Let's Play "The Book Dating Game!"

I think we've all had this experience: You read a fantasy novel you love, but when you go search for a book with the same feel to it, the two of you just don't have that same chemistry. But hey, they say that getting set up through friends is a great way to make a book-love connection, so let's see if the Inkpot Hivemind can do just that.

Just put your "what I'm looking for" request in the comments and we'll try to fix you up with the perfect book. Then chime in with your own book-dating recommendations.

Ready? I'll go first. Here's what I'm looking for in the perfect book:

-A story set in a somewhat realistic past with touches of magic and a bit of a fairy tale feel. Some of my favorites include Magic Under Glass and Sorcery and Cecelia.

Okay, it's your turn. Let the book matchmaking begin!

Interview with Anne Nesbet, on writing a BOX OF GARGOYLES

First - wow!! You wrote a book about my three favorite things - chocolate croissants, gargoyles and Paris!

Thank you :)


Anne Nesbet

Q: Seriously, I love that the book starts with a BANG - really not a spoiler unless you haven't read the first word, but I was so intrigued by what happens next and the whole consciousness of the stone becoming self aware. It's such an unusual creative idea I wonder how it came to you?

A: The first few chapters of A BOX OF GARGOYLES were written and rewritten about three thousand times! Sequels are hard, especially when you really, really want the sequel also to be able to stand alone in a pinch. I kept experimenting (let's have Valko be the main character this time! let's start with a really long recap in the narrator's voice!), and my editor, Rosemary Brosnan, who is the best kind of loving perfectionist, kept sending me messages that basically amounted to "try again, please, dear."  Finally I was brainstorming on the telephone with her, and in total desperation I said something like, "Oh, forget all this--I'll do the beginning from the point of view of the WALL!" And Rosemary said, "Wait, YES!" So that's how the opening was born.

Q:  I haven't read the first book *blushes* but this really stands alone well. Did you conceive this as a separate story? Will there be more?

A:  I wanted this book to be something you could read and enjoy without having THE CABINET OF EARTHS in mind very clearly, if at all. So it makes me very happy to hear you didn't feel too lost or confused!  My model for sequels-that-stand-alone is probably Madeleine L'Engle's A WIND IN THE DOOR, which can absolutely be read by someone who somehow missed A WRINKLE IN TIME, though knowing the first book deepens a person's experience of the second book.

As to whether there will be more--who can say? My third book is not about Maya and Valko, though it continues to play with the ways science and magic collide. I do have a rough outline of a third book about Maya's family hidden away in a notebook in a secret drawer, though. So perhaps I will come back to these characters again someday.

Q: This is a really interesting exploration of fate, wiggle room and free choice. Where do you stand on fate versus free will? And did you have to do much research on these philosophies?

A: The problem of fate and freedom is something my brain has been chewing on for years and years like a very hard biscuit. I remember talking about determinism and the Uncertainty Principle with my high school physics teacher. I think at that time I was very stubborn about free will being impossible (I have mellowed since then), and I remember Mr. MacDonald looking at me and saying, "Thanks, Anne, for ruining my whole day!" I think everything about the universe has become more mysterious since I was in high school, however.

But of course in our day-to-day (or fictional) lives, it isn't so much what happens on the quantum level that worries us. It's the problem of feeling trapped, and wanting to find some wiggle room within all the unwiggly things that bind us. Middle school, for instance! You have to get up at some awful early hour, make the bus or the carpool on time, turn in your homework, eat your prescribed lunch at a certain hour (I once had a job, by the way, where the hours were 7:36 to 4:18, with a 42 minute lunch: I kid you not), and all the while behave according to a thousand picky laws and rules--where's the room for free will there? So I think there is a natural bond of sympathy and solidarity between your average middle-school student and your average Greek tragic hero. Maya, who is trapped in a bind that's even worse than having to eat cafeteria food in 42 minutes, has to figure out where the wiggle-room is in the awful spell that has trapped her. And I think she is very ingenious and resourceful about how she goes about it!



This is Anne thinking about wiggle room - or some serious plot points at least!

Q: It really reads like you've been to Paris - maybe even lived there - did you? And if yes, where were your favorite haunts and if no - how did you create such a vivid version of Paris? This is from someone who used to be dragged there every year as a kid - so your kid's view of Paris really felt real to me!

A: Yes, I've lived in Paris. When I was little my father worked sometimes in a lab outside Paris, and so when I was seven and ten and thirteen I was dragged (like you!) to Paris, and sometimes plopped right into the local schools. That was so much fun that I've kept returning to France all my life, sometimes dragging my own children along, poor things. (But how many kids can say they have gone snowshoeing on the decks of the Eiffel Tower?) I have many favorite corners in Paris, and I keep discovering new ones, because Paris is astoundingly full of magical corners.

Here's one story about a magical corner: for A BOX OF GARGOYLES, I needed an apartment building on the other side of the Seine from the Eiffel Tower for a slightly crazy new character to live in. I was thousands of miles away from Paris when I was writing that chapter, so I just opened a map of Paris on my computer and plonked my finger down on the screen and said, "She'll live THERE!" So then when we were next in Paris, I naturally thought it would be interesting to go take a closer look at this building I had chosen. And guess what? When I looked at the buzzer by the side of the door, I found the family name of one of my main characters right there on the list! Look, look: I'm getting goosebumps all over again, just thinking about that . . . .

Okay, so now I have goosebumps too!



Little known fact - most writers I know love graveyards! The Fourcroy Tomb - yes, it's really there! These are Anne's photos taken at Pere Lachaise Cemetery, Paris.

Q: I love the violin scenes and the Dance Macabre - do you play and if so did you play like Pauline?
 A: I play violin and viola, which is like a larger violin. Many, many jokes are told about the viola and violists, so people who love the viola quickly develop either a sense of humor or a thick skin or both. And do I play like Pauline? Hey, what are you implying? Remember, she's bound to get tons better in another nine thousand hours!

HA! Sounds like me with a guitar!

Q: The Bulgarian aspect is very tightly woven into this tale, is that from your own cultural background or did it insist on being in there?

 A: It insisted! It absolutely insisted. Although I teach Russian literature (and Russian and Bulgarian are close cousins), I didn't know all that much about Bulgaria and Bulgarian mythology when I started writing these books.  I have always liked yogurt, though!

Q: I love the creepiness of so many scenes but especially the singing - no spoilers! Which made me wonder what are your favorite creepy movies, books or plays?

 A: Ooooh, sorry, but it's way too late at night right now for me to be talking creepy movies! If you're looking for creepy stories, though, Hans Christian Anderson would be happy to oblige. And Neil Gaiman's CORALINE does a lovely job of being creepy in a twenty-first-century sort of way.

Coraline is pretty creepy in the best kind of way!

Q: This story seems really bursting with sensory delights to me, taste, smells, touch, sounds and sights, all amplified. Did you have a sound track for this story or a stash of chocolate nibbles, or some other magical writing aid?

 A: My secret writing aids: good tea and long walks with the dog in the hills. And I am not averse to some dark chocolate, here and there. Not averse at all! But when I get really stuck, I eat something spicy to wake up my brain.

Interesting - I've never heard of that before!

And finally some quick fire questions...

What are you reading right now? 

A: Several things at once, of course! Dickens's THE OLD CURIOSITY SHOP, Catherynne Valente's THE GIRL WHO FELL BENEATH FAIRYLAND AND LED THE REVELS THERE, and--as soon as I can pry it out of my kids' hands--P.S. BE ELEVEN, by Rita Williams-Garcia.

What movie did you last see?

A: In a theater? François Ozon's IN THE HOUSE. It's a French movie about a teacher who gets a little carried away trying to turn his student into a good writer, and I saw it with my absolutely amazing father-in-law, because we always go to some wild foreign film together when I'm in town.

Croissant or Danish?

A: Croissant, of course.  With one exception: there's a bakery (Nabolom) in Berkeley with a blackberry cheese danish guaranteed to make even tired tastebuds stand up and dance. But otherwise: croissant, please!



Thank you so much Anne, it was a joy to read your book and an even greater joy to meet you! 
P.S. We are meeting up at Nabolom, right?

The School for Good and Evil-Interview with Soman Chainani

I have fallen madly in love with a book. From its stunning cover to each magic laden page inside, I’m just absolutely crazy about The School for Good and Evil. It even has the most epic trailer I’ve ever seen for a book! 

So how awesome is it that I get to present Soman Chainani, author extraordinaire, to the Inkpot, and also a chance to win a SIGNED hardcover of THE SCHOOL FOR GOOD AND EVIL! I admit that I’ve been quite shy around him. Soman is basically a genius. He is a Harvard summa cum laude and a graduate of the MFA Film Program at Columbia University where he walked away with the school’s top prize, the FMI Fellowship for Writing and Directing. See what I mean? He’s totally brilliant and he wrote this marvelous book I adore and admire so much. Kind of how I feel about J.K. Rowling is also how I feel about Soman. But how lucky am I that we have the same wonderful editor at HarperCollins, which meant I got to read an ARC early on and get my own personal introduction! And what I found was that this brilliant author is also a really nice, awesome guy. Even in the midst of preparing for his big 11-city tour and writing the screenplays for the movie adaptations of SGE as well as finishing up book 2, he still made time to stop by the Inkpot. So please welcome Soman!

(EO) - Hi Soman! Thanks for stopping by the Inkpot! You know how much I love your book. I pretty much twitter stalked you obsessively after reading it. And after reading SGE, I found myself running to the library and taking out all the Andrew Lang’s Fairy Books again, the ones that came in all the colors. I felt so nostalgic for them. Did you read those as a child?

(SC) – First off, let me say that long before we made contact, I’d heard so many wonderful things about you, as both a writer and a person, that I felt quite honored when you read my book, let alone enjoyed it. So it’s quite a privilege to be here at Enchanted Inkpot.

I feel quite ashamed to say I haven’t read Andrew Lang’s Fairy Books, even though I was deeply obsessed with fairies as a child. I used to make paper doll fairies out of tissue paper, slather them with glitter, and enact grand melodramas with them under the bed. My mother couldn’t understand how I could go through an entire box of tissues a day, but just learned to put up with it. I think she always did – and continues to – find me quite mysterious.

Your question brings up another funny story. When I was in England a few years ago pitching new project ideas, the studios over there kept demanding I do “something like ‘the Fairy Books’” because they were apparently a cash cow. I heard it about ten times before I trekked over to Foyle’s, the massive bookstore in Leicester Square, and discovered the Rainbow Magic Fairy Books… which look EXACTLY to me like Andrew Lang’s, now that you mention it. In fact, I can’t quite tell the difference between them. So like werewolves and vampires, it seems like fairies are constantly rebooted these days too. However, the fairies at the School for Good and Evil, as the trailer points out, are much trickier creatures. For one thing, I wouldn’t get too close to them. And second, I have boy fairies, which are non-existent in most fairy books. (Ludicrous!)

(EO) – Oh the Rainbow Magic Fairy Books ARE the same thing! Ok so, when I heard that you wrote your thesis at Harvard on why evil women make such irresistible fairy-tale villains, I immediately thought, now there’s a thesis that I want to read! So I have to ask you, who are these irresistible fairy tale villains to you and why?

(SC) - To me, I never understood why Disney used female villains so sparingly. In the 50 or so animated films they’ve made, only six or seven have wicked women – but these are the ones we love the most. Ursula, Maleficent, Cruela, the Wicked Queen… (not to mention the rather effeminate qualities of Scar and Jafar). What makes female villains so alluring is the fact that they cannot rely on brute strength. Instead they must deliciously manipulate – through subterfuge, seduction, and disguise. Only with the females do we really sense the attraction of Evil and the sheer charisma, cleverness, and force of personality it requires to vanquish Good.

(EO) – Yes, Malificent was always my favorite villain and really the only reason I liked the Sleeping Beauty film, to be honest. I do think that a great villain can make a story great. But in SGE, you muddied up your own thesis by playing around with the idea of good and evil! You have the classic battle of good versus evil, and yet nothing is as it seems. It’s like you took all our fairy tale notions and said “OK, let’s have some fun with this!” And then you literally let all hell break loose. I bow down to your genius, by the way. While the idea of playing with the fluidity of good and evil is not new, this is seriously fantastically original stuff. And it’s definitely more Brother’s Grimm than Disney. I love that! So what came first for you? The plot, the character, the world?

(SC) – It’s funny, I started writing THE SCHOOL FOR GOOD AND EVIL about six months before the fairy tale craze started happening in Hollywood and in publishing – and I remember asking myself the same questions everyone is asking now. Why do fairy tales matter so much? Why do we respond so deeply to them in every age? And I think the answer is that they feel like a Survival Guide to Life, no matter what age you are. They present such a clear-eyed view of the world, without Disneyfied happy endings or even the expectation of happy endings. At the end of the Grimms’ stories, kids often end up baked into pies, losing tongues, or being turned into birds, just for making poor decisions.

So with THE SCHOOL FOR GOOD AND EVIL, I wanted to start in that kind of world with true consequences – and where there is balance between Good or Evil (which is in fact the reality of our world today. Balance might even be called optimistic.) And I wanted to deal with the notion that Good has been winning everything… and what did that mean? Why does Good always win these days in stories? And is that what children really need to learn?

So just by starting with fundamental questions, I realized I could actually conceive a school around these principles. And so the book begins with the quite provocative idea that every child’s soul fundamentally skews towards Good or Evil, that each child is born the inclined to create… or to destroy.

(Which seems quite accurate to me, by the way. To play with this idea, I created the entrance exam to The School for Good and Evil on the book’s website, which tests what percentage of your soul is Good and what percentage of your soul is Evil. Over 10,000 people have taken it so far… and it’s pretty balanced between Evers, or those that skew Good, and Nevers, or those who skew Evil.)

To take the exam - go here. 

(EO) – Speaking about your main characters, I seriously adore Sophie and Agatha. I think you have accomplished so much in this brilliant novel, but what I love the most is how you literally had me switching my allegiance from Sophie to Agatha, back to Sophie, back to Agatha, and then the absolute best, most satisfying conclusion I could have ever hoped for! Can you tell us a little about how you came up with your two main characters? Who are they like? Who did you channel?

(SC) – This question makes me light up, precisely because one of my biggest goals in the novel was to keep the ground shifting under your feet. Disney films always open with the blond princess singing her big ‘I WANT’ song, where she speaks of her wish for true love, or a new mother, or a different life – and Sophie practically opens the novel the same way. So subconsciously, readers invest in her as the protagonist. It’s been fascinating to watch the reactions once Agatha is introduced and she and Sophie begin their fraught relationship. Certainly some readers are uncomfortable with shifting allegiances (they want their Good Good and their Evil Evil) – but I wanted to tell a story where you’re forced to judge the characters’ actions instead of investing in an abstract archetype.

As for who they’re like, it’s not a coincidence that the SGE Playlist that Amazon.com is hosting is littered with Madonna songs and videos. There’s a lot of Blond Ambition in Sophie. My family, meanwhile, would answer your question differently. When my brother was reading the book, he called me up and said “You know this Sophie girl… She’s the real you.” Though it’s a rather uncharitable assessment, I have to say that writing Sophie is the highlight of my day. She delivers monologues as if the whole world is listening and I relish the tightrope act of making her at once ludicrous and alluring. In fact, Sophie was born first – I heard her voice for weeks, bawdy, cooing, and warm. In time, Agatha’s began to answer her, throaty, brutish, and cold. I wanted to create the ultimate odd couple – the idea that they’re at once inverses of each other and yet can’t live without each other.  

(EO) – Also, I want to say off the bat that anyone trying to make any comparisons to another magical school for children couldn’t be more wrong! The School of Good and Evil and the fairy tale creatures that inhabit it is both a dreamland and a nightmare, on both sides! Its more Wonderland than Hogwarts because everything is so strange and wondrous and also quite terrifying. I kept wondering, what was Soman thinking when he came up with this?

(SC) – One of the strangest elements of writing a fantasy novel is that you have to abandon all control. I can’t even begin to tell you why the world looks like what it does. It’s just how it surfaces in my imagination as I write – and I try not to doubt it. But I remember looking at Iacopo Bruno’s mind-blowing full-color map that opens the hardcover edition – and having this moment where I had to admit to myself… This world doesn’t exist. It’s all in my head. It was a sad moment, actually.

I think the biggest relief so far is that no one has compared this book to Harry Potter at all. And you hit the nail on the head – I think the reason why is because in Rowling's series, we know who our protagonist is. We know what Good and Evil is -- and Hogwarts is a safe place of learning and good intentions, for the most part.

At the School for Good and Evil, all of that is destabilized. We have no idea who's Good. We have no idea who's Evil -- and we're not even sure which one is supposed to win. There's nothing even remotely safe about this world. You choose to attend Hogwarts. You're kidnapped to the School for Good and Evil.

(EO) – This next question is a bit of a spoiler so I'm going to change the font very light. If you want to read it, just highlight it. I do want to talk a little about one of my absolute favorite scenes of the book. Agatha has always thought she was ugly and she undergoes a makeover, or so she thinks, and believes she is beautiful. But in actuality, nothing physically had changed, except her confidence. To me, this was a powerful message. When you are always told you are ugly, you come to believe it. But when you are self-confident in your worth, than you are beautiful. This is such an important message and you captured it brilliantly.

(SC) – I remember in my notes for the outline, I had that she comes out of the Groom Room ‘changed.’ In my head, I always assumed she’d have a makeover. So when I wrote that scene, I started envisioning this physical transformation – and felt myself nauseous over it. I just couldn’t do it. Then I realized why I’d been so vague in the outline. My subconscious knew all along – this was the story of a girl who had discovered beauty from the inside out. But would audiences believe it? That was the difficult part. So I really had to dig in and make Agatha feel so deeply, so honestly that you put yourself in her shoes.

And honestly, I think her transformation is far more authentic than a Pygmalian makeover. I always thought of myself as a bit of an Agatha growing up and despised the way I looked. But I fought past it, accepted myself… and realized that the world just mirrors back how you feel about yourself. I had a line that I had to cut, but I’m sure will show up somewhere else: “Even the boys started smiling back at Agatha. Like monkeys, they reflected the face you gave them.”

(EO) – I completely agree with you and I thank you. There’s so much I want to talk about, and yet I can’t because it would be too spoilery. But I just want to tell everyone to please, please read this book and when you get to the gargoyle scene, you’ll know when you get there, please come back and comment here. Because it is the scene where I cried. I think you win the award for best gargoyle use in a fantasy book.

(SC) – That scene was never in the outline. I was in a hotel in Boston, having just finished this emotionally grueling tennis tournament and was writing Chapter 8, which just wasn’t going in the direction I wanted to. I remember fighting and fighting myself and then being too tired to fight… And the entire rooftop episode came spilling out: the wish fish, the stampede, the gargoyle… All in one go. I remember going to sleep that night thinking, “My god. Why am I trying to write this book consciously? Let go.” It was such an important lesson. Just let go and let the elves do their work. 

One of the things that I love about Phoebe Yeh, our mutual editor, is that she trusts an author’s intuition. She knows when I’m doubting myself and won’t have it. What’s so remarkable about her is that she’s 100% dedicated to making sure the book turns out the way the author wants it – so she’s constantly asking questions and probing to make sure each scene achieves the effect we want. In a way, she’s a bit like that mirror barrier on Halfway Bridge, constantly testing if we’re staying true to ourselves.

(EO) – Oh yes, I think we are so fortunate to have Phoebe and Jess and the fabulous Harper team! OK, I need to talk a little bit about the conclusion. There’s so much I want to say about it, and ask about it, but I can’t because it would spoil the book. But there’s just no words to express how much I loved it. And I wanted to thank you for the unexpected and yet perfect ending. Did you know how it would end when you first came up with the idea or did it come out of writing the whole thing?

(SC) – I did. It was the ending that made me know I had to write the story. Because no one could possibly predict it! It just felt like an opportunity to really bring two girls on a massive journey to a brand new place, both literally and emotionally.

(EO) – And you do a magnificent job! Now I know you are working on the screenplays for the movie version, which I can’t wait for because this is a book that BEGS to be made into a film! And you are also working on book 2. Can you tell us a little of what comes next?

(SC) - You know, it’s a funny thing, because I’d love to – but Harper will kill me. To even tell you who’s in the sequel will spoil the surprises. But let’s just say you can’t possibly predict what’s going to happen in this one either. It’s an even wilder ride than the first, with a lot more provocation, mischief, and intensity. It isn’t your classical Year 2 book, that’s for sure. And the truth is, where writing the first book was a bit daunting, I’m having a blast with the second one. I’m sure you’ll agree with this, Ellen -- once you’re done writing the first book, you can spread your wings and just fly.

(EO) – Oh kill me now! I can't wait. Thank Soman! I don’t know if you set out to do this, but you have written a wonderful tale of girl friendship, strength and empowerment. SGE is a wonderful Girl Power book and one I would gladly give to my daughters and buy copies of to every girl I know. And I, for one, seriously can’t wait for the next installment!!

(SC) And I can’t thank you enough for your support and encouragement. For such a talented writer to help other writers get their work read is a testament to your character, energy, and passion for good books. Thank you so much for having me!

My wonderful editorial team at HarperChildren's has very generously provided a SIGNED hardcover copy of THE SCHOOL OF GOOD AND EVIL for one lucky Inkpot winner! All you have to do is leave a comment about what your favorite fairy tale is and why!! One random winner (US only) will be chosen. Enter as many times as you want! The contest will run for two weeks and the winner announced at the following Shameless Saturday post!

Interview with Amy Butler Greenfield, Author of CHANTRESS

Today we welcome author (and Enchanted Inkspot member) Amy Butler Greenfield, to talk about her new YA historical fantasy CHANTRESS. If you are looking for a beautifully written, atmospheric fantasy with a fascinating and complex magic system and a determined heroine seeking to make her own future, then you much check this one out!

Sing and the darkness will find you. 

Shipwrecked on an island seven years ago, Lucy has been warned she must never sing, or disaster will strike. But on All Hallows Eve, Lucy hears tantalizing music in the air. When she sings it, she unlocks a terrible secret: She is a Chantress, a spell-singer, brought to the island not by shipwreck but by a desperate enchantment gone wrong.

Her song lands her back in England — and in mortal peril, for the kingdom lies in the cruel grasp of a powerful Lord Protector and his mind-reading hunters, the Shadowgrims. The Protector has killed all Chantresses, for they alone can destroy the Shadowgrims. Only Lucy has survived.

In terrible danger, Lucy takes shelter with Nat, a spy who turns her heart upside-down. Nat has been working with his fellow scholars of the Invisible College to overthrow the Lord Protector, and they have long hoped to find a living Chantress to help them. But Lucy is completely untrained, and Nat deeply distrusts her magic. If Lucy cannot master the songspells, how long can she even stay alive?

CHANTRESS is available now in stores! You can also learn more about Amy and her books at her website!

You've previously published several other books (VIRGINIA BOUND, historical fiction for young readers set in colonial Virginia, and A PERFECT RED, described as "A true story of mystery, empire, and adventure, in pursuit of the most desirable color on earth"). But CHANTRESS is your first published work with fantasy elements. What drew you to write a historical fantasy? What do you think draws readers to fantasy and magic?

The past is a strange and amazing place, full of wonderful true tales, and until I wrote CHANTRESS I always went to great lengths to depict history as it really happened. But a few years ago, I found myself wanting to tell a different kind of story, a story that asked “What if?”

My favorite “what if” had to do with 17 th-century England, when even brilliant scientists like Isaac Newton and his crowd believed in the possibility of magic. What if history had been different? What if the magic those scientists believed in had been real? And what if the magic belonged not to them, but to someone who ordinarily wouldn’t have had much power: a young woman, a singer of songs?

A wild flight of fancy for a sedate historian like me! But I’ve loved fantasy fiction since I was small, which helps explain why I made this huge leap into the unknown. Pretty soon I was reworking the course of English history, dreaming up a magical system, and conjuring up whole dynasties in the blink of an eye.

I can’t speak for all readers, but for me that “leap into the unknown” is a powerful part of magic’s appeal. And when it came time to write about the magic itself – well, in all honesty, I felt as if I’d sprouted wings! To write about anything is a bit like working magic, I think. But in writing about magic I felt that tenfold.

While CHANTRESS features a number of fantastical elements, they are grounded in a real-world historical setting. How do you balance the need for historical research with the needs of the story you are telling? Do you do the bulk of your research before you start drafting, or during the drafting or revision?

I was lucky enough to come to CHANTRESS with a good grounding in my chosen setting, which was a huge help. But even so, I was always hitting points where I’d say, “Wait, would a pork pie really keep that long?” or “What kind of sound would a clock like that make?” and it was incredibly tempting to start hunting for exact details then and there. But as much as possible, I’d make my best guess or put in a placeholder and keep going. I know from experience that it’s way too easy for me to get caught up in research, and I needed to keep my head in the story.

In CHANTRESS, the main character, Lucy, discovers her own abilities to work a rich and complex music-based magic. Can you tell us a bit about how you developed Chantress magic? Did the origins and mechanics of it change during drafting and revision? Do you have any advice for writers who want to include a system of magic in their stories?

At first the whole idea of creating my own magical system scared me. But once I got going, working out the magic turned out to be one of my very favorite parts of writing CHANTRESS.

I knew from the start that the magic was worked by singing, and how it sounded. The origins were always clear in my mind, too. But it took me several drafts to work out the relationship between Wild Magic and Proven Magic. I’m fascinated by the difference between what we’re taught and what we know by instinct, and that turned out to be key to the magic I wrote about.

It helped me a lot to ask “real world” questions about my magic: How did it start? How is it passed on? Has it changed over time? Does it need just one practitioner, or many? Is there a wrong way and a right way to do it? What are the consequences and costs of the magic? What are its limit? How have people
tried to control it? Can the magic be countered – either by mundane means or with other magic?

The magic in CHANTRESS is strongly based on music. Do you sing or play any instruments yourself? Were there any specific songs that inspired the music in CHANTRESS?

I grew up in a house that was filled with music. Singing and playing the piano were big parts of my life. But in my twenties, for complicated reasons, I stopped, and it left a huge hole.

One of the best gift CHANTRESS gave me is that it made me realize how deeply I longed to make music again. We now have a piano, and I sing in a choir.

Although I can’t point to a specific song that inspired CHANTRESS, I can think of a silence that was crucial – the silence that comes after you’ve sung a song with everything that’s in you. Even in our world, that silence is powerful. It feels as if magic could happen, or has happened. In CHANTRESS, I wanted to write about a world where that magic is real.

One of the themes in CHANTRESS that most intrigued me was that of magic and science. Nat, the young spy who helps Lucy, is highly involved in a society of scholars and favors scientific observation and experimentation. Do you see any parallels to the tensions we see in our real world, between mystery and knowledge, between the numinous and the known? What sort of questions do you hope readers will ask themselves when reading CHANTRESS?

I’m a writer, but my dad is a scientist, my husband is a mathematician, and I myself was really torn in college between science and the arts. So I guess it’s no surprise that I’m very interested in the different ways of “knowing” that are possible. I’d love it if readers found CHANTRESS a good way to explore some of that territory.

In the real world, it’s all too easy for people to dismiss a way of knowing that differs from their own. I’ve tried to reflect that in CHANTRESS, particularly in the tensions between Nat and Lucy over Chantress magic. It was fun — and also deeply satisfying — to let Nat and Lucy challenge each other and ultimately to come to respect each other’s point of view.

In CHANTRESS, scientists and magic workers have to work together to set the world to rights again. Although I didn’t consciously set out to write the book that way, I’m very happy that’s how it turned out.

While CHANTRESS stands alone (at least in this reader's opinion!) and resolves Lucy's story in a satisfying way, I believe I am not alone in wondering what she will do next. Can you tell us anything about your next project? Will we get to read more about Lucy and her adventures as she learned about her Chantress powers?

I like stand-alone books, and I thought CHANTRESS would be one. And I’m thrilled to hear that you found the story satisfying just as it is. But when I was midway through drafting CHANTRESS, I had a thunderbolt moment when I suddenly saw that Lucy’s full story might actually take 3 books to tell. I scribbled down everything I could that day and tucked my ideas away in a folder. Years later, when my agent and editor asked if I could write more books about Lucy, I was delighted to pull those notes out again.

There will be two more books about Lucy. The next one is called CHANTRESS ALCHEMY (at least for now!), and I had a wonderful time writing it. It should be out next year.

I can't wait! Thank you so much for answering all these questions, Amy!

***

Deva Fagan is the author of Fortune’s Folly, The Magical Misadventures of Prunella Bogthistle and Circus Galacticus. She lives in Maine with her husband and her dog. When she’s not writing she spends her time reading, doing geometry, and drinking copious amounts of tea. Visit her at www.devafagan.com

TOTW - Fresh Fairy Tales

Fairy tales – they’ve been told and retold, but maybe you’re drawn to tell one again. And you’d be in good company.

Even many of the versions of fairy tales we think of as “collected” were actually retold in ways that made them distinctive. A number of today’s popular fairy tales were invented by actual authors, often women, in the French salons of the 17th century. These salons were creative and intellectual outlets for women shut out of other intellectual institutions. (For more on the French Salons, read “Introduction: The Rise of the French Fairy Tale and the Decline of France” by Jack Zipes in Beauty and the Beast and Other Classic French Fairy Tales.) Later, in the nineteenth century, the Brothers Grimm made significant changes to tales they collected from their sources, most of which weren’t peasants in the German countryside but educated young women. (For more on this, read the introduction by Jack Zipes to The Complete Fairy Tales of the Brothers Grimm.) The Grimms also reshaped the tales for their intended audiences. Perhaps you would like to join such an august company of re-tellers.

But what more can be said with these stories? Bookshelves in YA and children’s libraries are full of fairy tale retellings. How might you craft fresh versions?

Perhaps the more appropriate question is this - Why do we still enjoy reading these tales? Why are many of us drawn to write them?

The simple answer is that they continue to have relevance for contemporary readers. What follows is a list of suggestions for finding unique relevance in old stories – the unexplored but rich terrain in fairy tales.

Consider the Historical Parallels or Significance. What are the connections one might make to tales and historical events? How might a tale represent what happened in the past? Jane Yolen, for example, used “Sleeping Beauty” to tell a sophisticated story of the Holocaust in Briar Rose. An alternative would be to consider contemporary parallels or significance, as Alex Flinn has done in a number of her novels. 

Draw a Cultural Picture. What stories are too little told? How might they depict cultures and peoples misrepresented or underrepresented in literature? Grace Lin used Chinese folk and fairy tales to inspire the wonderful MG fantasy Where the Mountain Meets the Moon. However, those of us considering writing outside our cultures should think carefully on the if’s, when’s, and how’s of such a decision. 

Find Logic in the Illogical. Often, the things that occur in fairy tales don’t entirely make sense. Why doesn’t Red Riding Hood notice that her grandmother has a hairy face? Why is Cinderella so obedient as she’s robbed of her position and possessions? Gail Carson Levine’s Ella Enchanted offers an answer to this last question that’s both humorous and emotionally resonant. Great stories can come from making sense out of nonsense. 

Tell the Tale from Another Side. Every character has his or her own story: the prince, the witch, the servant girl who walks into the tale briefly and then walks out. Try seeing the story from all sides, and writing it from an alternative perspective. To read an example of this kind of story, track down Donna Jo Napoli’s Zel or The Magic Circle, both of which offer the perspectives of witches. 

Kindle the Emotional Heat. Fairy tales might be about magic and once-upon-a-time, but they’re also about fathers who abandon children, lovers who must see past the ugly outward appearance of a beloved to the sweetness beneath, girls who make the wrong choices and must try to save themselves. These stories are, at their cores, about situations people continue to face every day. When we’re drawn to a particular tale, we might ask, why? What truths are we finding in it? The answers to these questions led me to write a version of “Hansel and Gretel”. Robin McKinley provided two sets of answers in two novels that retell the story of “Beauty and the Beast”, Beauty and Rose’s Daughter. 

I’m sure I’ve overlooked some ways of approaching old and yet compelling stories. How do you create unique stories from already-told tales?