Things just got swampier: Wilderking Books 2 & 3

Also, introducing Paradise Lost in 90 Minutes.

Yesterday a truck pulled up at Rabbit Room Press and disgorged boxes and boxes of The Secret of the Swamp King and The Way of the Wilderking—Books 2 and 3 of my Wilderking Trilogy. These are the 20th Anniversary Deluxe Hardcover Editions, with new covers by Stephen Crotts and new interior illustrations by Joe Hox.

If you preordered from the Rabbit Room, your books will be arriving in the next few days. If you didn’t preorder from the Rabbit Room, you can order now, and you too will get your books in the next few days. Amazon starts shipping August 22, so for the next three weeks or so, the Rabbit Room store is the only place to get these books online.

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Riddles! Love Sonnets!

Besides the new covers and illustrations, each of the new Wilderking books has bonus material consisting of newly discovered poems, songs and riddles by feechiefolks, the tribe of swamp-dwellers who populate the Wilderking books. Here’s a riddle from Book 2:

I smile at peril.
I die of fright.
When danger passes
I’m back to life.
Who do you reckon I am?

Here’s a harder one, so newly-discovered that it isn’t even in the book:

A spear on the end of a snake.
A snake poking out of a feather pillow.
A feather pillow perched on two sticks.
Who do you reckon I am?

If you want to answer these riddles, feel free to send me an email, and I’ll tell you if you got them right.

And here’s one of six love sonnets by Dobro Turtlebane that you can find at the end of Book 3. I edited out the name of Dobro’s beloved, since it would be a bit of a spoiler.

When I consider all I ain’t accomplished,
When I feel lonesome, overlooked, and snubbed,
I get to feeling lower than a mudfish.
Then I start to get the mullygrubs.

I wish I had some other feller’s hairdo.
I wish I had some other feller’s skills.
My poems don’t turn out as good as theirs do.
They got more friends than Dobro ever will.

Then [that gal] looks on me with loving eyes,
And just like that, I cannot feel so gloomy.
My heart leaps up like a bullfrog catching flies.
I’m [that gal’s] man: there must be something to me.

So why compare? Life aint a competition.
I wouldn’t swap my place with feechie chieftains.

You may have noticed parallels between this sonnet and Shakespeare’s Sonnet 29, “When, in disgrace with fortune and men’s eyes.” The date on this one is vague, so scholars are still working out whether Dobro was influenced by Shakespeare or whether it was the other way around. Since I’ve never heard of feechies reading Shakespeare, I figure Shakespeare must have been influenced by Dobro.

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Paradise Lost in 90 Minutes

I’m trying something new. In my Writing with… classes I teach literature as a way of teaching writing, but it has been a while since I’ve taught literature as literature. Next Tuesday, August 6, I’m going to teach a one-off, 90-minute class introducing John Milton’s Paradise Lost. I wrote my PhD dissertation on John Milton, so for me this will be a return to my roots. Here are some of the things we’ll cover in this 90-minute blitz:

• John Milton’s life and career

• The historical context of Paradise Lost

• The structure of Paradise Lost

• Milton’s use of simile

• Epic conventions in Paradise Lost

• Theological considerations

• The status of Satan in Paradise Lost: Does Milton consider Satan the hero of his poem?

Paradise Lost is more than 10,000 lines long, so we’ll only be able to get into a fraction of the poem in our 90 minutes together. My goal will be to equip you to get more out of Paradise Lost when you read it for yourself (or when you teach it).

This class is included in The Habit Membership; if you’re a member, you don’t need to register. If you’re not part of The Habit Membership, you’re welcome to join for a $15 registration fee.

I’m going to run this class twice next Tuesday—at 1pm Central and at 7pm Central. Registrants can come to whichever session is more convenient.

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• Virtual Writing Rooms on Monday Tuesday, Thursday, and Friday

• TODAY: Short Story Extravaganza! (1:30pm Central, 7:00 Central)

• Wednesday Evening: Habit Frontiers—Time Travel

• Thursday: Afternoon Office Hours

• Next Tuesday: Paradise Lost in 90 Minutes (included with membership)

• Coming in August: Dorothy and Jack Reading Club (order your book now)

There's a place for you in this vibrant community of writers. Find out more about The Habit Membership here.

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Shirley Mullen claims the courageous middle.

Dr. Shirley Mullen is President Emerita of Houghton College in New York State and the author of Claiming the Courageous Middle: Daring to Live and Work Together for a More Hopeful Future. In this episode, Dr. Mullen and I discuss the idea that, in an era of such dangerous polarization, the “courageous middle” is not a place of bland averaging, moral cowardice, indecisiveness, or indifference, but a place where thoughtful people work with urgency to foster attentive listening–listening even to those with whom they disagree–in pursuit of what is true and good and beautiful.