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The January Untold Snippet

Originally published at Sarah Rees Brennan. You can comment here or there.

In the spirit of the New Year, thought we might have something new from Untold, and some lovely people seemed interested in where Angela and Holly were at.

K hope you guys enjoy you know I love you xoxo!

Angie’s living room was almost as intimidating as the parlor at Aurimere. It was white and clinical as a doctor’s office, if said doctor’s office had a fur rug on the floor and a sofa with gold curly legs.

Rusty was in the kitchen making tea and snacks. Angie was prowling about the room like an unhappy cat.

“I’m sorry,” Angela said at last, and sat down beside Holly. “I don’t know what to say to make it better. But I’m sorry.”

That already made it better: that Angie, who never pretended, was concerned. It made Holly feel special, in a way she never really had before. She saw Angie’s hand waver for a moment, then move toward Holly’s: Holly was glad for a moment.

Then she remembered and flinched back. Angela withdrew her hand.

“Can we just get it over with?” Angela demanded. “I want to be friends with you again, without all this weirdness. If you think I’m disgusting or something . . .”

Holly looked at Angie then, stricken. “Oh no,” she said. “No.”

“Then can I just say,” Angela began, and stopped, then started again. “I don’t want to say I’m sorry, as if a guy hitting on a girl is a compliment and a girl hitting on a girl is an insult that should be apologized for. I won’t try anything again. I obviously picked up cues that were not there; I don’t have any experience and I’m sorry that—”

“Cues?” Holly asked. She felt cold suddenly, as if she had been turned to ice and might shatter.

“What?” said Angela.

“You thought there were cues?” Holly asked. Her voice sounded cold, too. “You mean you thought there was a chance I might like you back . . . that way?”

There was a silence.

Angela said in a level voice, “I made a mistake.”

“Yes, you did!” Holly stood up, looking at anything but Angie. “I have to go home.”

Thorin Dreamboatshield: An Unexpected Hotness of Dwarves

Originally published at Sarah Rees Brennan. You can comment here or there.

PETER JACKSON: Dear Sir Ian, here’s my script of THE HOBBIT. Please come be Gandalf!

SIR IAN MCKELLAN: Nah.

PETER JACKSON: Dear Sir Ian, holy God, the success of these movies rests on your celebrated and award-winning silvery head. Please, please, please be Gandalf! Here’s my revised script, subtitled WIZARDS RULE, DWARVES DROOL, PS YOU’RE HOTTER THAN MICHAEL FASSBENDER.

SIR IAN MCKELLAN: … I will consider this.

Once Sir Ian was in, the movie was on, and the script had to be further elegantly crafted…

SCRIPTWRITERS: Uh, let’s add necromancy!

PETER JACKSON: Excellent.

SCRIPTWRITERS: Evil pale orc who wants a grudge match redo with our dreamy dwarf leader!

PETER JACKSON: Good, good.

SCRIPTWRITERS: Story of how a forest gets infested with giant spiders and goes evil.

PETER JACKSON: Can borrow Forbidden Forest set, check!

SCRIPTWRITER 3: Like, when they’re just walking up mountains, right–so boring, we totally already saw people walk up mountains in THE LORD OF THE RINGS–and they realise that oops, the mountains they’re walking on are actually stone giants throwing bits of stone at each other?

SCRIPTWRITER 1: Jesus, Brad, are you high?

SCRIPTWRITER 2: You’re letting the team down and you’re letting yourself down.

PETER JACKSON: I’ll put in the stone giants, why not!

SCRIPTERWRITERS: …

PETER JACKSON: WE HAVE THREE MOVIES TO FILL HERE, PEOPLE, THIS IS NO TIME TO BE FUSSPOTS!

And so the movie begins.

CAMERA: *slow pan over pastoral landscape*

MUSIC: *ye old hobbyt medley*

AUDIENCE: This is just a shamelessly cynical attempt to cash in on people’s nostalgia for the beautiful sets and epic feeling of THE LORD OF THE–

SARAH: *sobbing* I-i-it’s the SHIIIIIIIRE!

OLD BILBO: Frodo, my lad, I know you think I told you the story of my adventures, but actually, there’s quite a bit more to it than that…

FRODO: That’s amazing, Bilbo!

OLD BILBO: You might have formerly thought my adventures would make a rather short book. In fact, it was more like three quite substantial movies.

FRODO: … For real?

OLD BILBO: You just shut your face. I have four words for you, young hobbit: Breaking Dawn Part Two. Now sit down and listen.

OLD BILBO: … Anyway it’s entirely possible the audience will go to see movie three and after the opening credits there will just be a giant ‘PSYCH’ onscreen.

OLD BILBO: So once, in days long gone by, there was a dwarf kingdom and its king was maybe a little unhinged about his treasure. Get it? Get i–never mind.

OLD BILBO: And as we all know, people with psychological problems attract dragons.

FLASHBACK TO FORTRESS, MANNED BY HANDSOME DWARF PRINCE, ATTACKED BY DRAGON.

OLD BILBO: And then they saw unleashed a blast of unrivalled and relentless hotness.

AUDIENCE: Well, he is VERY attractive.

AUDIENCE: Oh. Oh you meant the dragon, right, our bad…

DWARF KINGDOM: *laid waste*

THRANDUIL KING OF THE ELVES: We should go help our sworn allies, the dwarves. That’s why I came wearing my shiny battle tiara!

ELVEN LIEUTENTANT: Sir, your son young Prince Legolas has got hold of that movie Brave, thrown out all his silken frocks and set up a strict five a.m. to nine p.m. archery schedule at the elven court.

THRANDUIL: Wait, what? What? No! I left strict orders that my elven subjects should do my will and PARTY DOWN!

THRANDUIL: Screw this! We’re going home.

THORIN DREAMBOATSHIELD, PRINCE OF THE DWARVES AND INTERNATIONAL DWARF PINUP: … Elves are assholes.

OLD BILBO: And Thorin never forgave. And he never forgot. And he never got any less dreamy.

Meanwhile, in the Shire…

BILBO: Another wonderful day of surfing Pinterest for more ideas about doilies!

GANDALF: Hi, young Bilbo. Want an adventure?

YOUNG BILBO: Is that a type of vacuum cleaner? Anyway, no thanks, I’m cool.

DWALIN: Hey dude, got any grub?

BILBO: Is this a dwarfish outreach program?

FILI AND KILI: Well, hello, can we come in? Incidentally, we are part-time models and the front men in the new dwarf boyband One Dwarfrection.

BILBO: Ahahaha, the thing is, I filled out that ‘Hot Young Dwarves’ Playmate’ form by accident…

OTHER DWARVES: All literally arrive in an anonymous heap.

BILBO: ARE YOU DWARFHOVAH’S WITNESSES?

BILBO: I don’t want to join your dwarf boyband!

GANDALF: I think you’re about to change your mind, Bilbo. I hope the audience remembers the hot dwarf from the last flashback…

AUDIENCE: WE SURE DO.

GANDALF: A slightly silver fox now, but no less foxy.

THORIN DREAMBOATSHIELD: I would have arrived earlier but frankly you were juggling plates and singing about the washing up and I’m not in for that.

THORIN DREAMBOATSHIELD: So I stood around outside letting the rain wash down my chiseled profile, staring out into the night and thinking about my dark past, as is my way.

THORIN DREAMBOATSHIELD: NOT A JOLLY DWARF.

THORIN DREAMBOATSHIELD: *but very chiseled*

GANDALF: May I introduce Thorin Dreamboatshield, the rightful king of the dwarves? Also Mr December in the Dreamy Dwarves of Middle Earth calendar, because you want to end the year right. And November, because that’s a month when people really need cheering up. Also October, September, August, July, June, May, April, March, January…

BILBO: But not February?

GANDALF: We figured Fili and Kili together would be hot enough so that people could do without Thorin for one month.

FILI AND KILI:

GANDALF: We picked the shortest month.

FILI AND KILI:

GANDALF: How about you take along the hobbit because I say, bucko?

THORIN: You’re not the boss of me! You know how I know that? Because I am KING.

DWARVES: All hail His Majesty.

FILI & KILI: All hail Mr January!

BILBO: … Hey, the dwarves are gone. Wow, my home looks a lot less studly.

BILBO: Bilbo, you fool, what have you done. You will never meet dwarves that chiseled again!

BILBO: CAN’T STOP NOW FARMER GAMGEE I’M OFF TO JOIN AN ALL-DWARF MALE MODELLING GROUP!

BALIN: Let me tell you the tale of how Thorin’s people went to war for another lost homeland–dwarves have many lost homelands it’s a thing–and Thorin’s father was darkly and mysteriously disappeared, and Thorin’s grandpa’s head was cut off in a non-mysterious but really asshole fashion, and let me tell you how Thorin led the battle despite being so young and supple and good-looking, and saved his people.

BALIN: That’s right–Thorin has TWO angsty, tragic backstories!

BALIN: Compared to Thorin Dreamboatshield, Batman is a whiny little crybaby

THORIN DREAMBOATSHIELD, OTHERWISE KNOWN AS BATDWARF: *stares moodily into the darkness, contemplating his tragic backstory*

BALIN: And Thorin faced down their great leader, some sort of pale orc, and cut off his hand, and fed it to a crocodile-

BILBO: I think I remember this story from somewhere el-

GANDALF: And from that day the pale orc was known as Captain Ho – Captain Horc.

DWALIN: No-one’s been like Thorin, a king-pin like Thorin.

FILI AND KILI: No-one’s got a swell cleft in his chin like Thorin!

THORIN DREAMBOATSHIELD: As a specimen? Yes, I’m intimidating.

BILBO: So, look, just in case you’re ever taking a nap when evil comes a-knocking, what other wizards could we rely on to save us?

GANDALF: Uh, let me see, there’s Saruman the Totally Not Evil, two other wizards who totally won’t be appearing in these movies even though there are three whole movies to fill up, I don’t even know, and Rabadash the Brown.

GANDALF: My bad, that’s Narnia. Understandable mistake, Tolkien and C.S. Lewis were bros. Radagast. That’s him. Radagast the Brown. And he’ll be appearing in this movie right about… now.

COSTUME DESIGNER: Hee hee hee I’m going to put birdpoop in Radagast’s hair.

AUDIENCE: Now we know who Scriptwriter 3 was getting high with…

RADAGAST THE BROWN: I really need to deep-cleanse and condition my hair, and I really need to sort out the eldritch evil consuming my forest, but first things first: must tend to an adorable hedgehog!

AUDIENCE: Uh… did Radagast just bring a hedgehog back from the dead?

HEDGEHOG:

AUDIENCE: D’awww, little zombie hedgehog! Most cutest zombie in the world!

RADAGAST: Time to investigate the fortress of darkness where I suspect evil may just be afoot!

GHOST OF EVIL WITCH KING ANGMAR: *attacks Radagast, drops sword, retreats in extreme embarrassment*

RADAGAST: This means necromancy, the darkest of all dark magics!

RADAGAST: … Except hedgehog necromancy. That’s 100 % okay.

GANDALF: Let’s go visit the elves!

THORIN DREAMBOATSHIELD: Nope I don’t want to go visit the elves. Because all elves are assholes, is why.

FILI AND KILI: Bilbo, could you investigate the mysterious disappearance of our ponies? We just don’t want our handsome leader to make the attractively disappointed face at us… Our hearts would break if we let down Mr January.

FILI AND KILI: We’re almost totally certain the ponies haven’t been stolen by gigantic vicious trolls.

TROLLS: Boogers! Murder! Stealing stuff and eating people! Also, boogers.

BILBO: My almost eerie intuition and people skills tell me these guys are evil and also gross.

BILBO: *immediately captured*

DWARVES: Man, Bilbo is not stealth.

KILI: I’LL SAVE YOU, BILBO!

DWARVES: Mind you, we’re not really ones to talk about stealth.

THORIN DREAMBOATSHIELD: NOW IS MY TIME 2 SHINE! Blue steel! BLUE STEEL AXE IN THE FACE!

DWARVES: Is he bold? No one braver.

DWARVES: Is he sweet? Our favourite flavour.

TROLLS: Put down your weapons or the hobbit gets it!

THORIN DREAMBOATSHIELD: Okay, let’s drop our weapons, and I’m sure we can talk this out like reasonable peop-

CUT TO: dwarves being roasted on a spit

GANDALF: saves the day with magical rock-splitting!

DWARVES: Oh no, now we’re on the run from orcs!

DWARVES: I wonder which wizard will save us.

RADAGAST: Unexpectedly, it is me! I will lead them away on my sled manned by rabbits faster than jungle cats!

DWARVES: …

SCRIPTWRITERS: I’m sure the racehorse rabbits will kill it onscreen. They will be hilarious.

AUDIENCE: …

GANDALF: Take a hit off my pipe, Radagast. Yeah, these movies make a LOT more sense when you know I’m high literally the whole time, don’t they?

RADAGAST: Thanks Gandalf! Here’s a plot point.

DWARVES: Was that weird? We feel like that was weird.

GANDALF: We’ve got three movies to get through, people, enough of your bellyaching.

DWARVES: Easy for you to talk. You’re HIGH.

DWARVES: Oh no, we’re still on the run from orcs!

THORIN DREAMBOATSHIELD: Kili, can you kill them all with your bow and arrow?

KILI: I don’t think I have… four hundred arrows…

THORIN DREAMBOATSHIELD: You disappoint me Kili. Your name is not ‘Pick Off A Few, Maybe Maim Another, Then Run Out of Arrows’-i.

THORIN DREAMBOATSHIELD: Back to Plan B: Wait for Gandalf to save our dwarf asses.

DWARVES: We love Plan B.

GANDALF: Quick I know this detour which will coincidentally take us real near the elves!

GANDALF: saves the day by leading the orcs to the elves!

THORIN: Gandalf I don’t know how I could have been any more clear on the subject of elves.

GANDALF: Oh come on, Elrond has a sweet home movie theatre.

BILBO: I wonder if I should get Elrond to look at my sword.

DWALIN: If you’re talking about making a pass, bad idea, Elrond don’t play that way, though I hear Thranduil is a freak every day of the week. If you’re talking about your letter opener–

BILBO: Why would elves enchant a letter opener to glow every time evil was near?

DWALIN: Nothing worse than orcs getting the jump on you when you’re trying to open your latest amazon package.

ELROND: *sigh* I had ordered my special box set of Gilmore Girls.

ELROND: As it happens, I can read your mystical map! Quickly, let us to the elven waterfalls avec giant sparkly crystal where I do all my light reading!

THORIN DREAMBOATSHIELD: *sigh* All elves are assholes.

GALADRIEL: Hi Gandalf! Do you like my sparkly elf wedding dress? I got it at Forever 21.

GANDALF: Babe, you look like a million Middle-Earth-currency-whatsits.

ELROND: Oh God, gross, it’s like seeing your mom and a really grizzled baby making out.

SARUMAN: I’m also here, your noble and incorruptible leader, Saruman The Totally Not Evil.

GANDALF: Thank goodness you’re both here. Check out this plot point: it’s an undead sword.

SARUMAN: Explain to me again… the concept of an undead sword…

SARUMAN: Forget about people coming back from the dead and whole forests going evil, I’m sure that’s nothing important, la la la. What really concerns ME is the handful of dwarves currently braiding each others’ hair in their jammies.

GANDALF: (psychically) I hope you noticed my sparkly scarf and fingerless gloves.

GALADRIEL (psychically) : Mmmmhmmm. I love me an elderly hipster wizard.

AUDIENCE: So basically that’s how Saruman slipped under the radar the whole time. We assumed it was devilish cunning, but actually Saruman was yapping ‘Blah, blah, blah, I’m obviously evil, blerderder’ and Gandalf and Galadriel were too busy playing telepathic footsie to notice?

ELF: Lord Elrond, some bad news, we may have lost a dwarf or two.

ELROND: Let’s be clear. Did you lose all the dwarves or just some of the dwarves?

ELF: … All of the dwarves.

SARUMAN: How did you intuit from all their muttering ‘Elves are assholes’ and ‘Let’s blow this lembas stand’ that the dwarves would just get their information and get the hell out of dodge?

GANDALF: *twinkle*

GALADRIEL: Oh Gandalf, you are such a maverick.

GANDALF: You know it, babe.

DWARVES: Questin’… and this is how quests go!

From sun on the grass to mountains’n'snow!

Middle Earth has got a lot of scenery bro!

To see it all we’re going to need a quest montage!

Oooh it takes a quest montage!

DWARVES: So these scenic mountains are actually stone giants hitting each other with stone?

DWARVES: R U 4 REAL, PETER JACKSON?

PETER JACKSON: Where are your dwarf gods nows?

AUDIENCE: So are the stone giants cannibals or are they just, like, berserker fighters who will rip off an arm and hit someone else with it?

STONE GIANTS: QUIT HITTIN URSELF.

BILBO: *pretty reasonably, falls off moving cliff*

THORIN DREAMBOATSHIELD: *rescues him*

AUDIENCE: Thorin Dreamboatshield, you–you DID SOMETHING! Like, in the present! You did something, yes you did, yes you did!

THORIN DREAMBOATSHIELD: Hobbits are junk.

AUDIENCE: … Wow, doing things sure makes Thorin Dreamboatshield cranky.

BILBO: I can’t stay here! Thorin Dreamboatshield thinks I am not truly one of you! He will never accept me as part of your dwarf flash mob/popular kid crowd/ice hockey team! He only asked me to prom on a bet!

DWARF WITH THE FUNNY HAT: I wish you all the luck in the world, Bilbo.

BILBO: And I wish you dwarves could’ve mentioned your names a bit more frequently, because I feel like this is a very warm and special moment between us, Dwarf With The Funny Hat.

DWARF WITH THE FUNNY HAT: Is that your sword glowing with eldritch light because we are about to be swallowed by a goblin kingdom or are you just happy to see me?

GOBLINS: Hiiii.

GOBLIN KING: Oh my God, I recognise you from the Dreamy Dwarves of Middle Earth calendar! Holy crap, I’m going to sell you for a ton of money! Like, just the head. Captain Horc doesn’t want you for your body.

GOBLIN KING: … Unlike the rest of Middle Earth.

DWALIN: Holy crap, the Goblin King’s huge hanging wattled chin looks exactly like a scrot-

BALIN: DWALIN PLEASE, THERE ARE INNOCENT YOUNG DWARVES PRESENT!

BILBO: Uh, later guys, I just remembered I left the iron on in Bag End…

GOBLINS: Now frisk the dwarves! Explore their every crevice! Especially the good-lookin’ ones.

FILI & KILI: … Eeeep.

THORIN DREAMBOATSHIELD: Eh. Groped by goblins. You spoiled young people act as if you’ve never had depraved liberties taken with your person by creatures of the underworld before.

BILBO: Yikes, am in a cave that is largely underground and . Oh hello there, are you a friendly local guide?

GOLLUM: In a casually cannibalistic manner of speaking…

GOLLUM: I expect you’re in a rush to save your friends?

BILBO: Not really. Do you have an Xbox down here?

GOLLUM: No, but I have a phone. The reception down here is terrible, but could you go for a game of Angry Birds?

BILBO: What with this and the shiny ring I found on the floor, I’m having a pretty good day. Shame about Thorin Dreamboatshield and the others, of course.

DWARVES: Yep, we’re about to be mercilessly ripped to pieces by goblins.

GOBLINS: It’s possible we’ll keep Fili and Kili to be our sex slaves.

FILI AND KILI: We insist on being mercilessly ripped to pieces!

GANDALF: saves the day with sweet ninja moves!

GOLLUM: Dude, give me back my ring, what is your problem?!

BILBO: Huh, my ring turns me invisible. So, like… I’m invisible, and armed, and this dude has his back to me… maybe I should stab him? Would that be a reasonably heroic thing to do? I think yes!

BILBO: Aw, man, Gollum cried a single manly tear like the wicked but devilishly handsome older brother on the Vampire Diaries! Now I just can’t.

BILBO: … I sure hope the DVR at Bag End is recording all of the Vampire Diaries.

DWARVES: Hey, where’s Bilbo?

BILBO: Look, I didn’t help you guys escape, I didn’t break out badass ninja moves like Gandalf, I slurked around in some caves and indulged in some petty theft, the absolute least I could do is show up once the danger is over. And here I am… showing up.

FILI AND KILI: You can join our band! We’ve decided our new band name is ‘Helpless Incompetents.’

BILBO: Huzzah! I shall play the tambourine.

DWARVES: Oh, man, out of the goblinesque frying pan into the orctabulous fire.

THORIN DREAMBOATSHIELD: Get into the trees! Orcs and the giant magic wolves they ride on can’t climb!

CAPTAIN HORC: Of course we can. I mean, we all have hands? I mean, MOST OF US have TWO hands, THORIN DREAMBOATSHIELD.

THORIN DREAMBOATSHIELD: My bad, guys. I totally thought I saw it on the Discovery Channel.

GANDALF: saves the day with flaming pine cone grenades!

THORIN DREAMBOATSHIELD: dun dun dun!

THORIN DREAMBOATSHIELD: running through the fire, wind in his hair!

THORIN DREAMBOATSHIELD: his hair doesn’t go on fire because he’s just that man–dwarfly.

THORIN DREAMBOATSHIELD: dun dun dun!

AND ALL THE LADIES SAY: there are no ladies in this movie, but if there were, they’d probably like Thorin.

AND ALL THE LADIES SAY: okay there was Galadriel, but she never actually met Thorin.

THORIN DREAMBOATSHIELD: Thorin’s gonna getcha!

THORIN DREAMBOATSHIELD: I am vengeance! I am the night!

FILI AND KILI: What a dwarf!

BALIN: His hair, his hair falls perfectly without him tryin’/He’s so beautiful/And I tell him every day

FILI AND KILI AND BALIN: If perfect’s what you’re searching for/Then just stay the same! When I see your face/There’s not a thing that I would change/ ‘Cause girl you’re amazing!

GANDALF: Does anyone want to go back Thorin up?

DWARVES IN THE TREE: Um, duh? We are Thorin’s back-up. We’re his back-up dancers.

GANDALF: This misunderstanding explains a lot.

DWARVES IN THE TREE: Like a knight in shiiiiining armour/From a long time ago/Just in time he’s gonna save the day/Take you to his castle far awaaaaaaaaa–oh.

THORIN DREAMBOATSHIELD: *thumped mightily by Captain Horc, thrown on his ass, thrown on his ass again*

DWARVES IN THE TREE: Oh. Oh, ow. Oh, that’s gotta sting. Oh, I think he put his back out.

THORIN DREAMBOATSHIELD: … Little help here…

CAPTAIN HORC: You should’ve been doing yoga all these years. Yoga keeps you super flexible.

CAPTAIN HORC’S LARGE MAGIC WOLF: *Thorin-chomps*

DWARVES IN THE TREE: Shake it off, Thorin, shake it off! Feel the bite and do it anyway! Oh, ow. Man, that did not look fun. Yikes, right in the… I can’t watch. How’s he doing?

GANDALF: A bit not good.

GANDALF: In years to come they will sing of the Epic Total Crushing Smackdown of Thorin Dreamboatshield.

CAPTAIN HORC: Could someone be a love and fetch me Thorin’s head.

DWARVES IN THE TREE: NOT THE FACE! NOT THE FACE!

BILBO: Okay that is ENOUGH this has got completely out of hand!

BILBO: You leave Thorin Dreamboatshield ALONE you big bullies!

CAPTAIN HORC: Eh? What is that? Someone fetch a flyswatter.

AUDIENCE: Is this where Thorin gets up and saves Bilbo, or when Bilbo overcomes the odds and–

THORIN DREAMBOATSHIELD: *swoons*

BILBO: Augh, that flyswatter really smarts! *falls over*

AUDIENCE: *facepalm* This is just getting embarrassing.

GANDALF: I can’t save the day I have to save two dwarves from falling to their deaths!

AUDIENCE: Does this mean the dwarves or the hobbit are going to have to do something useful?

DWARVES: Uh…

BILBO: Um…

GANDALF: No don’t worry I sent a butterfly off to fetch giant magical birdies to carry us all away and save the day!

AUDIENCE: But why are we having a quest at all if there are giant magical bir–

GANDALF: If you start thinking along those lines you will ruin the entire THE LORD OF THE RINGS series for yourselves. Do you want that? Well do you, punk?

GANDALF: Okay Thorin basically got half eaten by a giant magic wolf, buddy, I think you need a hospi-

THORIN DREAMBOATSHIELD: Medical attention is for wusses and elves. All I needed was a quick nap in a giant bird’s claws and also forty winks on some bare rock. Now I’m fighting fit!

THORIN DREAMBOATSHIELD: Bilbo, you know how I’ve been a relentless asshole for the entirety of this movie?

BILBO: But so chiseled.

THORIN DREAMBOATSHIELD: In a shocking twist, I am impressed by your moxie and under my gruff but chiseled exterior, I have a heart of gold.

BILBO: I didn’t really accomplish much. Basically I meant well and then we were all rescued by Gandalf.

THORIN: That is the spirit of our fellowship! On our glorious shared tomb will be inscribed the words ‘U TRIED BUDDY… U TRIED.’

BILBO: … Is a quick feel totally out of the question?

THORIN DREAMBOATSHIELD: … Very quick.

THORIN DREAMBOATSHIELD: Please be gentle, I was just gnawed on by a giant magic wolf.

BILBO: I think the next two movies will be pretty uneventful!

GANDALF, OFF CAMERA: *thumps Bilbo with his staff for being a big hobbit jinx*

I went to see this movie yesterday with two friends, both much less nerdy than me. One disliked it, one liked it fine, and I obviously really liked it, because I just spent ages writing a parody. I mean, I think it was flawed, but I really liked it just the same!

Parodies are always done in a spirit of love here. Happy holidays, and I hope you liked it. If you should wish to continue readin’ funny things by me, here is a shameless link to my latest book! If you have already read it, m’friend, thank you for the Christmas present.

The News At Last

Originally published at Sarah Rees Brennan. You can comment here or there.

So, Cassie Clare and Maureen Johnson are great friends of mine. I could say I don’t know how I got so lucky, but I remember quite clearly: I met Cassie at a party where… let’s just say someone died… and I met Maureen by assaulting her with a cupcake.

Crime’s paid off for me.

Not really for them, all I do is play Taylor Swift at Cassie until she is brainwashed. I did bring my box set of MISFITS to a writing retreat in Mexico, thus introducing Cassie to a certain actor: that contribution of mine worked out okay.

My poor Americans spent their time watching MISFITS going ‘British TV is FILTHY! And that Irish boy is the FILTHIEST OF THEM ALL!’ I was proud for my country.

It was at another writing retreat, this summer in France, where we had THE IDEA. We had adopted a kitten and were sitting around on sofas petting the kitten and plotting who would die in our future novels (answer: LOTS OF PEOPLE).

MAUREEN: You know who I love?

EVERYONE: Simon.

MAUREEN: YES. But also, Magnus.

We all agreed that we loved Magnus, and that we were super excited about seeing Magnus in the movie.

I recall watching The Magnus Audition. I confess, watching The Magnus Audition enhanced my love for Magnus extremely. I clawed at Cassie’s shoulder as I watched it. I maybe bit her. I don’t recall. ‘HE’S SO HANDSOME,’ I kept saying.

‘OW’ said Cassie.

I’m deep. I like characters to have facets, okay? And one of Magnus’s facets is that he is super hot.

Back to the French sofas: I talked about how another thing that had cemented my love for Magnus was reading the Infernal Devices, because he was younger in the 1800s, at least one heartbreak back, a bit more vulnerable, still hilarious and a snappy dresser, and still so kind.

(As I am PARTICULARLY fond of the Infernal Devices, I suggested that perhaps Magnus was acquainted with a certain Mr Herondale’s father…)

We all got to talking about the adventures Magnus must have had over the centuries, the people he’d met, the wacky hijinx he’d got up to, the costumes through the ages. Maureen mimed an escape in a hot air balloon and fell off the sofa. (The kitten was very alarmed.) And we got to a point where we were writing a lot of it down, all together, because that is kind of our thing: we get together and write stuff and laugh our heads off about imaginary people. It was all going really well, and we were like, Wait. Could these be REAL stories? Could we do this?

Maureen and I had to ask ourselves, could we pull off Magnus’s voice? (Cassie thought she probably could, you know…)

Maureen said to herself: Yes, for I am hilarious. (Or at least that’s what she should have said, because she IS.)

And I remembered that I had done Magnus’s voice before, in a way…

In Clockwork Princess, Magnus, seeing how much fun Will and Jem are having (aside from all the blood and curses and romantic complications) gets a bromance of his OWN. We were thinking about how these two characters would speak to each other, and Cassie’s husband Josh and I started bantering back and forth, me playing Magnus, Josh playing Magnus’s NEW BRO.

SARAH AND JOSH: *mad laughter* *some interpretative dance*

CASSIE: KEEP GOING I AM TYPING EVERYTHING YOU ARE SAYING.

… So I decided I could perhaps pull off Magnus’s voice as well.

We all got a bit more serious about the stories, and now this is a REAL THING.

We bring to you THE BANE CHRONICLES, chronicling (you see what we did there) Magnus’s adventures through the ages.

Have you ever wondered about Magnus’s past loves and lies? Magnus and Alec’s first date? How Magnus and Camille got together? What happened in Peru? Starting in February 2013, in the run-up to City of Handsome Magnus: the Movie (Also Starring Some Other People Who Are Pretty Good-Looking) we will put out a Magnus Short Story every month.

There will be ten of Magnus’s magnificent adventures all in all. Some of them Cassie and I are writing, some of them Cassie and Maureen are writing, some Cassie is writing herself as we cruelly abandon her! All of them, we think, are lots of fun.

The NEWS is emblazoned here:

http://shelf-life.ew.com/2012/12/10/c...

We just hope you will have as much fun reading the stories as we are having writing them!

December’s Untold Snippet

Originally published at Sarah Rees Brennan. You can comment here or there.

It is December, and that means you guys can have a snippet of Untold! I asked about on the twitter, and several people expressed the strong desire to see a little more of Mr Rusty Montgomery. So here he is, in all his glory…

“Okay,” said Rusty. “Let me handle this. Trust me, Kami.”

Kami glanced over at him in surprise. He rarely used her real name.

He even more rarely looked both serious and alert, but he looked both now, leaning against the cushions and tilted in her direction, his dark hair ruffled against the pale silk cover of the couch.

“I know what other people think about me,” Rusty told her. “‘That Rusty,’ they say. ‘Charming and handsome,’ they say first, of course—they’re not blind. Then they add, ‘All the ambition and drive of a chocolate sundae.’”

“Rusty, no,” Kami said.

Rusty put out a hand, palm raised, to stop her.

“They’re right. That’s what I am. Why not? Most things come easy to me, most things come lightly. That’s what I come from and how I was made.” He grinned at her. “I was exactly the son my parents wanted: no trouble, no demands. Why demand anything when it was all going to come to me anyway? I had this nursery suite in London, it was pretty great. I miss the scheduled naptimes to this day. And then one day I heard this noise through all the doors, this baby screaming her fool head off, and it was Angela.”

Rusty used the hand he’d lifted to stop Kami speaking and made a small gesture; Kami wasn’t sure what it meant.

“I had been introduced to Angela before, obviously. They brought the baby to me from the hospital, and there was a christening where she wore this big lace meringue dress and looked alarmingly like a two-month-old bride. We were somewhat acquainted, but honestly I was more interested in my toy trucks and my naptime beanbag. Only she just kept yelling, and it was interesting because I thought it was so dumb. I knew she didn’t want anything, because that wasn’t how we were brought up—the nanny would have made sure she had all she wanted, though she wasn’t paid to fuss. I didn’t really get why Angela was doing it, so I went through doors and up stairs until I found her. She was just lying in her crib, because babies are unimaginative like that. And I know people think Angela is pretty now, but none of those people ever saw her as a baby. She was god-awfully hideous. I swear she looked like a bad-tempered mutant tomato, and she was making a sound like a cat being fed into a printer.

“I just couldn’t figure it out, you know? Why she was so angry, when everything was fine. I sort of wanted to go away and pretend it wasn’t happening. But she was unhappy, I could tell that much. She wasn’t ever going to be like me, a content sort of person. She was always going to be raging at the world, and there was only me who would even think about paying attention. So I picked her up and took her back to my rooms and showed her the naptime beanbag, and it was me and Angela from then on. And then Mum and Dad decided to set us up in a house surrounded by all this peaceful pastoral evil, and there was you. You care about a lot of stuff like Angela does, and you don’t even have the basic common decency to pretend you don’t. Only you aren’t angry about how much you care, because you always had someone around to give you all the dumb stuff babies cry for, and your house was—I want to be like that someday, be someone like your dad who can help make something like your house. When I went away to college, it was all fine, everything’s always fine for me, but nothing was important. So I sort of slid out, bringing Claud with me, which was a mistake, but I didn’t know you were going to have the bad taste to date one of my friends. I would never have invited him to stay if I’d known he was going to grow that goatee. It had a whole other personality. Tiny Even More Self-Important Claud.”

“Is there a point to this meander down embarrassing memory lane?” Kami asked.

“Actually,” Rusty said, “yes. I was worried about you, when it came to Claud. I’m worried about Angela with this whole business with Holly. I’m worried about you again, with the voice in your head turning out to be this surly guy. I actually wanted to punch someone. I never actually want to punch people.

“So my point is, things aren’t easy, with Angela and you. I don’t take you two lightly. This is the great exception of my life. I don’t want you to interfere on this. I want you to trust me.”

Looking around at the Montgomerys’ room, Kami could picture the showcase loneliness of the Montgomerys’ nursery. Rusty could not have been more than four when he carried Angela back to his room, recognizing despite the fact nobody had given it to him that what Angela needed was love.

“That was a very touching speech, Rusty,” she told him. “But actually, you haven’t been as convincingly louche and laissez-faire as you appear to believe. I knew all this already. On any day of our lives, I would have trusted you with my life. And I’ll trust you now.”

She sat up straight despite the slippery sofa, and looked him directly in the eye, so he would know she meant it.

But the sleepy look of boundless good humor was already restored to Rusty’s face, and his hooded lids were hiding whatever expression was in his eyes. “Don’t pretend, Cambridge,” he said. “You know my beautiful speech has made you see me in a whole new and even more attractive light. You totally think I’m secretly deep now. And you are right. It is true. I have deeps.”

He slid even lower on the sofa, his eyes falling almost completely closed.

“Maybe,” he added, his voice almost too casual, “this revelation will lead you to make the sensible decision, and go for me.”

Get Your Red-Hot News Here!

Originally published at Sarah Rees Brennan. You can comment here or there.

Dear internet: I know that I’ve been teasing some news Maureen Johnson, Cassandra Clare and I have (and excellent news it is!) and then we were told we couldn’t release said news until next week and had to cruelly deny you all. I am so sorry about the cruel denial!

But I do still have news. It does not involve the other two fabulous ladies, but I still hope you will LIKE IT.

So, here is the news: I have a NEW BOOK COMING OUT to tell you guys about.

I was on the phone with Anne Hoppe, the lovely editor at Harper Collins who edited mine and Justine Larbalestier’s TEAM HUMAN. She asked me about things I had been writing and thinking about writing.

… Now, when a lovely editor asks you this question, it is MUCH LIKE when a dreamy boy/girl/whoever strikes your fancy asks you if you are single. It is good news. So we chattered idly about all my ideas. Poor Anne, she wasn’t to know that I always have, at a conservative estimate, one million ideas at any time. We went through these one million ideas.

SARAH: And then there’s werewolves.

ANNE: I’m kinda tired of werewolves.

SARAH: As Plato said, she who is tired of werewolves is tired of life. However… you know how I like to tell stories about books I have read and TV shows I have seen, until said stories take on a LIFE OF THEIR OWN?

ANNE: Oooh, do you mean you’d like to do a retelling?

SARAH: Yes! You’re like an editor detective.

I was in a pool once (fancy I know!) with Cassie Clare, and we were discussing A TALE OF TWO CITIES, which is both of our favourite Dickens novel. (This is just the kind of nerdery one gets with writer friends. Possibly my favourite day in France, aside from the Kitten Adopting Day, was when Cassie gave a dramatic reading of Captain Wentworth’s letter from PERSUASION.)

This conversation lasted for hours. We went all pruny. Pruny with LOVE FOR LITERATURE. A TALE OF TWO CITIES is a fairly important element in a few of Cassie’s novels, and one of our discussion points, about what got ladies of the time hot beneath the petticoat–I mean, about the changing perception of what is deemed attractive and about book boyfriends and what, shut up, we’re classy ladies–made it into one of her books.

Many other things we discussed, and that I have discussed with others about A TALE OF TWO CITIES since then, kept lingering in my mind.

SARAH: So, A Tale of Two Cities has this scene where one guy is accused of a crime, and then his lawyer’s helper, who is lounging about being drunk and disreputable as usual, whips off his wig and is like ‘We’re coincidental lookalikes! Who can SAY who did the crime? How do you like them lookalike apples!’

ANNE: That scene did… happen, but… I’ve never heard it described that way before.

SARAH: The thing is, Anne. I don’t believe in coincidences.

SARAH: I have one word for you. DOPPELGANGERS.

In folklore, a doppelganger is the double of a living person, who represents evil, misfortune… sometimes the person’s coming death. This is, undeniably, cool.

Also in A Tale of Two Cities, the heroine Lucie spends a lot of time reacting to exciting stuff happening to her–Surprise! Your father has been released from prison! Surprise! The French Revolution!–and I thought it would be fun to write a girl who has a very active hand in what is going on.

So, in 2014, I will be publishing a modern retelling of A Tale of Two Cities, with magic. The working title for this book is TELL THE WIND AND FIRE.

It is taken from a quote from A Tale of Two Cities, which goes like this.

‘Tell the wind and fire where to stop… but don’t tell me.’

Unstoppable ladies and evil doubles coming your way in 2014, is what I’m saying. I hope you guys are even a hundredth as excited as I am!

I Was Thinking You Might Like A Present, So I Thought I’d Ask What You Want…

Originally published at Sarah Rees Brennan. You can comment here or there.

What Christmas Present Do You Want, My Sweetlings?



A Hunger Games Movie Parody



A Teen Wolf Season Two Parody



A Revenge Season One Parody



A Vampire Diaries Season Three Parody



A short story set in the world of the Lynburn Legacy



A different short story you will describe to me



A different parody you will describe to me


  


pollcode.com free polls 

November’s Untold Snippet!

Originally published at Sarah Rees Brennan. You can comment here or there.

So, let’s talk about drunkenness and debauchery. I will level with you: the Irish and British experience of being a teenager is pretty different than the American one. In America, you do not get served alcohol if you are not over 21: in Ireland they pretty much throw the stuff at you unless you arrive on a tricycle. Sometimes this Cultural Difference confuses and upsets people. I’ll level with you some more: I once wrote forty pages of one character being drunk because I thought it was hilarious. My editor made me cut that DOWN.

MY EDITORS: Why do you keep putting your teenagers in bars?

SARAH: I’m sorry I don’t understand your question. I’m Irish.

This time, my friends, I have gone one better.

Once outside, the November wind cut through her blouse. She stood on the doorstep and hugged herself, sorry that she had forgotten her jacket. Jared in his thin T-shirt gave no indication that he felt anything but annoyed.

“You should be in school,” he remarked.

“So should you!” said Kami. “You’re the one who’s a year behind! You absolutely cannot afford this kind of academic recklessness.”

“Fred Wright called the school and got me the day off so I could learn the work,” Jared said.

“Which brings me to my first and most important question: What the hell do you think you’re doing?”

“Working,” Jared said. “I asked the Wrights if I could work in the pub for room and board. They agreed.”

“You’re seventeen! This is not only ridiculous, it’s super illegal.”

“It’s possibly not the most super illegal thing a Lynburn has done this week,” Jared pointed out.

It was so strange to Kami, how little she could read him. It was like coming to a door that she had always run through before, to find it locked and barred.

“Why did you leave Aurimere?” Kami asked, her voice small.

“My aunt Lillian made me an offer I had to refuse,” said Jared. He looked forbidding.

Kami knew that expression, and remembered the feeling that used to go with it: he was unhappy. “So you ran away from home,” she said. “To become a tavern wench.”

“I’m not a tavern wench,” said Jared. “That’s not a job.” His voice was slightly less stern than before, as if he was taken aback.

“It sounds like you’re a tavern wench,” Kami told him. “Fleeing persecution, you have to take up a menial occupation to keep body and soul together. But at least it’s honest work, though as you labor, many predatory customers make advances and offer indignities.”

“One can only hope,” Jared responded.

Encouraged, Kami reached out a hand: Jared flinched away. He always did that. Kami didn’t know why she kept forgetting. “Jared. You realize the Wrights only agreed because you’re a Lynburn and they’re frightened of you.”

A muscle in Jared’s jaw twitched. “What do you want me to do?”

“Jared,” she said again, her voice softer. “If you needed help, you could have come to me. Don’t you know that?”

Jared gave her that new look, winter-gray and cold, as if he hated her. “I wouldn’t come to you for anything. Not for any reason.”

It took her aback for a moment, the way he could still hurt her just as much, even though he didn’t care any more. Jared turned away and opened the door to go back inside.

“Wait,” said Kami.

The Untold Snippet You Voted For

Originally published at Sarah Rees Brennan. You can comment here or there.

I just had some super-fabulous news about Unspoken, and since it is all down to you, beauteous readers, I decided to give you a snippet of Untold! I put up a poll on tumblr and ‘A Kissing Scene’ won by miles, because you are all saucebuckets.

Your wish is my command. Spoilers, of course, and THANK YOU!

Holly leaned against the bar. At the same time, Jared came over and dumped his empty tray. There was snow on the ground, but he had the sleeves of his shirt rolled up past his elbows and a couple of buttons undone. He looked overheated and overtired, and aside from that, Holly didn’t know if he was feeling anything at all. He wasn’t like Ash: he was like the other Lynburns, with faces cold as stone and eyes cold as steel.

There was a splash of what seemed to be lime cordial on his open collar. When he dumped the tray, he pushed his hair back and looked at Holly. “You look like you could use a real drink,” he said indifferently.

“Please,” Holly responded.

Jared leaned over the bar and tipped some whiskey into Holly’s glass. Holly drank it.

“Thanks.” Holly looked up from her drained glass to Jared’s eyes. She realized he was looking at her with a certain consideration.

There was no sweet curl to his sullen mouth, no excitement and no nervousness betrayed. He looked just like she felt: as if he would do anything to feel differently than the way he did now. His eyes were beacon-bright. He looked like driving too fast down a dark lane.

Holly met his eyes, and did not look away. Jared put his hand out over the corner of the bar and drew her slowly toward him. She let him do it because nothing about his demeanor suggested that he would care if she pulled away.

“I can’t hurt you,” she asked. “Can I?”

Jared murmured, as if he was telling her a secret: “You’re welcome to try.”

Then she was flush against his body, the corner of the bar digging sharp into her back and his warmth going through her, turning into heat.

Jared leaned forward and set his mouth against hers. The kiss turned deep almost instantly, his hands clenched in the curly weight of her hair. The noise and lights of the bar faded away to a buzz in her ears, light dying behind her closed eyelids.

When the kiss broke apart, Holly’s mouth was stinging and she was staring up at him.

Jared looked down at her. “Want to go up to my room?”

Holly said, “Yes.”

The Map Of My Heart

Originally published at Sarah Rees Brennan. You can comment here or there.

So, I have a Thing To Announce!

Theo Black, fabulous artist, who did a map of Tamora Pierce’s Tortall, also drew me a map for the fictional English town of Unspoken, Sorry-in-the-Vale. It is MOST FANCY, and has things like the Hope Well, and the library, and other streets like Shadowchurch Lane which are in the second book…

And this map will be given out with Unspoken at the signing I have on Sunday at Powell’s, the lovely bookshops where Unspoken is a fall staff favourite!!! And where I will be appearing with other AWESOME LADIES.

Panel: Women in Speculative Fiction for Young Adults

Join us this afternoon for a panelist discussion between five female fantasy writers of novels for young adults. Participants include: Cindy Pon (Silver Phoenix), Mette Ivie Harrison (Tris and Izzie), Sarah Rees Brennan (Unspoken), Malinda Lo (Adaptation), Janni Lee Simner (Bones of Faerie).

Sunday, October 14th @ 2pm Powell’s Books at Cedar Hills Crossing

3415 SW Cedar Hills Blvd. (800) 878-7323

Unspoken is buyabibble from the Powells website or you could come to the signing or call/email the Cedar Hills shop, to make sure your Unspoken comes with map and also a signature and whatever you’d like me to say. (I probably shouldn’t draw pictures, given my lack of artistic SKILLZ, but I will if you really want me to. )

I will add this: The cover of Unspoken is definitely changing for the paperback. I am sorry, as nobody loves that cover more than me, but c’est la vie, and Random House has been awesome to me so far, so I’m thinking the next cover will be lovely too. However, if you like this cover, now’s the time to get it.

In other news, I am interviewed by a very smart lady at tor.com here: Sarah Rees Brennan and Sleeping with Monsters… where I talk about ladies, and writing, and other such things. As is my way. At length. As is my way…

The Saga of Miel

Originally published at Sarah Rees Brennan. You can comment here or there.

Dramatis personae of this saga…

ROBIN WASSERMAN: Golden curls, mind like a cleaver. Occupation–writer and cynic

HOLLY BLACK: Like a Goth Snow White. Wiser than everyone. Occupation–writer

CASSIE CLARE: Redhead, and thus not to be trusted, no matter how great her taste in shoes, jokes or cats. Occupation–writer

THEO BLACK: Looks To Be Determined every day. Once there was a mohawk. Basically a whirlwind of excitement. Occupation–artist

JOSH LEWIS: Beware, hiding sly humour beneath rumpled hair and spectacles. He wears a mask! Occupation–writer

MAUREEN JOHNSON: Hers is the stare of a killer. Occupation–writer who fiends for kittens

So, a bunch of my friends and I, the criminals listed above, were on a writing retreat in the French countryside. Oh it was a beautiful time, full of sunshine and rolling hills and lavender in the garden and orchards where we would scrump for apples. Sometimes we would wear berets while we scrumped apples (Robin did not scrump apples, because that is thieving and she is an honest soul. She did play look-out while I munched on the apples of sin, though). Sometimes we would just wear berets around the house. (We were in FRANCE.)

Sometimes Cassie would scream ‘Help, I’m being tormented by weiners in berets.’

… She was just jealous because she didn’t have cool berets like us.

Now, the Robin mentioned above is a much more active bee than the rest of us. I am content with sitting on a sofa and reading, and occasionally getting so into the reading that I gesture wildly and fall off the sofa with a crash. But Robin would ride her bicycle every morning. Every. Morning.

Sometimes we would go on walks.

… Sometimes Robin would go on walks and I would go on what, in sporting terms, is known as a ‘trip for ice-cream.’ Sometimes we would go together. Beautiful French countryside, beautiful Robin, beautiful ice-cream! Perfect happiness.

This one time we had an adventure. It was all my fault.

But I feel like I can’t be blamed, you know? It was a NATURAL IMPULSE. I am only human. If you cut me, do I not bleed? If you put an adorable leggy kitten in front of me, do I not try to pet it?

It is what I do with cats. I see a kitty, I reach out and go ‘KITTY!’ I have a lot of love to give. To cats.

So, one of those teenage kittens with long legs and still a teeny-tiny body, slinking through some dry yellow fields. I said ‘KITTY!’ and leaped forward without much hope: usually cats rebuff me with scorn. I am like that sleazy guy in the bar who is always striking out with cats: the cats are all ‘Don’t even dream you’re going to pet with this.’

But little grey kitten let me pet her. Pet, pet, pet! She seemed happy with the attention. Then I went and caught up with Robin, flushed with kitty victory.

ROBIN: … Okay, Sarah. Don’t look behind you but…

SARAH: *looks behind her*

SARAH: KITTY!

SARAH: Oh no kitty…

ROBIN: We just have to keep walking. She’ll get bored. Don’t look behind you. She’ll stop following us if we keep walking.

SARAH: Kitty…

ROBIN: Walk faster!

We did walk faster, stealing glances over our shoulders as we went. The kitten was wobbling determinedly along the country path. The kitten, like a fluffy little terminator, just kept coming.

ROBIN: Honey, go home. Honey, please stop.

SARAH: We’ve gone too far now. Robin, you know there’s no going back.

ROBIN: Honey, this is a bad idea. We’re bad ladies.

The kitten was determined on her course.

ROBIN: Sarah, you cannot touch that cat again. Sarah, promise me.

SARAH: Robin, I swear. Robin! You can TRUST me.

… All right, look, it wasn’t my fault.

We were crossing at an intersection. A van was speeding down the road.

KITTEN: Oh look! I must run out to meet my new friend the van!

SARAH: SARAH POUNCE!

ROBIN: Oh Sarah, you promised!

SARAH: I lied. I lied.

Once I carried the kitten across the intersection, though, we were responsible. (ROBIN: LEAVE ME OUT OF THIS SARAH! But I knew she was too soft-hearted to abandon two foolish wandering things that did not know their own way home…)

It took us a long time to walk that two and a half miles home. The kitten occasionally collapsed by the side of the road, mewing and rolling hopefully to see if I would scritch her. She enjoyed trying to make friends with cars, bicycles, trucks and ponies, and then I would snatch her up and press her to my pounding heart.

She was so amenable to being seized and zoomed through the air in my pterodactyl-like clutches that I began to worry she didn’t have claws, but then we met an Alsatian and she went up a thorn tree like tree-climbing lightning. So we figured she did have claws, and then had to work out how to get her down from the thorn tree. I wound up a bit scratched (not by the sweet little kitty, by the sweet little thorn tree). Also on my ass in a ditch.

Robin may have started to laugh at me, a tiny bit. She also stopped saying ‘Honey, don’t’ to the kitten and instead would say ‘Oh, honey’ in a way that indicated the cat’s fate was sealed.

Eventually, we walked through the gates of our holiday home, and found the others. I was trying, as I walked with a cat at my heels, to think of a way to break the news of what I had done gently.

ROBIN: GUYS. GUYS, SARAH SCRUMPED A KITTEN!!!

SARAH: We both sort of–

HOLLY, THEO, CASSIE & JOSH: Seems like something Sarah would do.

That was when our merry band sharply divided. Holly and Josh instantly joined Robin on what we call Team Sensible Actions and Responsible Behaviour.

Cassie and Theo instantly joined me on Team Fiending For Kittens.

HOLLY AND JOSH: Don’t let that kitten in the house! Don’t feed that kitten!

CASSIE AND THEO: Kitty wants to come inside wif us, yes she does! Does kitty want some ham? Kitty loves ham!

HOLLY AND JOSH: Please do not name that cat. That is not our cat.

CASSIE AND THEO: What have you guys been calling the cat?

SARAH: Robin kept calling her honey…

ROBIN: Leave me out of this, this isn’t my fault!

SARAH: Miel is French for honey.

So Robin and I named Miel together, as co-kitten scrumpers should. (It’s possible that she was just the kitten scrumper lookout, but it still counts.) By that evening, full of ham and milk, Miel was curled up with all four legs around Holly’s bare leg.

Aw yis. Life was good.

ROBIN, JOSH AND HOLLY: We must inform our friend Maureen, who is coming to stay, that there will be a STRANGE CAT here.

MAUREEN: A KITTY! I’M COMING KITTY! KITTY!!!!!!! DON’T LET THE KITTY GET AWAY!!!

ROBIN, JOSH AND HOLLY: All right, Team Fiending For Kittens, you win this round.

Miel never used her claws on people. Miel, it was clear from the start, loved people. She followed us from place to place throughout the house, even though she was clearly still tired and still hungry, anxiously as if we were going to go away. Theo, the biggest sweetheart in the place, could not stop feeding her.

Also once she had rested up a bit, she began to play little kitten games. Her favourite was hiding behind a sofa or a wall and waiting, her small pointed ears entirely obvious, to leap out, surprise us and wrap her pad-pawed legs around one of our legs and strut off convinced we had been terrified.

Miel also enjoyed: playing with bits of lavender, and lots of sleeps. Robin always went to bed early, and I always slept in late, so Miel would bed-hop between us: I would wake up in the early morning with a fountain playing outside and a kitten under my chin being like ‘She said she was going for a bicycle ride! Inconceivable! Also, purr!’

Artistic Portrait of Small Cat and Large Birdcage.

However, what we were going to do with Miel was something of a concern. My proposal of living in France forever with the kitten was vetoed because of ‘we have lives, Sarah’ and ‘your French is atrocious, Sarah.’

LANDLADY: We will fix this situation! We’re going to put the kitten out in the road.

SARAH: Madame, I am too indignant to speak French at this time! I SAID GOOD DAY!

I didn’t actually even say that. I just gave her a weird, bug-eyed stare, seized Mel, crushed her to my bosom and ran away at speed. Miel was just like ‘Whee where are we going’ and I hid behind the lavender until the landlady was gone. Cassie had to weakly explain ‘mon ami… elle est fou. Like, totally, totally fou. Quelle fiending for kittens.’

Holly and Cassie then activated their Kitten-Saving Wonder Twins powers, and bent their mind toward kitten rescue. Cassie, Holly and I took Miel to a vet, to see if she was chipped or anything, and had perhaps wandered from home. The vet was of the opinion that Miel was a summer kitten, abandoned when grown less teeny and cute, and said it happened sometimes, especially as she’d clearly not been in the best state when we found her.

… The vet seemed alarmed when I burst into tears and tried to blow my nose on Miel at this tale of woe.

CASSIE: All right, what if we wanted to take the kitten to another country? Ireland or America?

VET: You can’t take the cat to Ireland without a three-week quarantine!

VET: America’s OK though. It’s lawless there. Give the kitten a rabies shot and they just don’t care about quarantines. They have enough to deal with with all the urban crime, and also cowboys.

HOLLY AND CASSIE: …

SARAH: America is an untamed land, it’s so true. The people there, so uncivilised.

HOLLY AND CASSIE: Why you little…

VET: So I’m going to get you guys a tiny kitten passport.

SARAH AND CASSIE: KITTEN PASSPORT THE MOST CUTEST LITTLE PASSPORT-

VET: And I’m going to give Miel a shot-

SARAH AND CASSIE: Look it says Miel on the kitten passport-

HOLLY: Guys, guys I don’t think Miel likes shots-

SARAH AND CASSIE: We’re going to put a little kitten picture in this little kitten passport-

HOLLY: Miel’s about to-

MIEL: I WILL RUIN YOUR LIVES AND BITE THIS VET’S FACE OFF!

SARAH AND CASSIE: It happened with no warning, none at all!

I was very startled by Miel’s sudden turn to the dark side. She bit that vet good and proper. Pro tip: when terrified by your kitten going evil, do not try to hide behind your tiny short friends. They will be no help at all, and if they are redheads, they will laugh at you.

The vet was very understanding about the biting, and also the blood, and also the screaming (that last part was me).

VET: I am a vet, n’est pas? C’est la vie!

SARAH: I love our zen vet!

MIEL: I will kill you all for this indignity…

SARAH: … Cassie, hold me.

CASSIE: Ahahahaha!

SARAH: What’s funny?!

CASSIE: … Your pain.

SARAH: … REDHEADS.

Cassie was brave enough to pick up Miel after her fit of rage, though, so maybe I should quit ragging on redheads. She cuddled Miel down from the cliff of fury and also weighed Miel, and I guessed Miel weighed twice what she actually did. Miel sulked all the way home, either because of the shots or because I said she looked fat.

The vet sold us a kitty carrier and told us we were doing a good thing, though admittedly he seemed puzzled by our passion for the kitty passport. (Passportion?)

Miel did not enjoy the kitty carrier. I am told she did not enjoy it on the way to the airport, either. (I took an earlier flight, and merely received updates. Maureen’s texts informed me that she had to change all of her clothing in an airport bathroom due to Miel. I laughed and laughed, and immediately the plane informed us in a serious voice that there were some issues with the engine but we would be flying anyway. Instant plane karma!)

Miel was going home with Holly and Theo, and our sensible Holly was worried about getting her through customs.

CUSTOMS: Proceed!

HOLLY: We have a cat, in that carrier, but we have a clean bill of health and a little kitty passport, see…

CUSTOMS: Whatevs!

HOLLY: Don’t you want to see the tiny kitty pass-

CUSTOMS: Nope!

THEO: We could have a rabid bat in this carrier for all you know.

CUSTOMS: Do you have a rabid bat in this carrier?

HOLLY: NOPE, NO WE DO NOT.

CUSTOMS: Well, we’ll take your word for it. Proceed!

We’re all a little alarmed by how easy it would be smuggle in a rabid bat. We’re also all a little sad that they didn’t get to use the kitty passport.

I was coming, after the Smart Chicks tour (which was awesome), to do an event with Holly and Libba Bray (which was super awesome!). I was also excited to see Miel again, and hoping she was doing well. For we all had one concern.

This concern was called Lily. Lily is a hairless cat. Holly loves her. She only loves Holly, and nobody else. Holly and Theo have two white cats already–pallid shadows of cats, living in fear of Lily.

Lily is a demon.

Just like that cat.

I arrived at Chez Black, and saw Miel. She was wearing a fleur-de-lis collar that said MIEL on it, because Theo is an artiste. And she had done something amazing to Lily.

LILY: I hate you.

MIEL: HELLO MY NEW NAKED FRIEND.

LILY: I’m going to ruin your life.

MIEL: YOU LOOK COLD. YOU NEED SNUGGLES!

LILY: Only I sleep in the bed with Holly.

MIEL: I’M SO GLAD WE MET. NOW WE SNUGGLE TOGETHER!

LILY: What’s your name, so I can draw it on the litter box when I bury you in a shallow grave?

MIEL: I SHALL CALL YOU BALDY, AND YOU SHALL BE MINE.

Miel, the cat who tries to make friends with vans, wore Lily down. Now Lily the demon cat has a friend! (Just one friend.) They snuggle together! (Lily looks very guilty when caught snuggling. She’s all, ‘It means nothing!’)

I admit I miss Miel, but she continues her career of adventuring and staying close to humans, even if that means snuggling in Holly’s desk drawer.

DESK DRAWER SNUGGLES!

And Miel was there for Unspoken’s release, on September 11. I had already had bad news about Unspoken and a book chain, and I was pretty sure nobody was going to buy my book and I was going to have to change my name. I also had wild plans of running away to sea. (I just need to stow away aboard the ship of a very attractive captain with a heart of gold beneath his gruff exterior, who will be drawn in despite himself by my, uh, quirky charm…) That day, I was so sick with nerves I could barely talk to my friends, but I sat with Miel clutched to my chest in the herb garden, and heard her purr and smelled rosemary and thyme.

Then I went back inside to my friends, who welcomed me with hugs, and Robin and Maureen took me for a walk to town. We had ice-cream and champagne, and managed to not pick up another kitten. (Though if we’d seen another kitten, I’m pretty sure Maureen would have picked it up. Team Fiending For Kittens For Life!) My friends are pretty cool, and so are kittens.

When fate shuts a door, it opens a kitten window. So, thanks for that, fate!

Sorry about that, Holly and Robin. I know the kitten is my fault.