Venero Armanno is the author of ten critically acclaimed novels, including his recent book Burning Down (2017). His other well-known books include Black Mountain (2012), The Dirty Beat (2007) and Candle Life (2006). Further back, Veny’s novel Firehead was shortlisted in the 1999 Queensland Premier’s Literary Award; in 2002 The Volcano won the award with Best Fiction Book of the Year. His work has gone on to be published in the United States, France, Germany, Switzerland, Austria, Holland, Israel and South Korea.

His latest novel, The Crying Forest, enters the realm of speculative fiction. Agata Rosso, a once-mighty yet now prematurely aged European witch, believes that the special gifts in a young girl named Lía Munro can restore youth and vitality both to herself and her bedridden husband. She sets a deadly plan in motion to capture and use Lía-but will the girl have enough power to protect herself, plus the father she loves so much?

Without further ado, welcome Venero!

On your Wikipedia page, it states you wrote 10 unpublished novels over 14 years before getting picked up. What made you keep going and do you have any advice for other writer hopefuls still struggling to get published? Have any of those unpublished novels been picked up since?

So yes, that’s true, I did write a lot of novels before having something published. I was young enough in those days to think I could do anything, so I launched in when I was 17/18 and started writing a horror vampire novel that I was sure would bring me instant fortune and fame. When that didn’t happen I realised I knew less than zero and that there was a long learning road ahead if I was to take this thing called writing seriously. However, still being young, I thought I could teach myself what I needed to know and do this by writing non-stop.

That part of the idea was good, but I set myself the formidable task of writing a novel a year until one got published. A novel a year doesn’t leave room for a lot of rewriting but that was part of my ignorance – I’d dash off 80 to 100,000 words, over the course of a calendar year, spend a week or two polishing what I had, then would start sending the ms off to every publisher I could find in the telephone book. This was in the late 70s into the end of the 80s, so there was no Internet, everything was hard copy on a typewriter with lots of time spent at photocopy machines and in post offices. Anyway, once I’d finish a ms I’d start on the next. I seemed to have no problem with new ideas, though maybe the ideas weren’t all that good. I wrote in any number of genres.

Once I got through my Stephen King phase, I had my Fitzgerald, Greene, Hemingway, Cheever… you understand what I mean. Rejections came thick and fast but to specifically answer your question here, what kept me going was a lot of fear – I dreaded being either stuck in an office job or spending the rest of my life working as a bricklayer’s labourer, which is what I had to do in my teens and twenties. Probably a more important point is that some rejections would have a nice note attached to it: “We can’t publish this ms but we like your writing so please send us your next book.” I recall I had lots of messages like that, so if an aspiring writer needs any greater encouragement, then they’re probably not all that serious about their craft and should think about something else. 

So any advice I might have for aspiring writers is along the lines of what I wrote above – keep persisting, keep trying. Don’t worry about time. Don’t want it all straight away. You might take years to find your true voice, something that’s original and new and completely yours. That’s what publishers are after – a new voice. You’ve got a lot to learn so give yourself every opportunity to learn it. Early success only comes to a few, and that’s okay. There’s nothing wrong in taking a longer road – because you want a writing career that is a very long road anyway, with strong foundations. That takes time and effort and every shortcut short-changes you.

Most of my unpublished mss deserve every bit of their non-publication, though I have a soft spot for the first one. It’s about a Sicilian-migrant-vampire who has an underground lair at a university and who kills students by night. In the end he gets bored with his life (i.e. I got bored with the book) and so commits suicide. Now, I’ve never read a book about a Sicilian-migrant-vampire who commits suicide. Somebody should publish it! Of the other books two did get published but in new forms. These mss became Strange Rain and My Beautiful Friend, two books that did very well, but they changed a hell of a lot from the drafts I’d first written in the 80s.

In addition to writing, you’re also a teacher at the University of QLD. How does teaching affect and inform your writing work and vice versa, particularly with your latest, The Crying Forest? 

I won’t complain because I love my job and I’m very happy to have it, but of course it certainly takes up most of my time – meaning I have less time to write. This could be a good thing actually; maybe it’s better to be forced to slow down, though I would have liked to have written more books over the last twenty years that I’ve been at UQ. Having said that, though, teaching creative writing forces me to engage more with the form – to really think about what I’m doing and how. It also gives me a direct look at readers i.e. students who love reading. Why do they read? What are they reading? Which books do they avoid like the plague? All of this is really interesting for a writer. It’s true that a teacher can learn more from their students than vice versa.

You’ve written novels for adults, young adults and children, as well as several short stories. How do you think trying out these different modes has shaped your writing, particularly your current novel?

I think writing short stories is one of the best ways possible to find your voice and to learn and improve your craft. The end of my little tale above about all my unpublished mss is that around 1988 someone said to me, “You spend a year or two writing entire novels that don’t get published… why don’t you try short stories instead?” It was a lightbulb moment. Yes indeed. Why not write short stories and send them out and get rejected (or maybe one day published) even faster? So then I embarked on a campaign of always having stories in the post to editors at whatever magazines or competitions I could find. That was my real start, when stories started being accepted and I started winning some prizes. My first published book was in fact a collection of these stories, Jumping at the Moon, not a novel.

This sort of writing experience does affect all my novels, including The Crying Forest. How? I think because it gives you the tools for shaping sub-plots into their own discreet arcs. The difference is that these sub-plots (which are stories in themselves really) have to feed into the main plot of course. However short story writing skills help you/me actually make those sub-plots so much stronger (I hope!).

You were born in Brisbane to Sicilian parents. Does that background influence your writing in any way, particularly with The Crying Forest? If so, how?

Yes, all my writing is informed by the migrant experience. Of my parents coming to this country when they were young (they met here and married) and me being a child of a father and mother who didn’t understand much about their new country at all. I’d be a completely different writer without these experiences, or, more likely, not a writer at all. It’s the outsider syndrome—growing up I never quite felt part of Australia even though I was born here. The family home was very Sicilian and the family and friend network was also almost purely Sicilian. So in a way it was as if I was new to this country as well: home was one world, outside of that was something completely different, and I really didn’t fit in. So as something of an outsider one becomes very observational: of everything around and also of the past, if I can put it that way.

Many of my books are based on Sicilian history and research, and The Crying Forest ultimately came together in the same way – I was researching something completely different and accidently came across myths and legends that weren’t Sicilian (but from the north, in Friuli) but that had resonances in Sicily. These legends had to do with witches and werewolves, and so my research deepened, leading me to think, well, Australia is a country of migrants, what if these legends had travelled across the seas with the migrant diaspora? That was really part of The Crying Forest’s germinal idea—and where I live, in an area that was once completely rural and has its own forest lands, felt like the perfect place to take up these mythologies.

Are there particular themes and ideas you return to again and again in your work? Why do you think that is? Do you revisit such ideas and themes in The Crying Forest?

As you might have gathered by now, recurring themes have to do with the migrant diaspora, leading to themes of loss and belonging—and, even, of the longing for the old world left behind. I’ve always felt sort of floating between two cultures – not quite part of one or the other, so that forces me back to writing inside these themes.

You’ve written in a diverse range of genres. What sort of books and authors inspire you and why? Are there stories you’d compare The Crying Forest to?

I think The Crying Forest is a sort of literary supernatural tale, in that characters’ emotions, their relationships and personal baggage really drive the plot—as well as a lot of “real” history. So I’d consider books in the same ballpark might be The Historian by Elizabeth Kostova and even The Haunting of Hill House by Shirley Jackson. But that’s setting myself a very high bar!  A writer/reviewer I was just speaking to said the book reminded him very much of the writing my Peter Straub, and I can see that – If You Could See Me Now and Ghost Story in particular.

Writers who have had a huge impact on me I’ve already mentioned: from Stephen King to Graham Greene, F Scott Fitzgerald and Hemingway. I’d add Truman Capote, John Cheever, Raymond Carver, Oscar Hijuelos, Ray Bradbury (who I had the immense pleasure of meeting once, in a Parisian bookstore) and Haruki Murakami. In fact at present I’ve just been rereading The Illustrated Man, The Golden Apples of the Sun, The Martian Chronicles, plus The Wind-up Bird Chronicle and South of the Border, West of the Sun. I love going back to my literary heroes.

Tell us more about The Crying Forest. What inspired the novel?

In 2001, newly-married and with my wife Nic pregnant with our first (and only) child, we travelled from our rundown inner-city Queenslander-style home to see an even more rundown old house in an outer-west suburb I’d never even heard of. We went because we’d seen a picture of a house in the real estate pages of a newspaper, and I’d never seen anything like it. The place was like some Gothic old English country manor that a louche rock star would buy and fill with drugs, booze and groupies.

We discovered the place was located on land that once had been part of immense hectares of farming property. Built in 1932, it sits at the top of a small hill and was (and still is) nicely isolated. With all good sense thrown aside we bought the property and moved in.

Some people, tradespeople for instance, don’t like to be alone in our home; we however find it inviting and perfectly peaceful. It became the “red house”—Rosso House—of The Crying Forest. And that forest itself is nearby; overgrown trails are where I walk my dog almost every day. So, for that matter, is the wider fictional region the book calls “Grandview”.

So in terms of inspiring the novel, other than a very spooky home, an isolated property and endless state forest, another thing that informed this book were the wild packs of escaped dogs in our region, howling at night and raising hell, plus the proliferation of deer—an introduced species not native to the region. Dogs and deer wage their own battles. It all just seemed to cry out for a novel about the supernatural, and I’d wanted to write this book for years, even though it was well outside of my usual genres.

What was the hardest part of writing The Crying Forest? What was the easiest? Did you have to do any research?

All novels are hard, in their own way, even the ones that come pouring out. The Crying Forest did come pouring out… I wrote the first draft longhand in a series of notebooks, then revised and revised endlessly on my computer. The hardest part was finding the time to write. Work at the University can be very intense, and the more senior I become the less extra time I have. So there were a lot of 4am mornings, doing as much as I could before getting ready to head off by six or so.

There was plenty of research for this book, a process I always like very much. While reading texts about several things I wanted the book to touch on I came across information about Italian witches: this interested me because when I was growing up my parents would take me to our local Sicilian witch if I needed medical attention, not a traditional doctor. I remember this crazy old crone treating me for neck aches (which she made worse) and a broken finger (thanks to her, it’s still crooked). My parents used to talk about the way this woman’s potions could cure all manner of illnesses, and that she was more knowledgeable than any fool-doctor with medical training. Remembering her, I read more about witches (and werewolves) in Sicilian and Italian mythology, and in particular I discovered the Benandanti: 

“The benandanti (Good Walkers) were members of an agrarian visionary tradition in the Friuli district of Northeastern Italy during the 16th and 17th centuries. The benandanti claimed to travel out of their bodies while asleep to struggle against malevolent witches (malandanti) in order to ensure good crops for the season to come. Between 1575 and 1675, in the midst of the Early Modern witch trials, a number of benandanti were accused of being heretics or witches under the Roman Inquisition.” (from Wikipedia)

It really didn’t take too much imagination to put all these disparate elements together: house, forest, Italian folklore.

What do you think’s different about The Crying Forest to your other books? 

I’ve only published in the supernatural once before, with My Beautiful Friend in about 1995. So The Crying Forest is a real departure into witches and werewolves, and people with special powers.

What’s next on the writing horizon for you?

I’ve got two novels on the go which are more my own traditional sorts of works, but I’ve got more of The Crying Forest planned, if circumstances allow me to go that far. I’m not one for sequels but I feel like there are more stories to come from these characters, some really fascinating threads that I’d love to explore. The book is mainly set in Brisbane, Australia, however many of the characters are European—I’m excited to follow them into places like Rome, Sicily, Barcelona and Paris… you know what the writer’s imagination is like!

Thanks so much for your considered answers Venero! I’m pumped to read your novel now! For you readers out there keen too, you can read more about the novel here (and watch a cool book trailer). The Crying Forest is available for purchase in all good ebook and print outlets. It is distributed through Gazelle (UK/Europe), Novella (Australia) and IPG (North America).

The first book, Reign of Secrets came to fruition about 7 years ago. I had this image of a princess with magical jewellery that could portal to different worlds. But the full world building of this series didn’t happen until earlier this year. My writers’ group helped me plan it out. We chatted about the rules that governed the world. I also wanted to write a story featuring gods and goddesses. At the time there weren’t many around in bookstores, but it seems stories of gods and goddesses are quite popular haha. I was glad in a way, because the book was received really well and is one of my highest bestsellers to date.

The sequel Crown of Lies, begins straight after the end of Reign of Secrets. I left it on quite a cliffhanger (sorry, readers!), but I planned to release each book fairly close together so readers wouldn’t have to wait that long.The last book, Queen of Midnight, follows Grace, as she not only deals with the aftermath of the gates of the underworld being opened, but her power growing stronger, and a couple of bombshells being dropped on her in the form of family secrets. She also doubts herself a lot in this book, so there’s a personal journey she has to take as well so she can eventually be queen and unite the kingdoms.There’s also the angsty romance between Grace and Maddi which I absolutely LOVE. I think they’re my new favourite couple.

So now I’ve whetted your appetite, it’s time for the interview to begin!

You mention in your bio you used to write fan fic. What fandom did you love and how have they influenced your original works?

Yes, I have written some fanfics. I loved writing Supernatural, and a few others. My friend and I actually wrote a Supernatural / X files crossover. I also had a Vampire Diaries one that was pretty popular online, as well as a few based on the Shadowhunter books by Cassandra Clare. They’re still published on Fanfiction.net. And no, I will not tell you my penname…

You’ve studied many different fields … vet nursing, forensic science, dramatic arts … how do they inspire this trilogy?

I’ve found that in studying many different subjects, it’s prepared me well for research when writing a book and as an author. I used some of my forensic science knowledge to write the Adelaide Paige Saga for instance.

You mention writing plays and musicals in your bio which I think is so cool! Any faves and how do they inform your novels?

With my drama class, back before I started writing my first novel, I wrote, produced and directed a series of musicals entitled No Frills Airlines. They were so much fun. Play writing and screenplay writing is a whole different ball game to writing a novel, but I guess they help you with plot. They use the same story arcs.

What speaks to you about paranormal romance? How do you think this trilogy stands out from the crowd? Also, any other great paranormal romances you’d recommend to readers?

I have loved paranormal romance since as long as I can remember. I love writing the creatures, their powers, you know, angels and demons with wings and glowing irises, and a man that can change into a dragon, etc. I think there’s something so interesting and magical about paranormal stories.

In thinking about the Midnight Ball series, when I was trying to market it, I couldn’t really think of a series that was similar. That’s good and bad. You want something to stand out from the crowd, but also something that fits, so readers finished one fantasy or paranormal series, can pick up another similar in theme and genre etc. When I first started writing and plotting Reign of Secrets, there wasn’t anything published that was like it at the time. And now a year later, I’m finding a lot more stories featuring gods and goddesses and epic adventure fantasies out there.

Can you give us an elevator pitch for the series as a whole?

The Midnight Ball series is about a young princess named Grace with magic blood. She lives in a kingdom named Sydlandia, which she then finds out is part of a bigger world called Aurum, and then that world is part of a bigger universe. There are secrets and magic and curses, witches, mysterious demi-gods as well as gorgeous gods and goddesses. Grace finds out her parents had been lying to her throughout her entire life, and she is part of a hidden destiny meant to restore peace throughout all the kingdoms and to unite the worlds. There is also a LGBTQ romance at the heart of it.

Tell us a bit about the trilogy’s protagonist and why we’ll love her.

Grace is naive at first, but only because everyone has been lying to her. But when she finds out about the lies, and experiences further betrayals, she really grows into her own skin and has to grow up quickly. She becomes strong and powerful and empowered, and that’s why I loved writing her. I hope you will love her as much as I do.

Why gods and goddesses? What about them appeals to you? Did you draw upon particular myths and legends for your trilogy?

I hadn’t written about gods and goddesses really before, and it’s something I’ve wanted to explore for a while. As well as creating a brand new world built from the ground up that has its own lore and rules. The trilogy was inspired by Greek mythology, such as the tale of Persephone and Hades, but in my books, Hades calls himself Aed.

Tell us a bit about what we can expect from the romance in Book 3.

Without giving away any spoilers, Grace and Maddi’s romance and relationship as a whole will really be tested in Queen of Midnight. But I promise you, there is a happy ending

What kind of research did you do for this trilogy and what’s the coolest thing you discovered writing Book 3?

As this series is epic fantasy, and the world totally created by me, I didn’t really need research that much. But at a writing retreat, which is where I finally finished Book 3, I threw out a question to the rest of the ladies: If you could eat anything in the world, say it’s your last day on earth, or wanted that special dish you couldn’t get anywhere else, what would it be? Something gods and goddesses would dine on.

Some of the answers floored me, such as Strawberries served in fairy floss tasting clouds, golden pear tarts, and thousand year old mushroom risotto using mushrooms found at the end of the rainbow in the land of the unicorns … most of them made it into a scene toward the end of the book.

Do you have a fave passage you’d like to share with readers to tease the final book?

I can’t really share a quote that won’t spoil the book, but there are so many favourite scenes in this book that I love. It’s my favourite in the whole trilogy. Especially the very last epilogue scene…

Awesome Laura! Thanks so much for chatting to me at my blog! Readers, you can read the complete Midnight Ball series now.

Reign of Secrets: https://books2read.com/reignofsecrets

Crown of Lies: https://books2read.com/crownoflies

Queen of Midnight: https://books2read.com/queenofmidnight

L.L. Hunter is the author of over 20 published works, including The Legend of the Archangel Series and The Eden Chronicles. She has studied everything from veterinary nursing, forensic science, and dramatic arts, but has always known her true calling was to be an author. She has been writing since her teens – everything from fan fiction, to song lyrics, to plays and musicals. When not working on her next paranormal romance, she can be found at home in Australia, reading somewhere comfortable with one or both of her “fur babies.” Follow her on Facebook, Twitter @llhunterbooks, and her blog – http://llhunter.blogspot.com.au.

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Maybe it’s the brooding atmosphere the cinematographers created (sets were built and feats of lighting and smoke and colour paid off – you can read some interesting behind the scenes on this here), maybe it’s Danny Elfman’s beautiful, haunting score, maybe it’s the fun of playing spot-the-Harry-Potter-actor (hint: there’s a lot), maybe it’s the puzzle box script or Johnny Depp back when he was indie or Miranda Richardson stealing every scene she’s in, or the theme of reason and logic versus emotion and heart. Sure, the romance between Ricci and Depp is a bit naff, but it’s all part of the charm.

The Cast

Johnny Depp is an awkward topic of conversation these days (why oh why did you not stay with Vanessa Paradis?) given a raging court case with ex Amber Heard and accusations of domestic violence. It can be hard to put knowledge of his real life dramas back of mind when watching him in a film, especially when many feel he has been dialing his characters up to 11 since the second POTC film. In Sleepy Hollow, he walks a difficult tightrope between leading man and character actor and in my opinion, pulls it off with aplomb. It’s one of Depp’s best performances in my humble opinion.

Police Constable Ichabod Crane comes to Sleepy Hollow from New York City to investigate a series of murders in the village of Sleepy Hollow by a mysterious Headless Horseman. His cowardice, snobbery (as a city slicker he sees himself as superior to the rural town he comes to deliver justice to) and childhood traumas make him an interesting lead. Crane is prepared to place women and children in danger before he himself is risked, but also shows courage, grit and determination in vowing to deal with a supernatural creature he only half believes in.

Christina Ricci as the leading lady, Katrina Van Tassel, is so-so and she and Depp have some cringe romantic lines, which in some ways simply add to the charm of the film (it’s so cheesy it’s fun). It’s also fun to see her play a different part (even if the age gap between her and Depp is a little creepy). Miranda Richardson as Katrina’s step-mum is, of course, brilliant (you can always rely on Ms Richardson to deliver her A game and she has an important role in this story). She’s also very beautiful. The supporting cast (including Michael Gambon, Casper Van Dien, Jeffrey Jones, Richard Griffiths, Ian McDiarmid and Michael Gough) are all good and each has an important part to play. Christopher Lee has a fun cameo and Christopher Walken is astonishingly memorable in his key part. One things certain, Burton put together a dream cast for this film.

The Visuals

Burton has always been known as a visual story-teller and that’s certainly the case with Sleepy Hollow. The contrast between the city and the village is cleverly done through use of fog and colour (or lack thereof), with each and every shot looking like a painting. The costumes are also extremely rich, with Miranda Richardson and Christina Ricci especially, having some beautiful outfits. There are some nifty steampunk touches too which I appreciated, curtesy of Crane’s newfangled detective contraptions from the city.

Some images really stand out … the young child watching a lit Halloween lantern cast shadows on his bedroom wall, the fog creeping as the horseman approaches, snuffing out the village’s torches, Crane’s bird in a cage trick, blood spurting up a pumpkin scarecrow, the way heads spun, the very landscape like a dream culminating in the Tree of the Dead.

Many reviewers at the time noted this is an old fashioned movie, doing visuals lovingly and painstakingly with every ounce of the sweat and tears of the production team evident on the screen. Ian Mcdiarmid was quoted as saying (having just come off the set of Star Wars: Phantom Menace):

Having come from the blue-screen world of Star Wars it was wonderful to see gigantic, beautifully made perspective sets and wonderful clothes, and also people recreating a world. It’s like the way movies used to be done.

For all it’s horror and death, this is a very beautiful film and it makes the journey memorable and worth watching again and again. I notice a new loving detail every time.

The Music

A lot of people feel Danny Elfman’s music sounds the same across Burton films. I’ve always disagreed with that. I think he’s a very good composer and when he’s inspired, his work is truly beautiful. Just think of Edward Scissorhands, Nightmare Before Christmas, Corpse Bride and the Batman films. I’d add Sleepy Hollow to that count. His music for this film tells its own story, full of eerie choirs, violins and crashing horror sounds. It’s a strong enough soundtrack I can happily listen to it on Spotify. The music really adds to the dread of the film and it wouldn’t be as good without it.

The Themes

I loved the motif running through the film about masculine coded reason and logic versus feminine coded emotion, imagination and superstition. It is only when Crane works with both sides that he is able to crack the crime and find love. I also thought the film did a good job of showing why Crane had fallen so hard on the side of logic (“I am beaten down by it”) whilst allowing nods to Hammer Horror and gothic horror tropes (for this is a film that nods to past films including the original Karloff Frankenstein). It really adds a little something to rewatches when you see how the scriptwriter wove this theme throughout the plot and character interactions.

To conclude …

I’m one of those people that just can’t get enough of Burton doing gothic horror. My favourite films by him all edge into that territory … from Batman Returns to Sleepy Hollow to Corpse Bride to Sweeney Todd, something about his lonely, constructed worlds speak to me. Though Sleepy Hollow was popular at the time, it’s a Burton film I hear less and less about as time goes on. I suggest it’s high time people dusted off their DVD jackets or hightailed it to a streaming service. There’s a lot to enjoy in this bloody, eerie tale. It may have little to do with the original Washington Irving story, but it remains a fun jaunt through a beautifully constructed world that could only exist at the movies.

Narnia is a strange blend of magic, myth and Christianity, some of it brilliantly fantastical and richly imaginative, some (the clunking allegory) toe-curlingly, cringingly awful.

I’ve split my thoughts into categories for ease of blogging.

The oddly modern nature and humour of Lewis writing

Look, it’s not all the time, and there’s a lot of points in these novels where I wanted to fling my book across the room, but I had genuinely forgotten how readable Narnia is given its age. Aside from the occasional reference to things like the war or antiquated language around clothing or exclamations of feeling, the books read easily. There are also many moments which are laugh out loud funny (many of which I missed the humour in when I was younger). For example:

On our protagonists being stuck underground with no way out to safety: And you must always remember there’s one good thing about being trapped down here: it’ll save funeral expenses. The Silver Chair

(Pretty much everything Puddleglum says is A plus gold).

On Jill and Eustace’s school getting a makeover: When the police arrived and found no lion, no broken wall, and no convicts and the Head behaving like a lunatic, there was an inquiry into the whole thing. And in the inquiry all sorts of things about Experiment House came out, and about ten people got expelled. After that, the Head’s friends saw that the Head was no use as a Head, so they got her made an Inspector to interfere with other Heads. And when they found she wasn’t much good even at that, they got her into Parliament where she lived happily ever after. The Silver Chair

On the folly of mice vs dragon:

Caspian: “A dragon has just flown over the tree-tops and lighted on the beach. Yes, I am afraid it is between us and the ship. And arrows are no use against dragons. And they’re not at all afraid of fire.”

Reepicheep: “With your Majesty’s leave-” began Reepicheep.

Caspian: “No, Reepicheep,” said the King very firmly, “you are not to attempt a single combat with it.” The Voyage of the Dawn Treader

On girls vs boys:

Edmund: “Girls aren’t very good at keeping maps in their brains”, said Edmund.

Lucy: “That’s because we’ve got something in them”, replied Lucy. Prince Caspian

On education in Calormen (putting aside the slightly uncomfortable Orientalism): For in Calormen, story-telling (whether the stories are true or made up) is a thing you’re taught, just as English boys and girls are taught essay-writing. The difference is that people want to hear the stories, whereas I never heard of anyone who wanted to read the essays. The Horse and his Boy

These are just examples and there are many more besides.

Hodge podge mythology and talking animals

When I was a kid this was a good deal of Narnia’s charm and damn the world-building and I have to admit I’m still the same today. Who could forget the time Susan and Lucy attended a bacchanalia (minus the sex), all those dryads and naiads, centaurs (and the quote about breakfasting with one being a serious business), Father Christmas showing up randomly in The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe, dwarfs, witches, giants and all manner of talking animals. This post on Tor.com explores this more thoroughly than I ever could. But I still love the riot of clashing cultures, myths and allegories today. Plus the food porn!

Pauline Bayne’s wonderful illustrations

When I was a kid, these illustrations were the bomb and now on a re-read, I couldn’t help but feel nostalgic at the wonderful images throughout the Chronicles, with many of them so memorable, I recognized them instantly or in some cases even knew when they were coming. I used to try and copy the illustrations and paint them, and spent one school holiday drawing and painting Pauline’s White Witch. They are definitely lovely and add to the charm and imagination of the series for me.

Issues with plot structure and well-drawn characters

Even as a kid, I recognized Narnia was no Pulitzer prize winner on this front. It used to bother me (without me being able to articulate why) how Aslan always swooped in and solved all the plot problems with a deux ex machina (and I get it fitted with Lewis’ Christian worldview but it does not a good story make). This time around, I really noticed how this device undermined the grand finales of The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe, The Horse and his Boy and Prince Caspian by taking any conflict out of the protagonist’s journeys. In addition, The Magician’s Nephew and The Last Battle seriously suffer in my opinion from too much allegory at the expense of good story-telling. Both of these books have some seriously cool moments that get overshadowed by evangelizing.

Interestingly as an adult, I found the Pevensie children seriously annoying. Where once Lucy was my ideal role model, this time it was Eustace and Jill who really shone, and I suspect that’s because they have proper character flaws that impact on the story as well as more of a character arc alongside Puddleglum (incidentally, The Silver Chair is by far my favourite Narnia book as an adult). The Pevensies (aside from Edmund that time he sold out his family for Turkish Delight) are that bit too good and proper and squeaky clean for my liking.

Gender Politics

So much has been written about this topic, I probably can’t say much that hasn’t already been said, but there’s no two ways about it; Lewis has a particular way of presenting women. They are all virginal and innocent children, scary house matrons, talking animal 1950s house wives, absent, or evil. Jadis and The Lady of the Green Kirtle as the devil stand-ins is more than a little problematic for obvious reasons, but then there is also The Problem of Susan (this link takes you to Neil Gaiman’s most excellent short story on this issue) to contend with. Susan does not follow her siblings and parents into Narnia because she has come to love the superficial and forget Narnia. This is the full conversation about Susan in The Last Battle often discussed:

“My sister Susan,” answered Peter shortly and gravely, “is no longer a friend of Narnia.”

“Yes,” said Eustace, “and whenever you’ve tried to get her to come and talk about Narnia or do anything about Narnia, she says ‘What wonderful memories you have! Fancy your still thinking about all those funny games we used to play when we were children.’”

“Oh Susan!” said Jill, “she’s interested in nothing now-a-days except nylons and lipstick and invitations. She always was a jolly sight too keen on being grown-up.”

“Grown-up, indeed,” said the Lady Polly. “I wish she would grow up. She wasted all her school time wanting to be the age she is now, and she’ll waste all the rest of her life trying to stay that age. Her whole idea is to race on to the silliest time of one’s life as quick as she can and then stop there as long as she can.”

Though I don’t *think* I am a Narnia apologist, I tend to disagree with J K Rowling and Phillip Pullman who see this as Lewis being squicked out by women becoming sexual creatures and agree with those who see this more as Susan has become too superficial and placed her belief and love in the material which precludes her from Narnia. Lewis himself intended to write a sequel where Susan made it back to Narnia. He wrote in a letter dated January 22 1957:

The books don’t tell us what happened to Susan. She is left alive in this world at the end, having by then turned into a rather silly, conceited young woman. But there is plenty of time for her to mend, and perhaps she will get to Aslan’s country in the end—in her own way.

Having said that, the lipstick and nylon bit is super uncomfortable in terms of having a particular sexist connotation and I do think others make valid points about Lewis being pretty mean spirited about Susan. For example, I think this Reddit commentator makes a pretty valid point:

In LWW they grow up. Into adults with adult worries (running a kingdom), adult desires, adult bodies, adult logic. They live full lives. Have friends, maybe lovers. Then suddenly they’re kids again. That’s got to be confusing at best, traumatizing at worst. They live two years in the real world. Get back to normal life, then bam, back to Narnia. They help Caspian, discover that thousands of years have passed, and all they knew and loved is dead. They start to hope they get to stick around, make a new life in Narnia, and then they get sent home and Peter and Susan are told they can never go back. How could you not try to forget? To pretend it was all a game, to focus on the real world, and lipstick and maybe boys and relationships and normal human things. Remembering would be painful.

This particular issue is why I think Gaiman’s story is particularly powerful and why excellent fan fiction pieces abound on the internet about poor Susan. This one from Tumblr is particularly great.

Race Politics

I am not a person of colour, but there’s no two ways around this, Narnia can get pretty racist, particularly with the Calormenes in The Horse and his Boy, with Lewis coming across as Orientalist in a lot of his world-building and descriptions (lest I forget the part about the city smelling of refuse, onions and garlic). All of the Narnians are described as ‘fair’ and ‘beautiful’ compared to their dark skinned treacherous allies and Aravis’ arranged marriage situation isn’t super nuanced. Plus, you could also argue that Shasta is the white saviour who gets Aravis safely out of this terrible situation (though Aravis does do quite a lot in the novel, which was written later when Lewis’ views about women were beginning to change). In The Last Battle, a Calormen does make it to Heaven, but no one else gets a speaking role and it is still clear that his way of speaking is ‘other.’

Then there’s also the uncomfortable colour coding of good and bad characters. The black haired dwarfs are coded as bad (or at least seriously flawed) in Prince Caspian and The Last Battle with Susan (who had dark hair) banned from Narnia and Lucy seen as the perfect child (with her blonde hair and blue eyes). Pauline’s illustrations also depict Jadis/The White Witch as having black hair (though this is never specified in the books themselves). Whether intentional or not, as a kid I definitely picked up on dark hair/darker skinned people as being flawed and/or the other while the fair skinned, blonde types were bound to be good. There is some pretty interesting defence of the books on the sexism and racism score that you can read here and an account of a Muslim man reading Narnia here.

That weird ending in The Last Battle

It’s quite strange. I oscillate on how I feel about the ending of The Last Battle. Some years I like it and other years I hate it as many others have done before me. These days I tend towards the latter. Mainly because as a kid, it was pretty damn traumatizing to read about a whole world being brutally destroyed after a bunch of misery and death and finding out everyone was dead for real and in heaven.

How you stomach that ending I suspect depends on your worldview. Personally, I find Pullman’s ending in His Dark Materials about the republic of heaven far more inspiring than that given to us in the Chronicles. It just seems pretty damn mean to end a seven book series with, Hooray kids, all of Narnia is brutally destroyed and you are DEAD but don’t worry, forget about your sister and friends and head on over to heaven. These days, I’d probably tell those who aren’t ardent fans to stop at The Silver Chair.

In conclusion …

Are these books worth a read? Definitely. Should that read be taken with a grain of salt? Absolutely. And if your kids are reading, prepare for some awkward conversations about Calormenes, the problem of Susan and when Christian allegory can interfere with good story-telling. But will I be watching the Netflix adaptations? You can bet the entire contents of my wallet.

A tall woman towers over me, her hair done in intricate ringlets like the statues they have in The Louvre, a shining pomegranate balancing on her head. When she smiles, crimson juice stains her teeth. “Welcome,” she says as she extends me her hand.

“I’m dead, aren’t I?” Maybe it’s for the best. I’d had nowhere to go and no plan for the future when I’d run away from Andre’s drunken punches, but I’d soon found homelessness every bit as lonely and soul-biting as the newspapers said.

“What a strange question,” the woman replies, and I can see she believes it, grey silk sliding about her arms as she pulls me to my feet. She extends me a black goblet. “You won’t die unless you drink.”

I hold onto the goblet, but I don’t do as she says. “Where am I? Who are you?”

“The Avenue des Champs-Élysées, silly. Where else? As to who I am? I’m a woman who’s lost her way.”

I glance behind me, through the Arc, at a world that’s white and full of magic from the fairy lights on the trees and laugh. “Join the club. Where are you trying to get then?”

“Aglea.”

“Never heard of it,” I say dismissively, leaning back into the Arc. It’s weird having no one crowding for snaps or yelling because you’re ruining the aesthetic of a national monument.

“Not it. Who.” She smiles. “You know I’m Persephone, right?”

“Sure, and I’m Hades.” Still, there is the fact I’m in some kind of second Paris so maybe it’s not as mad as all that.

“You’re not mad at all,” she laughs and I’m trying not to freak out that she’s somehow read my mind. “The world’s gotten everything wrong about me. They say I wanted the underworld to escape my mother, that Hades kidnapped me, and I made the best of it, that other Gods and heroes came to woo me. They say Hephaeastus was one of them.” She steps forward to grasp both my arms. “Bullshit. It was you, Aglea, I yearned for.”

“Come again?”

She tilts her head. “You truly don’t remember?” And before I can back away her honeyed lips are on mine and it’s intoxicating and frightening all at once.

“We walked through the Elysian Fields and we loved, but then you returned to Zeus and Olympus. You Charities were always too unselfish. I’ve waited so long for you to be reborn and to find me.”

My head feels like cotton candy as I let her take my hand and force the death goblet back to my lips. I’m thinking I’d rather stick with a goddess over Andre or begging and there’s the fact I remember someone who looked an awful lot like this Persephone in Algeria, when I’d bought my plane ticket to France. She’d given me money, told me some story about making a fortune in the city of love. Had it all been leading to this?

I’ll take the chance. I drink down to the bitter dregs.

1. The Merlin trilogy by Mary Stewart

Mary Stewart was famous for her thriller romances in exotic locales (man, Madame will you talk? is a brilliant debut and brilliant title). In the 70s she surprised everyone with her Merlin trilogy, an imagining of the King Arthur legend from Merlin’s first person perspective. In this series, there is a focus on historical realism over fantasy and magic, and I have the entirety of the series to thank for my obsession with the historical basis for the legend. As a young teen, I liked The Crystal Cave best with some of The Last Enchantment (with the sexually promiscuous Morgause) also an eye-opener at that age. I thought the ending to the series in The Last Enchantment was particularly beautiful.

You can buy the entire trilogy from Book Depository

2. The Dragon Prince and Dragon Star trilogies by Melanie Rawn

Sometimes I wonder at my mother. There was A LOT of sex and violence in these books and I lapped up every moment. My favorite characters by a long shot were Sioned and Rohan and I liked the original trilogy more than the second because of this. One of the first times magic and dragons felt well done for me. People accuse these books of being soapie, and I guess to some extent they are, but there were (and still are) moments of genuine emotion for me, particularly around Pol mucking everything up and Andry too. I liked the combination of Machiavellian politics and magic and in the first book, Roelstra and his children sure were terrifying villains.

You can find the entire series on Book Depository starting with Dragon Prince

3. The Deverry Saga by Katharine Kerr

I don’t much care for this series past The Fire Dragon (which in my opinion was the perfect place to end the saga), but I did love this series to death as a child. My favorite sections were the ones where Rhodry and Jill had adventures and bested the dark dweomer as silver dagger outcasts and I think the series lost its lustre when Kerr pulled back from this. I understand she wanted to get away from the swords and sorcery generic trope, but she was onto a good thing with those two.

This series pulled at my heart strings like no other. I cried a lot. I wanted to throw books across the room a lot. There are still lines I can remember off my heart because in my opinion they were just that damn good. I’ve written poetry about Jill. I’ve participated in livejournal comms and started livejournal blogging as a result. I even won a signed copy of The Silver Mage. I still re-read this series up to The Fire Dragon every couple of years. Also Arzozah is the best dragon personification I’ve read in fiction ever. Period.

Again, Mum, not sure how I got away with these. There were rape, incest, sex, blood sacrifice, graphic battle and death scenes galore. But they all served a purpose and were necessary to the story.

You can find the first book in the series, Daggerspell here

4. Agatha Christie crime novels

I was bored at my grandma’s once and found a copy of The Murder of Roger Ackroyd to read. The shock ending caught me well out and I was sold on the genius Christie ever since. Endless Night made quite an impression, scarring me a little for life and it is probably still my favorite Christie. And Then There Were None, Halloween Party and The Clocks also made strong impressions.

My love for Christie never died. I still re-read her on and off and I am currently in the process of re-reading all of her novels in publication order. I’m up to the 1940s and will blog my least favorite to most favorite Christie’s once I finally finish (see you in another three years, interested reader). In 2016 when I met with a friend in London, it was a dream finally fulfilled when we saw The Mousetrap together.

My favorite Christie by a long shot is Endless Night and you can find it here

5. A Series of Unfortunate Events by Lemony Snicket

Anyone who has ever met me knows I like this series A LOT. The Netflix show will be reviewed on this blog shortly. I have reviewed Snicket’s newer series All The Wrong Questions before. I was going through a tough time as a carer and my Mum and Dad divorced and my Granddad died when I was 15. I found it oddly comforting to know that those three children had it worse than me. I loved trying to solve Snicket’s tantalizing asides, the word play and the absurdism too.

The Bad Beginning and the next few in the series may be a little formulaic, but it’s best to start at the start. You can purchase the first book here

6. The Sevenwaters trilogy by Juliet Marillier

I’m sure my best friend, Tegan, would agree with me; this series by an Australian author is seriously good! Beautifully written, full of good research, beautiful romances and held together within an Irish first person oral story telling framework, this is some of the best modern fantasy you’ll ever read. Daughter of the Forest must be one of the strongest fantasy debuts ever penned and is my favorite of the series. There’s one scene that is brutal and is guaranteed to make you cry or throw the book across the room. Anyone who’s read this will know the scene I mean. Keep going. It’s a scene with purpose. Trust me. The trilogy’s end in Child of the Prophecy is one of the best fantasy endings to a series I’ve ever read too.

Find Daughter of the Forest here

7. Harry Potter

What can I say about this series that hasn’t already been said? I didn’t much like the series post Book 5, but there’s no denying the power of the original Potterverse. How I longed to visit Honeydukes and drink butter beer, or journey through Diagon Alley. How I wished I’d get a letter from Hogwarts (I did once. From the President of UOW Harry Potter Society anonymously I believe). I lined up at crazy hours to get the next book in the series and stayed up all night to avoid spoilers (how dare people spoil Dumbledore’s death in book 6!). I got to see the first two films with school as a library monitor and the last two on exchange in the UK(!). I’ll never forget the surreal experience of sitting in a packed theatre at Oxford to watch the final film and the sound of tissues rustling and everyone sobbing their hearts out at the Snape mini film section.

After all this time?
Always.

You have a heart of stone if that doesn’t get you. I made a lot of friends through this fandom and did a lot of crazy things (like dress as Boggart Snape for a Yule Ball Party once).

I’m not bothering to link to Harry Potter. If you don’t already own it there’s something wrong

Honorable mentions: Everything by Isobelle Carmody but especially the Obernewtyn series and Alyzon Whitestarr. I only omitted her because I included her in my tender years too. Phillip Pullman’s His Dark Materials trilogy. The tried and true staples: The Chronicles of Narnia and Lord of the Rings.

I have such fond memories of these long Saturdays with books, that I thought I’d write two posts capturing my favourite discoveries. This first post covers primary years. The second post will track early high school.

And now in no particular order…

1. The Asterix comic series

I read them all, but a few stick out as being particularly memorable. I still can’t read about Cleopatra without imagining Caesar and everyone else she came into contact with commenting on the quality of her nose. I enjoyed Asterix in Britain with the constant tea drinking and the football match. I can’t think about the country Switzerland without seeing the comic strips from Asterix in Switzerland of Roman legions engaging in orgies and gorging on too much cheese fondue. Asterix and Obelix all at Sea highlighted the bond between the two friends and I also liked the stories set in The Middle East.

2. The TinTin comic series

There’s a strong theme happening here. Once my brother and I had devoured all of Asterix, we started on TinTin. Excluding the first two (let’s pretend they never happened), most are great mysteries. TinTin in Tibet is the most emotional, but I also loved the Incan two parter, The Calculus Affair and The Red Sea Sharks with an unhealthy obsessive love. Most loved of all was the first appearance of Captain Haddock in The Crab With The Golden Claws. Best. Comic. Ever. The relatively good animation is now available on Netflix.

3. Enid Blyton. All of them.

They aren’t politically correct. They aren’t high brow literature. They are often racist. Blyton novels may be all these things, but by jove how I wished I was one of the featured children off on my next adventure. I never warmed to The Secret Seven as much as The Famous Five, and I liked The Faraway Tree series better than The Wishing Chair series. Strangely, none of the popular ones were my most beloved. The Adventurous Four and The Adventurous Four Again as well as The Adventure series became firm favourites. I’m ready for a re-read…

4. Nancy Drew series

I even owned the computer game of Secrets Can Kill (Number 1 in the Nancy Drew files) as a child. That game was scary, hard shit. My best friends and I spent hours and hours trying to crack that mystery and I don’t think we ever managed it. Anyway, Nancy Drew. I loved everything about her stories. There’s so many and I’ve mixed them up so often in my head, I couldn’t pick a favourite, but I seem to remember loving one about a Chinese girl getting kidnapped and another involving candles containing chloroform or some such. I did get into The Hardy Boys, but they were no Nancy Drew.

5. The Obernewtyn Chronicles

Back when I was a kid, some bright spark in government decided to get children to read more books with The Premiere’s Reading Challenge. I’m all for reading challenges, but my ten year old heart broke when there was a set reading list, 90% of which wasn’t genre fiction. Getting through the reading list was torture, but there was one small ray of sunshine.* The librarian handed me a copy of Obernewtyn by Isobelle Carmody. The story scared the shit out of me, but I loved it, and thus a stubborn persistence to wait for the series to end was born. I finally read the final book in the series last year. It felt like coming home.

*All right, I exaggerate a little. I also discovered Emily Rodda through this challenge and Deltora Quest was some seriously cool shit (the book cover artist came to my primary school once and it was the best). And around this time I discovered Geoffrey McSkimming and Cairo Jim which was tongue in cheek fun of the best kind.

What about you readers? Any favourites from your youth you want to share?

To be honest, I’m actually not all that clear on what this episode was about. The first half follows Clara and Danny doing the obligatory zoo sleepover with their students, but with a twist. A giant forest comes to London and the children and teachers wander around aimlessly. Meanwhile, one student, Maeve, gets separated from the others and finds The Doctor (aside: strangely though the giant forest takes over London, there are surprisingly few people about for students to bump into). Then there’s something about people destroying trees and something about earth getting destroyed and something about the trees loving earth and saving it and pretty gold dust stuff and the power of the mentally ill to find lost things and… yeah… I don’t know… as I said… a big mess.

Companions who never were?

Child actors generally don’t bode well for companions of the week (see Nightmare in Silver and Courtney) but Maebh was quite good even if her storyline was rubbish. Her plaintive ‘everyone knew everything but me’ felt quite honest and I liked the way she thought differently to not just her teachers and fellow class mates, but also The Doctor. The most interesting scene for me in the whole episode was the one where Maebh told The Doctor that the trees were communicating silently and he didn’t believe her because he couldn’t hear them speak. I can’t find the exact quote online, but she basically pointed out to him that people communicate non-verbally all of the time and it was a pretty neat put down.

Clara and Danny

Urgh, these two are just no Amy/Rory no matter how hard this show tries to sell them to me as such. I genuinely don’t give a damn about Danny until Dark Water (which is pretty ironic as you’ll see in my write-up next week) and imo Clara is too good for him for the most part. The decision to have Danny constantly question Clara’s choice to travel with The Doctor, essentially forcing her to lie to him about still travelling in the TARDIS drives me insane every episode.

Danny: You said you haven’t seen him in months

Clara: Something like that

Clara, the fact you have to keep lying should be telling you something!

Danny brings out the worst in The Doctor too. When Maebh first meets The Doctor and tells her story he pettishly replies with, ‘Mr Pink was looking after you… that explains why you’re lost.’

Finally, Danny gets extra irritating this episode when he tells Clara why the TARDIS isn’t for him.

Danny: I don’t want to see more things. I want to see the things in front of me.

Yes, I get that Danny was a soldier and saw and did awful things. The problem is, we’ve been told about it, not shown it and I simply don’t buy his comments. Who wouldn’t want to travel the TARDIS? Really? (Ok, so I know Rory didn’t want to, but he loved Amy so much he did it anyway and found hidden reserves inside himself he didn’t even know existed. I love Rory. Danny just stagnates)

The Doctor

Harsh Doctor is back in full force this week. Take when Maebh first turns up. His response to her unexpected appearance on his TARDIS doorstep is, ‘You need an appointment to see The Doctor.’ Callous, much? Though this Doctor does seem to have travel differentiating between adults and children and tends to lump all humans in terms of functionality in the same basket.

Capaldi is also given the opportunity this week to dig into his softer side in time for the finale and the Christmas special. He tells Clara he can use his TARDIS to save Clara from the destruction of earth.

Clara: I don’t want to be the last of my kind.

The Doctor: This is my world too.

The conviction and quiet delivery of the lines is quite beautiful. I think Capaldi is also very good when he says that the human super power is forgetting, sounding sad, thoughtful and relieved all at once.

Mental illness, fairy stories and un-earnt denouements

In general, the main problem for me with this episode is the lack of real conflict. However, where everything really started to go pear-shaped was when the script writer thought it would be a good idea to imply that mental illness equated to some kind of magical ability that could inexplicably bring back lost things. Wow, way to perpetrate stereotypes much! The fairy story tone didn’t actually give the writer a get out of jail free card as some episodes got in series 5 because tonally it didn’t match the rest of Capaldi’s run. I simply felt cheated when Annabelle turned up in a bush by Maebh’s house. Furthermore, Maebh’s imagination (depicted through her coloured drawings) felt too Fear Her for my liking and the reveal that she’d created the tree plague felt pretty random. When The Doctor says that the forest is mankind’s nightmare (hello Into The Woods), it’s actually Maebh’s nightmare (or deep desire), but none of these reveals really gel or feel earned. Look, maybe I’m just sensitive, but this whole concept felt like a hot mess.

Missy

Missy turning up, even if for a minute, is always welcome. This episode I just felt confused. Why was Missy surprised that the trees saved earth? Or was she actually implying that she was surprised at The Doctor’s choice to remain on an earth about to be destroyed? Why? Does anyone know what this scene was about? Please help.

On the plus side, next week is Missy in crystal clear abundance and one of the best episode’s of the season.

In The Forest of the Night: 2/10 inky stars

In one of the more interesting fairy story appropriations, there has even been a Tony award winning Broadway musical featuring the memorable rapping witch, Bernadette Peters, in a post modern opretta. With songs like Children Should Listen, Last Midnight and No One is Alone, Sondheim further cemented himself as a musical composer and lyricist of considerable skill with Into The Woods.

It’s fair to say that I care quite a lot about this one. I was more than a little worried, however, when I heard that Disney were making Sondheim’s Tony winning musical. The very idea seems an oxymoron. Though the first act follows tried and true fairy tale paths, albeit by revisiting the origin fairy stories of those we know and love today, the second act tracks what happens after ‘happily ever after’ has faded and becomes a moving treatise on relationships between parents and children and the importance of stories in shaping children. It’s hardly something I would have thought was up Disney’s alley.

I also wasn’t too happy when I heard that Meryl Streep had been cast as The Witch (aside: why must Hollywood insist there is only one woman over 50 suitable for Hollywood roles? It’s very tedious. Years ago Miranda Richardson pointed this out despite cries of ‘sour grapes’ but her point feels more relevant than ever these days. I like Meryl Streep and she’s a wonderful actress, but other excellent older women who act are out there!) It’s just that Bernadette Peters made that role and The Witch is the best character and I couldn’t see Meryl being as powerful a singer as Bernadette. However, it is my brother’s favorite musical and every time an adaptation is put on near us I can’t see it, so I felt like I owed it to him to see it. Also, I quite like Emily Blunt.

Surprisingly, the film isn’t as bad as you’d think it might be. Actually, it’s rather, well, good. The first half religiously follows the first act of the musical, a quest story held together by The Baker (James Cordon) and his wife (Emily Blunt), who must reverse a witches curse by collecting items from people from popular fairy stories (Jack and the Beanstalk, Cinderella, Little Red Riding Hood and Rapunzel) so that they might get their long sought after child. This half sits more comfortably with Disney’s modern oeuvre, particularly modern films like Burton’s take on Alice in Wonderland. All of the cast are competent singers, with some of them genuinely very good. It’s no surprise that Daniel Huttlestone (Gavroche in Les Miserables) is excellent, but though I’d heard Blunt sing once before in Poliakoff’s excellent Gideon’s Daughter, I was surprised by how convincing she was as The Baker’s Wife and Anna Kendrick sang a beautiful Cinderella. Johnny Depp was also perfectly cast as The Wolf and The Prince’s entertain in the wonderful Agony sequence. In fact, the only real quibble I had with the first half of the film was the decision to leave The Narrator in. Given that he didn’t play the part he was meant to play in Act 2 of the film, it just sounded silly to have him tell us what characters were about to do just before they did it and he threw me out of the story. The only other minor quibble I had was that Meryl Streep sounded a bit out of breath during her rapping sequence at the start.

On the other hand, Disney didn’t edit out the line, ‘he was robbing me, raping me,’ which I was certain they’d do. Actually, they left a lot in. Cinderella’s sisters still mutilate their feet to try to win The Prince, Rapunzel’s Prince still gets blinded by the angry Witch, and most importantly of all, they left Little Red Riding Hood’s sequence with The Wolf as an ode to emerging sexuality. I was dead certain they’d tone that controversy down. Johnny Depp was creepily pedophilic as he crooned Hello, Little Girl and when Little Red Hiding is rescued and later sings ‘And I know things now, many valuable things, that I never knew before…’ the Freudian overtones were still there. It was perfect.

Unfortunately, the second act of the film became a bit of a mess, and from what I’ve heard from many of my friends who haven’t seen the original musical, for them it was both incomprehensible and confusingly amoral. It all stems from the fact that they cut the Act 2 Prologue which shows what happens when the initial ‘ever after’ has started to fade. This is really important to the story because it explains why The Baker’s Wife strays and commits adultery with Cinderella’s Prince (because her baby won’t stop crying at all hours and her husband is too insecure to help her look after the baby) and because in cutting this song and later Agony Reprise (the line, ‘ah well… back to our wives…’ is deliciously ironic), we don’t get a sense of just how misogynistic and flighty The Princes are (In the original, Rapunzel’s Prince abandons her in the wood for Snow White and Rapunzel is left roaming the forest mad until she gets killed and Cinderella’s Prince seduces The Baker’s Wife after singing about how much he wants Sleeping Beauty). This omission seriously weakens the character of The Baker’s Wife and makes her seem like a right floozy, though poor Emily Blunt does her best with what she is left with. The cutting of the Rapunzel story arc also makes The Witch’s motives in Last Midnight less coherent, which in turn, weakens the ‘children should listen’ theme.

Still, it was all beautifully sung, and Meryl Streep seemed a lot more comfortable singing Children Should Listen and Last Midnight (my favourite song in the entire musical) then she did rapping at the start of the film. It is also a very complex musical, as all of Sondheim’s pieces are, and filming his stuff well is nigh on impossible, even if Burton did succeed with Sweeney Todd (I would argue this is because he is an auteur director though). The fairy story revisionism part of Into The Woods is only the tip of this rich play. Digging deeper, it is a Freudian look at relationships between parents and children, a post modern take on morality and the way we, as individuals, choose to tell our stories, and a parable about the need to take action, to journey, to do with all of your being (to go into the woods) even if doing so undoes you. I absolutely love that the musical and the film end on Cinderella’s final ‘I wish.’

I’ll leave you with the finale lines which sums up the entire point of the show:

Careful the wish you make,
Wishes are children.
Careful the path they take,
Wishes come true,
Not free.
Careful the spell you cast,
Not just on children.
Sometimes the spell may last
Past what you can see
And turn against you…

All
Though it’s fearful,
Though it’s deep, though it’s dark
And though you may lose the path,
Though you may encounter wolves,
You can’t just act,
You have to listen.
you can’t just act,
You have to think.

If Disney had taken as much care with the second half of the film as they did with the first half, this could have been a second Sweeney Todd. As it is, it’s a passable effort with moments of brilliance.

Into The Woods: 7/10 inky stars

I have read criticisms of this film that criticise it for not casting people of colour. Whilst I get where this criticism comes from and acknowledge it’s a valid one, given that diverse casting is a wider Hollywood problem, I don’t think it’s necessarily fair to single out this film for all of the blame.

River Song

Ah Professor Song. What an unexpected delight you proved to be. When I first saw River alongside Ten in the Moffat two parter Silence in the Library/Forest of the Dead, she made little to no impression, joining the ranks of people in s4 who became ‘the companions who never were.’ So little did she register on my character radar, I was left asking River Who? when she was announced as appearing in Time of Angels. From the opening few minutes of Time of Angels, the character felt fresh and revitalized: from her coy use of hallucinogenic lipstick, the peroxide blonde curls which she fluffed coolly to the confident way she knew that The Doctor beguiled would pick her up from space.So much did I grow to love River in series 5, I wrote an essay on her for my gender politics class in first year university.

River is such a refreshingly feminist character, I could write a book about it. Now nobody but the most die hard of Whovians have time for that, so I have made a list instead. Below the list are criticisms that people have of River and my responses.

Reasons Why River is a Feminist Character 101:

1. Alex Kingston is allowed to play an older, sexy, desirable woman, sometimes in a near lead part, alongside the youngest Doctor ever. For those who are thinking ‘so what?’ have you watched TV lately? When’s the last time you saw a sexy, older woman be allowed to be a sexy, older woman without the TV story harshing on her? Be honest now.

2. Following on from the last point, in a show about Doctor Who ie The Doctor ie white, male Brit actor, River is often smarter, wiser, more compassionate even, then The Doctor (well, she is a Pond). She spends a lot of her screen time making fun of The Doctor and solving problems he can’t solve. Lest we all forget the enormously entertaining time she told The Doctor to use his screwdriver to build a cabinet whilst she shot down The Silence. Some fans didn’t like this at all. To them I say, keep your sexist opinion to yourself. That kind of attitude says a lot about you and not a lot about Moffat.

3. River Song doesn’t care about rules or gender norms. River does things like date aliens with multiple heads to keep things interesting. River does things like shoot The Doctor’s fez because we all know it isn’t really cool. River does things like break out of prison all of the time in the most brazen way possible because why not? River does things like threaten to destroy the universe to save the person she loves because deep down you can’t keep a bad girl down. Remember Point No. 1? Alex was over 50 for all 13 episodes she appeared in. Just saying.

4. River Song is smart. She’s a professor of archaeology after all, and all of the best companions have a healthy respect for history (Evelyn Smythe). She runs rings around us ordinary folk. It must be a 51st century thing.

I could go on further but I feel like that covers the basics. Now, from what I read within fandom, most people didn’t have a problem with River as a sexist character initially. People disliked her because they weren’t fans of Alex or because they didn’t like River being depicted as The Doctor’s equal (oh the irony) or because they didn’t like the romance angle. This all changed with the dire yet utterly mad Let’s Kill Hitler and The Wedding of River Song in Series 6 which revealed that River was Amy’s child, stolen by The Silence to destroy The Doctor. River is redeemed by The Doctor in Let’s Kill Hitler after her attempted murder fails. She then refuses to follow through on fate in The Wedding of River Song, nearly destroying the universe in the process. People didn’t like this seemingly sudden linear approach to Doctor Who’s Time Traveler’s Wife take which seemed to indicate that River’s birth, childhood and adulthood had all been molded and shaped by The Doctor, in an echo of Amy.

I again repeat what I said in my first essay. That is one aspect of the story but it is not all of River. We do not see her life outside of the show which revolves around The Doctor as the main character. This is because the show is not the River show. It is The Doctor show. We do know that River has adventures separate to her life with The Doctor. Hence her relationships with unmet aliens and humans, her archaeological adventures (why was there no spin off?), her refusal to travel full time with The Doctor because the fun is in the not knowing when they’d next meet. It was interesting that River refused. Hardly the actions of someone whose entire identity revolved around The Doctor.

Besides, I feel people miss the point of River’s character arc in Series 6. Moffat’s Doctors aren’t about Gods and destiny ala RTD and Ten. Moffat’s Doctors are about being catalysts for change, about bringing out the best in humans so that they bring out the best part in The Doctor. River is stolen away as a baby and brainwashed to kill The Doctor. When she is outwitted The Doctor gives her a choice to choose a different way. He knows it. Because his first is her last. That doesn’t make River predictable. It gives her agency. Agency to claim any identity she wants as long as that identity is not one based on hate and anger. That isn’t about gender politics. It’s about humanism. And so we end up with series 5, 6.1, and 7.1 River who is bad ass and wild and sexy and and smart and blows shit up for fun. We end with post library River in The Name of the Doctor who gets her Doctor closure and… chooses to let go and accept her fate, fading away. River, you strong woman, I salute you.

Clara Oswald

After The nuanced Pond’s, Clara felt stale before she even got started. Though she had strong starts as Dalek Oswin in Asylum of the Daleks and as governess Clara in The Snowmen,, throughout series 7 she remained more of a plot device than a character. People choose to read this as Moffat’s propensity for sexism. I read it as Moffat’s propensity to write complex and detailed plots using characters like stiff set pieces to move plots forward. A story telling failing? Absolutely! Sexist? Harder to determine, not living inside Moffat’s head and understanding his intent.

From the Series 7 finale on, something strange and kind of magical happened. Clara became important. Really important. Not just pretty sidekick companion important to the plot because of reasons. Actually, meaningfully and powerfully important within the entire Who canon. First, it turns out she tells The Doctor to take that faulty TARDIS, second, she discovers his secret and sees all of him in a way no other companions have, thirdly, she makes The Doctor see a way to go back and prevent himself from committing genocide to end the Time War, fourthly, she is one of the only companions to see The Doctor’s childhood, even offering him words of comfort about fear and creatures under your bed, fifth, she BECOMES the freaking Doctor in the excellent Flatline, sixth, she manages to prolong near certain cyber death in Death in Heaven by pretending to be The Doctor, earning Jenna Coleman the privilege of being the first ever companion to have her name come before the actor playing The Doctor in the opening credits, seventh, she spends all of series 8 telling and showing The Doctor that she won’t be bossed around by him, spending many episodes solving alien problems herself before The Doctor gets near them. So unexpectedly important has Clara become in The Doctor’s life, a friend of mine has re-titled the show and her, Clara Who?

That doesn’t excuse the woeful Series 7. Or the limp injection of the Danny/Clara story line into series 8, and the poor writing that created these messes. By the same token, it doesn’t make Clara a sexist character. It makes her a partially poorly written one. In Series 8 she becomes more though: control freak, passionate lover, angry avenger, teacher, problem solver and most importantly, a close friend. It helps that Jenna is an excellent actress. I’m not entirely sold on Clara as a character, but I do think we should acknowledge the audacity of Moffat making her the unexpected linchpin of the show. Hardly a sexist move.

Missy

I admit, I am not objective when it comes to Missy. I was in love from the second she manically spun around her creepy version of Heaven in Deep Breath.

People have made lots of dumb claims about Missy on the internet. How dare Moffat change a Time Lord’s gender some say. Fuck off, sexist twits, I say. This post sends up some choice examples of the idiocy and is entertaining to boot. Others complain that Moffat is a sexist pig because as soon as he started writing a female Master she flirted with The Doctor. I admit, I feel vaguely sorry for these people. Have they read fanfic.net? Livejournal? Tumblr? Oh bless, have they ever seen a single canon Master story? People have been slashing this pairing for years, and um yes folks, that means shipping Doctor/Master same sex (oh the horror!). Still others (I believe MarySue was one of them), complained that a female Master merely served to mock fans who want a female Doctor and have no hope of getting one. This is so unfounded I can’t even. Unless you are determined to hate on Moffat in the face of all evidence to the contrary, it is evident that he is trying to push the possibility of a female Doctor on to many fans radars. Not everyone has thought about it as much as the rest of us have. Some people are dead against it. Change needs to be introduced slowly. Hence Gaiman’s The Doctor’s Wife, which revealed Time Lords can switch gender, the Missy gender change reveal, and the conversation at the end of Death in Heaven where Clara suggests to The Doctor that he could return home to be a Queen rather than a King and he agrees with her. If The Doctor is cast as a female next regeneration, I will be mocking half of the internet. I told you so.

Michelle Gomez is great as Missy and I am glad that she is playing a more Delgado style Master. I like that she is chillingly evil and like a deranged Mary Poppins at the same time. I like that her reason for her plan was the most interesting plan a Master has had in years. I like that she manipulates humanity and The Doctor with lies and deception the same as every other Master before her. Her gender has changed, but if anything, she felt the most masterish for a long time. Poor Moffat. He casts the best person for the role (and across the internet and fandom it’s pretty widely acknowledged that Michelle was the best person for the role) and writes the character in a way that doesn’t depend on gender stereotypes (If you can’t see that The Master/Doctor nose kiss was about power, I give up) and people still accuse Moffat of Missy sexism. The poor man can never win.

In Summary:

Look, it’s no secret that I dig Moffat Who. I think that his stories are richer and subtler and more nuanced than RTD’s. I think that he dares to be audacious and break audience expectations. I think that he dares to push boundaries. I think that he dares to make unpopular decisions for the sake of stories with wide appeal. It’s also no secret that I think my faves, including Moffat, can be problematic. The second half of series 6 and series 7 is best never mentioned again, OK?

However, I don’t think my fave is problematic because he writes sexist characters. I think he writes roles for women which push TV boundaries. I think he sometimes manages to write feminist characters, and actually, the score is that he writes them on Who more often than not.

I passionately believe that Moffat is problematic because his ambitions don’t always fit the television medium and his crack makes it from the page to the screen without a filter. I passionately believe that Moffat can be unintentionally problematic about his characters because he writes complex plots and forgets how to characterize.

I also passionately believe that Moffat is not sexist. I passionately believe that Moffat Who is one of the most unexpectedly feminist shows on TV, and that the internet heat is mostly a lot of ill informed and poorly contextualized hot air. And this essay has ended without even mentioning the lesbian relationship between a lizard alien and a human woman…

I am feminist and I really, really, really love Moffat Doctor Who. I’m done (re)explaining why.