#trigun is cool and based and i think seeing bigolas dickolas wolfwood in articles is funny as fuck

[booksanstime]

Bigolas Dickolas and the Time War

The other day I was feeling rather out of it, so I decided to pick some media to immerse myself in. Some media to make me feel something sharp and intense, to get catharsis. I landed around reading a few books, all I will get to talking about in due time, but I surprisingly started with the book I didn’t initially plan on reading. This Is How You Lose the Time War by Amal El-Mohtar and Max Gladstone. I will start with giving a short review on the book that is spoiler free and then go more into detail on my actual feelings. Spoiler Free Review- Nothing. I really can’t say much. It made me cry, it made me look up quite a few things, and after I was done reading it I was blown away, but I truly feel no information is the best way to go in. For those who want some idea of what you’re getting yourself into, I will say to just read the synopsis on the back of the book, but not the reviews, and be prepared for a possibly challenging read(it can be verbose). The back of the book reads: “In the ashes of a dying world, Red finds a letter marked “Burn before reading”       So begins an unlikely correspondence between two rival agents in a war that stretched through the vast reaches of time and space.       Red belongs to the Agency, a post-singularity technotopia. Blue belongs to Garden, a single vast consciousness embedded in all organic matter. Their pasts are bloody and their futures mutually exclusive. They have nothing in common--save that they’re the best, and they’re alone.       Now what began as a battlefield boast grows into a dangerous game, one both Red and Blue are determined to win. Because winning’s what you do in war. Isn’t it?       A tour de force collaboration from two powerhouse writers that spans the whole time and space.” One other thing. I don’t want to say too much, but it is also a good read if ya want something remotely queer for pride month, and it’s only 198 pages long. Now, onto not caring about spoilers, ---warning!! spoilers ahead and some unfiltered thoughts--- This book fucking took me by the throat and made me look directly into it’s eyes on every fucking page. I swear, the moment I started reading I did not stop once until I had read it all. I had to take a moment to sip some water, perform some standard body maintenance, but outside of that, I didn’t put the book down until I was done. And then when I was done, I laid down for a moment, and then reread certain lines and paragraphs and phrases again. The next day I was still going back to it, so much so I decided to reread the first bit (while not emotionally prepared to reread the whole book yet) and it had me losing my mind and recommending it to everybody I know. This Is How You Lose the Time War fucking hit like a school bus on a college campus. It’s everything my friends and I joke that we need, would be a pain to actually live through, but I’m sure half of us would not complain to have. Reading this book was, in a way, exhausting. The journey the authors took us through, the tragedy, the love, the longing, it wore on me. It was incredibly engaging and profound, yes.. but it still was a trip, a roller-coaster of emotions, and I don’t do well with heights. It may take me many more days before I feel like I can read it again, but rest assured I will, because I am absolutely certain it is worth at least another read. Like a video game where each play around you unlock new things, new aspects of the story that can lead you to the true end you couldn’t get the first go around. But I guess it’s slightly different than that. This book is more so a Möbius strip, as the last letter from Blue reads. This book is about a war and a love that, “stretches through the vast reaches of time and space.” Everything happening from the beginning of the book is happening later in the book as well, but I digress, I should go into more specifics. This books is about two people on opposing sides of a war. Red and Blue, code-names (though we don’t learn their actual names). They have a fierce and intense rivalry, while having respect for one another at the same time. They both weave and manipulate the past to try to make their respective futures possible, to make their very existences possible. They may just be the grunts for their respective futuristic matriarchs, but they are the best in their field and constantly at each others throats, while never outright sabotaging one another. And while constantly communicating through an effort akin to growing strawberries for a loved one (a painstaking thing to grow), the two rivals painstakingly weave time to leave messages for one another. Taunting each other. Blue saying they’ll turn Red to their side, to Garden. Both enjoying the company at some point of simply each other’s messages in their memories, as both Garden and the Agency keep close tabs on them and they could not simply keep a message, a letter, around. And at some point, from the intellectual back and forth from two people on opposite sides of a war, they fall in love. Blue takes a heavy wound when Garden sends her to kill a younger version of Red, a wound she will carry in every form she takes. Red is taken aback and professes she no longer sees Blue as the enemy, that she wishes to talk to her more. Blue and Red weave messages through time, in bee stings and dragonflies. In seeds and teas and then.. Red confesses her love. Blue dies at the hands of Red and the Agency, and then Red tears through time and space to bring her back. To Be Continued... >>