woman. But you know. Yeah, we'll grow. We'll learn and grow. Yeah. Spoiler. Reader. Sabine did not learn and grow. She grew. I'm not sure she learned. She did learn and grow. She did learn and grow like the feral rose she is. Yes.

Uh-huh. Yeah, it made her more dangerous. Yeah, the next one I had actually was the origin bit of Sabine becoming, well, as I put Sabine Jr.'s origin story. Partly because it was just so unexpected to me that she did that. Yes. By that time I kind of feel like I've had the vampires realization. But I was like, Oh, my God, she's killed like I thought it was going to be the love story between those two. Yeah, that's what I was thinking as well. And then and then it was over so quickly. And she was ash. Yeah. And then says new Sabine didn't think that much of it. And later I came to

appreciate how much Sabine the original had just been referred to as the Widow because it made that transfer of the name a lot more seamless. Gina Hicks Yeah, it wasn't a, oh, hang on, which Sabine is this? Emma Marey Yeah, although you got that one, oh, I knew a Sabine. Gina Hicks Yes. Emma Marey Very satisfying little moment.

Gina Hicks That was a fun moment. And later on Sabine becomes known as the Widow and uses that as a form of power and has learned that one lesson from OG Sabine. Continuing on Sabine's journey, and I will talk about other characters, I promise. She's really compelling, quite literally in places as well. Her hiding when Renata and Hector die. Oh yeah. And there's something about her like ruthless survival instinct there and it's very show don't tell. It's not saying Sabine has chosen to hide because she cares more about surviving than helping her friends. It just shows Sabine hiding because she cares more about surviving than helping her friends. And there's something about how much she has longed for connection and somewhat

enjoyed it and then started to suffocate under it and being freed from it unexpectedly and just as she did with The Widow, immediately stepping up and walking on from it. Not immediately. sense because they kept her there. Like Renata had tricked her into staying. Yeah, the promise. Yeah, this idea of vampire promises being binding. Yeah. Again, it didn't damn her in the reader's mind as much as it might have done because there was that extra layer to it. Yes. It is a slow and you know, as much as the vampires, I said to die slowly, it is kind of a slow dying of her and our esteem as well. Yeah, and something about another piece of her humanity really flaking away with that in how little she mourns them. Yeah. She is very much able to just get up and walk away.

This is after Matteo, but who by the way, lovely character. Love that name also, always love the name Matteo. I do love Matteo. No, it's Mateo. Matteo, Matteo. Matteo. But it always makes me think of Matteo, who's a Redwall character. Oh, lovely. But yes, so this is after he's taken his second attempt at love, Giovanni, who has been frankly a terrible vampire. A little shit. Just a little shit, yes. And is now dead.

Yay! Gio is dead. The world's full and keep falling. She waits for them to land, searches herself for sadness, dread, but finds only dull relief. But yeah, just the words fall and keep falling. She waits for them to land. And that's a lovely description of, and I think for you and I, that is because it takes quite a long time for terrible news to sink in, for instance, or to react the way you know you're going to react at some point. But for her it's just like, oh, yeah, no, that's all right. Okay, cool. Carry on.

Yeah, this isn't going to be a reaction for me. I was kind of sad we didn't see him again in America, but then that makes sense, doesn't it? Now we've got a vague idea of the timeline. Yeah, no, it does make sense, but I was also kind of hoping we'd get one last little glimpse of Mateo. He was a real favourite character of mine. Yeah, nice guy. Kind of.

And I like the kind of education. It's not a montage, but that feeling of getting education, and that's our window into how the law works. That's a very fun thing for me. Yeah, absolutely. Charlotte and Sabine meeting and getting to know each other, I really loved. Because there's something about like, I know that story is not going to end happily. Yeah. Because of where the book has got to. Yeah.

But from because it's all Charlotte's point of view and Charlotte's very interesting, it's like an unreliable narrator. Yeah. And you really get that start of just how unreliable she's been later on, which is nice. And there's something about just watching that and seeing how I learn there's another option in a much more thorough way than I think we see Maria slash Sabine learning. Because Maria slash Sabine doesn't really go into everything as eyes open as I think Charlotte does by the time she gets there. Also, it's sweet, it's romantic. No matter how much we already know Sabine is more than just morally grey at that point,

it still feels like a very sweet sapphic romance in the middle of this much bigger, darker story. Also, it's Regency period and I like Bridgerton, so there's something about a dark sapphic Bridgerton. Niamh I don't know about you, but I noted later when it became bad that at that time I hadn't really reacted to the huge age difference. It's always something we take the piss off of with like Twilight or any other 500 year old goes after teenager. But in this one I was like, yeah, yeah, too young a woman, whatever. I think there's something about the fact that Sabine doesn't really ever mature emotionally because she doesn't get a chance to as a human and then she definitely doesn't emotionally

mature once she becomes a vampire. No, but she just learns. She becomes clever. Yes, that's it. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. She definitely grows more intelligent, but yeah, I don't think she ever really emotionally matures fully beyond the teenager, which makes it seem less icky. Yeah, that's true. Like the 500 year old going for 16 year olds.

Yeah. Well, if we're doing world building, actually, I mean, if you know, what was she 20 when she died? Yeah. 20. I mean, the hormones are just settling down. Yeah, exactly. Charlotte's 18. Yeah. Imagine like, you know, the physical things that are all like Charlotte's tan didn't change after she died. Exactly. I imagine the whole main stuff. Yeah. I feel like if I were to have to become a vampire, and obviously I'd rather not in general, then I would rather have gotten turned in like my 30s or 40s. For sure. People take you more seriously too. Exactly. Yeah. And then there wouldn't be any weird thing of I look like a teenager so I have to keep going to school over and over and over again. Oh yeah, great.

I know why the books are written like that, so that the teenage point of view character can meet the handsome basketball, but still. Oh yeah, one really short one, which was I really liked the metaphor about going over a memory too many times in your head and the memory being like a tea bag that was used too many times. I just thought that was a good metaphor. I love that. Especially thinking about handling a photograph too much and it fails. Yeah. Because it's true. I've got very few memories of my early childhood and I feel like now I've gone over them so many times that I don't know if they are actually memories.

Yeah, I definitely have that a bit. My sister and I have to check which one of our brains is being the unreliable narrator this week. I have a kind of grey area like and dislike moment, which is Lottie lying to Alice about the fact that she could become human again if she kills Sabine quickly. Dislike isn't the right word for it because it's really good storytelling. And a smarter person than me would probably realise immediately, hang on, that's bollocks, because Sabine didn't immediately become human after immediately killing a sire or since she got turned into a vampire.

I broke that down, but I didn't write it down in like a, that's bollocks way. I was like, well, how? Yeah, no, it didn't occur to me immediately. It took until Alice was in the room with Sabine. I went, oh yeah, no, it's a lie. It can't be. Which I think is not a I'm stupid and didn't spot it or that it was in there as a plot hole. It was there so that you know Lossy is unreliable and she's lying in this moment. But it's not so, because it's far enough away in the book, it is easy to forget it and still be caught out in that moment. Yeah, definitely.

I think it's a really good foreshadowed plot twist. And Charlotte at this point has painted herself as it turns out, so earnest and caring and you can't imagine that she would have done that. And it gave me such a sick feeling once I worked out that Lossi was lying to know that, to kind of realize the dark path that Alice was going to go down because at this point I've become such a fan of Alice and very much care about her. Did you have any bits you didn't like as much? I only made one real note about that, which was, and I think this is really only because I'm

English, but there were a few jarring bits of language here and there. Oh, I have exactly the same in Alice's point of view, especially in the memories when it's still kind of Americanized. Yeah, Americanized language. But for me, it jarred a little more when it was Maria. And there were a couple of those because it was the 1500s, particularly, and the author had been so good about writing it in a very total in a very historically neutral kind of way. And then bits and pieces came up. And if you're American reading it, it was still really historically neutral. But to me, because I only heard like the word mad to mean angry on American TV shows, to me

it's very modern. But that's the word you have used instead of cross for instance, which would sound just as weird to an American as mad does to me in that context. But to me it's normal. It's not a criticism, just a, uh. Gabbana It didn't bother me as much with the historical POV stuff, but it is a bugbear of mine with like a non-American character's point of view that it's not written in like British English as opposed to American English. Because it's harder then to remind myself like Alice is also doing all of this with a Scottish accent. And I feel like it's an important

part of a character. And I think the writing, think all the writing set in Scotland and in Hawkesburn and stuff was really good and it captured that particular English flavour of bleak, or not English, Scottish, but that British flavour of bleak small town life. The sun doesn't come out for very long. But I imagine to be, Beachfob will have a very good editor and I imagine this this kind of language was discussed and decided that, you know, having car park explained to your American listeners, American readers is more taking out of the story than because we know what a parking lot is. Yeah, no. Yeah, I understand why it's done. I just like to get on my high horse about it every now and then. So vampire mythology. Yeah. I just like to get on my high horse about it every now and then. So vampire mythology. Yeah. This is a really fun take on vampire mythology. What did you like?

Okay. So I've got a lot to say about hunger. Yeah, same. That was my first bullet point. Hunger. Okay, good. Because, okay, first, is like an almost tangent just to start with, because we are who we are. Yeah. Is our obsession with vampires and zombies as a species a projection of our species-worth trait? And supporting this thesis, which I promise I'm not going to go into in too much depth. It's been in my head since I watched it a few weeks ago. Do you follow odd pride on TikTok? I might have come across them, but I don't know if I follow her. She's like a historian and scientist. I think I've definitely sent you a few other videos, but so you probably do. However, she recently wrote and performed a song on TikTok called I

Couldn't Help It. I Was Only Hungry and it's about the unending hunger of humanity as like a species and you know, going across the world and fucking decimating it 100,000 years ago and all this stuff. And I just there are a couple of lines in there that just kept coming to my head like while I was reading this book. It was, sometimes growth leaves a poison in the water, I'll inhale the future that I promised my daughter, I'll devour the earth, I'm entitled if I caught her and in the end I would still be hungry." It's really been on my mind a lot recently, just this hunger of humans and how upsetting it is to me generally and how much it's behind a lot of things. You should have witnessed my 15-minute run on conspicuous consumption the other day.

It was a doozy. I think I probably felt it psychically. Yeah, yeah. It's very, very easy to trip me onto and late stage capitalism is the villain. To pull myself back from the precipice, I also really liked the way that hunger and yearning were tied up in this. Especially when Sabine learned how to wait with Matteo. The anticipation being better than the satiation thing, which is a favorite thing of mine to read. I love it. And if anyone's ever met a queer femme person, there's two versions of attraction. It's let's move in tomorrow or yearning.

And I am a sucker for yearning. I'm a big yearning. I love a yearn. Even a straight yearn is pretty good. Even a straight yearn, yeah. Ben and Leslie on Parks and Rec being probably the straightest yearn I can think of. It is a very straight yearn and it's a very good year. Yeah. The toxic vampire lesbian year 10 out of 10 chef's kiss. No, I had the hunger stuff as well.

I love this thing and there's nothing to sublimate it with either because you can't consume food, you can't consume drink. They can't even like smoke a cigarette properly. You can't black ribbon or it. Yeah. Yeah. Likeography does nothing for you. There's just some amazing descriptions of the hunger. Just like each bite like a stitch unpicked, the more you eat, the hungrier you get. This image of a colander that keeps coming back, this idea of there is no way to fill

it because it will always be full of holes. And then that tying into the bigger theme of them being immortal and the longer they go on, the more they lose stuff, like they get these more and more of these gaps. Yeah. Amazing stuff. And yeah, one of the notes I sent you a screenshot of, because it just seemed a bit unhinged at the time, was the things that Sabine craves that just make her hungrier, kind of piling up chocolate, sex, blood. And I was like, oh, I can't wait till she gets to cigarettes. She'll love cigarettes, but she doesn't love cigarettes. They don't love cigarettes.

Yeah. Yeah. I couldn't think of any other good examples of things like that, that you crave and make you want more of when you like immediately or while consuming. It's like a really good book, honestly, which is one of Charlotte's. Yeah, she doesn't want to stop reading. This is something Sabine is dismissive of because she never had it, whereas it was a huge part of Charlotte's upbringing. I would very much be a Charlotte if I was, again, made immortal. I can read

everything now. Yeah, definitely. Then my brain would go, no, shan't reread this book series you've read 8,000 times before. If I became immortal- It's been so long. It must be 80 years since we last met for coffee. What have you been doing? I reread Pratchett 8,000 times. Fine. You want to make a podcast.

That's the only way the listeners will ever get like a once more with spoilers version of our Discworld podcast. Make it happen guys. If you guys can make us a morsel, we'll go through all of Discworld again but with spoilers. Just open every episode with a massive spoiler from Shepard's Crown. STACEY My shortest note on cool vampire bits is grave dirt full stop. Cool full stop. GERMES Ooh, I love the grave dirt thing.

Especially as a Chekhov's gun thing as well, planting the idea of grave dirt being poisonous and again, really good descriptions. When Sabine is trapped in the grave dirt, well, Hector and Renata are getting all fucked up. And this idea of the way it's pulling to her and trying to pull her down and stop her, it's fantastic. Niamh It is, yeah. So much of it seems like it matches our understanding of vampires. And then you get stuff like, oh, they can walk into churches and touch Bibles and all

this kind of thing. And then you're like, oh, oh, oh no, it's real specific. Nice. Yeah, I love a vampire story that changes them. It tweaks the law somewhere. I love a little law tweak. When it's a tweak like that, it kind of suggests somewhere that our stories about vampires are based on reality, but obviously they get a bit changed along the way. Exactly. Like practice talking about dragons. Yes. But you can see it as well, the church thing would come about from the grave dirt thing being like that actually being true. And so then they start thinking it's holy

ground because that's the only place graves would be. Yeah. Yeah. And does it have to be like a dug grave also? Or is it just somewhere like that someone was buried? Yeah. After being murdered? Or is it just somewhere like that someone was buried after being murdered or somewhere where her bones get gradually covered? Okay, but imagine right if we take this bit of law and then like a vampire archaeologist who can figure out where stuff is buried by walking around and feeling sick. Imagine if that was how they found Richard Thurston in that car park. I mean, I'm still really confused as to how they did. So let's take that.

I don't know, there's a bunch of weird films about it. But I, it all seems that the woman who was very obsessed with it was like weirdly obsessed with it. And so I just feel like there's a whole lore and drama that I don't want to dive into vampire lore on the other hand, very into that. Yeah. The idea of claiming space. Yeah, like this power they have. I'm always interested in stories about vampires where they've got some kind of weird psychic powers as well. I don't want to ever say anything good about The Vampire Diaries because it's a trash show, but the way the compulsion does and doesn't work on that show is fun. It is very fun and full of very handsome and

pretty people doing interesting things. But yes, this idea of standing in somewhere and claiming somewhere a step at a time and watching that process happen so slowly, Sabine figuring it out and Matteo going, yeah, and I did that to a whole city. Yeah, yeah. And you realise how boring immortality must be if you've got time to walk around and do that step by step in all of Venice. But also tying into these central characters being women and lesbians and people who historically do not get to carve out space for themselves in the world and then having this physical manifestation of them getting to claim space in a way that no human ever could. I really love that.

Yeah, definitely. You also get, I think it's like an accompanying power, the hand that's smaller in the back, like when Mateo pushed the back from the edge or something. And this is what is happening to the women adjacent as well. There was literal small in the back hand for Charlotte going into various situations in Bridgerton, I'm calling it the Bridgerton Capture. And also if you've ever existed in a femme body, one of the most insidiously gross things that happens to you is the constant hand on the small of your back. Did someone touch you when they don't need to and they say it's just because they're trying to get past?

I'll tell you what, it doesn't fucking happen as much after you've turned 25. So weird. Yeah, no, I do feel like I've outgrown it somewhat and I'm happy about that. But I also still wish it doesn't happen. And it never doesn't make my skin crawl. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, Alice is very aware of just existing in a teenage body. You get this kind of attention is absolutely true. Yeah, when you get into the modern perspective shift, and it's just all very present there for Alice in a way isn't for Charlotte, because Charlotte's always had to discuss these things secondhand. Just the difference of a character knowing from

the beginning she's a lesbian rather than kind of learning that as she becomes a vampire is a very interesting switch. By the time Alice turns, she knows she's a lesbian. Yeah, whereas in Charlotte's era and Maria's era it's the maiden aunt. Yeah, and I mean it's not always fine obviously, she's still getting homophobic abuse in New York. But it's Yeah, Boston. Yeah, Boston, sorry. Any other big like bits?

Actually tagging onto the kind of psychic power bit. I really like the kind of perception slash thought tasting. Oh, yeah. Kind of. Which by the way, ideas taste a little parallel. I'm never going to stop drawing parallels to Pratchett unfortunately. No, that's fine. And that's because I've always done it, even before we did the podcast. Yeah, no, it's just built into the very basics of our personality at this point.

As well as being just a cool power, I think it's a really good way to underline the imbalance of power in these vampiric relationships. Yes. And so the newer vampire is always at a disadvantage. And it works in this kind of gross imbalanced power way, much as a teacher dating a student kind of thing. Yeah. Except times 10 because some of these people are bound together and Charlotte doesn't have anywhere else to go. And yeah, and Sabine can read Charlotte like a book and is very offended of Charlotte so much as tries.

Gabbard Yeah, and there's something about also being set free of shackles you've lived under your whole life, only to immediately find yourself stepping into a new pair of shackles. The only way to escape that is to do something like what Maria slash Sabine did and immediately kill your sire. Yeah. It turns out being a weird psychopath worked out quite well for her in the short term at least. The kind of other connection to what we were just talking about with the kind of difference in the immediate consequences between old world and new I found quite interesting. Sabine or even Charlotte become vampires, there are, you've got a bit of time to ease into it in certain ways. And, and, but when Alice becomes a vampire, she has to go

to class. And she there's more stuff to be blinded and deafened by the modern world. And Alice feels Alice has a routine or a current life that she's trying to stick to, briefly, granted. But obviously, for Sabine or Charlotte, making this change took them, or was part of being taken away from their life anyway. And they would have never had a structured education or job or whatever. Yeah, and it's a lot easier to just step out of the world when there aren't also things like, strict passports and mobile phones. Yeah, absolutely.

When communication becomes more global, it suddenly also means that you cannot immediately disappear. Any more from fanfiles? The poem. Oh, yes, yes, yes. Which gives the book its title, which is, you know, bury my bones in the midnight soil, plant them shallow and water them deep, and in my place will grow a feral rose, soft red petals hiding sharp white teeth. And it just has a little poem, obviously, it's great.

Name of the thing? The thing? If I had read this book even 10 years ago, I would have obsessed over that poem, written it out and drawn very bad roses around it, probably wanted a tattoo of it. I'm not quite as I'm immediately deeply obsessed, but I love a bit of Named The Thing and The Thing as you know. I do really enjoy the poem and I love it as a piece of lore. It's something Sabine learns and is told her maker was meant to tell her. This is the thing that they pass down from vampire to vampire is this poem.

A bit of oral history. Yes, and it makes me want to know where it came from. I don't mind that that question is not answered in the book. I like that the book makes me ask the question. Yeah. It's interesting that their core bit of oral history as well is not actually a fact or anything on its surface useful, but it is a way of thinking about oneself, which might take you away from wanting to immediately commit suicide after finding out what you are. MS. Yes. Yeah, it is more like a religious doctrine than anything that is useful information.

And then it becomes symbolic of how a vampire has been treated slash has treated their sire. Sabine doesn't know the poem because she killed her sire. Charlotte knew the poem but didn't know it was an important piece of lore because to her it was something that Sabine specifically gave to her. Sabine chose not to share any more information than that and tried to keep her isolated away from other vampires. So kind of using law as a weapon, obviously going to love that. Yeah. There's this kind of hint at a deep well of history that we may or may not ever get to learn more about like Mateja's history or whatever, the original Sabine's history, all that stuff. Yeah, I think what's really great about this book is that if this is the book we get and

that's all we get, I'm completely happy with it. I love it and I want to keep it in my pocket. But I also would never say no to reading more set in this world. I was going to ask you, do you know if there's a sequel planned? I know Sysbjotv does both series and standalone. At the moment there's no sequel planned. I want to know if they're going to ask you, do you know if there's a sequel planned? I know Sysbeefov does both series and stand-alone. At the moment there's no sequel planned. I want to know if they're going to do an adaptation at some point because there are bits of this book I really want to see done visually. Specifically, Toxic Lesbian Vampire Bridgerton. There's so much to me that can't be like the panels.

Yeah, things would get lost in translation. They would. It would make a really cool series, but it wouldn't be. Yeah. Oh yeah, the book would be better. As immersive as a book, yeah. The book would be better, but that doesn't mean I don't want to see the series. Of course, I say stuff like that and then I watch a really good adaptation of something. I'm like, oh, no, that was really good. Okay, fine. I just lack screenwriter imagination, I think, a lot of the time. Have I mentioned it's a really good book and I really like it?

Yeah, I think so. Yeah, yeah. Were there any vampire bits you didn't particularly... There were a couple I don't love as much. I would prefer if the sun was more of an outright threat. Taking that out of context as the promo clip. Yep. No, just one of my favourite things about vampire stories is the ones where they literally can't go in the sun or they catch fire and the way it forces them into the dark corners and edges of the world. That's a really compelling part of the lore. Very funny in what we do in the shadows.

Very funny in what we do in the shadows, handled by incredibly rare but somehow also always available rings in vampire diaries in Twilight, it's because they sparkle. Handled in Buffy by the- The most half-assed nod towards that law goes to. I think Buffy does it mostly really well in that they do literally catch fire and it's used as a weapon quite often and then it's very funny when all of a sudden it's like, well actually no, he's all right if he stands in the shade and has a blanket over his head every now and then because it's a lot easier to film

this scene that way. It's a very old foil for a folklore villain, isn't it? The sun rising and hocking everything up for the monster. Yes. Yeah, I've always liked it's theme of gothic horror. So it's not like the sun doesn't hurt them, but I like I always like it when the sun actively sets them on fire. I think it's more fun. Although I would have put a stop to the plot quite earlier. Well, yes, there is that. And then also very quickly, as much as I really like the hunger

thing, I also hate reading it because if I had the choice between becoming immortal and being able to cook for myself and eat nice food, I would choose cooking for myself and eating nice food like any day. This kind of book does somewhat test my determination to live forever. Because I spent one summer on the type of birth control that made me literally never not hungry. Yeah, I did not care for that. I didn't even have to murder to have my snacks. I know what a bitch I am when I'm hungry. My hanger is really impressive. If I became this flavor of vampire, it wouldn't be prissy. There would not be. Just imagining one of these chapters ending, Snickers, you're not you when you're like one of those Maggie

Noodle style stealth adverts. Amazing. What about you? Anything you didn't love about what I did with vampire mythology? Not particularly, no. Ah, that's fair. Yeah. I haven't read as much Gothic horror as you. Yeah. We've had some mild dislikes just for balance. We do really care about balance on the truth, Jan-Mikki, Fred. We are so unbalanced ourselves that our reviews must at least nod towards it lest we all go

spinning off into some kind of horrible vortex. Flying off a wonky seesaw. Yeah. Let's talk about feminism. All right. Yeah, it's been a while. Yeah. Purple paste is out for the lads. Hey. At least 30 seconds. Now I just, I like it. I feel like it's a bit of a, it's a bit of

a, it's a bit of a, it's a bit of a, it's a bit of a, it's a bit of a, it's a bit of a, it's a bit of a, it's a bit of a, it's a bit of a, it's a bit of a, it's a bit of a, it's a bit of a, it's a bit of a, it's a bit of a, it's a bit of a, it's a bit of a, it's a bit of a, it's a bit of a, it's a bit of a, it's a bit of a, it's a bit of a, it's a bit of a, it's a bit of a, it's a bit of a, it's a bit of a, it's a bit of a, it's a bit of a, it's a bit of a, it's a bit of a, it's a bit of a, it's a bit of a, it's a bit of a, it's a bit of yeah, it's been a while. Yeah. Purple Post is out for the lads. At least 30 seconds. I just know I like it. I feel like it's a very feminist book. It's feminism and queerness in a wonderfully intersectional way. I like the idea of telling queer stories and showing the different ways queerness is getting stifled across these three different generations. So you have Maria who has nothing but curiosity and it can never really go beyond that. Yes. Yeah, but it doesn't occur to her that it could. Really? It doesn't seem physically possible. And then you get the sort of new, slightly updated version of that with Charlotte where

it goes closer to going beyond that and she actually has someone to guide her and lets her open her mind to it a bit. Emma Watson Yeah. You wonder if Jocelyn had been more open to the idea whether they could have gone off and been very good friends in the history books. Beccy At Yeah, if Charlotte could have become a maiden aunt. Emma Watson Confirmed, bachelor aunt. Beccy At Yeah, or if Charlotte could have become a maiden aunt to Jocelyn and her brother or something. Yeah, yeah. I did love that little moment of, I know it turned out Charlotte hated it,

but I thought it was a nice moment of closure at the end of Jocelyn's life. Oh yeah, when she goes back and Jocelyn's aged and sees the place one last time. And Jocelyn did love her. She hadn't kissed her first. Yeah. But even Alice has to deal with this, like having to suppress her queerness in some ways, because you know, she's living, she's 18 and she's at college and she's living in these dorms and she's like, I don't want them to necessarily know I'm a lesbian because then they'll be weird about me and be like, oh, does that mean you fancy me? Which I think is something a lot of queer people have gone through during the coming out process. 18 year olds are very self-obsessed. CHARLEY Yeah.

STACEY It's not, I think, unreasonable to expect a bunch of 18 year olds to go, oh, this is about me? When you tell them you are queer. CHARLEY But it is also like shit from the queer point of view, I feel like I have to hide this because otherwise someone's going to assume I'm trying to be a pervert in some way. The women aren't evil because they're queer, but their queerness puts this barrier between all of them and normal society. So it does what sunlight does in vampire stories and forces them into corners, into the shadowed places. Oh, parallel, very nice, good.

Yeah. Just came out with that on the spot. Takes them out from the herd and makes them easier pickings. Yeah, that too. And then it forces them to stay in those spaces because where else are you going to go? I found it interesting the way, the opposite way Sabine and Charlotte dealt with it, well, as far as we know, Lottie being the narrator she is. Sabine realised that women were just better people, but they taste better, so whatever, just going

to eat women. Charlotte's like, oh, men don't taste great, but I feel I should at least not kill the gender I care about a bit. Yeah. At least try and go for the nasty blokes. Only looking men. And the way they use their inherent status as victims or being seen as victims to go after nasty men because Alice does the exact same thing. Once she realizes she has to feed, she goes and finds a bloke that is clearly a raging pervert and rips out his throat. I like the women being described under the female gaze as well.

Yes. Even when it's women written by women, quite a lot of the time if it's a hetero romance book. It feels very male-gazy. For some reason it does feel very male-gazy, even though men aren't gonna be reading it most of the time. I think it's because quite often it's being described from the male perspective.

Yeah, yeah. So it's either the woman describing herself of, oh well, I've got dull brown hair that happens to tumble all the way to my waist and my hips are far too broad-wide. Women are just as guilty of writing women that breast-poopily down the stairs. Niamh Yeah, they are. Except they're more likely, I think, to err on the side of, oh, no man will ever love me. I'm just too skinny. Yeah, definitely a bit of that.

She felt her sharp elbows something, something. The jutting hip bones. Jutting hip, fucking jutting hip bones. Anyway, point in. Yes, the female gaze, female attractiveness. I love all the, oh, the hair setting off the colour in her cheeks and the the light in her eyes as she discussed French toast and made that up. You know, it's that kind of thing. And she smelled like cinnamon and journeys.

I think let's maybe leave Vichwa to do the actual writing. Hey, give me a few hours and a pen. Oh no, I'm fully sure you could. I could come up with just cinnamon and journeys actually. I think that's perfect. I don't know why you keep following me. She smells like cinnamon. No, you're right actually.

This isn't just that thing where I immediately agree with you because I'm scared of conflict. I've taken it under consideration and actually, yes, she smells like cinnamon and journeys is perfect. Yeah, you know what I mean. Anyway, it's, it's this, oh, do you know what it is? It reminds me of when the really good perfume reviewers review a perfume. Yeah. And I keep going on about smells. I really, I think I need to go buy some new perfumes. I'm very into smells at the moment. But yeah, it's just these kind of, oh, how have you managed to describe that combination of things I've never experienced in a way that makes me feel like I have? That's interesting.

She's doing that a lot, but with women. Yeah, no, it's beautiful. It is excellent. And yeah, I mentioned it already, but this idea of upending women as victims, like any story where that gets subverted and all women gets to reclaim power is the. I know I keep mentioning it's because we're talking about vampires and I'm obsessed with it, but it's the Buffy thing, taking the blonde fluffy girl that would normally die in the opening of the horror movie and giving her all the power and making her able to kill all the vampires. Or in this sense, taking the women that would normally be somewhat victimized in their

lives because they are feminine and pretty and the world is a horrible place. And especially with the historical stuff and making them the aggressors. Although in Sabine's case, especially, then making all those other women those victims exactly. She's subverting the trope but only for herself. Yes, and does not care about the other ones. And then Lossi in theory subverting the trope in a very noble way that is quite unnoble under the surface. And Alice I think being a normal amount of flawed protagonist.

I think Alice is really the one where I'm fully in the, I kind of support women's wrongs because the feeling is very much that Alice is going to be worse at the end of the book. Alice is going to be worse than Lossi and Sabine put together. But I feel like she just deserves to go off the rails for a few years. Yeah, do you know what? Go for it, mate. Ezra we haven't mentioned as possibly the only useful man in the book. Oh, sorry, Matteo, I keep getting used to the man. Ezra's a lovely character.

Yeah. Ezra means helper, I think, as a name. I kept meaning to do more research into the Esra's a lovely character. Yeah. Esra means helper, I think, as a name. I kept meaning to do more research into the names because I get the distinct feeling that V.E. Shrava has been very thoughtful with her names. Obviously, we have Sabine as in, you know, the Sabine people, the rape of the Sabines. Yes. I don't really know much about Charlotte as a name and Alice probably has all kinds of connotations outside of Wonderland, but I'm not sure.

I don't know. She goes down a rabbit hole on this. If it's a direct Wonderland connotation, then I fully support it. You have her dressed up as Alice. Like earlier in the book, she goes to the party with her sister. We haven't talked about Alice's sister at all, actually. That's the one bit of the book that made me cry, actually, I must say. Oh, I cried multiple times during the Alice and Cathy backstory. Some of it because it's quite personal to me as somebody who lost a parent as a kid and went, oh yeah, no, I remember that bit. Especially somebody who lost a parent as a kid and had an older sibling. So there was lots of that that really kicked in. Just the wanting to chase the older sibling and

stay a part of their life. Yeah, you guys are like the same age gap and everything, aren't you? That's kind of- Yeah, yeah. It hit weird. Yeah. Although, luckily, Katie is pretty much the opposite of Cathy. Oh yeah, my sister is as far away from Cathy as you can get in every way possible. Yeah. Although I bet she'd take a bottle out with a baseball bat. Oh yeah, 100%. I think it's safest for all on the planet if my sister is not given a baseball bat. I say that in a very loving way. I loved that part of the story, this building of Alice's backstory, but it's not like a long flashback session. Everything is relevant to what she is currently going through. With that theme of not

taking the memories out too often, there's almost a sense of she's living through all these memories one last time. LH – Yeah, life flashing before her eyes. MG – Yeah, but you can feel this kind of sick dread as it builds up to the last horrible memory, which is losing her sister. Did you see it coming? I think I saw it coming that she was going to die. I didn't see it coming that she'd been in Glasgow the whole time. No, that bit was the bit that really got me. But yeah, I could feel it building up that she was going to lose her sister. I don't think the story would have worked in the same

way if Alice still had Katy. Emma Watson No, because you'd be expecting Katy to turn up and you weren't expecting Katy to turn up. It wasn't. Emma Watson And there's also a sense of like, Katy could have probably done okay if she'd been the one turned. Emma Watson Although she might have gone Giovanni with it. Emma Watson Oh, she might have gone a bit Giovanni to be fair. But yes, the interaction of that and losing

someone versus living forever. Alessandro actually, we haven't talked about either. Is that his name? Yeah, Alessandro. Matteo's lover. Yeah, the artist again. Yeah, the grief of outliving your loved ones. How did you feel about all the depictions actually of art and drawing and painting and visually depicting? Nice, yeahicting. You are the visual artist out of the two of us. Yeah. I quite liked the repeating theme that no one could catch Sabine on paper. And then it just seemed to be Sabine that had that, which was interesting. Yeah. It wasn't a vampire thing. It was something about who she was.

Yeah. Also found it interesting that Alessandro was... Is that his name? It is, isn't it? I really hope, yes, it's Alessandro. Yeah, Alessandro. Whatever. That is his name now. Having just said that name is very important. Is also possibly the only man on the planet who would have responded positively, like physically positively to the prevailing doctrine at the time, which is, oh, he's feeling ill, take some more blood off of him. Yeah. He was too sanguine.

Clearly that was his problem, too much blood. Apparently so. Also TB, do we think TB? Yeah, I assume something along those lines. I don't even know how thought out it was, like, what is it Alessandra has died of so much as... He was very young when he became very old, and so it's got to be some it was, like, what is it Alessandra has died of so much as... He was very young when he became very old, and so it's got to be some wasting disease like that, isn't it? Yeah.

But there were plenty of those about back then. That's true. I've heard. There was a lot of it about. It was the style at the time. Yeah. Should we talk about the endings then? Yes.

We've wandered towards that direction. As one must. On a journey. Did you feel like all of the final moments have come up and like felt earned? Hmm. I suppose it's not very nice. If I'm going to be all book talk about it and be like, everything should have a correct amount of morality attached. It's obviously a little unfair for poor Charlotte that she had a much more horrible death than Sabine. Yes.

Sabine obviously, if you're going to put Deserve in front of anything, it would be her, but also needed to die. Yes. That was a putting down a rabbit animal type situation. She had stopped being anything but a predator. Even if she could pretend for a minute not to be. Charlotte, I didn't get the smack in the face about her being the deceiver until that last scene. I think you saw it earlier than me. I don't know that I saw it that much earlier. With Sabine, it was one of those, I was rooting

for her to go, but I really liked the way it was written. It didn't feel cathartic. It wasn't the magic thing that made Alice feel better in any way. It didn't bring her back to life, obviously, but also it didn't bring her any closure. Yeah. Sabine didn't get that moment of reflecting on what she'd done. Yeah. For Alice, it was just like, I am doing a task that needs to be done. Yeah, this is a job. This is not going to help in any way. It is just simply something that needs doing today. Now there's all jewelry on the shower floor.

Yeah, mess. But yeah, Lossy said, I didn't see, I spotted that she must have told a lie, but I still didn't see anything more than that with Lossy. Yeah, and how much meaning it was until, like I said, we kind of got to that scene and you go through it with Alice. It's the moment where you spot the hairbrush. And you remember the story she tells about killing the person that's being turned with this silver hairbrush. And you remember the story she tells about killing the person that's been turned with this silver hairbrush. Yes. And Alice spots it and makes the connection.

Because you're wrapped up in these women's stories. There was nothing stopping me from making the association that Lottie's being an absolute dick by continuing to associate with other women. Yeah. It was, oh, she's been careful about it now because that's how she was putting it. And also, like I do think it's quite relatable. Like loneliness is a horrible thing. So you can see how that doesn't mean it's a good thing that Lossi does it, but it's understandable.

It's in that hunger context again. It's understandable, but in the same way that we all do evil things every day to satiate one want or another, not even need, but want. We eat things that we know come from suffering and we buy things that we know come from suffering. Again, with the projection, I think, of us as a species, we make monsters of ourselves in stories, kind of caricature ourselves, and vampires are a very attractive caricature of ourselves in stories, kind of caricature ourselves and vampires are a very attractive caricature of ourselves. And there's something about how sweet Lottie is to Alice. When Alice killed Lottie, I found

myself needing to pause and digest it and think back over how deserved it was. Is it that she killed Lottie as well? Did she kill her or did she just not save her life? I'd say she did. She could have stopped her and didn't. Yeah. I would say in a course of law. In a course of law? Yeah, fine. Maybe not. And she might not have gone with the intention to kill Lottie. No, but she had long enough to think that actually, yeah, she could have taken it. She could have stopped her drinking that very quickly.

I think she probably would have killed Delayter anyway. Yeah. And stopping and digesting it, and it makes you go back and reassess all of Lossy's story. And then you start seeing some of her sweetness is actually again being very patronising. The notes about Alice taste like grief. How fucking horrible that must be to read as Alice. Yeah, of course, of course. And in a long list of people as well. My defining feature is my grief. Super. Yeah. And I say this to someone who has maybe every now and then given someone I spent a

brief evening with a nickname and attached a silly story to them because sometimes entertaining things happen. Shout out to shoulders. Shout out to shoulders. A story from a long time ago that I will not be telling on this podcast. Ditto pepperami. Anyway. Oh no, I was about to say nothing against shoulders. Fine figure of a man, pepperami not so much. Not like that though, that's not what that means. I should not have made that pepperoni.

It was a literal pepperoni. The story involves the snack. Anyway, yeah. So there's the again, it's very, all of the evil things Lossi does are very human evil things. Yes. Sorry, I've broken Francine. No, it's all right. I've recovered. Oh, if I'd let myself go that would be... Sabine's evil is all about her losing her humanity, whereas all of Lottie's evil is about her clinging to every bit of it.

Like a parasite. She's getting the humanity fix from others, you know, we're going to kill them. Yeah, it's parasitic. It's a zombie parallel. It's a zombie parallel. Oh, I love a zombie parallel. It's the people who get bitten and still continue on with the group. Yes. Because, oh, that was that bit about belief.

There was that bit about belief on how belief is such a strange thing because it's so easily found if it's pointing you in the direction you want to go. It's obviously a very astute observation. And ties back into our ongoing project thing. And yeah, and then obviously Alice is ending this potential to be worse than Sabine and Lossie combined. And this idea of violence is a cycle. Violence begets violence, revenge begets revenge. And Sabine becomes begets Charlotte, begets Alice. Do you think she's being set up to be worse?

I think it's there. I think you could take it in whatever way you wanted to. It's intentionally left open at the end of the book. But to me, I think there's something in the way Sabine goes and then Lossy goes so quickly while Alice watches that feels like an echo of Sabine letting Hector and Renata get caught. And the way Alice sign of chooses to go, I'm going to get out of Boston before Ezra catches up with me. She has that awareness that people are going to be upset she killed Blossie, but she has no guilt. To me, the way I was reading the... I agree she's going to be like a very effective whatever she does, which is not going to be nonviolent. To me, I was kind of almost being set up to

be a serial killer of other vampires. Yeah, could be. Like a Dexter character, you know. Yeah, and then you get into the thing of like, well, maybe that's a good thing, but then you have vampires like Mateo and like Ezra and that makes you root for... And then we're nearly at the I am legend book, aren't we? Yeah. Any other thoughts before you jump forward to closing snapshots? I don't think so, no. I want to go into the power of belief,

but I think we've got a whole episode planned on that one day. Oh, that's going to be an episode. That's definitely going to be an episode. Maybe two. That's going to be more than one episode. Closing snapshot with spoiler context allowed, final closing thoughts. What do you think of the book? Excellent example of The Power of Three.

Yeah. All my favorite gothic horror tropes of which I didn't realise there were so many being subtly subverted. Very good book, very good book. Enjoyed it. Excellent. We'll be keenly awaiting the next one that I hope there is. Fingers crossed. The Hunger, you see, you understand? Yes, we have The Hunger now.

Yes, yes. And you? I thought this was a fucking great book. I really loved, I managed to care deeply about everyone in it, although also sort of hating them a bit at the same time. I like that a story can make me want to be a character and root for their untimely demise all within a few pages. I like a story that doesn't completely wrap everything in a bow at the end. Oh yes, this is true. We agreed on this. And back around to what I've said, I will happily just have this book and nothing else in this world ever and it will still be a wonderful book. But also, still out there.

And you know what? I can think about what Alice might be up to next and that's free. I was just about to say, this is one of those really fun ones where you can just lie there and speculate about it. So it's enough of a fleshed out universe in this one book that you can get. But what if? Oh, wait, fuck. That's right. I added a question to this that I really wanted to ask you, which was, do you think it's possible to live ethically as a vampire in this universe? Yes, if you don't have a psycho ex-girlfriend to a certain extent, but I think part of living ethically as a vampire in this universe involves having a network of people that are willing to kill you when you become inhuman. I think the only way you can live ethically in this universe is if you go, right, I've been turned on this day. So say 250 years down the line, 200 years, someone come and put a silver hair mash through my back. And you would need somebody like or several people

like Alessandro who would consent to. Yes, you would also need to find the consensual things. Yeah. I think it would be possible in modern day, especially because you'd also need to find the consensual things. Yeah. I think it would be possible in the modern day, especially because you'd be able to find those networks more easily. Yes. But probably in realistically. I don't think someone would end up living ethically as a vampire in this universe, but I think it would technically be possible. Thoughts on a bloodstained postcard, please listen.

Yes, not too bloodstained. I think that's everything we are going to say about Bury Our Bones in the Midnight Soil by V.E. Schwab. If you've got to this part of the podcast, I'm assuming you've read the book already, but just in case you haven't and you just listened to all of that, go and get the book. It's very good. Next time on The Truth Shall Make You Fred. Jess Oh, this is a new subsection. Niamh Well, this is a new subject. Well, we're a bit more wibbling about than we were in the past. We are going to finally go to the long earth.

Oh, yes. Fuck yes. That's my birthday treat next month. That's Francine's birthday treat. This was mine. That's Francine's. We're going to do two episodes. So we'll split the book in two. I can't tell you where because I haven't reread it yet. And they will hopefully be coming on the 7th and 14th of July. Obviously, that's quite far away from now and it's highly likely we'll randomly crop up in the feed before then because we spoke nonsense and decided to record it. That is how this works usually. Yeah, what the entire podcast is based on. But until July or possibly before, dear listeners, you can

of course join our Discord. There's a link down below. You can follow us on Instagram at the true show, makeyourfrat, on blue sky at makeyourfratpod, on Facebook at the true show, makeyourfrat, join us on Reddit, r slash ttsnyf. Email us your thoughts, queries, castles, snacks, blood, stains, postcards, the true show, makeyourfratpod at gmail.com. And if you want to support us financially, you can go to patreon.com, for which that's the true show, makeyourfrat, and exchange your hard earned pennies for all sorts of bonus and nonsense. Including a presentation on the history of chocolate.

Oh yeah, go watch that one, it was fun. And until next time, dear listener. Don't let us detain you. Creaking coffin noise. Thank you Francine, you make an excellent soundboard.