Sometimes It Feels Like Everyone Around Me Is Speaking In A Secret Language And I'm The Only One Who

Just yes

Meanwhile he refused to solve his own problems and until they almost killed him

Neil saw the "I can fix him trope" and said "I can fix his brother and their issues, his vague acquaintances, his college sports team and his extremely dependent best friend and have his enemies killed but I won't fix him cause he's perfect"

Yeah Mary, your boy did listen to you

He didnt got close to girls....but with a certain boy....

thinking about how Neil let Andrew do every single one of these things to him without noticing just because Andrew’s a boy and Mary was heteronormative

OP, just know you are perfect!

It annoys me so much when people say AFTG is badly written, this post is just PERFECTION

Thank you!!

AFTG is Well Written: a Masterlist

Many people have said the book series All For The Game by Nora Sakavic is badly written. However, I believe it is not. To prove this, I made a compilation of posts that explain why the books are meticusly crafted and amazingly written.

*disclaimer: I'm not claiming the books are perfect or have no mistakes, it is impossible for any book to be that way, I'm just saying that it's not even half as bad some people claim it to be

Plot

Why The King's Men's plot structure is genius

In defense of AFTG crazy plot

Characters

MCs and trauma responses by @skydaemon

Mirrors of eachother by @sirandking

Riko and Neil parallels by @notlacrosse

Jean: Number, name and the narrative by @owlarchimedes

Metaphors/Symbolisms

Characters and their respective chess metaphor

Number symbolims in AFTG by @darkblueboxs with additions by @whydamnitwhy

Writing style

Conveying feelings by @lochenfreh

Here by @joejhang

The reason for the simplistic language by @afurtivecake

Neil/Nathaniel switch by @obsessing-over-fictionn

General

Here by deactivated account

The reason why people tend to think the book are bad by @thetamingofspike

Here by @the-foxhole-clutter

If I'm forgetting something or you know a post that could fit in this masterlist, share it pls!

When Kevin met with Jeremy before the Foxes vs Trojans game, Neil noticed he opened one of his rare real smiles

The other Foxes were all kinda of surprised to see Kevin like that

I need more of those interactions

i want jeremy to meet the foxes just so they can see how kevin treats and listens to him and the other foxes go “woahh kevin can be nice even tho cameras are not around???”

something about jean having to live under the ground in the nest for so long but the people he loves are from the sky

renee is a rainbow. kevin is a star. jeremy is the sun.

"Freakin' out on the interstate" describes pretty well Kevin at the night he scaped the Ravens

Don’t ask me to make sense of this just know I’m Right

I mean, Neil and Jean were actually trying to protect Ichirou not Riko (Neil would probably love to throw some more shade at Riko)

But still, we all stan Kevin Day

neil and jean: making up stories and lying to the FBI to keep riko out of any negative light

kevin on national television: RIKO WOULD HAVE KILLED NEIL IF ANDREW WASN’T FAST ENOUGH

Girl, I NEED this so much 😭😭😭

This would literally be amazing!!

Other super cool ep: a shot of Mary telling Neil that girls are trouble, he shouldnt think about love, that it is too dangerous to fall in love....and then it cuts to him kissing Andrew for the first time

I swear, this would be so amazing

Aftg series adaptation idea:

Every episode starts with a brief flashback to Neil's life on the run/ his childhood, and at the end of it, the scene cuts to a contradicting thing he does in the present (which would be the plot of that ep).

Like, for example, "i have been running for 9 years, always hiding, staying out of sight, (bla bla u get the picture)" and then BOOM it cuts to Neil dressed up on live TV. Like ??? Yknow, and then it proceeds with the story leading up to that moment.

Or or or

Smth about how he got his scars, some dramatic montage of Neil and Mary fleeing, shots fired in the background, her prying off Neil's kevlar vest to reveal an ugly wound, and then the scene abruptly cuts to that same wound, but healed. Camera pans out, and its Neil showing Abby his scars.

DO YOU SEE WHAT I MEAN??

Like there are so many options:

Playing at Evermore as a kid/ ...playing at Evermore

Neil getting struck by an iron/ showing his scars to Andrew (again. Or smth else).

Lola teaching Neil how to cut things/ kidnapping scene

Nathaniel Wesninski/ Neil Josten

Etc.

Like, this way we get bits and pieces to Neil's past like how we do in the books; we're not getting totally info-dumped, but we get insight throughout the books as to who he actually is.

It also works with how strongly Neil holds onto Mary's rules, how sick/ sorry he feels whenever he breaks them, because we can actually see why she was so hell-bent on laying low; she doesn't only come off as some paranoid freak, she had reasons- (This is getting off track, Mary ily).

And then we get to experience pure whiplash as to how crazy Neil's life acctually is without him suppressing/compartmentalizing it.

Ah, a girl can dream...

And the fact Andrew doesnt feel threatned by Neil's ability to pick locks, bc he trusts Neil entirely and knows that Neil will never cross his boundarys, even if he is able to

you ever think about how important keys are to neil and locks are to andrew and how they're also the only characters in the series shown to be able to pick them. because i do. im actually always thinking about neil liking having keys bcus it means he belongs somewhere and therefore doesnt need to pick the lock. im always thinking about how andrew needs locks to feel safe and how neil's respect of that boundary despite having the tools to cross it is the reason andrew even lets him in. im thinking about it.