Here’s a behind-the-scenes blog on my second novel, On Earth, As It Is. If you haven’t read it yet, be forewarned that this posting assumes you did. In other words, major spoilers ahead.
People often ask me about my names. I’ve been fascinated with how much of a role names play in novels. Scrooge, Severus Snape, Ishmael. These are names that stay with you and somehow convey characteristics of a person in a novel. In Dickens’ time, they may say “He was a wicked old screw.” See how close Screw and Scrooge are, and why the name Scrooge meant something to people even subconsciously?
I’m not that psychological, but when I started Kingdom Come I decided I was going to have fun with the names. No wicked names here like Garblood Dragonbane. I only broke this rule once (I’m proud of Fyrekilm for Rose Red), but I decided for some of my characters to put in a hidden meaning, or just have fun with the name.
On Earth, As It Is, I introduce a number of new characters which gave me the opportunity to be creative with names. So we have five women from earth who take the place of the five queens of Kingdom. Trying to remember which of the five women took the place of which of the five queens was hard for this writer. “Was Paisley Nepta Snow White’s replacement or Penta’s?” I tried to make it easy on the reader (and the writer too!) and have the first letter of each of the women match the first letter of each of the queens. So Cinderella’s “C” matches the “C” in her counterpart, Charley. And Sylvia’s “S” matches “Snow White.” To add to the fun, each of their last names are anagrams of the queens’ first names. For example, we have Paisley Nepta who fills in for Penta. Nepta is an anagram of Penta. I’m certain most readers spotted this little bit of nonsense.
I introduce the Hartstone family and their names at different points of the book for a reason. The Hartstones are the family who adopted Cinderella. I assume everyone knows she has a step-mother and two step-sisters. The sisters’ names are Bonita and Clydamonte, or Bonnie and Clyde. The mother’s name is Astoria, so (and I admit this is really obscure) if you take the first letter of each name, you have A-B-C.
Some people figured out my dragon names. In my opinion, Smaug remains the best of dragon names in literature. I racked my brains trying to come up with something half as great but failed. So I went the other way. If I can’t be cool, then at least I can be silly. The mother-grandmother combination is Her-She (Hershey) and her sons Cra-Kel (Crackel), Ree-See (Reeses), Wop-Pur (Wopper), and the groaners go on from there.
Danforth came from Sally Forth, a cartoon whose name I always loved. It was only later I realized that Dan’s name matched my illustrator, Dan Johnson. I named the mob boss’s after actor John Fielder who, among his many credits, voiced Piglet. I enjoyed pairing this big bad wolf of a character with Piglet’s voice actor.
Lastly on the subject of names, I must admit to a serious faux-paux in my second novel. In the first one, Planet the pixie renames Harold as “Hero” because, when you cross worlds, you should get a new name. As I was in the middle of my millionth revision of On Earth, I realized I had never renamed Sondra. I originally added a line at the end of the book where Sondra wonders why she didn’t get a “cool, new name.” I decided to remove this passage and hope people wouldn’t notice, but now that I’ve admitted it, oh well. I saved Sondra’s “Kingdom” name for a future installment if I ever continue the series.
The themes of On Earth center around identity. The queens counterparts are both like and unlike the queens. My goal was to take a virtue of each of the queens and twist it to its opposite. The virtues of loyalty (Penta), pacifism (Helga), philanthropy (Valencia), modesty (Cinderella), and courage (Snow White) are reflected back to them as their opposites. I chose the word “reflected” on purpose as it’s always a reflection that shows the alter ego. In the case of the queens, it’s the mirrors. In the case of Sondra, it’s a reflective surface. I placed mirrors carefully throughout the story. Sondra uses her compact mirror in Harold’s apartment and she’s herself. When her compact smashes on the ground after saving Hero, she’s no longer completely herself. She’s now Sondra with pixie highlights. She’s “restored” to being Sondra when she looks at herself in the pool at the end.
The Claddagh ring also symbolize friendship (as it always has). Sondra takes it off at the beginning and leaves it on the sink. Her friendship with Harold is broken. Harold picks it up and gives it to Clydamonte indicating they are now friends and Clyde passes it onto Sondra, also cementing their relationship. Why doesn’t Sondra give it back to Harold in the end? Because another ring comes into play that symbolize a whole lot more than friendship. The new ring symbolize that Hero and Sondra’s relationship is not “the same, old thing” it once was, but a deeper, “richer” ring. When marriages stay together or fall apart, it’s not because they stay the same, it’s because they change, and those changes come through experiences (note Harold’s speech to Sondra).
The horse is also a symbol. Often connected with freedom and riding “the open range,” women riding horses is a powerful symbol of many things. In this case, the horse transports Sondra to Kingdom. The toy horse symbolizes her desire to be with Harold and it’s so strong it transforms and takes her directly to him. It’s also a flipped symbol. On earth, it’s a toy that should unlock imagination and not a “real” thing. In Kingdom, it becomes real. This hearkens back to the first book which asks the question “What is real anyway?”
The first novel Kingdom Come referenced many fairy tales. I didn’t want to repeat myself, so I toned that aspect of the novel down quite a bit. However, I wanted to introduce a few fairy tale characters into Kingdom, and so we now have Alice from Alice in Wonderland, Tom Thumb from Tom Thumb, Gretal from Clever Gretal, and the entire concept of white snake from The White Snake. Hope you spotted them. And kudos to my beta reader who told me White Snake is also a drink which I incorporated into the story.
As you read, On Earth was carefully plotted and I paid attention to details to bring you not only a fairy tale but a novel about relationships, virtue and sin, popular culture, and ultimately, marriage. My boy-meets-girl story is Kingdom Come. This novel explores what happens afterwards. How does boy-and-girl-stay-together? I hope you enjoyed it.