#sgeconfession

They are depicted as an old couple, and Hester should be the same age as her classmates (unless I missed/forgot some information about her actually being older and not aging).

The thing is, Hansel and Gretel were CHILDREN in their story. And even if they were young adults (after graduating SGE) in Soman’s universe, HOW on Earth would they be so old during that book? Even if they were in their early twenties, and Hester is 15 (as she was apparently 4 when her mother died) they would be at MAXIMUM in their early 40s.

I’ve seen this discussion on Amino and some people tried to use an “explanation” of how the Candy Witch used dark magic to have Hester at an old age, and then I saw this claim pushed in one of the following books (not sure which one now). The thing is, this doesn’t explain HOW HANSEL AND GRETEL AGED SO MUCH.

People also claimed that maybe the Witch did not die during the story and escaped to have Hester several years later, however, this makes zero sense since the latter herself is upset that she has to be in one group with the people who killed her mother.

Few explanations I can think about arethat Hester is actually way older than her classmates, but doesn’t age, or that she was frozen for several years and then unfroze when her mother’s nemesis were old. Or that H&G were in their fifties during their fairytale, or that the gingerbread they ate made them age quickly. 🙄

like, yeah she’s a never and as nevers they believe that love isn’t enough of a reason, but wHO THE HELL LEAVES A KID IN THE WOODS BY HIMSELF??

LIKE HOW DO YOU DO THAT??

and we can’t really attribute this to all Never parents, cause look at Callis for crying out loud! she adopted a kid who wasn’t even her own child and physically transformed herself to look more like her so the other townspeople wouldn’t speculate!!

and lady lesso was able to show genuine love for someone else besides her self, like her best friend clarissa dovey and her best student sophie (who she even said she saw as her own child), so why couldn’t she feel the same way for aric??

you’re probably going to say tho that it’s too late by then, cause he’a all revenge-hungry and probably wouldn’t see reason, but that’s kind of the point

forget the fact that aric is a raging lunatic who tortured people for kicks for a moment (tho i know it’s hard to), and remember that this was a kid who had to leave with the knowledge that his own mother - the one person who most of us know we can always count on on matter what happened - left him for dead basically!! in the woods!! alone!!!

well we dont really have much of a backstory tbh to know if lesso left him with some form of protection or not tbh

maybe lesso has more of a reason behind it, like maybe she didn’t like being reminded of aric’s father or something like that, but if that was the case, why would she keep aric close in the first place by placing him in the blue forest so she can be near him?

let’s be honest, child abandonment is child abuse, and there’s really no excusing that

i’m sure i’m not the only one who has wondered how different aric would have turned out if he’d grown up with a postive role model or some good influence or something like that

i’m not saying that this excuses aric for the terrible, terrible things he has done in the series, but what more can we expect of a person who has not been taught to be anything but a monster?

he probably had to go through some rough ordeals in order to survive, and maybe he lost some parts of his humanity to live to see another day

no one was there for him (probably, due to lack of backstory™ ) so how can expect him to act like a morally upstanding citizen, especially given his Never nature?

i know it’s easy to hate aric (i know i do) but we have to remember that villains just dont come out being bad irl (no matter how misleading this series may be lol) but because they went through some horrific experiences and didn’t have proper direction or a working conscience to stop them or make them change or something

aric was a child then, plain and simple, who did not deserve to go through that

no matter how grand a legacy leonora lesso left behind, it doesn’t excuse the fact that she abandoned her own child to save her skin

There, I said it. A short story collection? Sure. Another series in the Endless Woods that shows us what’s happening from someone new’s perspective? Sign me up. But another book, in what we assumed would be a trilogy? No. Even the title doesn’t fit with the others. Quests for Glory doesn’t match The Last Ever After or A World Without Princes. I love Soman’s writing and the world he’s created, but I want to read something new. We don’t need a fourth book. I think the handbook and TLEA provided good closure on a lot of things, but the Quests perhaps could have their own short stories, not a whole book. I just feel it’s unnecessary to write a new book. And I think that maybe we should just be content with knowing about a Tagatha wedding, and Sophie as Dean, because knowing Soman, something will happen that we don’t want, if he writes those bits as we expect them at all, and doesn’t do one of his plot twists.

I am super hyped for his new series and the movie though.