#like clinically

Like this was actually a religious experience but in the way where God is like “hey babe stop making bad choices” and I’m like “Okayyy, but what if i didn’t.”

I read ‘All For the Game’ by Nora Sakavic and it is truly the worst. And before anyone yeets an exy racket at my skull, let me explain the emotional journey I went on:

I’m chilling, scrolling, being a peaceful little creature of the internet, and one of YouTube people I like drops a video about the series. Sooo I, in all my foolish innocence, go: “o, huh. must consume media BEFORE watching analysis. like an honourable knight of academic integrity.”. 

I open book one. THE FIRST PAGE hits me like being slapped with a cold sock. The writing? It’s giving Wattpad draft written during a possession and never edited out of respect for the demon. It’s fanfic-core, but like, UNFILTERED fanfic-core. Razor-sharp edge levels of edgy, like acctually it would fit better as a kinfe that a story. This is what happens when someone tries to reinvent lacrosse while concussed and succeeds disastrously.

AND THEN SUDDENLY. THE MAFIA. JUST WALKS IN. Why are they here. Why is anyone here. I thought this was going to be a silly goofy sports book, not SPORTS-MAFIA-TRAUMA-EXTREME-CHAOS: THE NOVEL. But okay! Fine!! Let’s go wherever this flaming rollercoaster of a plot wants to take me!!!

Anyway I finished book one out of sheer spite. Like the world’s pettiest paladin. It sucked so bad I had to continue immediately. (Shoutout to my brain that forces me to complete ANY media I start like it’s a side quest without a skip option.)

Book two? Still terrible. BUT THEN I’M LIKE… hold on… I love this gremlin protagonist actually?? That boy is allergic to survival. He walks into danger like “ah yes. my natural habitat.” and I'm sitting there cheering for him like a proud parent watching their kid eat gravel.

And THE CAST??? Found family of absolute peak Tumblr-core characters. Crafted in a lab specifically for people who stayed up until 1AM reading angst fanfic under their blanket while ignoring their responsibilities. There’s a 5ft rage goblin that wants to stab everyone, several traumatized disasters, like 4 bearly functioning parental figures and all of them communicate exclusively in threats, lies, and trauma bonding with knives (bad. BAD. do not recommend. but also I love them deeply).

The whole series is so bad it looped and became good again. It’s like someone lit a sports anime on fire and called it a day. It’s cringe. It’s chaotic. It’s messy. I’m having so much fun.

BUT LISTEN. The trauma/mental illness stuff??? Disaster. Unsalvageable. Handle-with-gloves levels of “no thank you.” It’s shallow and thrown around like seasoning and sometimes genuinely harmful. Like really using trauma for enterteinment and shock value. My biggest issue hands DOWN. (Like for real, thats a trigger warning, i want it to be taken seriously even if im not very serious. Very bad mental illnes and trauma rep) The sequel gets better-ish but not enough to say “good.”

Now I’m in the sequel series like: Who am I? Where am I? At which chapter did my dignity leave my body?!

Is the writing slightly better or am I simply feral and desensitized now?? Impossible to know. Vibes still fanfic. But now it’s that good comforting fanfic that you bookmark for emergencies. Anyway. I’ve accepted that I must finish everything now. The only way out of this franchise is THROUGH.

It’s a series that is bad, iconic, and devastating in the way only deeply flawed books can be. You will cringe. You will scream. You will finish all three books in 48 hours and then question your life choices.

To summarize:

Quality: 0/10

Entertainment: 100000/10

Would I recommend it? Not in my right mind.

Would I lie and say it’s good? Never.

Did I have the time of my life? Unfortunately yes.

make oc to ship with the guy i simp > simp harder for said oc because i forgot i'm as straight as a bendy ruler (no but for real what is this fuckass pipeline)