Sarah Morse Adams's Blog, page 3

Fairy Tale Friday: “The White Cat” by Madame D’Aulnoy

Wasn’t she a dish?

Marie-Catherine Le Jumel de Barneville, Baroness d’Aulnoy.

This Fairy Tale Friday, I drink to her.

I should probably admit before I start that I’m just a little bit in love with this woman. Okay, I’m a lotta bit in love with her, and I’ve only just scratched the surface of her life and her work.

Her life was, at times, like the plot of a suspense novel. She was married at age 15 to the Baron D’Aulnoy. Three years later, the baron was accused of treason but somehow managed not only to prove accusations false (whether they actually were or not, I’m not sure), but to have the two accusers executed. Then, Marie-Catherine’s good friend tried to kill her husband and was beheaded.

By all accounts, the woman was lively and spirited. She was afraid of ghosts, but not much else. She was rumored to have been a spy in England and to have born one to three illegitimate children.

She hosted some of the most popular “salons” in Paris, where the French elite would come and discuss ideas and literature. At these parties, one of the major activities was “spontaneously” creating fairy tales (many had been committed to memory beforehand, of course, they just acted as if they were making them up on the spot).

Sigh.

I’m struck with the feeling, not for the first time in my life, that I was born in the wrong century. How do you think that would go over at a dinner party now?

Okay, just one more thing and I’ll get to “The White Cat” which is an AWESOME STORY: Madame D’Aulnoy was the first to actually call these stories fairy tales (Contes de Fées)! She directly inspired Perrault, and yet he gets all the cred for his Mother Goose Tales. So, she made up some stuff in her more serious writings Since when is history actual fact?

*Breathes*

Okay. I’m done.

Now, “The White Cat” is my favorite fairy tale of the week. It’s got a little something for everyone. A prince (three, actually), a queen, a maiden trapped in a tower, a curse, a happy ending. The happiest ending that could be. It’s a little like Beauty and the Beast in a way, a little like Rapunzel in another. With a touch of Snow White.

This story feels a little less sparse than the Grimm stories — and Madame D’Aulnoy’s humor often seeps in. Here are some of my favorite quotes:

“A day scarcely passed that he did not buy dogs–big, little, greyhounds, bull-dogs, boar-hounds, harriers, spaniels, poodles, lap-dogs; as soon as he had a very fine one, he found one still finer, and therefore let the first go and kept the other; for it would have been impossible to take about with him, quite alone, thirty or forty thousand dogs, and he did not wish to have gentlemen-in-waiting, valets or pages in his suite.” SMA – Thiry or forty THOUSAND dogs. hahaha.
“White Cat was going hunting and wished the prince to join her. The helpful hands gave him a wooden horse, which galloped at full speed, and stepped grandly. He made some difficulty about mounting, saving that he was far from being a knight errant like Don Quixote; but his resistance was of no avail, and he was

put on the wooden horse. It had housings and saddle of gold and diamond embroidery. White Cat was mounted on the handsomest and finest monkey ever seen. She did not wear her long veil, but a dragoon hat, which lent her such a determined expression that all the mice of the neighbourhood were in terror.” SMA – bolding mine. The cat rode a MONKEY.
“I took a turquoise ring from my finger and hastily threw it him, signing him to go away quickly because I heard the Fairy Violent mounting her dragon to bring me my breakfast. The first words she said on entering the room were: ‘I smell the voice of a man here; search for him, dragons. Imagine my feelings. I was paralysed with fear lest he should go out by the other window and follow the knight in whom I was already greatly interested. ‘My dear mamma’ (for it was thus the old fairy liked me to call her), ‘you are joking when you say you smell a man’s voice; has a voice any smell?”

The story is busting with funny little quirks like these, and I totally recommend it for your Friday night reading pleasure. It’s like a sweet bite of cake. Read the full translated text here.

Now, if you’ll excuse me, Madame D’Aulnoy is waiting.

Entranced Sneak Peek: Free Chapter One

Chapter One

I clutched a plush teddy bear in one hand and a pendulum in the other. Holding my forearm horizontal to the butcher block table’s surface, as still as possible, I whispered, “Is Joey in Hemlock Hollow?”

The golden pointer swung horizontally. Yes.

“Is he safe?” I asked, even though I knew the answer. My son and I had a connection. I might not be able to locate him exactly, which was why I was using this piece of junk pendulum, but as sure as my heart beat in my chest, I knew he was out there.

The pendulum gave another positive response.

I dropped it to the table and squeezed between a four-poster bed and its matching bureau to start the journey across my antique store to where I kept the maps. Mama would kill me if she saw the place now. For twenty years, she had kept Frantiques in perfect, pristine order — dressers and beds along the walls, straight rows between tables. My method was a bit more, let’s just say, organic. I was regretting that now as every item that came between me and the maps delayed my reunion with Joey.

It had been four weeks, three days, two hours, and twenty-nine minutes since my husband had taken my son from me. My sweet little boy with a head full of curls and a heart full of laughter. I could see him in my mind’s eye clear as if it had only been the previous day, giggling as he leaned precariously to the side, like a mini Tower of Pisa, thrilled that he was walking.

But that hadn’t happened yesterday. That was years ago. My boy was four, nearly ready for kindergarten, and no doubt growing and changing with each passing day. Each second hurt. It was too long for a boy to go without his Mama.

I finally reached the eighteenth century wooden water bucket filled with rolled maps of Hemlock Hollow. Shuffling through them, I found the most recent and brought it back to the table. I spread the map flat, grabbing four old vases to hold down the corners.

I positioned the pendulum over the map. “Where is he?” I choked out. “Where is my son, Joey Reynolds?”

The pendulum sat impossibly still for a moment, then started to twist back and forth. I let it roam over the surface of the map, concentrating on feeling any little tug or pull in a specific direction. But it remained in one place, twisting, twisting.

The map was from the early nineteen twenties, but the town hadn’t changed much. Deep in the Catskill Mountains, nestled between Hemlock Mountain and the New York State Thruway, it didn’t have room to expand. But even if it did, it wouldn’t have. This was the kind of town where people fought very hard to keep things the way they were.

I should know. I fell into the group of people that were “fine” but “not our kind of people, if you know what I mean.” Somehow, I was the exception to the rule. But I couldn’t claim credit. I stood on the shoulders of my Mama, who fought hard to open Frantiques. All I had to do was stay in town and not bother anyone. So far, I’d done both.

With a sharp tug, the pendulum jerked left. I clutched the clasp at the top of the chain to keep hold of it. Now we were getting somewhere. It ripped to the right, dragging my arm across the map, then back to the left. Then it shot toward me, like it was a stray dog dragging its owner — my arm — on a leash. On the next tug, it pulled so hard that the cyclone pendulum detached itself from its chain and fell to the table with a dull thud.

“Darn it,” I said, picking up the pieces. Livid, I pulled my cell phone from my pocket and dialed Liora’s number. She was supposed to be one of my best friends, but just then she was teetering on the edge of enemy territory.

The phone rang three times before a chipper voice answered. “MoonGoddess Psychic, how can I —”

“Do you know who you remind me of?” I said without introduction. I didn’t need an introduction.

“Shawna, Goddess be, what are you talking about?”

“Don’t pull that ‘Goddess be’ crap with me, Liora. Answer my question.”

“No,” she said, drawing out the word.

“You remind me of a man I know who calls himself an antique dealer…”

“Is this about the pendulum?”

“…but all he sells is crap that no one wants…”

“Did it work?”

“….claiming it’s all antique when it’s really just trash.”

“Shawna.”

“What? I’m just telling you a story. A hypothetical story.” Normally, I didn’t go around insulting people, but with Liora I felt like I could be myself. Not because she was a tall willowy hippie witch who never met a New Age philosophy she didn’t like, but because of what was underneath all that. A solid and trustworthy friend. I didn’t have too many of those.

“You said ‘you remind me of.’ That’s not hypothetical,” Liora said. I could hear her smile through the phone.

I smothered an answering grin. “Whatever. What I’m saying is that that pendulum is a piece of trash. It’s one thing to sell it to me, Shawna, it’s another thing altogether to sell it to unsuspecting customers.”

“I gave it to you, Shawna.”

“What?”

“I gave it to you. And if it didn’t work, it’s not the pendulum’s fault. It’s just a metal trinket. It’s supposed to help you tap into your powers.”

I knew that. Although my witchy studies had been cut short due to my mother’s unanticipated death, I’d read my grimoire like a good student reads a textbook — cover to cover. I shook my head. “I’m telling you, that thing was junk.”

“So it didn’t work?”

“No. Is it possible that the pendulum can’t find my husband because he’s pure evil? So evil that he blots out even the good that is Joey?”

“That anger sure isn’t helping, woman.”

My voice had risen without me even noticing. “How would you feel if this happened to you?”

“Not great, love. Not great.” A beat of silence passed on the phone. “Shawna, you should really consider involving the police. I know they haven’t been much help in the past…”

I let out a harsh bark of laughter. “Sorry? What was that? Didn’t your recent brush with the law cure you of the idea that the Hemlock Hollow police department act out of anyone’s interests but their own?” Liora had spent some time in the Hemlock Hollow jail. It was not a nice place.

“I deserved it, Shawna. Plus, from what I’ve heard, the police have had quite the makeover since our little run-in with them. Your husband took your son from you. Magic can only help so much here. Maybe it’s time to give them a try.”

The eyelid over my right eye twitched and I rubbed at it, sighing. “Maybe you’re right.”

“But before you do — the universe knows where Joey is. Try to tap into it again, like we did the other day. Clear your mind of everything else.”

Liora’s voice was low and sweet as honey over the phone, but it didn’t make me feel much better. We’d been trying different things for the past week, and none of it had worked. I sighed and hung up the phone.

Picking up the teddy bear again I sat back in my chair, running my hands over its pilled fur. I closed my eyes and relaxed each muscle from my temples down to my toes. Only then did I ask the question that I really wanted answered: “Where is Joey?”

…Find out in the full-length “Witches of Hemlock Hollow” standalone Entranced, available at all the major ebook retailers:

Read on Amazon/Kindle

Read on Nook

Read on an Apple device

Read on Kobo reader

Entranced Release + The Inspiration

Today a book is born. Yay! Celebration! Party! Mini victory dance! (More like a nap.)

It’s called Entranced.

If you’ve read any of the “Home of the Dead” serial, then the characters in this book will be very familiar to you. Entranced focuses on Shawna Reynolds, Grace Deacon’s best friend, whose husband took off with their only son. On her journey to find them she encounters a woman who offers a tempting solution to her problem. But when the solution threatens the very fabric of her life she must decide: is real life better than fiction?

You don’t need to have read of Home of the Dead to enjoy this book, but since this takes place after Home of the Dead, it may spoil a few things for you.

Buy Entranced from any of the major retailers here.

The Birth of a World: Witches of Hemlock Hollow

As I finished Home of the Dead I realized I was falling in love. Not just with Grace and Lily, but with Shawna and Liora as well. I wanted to deep-dive into all of their lives…so I decided, why not?

So began the Witches of Hemlock Hollow.

For now, each woman (Grace, Shawna, & Liora) will have her own series. They will loosely tie together, but be slightly different from one another. Hate serials? Liora and Shawna’s books will be full-length. Prefer mystery over suspense? Liora’s books will cover that. Read just one series, or two, or all of them. You’ll be able to follow as long as you start with Book 1 in each series.

It is best to read them in order at the moment if you want to read them all. So, begin with Home of the Dead and continue with Entranced.

If there is enough interest in all three, I’ll tie them together at some later date.

I’m really excited to live in and to expand the world of Hemlock Hollow.

The Idea for Entranced

When I begin with books I start with a barely there concept. A mood. For Entranced it began with the villain. I wanted him or her to be creepy as hell, to get under Shawna’s skin, to make her doubt her sanity. Since Shawna’s magical powers are mental in nature she was the perfect victim for a psychological villain. But one question persisted, my constant question in this series: How could magic make this worse?

What followed was an ambitious attempt to write a psychological paranormal suspense with a dash of romance. After the first draft I was like…WHAT THE BLEEP IS THIS? But, somehow, with lots of rewriting, I massaged it into what I wanted it to be. Almost. It’s never the perfect work of literary fiction that lives only in my brain, but the final result is closer than I’d hoped.

The next problem was one of race. It was important to me to write Shawna’s story, but how could I write the experience of a black woman in a mostly white town? The answer came to me after lots of reading and thinking on the topic: just like you write men, or someone who has lost her whole family, or a witch — with empathy and respect. None of these things describe my experience, but if I do my research and listen to other people, I can start to understand. I can write from that place.

If authors only wrote what they knew we’d have a lot of boring stories.

This book deals with race when it came up, which it did, but it deals more with the intersectionality of being a black woman, a witch with magical powers, and a woman in a small town.

So, that’s a little background on the book. More to come later when I awake from my post-publishing stupor.

Don’t forget to pick up your copy of Entranced today.