u/AgentBrittany

This is not an anti-Nesta take. This is a weird discussion to have on Reddit of all places but it needs to be said because it is prevalent in this fandom. And at this point, I think mods in certain places need to stop allowing certain comments.

We do not owe the internet our life stories to have an opinion on a book character.

We do not need to list our mental health diagnosis to have an opinion on a book character.

Ww don't need to discuss why you "relate" to a character. These characters are not real. We can tell people our story, your traumas, whatever-if we want to. But we shouldn't feel forced to explain our stories to strangers on the internet why we may not like a book character. These characters are not real.

None of us are Nesta. Or Elain. Or Feyre. We can understand PTSD. We can understand depression. We can understand why characters do certain things. But we've never died UTM. We've never been thrown into a cauldron and turned into faeries.

I am so so so sick of comments from people telling anyone that if they don't like a book character that it "must be nice to not understand trauma".

Just shut up.

I'm just going to start doing more of these discussions so that maybe new fans will find their way here. This fandom desperately needs more positivity lol

I think we can all agree that Sarah has some great quotes in the five books. What are some of your favorites? This post would be never-ending if I included all of my favorites. So I'll go with this one:

"You do not fear. You do not falter. You do not yield."

Rhys speaking to Feyre in ACOWAR. I love it so much it will be tattooed on me at some point. My wife is an artist and is going to help design what I have in mind.

What quote made you cry or made you rage or made you want to stand up and clap?

Why does it feel like some ACOTAR fans are miserable 90% of the time? Every time I go on Reddit it’s discourse, character hate, ship wars, arguing about who sucks, etc. and honestly I just need some positivity.

So tell me your favorite part of the entire series. A scene, a line, a character moment, a relationship, or just how the books made you feel. I don’t want to hear what you hate or who you think is problematic. I just want to hear something that made you LOVE ACOTAR.

For me, I’ll just say Feyre is my favorite and ACOMAF is probably the best book in the series. Not to get too deep on Reddit but I really understood Feyre’s depression and anxiety. I’ve struggled with that for years, decades really. I’ve never died and been turned into a faerie, obviously, but I’ve lost 10 family members in the last 15 years and had to deal with a level of grief I never thought would be possible. So yeah, she’s my girl.

But also, the scene in ACOMAF when Rhys goes into her mind and makes her imagine going to try on lingerie, and she starts getting turned on before realizing Rhys is doing that to her, makes me crack up every single time. I love their relationship.

Give me your favorite moments. I just want to read everyone’s happy ACOTAR memories for once.

I need to get this off my chest because I keep seeing it in the fandom. "Unreliable narrator" is an actual literary term. It doesn't mean "the character is emotional," "they're young," "they're traumatized," or "I disagree with their opinions." A biased narrator and an unreliable narrator are not the same thing.

Every first-person and even third person limited narrator is biased because we're experiencing the story through their eyes. They're limited by what they know, what they believe, and how they interpret events. That's true of Feyre, Nesta, and Cassian. An unreliable narrator is someone the text itself teaches you not to trust. They lie, intentionally mislead the reader, hallucinate, have severe memory distortions, or the story later reveals that what they told us wasn't actually true. Feyre doesn't do that.

Is she biased? Of course. Does she misunderstand people sometimes? Yes. Does she have incomplete information? Yes. That's what happens when you're reading from just her perspective. The comment that inspired me to make this post was someone arguing that Feyre can't be a reliable narrator and she's 19 and her frontal cortex isn't fully developed. And that this persons "feelings" matter, not understanding unreliable narrator is an actual literary term. Facts don't care about your feelings.

It feels like "unreliable narrator" has become shorthand for "I don't like this character" in this fandom and I'm sick of it not even being used correctly. You don't like Feyre? Fine. Say it with your whole chest. Don't use unreliable narrator as your reason.

Anyway, thank you for coming to my TED Talk.

I'm new to the fandom so when I hopped on reddit and saw all the Elain hate (and Feyre hate lol) I was really surprised. The more I lurked in certain spaces, the more it makes me wonder. Was she hated this much *before* ACOSF/the bonus chapter *or* after?

This will be long.

My mom and I (43F) have always had a good relationship. We never argue or really even disagree about things. And I've realized this is an anomaly considering literally everyone I know has a difficult relationship with their mom.

My mom married my stepdad when I was 6. I was close to him too and they had a good marriage. He died 16 years ago of cancer. After he died, she went into a deep depression. Told me things I shouldn't know as a daughter (how when he was diagnosed she asked him if he wanted her to drive off a bridge together so they could die together). This has been stuck in my brain since. She drank a lot for awhile. Would drive drunk occasionally. No legal trouble. After he died multiple family members died within the span of a few years. Lots of tragedy in the family. And somehow the roles reversed. She kept using me as a therapist. Telling me things I don't need to know. Coming to me for all of her problems. I have clinical depression, anxiety and also really had health anxiety. She calls me a lot about her ailments. Her illnesses. Even something as simple as lab work. And every time, it triggers me in a major way. She had a GI procedure done a few weeks ago and before she went in she told me she hoped she'd wake up from the anesthesia. Instant anxiety until she came out.

It all came to a head yesterday. She had something weird happen with her vision. She was driving home. Called my sister. Then called me "I just talked to your sister and I told her I was calling you immediately." I'm not a doctor or nurse. What can I do? Immediately my body goes into fight or flight. I have no idea what to do. I tell her to come to my house and I start to drive her to the ER. Then she tells me its not as bad. And for the first time in oh, 40+ years. I lost it. I didnt yell. I didnt scream. But I told her until she knows shes actually having a medical emergency, I dont want to hear it. She got angry. I told her sometimes I feel like her mom and she's my daughter. Well that set her off. Told me to take her back to her car. I told her this is why I don't tell people how I feel because it ends up with me having to make sure they are okay and basically f*ck my feelings. When I got back to the house she wouldn't even hug me. Told me "you said some hurtful things" and left.

My mom can hold a grudge. I love her. But I don't want to apologize. Because what I said was the truth. Family members see it, my partner sees it, friends see it. They've all said she treats me as a therapist or even a friend. But she's my mom. I want the mother/daughter relationship. But I think this has forever changed our relationship. She was supposed to come here Monday before leaving to go to Europe and tonight she texted she's coming Tuesday. I don't know how to navigate this. I dont want to get into another argument. I wish I didnt lose my temper. But I also wish that I am, once again, not having to be the adult. My fear is that she'll say something like "never mind, I'll just see you when I get back" (in 2 months) and if I respond "okay" she'll then accuse me of not caring. I don't want her coming here Tuesday and acting weird. I've told her multiple times she should see a therapist. I see one and it's done wonders but the one constant trigger is my mom. What I said needed to be said. But I have no idea how to navigate this going forward because I'm almost positive she's going to turn this into a guilt trip. I'm not used to arguing with anyone, but especially my mom. My life is very quiet and calm and this has really thrown me the last 24 hours.