I feel validated for loving mcgilchrist's master+emissary now. Haven't read HDM in a looong time now, but it was formative for me, especially the bittersweet en

I feel validated for loving mcgilchrist's master+emissary now. Haven't read HDM in a looong time now, but it was formative for me, especially the bittersweet ending. The symbols and talismans captivated me. Looking back, it's still masterful how it hangs together. As YA fiction, it has to be about blossoming sexuality. Monkey as id, relationship with animal as childhood-level affection, catholic repression in the first book (literally locking the animals away), then fighting god, overthrowing the authority figure to move into a mature understanding of love. The knife and universes as a metaphor for decision-making and branching lives (literally named Will). Plus the ending dovetails wonderfully into the actual lived experience of the author, who spent all that time building a fantasy and has to let it go. And I love the concept of the aliens in the last book, that use coconuts as wheels and travel on natural highways.