Wisdom's Kiss by Catherine Gilbert Murdock
In yet another nod to "Puss in Boots," Tips's last name is Müller, or "miller" in German. (As with many fairy tales, the son/hero in "Puss in Boots" is never named; he's an archetype, not a person.) And of course Tips is the third son, and while third sons are often quite unfortunate in life, they're fortunate indeed in fairy tales. >
If I were a movie director, I'd cast Skandar Keynes to play Tips ... although now that I muse on it, I'd also cast him to play Prince Florian. Clearly I have a thing for tall, dark and handsome—or at least a thing for Skandar Keynes.
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Felis
Author's commentary on Felis el Gato
So, the Booted Maestro ...
I'm outlining Wisdom's Kiss, trying to figure out how all these different plot lines and characters will fit together. I've got the love triangle, I've got Nonna Ben and the evil duchess, I've got Montagne intrigue and a dopey suitor and—O joy!—an acrobat scooping up a princess and sailing with her across a circus tent. I definitely had to include THAT. Pondering, I realized that the swooping princess + acrobat could be two of the people in that romantic love triangle; characterwise, I'd be killing two birds with one stone. And this boy—Tips—could begin life in nowheresville (ultimately dubbed Bacio) with the triangle's third person, sweet and loyal Trudy.
But how exactly did the boy get from nowheresville to acrobatdom? He wouldn't run away and join the circus; not with Trudy so close. Someone passing through nowheresville must have caught sight of the boy and realized that such a gifted athlete deserved proper training and a paying audience. The sighting had to be unforgettable and intensely visual, so powerful that it seizes not only the passing stranger but the reader as well, a real grab-you-by-the-throat kind of moment ... Thus Tips's dive, with all the supplementary and oh-so-useful details of the flour mill and his sullen brother and Trudy's sight. >
The problem was, at the point in my outlining I didn't have any way to tell this scene, to get all these pivotal details across to the reader. Tips wouldn't describe it; he's far too modest. Trudy wouldn't because she didn't know how amazing it was; Tips did stuff like that every day. I needed someone not only to describe the dive but to make it larger than life, to point a proverbial finger and say, "Look at this kid! This kid's amazing."
By doing that, however, wouldn't I be tipping my hand? The boy's a great acrobat; a hundred pages and six years later we meet a young man who's a great acrobat ... It wouldn't take a rocket scientist to connect those two. Yet I didn't want connections drawn until the time was right—I didn't want readers learning Tips's true identity until Trudy did.
The solution: describe Tips with all the marvel and enthusiasm that he merited, but do it while hoodwinking the reader with other prose. That passing-through-nowheresville observer ... perhaps I could make his voice so extreme that Tips's genius would go unnoticed, a drumroll disguised by clashing cymbals.
So I started writing and Felis started bragging, and the more he bragged the more I liked him, and the more details about Tips I could add, because every detail ended up camouflaged within Felis's preposterous hyperbole.
And oh, did Felis pay off. Every one of his entries provides subtleties I could not convey any other way. The blow-by-blow description of Tips's sword fight, and Dizzy and Tips's escape from Froglock (neither of which, by the way, Felis actually witnesses; he just describes them) ... the details of the Sultan's Throne of the Globe d'Or ... how Dizzy for years managed to fake the circus persona ofViolet la Riene ... the subtext of protocol infighting in the standoff between Escoffier and Handsome the dog ... None of these could have been told any other way; certainly not as effectively as Felis describes them. Using him, I felt rather like a pretty girl saying within earshot of a big dumb guy, "I bet no one in the world is strong enough to carry this piano up to my apartment." "Ha!" says Felis/dumb guy. "Just watch me!" Not only does he end up conveying massive pianos of critical information, but his narcissism makes the information delectably digestible (unlike, say, the encyclopedia, where the information is tasty but dry, like biscotti). I made myself a rule, broken only rarely, that Felis had to brag about himself at least once per paragraph. It's a bit of a contradiction, really, that Felis's boasting ends up revealing so much about all the other characters, but perhaps that's what makes it so much fun.
Even the structure of his prose reveals something about Felis. Elsewhere I describe how punctuation can enrich a character; Felis's character development is accomplished in part by length. With every sentence, Felis conveys his unceasing self-regard and his concurrent disinterest in the needs of others, particularly the needs of the reader, who is left figuratively (and at times literally) gasping for air, trying to make it to the next period.
You might think that writing Felis would be hard, but actually it was just the opposite. When Felis interrupts his breathless description of Tips's sword fight to endorse calisthenics, or in the midst of Tips's heartbreak chides the boy for not complimenting his new outfit ... Felis made me laugh harder than any character I've ever written, and more than most characters I've ever read. Besides, he'd undoubtedly take full credit for his prose. He wouldn't even mention me.
I'm afraid I can't remember exactly when I decided to fuse him with the fairy-tale Puss in Boots, but it was quite early, as was Felis's name. "Felis" is a genus of cat and also a proper name; "el Gato" is, of course, "the cat" in Spanish. Felis's preferred nickname, "The Booted Maestro," deliciously reflects the original "Puss in Boots" title, "The Master Cat; or, Puss in Boots." Felis himself does an excellent job explaining the overlaps between himself and fairy tale; you can also read the original 1697 story for yourself. Of particular note are the story's two hardhearted morals; Charles Perrault knew far too much of royal life to view the world unsullied. (At least one scholar of fairy tales observes that "Puss in Boots" has a third, implied moral, much valued by felines in the centuries since: don't kill cats.)
As for Felis's memoir title, yes, it is supposed to resemble a circus poster. ("All Boasts Real" is my sister's favorite line in the book.) I'm hopeful that readers will, over the course of Wisdom's Kiss, read the title more than once and in doing so discover deeper insights into this crazy dude. But no, I don't know what the "Fist of God" is. I have a sense that it's a circus act involving shooting someone out of a cannon, but it might also be a troupe of performing soldiers ... It's the words that matter, however; not their meaning.
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Teddy
Author's commentary on Temperance, Queen of Montagne, a.k.a. Teddy >
In her own way, Temperance, nicknamed Teddy, was as challenging to write as Tips. Like Tips, Temperance has a big secret that can't be revealed until late in the story. Beyond this, Temperance—being physically absent from most of Wisdom's Kiss —is a character told through others, and their biases make it difficult to present her accurately, and thus for readers to understand her, sympathize with her, or even (I fear) remember her. >
Dizzy, of course, has no patience whatsoever with her meek and bookish older sister; behold how Temperance is presented in Queen of All the Heavens. But Queen Ben, for all her expressed concern about her granddaughter, isn't much better: saying in effect "I don't care what others say, I'm sure you'll be fine" isn't the strongest vote of confidence. I, the author, knew that Temperance was kind and well-intentioned and earnest, but I couldn't figure out how to convey this information without either giving away that she was being courted by a spy or, in my coy obfuscation, making it obvious that something was suspiciously rotten in Montagne. Thus, no letters from Temperance, or any "Meanwhile, back in Montagne..." prose. (I did briefly have a letter from Temperance to Ben included in Wisdom's Kiss; you can read it here.) I also enjoyed describing (and thus vicariously experiencing) Trudy's delighted surprise when she realizes how great Temperance is. >
Like so many of us, poor Temperance has not only suffered from the judgment of her family but also internalized it: she believes she's du
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Roger and Hrothgar
Author's commentary on Roger, Duke of Farina, and Hrothgar, his brother >
Poor Roger. He's got the world's worst mother, he can't decide if he wants to be brutally ambitious or passively resistant, and he ends up spending his adulthood in love with a corpse. I'm very fond of him, but really, dude ... grow a spine.
Okay, okay, he may have been set up. It's tough playing the role of rejected suitor: you have to be sympathetic enough that readers understand why the main character fell for you, but not so sympathetic that readers mourn when you get dumped. Small wonder he collects figurines; they at least won't turn on him.
Truly, I am fond of him, and one of my bigger regrets with Wisdom's Kiss is that the particulars of Roger's life get lost to important characters and events. So this write-up is a chance to present without distraction the finer details and miseries of the life of the Duke of Farina.
For example, he was named—and not just Roger, either, but his two brothers as well—after the emperor, a man their mother otherwise despised. Imagine what a joy-filled childhood that must have been. (I had not realized the name Roger has so many permutations: Latin, Spanish, Catalan, Norse, German, French, Welsh ... sheesh. Those historic names—crazy.) The whole three-boys-named-Roger business also serves to illustrate the fawning insanity of the empire, as ambitious nobility named whole generations after the current man in charge. Although it doubtless simplified the work of Lax historians (in the way that farmers every year give newborn animals names beginning with the same letter, so they can later calculate ages), it must have made for some pretty lame birthday parties.
Roger, sweet thing, wants to do well. He rescues Dizzy and carries her offstage—but only after she's fainted; he was scared to step in before then. He even tells Dizzy that she will thrive in his family and that his mother will love her. Is he lying or delusional? A bit of both, I think, though more the latter—you'd need a bit of insanity to survive that upbringing.
Speaking of which, there's the whole matter of his younger brother, Hrothgar, who is married to another man. The gay couple even adopts and raises children together. Let us pause for a moment to reflect on how Wilhelmina, had she ever learned this news, would react...
That was fun.
I do think that of the three siblings, Hrothgar is the luckiest. For one thing, he's not dead like their oldest brother, Rüdiger. In fact, he's youngest, and in fairy tales youngest sons always emerge victorious; look at Puss in Boots >. He's married to someone who—I assume—can occasionally engage in conversation, unlike Princess Wisdom's mute and lifeless Doppelschläferin, and the two men love each other enough to adopt children. Most of all, he's far, far, far from Phraugheloch Palace and all its accompanying misery.
That said, I do think Roger also ends up happy, which is nice for the role of sympathetic rejected suitor. He has his figurines; he drives his mother mad with frustration (well done!); after she dies, he instantly and definitively blows off all of her ambitious scheming. Would that we were all so privileged.
More on Roger's lovely mother
Roger on stage >
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Dizzy
Author's Commentary on Wisdom, Princess of Montagne >
Oh, Dizzy, how I love ya.
Princess Wisdom of Montagne began life, poor thing, as the Other Woman—the girl who would steal Tips from Trudy. That was pretty much all I knew about her. Given that I intended to tell Trudy's story via a third-person memoir, it seemed appropriate to give this other character the immediacy of a diary, which I thought would help to differentiate the two young women. Otherwise a reader, you know, might confuse them.
Then I started writing said diary, and within the first few sentences I realized I had a tiger by the tail. No one—no one—could possibly confuse Trudy and the princess. Trudy is quiet, dutiful, modest, loyal, a bit dull. She's nice. And nice is ... well, nice is nice. Dizzy, on the other hand, is stubborn, self-centered, capricious, taxing ... But she's also enthusiastic, determined, and fearless. Deep down inside, she's a good person, and I loved coaxing out her integrity, helping her discover her "innate compassion." (I still get a kick out of Nonna Ben's admonition that Dizzy "present more graciously [her] innate compassion." That's going to be a tough one; compassionwise, Dizzy is scraping rock bottom.) And yet Dizzy does improve, as evidenced late in the story when she realizes how she's hurt Trudy. Musing on the link between cruelty and envy, she vows "improvement on that front." There is indeed a strong link between those two vices, and kudos to Dizzy for figuring it out.
Perhaps it was subconscious—no, it had to be subconscious, because I certainly wasn't smart enough to reason this out—but the two contrasting writing genres ended up reflecting perfectly the two contrasting personalities. Trudy's memoir, like Trudy, is quiet, dutiful, and modest. Dizzy's diary, on the other hand, explodes with her innate breathless energy. It helps that she doesn't use commas, an inspiration I stumbled upon quite by accident while trying to make her voice more distinctive. > Writing without commas—it turns out—is a world-class royal pain. I'd craft a comma-free sentence that made sense to me at the time, and then while reviewing would add a comma reflexively, just to clarify things. Several times I searched Dizzy's entries specifically for commas, and darned if there always weren't a couple snuck in by the midnight tweaking pixies. To be fair, every comma those tweaking pixies inserted indicated that the sentence was ill-phrased in some way. So I would rework it, and be very grateful afterward for that nudge toward elucidation, however irked I'd been initially.
The princess's name was also a challenge. I needed a virtue that didn't sound too clunky or weird (Diligence? Humility?? Citizenship???) and that could be shortened to an apt, memorable nickname. "Wisdom" I wasn't so fond of, but "Dizzy" was a total keeper—not to mention the juxtaposition of these antonyms, and the thought of her family observing this tiny ball of fire and saying, "Well, her given name might be Wisdom, but in truth she's kind of the opposite..."
I especially enjoyed exploring the tension between Dizzy and Trudy, how they relentlessly misinterpret each other ... which happens ALL THE TIME in real life, especially between teen girls. Trudy believes Dizzy is disgusted with her, when in truth Dizzy is consumed with green-faced jealousy but masking it with icy disregard. And Dizzy assumes that Trudy is just faking her modesty to cover her vanity. Wrong, wrong, wrong. Allow me to repeat: girls do this all the time. Do not ever assume you know what's going on in someone else's head, particularly if that person has traits you either long for or despise. I guarantee there's a lot more insecurity and a lot less confidence inside that enemy's skull than you could ever possibly imagine.
Dizzy is now one of my favorite characters in Wisdom's Kiss, next to Felis and Escoffier. Just as I once imagined young Princess Ben as a grandmother, I now wonder how Dizzy would fare as a crazy old aunt. She certainly is a crazy old playwright.
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Wilhelmina and Edwig
Author commentary on Wilhelmina, Dowager Duchess of Farina, and her father Edwig>
As I've mentioned elsewhere, Wilhelmina represents my first authorial experience with villainy. I'm not a fan of the whole good-versus-evil foundation of storytelling: "Oh, the other dude is the bad guy! Wow, everything is explained!" Um, no, it's not. First of all, even if you're writing fantasy, you still have to ground it in human emotio
As an author, I've found great joy in exploring the truth that people, however fallible and self-involved they might be, also mean well. The "bad guys" in Dairy Queen and Princess Ben turn out to have their own fears and dreams and misconceptions, and learning this greatly matures the heroine narrator. Hopefully, it also matures the heroine readers. In Wisdom's Kiss, even Duke Roger of Farina, while complicit in his mother's plotting, views himself as good: he's only taking over Montagne to please his future wife.
Which brings us to Wilhelmina. She, too, has fears and dreams and misconceptions, but they are so twisted and malicious that even I could not describe them as anything but evil. The woman is a monster whose presence advances the plot wonderfully. > I originally started writing diary entries just to get inside Wilhelmina's head, and—poof—I was addicted. With Felis el Gato, I sought to wrap the prose in preening so that readers laughed at his vanity; with Wilhelmina, I wanted readers gasping aloud: "Did she just say what I think she said? Holy cow, she did!"
Of all her odious sentiments, I most love her description of how she used to command her husband to dominate her as a real man should. Say what? I also adore her affront at being perceived an incompetent murderess: is it the label of murderer or of incompetent that insults her? If I were feeling generous, I'd argue that Wilhelmina is a victim of her culture's horrible sexism. She's clearly smart, hard working, and highly motivated, yet she's been taught that only men can be these things. So she has to find men to carry out her ambitions, and she ends up destroying them and then hating them for their weakness. >