Ep 77 Holy Crow!! it’s Crowtember! Let’s talk House of Beating Wings, Unhinged Crow Shifter Books, and Crowmandments!

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Holy mother of crow, what just happened?! Honestly, we’re not even sure ourselves. We blinked and it was Crowtember! Also known as “September,” we’ve deemed Crowtember the month of the crow, the gateway to fall, spooky season, and all things wonderful! 

So what did we do to honor this lovely time of year?! We launched our very first merch line to honor the crows (our pod mascot), and we read some birdish books so we can give you the crow-11 all about them! So stick around if you want all the details on how you can get your hands on our official hoodies, beanies, and more! And discover whether or not these bird shifters are shadow daddy worthy. 

We decided to read one cringy crow read: Crow by Layla Fae (IYKYK), and one popular Romantasy read: House of Beating Wings by Olivia Wildenstein. And boy howdy did we have a good time. We’re bringing you a deep dive that covers everything from a complex fantasy world in the sky with a shadow daddy crow king, to a cursed half man, half crow with an egg-expelling appendage… We can’t wait to yap our beaks off with you about both of these books so you can decide if you’ll add them to your TBR or not. 

And don’t worry, we’ll make sure to answer the question: Are we INTO crows now? (Yes, like that…) And we finish with a good old creature / crow smash or pass.

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Check out these author interviews? ⬇️

Check the official Author Interview with Lindsay Straube of Split or Swallow! Now a Barnes & Noble & Amazon best seller titled: Kiss of the Basilisk!  https://youtu.be/fknhocSNIKM

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Use code “CROWSPEED5” for $5 off one order of $50+ (ends 09/15/2025 11:59pm PST)

Ashley is Wearing: The Crop Hoodie with BATB Branded Colors | * https://besties-and-the-books-shop.fourthwall.com/products/cropped-hoodie-besties-anti-social-crow 

And the Anti Social Social Book Club Beanie | * https://besties-and-the-books-shop.fourthwall.com/products/anti-social-social-crow-book-club-knit-beanie 

Liz is Wearing: The Zip Up Hoodie with BATB Branded Colors | *  https://besties-and-the-books-shop.fourthwall.com/products/zip-hoodie-grey-besties-anti-social-crow 

And the Greyscale Besties and the Books Beanie | *

Chapters

• 0:00 Welcome to Crowtember!
• 5:57 Crownouncments! WE HAVE MERCH!
• 8:55 The Crowmandments
• 12:00 Fav and Fail of the Week
• 20:50 CROW by Layla Fae
• 38:29 House of Beating Wings by Olivia Wildenstein
• 1:06:16 Unhinged Smash or Pass

Transcript

0:00

Is the crow in the room? Think of any crows and you're like, I have at least three. Get out. Where's the parachute? I'm getting out of this plane. I have no business ever being around a beak. K-pop demon hunters, can I get a[Music] Welcome to the Besties in the Books podcast, guys. I'm Liz. And I'm Ashley. and welcome to our kickoff to Karot Timber episode. We've been kind of talking about a little bit teasing, you know, this episode, these things that we're going to be sharing, discussing, having, and holding. And we're so and excited. If you guys have been listening to us for some time, you know that crows have kind of become a huge part of our podcasting lore. And I mean overall it's bled into our entire life honestly. You know when we're trying to motivate each other we have a lot of crowisms that we you know naturally say to each other. May the crows be with you. May the crows be ever in your favor. Crows be crows speed. What else? All the things. A lot of crowandments if you will. Cromandments. Well here's the thing. It's like cuz I was trying to take us back to like the origin and I was like I don't remember I don't remember how it originally started but I do remember how it got solidified because we had kind of been like mentioning crow stuff and then when we were reading Twilight Bella says holy crow and she says it twice and so we were like this was not a coincidence and so from once that here we are and it was born. I don't know how to say that. Well, I do know where the birth was. The birthplace. We were there when it was written. That was the crow's no It was just a crow noise, right? I mean, that's in like especially at the beginning of our film. I cuz I don't know. I don't know if maybe I was forgetting close sometimes. Maybe it's the time of year. You guys will know. You'll hear the crows because I have a lot of crows around my house. Always my whole life, but specifically this area. And I was editing the videos and realizing how much you can hear them, especially I don't know if it's, you know, the spring when they're all Twitter painted that the crows take over this neighborhood. So, and then there was like at one point your husband was chainsawing. So, was like crows and chainsaws. It's just like a whole Halloween unofficial background mascot slash Now we're making it official. We're making it Facebook official over here. We are in a relationship with we decided when we talked about doing an episode like this that we wanted to cuz you know crows are kind of spooky right a little bit for some people not for us but for some people they're spooky vibes you know so we want to launch this episode into the space let the crows fly free if you will during the ver months right it's September prober it's kind of your like ease into Halloween cuz it's not full Halloween. It could definitely Crows can be all year round like they are here or it could be more of a fall thing for you. Whatever it may be, we are so excited. And now we'll be talking about some crow reads that we participated in as well. Yes. Yes. Cuz we wanted to tie it all. We wanted to tie it all in. You know, it's like Ashley said, it's like we've got Cronouncements. Okay. So, that's my that's my favorite one that I put in the notes for today. Cronouncements. Crow mandments that we will be sharing with you and of course crow reads. Um so what did we do? We decided to bring you a variety of crow reads. That's only we only brought you two. We can only keep you here till 4. But to us it's a variety because we have one cringey cuz you guys know us. We like to cover our cringey holiday reads. So one cringey and one very popular in the romanty space right now. So we read Crow. It's literally just called crow, guys. That's it. Keep it simple. K I kiss. K I S S. Keep it simple, stupid, says Michael Scott. I thought you were going to say Crow. K R O W. Oh, hey, that's good. Keep it Crow, stupid. But no, it's literally just called Crow. It's by Leila Fay. So, if you've been around here for a while, you know Leila Fay is responsible for the infamous uh Thanksgiving special that we covered last year for Full Sack. Okay. Uh, so that'll give you an idea of where this episode might be going if you remember that. Um, and then we also covered House of Beating Wings. Yeah. By Olivia Wildenstein. I think that's how you say her last name. So, this is more of your traditional what we would cover romanty uh, level book. And it is book one in the Kingdom of Crows. Yeah. series. There we are. There you go. Um, so just so that you guys know, little disclaimer, this episode will probably be a little bit more explicit than our typical because we are going to be covering Crow by anything with Lea Fay pretty much. Yeah, there's just no there's no way to avoid it. Uh, there's going to be lots of spoilers once we get past the first initial 15minute spoiler-free section where we'll be giving you guys some fun crow announcements. Um, but before we get into that, we just wanted to say thank you so much for being here. Thank you guys so much for being here. If you clicked on this episode and you're like, "What the heck am I going to listen to or watch?" We appreciate you taking a risk with us, weirdos. Listen, we're a book podcast first and foremost. We like to have fun with it, right? So, you know, yes, crows are a part of us and our soul at this point, and I hope they are for you guys, too. We're having so much fun. Make sure to like, follow, and subscribe anywhere you like to listen your favorite podcast, including YouTube. We're also on Instagram and Tik Tok. right season books podcast everywhere. And you guys, first up for our crow announcement. Ah, if you are watching the YouTube video, you might notice that Liz and I are actually sporting some Crow merch. It's pretty awesome. I'm like, can you even see? Yeah, it's you have to twist it. Yeah. Well, you know, we'll describe it for you and we'll have pictures also if you're not watching YouTube. We'll have pictures on the website of the Crow Merchandise website. We'll just merch website, but specifically crows for this round. Just crows. All the crow things. All the crow things. And if you don't like puns, good luck with this episode cuz there are going to be a lot of crow puns. So, uh, you know, we'll also be posting pictures on Instagram and Tik Tok if you want to peruse that. We have designed and curated this really special collection that, you know, is our Besties in the Books podcast theme. This is the first official launch of our merch. We did a beanie, special beanie release earlier this year and thank you guys so much for your support on that. We appreciate it so much. So, we took the ideas that we are getting from making those pieces and made the special crow merchandise. Some of the things will, you know, be staying cuz they're just like our normal merchandise and then some of it will be having this special crow branding, if you will, on there. All right. So, we'll be having two hoodies for this launch. One in the style of your classic pullover hoodie. That one's going to have our branded colors on there. So, the teal and the pink. And then we're also having a zip that it's going to be grayscale. So, that way, you know, depending on your color story that you like to work with. I'm wearing right now a different hoodie that's a crop hoodie. So, it also has our branding. We have little crows on the sleeve. This one's wearing headphones. You have a little crow saying on your sleeve. Yeah. My sleeve says, "May the crows be with you." So, hey. Hey. Little daily motivation when you're in the thick of it. We just hope that this, you know, these little pieces can bring you joy and some laughs and and look good doing it. Yeah. Right. We also are both wearing beanies. They look kind of similar from far away, but up close, mine is just Antisocial Social Book Club. And that's what most of the hoodies will say on the back. It's a crow with books. Antisocial social book club. Cuz that's what we are, right? We're just, you know, two ladies filming in our room together and, you know, semi antisocial when it comes to the real world, but we can all be social together on social media and then go back in our little reading caves. So, little perfect kind of book club for us and hopefully for you guys as well. So, we have these two different beauties. Liz is branded with the besties and the book club crow on there and we'll be having stickers, you know, shirts, a couple other things for you guys to check out in all different price ranges. So, if you guys want to check it out, we would love it so much. We'll have everything linked in the description box so you can check it out. For this first week of the launch, we are offering this little secret discount code for those of you who tuned on in. Use code crows 5 at checkout to get $5 off your purchase of$50 or more. And we appreciate your guys' support. Thank you so much. Oh, this is so fun. Happy Protember. We're here. Yeah, we are here. So, what else did we want to share with them today? What else? So, when we did one of our unhinged questions episodes, we just have to give another shout out to one of our uh friends of the podcast and one of our favorite indie authors, TJ London. So, she submitted a question asking us, we start a cult. So, Ashley and I start a cult. What are the five foundational beliefs? So, you know, we were really thinking about this. We wanted to figure it out. And so, what we came up with and what we wanted to share with you today are our five crowments. Yes. Um, and this is basically just exactly it's our foundational beliefs of the podcast. It's what we hope to bring to you and that you enjoy when you listen to us talk in your ears for an hour for whatever reason that day. So TJ, and for everyone else wondering, they consist of one, remember, we're all in this toilet together. Yes, we are. You know, just trying to pull through. Just trying to pull through, not go all the way down the drain. Yeah. On a daily basis. Yes. Wise words of the crows. Crows are wise. You know, owls get all the credit, but crows are crows are smart, too. Yeah. I mean, are owls really that smart? I think like, you know, in popular media. I know, but now I'm kind of wondering. I'm like, what's the smartest bird? Someone tell us. I mean, crows are pretty freaking smart, man. I know. They are. That's what's kind of crazy about it. But our animals, too. That's what I'm saying. I don't I don't appreciate the crow hate the crow propaganda. The crop crop. That's a hard one to do. Crop crop crowanda. No, not going to happen. I don't think it's meant to be. Yeah, that's okay. It's all right. We'll do our best. Okay. So remember, we're all in this toilet together. Yeah. Number two, let the crows guide you. Yes. You feel it like gliding on the breeze. Let the crows guide you. All right. Number three is fly on vibes. Yep. So again, with the crow imagery. Yeah. You know, a lot of times we're like, hey, do what feels right. You know, like, should I do this? Should I do that? With the, you know, podcast stuff. Uh, just do what feels right, man. So fly on vibes. Just feel the vibes. feel it. Mhm. Yeah. Number four, get it done against all odds. Literally, it's the tenant of life. Yeah. It's the biggest crowment of all, honestly. I dare say, cuz it always does. It always gets done against all odds, you know, and it's kind of like uh, you know, it all works out. It does. It's a good reminder. And then five, our purpose is to build the water cooler of the future. Yes. So, if you're interested, please join our cult. Thank you. Goodbye. Beautiful. The mascot is a crow in case you didn't realize. Yeah, exactly. We worship at the altar of the crows, aka spooky season. Here we are. Crow temper. So, we have officially answered your question. Those are our five crowments. And that kicks us into our favorite fail of the week before we get started on these crow reads that I'm sure you're very excited to hear about. Yeah. Okay. So Ashley, what was your fave and fail of the week? Well, I mean, hey, we'll talk all about F and Fail Crow edition in a second, so I'll save that for the book portion. Yeah, I'm going to say um guys, K-pop demon hunters, can I get a Okay, listen. We know it's taken the world by a storm. It took my house by storm. I am such a naysayer. And while I say I try not to be, I still am. And then I finally consumed the media and then I'm like,"Oh, this is great." So my daughters were watching it for like a good week cuz it's free on Netflix to stream. So I didn't know. I was like, "Is it a show?" Like was it a book originally? Like why is it so crazy popular like overnight it felt like? So I let them watch it and I could never sit. They wanted me to sit down and watch it but I could never do that. I had I was like doing like a million things around the house. It was right when we got back from vacation. So, I saw like little parts of it and I was like in my brain trying to put together, but it didn't make any sense. And I was like, I don't think it's for me. It's like a teeny Bob movie. I don't know. Which, like, give me a break. I love old teeny Bob movies, you know. So, my daughters wanted to watch the they were doing a special showing on the weekend of the K-pop Demon Hunter sing along. And my husband, he's all about that, too. And he's like, "Let's go." And I'm like, "Oh my gosh, movies are so expensive these days. is like I really only like to go if I really want to see it, but I'm like fine, let's go. And then we had our friends go with us, too. And cuz their daughters are super excited about it. Like, okay, we'll make it a thing. We'll go. Um I go semi- begrudgingly cuz I'm like, hey, I like popcorn. It's going to be fine. Whatever. I like popcorn. Okay. Yeah. Um I get it now. I get it. I get it. I get it. Okay. It was totally different than what I thought it was going to be about. I love the storyline, the music, the clothes, the hair, the undertones, the like special messaging that's going on inside the story. And I think it's beautiful. And you know what I loved both about I mean what I loved most is that this generation and a lot of generations together are coming together as one to enjoy something fun and silly and beautiful and positive. So, it's a water cooler moment. It is. It is. See, I tried and I still don't get it. Like, I made it through maybe like 30 or 45 minutes and I was like, I don't understand. And then I stopped watching it. Yeah. So, I think you needed to go in. I don't know. Maybe your bar was low, though. My bar was low. So, my bar was low. I had no expectations. I was just wondering the same as you. Like, why are so many people into this? And so, cuz I'm the opposite of you. if someone if a bunch of people are telling me to do something, I'm like, "Oh, cool. Let's check it out." And so that's what I went into it thinking like, I don't get this, but let's see. And then I just turned it off. I was like, I don't I It's weird, too, cuz like your husband too even, he loves anime. And I love they like in different times they would blend a bunch of different um animation styles together. It was so cute. I don't know. I don't know why it didn't stick. Also, it was a hype, you know, watching it in theaters with all those kids singing the songs. It felt like a musical, you know, where everybody's that energy was buzzing. Everybody was excited. I'm sitting there like, I don't know. And then I'm like slowly like, okay, I get it. I love it. And now the songs I love. And we play. We were already playing them, but I didn't have any context to it. And now I'm like, golden, whatever. Yeah. Love it. So that's my fave of the week. Nice. Um, my fave, just to build on yours, it's very similar. So, technically this isn't of the week because I think it was like two weeks, whatever. But we haven't done one of those in a while. Yeah. So, um we try to me and my sister and then two of our other really good friends try to get together and have like a girls weekend once a year. And so, we did that. Yeah. It was amazing. It was so much fun. It was just like we did like a river day and then we just like uh did an after dark Pictionary session that was hilarious. and like um yeah, it was just like a really good weekend where we got to spend like three quality time days together just not having to work or like do life which was really really cool. The reason why it ties into yours is because we wanted to go see so we went to Spirit Halloween. We did that one of the days cuz we were like we're going to like do a little Halloween shopping and then go see a spooky movie and so we went and saw um why am I now blanking on what it's called? weapons and it was really good. So, Rinda doesn't like spooky movies or anything like that. So, she went and saw the K-pop demon hunters sing along at the same time we went and saw the horror movie. So, she loved it. She said it was like the best thing ever. So, yeah. Hey, you know, but yeah, that was my definitely my fave of the week. Nice. For sure. Did you try watching it at home? Just stream it on Netflix? I think that's it. I do cuz nothing when I was like walking by like grabbed me, you know, when I was watching with my girls at all. So, I think it's something about the cinematic, you know, wrap around screen and it's loud and you don't have anything else to do but pay attention to it. Otherwise, yeah, I can't pay attention. I'm like doing something else, you know? Yeah. Yeah. It didn't suck me in. But then at the by the same token, if something if I don't love something, I don't know that I'm going to go to a theater and sit in a sing along full of children cuz I don't even have kids. Yeah. You know what I mean? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, did it she loved it. Yeah, but um yeah, I think the only singalong I've ever gone to was Greece and that was a pretty good time. Yeah, I did enjoy that. Yeah, it was Yeah, there we go. Well, what's new about the theater that I went to is they finally freaking started remodeling my local one, which is like jeez cuz like there's cheap ones that we drive like 30 minutes to that have the recliner seats and everything and our local one is super expensive and didn't have that just regular stadium seating. So they finally upgraded it, which I love cuz then you don't feel on top of each other. So while people were singing along, it wasn't like right there, you know, cuz each seat is so big. And it was cute seeing my girls all excited with their friends. It was just so cute. Do you fail of the week? Yeah. Yeah. Honestly, just keeping up with everything that we needed to get done. That was my fail. That was my fail, too. Not that we don't want to keep up. Like this is the stuff we want to do, but unfortunately life gets in the way. But we get it done against all odds. Yeah, against all odds, guys. Take the crows because like really, come on. Because we picked this um we were really struggling. We wanted a physical read for our vacations that we happen to be taking at the same time and not together. So, we picked the House of Beating Wings cuz like, oh, well, that's actually good cuz you know what? We might not have time when we get back to read it. Well, we didn't even have time on vacation really. Like I made like it to I don't know a hundred pages in maybe during vacation and then after that oh forget it. So yeah I don't think I read any of it on vacation. I think I finished A Curse Carved in Bone and then started reading Haven Ever After and then just didn't read any but I did pack it. I brought it all the way to Colorado and back with me. Yeah. So if you guys are ever wondering gez how do they read so many books? Um not well. No, we do it. But it's like it's hard. It's just hard. It's hard. Yeah. Life. It depends on the time of year. I feel like Yeah. In summer cuz like that's the thing is like in my ideal world, right? I would go on vacation and I would spend half of every day just reading because that's what I want to do on vacation is I want to sit by the pool and read or whatever. Right. But like the reality is just like that never happens. Yeah. It's always there's way too much going on. you know, you want to go out and see things. You're with other people you want to spend time with. And so that just really typically never happens. But once we start getting into Crotember and beyond, yeah, things do get a little bit slower and easier aside from actually like Thanksgiving week, Christmas week, like all those things. So, um, it's a cozy good time. And I feel like I do read a little bit more in the fall and winter, especially once we hit like January, February, March. Those are like the prime of lime reading times, you know. Yeah. Yeah. So, that was definitely my fail of the week, too, because it was down to the wire for real this week. Well, hey, next year we'll try to remember that summer. Take it easy, baby. Take it easy because you don't have as much time as you think. Yep. Yeah, that's for sure. True. Okay, so here we go. Should we just get into our discussion of Crow by Leila Bay? We shall. We'll start with this cringy read, guys. Spoilerfree one sentence star review, spice rating, and if you will recommend it. Liz, start us off. Okay. Uh, I was like, "How are we even going to talk about this book?" Exactly. I rated it three stars, which is generous in my opinion. Um, it was a five spice for sure. Mhm. Um, I literally just put I don't even really know what I read right now, but if you are someone who has specifically a crow or an egg kink, then you will like this book. So that's why I gave it three stars because it's so niche that it's like someone probably really enjoyed it and that's great. Yeah. I'm happy for those people. Yeah, for sure. Yeah. Yeah. Mhm. Uh what about you? Well, what's your spice rating? I gave it a five spice. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Lots of triggers and specifics and um frequency just like all around. Five. Yeah. Five. Five. Yeah. You know, echoing almost everything she said. Um, three stars. But I gotta say, got me in the first almost half, not going to lie, cuz Liz was like spiraling, texting me, not giving anything away, but like, oh no. Oh no. This is so This is so crazy. This is so cringe. Um, and I'm like, okay. You know, obvious opposite naysayer that I am. No, I'm like, okay, I'm going to be prepared. I'm going to brace myself. So, more like the bars the bar's down there. flow and then it starts off as I kind of like it. I'm like, "Okay, I could This is fine. Everything's fine. This is great. Oh my gosh, no. Get out. Where's the parachute? I'm getting out of this plane. Like, I need to crash land." Whatever it takes. So, yes. Um, I would recommend it for anybody that has a thing for eggs um in places um and crows and um if you just want to read something crazy unhinged cuz it's hilarious, you know, go for it. But I'll say Full Sack was a five star for me because it was so out there and crazy that it couldn't I don't know. I was really freaked out by this one, the egg thing. So the other thing was crazy, but it was too crazy. You know what I mean? Yeah. It was like very creative and like out of nowhere. This was a little bit more like it has to be something that you're into, I think, for it to resonate. Yeah. And it and unfortunately it was not something that I was into. I find I'll never forget it. I found out I'll never forget it. It'll be in our mind. Mom, pick me up. I'm scared. Yeah. Until end of time. Yeah. Okay. There we go. So, should we get into the five sentence summary? Sure. I can't wait to hear what you came up with. Kaka kaka. Get out of here. If you don't want to be spoiled on this, but you might want to. Yeah. Do you want to Are you going to Are we Have we piqu your interest? It's only 80 pages, you know. So, if you want to pause it, read it real quick, and then join in the chaos. We get it. So, save it to your playlist. Come back and watch later. If you're not interested, we'll tell you everything you need to know. Yeah. morbid curiosity. Here we go. Yeah. All right. Uh, so just to remind the people, so this is a summary in five sentences or less. I was able to do this one in four. Wow. You finally did the or less. Wow. Look at us. I mean, we're usually covering really big crazy books. So, yeah. Look at that. Like House of Beating Wings, which we'll cover next. Okay, so here we go. Crow by Leila Fay. Crow is a prince who was turned into a crow by an evil witch who cursed him. I had no idea what you were doing. That's the sound one. Yeah, I love it. You can hear it good. Okay. Yeah. Is the crow in the room? Is the crow in the room with us right now? It's so lifelike. I can add this later, but what's the fun in that? I wanted to get some kind of instrument. So, I have the iPad playing crow sounds for you guys. It's a joy. It's a joy. Um, he can only turn back into his princely human form through true love's kiss. There we go. There we go. These are like This is like This is a website that people can input their bird recordings into. And this is all crows. So, bear with me. They're like real crow. I love it. But, see, so far so good. It's cute. It's tail as old as time. I'm liking it. Yeah. Yeah. Very Beauty and the Beast like. Um, he finds his mate, but True Love's kiss only turns him partially back human. Just enough, if you know what I mean. Although he can more easily shift back and forth than before. Yeah. Four. Four. Okay. Okay. His mate doesn't mind and they end up living happily ever after with their crow human babies. The end four. I mean, you're leaving out a lot to be desired. Well, yeah, but those weren't like plot points necessarily. Like more so like you guys can put two and two together. They He only turns back half human and half crow, but yet they have crowum babies. How you ask, we will tell you. Unfortunately, under duress, we will explain. Um, okay. Yeah. So, let's just get into it then. So, what was something that you liked about this book? You have to come up with something. What? Yeah. Yeah. The first half I was enjoying it. I was like, "Oh, cute. It's like, you know, an evil witch turns him into thing." I didn't He was a little bit of a peeping Tom Crow. So, I'm like,"Here, you're making me icked out on crows and I don't like that." He was a little bit of a stocky crow, but it was like semi-stalker, but it was he was a little bit peeping Tom about it cuz he was watching other people, too. Um, so I didn't like that aspect. The stalker thing was actually fine, but you know, whatever. So, I liked the witch turning him into a crow and he has to like true love's kiss. I'm like, "Okay, this is cute." And then he like kills the or like gets rid of the ex-boyfriend later. I think he kills him. He literally just throws him into a big creass like into a hole. He's like,"I'll get him later. He's fine. He's not dead yet." It's like, "Are you sure?" Cuz he's not moving. That cracked me up. I actually had to go back and reread that cuz I was like,"Oh, he didn't kill him. He just threw him into a hole at like a construction site cuz this is contemporary." So, yeah. For just on the sidewalk just like,"Yeah, bye. There you go." into the hole. never to be heard from, seen again. Yeah. But I was like, what's Liz not liking? This is totally It's just like a crow stalker romance. This is fine, you know? Like everything's fine. He's pining for her. He's getting rid of the bad guys, the bad ex. Um and he's like semi he has when he shifts, he has to keep like his like crow face. Yeah. So he has that, you know, face transformation. It's gross. He has a little feather happy trail. It's not good, but she's enjoying it. the main character. So, hey, that's good for her. Yeah. Yeah. Uh I mean, literally, I could not get over the fact that like every time he transformed back into his quote unquote human form, he was like super hard, specifically in detail around no one, no one. It's like a fly the fly transformation. That's how I picture it. So, if you liked that, then you'll like this. It like literally scarred me as a child, I feel. Well, and not only that, but like the way they describe his member, crow member, if you will, she decided to go with a bit of an elephant trunk vibe to support the egg release. Yeah. Like not like sizewise, but like functionalitywise. Yeah. Which is just as bad. So, it will stick in our brains until the end of time. Yeah, that'll do it. Um, yeah. I mean, as far as the things that like literally I just can't stand, like I just put the eggs and how they um are produced and then put into her because they're also literally the size of actual eggs. Like, they're not like like they're I don't know. They're not cool. They're just eggs. I mean, yeah. And I just can't get it out of my brain. Um, and then also, I didn't like how it made me feel to then have to do further research to look up like how crows reproduce because I just I didn't like the rabbit hole that I went down to figure out that literally none of this is actually anywhere close to accurate whatsoever. So, none of this is biologically sound. No. No, it really isn't. And now, hey, hey, RIP your algorithm now. You thought you had it bad when you we were talking about hot dogs. Good luck. I'm like, I don't know. Like, yeah, like how I don't feel like I've seen any other crow content. Craw content. That was good. So far, cro. Um, so, and it depends on the crow content. It might be okay. You know what I mean? But it might not be okay. But yeah, as far as like new icks for me, I did discover that I want no I have no business ever being around a beak. Yeah. Or their long spindly tongue. I can't like literally that's where they lost me. That's where Leila Fay lost me. I was like I can't. It was like half. Yeah. It was like halfway through. I feel like that's when I started texting you. I was like, "How far in are you?" Literally, things just took a bad turn for me. Like a very bad turn for me. And then it just went from bad to worse. And but yeah, I can't I can't get on board with that. But you might be listening to this and saying, "Hey, I like all those things." Well, boy, do we have a book for you. Yeah. And we are happy. We're happy for you that you have a book that you can see your interests um Yep. It is a no for me dog. It is a no for me. The beak was too far. Honestly, everything like but that's the thing. If the beak was too far, then the rest was definitely going to be too far for me. Yeah. Yeah. You know, but she delivered. I'll give her that. She did. Yeah. I will give her that. And I mean, we read our fair share of monster romance over here. And so it's not even necessarily like I have any issues with um you know, maybe nonhuman appendages and whatnot. It's just there's something about a beak and a long spindly tongue that I just want nothing to do with. Yeah. And it's the elephant snout. Um you know, man, a poor little elephant. Why do you have to drag them into this? You know what I mean? It's so sweet. I do have a thing with like a not I have I have an ick against appendages not being how they're they are for us humans. So Oh, really? Uh I mean octopuses. No thanks. I was going to say you're not into a good kraken tentacle. No, absolutely not. I So those kind of appendages and now thanks. You ruined elephants. Great. Yeah. Yeah. You know, obviously Tales for me it's a big ick. Everybody knows. Um, you know, you couldn't turn my you couldn't change my mind with getting it on with gargoyles. However, I do like that series, just not for that. Yeah. Yeah. So, yeah. See, it doesn't really freak me out. Like a good I I like a good gargoyle tail for its abilities, you know? But it's like, yeah, a tentacle thing doesn't really freak me out, but for some reason, I draw the line a beak. Yeah. I don't want to kiss a beak. I don't want to kiss a be. It's very unromantic in my opinion, too. It's like it's like the sound. I mean, what if it's two beaks for sure, but like they say that's actually what the sounds that the vampires make in Twilight cuz they're marbleink. Like a couple porcelain bowls. So weird. I just couldn't do it. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So there you go. There you Okay. How was the plot versus smut ratio? Honestly, it was fine. With all that said, it was good. She balanced it well. She did. Even if it's not something I like, it it was well written. I'll give her that. I felt like I was there. Unfortunately, um this lies the problem. It was written too well. It was written too well. Therefore, three stars. I see it when I close my eyes to go to sleep at night. I mean, you know. Yeah. But yeah, no, I agree with you. It was It was balanced for sure. Plot versus smut ratio for an 80 page novela or whatever was spot on. I feel like she's good at that. So, that's great. Yep. That's good. Um, okay. So, this will be our first installment of Rate the Crow. So, this is a new uh little game we will be playing every time a crows our path. Um, flies view. Yeah. Flies into view here on this podcast. So, Crow, that's his actual name, will be the first Crow that we will rate. So, on a scale of one star being the most unsmatchable and five stars being the most smashable, how would you rate the crow? Yeah, with all the things we just said, that's a that's a one star for me. One star for me, too. Yeah. Sorry, Crow, but Yeah, just no thank you. Yeah. And I'm glad he found his person, though. Good for him. Yeah, she seemed very perfect for him. Yeah. And she was very accepting of who he was. It's beautiful. Beautiful thing. Mhm. There you go, guys. Oh my goodness. Did you enjoy that ride? Wow. Did we convince you to read it? Let us know. You might enjoy it. Well, if we didn't, let's share a few reviews for you. Yeah. Okay. So, first of all, let's just start off with the the stats here. Okay. So, it has 1,31 ratings. Gets an average of a 3.77 on Good Readads. And here's just some uh great little oneliner reviews for you. One stars. Leslie, if you see me reading this, no you didn't. Um my personal favorite by Julisa. Uh one star. Julisa. I know Julisa. She keeps coming up for some reason. Hey, she reads all the books we read. Come hang out, I guess. Uh, the image of him fighting her ex-boyfriend butt ass naked with a heart on haunts me. You too, Julisa. Literally though, it's like that I feel like encapsulates like so much of the vibe of this book though. Like, you know, um, I should have minded my business. This one was a no from me. Yeah. Yeah. One star. Um, let's see. Okay, so what else do we have? Well, we've got some five stars cuz we got to be fair over here. Mhm. Lori says, "Five stars. This Monster Ever After series is definitely unique and entertaining, and I enjoyed this story, too. It is unique." That's true. Yeah. Yeah. Uh VP says, "Very romantisy. I really loved Crow so much. He's been the most romantic uh MMC so far of the series, and you can feel his love for Veronica. There are no laughs in this book, but the first 45% is dark and romantic, very fairy tale with curses, auras, and witches. And the second part that turns it's the second part that turns it into erotica. Very different and with a small amount of spanking, and you will have to read it to learn about the eggs. Yes, you will. You'll just listen to this and then decide if you can do it. Yeah. And then Brandy says, "Five star, short and so dang hot." Well, I came for the monster smut and stayed for the surprising sweetness. This was a short and sexy read, and I was surprised by the tenderness that Crow exhibited towards Veronica. Sweet moments aside, this was definitely as hot as I had hoped it would be. This is my first book by Ila, but I'm definitely going to have to check out the rest of her books. There you go. You will love them. Something for everyone, guys. It's beautiful. It's beautiful time we live in. Yes. Okay, so I think that pretty much wraps up Crow. So, our Croy Crow read. Yep. So, should we move on to House of Beating Wings? Let's do it, guys. House of Beating Wings. We're going to start off with our spoiler-free one-s sentence star review spice rating and if we'd recommend it. So, if you want to stick around for a moment, if you're thinking about reading this one, um, but you don't want to get spoiled, we'll give you a warning after, you know, when we're ready to talk about all the spoilers. So, Liz, what did you rate House of Beating Wings? I rated it a four star. And I do want to also say too before we get into it. So we were doing as I said at the beginning a variety. So two. So the first one was um cringey. This one is just very popular romantic. So something we would normally cover. We wanted to be able to give you guys kind of like an overview of both options. And so I rated this one a four stars. This was a very solid romanty read. I feel like I fully enjoyed it from start to finish. It was very entertaining. It was fast-paced. You know, the um the world that was built was really, really interesting, and I liked that we were getting set up really well for book two. Um like you said before, there's at least three in this series. So, um I just feel like it was a really solid book one, and honestly, it was a little bit it was actually more entertaining, I feel like, than a lot of book ones sometimes are in fantasy series. So, yeah. Yeah, four stars for sure. Um, and then I gave it a one spice because there was just a teeny tiny little semi-spice scene. Yeah. And that's it. Yep. Mhm. So, very different than And would you recommend it so far? Yeah, for sure. I would definitely recommend it. Yeah. Um, if you like romanty? Yeah, it's got some big potential for sure. I Yeah, I'm loving it. What about you? Yeah. So, House of Beating Wings by Olivia Wildenstein, you know, is a part of kind of like a high fantasy series because it's multibooks at this point, but more romanty style because you do have that romance theme that's going on throughout different love interests and stuff. So, way different, a little bit of a whiplash from Crow. You have, you know, much more of a deeper element going on and minimal spice. So, there you go. My star rating is gonna be a four star as well. So, all the same things, you know, I'm loving it so far. I see the potential there. It's not a five star because it's not like earthshattering and I'm going to lose sleep over it in a good way. It's just like this is a good fantasy book. It has all the things that I like. I'm enjoying the ride and I can't wait to see where it flies me to. Where it flies me to. Yeah, I agree. It wasn't life-changing, so that's why it didn't get a five star, but I could see how maybe book two might end up being a five star. You know what I mean? Oh yeah. As far as Crow is involved, you know, it's a crow shifter. So, and you know, if you're worried after hearing what Crow was about, it's not as unhinged whatsoever. So, Oh, no, no, no, no. So, you know, they're very they're two different things. Yeah. Yeah. Opposite complete opposite ends of the spectrum, but we wanted to give you guys like a good overview of like what's out there if crows are your thing. You know what I mean? There's such a Well, if you want to find out if they are variety. Yeah. Um, so yeah, and we'll rate the crow for this crow as well once we get there. Okay. So, should we get into our five sentence spoiler section ca spoilers coming. So, if we got you hooked and you want to read this one, save it to your playlist. Watch it later. Yes. Here we go. All right. House of beating wings. Fallon Rossi is the bastard halfling child of a disgraced royal fa woman who slept with a human man of mysterious origin. Supposedly, she is treated as less than and the kingdom she lives in. But the crown prince Dante openly favors her and protects her from punishment when it's discovered that she has a special connection with animals, but specifically the sea serpents that the fay rival with. Ooh, that was a weird one. That's just like a baby in a fulls size. Weird. Okay. One what? This isn't distracting at all. Definitely not. Uh, one day Fallon travels to the decrepit human island to meet with a mysterious and disfigured peasant woman named Bronnwin, who turns out to be a seer that explains to Fallon that she is the chosen one who must find the five Iron Crows and set them free in order to become a queen. Later, it is revealed that Fallon is the only one able to free the five crows because of her immunity to iron and obsidian, stemming from the fact that she is actually the last of her line. Half crow, half shabin, a fact that has intentionally been kept from her like her bound powers. Oo, sorry. Say one, two. I had to refresh. Okay, there you go. I'll do whatever one. Two. Good. Two. Fallon finds the first crow in her friend's parents' house, their royals, and sets Morgot free. The first crow who helps her to find the others and who she discovers later is actually Lurcin, the king of the crows and the sky king. Ooh. Ah, beautiful. Solid. Mhm. Three. Three. During the scavenger hunt to find all five of the crows that make Lurin whole and bring him to his full power, Dante and his henchmen hunt them down. And it's revealed that he is working with Lore and using Fallon to usurp his brother Marco in order to steal his throne in exchange for several parts of his kingdom. I didn't know they made those noises, but hey. Hey, learn learning something new about crows every I don't want to know anymore. I don't know anymore. I know too much. I know too much. I'm good. Okay. Um, Lore kills Marco in the final battle during which they retrieve the last crow, restoring Laura fully and freeing his people. Dante leaves with his henchmen to start ruling his newly acquired kingdom. And Fallon is taken to the sky kingdom by Lurcin, who she wants nothing to do with because he kept her true lineage from her, but who tells her that their story is just beginning. Satisfying. They're all flying. Five. What a great way to end the summaries for today. Beautiful. Well done. Well done. Yeah. Well done on your part, too. I did not see that coming. I didn't know we were going to do crows today. Even though that makes perfect. I got to figure it out. Yep. If there's a theme, there's a way. That's what I always say. I'll do it. Okay. Well, Liz, tell me. Tell us, tell everyone what's something that you liked about House of Beating Wings. I liked a lot about this book, but I would say that probably my favorite part was the fact that our FMC Fallon, we don't really know what her we don't know a lot about her character yet as far as her p we don't know her powers. We kind of think we know her lineage, but we aren't exactly sure. Um because we do find out that she's a changeling, which I did not include in the five sentence summary because we're not really sure what that means yet, but we shall see. Um I just like the fact that yeah, she can communicate on some level with animals. We're not really sure why. I kind of called it in the fable chat at the very beginning where I was like she has to be somehow related to the the only queendom which is the island of Shab which we find out um her mother was from. Um and I don't know if that means that all of them can kind of like communicate and understand on some level you know animals or what but I did appreciate it. I did like that. Yeah was cool. Mhm. Yeah. What about you? I think my favorite part I do love the serpents, you know? I do. Um the crows I feel like we're just kind of getting a taste of right now, but cuz I kind of thought I'll be honest, I don't I go into a lot of these things blind, but I was like, okay, kind of a crow statue scavenger hunt. It's kind of weird. Like I want some like crow shifter craziness. Oh yeah, we're f we are getting it now. Um so I'm excited to see where that goes. But I definitely loved the serpents and you know the magical mythical being element. uh the magic system that we're starting to get introduced. We don't fully understand all of it yet, but I like the building that we're getting. I like the um character development, the growth that she's having, and um the unraveling of like family lineage is always really interesting to me. So, I'm excited to see where else that goes. I've already bought the second book and have it on the way, so I'm excited to read that whenever I have time. Good luck. Um, well, we should also mention too that I know both of us did Kindle, but then we also did audio and I liked the audio. I thought that it was good. It was good. Yeah, it was good. I am glad I started with reading it physically. If I had more I was I was trying to do it. I tried to do the whole thing and there just was no way. sometimes fantasy like I need to physically be reading it before I can get into the world. So, I am glad I did it that way. Um, but then I got the audio. I was like, "Oh, well, I'm gonna have to listen to the rest." Especially if the male voice comes up later more, too, cuz the male voice was topnotch. Yeah, he was good. I feel like both of their voices were really good and exactly like kind of how I like and like would have heard them in my head, you know? Yeah. So, totally very good. Mhm. Yeah. Yeah. Um, what was something that you didn't like? Like what was the most dislike like part of this book? H, you know, she's a little immature, but she's supposed to be, so I'm not that's like the only thing I could really think of, you know. Um, I everything it's hard cuz everything was intentional. like, you know, her pining over Dante is annoying, but that's that's what you do in a small town, you know, and he's a prince, but he's like literally the prince, so it makes sense. I mean, literally her losing the virginity to the prince, and he's so gross about it. He's not gross about it, but it was so, hey, not good for her, that's for sure. And it's yeah so that you know it's it was hard to to read that but hey relatable you know not necessarily for me but like in generally speaking it's relatable for a lot of people. So it was well I think it's like he's what probably 20 years old and a prince and so you know yeah it went down how you'd imagine it would. Yeah. Yeah. It wasn't underwhelming. Nothing Yeah. romantic is you know what the author did a great job writing that out. I will say because it has a representation there because a lot of the fantasy that we read you know it's not for and you know the girls it's their first time you're it's very romanticized and everything so this is a different I feel like people can be seen that read this you know it's like oh yeah you have all these hopes you know she's been pining for him and allegedly for each other since they were little you know since they were youngans and uh it didn't live up to the hype and so she's having to deal with that like oh Now I feel weird about this. What do I do? Yeah. You know, so Well, I feel like I mean that was definitely my least favorite part cuz I feel like this book didn't really have anything that particularly bothered me. So that was good. I feel like Yeah, like you said, everything was like pretty intentional. I feel like the writing was good. Like everything made sense. Like I wasn't confused by anything. Um but I think the part that did get me was just like how naive she's being specifically about the situation with Dante. And like I think I even texted you. I was like, "When are we gonna find out that Dante's just a little piece of crap like we know he's gonna be?" You know, because it's like she just puts him on such a high pedestal. Like no, he you know, he loves me. I'm different. It's like no girl, like he's going to use you and then he's going to marry another royal, which is what they do because he has to. I'm not even saying that it's necessarily his fault. It's just like that's how royalty works. like you're being so naive and thinking, well, it's his fault to lead her on though, you know? Well, yeah, but I don't know. It's kind of like one of those things where like, yeah, he shouldn't be leading her on, but he's also a prince. It's like, what do princes and kings do? They're going to get what they want regardless, you know? Yeah. And so I it bothered me that I was like, snap out of it. Like, he's not that great. And like, yeah. Then they sleep together and he's still not that great. I'm like, okay. Um, so yeah, but you know, she kind of needed that to see for the illusion to finally drop. Just like, oh, he's sucks at this. Well, yeah, but I don't even think the illusion of him dropped for her until she found out that he was plotting to usurp his brother and was actually kind of a crappy person. Yeah. You know, and then I think the facade really came down and she was like, "Oh, like this is like political subtrifuge. Like I had no idea that you were this person." Yeah. And then he tries to flip it around on her. I never liked Dante, first of all. No, no, no, no. I always figured he's just a player. Like, come on. Yeah. Yeah. But then he tries to flip it around on her. Oh, you weren't the girl that I thought you were. She's like, are you kidding me right now? Like, I've been doing what I have to do to survive and you just are like suck now. You know what I mean? It's like, come on. Yeah. So, that's what I didn't like. But I mean, I think that's intentional from the author, too, you know? So, yeah. Exactly. So, interestingly enough, how was the plot versus smut ratio in this book? I mean, I still think for book one, it's good for what we're working with. I wouldn't have added any and I would I wouldn't have taken any away cuz it was all the way it needed to be. I mean, for her sake, I would have wanted her to smash Antonio, but you know, you know, I can't I I'm I'm excited for her to be with a lover who can be good to her, you know, and find out what the fuss is all about, right? There's just nothing quite as satisfying as having this like virginal girl, right, character who is like pining after this prince, sleeps with the prince, find out he doesn't know what the heck he's doing, right? Just knowing that like now she's on this trajectory and I mean I'm speculating but we've read enough books, right, to where it's like she's now on this trajectory to basically end up with the sky king. Sky Daddy. Sky Daddy who's like literally a crow shifter shadow daddy with all these powers. I'm like, girl, you're gonna have such a good time. I'm so happy for you. Yeah, right. I'm I was sad for you in the beginning, but I'm going to be so happy for you later. Can't have the sweet without the sour. Hey, I know. I mean, she got a she got a taste. He gave her a little midnight massage back massage rub down and she thought it was a dream, but it was his shadow daddy hands. Yeah, that's what that was. There we go. So, that's a good time. Um, so yeah, I would say the the the ratio was good for me. I usually prefer a little bit more spice in my romanty books, but it didn't bother me here because it's all I mean, literally, we're on a scavenger hunt to collect all five pieces basically of your future book boyfriend, right? So, it's like he had to have all of his parts before we can move forward. And that's what that this book was about. So, I was okay with it. Yeah. Yeah. Uh, yeah. We don't need any like beak action, you know? We're waiting until he can form a a man version of himself. Um, so that being said, it's time for Rate the Crow part two. Time for Rate the Crow part two. With what we know right now of Lurin, the Sky King, which isn't a whole lot. Yeah. How would you rate The Crow? Vibes so far are gonna go with four. Yeah. Yeah. We have potential to go either way. Yeah. Same. I would rate him four because so far it's like we get just enough um like we were saying, enough Shadow Daddy vibes. We get enough um you know, there's some snarky banter, but he's he's also you can tell he's old timey, right? Like you can tell he's old. He's been around a long time. Um, so he kind of talks a little bit more, you know, proper and um, like royalty, which I like. So, yeah, right now he'd be a solid four. Hopefully in book two we can bump the rate the crow up to a five star. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And I do love the concept of how like each one of the crows comes together to form like one super crow. Yeah. I mean, there's no better way to say that. It sounds ridiculous, but it's actually really cool concept. It's like all of us, guys. It's all of you listening and it's us. We're just a bunch of crows coming together to make one super crow. The book world by storm. Yeah. It's like one of his crows allows him to mind speak, right? And then like another one of his crows allows him to control the weather. And like it's just it's cool that they each have different powers and that he was separated into five so that it would be what like harder for someone to kill him basically permanently, right? Yeah. Um and she even said that she's like why didn't you separate yourself into like 20 crows? That would be even harder to kill. I was like that makes sense. Um but I did really like that aspect of his character. I thought it was very unique. It was cool. Yeah. Mhm. So, do you have any high or low reviews of House of Beating Wings that you'd like to share with the group? I do. House of Beating Wings at Goodreads. There are so far not not a lot of reviews. 4,500 roughly, more or less. Um, 4.07 stars for this one. Okay. I have to say when I was perusing these originally, I know that people were really annoyed by the female main character and her um naivity, especially regarding Dante and her constant pining. So, I had that in my head going into it, but I felt like it wasn't too much. Like, I felt like it made sense to me. It wasn't like obnoxiously. It can be. I don't know. I just I thought the pacing of it was fine with her. It was very Yes, it's juvenile, but it's intentional. Does that make sense? You know, and once she like once they did the deed, she sp started to become disillusioned. Yeah. She was still holding on to that hope as you do at that age, I think. And then the more and more she really fully got to know him, it was dissolving. So, it's not like by the end she's like, "But I love Dante." You know, I don't feel like she's still doing that. So, um, so there you go. A lot of DNFERS in the one stars. Like literally at 5%. It's like it's 5%, guys. Don't review it. Yeah. You know, which is crazy cuz I was hooked right at the beginning. I was like, "Oh, Seaurppent's cool." I liked it. You know, it was great. Okay. One star. Not good. Not good at all. Dislikable characters, incredibly confusing world building, incredibly confusing and convoluted plot. Names, places were so confusing. And there were a lot. There are a lot of names and places. There is a glossery at the beginning, especially cuz they have different words. Was very useful. I looked over it and probably forgot everything. No, it did. It did help cuz it was like talking about even like the way they say grandma and stuff would be, you know, different. So, I knew that going into it that there would be some replacement words that I could just use context clues to figure out. And I mean I feel like by compared to some of the other fantasies that we read, I didn't find this world building confusing. Incredibly difficult. So I get confused when the names are all too similar. Oh, personally, you know, uh so that someone says, "This book was something. When I first opened it, noticed a little dictionary at the front as we just talked about with words and phrases and presumably a fictional language used in the book. At first, I was encouraged at the detail. Then I was disheartened when I realized it was literally just barely modified Italian. I did think it was a little Italian, but I don't know. It was It definitely was. It just was Italian. Just straight up. Um I don't know cuz I speak Italian, but I would just say similar. Yeah. Yeah. I'd be interested to know if the author is um so many did not finish. So, hey. Okay. Here we go. I went into this blind and wasn't sure where the story was going. So, the first few chapters were a bit rough for me, but once the story picked up, I couldn't put it down. I'm so excited to read the next one. I'm a sucker for men with Phantom Wings. Hey, this shouldn't be in the one star category. Wanda, one star. That's one star. Loved it. Okay, nobody there's a bunch of comments on it. Oh, one star is really throwing me off here. Fix your thing. Okay, so let's just keep talking about five stars cuz sorry Rhonda put it in the wrong one. Uh but yeah, overall the one stars, that's what the complaints were. Um, a lot of people DNFed it because they didn't like the character, but it's like, give her a second. She's figuring it out. Yeah. So, five star, exquisite, simply the best, wonderful, amazing, all the things. In terms of world building, this book is top-notch and maybe the author's best so far. Love everything Fay and almost every book has to do with Fay, but add in some shifters and we have a recipe to die for. Fallon's story took a bit uh to build up to, but once it got started for me, when the kissing started, things moved along rather quickly, and I enjoyed all the characters and Fallon's humor. Yeah. Um I got to say I did like that um the hi were kind of dicks. I didn't like it, but like I liked a different take on it, you know, and they're they're trashing humans the whole time and halflings. So, it'll be interesting to see where that all goes as well. I'm just curious to meet all these like different types of I don't know, fantasy creatures and like how they all blend. And obviously, there's some political undertones in there about treatment of different beings. So, yeah. Yeah. Reminded me a lot of Spark of Everflame at times, I feel. Yeah. Um, totally. I'm, like I said before, I'm interested to go to the Queendom to good old Shab and see what's been going on over there. Yeah, because I have a feeling some cool stuff's going on. Yeah, there's lots of propaganda that she's having to unravel. Yeah, we love that. We love some unraveling of the props. The propose props. Yep. Okay, so let's just wrap up with some general croions. Okay. So, do you understand why crows are a micro trope? Yeah. Something for everyone. Why not? Yeah. Why not crows? Yeah. Why not crows? Exactly. We got dragons, lions, tigers, and bears. Oh my. Why not crows? Why? Add to the mix. Yeah. Yeah. I think that, you know, with any monster romance though, if that's what you want to call it, there needs to be like a balance. Mhm. I feel like this is like a good balance, right? Where it's like, yeah, he shifts into a crow, but we're assuming he also probably will have a fairly nice looking human form as well. Yeah. Um, so yes, I do understand why crows are a microbe. Um, are you I mean, Rowan Rowan's a bird, so that's He's not a crow, but it's close enough. A hawk. Yeah. Close enough. Close enough. It's been a while since we were doing the puns in this episode, so I got to bring them back. Yeah. Uh, are you into crows now? Not specifically. I mean, well, okay. Like, as like a general funniness for a podcast, very obviously. So, I mean, we have a whole merch line now covered in crows and crows with microphones. They're so cute. I've always loved crows as an animal. They always have a special place in my heart. I'm glad they're getting their moment to shine. I'm glad books are incorporating them. I'm not into it as far as like a smasher pass type of vibe, but I'm happy to be here. What about you? Uh, yeah, same. I would say I'm not into Crows now in a Smash kind of way cuz the beak thing just doesn't do it for me. The tongue thing doesn't do it for me. Um, I'm I'm into your good old uh run-of-the-mill crow shifter shadow daddy. Yeah, that's what I like. Um, so in that way, I guess. Sure. Yeah. The pro personality. Great. Yeah. Great. Shiny things. Great. Awesome. Yeah. Attacking your evil, I don't know, boyfriend. Great. Great. Yeah. All things we love. So, will you read another in the crow genre in general? Why or why not? And I mean, it sounds like you will because I think we've both already picked up the sequel to House of Beating Wings. Yeah. So, this one specifically, yes. But is it make or break for the Crows? Not necessarily. It's the story for me. So, will I seek out other crow books? Not particularly, unless we, you know, if you guys want us to do more next year for Crowber, if you want this to be an annual thing, cuz September it's like, hey, what who now? Like, we want to get spooky vibes, but it's still hot outside. Like, this is a good in between. So, let us know. Are there other crow books that you guys really like? I mean, this one got House of Beauty wings got recommended to us a lot. Um, so there's definitely that one, but if there are any others, please let us know because yeah, maybe we'll stick them in our back pocket for next uh year when we decide to cover see what we're covering for the fall. Um, but yeah, I mean, I'm definitely going to read the sequels to this book for sure. Would I seek out Crowsmmet specifically? I don't think so. Yeah, they kind of she kind of ruined it for you, didn't she? Yeah, I think so. Um, if it came across my desk, I wouldn't I wouldn't just throw it into the trash can depending on what like it's about, but I think that I'm more into the crow thing when it is part of like an overall magic system and is a little bit more complex like in a romanty as opposed to just Yeah. bang banging a crow. Yeah, because the crow shifting is useful. Like he's gonna go you like, "Okay, I'm gonna be a crow because I'm like checking out some stuff, you know?" Yeah. I gotta It's like I gotta fly some places. I gotta scope out some things like Yeah. Very stealthy. Yeah. Yeah. Mhm. It's great. Yep. Sounds good. I feel good about that. Yeah. Me, too. So, all right. So, we we're wrapping up Crowber uh episode one. I'm like, I don't even know what I'm saying anymore. Um with a smasher pass. So, I did my best to find a bird smasher pass and couldn't really find one that I liked. So, I just found an animal instead. Oh, wow. I'm surprised. I got a good one for you. So, okay. So, why don't you go first then? Well, I have a crow theme. So, Oh, you have a specific crow theme? Yeah. This crow timber, baby. Come on, catch up. I just I just picked a a So, it sticks with the monster romance theme. That's what That's okay. So, I don't think that we've done him before, but Randall from Monsters, Inc. Oh, pass. He's this guy. Yeah, it's a hard pass for all the reasons, including it's Steve Bushi that does his voice. So, that's a pass for me. Yep. What about you? Same. But guys, I mean, too many arms also and scales. Arms. Yeah. Some people and his eyes don't like him. Yeah. Hey. Okay. Yep. After reading Crow, there is something for everyone. And I'm sure Okay. Crow or Randall? There. Pick. You have to pick one.[Laughter] I don't want to. I probably honestly would pick Randall. Yeah. Yeah. I can't risk those eggs. I can't do it. I can't do it. Yep. Nowhere in my body, please. No, thank you. Absolutely not. Absolutely not. What do you have? Well, I there was a lot of crows that I thought of, so I had to do an F, Mary, kill. Okay. Oh my god, I couldn't think of any crows and you're like, I have at least three. Yeah. Mhm. Okay. All right. Narrow it down. Okay. Cool. Okay. So, you have to f marry or kill these of three. Okay. These crows of three. Let it be. The OG the crow. So, the original one. Okay. You need to look these up. You may. No. Okay. I know who the new scars guard crow the scars. It's a crow guard. Scarsgard. Crow guard. Crow guard. Um or sounds like a medicine crow or like a a patch you put on when you hurt yourself. Crow guard. Or Moira from Shitz Creek as the crow. I love that so much. I was really proud of that one. Not going to lie. I thought of it in the shower. It's like the crows have eyes. The crows have eyes. I love that so much. I didn't even think about that. That's funny. Okay, so f Mary kill. Yeah. Okay, so I'm effing the crows guard obviously. Yeah. Um I'm going to marry Moira. Mhm. From Shitz Creek because I freaking love her. She's my favorite. Um and then I'm going to kill the old crow. I don't even remember who played him. It's been so long since I've seen that. Um yeah, that's my solid answer. Locking it in. What about you? Same answer. Same answer. Easy. What a time to be alive. Great. Did you see that at one of the recent BookCons? I'm so mad we weren't there. Um they had a crow ball of some sort. I'm like, "Hey, where's our invite? We're all about crows over here." I did. I would have dressed as her, you know? I would have dressed as that. That would have been great. That's hilarious. Snoozy lose. All right, guys. as well. If you want us to read more Crow things, let us know. Check out our Crow merch. It's exciting times. I think that crow merch I like so much about it. But, you know, we've been wearing it, using it, loving it. Um, but, you know, it's not too much crow. It's just enough. You got our logo and the little crows. It's not too It's not overwhelming. Yeah. But, I'm really happy with it. I hope you guys check it out. Make sure to like, follow, and subscribe anywhere you like to listen your podcast, including YouTube and Instagram and Tik Tok. Bessies and the Books podcast everywhere and fable at besties and the Book Club. Thank you so much for sticking around to this very unhinged, weird, random episode, if you will. Yeah, we had a great time. It was fun. All right. Yeah. All right, you guys. We'll see you. See you next Tuesday. Next Tuesday. Bye. Bye.[Music]