Trope: If You Love Them, Set Them Free

  • Witchcraft for Wayward Girls

    Witchcraft for Wayward Girls

    They call them wayward girls. Loose girls. Girls who grew up too fast. And they’re sent to the Wellwood Home in St. Augustine, Florida, where unwed mothers are hidden by their families to have their babies in secret, give them up for adoption, and most important of all, to forget any of it ever happened.

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  • We Speak Through the Mountain

    We Speak Through the Mountain

    The enlivening follow-up to the award-winning sensation The Annual Migration of Clouds Traveling alone through the climate-crisis-ravaged wilds of Alberta’s Rocky Mountains, 19-year-old Reid Graham battles the elements and her lifelong chronic illness to reach the utopia of Howse University. But life in one of the storied “domes” ― the last remnants of pre-collapse society

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  • The Apothecary Diaries Season 2

    The Apothecary Diaries Season 2

    , , , ,

    As per usual, I LOVE Apothecary Diaries. Maomao is the aroace KING we all deserve. I love that Jinshi is 100% a doting husband on her autistic ass. The mysteries up the stakes and Maomao gets involved in a national fucking incident while just doing her thing. In between the beginning and National Fucking Incident,

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  • Don’t Hold Back, Lord Hades! Vol. 1

    Don’t Hold Back, Lord Hades! Vol. 1

    In the Realm of the Gods, new goddess Persephone spends her days tending to her fields of flowers. Every new sprout comes at the cost of an old one withering and dying—which is how she meets the handsome but taciturn Hades, who visits to collect the dead. Persephone grieves for the death of her beloved

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  • Cutie & the Beast

    Cutie & the Beast

    Unlike her friends who are into pretty boys, Momoka has a crush on a giant professional wrestler named Kuga who plays a villainous heel on TV. But in real life, Kuga is a big softie, and he really appreciates her fan mail! In this lighthearted romantic comedy, a little TV crush for a very big

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  • The Hitman Stans Vol. 2

    The Hitman Stans Vol. 2

    The best hitman of the underworld, Owaru Endou, leads a dark and secretive life, constantly bathing in the blood of his targets. However, his life takes a brighter turn when he becomes a fan of Kaori “Kaorin” Minaboshi, an underground idol from Rosaceae whose concerts Owaru always attends. Feeling that his hands and dirty money

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  • No Longer Allowed in Another World Vol. 3-9

    No Longer Allowed in Another World Vol. 3-9

    ISEKAI’D BY: Truck-Kun! (this entry does not add to the total) I ended up reading all the volumes I had in a row. I enjoyed the comedy, meeting the fucked up fallen angels— and then found that there’s rewriting powers, so things get reset, except they don’t, and also Sacchan is kinda an asshole. I

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  • Tantrum

    Tantrum

    this book left me paralyzed. it’s about generational trauma passed from mother to daughter, abuse that takes the form of “taming” and reliance. the beginning of the book seems grounded in reality and the discussions of feminine rage. of feeling underappreciated and overworked and having more problems on top of that. the deep boiling anger

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  • The One and Only Crystal Druid

    The One and Only Crystal Druid

    Ten years ago, I risked everything on a nameless boy. I came out the other side with a murder conviction, a prison sentence, and a minor case of amnesia. I forgot everything about that boy, and now I’m out on parole, just a nobody witch volunteering at an animal rescue and keeping a low profile.

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Welcome to the Menagerie.

Here is where M logs their media activity. Partly because Goodreads is forgettable and keeping physical logs is harder. Sometimes M writes a lot. Sometimes M doesn’t write enough. It doesn’t matter. This is just a for-fun little blog so that M can remember what they thought about whatever they watched or read or played or. Whatever.


What is M?

I read. Voraciously. I have subscriptions to those book things on digital retailers. I consume books at nearly all hours. The hours I don’t spend reading? I’m writing. I’m drawing. I have a problem. I have a problem in that I love to read things that are in the same vein repeatedly. Book journals don’t work and as much as I text my friends screenshots of book passages, it doesn’t scratch the itch. Now I’m going to be doing… tiny… tiny book reports.


Truck-Kun Kill Count:


Books & Light Novels Read in 2025: 19/50
38%
Comics Read in 2026: 39/200
19%
Physical Owned Books Read: 477/830
58%


Menagerie Categories


Tagged in the Menagerie

Absolute Asshole NPC (86) A Fetish For Suffering (45) Can't Say No (67) Chekov's Gun (42) Childhood Friends (50) Curiosity Fucks You Up (76) Cursed (58) Damsel in Distress (57) Damsel in Distress (subverted) (85) Dangerous Reputation (85) Doting Husband (64) Double Identity (41) Everyone Loves MC (87) Evil Eyes & Big Heart (49) Fan Service (92) Grumpy x Sunshine (52) Hypercompetent MC (72) If You Love Them, Set Them Free (49) I Know a Guy (46) Last Minute Hero (97) Loss of Humanity (50) Main Character Coloring (69) MC's Skewed Metrics (71) Mean Boy (118) Mean Boy Love Interest (47) Modern Morals (45) Nat 20s (89) Not Actually Dead (74) Nuclear Revenge (68) OP Protag (91) Petty Revenge (44) Power of Friendship (73) Power of Love (68) Self-Sacrifice (67) Shock Value (44) Sympathetic Evil (63) The Moral is Community (60) Tragic Backstory (76) Twist! (55) Uniquely Skilled (87) Unreliable Narrator (53) Weird and Wacky On Purpose (74) Western-Style Fantasy (83) Wrong Place Wrong Time (64) Zero to Hero (77)


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