Edward Willett

The Fifth Princess by Alice Willett

This is the short story my 10-year-old daughter Alice (that’s her in the picture–she’s the one on the right) entered in the Canadian Children’s Book Centre’s Book Week 2012 Writing Contest for Kids & Teens. She didn’t win or get an honorable mention, but I still think it’s pretty good. (It’s also possible she was disqualified because, try though she might, with everything I could suggest, she couldn’t get the story under the 1,500-word limit…although she was close. But since the first version of this story was more like 2,500 words, and at that, she’d left out some elements she intended to include, I thought she did pretty well.)

Anyway, enjoy!

***

The Fifth Princess

By Alice Willett, Age 10

When the fifth daughter of the king and queen of Averandel reaches the age of fifteen, she will fight the peril that befalls us.

š›As Princess Jennifer climbed the mountain to the dragon’s lair her mind was focusing on one thing: slaying the dragon. She could not fail.

Ever since she was a little girl she had dreamed of being a Wanderer of Averandel. She would fight monsters and wander around at pleasure. Slaying this dragon would show her parents once and for all she could be a Wanderer.

The Mountain of Zurg was very tall. Jennifer knew the dragon’s lair was up at the top. She looked down to see how far she’d gone. Quickly looking up from the dizzying view, Jennifer kept climbing.

Directly below, a young prince was riding his horse to the forest. His mind on catching a deer, he didn’t look up. If he had he probably would have fainted, because Prince Suran of Ameran was definitely not the most noble prince. He wasn’t brave or courageous. He thought he was, but that was far from the truth.

As Jennifer climbed farther, she thought about the best way to slay the dragon. She figured if he started flying she could crawl under him and slay him from beneath. Jennifer put her hand on a rock, thinking it was solid, and…

…it happened so fast she didn’t even realize she was falling. When she did realize, she started screaming. Grabbing a branch, she stopped screaming, looking at the rocks falling away beneath her.

Now even when you’re not noble you do notice screaming, falling rocks and falling dirt. In fact, so much dirt fell on Prince Suran’s freshly cleaned clothes that he thought it proper to look up. Of course he almost fainted, because above his head was a young girl in a tunic, boots and leggings, hanging by one hand off a branch. Since Prince Suran thought he was noble he thought the right thing to do was help her. So he yelled up, “My dear lady, may I ask what you are doing up there?”

Jennifer snorted. “What does it look like I’m doing? A geography lesson?”

Prince Suran, taken aback by this rudeness, yelled back, “No, my lady, I was just wondering how you got up there.” Then, as an afterthought, he yelled, “By the way, I’m Prince Suran of Ameran.”

“Well, to answer your questions, I got up here by climbing and I am the fifth daughter of the King and Queen of Averandel, Princess Jennifer. I was going to slay the dragon.”

Thoroughly confused, Prince Suran yelled, “Pardon me, Princess, but did I just hear you say ‘slay a DRAGON!?’” Prince Suran had never in his life even thought about slaying a dragon.

“Yes! I was on my way up the mountain when I slipped on a stone.”

Prince Suran thought for a moment. Then he yelled up, “Then I will come to save you, so the dragon,” (his voice wavered), “won’t hurt you.”

Jennifer frantically yelled, “No! I can save myself!” Jennifer knew that if this clumsy oaf climbed onto the mountain rocks would fall, and that could wake up the dragon. He’ll kill himself and me, and that would kill Averandel!

“Nonsense!” the prince yelled up. “Wouldn’t allow it! Must come up!”

Jennifer shook her head miserably as Prince Suran started climbing. No sooner had he begun than (as Jennifer knew would happen), the dragon came down, picked Prince Suran up in his powerful claws, and flew away with the prince flailing helplessly. “Helllllp!” he screamed.

When the dragon was no longer in sight Jennifer gingerly climbed down the mountain. Back on the ground, she took one look to the sky and cursed. (Now, as Prince Suran isn’t a very noble prince, Jennifer is definitely not a proper princess.)

Jennifer knew the dragon had three mountains: Zurg, Zorg and Zarg. Zarg was the farthest away, and she was sure that was where the dragon had flown to. Jennifer knew there was a secret passage through Zorg that would take her to Zarg quicker, but first she had to get to Zorg.

The field which the dragon had chosen to guard his mountains was dangerous.  Jennifer thought about each type of monster she might face and how she would fight it.  She thought about many monsters, each more dreadful than the last. At the end she thought about the worst yet: a Batax, part bat, part snake. Jennifer shivered, but she kept walking towards the not-so-distant Zorg.

#

Zorg is even taller than Zurg, Jennifer thought as she looked up at the towering mountain. I’m glad I don’t have to climb it! She walked around the mountain, looking for the dragon’s secret passage. After passing around the mountain a few times (it was tall, not wide), Jennifer noticed an odd swirl on a stone. Tracing her finger over the rock, Jennifer hoped nothing bad would happen.

Nothing bad happened at all. Instead a huge boulder moved to reveal a dark passageway. Without a second thought, Jennifer walked in.

#

“If only I had a light!” Jennifer said, and clapped a hand over her mouth. All she needed now was every monster in this cave to come looking for the source of the noise. You’re a real smarty, aren’t you?

Luckily, she still didn’t see any monsters. She kept her hand on her mouth, just in case. Because of her noise Jennifer was extra wary. Every little sound she jumped at. Oh, stop this nonsense, Jennifer thought. A twig snap isn’t going to hurt you.

At that moment she felt a gust of cold air on her face. Looking up, she saw something flying above her head. Her heart almost stopped. “A Batax!” she breathed.

With a screech, the Batax swooped down at Jennifer’s head. Jennifer thrust her sword at it, hoping to hit the wings. Flying at top speed, the Batax knocked her only weapon to the ground. Backing away, Jennifer’s mind raced. What could she do? I’ve got it!

Pretending to retreat, Jennifer saw the Batax relax. She spun around so fast the Batax looked surprised. Grabbing the Batax’s wing, Jennifer reached for her sword. Shrieking, the Batax frantically tried to escape. It was no use. The Batax looked down, ending its struggle.

Raising her sword, Jennifer paused. The Batax looked so sad and defenseless that Jennifer couldn’t bring herself to slay it. She lowered her sword.

“I won’t kill you if you won’t kill me,” she whispered.

To Jennifer’s surprise, the Batax spoke. “Fine,” the Batax said in a gruff voice.

After a moment of shock, Jennifer found her voice again. “Um…hi? I’m Jennifer? What’s your name?”

“Batax 5.”

“That’s your name?” Jennifer said, trying to contain her laughter.

“Unfortunately,” Batax 5 said.

Still giggling, Jennifer asked, “How do I get out of here?”

“It depends on where you’re going.”

“I need to get to the top of Zarg,” Jennifer explained. “I’m going to slay the dragon.”

“Really?”

“Yep,” Jennifer replied.

“Well, I think you should know something about this dragon,” Batax 5 said.

“What’s that?”

“The dragon you’re dealing with has an allergy to roses.”

“Roses?”

“Not just one rose. He’s only allergic to five roses. No more, no less.”

“How am I supposed to get five roses on top of a mountain?”

“There is a secret nook by the dragon’s entrance that holds a small patch of roses.”

“So I have to pick five roses and hold them under the dragon’s nose?”

“Exactly,” Batax 5 said.

“Is there anything else I need to know about this dragon?” Jennifer asked.

“Yes. There is a prophecy that a young girl about fifteen will slay him.”

“Hey, I’m fifteen!” Jennifer said. “What does the prophecy say?”

“When the fifth daughter of the king and queen of Averandel reaches the age of fifteen, she will fight the peril that befalls us.”

“I’m the fifth daughter of the king and queen of Averandel!”

“Oh. This prophecy works out for you, then.”

“Thank you for your help, Batax 5.”

“You’re welcome. Thank you for not killing me.”

#

As Jennifer sneaked towards the dragon’s entrance, she found the nook with the roses in it, and picked out five. She called, “Oh, Mr. Dragon! Look who’s here!”

The dragon walked out holding Prince Suran wrapped in his tail.

“I’ve got a present for you, Mr. Dragon!” Jennifer cooed. “Five roses.” Jennifer shoved the roses in front of the dragon’s nose.

Backing away in horror, the dragon started sneezing fireballs. Dodging, Jennifer ran to the dragon’s stomach, yelling at Prince Suran, “Don’t move!” Prince Suran, frozen in shock, just nodded.

Dropping to the ground, Jennifer dodged a giant fireball, ducked under the dragon’s belly and without a second thought thrust her sword into his stomach. The fireballs stopped immediately.

Jennifer quickly crawled out from under the dragon and backed away before the dragon fell. Grabbing Prince Suran, who seemed to have fainted, she headed home.

#

“How can we ever thank you?” the King and Queen of Ameran said.

“Oh, you don’t need to thank me—” Jennifer started.

“No, we must!” the mother of Prince Suran persisted. “What do you want?”

“Well, I’d like to be—”

“I know!” the King interrupted. “You can marry our son!”

Jennifer’s jaw dropped. “Are you crazy? Why would I want to do that?”

Before the prince’s parents could reply, Jennifer’s own parents said, “She doesn’t mean that, she just means that she doesn’t want to marry yet.” They turned to their daughter. “Is there anything you want?”

Jennifer started smiling. “Well…there is one thing.”

The King and Queen looked at each other. “Name it,” they said.

“Well, I would like to be…” Jennifer pretended to think. “A…Wanderer of Averandel?”

The Queen looked at the King. “What do you think?”

“If that’s what you want,” he said to Jennifer.

“Oh, that is exactly what I want.”

“Do you think you’re ready?” the Queen asked.

Jennifer’s smile was from ear to ear. “I am definitely ready.”

Saturday Special from the Vaults: The City Must Die

Chapter One of a YA novel I hope to finish someday…The City Must Die (that’;s an entirely fictitious cover).

Why is it unfinished? Well, because I sold Masks instead, I guess. But reading this over again for the first time in months, I realized I really want to write this one.

There’s actually a different version of this, too, one in third person and starting off with a completely different character’s viewpoint. But I like the first-person approach best, I think, so if I do get around to finishing it, I’ll probably carry on with this, which is about half of what I’ve written in total. Whole thing is planned out, though.

Anyway, enjoy. And let me know if you’d like to see it carried on!

***

The City Must Die

By Edward Willett

Chapter One

I never meant to destroy The City. It just sort of happened.

Not that The City is really, you know, gone. I mean, I can see a big piece through my bedroom window, sticking up above the ridge on the north side of the farm. It kind of looks familiar, like maybe I used to walk by it when I–

Oh, I’m doing this all wrong. I knew I would. “Write down what happened,” Fedlar said. “For posterity.”

“But isn’t it a big secret?” I said. “I mean, we’re not supposed to tell anyone–”

“It’s a secret for now,” he said. “But not for always. Someday, someone will want to know.”

So I guess I’m writing this for you, Mr. or Miss Mysterious Someone way off in the Someday. And I guess I should start at the beginning. Which would be my fifteenth birthday.

You’d think turning fifteen would be really special. And I guess it was. But not in a good way.

See, when you’re the Ward of an Officer, which is what I was, back when all this started, there are Things Expected of You, one of which is to hold great big birthday parties, every year, for every girl within two years of your own age.

Whether you like them or not.

Which is why, on the day this all started, I was sitting on a dais in the really much-too-warm dining room of Quarters Beruthi, watching the Amazing Belgrani make himself disappear in a puff of purple smoke.

Which may sound very exciting to you, Someone in the Someday, but you have to realize I’d seen the Amazing Belgrani before. At Vessa Stillmore’s sixteenth birthday party. At Shelli Antonin’s fourteenth birthday party. And at the really boring party Parisi Hedmore had thrown just the week before just because there hadn’t been a party for ten whole days days.

The Amazing Belgrani was amazing enough, I guess. But the fourth time you see someone disappear in a puff of purple smoke, it kind of loses its appeal.

Besides, that smoke smelled like moldy cheese, and not the good kind of moldy cheese, either.

I coughed (covering my mouth, of course; I was a very well-brought-up Ward), waved my hand idly in front of my face, and turned to look at Sallia, my personal servant, hovering just off my left shoulder. “The main course now, please, Sallia,” I said.

Sallia curtsied in precisely the proper manner of a servant acknowledging a command from the young mistress of an Officer’s house, but then rather spoiled the effect by winking her left eye. I winked back, then folded my hands in front of me and peered out at my guests.

“Peered” is the right word. The theme for my party, which I had had nothing at all to do with–there were People who decided that sort of thing for me–was Primitive Romanticism–you know, candles, gowns cut daringly low in front and even lower in the back, big hair, lots of ribbons. All well and good, I supposed, and many of the girls looked lovely–I wouldn’t know about myself, though I doubted it; frilly dresses and I never really got along–but the candles seemed to have been made according to some far-too-authentic recipe involving rendered animal fat, and they smoked. Worse than the Amazing Belgrani, in fact, though not as smelly. So I could really only see the girls in the seats closest to the dais at all clearly; the others were just kind of faded silhouettes in the fog.

Plus side: I couldn’t really see Bacrivia Jonquille and her catty little clique, whom I had made certain were seated as far away from me as possible.

Did I mention we were required to invite all the other girls within our age group? No matter how much they reminded us of snakes?

The sad fact was, I reflected as I peered down at the twenty-three perfectly coiffed heads at the lower tables, I only had two real friends among the lot–and they, naturally, were seated at the head table with me.

Not that they were paying the slightest attention to me at that moment. Lissa and Sandi had been giggling, heads together, all through the Amazing Belgrani’s act, which of course they had seen just as often as I had. I suspected they had been talking about boys. Unlike me, they had actually met real-life examples of those mysterious creatures during their outings to their father’s estates on Lake Glass, or balloon trips to Green Plateau.

Unlike them…unlike everyone else in that room…I had never been out of The City. In fact, I had never been off of the Twelfth Tier. Which was another reason I wasn’t exactly thrilled to be turning fifteen. All it meant was that I had spent another full year as a caged pet. A pampered pat, I had to admit–I took a sugared pink bon-bon from the bowl by my plate and sucked on it to ease my woes–but caged, nonetheless.

I became aware that Lissa and Sandi had quit giggling and were now looking me. And they weren’t just giving me ordinary looks. They were giving me Significant Looks.

Oh, great, I thought. They’re going to try to make me feel better.

I dug up my best fake smile and hung it on my face. The things we do for friends.

“Millicred for your thoughts,” Lissa said, leaning in. “You look like you’re a million kilometres away.”

I wish I was, I thought. But all I said was, “Just thinking. Sorry. Side-effect of maturity. You’ll understand when you’re older.” Lissa’s fifteenth birthday wasn’t for another two twenty-days.

“You can’t blame her for looking like she’s at a funeral,” Sandi put in. “After all, a funeral would be more fun. At least at a funeral we wouldn’t have to watch the Vaguely Amusing Grand Belly again.”

Vaguely Amusing Grand Belly! I liked that. My smile turned a bit more genuine.

“Why our mothers put us through this…” Sandi continued, then suddenly turned bright red from the top of her head all the way down to her chest, a great deal of which was exposed by the silly Primitive Romantic dress. “Sorry!”

You couldn’t be mad at Sandi, not for long. It was like being mad at a puppy. “It’s hardly news to me I don’t have a mother, Sandi,” I said. “Or a father. I have noticed their absence from time to time over the last fifteen years.” I sighed. “I’m living proof that these horrible traditions exist independently of parents. Maybe they’re an Order of the Captain.”

“May She live forever,” Lissa and Sandi said in unison. It was the automatic response to every reference to the Captain, although considering She’d ruled The City for, supposedly, more than five hundred years at that point, I did occasionally wonder why she needed benedictions from the beneficiaries of her beneficence.

(So I like alliteration. So sue me.)

“If you could do whatever you wanted for your birthday, instead of hosting these stupid parties,” Sandi said, “what would it be?”

“I’d go horseback riding,” Lissa said instantly. “I only got to go that once, last summer out at our estate, and it was incandescent.”

“Incandescent” was the word of choice for something really wonderful that half-year. I thought it was a silly choice, but nobody asked me.

“I’d go paragliding off the Silver Cliffs,” Sandi said dreamily. “What about you, Alania?”

I felt my smile fade, and I looked up at the dining room ceiling. That night it was programmed to display holographic stars. They were the only stars I’d ever seen. “Me?” I said. “I’d just go…out.”

Which of course earned me more Significant Looks from Sandi and Lissa. And then they exchanged Significant Looks with each other. I knew exactly what they were thinking. Poor Alania, shut up in her guardian’s house her whole life. Never allowed to leave the City. Never allowed to leave the Tier. Never been anywhere. And never told why, either.

It was, after all, exactly what I’d been thinking. But it wasn’t their fault I was a prisoner, and they were my only real friends. I didn’t want them to feel bad on my birthday. I could look after the feeling bad all on my own.

I forced my smile back onto my face. “But since we’re all stuck here, let’s make the best of it.” I looked to my left, where the Vaguely Amusing Grand Belly’s props had been cleared away and the next act, the Seventh Tier Acrobatic Association, was setting up. I felt vaguely interested. Them, I’d never seen. “The entertainment is about to continue, and the main course is about to arrive. I had the Master Chef make my favorite: candied vatam with mashed sweebers and red gravy.”

“Incandescent!” Sandi and Lissa said in perfect unison, and I couldn’t help but laugh; probably my first real laugh of the evening.

It didn’t last long, though, because just at that moment I heard a deep gong, the kind that gets inside your bones and vibrates your whole body. It came just as the Seventh Tier Acrobats were rushing into the room: the one in front pulled up so short the others piled into him and they all collapsed into a tangle of gold-spangled tights and leotards. While they were sorting themselves out, the dining room’s main door slid silently open. At first all I could see through the smoke was a square of light, much whiter than the yellow candlelight, and two silhouetted figures. But I heard a gasp from the girls seated nearest the door, and as the figures walked toward me, I understood why.

Both of them wore the crisp white uniforms of City Crew, but that hadn’t sparked Bacrivia’s startled reaction: both of her parents were Crew, and everyone there had at least one Crew parent.

It wasn’t the man on the left they were reacting too, either. That was Second Lieutenant Ipsil Beruthi, my guardian, and they couldn’t have been surprised that he showed up at his Ward’s party–although, to tell the truth, I was.

No, the man they were reacting to was the second man. He wasn’t anything special to look at–not much taller than me, really, a little paunchy around the middle, with neat gray hair and a little gray mustache just the same width as his nose. But he had a lot more gold braid on his hat and shoulders than my Guardian.

Which is what you’d expect, on First Officer Staydmore Krenz.

Maybe by the time you read this, way off in the Someday, that name won’t mean anything. So you’ll just have to take my word for it that Staydmore Krenz showing up at my birthday party was about as shocking as waking up one morning and discovering the sun had changed color.

The Captain, as I’d just been thinking, had ruled The City for centuries. But nobody every saw The Captain. We just knew She must still be alive and in charge because…well, because The City kept running, and that proved it, didn’t it?

Sounds kind of silly, now, although oddly enough, I guess what happened proved that it was true…

Anyway, even though The Captain was the One In Charge, the day-to-day governing of the City and the surrounding Homelands actually fell to Krenz. Which made him nothing less than the most powerful man in the world.

And I was pretty sure I hadn’t invited him to my party. I mean, you wouldn’t forget something like that.

I’d only seen pictures and viddies of him before. He was shorter than I’d expected. And fatter. Not fat, exactly, but…thick. Solid. He had gray hair cut very close to his head and no neck to speak of.

He sort of flicked his hand at all the girls who had stood up as they realized who he was, and said, “Please, ladies, be seated, be seated. Go on with your festivities.”

He had the kind of deep booming voice that fills a room even when it isn’t particularly loud, though it certainly left you with the impression it could be louder if it needed to be. Much, much louder.

The girls looked at each other, then up at me, and then rather hesitantly sat down again. The whole room sort of glittered as all those jewel-decorated heads tilted toward each other, and the sudden outbreak of whispering sounded like air leaking from a compressor.

Lissa and Sandi sat down, but I stayed standing. I was the hostess, after all. And did I mention all that drilling in manners I’d had? Somehow it not only kept my astonished body on its feet, it managed to keep the astonishment out of my voice as I heard myself say, “Guardian. First Officer. So kind of you to come.”

Out of the corner of my eye I saw Sandi and Lissa trying really really hard not to look like they were eavesdropping. They failed.

“Happy birthday, Alania,” my guardian said. He didn’t offer his hand. He’d never touched me, that I could remember. One of my earliest memories is of tripping over something in that very dining room and banging my head on the sharp corner of a table. My guardian was right there, but he stepped away from me and had a servant pick me up and comfort me. That pretty much defined our relationship from the very beginning.

But, like I said, years of training in being polite, etc.

“Thank you, sir,” I said.

“May I present First Officer Krenz?” he said.

Unlike my guardian, Krenz held out his hand. I found myself rather reluctant to take it, but…well, most powerful man in the world, ruler of The City, etc., etc. I put out my own. His hand felt smooth and dry, and his grip was firm without being painful. “Alania,” he said. “A pleasure. Ipsil has told me so much about you.”

He let go. I pulled my hand back and resisted the urge to nervously dry it on my pale green skirt. I couldn’t imagine exactly what my guardian could have told him about me, since as far as I knew he knew nothing at all about me beyond the fact I took up space in his house, but I couldn’t exactly argue the point.

“Thank you,” I said again. That seemed safe.

“I’m sorry to take you away from your dinner,” Krenz went on, glancing around. The servants had emerged with platters, now being uncovered on each of the tables. The savory-sweet smell of roast vatam rose with the steam from mounds of golden-pink protein slabs. The food hadn’t made it’s way to the head table yet, though; I suspected Sallia was understandably reluctant to interrupt whatever it was the First Officer had come to say.

Krenz’s eyes wandered up toward the ceiling and the wire strung high overhead between two pylons. “And the entertainment,” he added. “The Seventh Tier Acrobats are very good.”

“My guardian hired them,” I said.

“I know,” Krenz said. “I recommended them to him.” He smiled at my guardian, who smiled back–or at least curved up the corners of his mouth.

Krenz looked back at me. “Unfortunately I have another meeting this evening and can only stay a few moments. I’d like to talk to you, if I may…?”

He made it sound like a question, but I knew better. You did not refuse a request of the First Officer. I trust I’ve made that clear by now.

“Of course, sir,” I said. I looked at my guardian, who took the hint.

“The music room, Alania,” he said. “I’ll stay here and fulfill your duties as host until you return.”

“Which won’t be long,” Krenz said.

I looked from my guardian to Lissa and Sandi, who had given up all pretense of not eavesdropping and were frankly staring, eyes wide. I suddenly had a mental image of the dour Second Lieutenant Ipsil Beruthi gravely engaging in small talk with my two friends, and had to bite my lip to keep from grinning. I winked at the two of them, then smoothed my expression–not without difficulty–and turned back to the First Officer. “This way, sir,” I said, and stepped down from the dais to lead him out of the dining room.

Since I couldn’t imagine what the First Officer wanted with me, I wasn’t particularly worried yet–just curious. And so I have to admit that my favorite part of the party to that moment was leading the First Officer right past the table occupied by the odious Bacrivia Jonquille and her coven. Much as I would have liked to, though, I did not stick my tongue out at them as I passed. I simply sailed by like the grandest of grand airships, studiously ignoring them.

(What had Bacrivia Jonquille done to me? I’ll keep that to myself, if you don’t mind. Posterity doesn’t need to hear all the embarrassing details of my younger life. Besides, this is the last time Bacrivia is going to show up in this account, so you don’t need to worry about her. I know I don’t, any more. As to why she seemed to have it for me from the moment we met at the age of nine…well, maybe I understand that a bit better, now. Now that I know the truth about my birth and how I came to be a Ward of the Officers. But I’ll get to that later.)

Where was I?

Oh, right, leading Staydmore Krenz to the music room.

It was three doors down the hallway to the left, a hallway painted white, trimmed in gold, and punctuated with statues of the heroic-nude-gazing-off-into-the-distance type. (What is it with sculptors and nudes? I know, I know, celebration of the beauty of the human body and all that, but whenever I looked at those statues surrounded by those snowy white walls I thought they just looked silly…and cold.)

The music room was also white: white carpet, white walls, white ceiling, and the concert kebe in the centre of the room, which I was spectacularly mediocre at playing despite years of lessons, was also white.

Floor-to-ceiling glass cabinets in all four corners of the room housed other instruments: strings, brass, woodwinds, electronics. I’d never seen any of them so much as taken out of the cabinets for dusting, much less actually played. Sometimes I wondered if they were just holographic projections.

Along the far wall of the room, ideally positioned to allow people to sit on it and listen to someone playing the kebe, was a rather spindly white couch with golden legs, and a matching chair, with a glass-topped table in front of them. I gestured to them, and Krenz promptly sat in the chair. I took the couch, carefully arranging my long dress around my ankles and then folding my hands demurely in my lap. I was rather horribly aware of just how low-cut the ridiculous Primitive Romantic dress was, but I resisted the urge to tug it up a little higher, figuring that would just draw attention to my cleavage–or worse, lack of it.

Krenz leaned back, one arm thrown casually over the back of the chair, thoroughly relaxed. “I won’t keep you long,” he said. “I know how anxious you must be to return to your party.”

Of course, I wasn’t anxious at all. This was far more interesting than a tight-wire act. But what in The City could he possibly want? “I’m entirely at your service, First Officer.”

“I just came to congratulate you on reaching this milestone,” Krenz went on. “Fifteen years! It hardly seems possible.”

Which was, of course, beyond weird. Until the First Officer had appeared in dining room, I hadn’t even known he knew that I existed. Now all of a sudden he was talking like he was my favorite uncle.

Not that I had an uncle, favorite or otherwise.

And what kind of “milestone” was fifteen, anyway? I  always thought it was a singularly uninteresting age. You were already a teenager, but you had a long way to go until you were an adult, which in The City didn’t officially happen until you were twenty.

“You’re too kind,” I said, letting my etiquette training handle things.

Krenz laughed. “and you’ve been very well brought up,” he said. “Because I know perfectly well what you really want to know is what in the Captain’s Name I’m talking about.”

Now, look, I’m no prude, but I have to admit the casual way he took the Captain’s name in vain shocked me, just a little. I guess I let a little of that show in my face, because Krenz raised his hand. “Sorry, sorry,” he said. “Pardon my language. I’m not used to the company of young ladies.” He leaned forward, his smile broadening. “But that’s about to change.”

All of a sudden I was really aware of just how low-cut that silly costume was. And took a giant step away from feeling curious and excited and into a big pile of totally creeped out. “Um…sir, I’m…”

For the first time, Krenz looked startled himself; then he suddenly chuckled. “Oh! I’m sorry, that came out rather badly, didn’t it? Don’t worry, Alania, I’m not making inappropriate advances–I’m old enough to be your grandfather, for Captain’s–sorry, for goodness’s sake. I just mean that…well, you’re circumstances are about to change. For the better, I believe.”

I didn’t say anything. I figured eventually he had to tell me what he was talking about.

Didn’t he?

Not right away, apparently, because the next thing he said was, “Have you been happy as the ward of First Officer Beruthi?”

Trick question, I thought. I didn’t know what was going on, but I did know I didn’t want to bad-mouth a fellow Officer to Staydmore Krenz. “He…has taken very good care of me,” I said. Which was true, as far as it went. I mean, I was healthy, I had everything I wanted–and lots of things I didn’t, like the birthday party dragging on in the other room. And sometimes I was happy. With Lissa and Sandi, sometimes. Occasionally when I was by myself. And the rest of the time…well, nobody was happy all the time. Or even most of the time. Were they?

Krenz chuckled. “I’m sure he has,” he said in that indulgent, aren’t-you-cute some grown-ups invariably use with children. Of course I wasn’t a child, not any more, but he probably didn’t realize that from his advanced aged. “I’m sure he has,” he repeated, “but between you and me, he can be a bit of a cold fish, can’t he?”

“He…doesn’t believe in spoiling children with too much affection,” I said, even more carefully, trying to keep my tone as neutral as possible.

Krenz snorted. It wasn’t a particularly dignified sound. “I’m sure he doesn’t. Well, I’m grateful to Ipsil for volunteering to raise you in the…absence…of your parents, Alania. He has done his duty well.” He leaned forward, resting his elbows on his knees and clasping his hands in front of them. “but now that you are fifteen, we believe it is time for a change.”

We who? I wondered. And what did the First Office know about my parents? More than me, that was for sure, since I’d never been told anything about them beyond the bare fact that they were dead, and that it was involved with something called the Secret City Rebellion. Sallia had murmured that to me once. “But the subject is forbidden,” she’d added. “I can’t say any more.” And she’d hurried away.

“Sir?” was all I said out loud.

Krenz looked me in the eyes and said, “You’re going to have a new guardian, Alania.” And then, before I’d even had the chance to digest that bombshell–uh, sorry, guess that’s what the Teacher would call a “mixed metaphor”–he dropped another one. “Me.”

I just stared at him. I’d heard the words, but they made no sense. It was as if he’d said I was going to sprout wings and fly to the Barrier Range. Ward of the First Officer? Me? Leave Quarters Beruthi, the only home I’d ever known?

Well, sure, five minutes earlier I’d been dreaming of just that, but I’d been hoping for a trip to the country, not moving into Quarters Krenz.

If I were Bancrivia Janquille, I thought, I’d be squealing with excitement. She has real parents and she’d dump them in a second if she thought she could do better. Just like she dumps her “friends”…

Sorry. Forgot I wasn’t going to say anything else about her.

But for me, the thought of moving into Quarters Krenz was frightening, verging on the terrifying. Quarters Krenz was not only four times the size of Quarters Beruthi, it was a fortress. Every entrance was secured and guarded by armed petty Officers.

I already felt like a prisoner in Quarters Beruthi, where at least I could go out into the streets of Twelfth Tier whenever I felt like it. How much worse would it be there?

What about Lissa? And Sandi? They were the only friends I had. Would they even be able to visit me? And what about Sallia? She’d been my servant for as long as I could remember. She was as close to a mother as I’d ever had. Would she be coming with me?

I opened my mouth to ask…but then closed it again. This was the First Officer. I was a well-brought-up Officer’s Ward. You didn’t question the First Officer that way. It would be impudent, improper, impolite–and possibly imprudent. There were stories…whispered by the servants, never by anyone else…that some of those who had questioned Krenz’s decisions had simply…vanished.

Executed, or maybe exiled to the Middens, the vast garbage dump that filled the canyon The City spanned on its enormous metal legs. Thieves, murderers, the insane, mutants, monsters…there were plenty of whispers about what lurked down there, too, and those whispers came from the girls as well as the servants. The Thing from the Middens was a reliably scream-getter at any Twelfth Tier girls’ sleepover.

I didn’t really think Krenz would have me killed or exiled. That sort of thing just didn’t happen to well-brought up Wards.

But I didn’t see any reason to risk it. Especially not when I took a good look at the bright-blue eyes behind Krenz’s easy, friendly smile.

They looked as cold and blue as the sky above The City on a midwinter morning.

His smile was fading, which made those eyes looke even colder. He obviously wasn’t getting the reaction he expected.

“Sir, I…I don’t know what to say,” I finally managed, truthfully. “Why me?” Who am I, was what I really wanted to ask, but I knew it wouldn’t be answered, and Krenz didn’t want it asked. All I knew about my birth was that some mystery surrounded it, something to do with something called the Secret City Rebellion. Sallia had told me that once, in response to my endless questions, but then had said, “But the topic is forbidden. Don’t ask me again,” and had hurried away. I had asked her again, of course, but she’d never said anything more.

Which left me free to make up my own stories, of course. Sometimes I imagined that my parents must have been heroes, giving their lives to save the Captain from evil mutineers. More often I thought they must have been mutineers themselves, and had been executed, while her endless imprisonment was to punish her for her poor choice of ancestors.

Sometimes I even liked to pretend that they were still alive somewhere. Maybe they’d been exiled off in the Barrier Range, and I was a hostage to their continued good behavior. That would explain why I couldn’t be allowed to leave the City.

For about two weeks when I was ten I convinced myself that Beruthi somehow blamed himself for their deaths in the mysterious rebellion and had taken me in because he was a man of deep compassion. I hadn’t been able to sustain that daydream very long, however, since he so obviously wasn’t anything of the sort.

But none of those explanations explained this.

Krenz’s smile had given way to a careful expression of grave compassion. “I can’t tell you why,” he said. “I’m sorry. I know it isn’t fair. You’ve spent your whole life wondering who you are, and who your parents were, and no one will tell you.”

I blinked. It almost sounded like he’d read my mind. But not even The Captain was reputed to have that ability.

He leaned forward again. “Alania, I promise I will tell you, soon. But not yet. For reasons of City Security, your origins must remain secret.” His smile suddenly returned, but there were a lot more teeth in it than before, and his eyes were as cold as ever. “Suffice it to say, young lady, that you are…special. Quite possibly–quite probably–unique.”

And then stood up, so suddenly it startled me. “Well,” he said. “I must get to my meeting. Go back and enjoy your final evening here, Alania. I’ll send an escort for you tomorrow–it will have to be rather early, I’m afraid–to bring you Quarters Krenz. Everything from your rooms will be packed up for you after you leave; don’t worry about that.” He held out his right hand, and, still feeling kind of numb, I put out my left and let him help me to my feet.

I tried to pull my hand free, but he held on, shifting his grip to my wrist. “Just one more thing,” he said. “A…precaution. Nothing to worry about.” He took something from the pocket of his uniform jacket with his free hand. I’d seen it glinting there and had thought it was a pen, but it was too big around for that. He held it up, and I saw it had an opening at one end. “Put your middle finger in here.” He guided my hand toward it.

It wasn’t like I had much choice. I extended my finger and he slipped it into the opening in the strange little device. Soft rubber squeezed it like mechanical lips. “This may sting a little,” he said then.

Something jabbed my fingertip, the pain sharp and sudden. I yelped and tried to jerk my finger out, but Krenz held it immobile. “A simple blood test,” he said soothingly. “Nothing to worry about.”

The tube beeped, and the rubbery lips released my finger. Krenz let go of my wrist and an pulled my hand back, resisting the urge to suck my finger, which would definitely not be appropriate for a properly brought up young ward of an officer. I did take a quick look at it, though; a tiny round spot of synthiskin sealed the hole made by the needle.

Krenz raised the silvery tube to his face, and green light flashed, reflecting for an instant in his startlingly blue eyes. “Excellent!” he said. He slipped the tube back into his pocked. “Well, I’ll leave you to your celebrations, then, Alania,” he said. “Once again, congratulations. I look forward to getting to know you better in the weeks to come.” He headed to the door. “I can show myself out,” he said, and a moment later the door closed behind him, leaving me alone in the silent music room.

My knees suddenly felt just a little shaky, and I sat back down on the couch so hard I thought I felt a spring give way. What had just happened? In the morning…in just a few hours…my whole life was going to change forever. I felt as if the whole world had been turned upside down and dropped on my head.

All I wanted to do was run to my room and cuddle a stuffed animal or four, but I was–still–the properly brought up Ward of an Officer–Ward of the First Officer, tomorrow, I thought, which did nothing to undo the urge to hide–and there was a rather ostentatious party going on just a few doors down the hall at which I was the guest of honor.

Besides, I knew my guardian–my former guardian–had to be getting tired of Sandi and Lissa, and they had to be getting even more tired of him. Plus they must be dying of curiosity.

Could I tell them?

I didn’t see why not. The First Officer hadn’t indicated it was a secret, and everyone would find out soon enough.

And then I thought of the look on Bacrivia Janquille’s face when she found out, and I felt a little bit better. Maybe it wouldn’t be so bad, in Quarters Krenz, I thought. Maybe I’d finally find out the truth about who I was, and who my parents were. Maybe Krenz would be a wonderful guardian. Just because people called him a cold-hearted monster who would exile his own mother to the MIddens if she crossed him…

Ulp. Better not start thinking like that.

One thing at a time. Get up, go back to the party, be a gracious host, tell Sandi and Lissa what had happened, rub Bancrivia’s nose in it. All of those things were doable, and they were all I had to do tonight.

Tomorrow would take care of itself.

 

 

Saturday Special from the Vaults: Intro and Chapter 1 of Johnny Cash: The Man in Black

I’ve posted the openings to my Enslow biographies of Janis Joplin and Jimi Hendrix–guess it’s time to give Johnny Cash his due.

I enjoyed writing about Johnny Cash because a) he was a really interesting guy and b) I grew up listening to him. My folks liked country music, and Cash was one of their favorites.

My only regret was that I didn’t find a place in the book to mention that Cash liked to fish in northern Saskatchewan. Normally, I never pass up an opportunity to sneak a little Saskatchewan into a book.

Herewith the introduction and first chapter of Johnny Cash: The Man in Black.

And, of course, a link to where you can buy it.

Johnny Cash: The Man in Black

By Edward Willett

Introduction

On January 13, 1968, a gray, gloomy Saturday, Johnny Cash entered Folsom State Prison in Repressa, California. With him were a crowd of musicians, technicians, photographers and reporters. Cash was about to do something no one had ever done before: record a live album in front of a crowd of prisoners.

With more than 3,500 inmates crowded into five enormous cellblocks, Folsom State Prison, the state’s second-oldest, held some of California’s worst offenders. About 2,000 prisoners assembled in the dining hall to hear the first of two shows. Armed guards patrolled overhead on walkways. The prisoners couldn’t be left in darkness, so the bright neon lights remained on throughout the concerts.

Marshall Grant, Cash’s long-time bass player, intended to bring Cash onstage with a big dramatic introduction as he always did, but Cash’s new producer, Bob Johnston, had other ideas. “All you gotta do,” he told Cash, “is walk out there and jerk your head around and say ‘Hello. I’m Johnny Cash.’”[1] Cash, he thought, “needed to assert control right from the start.”[2]

Cash took his advice. He walked out, grabbed the microphone, and said, “Hello. I’m Johnny Cash.”

It would become one of the most famous phrases in the history of American music.

The audience of prisoners exploded. Cash’s songs kept them at a high pitch of excitement and appreciation. He sang songs they could identify with, songs about prison and crime, loneliness and separation–and a few just for fun.

Unlike an audience on the outside, the prisoners didn’t just respond at the end of the song. Instead, they applauded whenever they heard a line they particularly identified with. Five tape machines running simultaneously in a truck in the prison yard captured their noisy appreciation and helped make not just a great live album, but what is generally considered one of the best live albums ever made.[3]

The album sold six million copies. It reached number 13 on the pop charts. It led directly to the equally popular Johnny Cash at San Quentin, which in turn led to Johnny Cash hosting his own television show on ABC. In 1969, Columbia Records announced that Johnny Cash had sold more records in the United States that year than the Beatles.

Johnny Cash at Folsom Prison also solidified the public’s perception of Johnny Cash as an outlaw, a rebel who followed his own path, no matter what the cost.

Thirty years later, his reputation as a rebel with a cause–the cause of the ordinary man–led to an amazing comeback, as he released acclaimed albums that found a whole new audience among listeners who hadn’t even been born when he recorded at Folsom Prison.

But the Folsom Prison recording itself was an amazing comeback. At the time he recorded it, many people thought Johnny Cash was already washed up, a has-been who looked old before his time due to years of hard touring and drug abuse.

For Johnny Cash, the road to Folsom Prison and beyond was a rocky one. It began in the darkest years of the Great Depression, in one of the hardest-hit states: Arkansas.

Saturday Special That’s Not Actually from the Vaults: The Seven-Sentence Story

I’m conducting a workshop this afternoon on writing science fiction and fantasy, in my role as writer-in-residence (for just one more month!) at the Regina Public Library.

Now, it’s easy to just talk for an hour and a half about writing, but I want people to actually do some writing: and to that end, I’m going to make us of an exercise that SF author and high-school teacher Jim van Pelt came up with, The Seven-Sentence Story.

Since I want to make sure everyone writes SF or fantasy, I’ve made one alteration to his rules, insisting that the first sentence establish the fantastical nature of the piece.

Here’s how it works:

The seven-sentence story

1. Introduce what the main character wants and the first action he/she takes to accomplish that goal; establish it’s a science fiction or fantasy story with some fantastical element.

2. The results of the action the charact takes in sentence #1 has to make the situation worse. The character should be farther from the goal now.

3. Based on the new situation, the character takes a second action to accomplish the goal.

4. The results of the second action the character takes from sentence #3 is to make the situation worse. The character should be even farther from the goal now.

5. Based on the new situation, the character takes a third and final action to accomplish the goal.

6. The third action either accomplishes the character’s goal, fails to accomplish the goal, or there is an unusual but oddly satisfying different result of the last action.

7. The denouement. This sentence wraps up the story. It could tell the reader how the character felt about the results, or provide a moral, or tell how the character’s life continued on.

Now, I’m a strong believer in the notion that if you’re going to ask students to do something, you should be willing (and able) to do it yourself. So I wrote my own seven-sentence story. This took me about 15 or 20 minutes, start to finish, including one pass at revision.

My attempt:

1. Anethor, strapped to the belly of the great dragon, stared down at the pointed tops of the spindly towers of the great city of Karrnikk, saw the wizard on his balcony right where the bribed servant had told him he would, drew his sword, and pulled the quick-release buckle on the straps…

2. …or what was supposed to be the quick-release buckle: the mechanism only released the strap holding his upper body to the beast, not the one holding his legs, so that instead of falling free, ready to spread his mechanical wings and glide down to the attack, his torso fell with a jerk that threatened to snap his spine—and he dropped his sword.

3. The blade fell, twisting and spinning, the red light of the setting sun flashing off of it with every turn, while Anethor, swearing, hanging like a cased ham from the oblivious dragon’s stomach, drew his dagger, jackknifed himself up, and slashed through the remaining strap.

4. Now at last he fell free—but that suddenly seemed far from a blessing, as he pulled the cord to release his wings, only to have the cord come free in his hand and the wings remain neatly tucked away in their leather backpack.

5. Undone by what could only have been sabotage, he looked down at the pointed towers hurtling toward him and had no other choice but scream his teacher’s name: “Taaaaaannnnniiiiissssss!”

6. Instantly his plunge toward destruction halted and, light as a feather on the breeze, he wafted down to the wizard’s balcony, landing upright with no more impact than if he had stepped off the curb, finding himself face to face with the Wizard Tanis, who smiled slightly and inclined his head.

7. “A valiant attempt,” said the old man (which, Anethor thought, was some consolation, since as Master of the Apprentices to the Assassin’s Guild, Tanis had seen a thousand attempts by students trying to get close enough to kill him without him being aware of it), “but you forgot one very important rule,” and here Tanis’s smile widened, as he looked up at the winged beast circling overhead, showing its fangs in a toothy grin: “Never trust a dragon with a secret.”

I look forward to seeing what the students come up with!

The SpeechJammer

Listen to the audio version

 

As a writer, freedom of speech is near and dear to my heart. It’s one of the basic principles of the democratic form of government. And yet it seems to be constantly under attack, for one simple reason: it’s easy to say you believe in free speech when people are saying what you agree with. It’s a lot harder when they start saying things you vehemently disagree with.

“He/she/they shouldn’t be allowed to say that!” is perhaps a natural human response, but it’s still one that must be overcome if free speech is to flourish. Which is why I find a recent technological development rather disturbing.

Imagine if, instead of shouting down people who say things we disagree with (as, disturbingly, so many people seem to think is the best way to deal with disagreeable speech, even—especially, it sometimes seems—on university campuses), squelchers-of-free-speech had a gun that could prevent someone from talking.

It sounds bizarre, but that’s exactly what Japanese researchers Koji Tsukada and Zautaka Kurihara believe they have come up with.

They call it the “SpeechJammer,” and it works because, in order to speak properly, we need to hear what we’re saying: we modulate our speech based on this auditory feedback. Singers can sing better when they can hear their own voices over headphones in the recording studio, or over the monitors on-stage: radio personalities, ditto.

But interfere with that auditory feedback by delaying the sounds coming back to our ears by just a tiny bit, and we become discombobulated: it’s thought that the delay actually interferes with our brains’ cognitive processes. And that’s exactly what the SpeechJammer does: it squirts a person’s own words back to them after a delay of 0.2 seconds.

As the researchers put it in their paper, “This effect can disturb people without any physical discomfort, and disappears immediately the speaking stops. Furthermore, this effect does not involve anyone but the speaker.”

The researchers’ prototype SpeechJammer consists of a directional microphone and speaker attached to a box that also holds a laser pointer and a distance sensor (and, of course, a computer, which computes the delay based on the distance to the speaker). To interfere with someone’s speech, you point the SpeechJammer at the person talking, using the laser pointer as a guide, and simply pull the trigger. It can be effective up to 34 metres away.

The researchers conducted a preliminary study with five participants, testing various settings and using the SpeechJammer on two different kinds of speech: “reading news aloud” and “spontaneous monologue.”

They found that speech jamming occurred more frequently in the “reading news aloud” context than in the “spontaneous monologue” context, and that it never occurs when meaningless sounds such as “Ahhh” are uttered over a long time period.

Their preliminary study has pointed them toward further research to make their device work better, but the technology seems so simple and straightforward (so straightforward they’re not even attempting to patent it) that it will almost certainly find real-world applications.

Which is where it gets a little creepy. Imagine politicians cut off in mid-speech because someone is jamming them. If you think that sounds grand, you’re not thinking hard enough, because it won’t just be the politicians of the hated other party getting squelched, but the brilliant orators of your own beloved movement.

Or imagine you’re at a meeting where your boss is presenting changes to the workplace you strongly disagree with—but you are unable to voice your concerns because the conference table is equipped with a SpeechJammer at every seat that allows whomever is chairing the meeting to literally control who gets to talk, and for how long.

That’s not to say I can’t imagine plenty of occasions when I think such a device might be useful and even desirable—but the point is, you might imagine plenty of occasions, too, and they’re probably not the same occasions.

As Peter, Paul and Mary didn’t sing (but might have), “If I had a jammer, I’d jam you in the morning, I’d jam you in the evening, all over this land…”

The world might be quieter. But a lot less free.

(The photo: Me, giving a speech.)

Saturday Special from the Vaults: Andy Warhol: Everyone Will Be Famous for 15 Minutes

Chapter One: Early Days

 

Saturday Special from the Vaults: The Shepherd

This is another really early story; in fact, I’d completely forgotten about it until I found the file on my hard drive. I must have written it when I was 21 or 22. I was pleasantly surprised it holds up as well as it does.

It was never published, though I think I submitted it a few times.

***

The Shepherd

By Edward Willett

Danell woke.

Dream-images of warriors with bright swords and glittering armor shattered around him, and he was left with only his narrow cot, his patched wool blanket, and the aftertaste of the bitter disappointment he had taken to bed with him.

Today had been the day of the great fair and market in Kingsholm. The King himself had been there, and all his mighty knights. There had been a tournament; displays of magic and music; plays and acrobats; food and wine overflowing. His father had been there, selling their sheep, and his brothers had been there, enjoying themselves, and he—

He had been left behind to look after his year-old sister, Teriss. His father knew how much he loved the old tales of war and wizards, how much it would have meant to him to see the King who won those glorious victories and watch his men wage mock war in the tournament. Surely his father knew he dreamed of becoming a squire and maybe even a knight himself someday. And it wasn’t as if Barett and Guildor had never been to Kingsholm before; they’d both been to the last fair. He’d never been at all.

But his father hadn’t been moved by any of his arguments. “You’re not old enough,” he’d said. “Kingsholm at fair-time is no place for a boy. You’ve filled your head with silly dreams. You’d go off with the first landless knight who needed a slave to curry his horse.”

“You don’t trust me!”

“I trust you enough to leave the farm and your sister in your safekeeping,” his father replied. “What you need to learn, my boy, is what’s really important. Dreams are fine, but this farm is wide-awake reality. You’ll get a good dose of it, being on your own today. You’ll find it a lot easier to reach for dreams if you keep your feet on the ground.”

And that had been that.

Still angry at the complete unfairness of it, he sat up and looked around the room, dimly lit by moonglow through the narrow window. Teriss had not awakened him; the only sound from her crib in the corner was her faint breathing.

A flash brighter than the moonlight flickered in the shape of the window on the stones of the far wall. Seconds later a bass rumble followed.

Satisfied he had been disturbed only by the approaching storm, Danell lay back and rolled over on his side, anxious to plunge into his heroic dreams again. Then he heard a voice outside, answered by a second, and a third.

He sat back up in a hurry. The voices were not those of his two older brothers, Barett and Guildor, though he expected them to return some time during the night. Nor could his father be out there; he would be at market two or three days.

Danell slipped out of bed and went to the window. A light breeze drew cold fingers across his bare skin, and he shivered. He could see nothing but a narrow swath of the farmyard, but the voices, when they came again, were nearer—the deep, thick voices of men.

“Easy as cracking eggs. The old man and his grown sons are gone.”

“What about the youngest boy?”

“What about him? He’ll be asleep. Even if he’s not, what can he do against three of us? We’ll slit his throat and take our time finding the gold…”

Danell stepped away from the window, his heart pounding. Robbers!

His first thought was for the gold, the gold his father had saved, coin by coin, over years and years of taking the sheep to market, the gold he’d kept hidden against some day of disaster, drought or disease. But then Teriss murmured in her sleep, and the gold seemed less than nothing.

If they planned to slit his throat, would they hesitate to kill her, too?

Danell didn’t even know how long he had. He had to decide what to do at once.

He had his sling and he could use it well—he’d once killed a sheep-stalking mountain cat with it—but in the dark, against three, it wouldn’t be enough.

There was no place to hide in the house. That meant he had to get outside.

Quickly he pulled on trousers and tunic, but left his sandals and cloak. Bare feet would serve him better, and the cloak would only be in his way.

He opened the wardrobe his father had made for his mother only last fall, and pulled down clothes to make a nest in the bottom, thinking sadly as he did so that though his mother hadn’t lived long enough to make use of the gift, it could now serve the daughter she had died giving birth to. He lay Teriss down on the clothes; she moved sleepily but did not wake, and he softly closed the door.

Next he ran into the kitchen and reached inside the chimney, feeling for the loose rock that—there! In the space behind it was a heavy leather pouch that jingled as Danell pulled it free. Slinging the pouch over his right shoulder, he reached into it and grabbed a handful of coins. Then, clenching them in his fist, he lifted the latch on the kitchen door and stepped outside.

Lightning flared, silhouetting the three robbers only a few feet away. Danell gasped as they lunged at him, then twisted away, dropping the coins he had in his hand. One of the thieves grabbed the neck of his tunic, but the material tore away and Danell ran for the trees.

He heard curses behind him: then lightning flashed again and the robbers saw the coins he had let fall. “The brat has the gold on him!” one yelled. “After him!”

Danell slowed down inside the forest and turned uphill. He knew these woods and the meadows further up; all his life he had kept sheep on the mountain, and on more than one stormy night had scoured the slope for a lost lamb. His bare feet made no sound in the leaves and twigs of the forest floor, while behind him the thieves crashed through the underbrush. They fell further and further back.

Lightning came again, followed close on its heels by thunder, and the rising wind drowned out the last faint sounds of his pursuers. Danell slowed to a walk, drawing breath. No doubt the robbers were still after him, but he had gained some time.

Above the patch of forest surrounding the house was the meadow where the sheep grazed during the day, before being bedded down in the fold, well away to his right. To his left rose a ridge, a shoulder of the mountain, that on the other side fell steeply to a cataract in a deep gorge.

Danell headed up toward the edge of the meadow, planning to cut left and climb over the ridge. With it between him and the woods where the thieves would continue looking for him, he would head down the mountain for help. His brothers had to be on the road home, maybe close by. And since he had the gold, the thieves would continue looking for him and leave the house and Teriss alone.

He hoped.

He broke out of the trees. Before him rose the grassy, rock-strewn meadow where he had spent many happier days. Lightning and thunder mingled in glare and cacophony overhead and the howling wind, whipping over the grass, hit him full force as he left the trees behind. Blowing off the snows of the peak, it seemed to suck all warmth from his body.

Hastily he turned left and, leaning into the gale, started for the ridge, a quarter of a mile away, sticking close to the tree line for as much cover as possible, both from the storm and from hostile eyes behind him. By the time he reached the ridge the chill in his limbs had become pain, and the first drops of rain spattered down, each as solid and cold as ice.

The thin, twisted trees on the ridge scarcely broke the wind. Danell scrambled up among them as quickly as he could, head lowered. As he crested the slope he could hear the roar of the river even above the storm. Swollen by rain upslope, the swift, splashing stream had become a torrent.

The rain thickened, until in seconds it fell so hard that even in the full glare of the lightning Danell could see only a few yards. Soaked and shivering, he began to descend the mountain, clinging to branches along the top of the ridge, feet sliding dangerously on the wet grass.

His confidence waned as the storm waxed. Shouldn’t he have fled with Teriss herself, instead of the gold? He had escaped with it, he could just as easily have escaped with her.

A knife-like slash of wind-blown rain across his face made him stumble, and he shook his head violently. Teriss would not have survived such a night. He took another step and slid for a heart-stopping instant toward the gorge before catching a branch. He might not survive it either!

Sheep are safe when the wolves hunt elsewhere, he thought. The wolves are hunting me; the lamb is safe.

Then he looked up and screamed. Like something out of a nightmare, one of the robbers appeared in front of him in a flash of lightning, naked sword in hand. The blade reached out toward his throat. “Give me the gold, boy!” Danell didn’t move—couldn’t move. Sharp steel bit his cold-numbed flesh. “The gold!”

The wolves had hunted him down…and when they had him they would return to the fold to take whatever else was there—including the lamb, Teriss.

Slowly Danell let the strap of the pouch slide from his shoulder into his hand. Then, “Take it!” he screamed, and with his slinger’s skill whipped the pouch in a half-circle and released it.

The gold-weighted bag smashed into the robber’s chest. He staggered back, arms flailing, the sword flying from his hand. Lightning flashed and Danell glimpsed a white face and staring eyes—then darkness returned and the man was gone. For an instant, a scream echoed above the sound of wind and river.

Danell, his own eyes wide and his heart pounding, flung himself up and over the ridge and down the other side, back into the forest. He ran through the trees, branches clutching at him, tearing clothes and skin. Twice he fell and stumbled back up to run again. The third time he crashed down so hard he couldn’t breathe for a moment, and lay curled in misery on the wet leaves of the forest floor, struggling for air.

In a burst of lightning he saw he was at the edge of the trail down the mountain. With his first shallow, painful breaths he staggered to his feet and stumbled onto the path—and saw the remaining two thieves not twenty feet upslope.

Danell didn’t have enough air in his lungs to run. He fell to his knees as the robbers ran toward him, swords drawn. One of them grabbed his hair and yanked his head back “Where is it? Where’s the gold?”

“The river,” Danell choked out. “With your friend.”

The robber flung him to the ground. “You’re lying!”

“I think he’s telling the truth,” the other man said. “I thought I heard a scream—”

The first robber stared at him, then down at Danell. “All that gold—in the river—” He raised his sword. “I’ll kill you for that!”

His blade whistled down, but Danell rolled out of the way, scrambled to his feet and pelted down the path. The robbers followed, screaming oaths.

Danell’s feet felt leaden and his chest still ached. Soon, very soon, he would fall, and they would kill him, and then they would go back to the house and Teriss would die, too . . .

He rounded a corner. Blinded by the rain and his terror and exhaustion, he didn’t see the two men on the trail until he careened into them. Strong arms grabbed him, then supported him. “Danell! What’s wrong?”

With overwhelming relief, Danell recognized the voice of Barett, his oldest brother. “Robbers!” he gasped. Barett thrust him out of the way, and he heard the ring of swords being drawn.

The ensuing battle was brief.

#

Wrapped in a blanket, Danell steamed by the roaring fire in the kitchen hearth. “I thought I’d never be warm again,” he said, and edged closer to the blaze.

Barett sat at the table with Teriss in his arms. The baby tried to grab his finger, laughing. Guildor turned from the fire and smiled at his little sister as he handed Danell a steaming mug of mulled wine.

Danell cupped it in his hands. “What will father say about the gold? He’s been saving that for so many years…”

Barett glanced up at him. “He’s always said he was saving it for a disaster,” he pointed out. “If you hadn’t used it as you did, tonight would have been the worst disaster of all. You know he isn’t concerned about gold as much as he is about you—and Teriss.”

“I didn’t think so this morning,” Danell admitted. “I didn’t think it was fair. He knows how I feel…” His voice trailed off. He felt only embarrassment now at the way he had acted that morning, and gulped wine to hide his flush.

Guildor and Barett exchanged glances, then Guildor said, “That was a very brave thing you did. Worthy of a great hero, if you ask me.”

Danell remembered cold, terror, violence and pain. He sipped from the cup again and shook his head. “If that’s what it means to be a hero—then to be a shepherd is the finest thing I know.” No dreams of knights or bold battles filled his head now; he had fought his battle, and to sit in peace and safety with his brothers and sister was all he could ask. He looked at Teriss, laughing as she played with Barett’s hand, and added, “Besides, all I was really doing was looking after a very special lamb.” He grinned and snuggled down in his blanket. “The ones with fleece are less trouble.”

#

 

The QWERTY effect

Listen to the audio version

  I took to typing like…well, like a writer to a keyboard. In high school I was always the fastest typist in typing class. Possibly it was genetic: my mother, who worked as a secretary, was a very fast typist. Possibly it was because I was highly motivated: my handwriting was (and is) atrocious.

Anyone who has learned to touch type has probably wondered about the peculiar arrangement of the standard keyboard, usually called QWERTY. Why aren’t the letters in, say, alphabetical order?

The fact is, some of the earliest typewriters did have keyboards in alphabetical order. But they had a problem: alphabetical order put some frequently used letter pairs too close together on the keyboard, resulting in mechanical clashes.

QWERTY was invented in 1868 and adopted by Remington for the Sholes and Glidden Type-Writer, whose brand name eventually became the generic name of all such machines—one sure sign of a commercial success.

The other sign of the machine’s success is the fact that its QWERTY layout was soon adopted by all other manufacturers.

QWERTY was designed to prevent the mechanical clashes that arose in early machines when two adjacent keys were struck in quick succession. It did that by separating frequently used letter pairs to opposite sides of the keyboard. (It also, not coincidentally, contains all the letters for the word “typewriter” in the top row, allowing salesmen to easily demonstrate the machine.)

QWERTY is now everywhere, which means that most of what you read passed, at some time, through a QWERTY keyboard. And now there’s research that suggests that the QWERTY arrangement actually affects the emotional content of what we read.

Linguists and psychologists talk about the “articulators” used in language production. They usually mean part of the vocal tract, but with so much language being produced using a keyboard, increasingly we’re letting our fingers do our articulation for us.

In spoken language, a portion of the meaning of words is linked to the way they are articulated. Researchers Kyle Jasmin and Daniel Casasanto wanted to find out if the same held true for typed language.

How does this supposed effect work? The QWERTY keyboard is asymmetrical: there are actually more letters on the left side of the midline than on the right. This means it is slightly more difficult to type words that use left-side letters than those that use right-side letters (something which has been demonstrated experimentally).

The researchers decided to test the hypothesis that “right-side words,” because they are easier to type, might be viewed more positively than left-side word. Not only that, but this might carry over to spoken language, because touch-typists (like me) actually implicitly activate the positions of keys when they read words.

To test this, Jasmin and Casasanto conducted three experiments, using three QWERTY-using languages (Dutch, Spanish, and, of course, English.) In the first, they set out to find out if the QWERTY effect carried across different languages—and found that it did. They showed participants a list of words and had them rate the emotional “valence” on a scale of one to five (using “manikins,” a smiling figure at the positive end and a frowning figure at the negative end).  Overall, words with more right-side letters were rated to have a more positive meaning than words with more left-side letters.

Next, they tested whether QWERTY influences new words more than old words…and found that the QWERTY effect was indeed more apparent in words coined after the invention of QWERTY.

Finally, they tested for the effect with pseudowords, made-up words with no meaning. (Science fiction and fantasy writers take note! We make up words all the time.) Sure enough, made-up words with more right-side letters were judged to have more positive meanings.

In the words of the researchers, “It appears that using QWERTY shapes the meaning of existing words and may also influence which new words and abbreviations get adopted into the lexicon and the ‘texticon’ by encouraging the use of words and abbreviations whose emotional valences are congruent with the letters’ locations on the keyboard.”

And the practical applications?

“People responsible for naming new products, brands and companies might do well to consider the potential advantages of consulting their keyboards and choosing the ‘right’ name.”

And for what’s it worth, I just realized that my name, Edward, is typed entirely using the left-hand keys.

It’s a wonder I have any friends at all.

Saturday Special from the Vaults: Janis Joplin: Take Another Little Piece of My Heart

Another Enslow book, Janis Joplin: Take Another Little Piece of My Heart tells the story of another ’60s rock star who died at age 27–within just a few weeks of Jimi Hendrix’s death. Since I also wrote biographies of Johnny Cash and Andy Warhol for Enslow, I spent several months kind of stuck in the ’60s. (I won’t say “reliving the ’60s, because I was a pre-teen in that decade and can’t say any of the social or musical upheaval impacted much on my consciousness!)

Enjoy! And if you feel so inclined, here’s a link to the Amazon page where you can purchase the book.

Janis Joplin: Take Another Little Piece of My Heart

Introduction

On Saturday afternoon, June 17, 1967, a band with the unlikely name of Big Brother and the Holding Company took to the stage of the Monterey International Pop Festival at the Monterey County Fairgrounds, eighty miles south of San Francisco.

Big Brother’s lead singer, a young woman named Janis Joplin, was nervous. She’d been singing with Big Brother for a year, and so far the group hadn’t made much headway. They weren’t a top draw even in San Francisco, their home town. Now here they were facing their biggest audience yet. Forty thousand people had turned out for the festival, but they were there to see Otis Redding and British imports like The Who and Jimi Hendrix. They weren’t particularly interested in Big Brother, which was why the band had been given a slot on the program on Saturday afternoon, hardly prime time at a rock concert.

A documentary about the festival was being filmed by D. A. Pennebaker that weekend for ABC-TV, but the cameras weren’t pointed at the stage when Big Brother and Janis Joplin launched into “Down on Me, “Road Block” and “Ball and Chain.” Instead they were pointed at the audience, where they captured the overwhelmed response of Mama Cass of the hit group the Mamas and the Papa. “Mouth agape, her ears were in music lover’s heaven,” wrote Laura Joplin, Janis Joplin’s sister, in her book Love, Janis.[i]

When Big Brother finished its set, the audience exploded. The organizers were dumfounded. Critics were ecstatic. Jazz critic Nat Hentoff wrote that Janis’s performance left him limp and feeling that he’d been “in contact with an overwhelming life force.” Greil Marcus, another critic, noted that Janis went so far out that he wondered how she ever managed to get back.[ii]

“When I sing,” Janis Joplin once said, “I feel, oh, I feel, well, like when you’re first in love…I feel chills, weird feelings slipping all over my body, it’s a supreme emotional and physical experience.”[iii]

At Monterey Pop, the audience felt the same way when they heard Janis Joplin perform. Brought back for an encore to ensure that this time, their performance would be filmed, Janis and Big Brother wowed the audience again.

For Janis, it was vindication. Letting her feelings take hold, letting it “all hang out,” in the slang of the time, had been something she’d always been counseled against, something that had led to taunts and ridicule in high school and beyond. But now, she said, “I’ve made feeling work for me, through music, instead of destroying me. It’s superfortunate. Man, if it hadn’t been for the music, I probably would have done myself in.”[iv]

Before Monterey Pop, few people had heard of Janis Joplin.

Afterward, almost everyone had. For the next three years, like a falling star, she would blaze a trail of outrageous behavior and incredible music across the pop-culture sky of 1960s America.

But then, also like a falling star, her light would abruptly go out.

Chapter 1: Frilled Frocks and Bridge

The short but eventful life of Janis Joplin began in what might be considered the most unlikely of places: Port Arthur, Texas.

Port Arthur, located in southeast Texas just off the Gulf of Mexico and just west of the Louisiana border, was founded (and named) by Kansas railway promoter Arthur E. Stilwell. Stilwell wanted to link Kansas City to the Gulf of Mexico by rail, because he had just launched the Kansas City, Pittsburg and Gulf Railroad. He and his backers acquired land on the western shore of Sabine Lake, a freshwater lake just inland from the Gulf and connected to it by a natural opening known as Sabine Pass.

Stillwell wanted the new city to be both a major tourist resort and an important seaport. A canal was cut along the western edge of the lake, connecting the site of the new town to deep water at Sabine Pass. Port Arthur was formally incorporated in 1898.[v]

Because Stillwell wanted Port Arthur to be a tourist destination as well as a major port, he planned beautiful broad boulevards and avenues and grand homes along the lakeshore. But early in the twentieth century Stillwell lost financial control of the project to John W. Gates, a Wall Street speculator whose nickname was “Bet-a-Million” and who had made his fortune selling barbed wire across the West. (The company he formed eventually became the giant corporation U.S. Steel.)[vi]

Gates extended and deepened the canal so that ships could sail it all the way to the cities of Beaumont and Orange. Unfortunately, that cut off Port Arthur from the lakeshore, ruining the view of the expensive lakeside homes and reducing Port Arthur’s appeal as a tourist destination.[vii]

That appeal faded further as Port Arthur became inextricably linked to the burgeoning Texas oil industry. By the 1960s, the town buildings seemed almost lost among the huge oil refineries, storage tanks and chemical plants. And since in those days natural gas was simply released into the air, the whole “Golden Triangle,” as the region encompassing the towns of Port Arthur, Orange and Beaumont is known, smelled like rotten eggs. Reportedly, at Lamar Tech, the college Janis Joplin would some day (briefly) attend, the fumes from a nearby sulfur plant were sometimes strong enough to melt the girls’ nylons.[viii]

But oil also means money, and good jobs, and it was the need for both that brought Janis’s parents to Port Arthur before she was born.

The flapper and the bootlegger

Dorothy East and Seth Joplin met in Amarillo, Texas, on a blind date. Dorothy, the daughter of Cecil and Laura East (nee Hansen), was known in Amarillo for her beautiful singing. She particularly liked Broadway show tunes, and in high school she won the lead role in a citywide stage production. The Broadway director the organizers brought in told Dorothy he could get her work in New York, but he recommended against it, because “those people just aren’t your kind of folks.”[ix] She took his advice and instead applied to Texas Christian University in Fort Worth. Disappointed that the university had only one voice teacher, who only taught opera, she returned to Amarillo after a single year and began helping at a radio station, KGNC. She was known as a “free spirit,” scandalizing her parents by adopting the “flapper” styles of short hair, close-fitting dresses, snazzy hats and high heels. She also smoked and once accidentally swore on-air.[x]

In other words, she showed flashes of the same rebelliousness for which her daughter would later be notorious.

Seth Joplin was the son of Seeb (who ran the Amarillo stockyards) and Florence Joplin (nee Porter). At the time he met Dorothy East, he was taking a break from engineering studies at Texas A&M—studies he never finished: a lack of money forced him to give up his schooling still one semester shy of a degree. A bit of a rebel himself, he made bathtub gin during the last days of Prohibition and smoked marijuana (which was legal then). While courting Dorothy, he took the only job he could find, as a gas station attendant. Dorothy worked as a credit clerk in the local Montgomery Ward department store, eventually becoming head of the department.[xi]

In 1935, in the depths of the Depression, Seth got a break: his best friend from college recommended him for a job at the Texas Company (later Texaco) in Port Arthur. Dorothy quit her job to follow, and soon found work in the credit department at Sears. With two incomes they were finally able to afford to marry, which they did on October 20, 1936.

Seth worked at the only Texaco plant that made containers for petroleum. When the Second World War broke out, his job was considered so vital that although he was called to join the armed forces three times, each time he was deferred.

Shortly after Seth and Dorothy married, Dorothy’s parents’ marriage broke up. Dorothy’s mother, Laura, and her younger sister, Mimi, came to live with Seth and Dorothy. Needing more space, they bought their first house, a two-bedroom brick bungalow on the edge of town. For fun, Dorothy and Seth liked to cross the Sabine River and party in the bars in Vinton, Louisiana.

In mid-1942, Dorothy became pregnant. Janis Lyn Joplin was born at 9:30 a.m. on January 19, 1943.

Janis Joplin makes her entrance

Janis was three weeks early and weighed only five and a half pounds, but she throve. After all, she had parents, a grandmother and an aunt doting on her. (However, Laura and Mimi moved out to a place of their own when Janis was three.)[xii]

As a child, Janis wasn’t rebellious at all. In fact, Dorothy Joplin said later she was easy to care for—not too docile, but not overactive, either—and cheerful by nature.

Janis’s mother, who believed a mother’s place was at home, quit her job to look after Janis full time. She made her beautiful dresses and blouses with ruffles and ribbons and frills, and took her to the First Christian Church for church school, which Dorothy eventually taught.

Seth, who started work at 5:30 a.m., got to spend time with his daughter when he got home in the afternoon. Janis would wait for him on the front porch, he’d give her a hug, and they’d sit and talk.

One day Dorothy overheard her husband telling Janis about making bathtub gin in college. “’Is that the proper topic for a conversation with a child?’ she asked him later,” Laura Joplin, Janis’s younger sister, wrote in her biography of Janis, Love, Janis. “Pop refused to argue the point; instead, he quit spending the evening time visiting with Janis on the front step. Janis was crushed and never knew why.”[xiii]

Janis’s mother introduced her daughter to music well before she started school. She bought an old upright piano and taught Janis how to play it. “She and Janis sat on the piano bench together, with Janis singing the simple nursery songs Dorothy taught her,” Laura wrote. “Janis often lay in bed at night singing those songs, over and over, to put herself to sleep.”[xiv]

But Janis’s father found the noise of a child practicing scales annoying. As well, Dorothy had recently undergone an operation to remove her thyroid gland. The operation destroyed her singing voice (although her speaking voice was fine). Seth Joplin thought having the piano around would be too emotionally painful for his wife, so the piano was sold, ending Janis’s first flirtation with formal musical training.[xv]

In 1949, after two miscarriages, the Joplins had a second child, Laura Lee, and moved to a larger three-bedroom house at 3130 Lombardy Drive, in a neighborhood called Griffing Park. Four years later, in 1953, Janis’s brother Michael Ross was born.

Janis was bright, friendly and inquisitive. Laura wrote, “She had a full face, small, twinkling blue eyes, a broad forehead that Mother always said showed her intellect, and fine, silky blond hair that had a soft curl in it…People might have found her features plain if a buoyant spirit and zest for life hadn’t overshadowed her looks. She was a child who liked people. She always made strangers welcome. Her sensitivity to others showed in a considerate willingness to go out of her way to include others in play.”[xvi]

Aside from singing herself to sleep and singing in the church choir (and, in junior high school, in the Glee Club), Janis showed no particular aptitude for or interest in music. She was much more interested in art. She began to draw as soon as she could hold a pencil. Her mother even arranged private art lessons for her when she was in the third and fourth grades.

Janis also loved to read, a love that continued throughout her life. She learned to read before she entered school and had a library card even before that.

 

Janis Joplin: her own tall tale?

Dorothy Joplin said that Janis particularly loved magical, fantastical tales. (In one of the letters in Laura Joplin’s book Love Janis, Janis recommends J.R.R. Tolkien’s books The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings to her younger sister.)

“She studied about the theater. She studied ‘tall tales of America,’” Dorothy said. She wondered if some of the over-the-top accounts of her own escapades Janis told the press once she became famous were her own versions of those tall tales.

“She’d spin these tales. It was so far out that you were supposed to understand that it was that way. She tried the same thing with the press–in my opinion. And it backfired.

“I overlooked that marvelous capacity of hers to trust people.”[xvii]

 

Janis even began writing her own plays in the first grade and staging them with her friends as puppet shows in a puppet theatre her mother built for her in the back yard.

A “strikingly timid child”

Janis entered junior high with a good but unspectacular academic record. Several of her childhood friends moved out of town when she was in the sixth grade, and she had to ride a bus to the junior high, which was further away than her grade school had been. She found the rowdy kids on the bus frightening—she was a “strikingly timid child,” Myra Friedman wrote[xviii]—but once she started traveling to junior high via a car pool instead of on the bus, she adjusted quickly. Her mother didn’t remember any behavioral problems at all. “I even worried about it a little,” she said. “She never did anything for me to correct!”[xix]

The limitations of Port Arthur meant that finding something interesting for the whole family to do took some imagination on the part of Janis’s father. He hit upon taking them down to the Post Office to look at the Wanted posters. “It was a little unusual,” he agreed later, “but it was somewhere to go. That wasn’t the real reason, the Wanted Men. We’d just roam around the deserted building and read about all the people who were wanted for murders. We’d go any unusual place we could.”[xx]

Everyone who knew Janis when she was a child praised her when Myra Friedman interviewed them not long after Janis’s death. “Janis helped out in the library; Janis helped out at the church. Janis won an artwork contest for the cover of a junior high publication; Janis did posters for the library. Janis was cooperative; Janis was shy. Janis was ‘just like everybody else,’” she wrote.[xxi]

But in junior high, as Janis approached adolescence, signs began to appear that perhaps Janis wasn’t “just like everybody else” after all. Her teachers began to give her unsatisfactory marks in work habits and citizenship because she “talked too much and didn’t get her work done on time,” her sister Laura noted. “…She was more inquisitive and energetic than the school program allowed.” [xxii] She was also, according to her friends, naïve and gullible, someone who could be led to believe all kinds of preposterous stories and who was always eager to please other people.[xxiii]

Janis did all the things expected of a proper young girl in Port Arthur in the 1950s. She joined the Junior Reading Circle for Culture, and Tri Hi Y club, and the Glee Club, which gave her her first public singing opportunity outside of church: she sang a solo in the Christmas pageant. She even took bridge lessons. (Bridge was a passion of her parents’.) In fact, she met her first boyfriend, Jack Smith, when they played bridge together in the seventh grade in the Ladies Aid Society’s ‘Bridge for Cultural Improvement’ club.[xxiv]

Despite occasional problems with talking too much in class or doodling when she should have been taking notes, Janis seemed destined to sail smoothly into Port Arthur society, following the course prescribed for young ladies: high school, university, marriage, house, kids.

But in high school, smooth sailing gave way to stormy waters.

 

Saturday Special from the Vaults: The Bounty Mutiny: From the Court Case to the Movie

One of the more interesting projects I undertook for Enslow Publishers was a history of the famous Mutiny on the Bounty, comparing the real-life events to the way they were portrayed in the movie starring Anthony Hopkins as William Bligh and Mel Gibson as Fletcher Christian that came out in the 1980s. I’ve always enjoyed reading about life at sea in the 19th century, so this was a natural fit. And honestly, what other book of mine is likely to have Anthony Hopkins and Mel Gibson on the cover?

I came away from the project with a great admiration for William Bligh, who is surely one of the more grievously wronged-by-history men in the history of the British Empire.

Here’s the introduction and about half of the (very long) first chapter of The Bounty Mutiny: From the Court Case to the Movie.

And, of course, a link to where you can buy it on Amazon!

***

Introduction

Boom!

The single cannon shot from HMS Duke rang out over the choppy gray water of England’s Portsmouth Harbor. It was 8 A.M. on Wednesday, September 12, 1792, and the Duke had just hoisted a flag indicating that a court martial was in process.

Thirty minutes later, ten prisoners were led from the gun room of HMS Hector and loaded aboard one of the Hector’s boats. British Marines in bright red uniform jackets stood at attention as the boat’s crew dipped their oars and began the journey to the Duke, moored in the outer harbor.

More than an hour later, with the Marines still standing at attention, the boat reached the Duke. The prisoners were formally taken aboard, and then led into the captain’s great cabin at the very stern of the ship to face the twelve captains who would serve as their judges and the Judge Advocate who would run the court. Also present were the prisoners’ counselors, and various witnesses.

The Judge Advocate, Moses Greetham, began reading from the “Circumstantial letter” which laid out the details of the case: the ten men were accused of mutiny, a crime punishable by death.

Specifically, they were accused of the most famous mutiny of all time: the mutiny on His Majesty’s Armed Vessel Bounty, the ship once commanded by Lieutenant William Bligh.

For more than two centuries now, that mutiny has captured the imagination of the world, inspiring histories, plays, novels, at least one stage musical, and five motion pictures.

Oddly enough, it all started with breadfruit.

 

Chapter 1: The Voyage of the Bounty

In 1688, while sailing around the world, a naturalist (and occasional pirate) named William Dampier noted an interesting new fruit from the island of Guam:

“The bread-fruit (as we call it) grows on a large tree…The fruit…is of a round shape and has a thick tough rind. When the fruit is ripe it is yellow and soft; and the taste is sweet and pleasant. The natives of this island use it for bread: they gather it when full grown while it is green and hard; then they bake it in an oven…the inside is soft, tender, and white.”[i]

Later explorers, including Captain Cook (the first European to visit Hawaii and Australia) also extolled the virtues of the breadfruit. The fruit was so much like bread that sailors actually preferred it to their own bread. (That’s not surprising, since the bread served in the middle of a long voyage was a kind of cracker made of flour, water, and salt known as “hardtack” or “ship’s biscuit.” Ship’s biscuit was so hard it often had to be soaked before it could be eaten. It was also occasionally infested by the worm-like larvae of beetles.)

As early as 1775, the Society for West India Merchants saw the potential in breadfruit as a source of food for slave on the sugar plantations in the Caribbean. The Society offered a hundred pounds to the first person who could bring living breadfruit trees to England.

 

A Passion for Botany

Among those with businesses interests in the West Indies was Joseph Banks. Born in 1743, Banks was independently wealthy and passionately interested in natural history—particularly botany, the study of plants. When he was twenty-one he collected numerous never-before-seen specimens of plants along the coasts of Labrador and Newfoundland. He was elected a fellow of the Royal Society, England’s top scientific society, when he was just twenty-three.

He next joined Captain James Cook aboard the Endeavour when he set sail in August 1768 to carry British astronomers to Tahiti to observe the planet Venus crossing the disk of the sun.

The ship’s visit to Tahiti seized the public’s imagination upon the Endeavour’s return to England in 1771, even though the island had first been reached by an English ship four years earlier. Banks had a lot to do with the public’s sudden interest. He returned with thousands of specimens, drawings and paintings.

In 1778, after a final voyage to Iceland, Banks was elected president of the Royal Society. For decades, very few expeditions of science or exploration were undertaken without his consultation.

Banks wrote and received tens of thousands of letters from all over the world, full of questions and scientific observations. More than a few urged that the breadfruit tree be imported as a new food source for the West Indies.

Banks could see the fruit’s potential. He convinced the British government to mount an official expedition, announced in February 1787, to bring back specimens of the plant.

A former merchant ship called the Bethia, approved by Banks, was purchased and renamed His Majesty’s Armed Vessel (HMAV) Bounty. (The Bounty was too small to qualify for the designation His Majesty’s Ship [HMS]).

Command of The Bounty was awarded to Lieutenant William Bligh.

 

Enter William Bligh

William Bligh, born September 9, 1754, was the son of Francis Bligh, customs officer at Plymouth, and Jane Pearce, a widow Francis had married just ten months earlier.

 

Reality vs. the Movie: A Cabin Boy at Age Seven?

Throughout this book, we’ll be comparing real-life events to the way they were described or depicted in the 1984 movie The Bounty, produced by Dino de Laurentiis. In that movie, Bligh (Anthony Hopkins) tells Fletcher Christian (Mel Gibson) that he has been at sea since he was twelve.

In fact, William Bligh first appears in naval records as a ship’s servant on the Monmouth at the age of seven—but it’s unlikely he actually went to sea at that age.

In the 1700s, Royal Navy captains would often enter youngsters from well-connected families onto the books, providing them with valuable “sea time.” Sea time was important because, to become a lieutenant, a young man had to appear on a ship’s roster for six years, and serve as a midshipman or master’s mate for at least two years of the six.[ii] Appearing on a ship’s roster at a young age allowed the boy to step straight into a midshipman’s position and take his lieutenant’s exam sooner.

Bligh probably first went to sea for real at age sixteen, shortly after his mother died.

 

In 1770 Bligh signed on to the Hunter as an able seaman. This was a typical classification for potential officers on ships where all the positions for midshipmen—officers in training—were filled. Six months later a midshipman’s position opened up, and Bligh was promoted.

From ages seventeen to twenty Bligh served as a midshipman on the Crescent, sailing to Tenerife and the West Indies. In 1774 he joined the Ranger, temporarily reduced to able seaman again, as she hunted smugglers in the Irish Sea.

At age twenty-one, Bligh learned that Captain Cook had selected him as sailing master of the Resolution for Cook’s third expedition. Cook must have heard a good report of Bligh’s navigational capabilities. He may also have known of Bligh’s talent for drawing. Cook wanted all his officers to be able to construct charts and accurately sketch the various places in which the ship might anchor.[iii]

 

Sailing with Captain Cook

With Cook, Bligh sailed to Van Diemen’s Land (Tasmania), New Zealand, Tahiti, and various Pacific islands. Cook also sailed up the west coast of North America in a failed search for the Northwest Passage (a more direct route from Europe to the Pacific that would avoid the stormy seas around Cape Horn, at the southern tip of South America).

Bligh must have paid close attention to Cook’s methods for keeping his crew healthy on long voyages, because he later implemented some of those methods on the Bounty. Second to Cook himself, he was responsible for creating charts and surveys, and also drew accurate sketches of birds, animals, and landscapes.

On February 14, 1779, at Kealakekua Bay, Hawaii, Bligh witnessed the murder of Captain Cook by natives. In Bligh’s view, the murder happened because the Marines guarding Cook did not do their duty.[iv] The tragedy affected Bligh not only personally but professionally. Bligh’s family connections were just good enough to get him into the Navy as a midshipman, but he had been counting on Cook’s influence to help further his career. (In the Royal Navy in that era, who you knew was often more important than what you knew.)

In February 1781, Bligh married Elizabeth Betham on the Isle of Man. After serving on a variety of ships for a few months near the end of the American Revolution, Bligh ended up on the Isle of Man with his wife and new daughter. In the scaled-back peacetime Navy, no officer’s berths were available.

The peacetime Navy paid only two shillings a day, so Bligh had to find work. The Navy granted his request for permission to sail on merchant ships. From mid-1783 until he was appointed commander of the Bounty, he commanded ships belonging to his wife’s wealthy uncle, Duncan Campbell, carrying goods from England to the West Indies and returning with rum and sugar.

His careful drawings and proven navigational skills probably recommended him to the Admiralty as commander of Sir Joseph Banks’s breadfruit expedition. Navigational skills were important because, once he’d retrieved breadfruit from Tahiti, the Admiralty wanted him to chart the Endeavour Straits, a narrow, dangerous passage separating Australia (then called New Holland) and New Guinea).[v] Cook had run aground there. The Admiralty hoped Cook’s sailing master might do better.

There’s no evidence Banks ever met Bligh. But Bligh, knowing the career value of a powerful patron, thanked Banks profusely for command of the Bounty, and wrote: “I can only assure you I shall endeavour, and I hope succeed, in deserving such a trust…”[vi]

 

HMAV Bounty

The Bounty was a three-masted merchant vessel, built just 2 1/2 years earlier. She was 85 feet, 1 1/2 inches long on the upper deck and 24 feet 4 inches wide. At just 220 tons, she was much smaller than any of Cook’s ships had been.

Because she was so small, she was rated as a cutter. That mattered because a cutter did not rate a captain or a commander as a commanding officer, but only a lieutenant. That, in turn, meant Bligh would not be getting a promotion, as he had hoped.

On a voyage expected to last at least two years, the difference between a lieutenant’s and commander’s pay was considerable. Bligh would earn just £70 a year. (As a merchant captain under Duncan Campbell, he’d been earning £500.) All the Navy offered was the assurance that that he would be promoted upon his return.[vii]

The Bounty was unusual in other ways, thanks to modifications Joseph Banks had insisted upon. All that mattered to Banks was the return of breadfruit, and, he wrote, “…the Master & Crew of her must not think it a grievance to give up the best part of her accommodations for that purpose.”[viii]

The most notable modification from Bligh’s point of view must have been the loss of the great cabin, the commanding officer’s private quarters. Normally the great cabin was as wide as the ship and extended from the stern almost to the main mast, with windows on three sides providing plenty of light. But on the Bounty, the great cabin had been turned into a breadfruit nursery. It was filled with shelves, cut with holes to receive 629 pots. It had special ventilation, a stove for warmth, a drainage system that caught and recycled excess water, and more. Bligh had to make do with a windowless cabin, eight by seven feet. He would eat in a small, cramped pantry.

The Bounty’s small size meant a smallish crew. Bligh would be the only commissioned officer. Warrant officers would include a master, boatswain, carpenter, gunner and surgeon. Bligh decided not to hire a purser, who normally bought provisions from the Navy Board, tracked them and doled them out on the voyage, and sold back unused ones at the end. Instead, Bligh would look after the disbursement of stores himself.

Most fatefully, the ship would not carry any Marines, who on most Navy ships served as the captain’s security and police force.

 

Edward Willett is a writer and performer from Regina, Saskatchewan. More about Edward …

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Magebane



“Spectacular” – Publishers Weekly (starred review)

“Evil wizards, multi-level conspiracies, hidden kingdoms…Lee Arthur Chane…has done a marvelous job…Magebane is a very entertaining book and well worth the time.” – A.M. Donovan, Night Owl Reviews

I happily recommend Magebane and I’ll certainly give Chane’s next novel a try based on this one.” —Bill Capossere, Fantasy Literature

“…an original and delightful tale of epic fantasy and magic, steampunk science, adventure, tragedy, and love…” – Errant Dreams Reviews

Eight centuries ago, the world changed. A devastating war swept the lands, and the MageLords, who had long ruled by virtue of their spell powers, were driven to a distant place, separated from those they had ruled by a magical Barrier. With magic banished from the rest of the world, the MageLords became mere legend and people turned to science to improve their lives. But if one man has his way, all that is about to change….

Written as Lee Arthur Chane (the middle names of my older brothers, Jimmy Lee and Dwight Arthur, and myself, Edward Chane Willett).

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Marseguro



Winner of the 2009 Prix Aurora Award for Best Long-Form Work in English

Water world Marseguro is home to the Selkies, a water-dwelling race created from human DNA. When an unmodified human seeks revenge on a Selkie by activating a distress beacon taken from the remains of the original colony ship, a strikeforce is sent from Earth to eradicate the genetic abomination. Yet Marseguro will not prove as easy to conquer as the Earth force anticipates…



Terra Insegura



Finalist for the 2010 Prix Aurora Award for Best Novel in English

Marseguro, a water world far from Earth, is home to a colony of humans and the Selkies, a water-dwelling race created from modified human DNA. For seventy years the colony has lived in peace. Then Earth discovers Marseguro, and a strike force is sent to eradicate this “abomination.” But Marseguro has created a genetically tailored plague to use against Earth’s Holy Warriors. With the enemy defeated, the people of Marseguro feel they are safe. But Chris Keating, the traitor who signaled Marseguro’s location to the Holy Warriors, has fled to Earth, unknowingly carrying the deadly plague within him. The people of Marseguro feel they must send a ship to Earth with a life-saving vaccine. Only time will tell what awaits them when they reach their destination.

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Lost in Translation



Kathryn was a human empath whose world and life had been destroyed when the alien S’sinn slaughtered her parents before her very eyes. Jarrikk was a young S’sinn, an unproven warrior who’d seen his flight mates slaughtered by the humans who’d sought to colonize his world.

As humans and S’sinn found themselves on the brink of war, these two Translators had to work together to find a common ground and avert catastrophe. But whether their Translators’ oath and training could overcome the enemies leagued against them was very much in doubt…



Archives

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Song of the Sword

My new YA fantasy novel from Lobster Press

Before the Lady called her, Ariane’s life was a mess. Two years ago, her mother disappeared. She bounced around different foster homes until her aunt finally took her in. The meanest clique at her new high school has decided to make Ariane their prime target. And to top it all off, she is having frightening premonitions, and they are becoming more intense. The moment water touches her skin, she sees visions of a lake, a lady, and a sword. When a staircase opens up in the middle of Wascana Lake and the water begins singing to her, she has no choice but to answer the call….

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Historic Walks of Regina and Moose Jaw



Ten walks to points of historic and architectural interest in the cities of Regina and Moose Jaw (eight walks for Regina, two for Moose Jaw).



Johnny Cash: The Man in Black

When country music legend Johnny Cash took the stage at Folsom State Prison in 1968, he solidified the public’s perception of him as a rebel who followed his own path. Born in Arkansas during the Great Depression, Cash endured poverty, the death of his older brother, and a difficult relationship with his father. He turned to gospel and country music to express the pain, and after many years of struggling, his songs of hardship and hope would finally reach the ears of those waiting for an artist who represented them, ordinary people fighting to survive.



Andy Warhol: Everyone Will Be Famous for 15 Minutes

“Paintings are too hard. Machines have less problems…” In the 1960s, Andy Warhol became the most famous creator of a new style of art called pop art, which transformed mass-produced items of popular culture into fine works of art. From Campbell’s Soup cans to photographs of Marilyn Monroe, Warhol’s willingness to use anything and everything from the mass media in his work expanded the range of subject matter available to artists. His avant-garde films, artistic usage of American icons, and unconventional social life made him a controversial figure, both greatly admired and deeply reviled. A trendsetter rather than a trend-follower, a dispassionate observer of both the seamy and celebrity sides of life, Warhol was a true American rebel.



Disease-Hunting Scientist



The true stories of six real disease hunters. Epidemiologists travel the world trying to keep us safe from deadly diseases—from high-tech labs in Canada to remote villages in Africa. Learn how these “disease detectives” are coming up with new ways to fight disease, and find out if you have what it takes to become an epidemiologist, too!



The Bounty Mutiny

The Bounty was a British ship visiting Tahiti in 1789 when some of the crew overthrew the captain, William Bligh, and set him adrift in a tiny boat with sailors loyal to him. The mutiny resulted in a number of trials–both of the men who mutinied and of Bligh for losing command of his ship. These fascinating events have been the source for numerous Hollywood movies, most recently The Bounty. The Bounty Mutiny: From the Court Case to the Movie explores the famous case and the movies it inspired.