it's literally read like a spellbook because the syntax consists of all natural language, and newlines are optional. your code can now be an essay, like everybody wants!
for example, if you want to print something, you'd write: `begin the grimoire. inscribe whispers of "hello, world!". close the grimoire.`
it has variables, dynamic typing, arrays, functions, conditionals, loops, string manipulation, array manipulation, type conversion, and user input, among other (listed in the docs!)
but why? i wanted to see how far you could push natural language syntax while still being parseable. most esolangs are intentionally obtuse (BF, Malbolge), but i wanted something that's weird but readable, like you're reading instructions from a spellbook, which makes it incredibly easy to read and understand. like an anti-esolang? hmm...
github: https://github.com/sirbread/spellscript
docs: https://github.com/sirbread/spellscript/blob/main/resources/...
I think you should read some actual grimoires before developing this further. I suggest the Picatrix or the PGM as starting points. Maybe a copy of 777 as well.
Besides "Please don't sneer, including at the rest of the community." (https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html), this guideline is relevant:
"Please respond to the strongest plausible interpretation of what someone says, not a weaker one that's easier to criticize. Assume good faith."
I doubt that egypturnash intended a "snarky nit". More likely this is someone who's passionate about the underlying topic (grimoires!), naturally got excited when seeing the OP, and then was disappointed when it didn't go as deep as someone with their level of knowledge would expect.
It's bad, of course, to express that by putting down the OP or their work; much better to respond by sharing some of what one knows, as I explained at https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45561740.