Luna’s Prose Ramblings

The Rough Grind

I knew the day would be a disaster. Standing with a rubber chicken in my hand I know I shouldn’t have gone to The Grind. Matthew always says that Sally is welcome there, but it’s just not a good place for a dog, even one as well trained as she is. It started with making a snide comment at the musician out front. Ever since I started frequenting the place, he’s been there. He wasn’t a beggar, he was too clean for that, but I could never bring myself to an introduction or ask for his name during the few words we would sometimes exchange before I went in. I am sure it was all business for him anyway. If he was kind to patrons of The Grind there would be a better chance of guilting them into giving him some change. I didn’t like his tactics, even though I am sure they were the first principles of business and everyone in the world used them. I just didn’t like it.
‘Good morning.’
‘Hi,’ I said trying to avoid his gaze.
‘Lovely dog you have there.’
‘Thanks,’ I said, while giving Sally a quick pat on the back before I reached to open the door.
‘I’ve always liked the idea of having a dog to share my outdoor stage with me.’ I could see him with a ropey mutt beside him.
‘Well, you’d have to properly take care of one. And not just have it for entertainment value,’ I said.
‘Yeah,’ he replied and looked at me with a mixture of affrontedness and disbelief. ‘I’d have to train it.’
‘I doubt it’d be as well trained as Sally,’ I cast over my shoulder while I walked into the café.

It must be bad karma or something. I was rude to the musician who is just trying to earn a living like the rest of us and now the universe was punishing me. It was only a few seconds, but enough to upset my day, my week, more than that. It was too busy in The Grind. It was one of those days on which it seemed that the whole studio building had emptied out into the hippest nearest coffee shop in town. The Grind obviously was doing well with all the producers and second-rate actors playing their game of see and be seen. And I was only too happy for Matt until someone stepped back to dodge him and his full tray of drinks, and nudged the bowl of water Matt had brought Sally half an hour earlier, slopping half of it over the side. ‘Oh, blast,’ I said aloud before I could stop myself. And stop myself I should have too, when I picked up the bowl with the remaining water and walked to the counter to deposit it there before some other loser would step into it.
When I arrived back at my table, I checked that no one has stepped on Sally in my absence when I noticed that my bag was gone from beside her. This time I swore properly and looked around to see it if I could spot the thief. Right as my eye fell on my bag leaving the café, I threw a fiver on the table and scooped up Sally’s leash and my wallet, phone and car keys, which fortunately were not in my bag. Making my way through the crowd, I realised it had everything. My uniform, Sally’s blanket and work items, and my work planner. I didn’t even know which studio Sally and I had to be at after lunch. It was all in there. Sally would be okay without her own blanket as long as I could arrange for a towel or something, but I definitely would need some of my whistles if she were to do a good job. I needed that bag back. ‘Excuse me ! Coming through ! Please, MOVE !!’ I shouted as I pushed people aside to get to the door as fast as I could. Sally and I plunged out of the door, only to find the musician looking at me in polite amusement. ‘Crowded in there ?’
‘Yeah. Hey, did you just see someone leave with a black bag ?’
‘There were a lot of people going in and out,’ he said unhelpfully.
‘Yeah, they were about this tall with a greyish coat, maybe black or dark blue,’ I urged while glancing around for the thief who was nowhere to be seen.
‘Sorry, puppet, not that stood out to me,’ he said with a pitying look.
‘Thanks,’ I said angrily while I walked to my car. ‘Just my luck.’

Sally stared up at the chicken in my hand while I looked at the assortment of whistles and clickers the shop carried. ‘Alright, have it then,’ I said while Sally caught it adeptly with her head curled back over her back to compensate for my bad pitch. As I walked to the register, I heard a mandolin tune outside that made me flash back to earlier this morning. Surely that wasn’t the same musician again ? Didn’t he have to stay on his own turf ? ‘Sit. Stay,’ I commanded Sally to make sure the shop girl didn’t think I was lifting, while I made my way outside. ‘Hey, doll face. Forgot you are supposed to be in studio 7 in half an hour ?’ It was Steve, the producer of the movie Sally was hired to work, with about the largest grin on his face I had ever seen there.
‘No, but it’s good of you to remind me of the number. Some jerk in The Grind stole my bag and it has my planner in it,’ I said, trying not to let show what else I wanted to do to the thief when I got the sole of my shoe on him.
‘I heard. Ted told me, while we were bargaining for his mandolin.’
‘Ted ?’ I said, while for the first time I noticed the musician’s mandolin in Steve’s right hand.
‘Yeah, I offered him 50 bucks to borrow his mandolin for half an hour, but he made me pay my whole wallet minus my driver’s licence. I don’t think he’d expect me to return it otherwise.’
‘What ?’ I asked, trying to make sense of the conversation.
‘You know, the mandolin,’ Steve said, holding it up. ‘I figured a serenade would be the only way for you not to be mad at me.’
‘A serenade ?’ I asked, having not made much headway.
‘Yeah, I waited for you across the street, expecting you to walk to the studio when you left The Rough. But you walked out, looked around and got in your car. By the time I realised my plan was backfiring, you had already driven off. When I went through your bag, I realised it had all the stuff you needed for filming. So I called my assistant for your expenses’ file to check where you had bought all your work gear from. ‘Cause I figured you’d go there to pick up new.’
‘Smart man. So, wait, you stole my bag ?’ I asked when it dawned on me.
‘Not stole. I didn’t steal it. It was a lure. I needed to talk to you. Outside of the studio and be honest, The Rough is practically one of the studio offices but with better coffee.’
‘Why did you need to steal my bag to talk to me away from the studio ?’ I asked, getting suspicious. ‘Are you firing me and not man enough to own it in front of the team ?’
‘No, no, the opposite in fact. I know you love your job and all, but casting told me you had originally read for one of the parts,’ Steve said, causing me to swallow hard. That was something I wanted everyone to know least of all. How the dog trainer wanted to be an actor. ‘The team got in a rough spot with one of our supporting. To make a long story short, it didn’t end well. And frankly, we don’t have enough time to re-audition. We are going to have to pool from people we have already seen. So I said to casting that I liked you and that blond dog of yours.’
‘Sally.’
‘Yeah, that one. So, okay, I didn’t want to offer you the job in front of everyone. They’d think I’m not being professional. I can’t have that.’ Steve looked contemplative.
‘You’re offering me a job ?’ I asked, incredulously.
‘Well, you already have a job,’ Steve corrected me. ‘I’m offering you a second chance, so to say. This time without that ridiculous whistle. Come on, I’ll give you a lift to the studio. I need to trade a mandolin for my wallet.’
I grinned and stomped Steve on the foot. ‘Jerk.’

The Rough Grind by LunaLouise is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 2.0 UK: England & Wales License.

Write an opening. Start with; January was…

Luna writes;

January was behaving erratically. The apartment was empty and she was pacing through it. My first impression was of distress. Her face was haunted, full of dread, eyes frantic and unfocused. She walked up and down in straight lines in a pattern that repeated few paths.

She looked up when she heard me walk in through the door. Her hand shot up behind her neck and her mouth opened. She said nothing. When she did, she walked to the side table and handed me a note. ‘She’s gone.’

Dearest,

Love

‘Is this all ?’
‘Yes,’ she sighed. ‘She says she took her mobile, but I think she is referring to the one I gave her. I wouldn’t know which other one she would mean. I tried ringing it, but it goes straight to voicemail.’
‘Great,’ I said and sank to the couch.

This work by LunaLouise is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 2.0 UK: England & Wales License.

Write an opening. Start with; January was…

Luna writes;

January was thirteen. Much like eight, eleven or even three. No, not three. Better than three. Another month has passed. And innumerable still to come. The work, a repetitive cycle. Once all is complete, the starts again tomorrow. Like a coal ship supplying a factory; when it reaches the dock with a new load, the previous has gone and there is reason to turn straight back. When the end of a task is reached, all is ready for a fresh start. There is a sense of completion in time, but not a job well done. No pride. Not ever pride.
The thoughts are not ordered either. One time there is nothing to think about except getting done what needs to, the other the task is so slow and tedious that thoughts drift in and out. The tasks have gotten easier, but I still don’t know what to expect from them. I wonder how long I am going to stay here.

This work by LunaLouise is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 2.0 UK: England & Wales License.

Luna writes microfiction part II.

My life in 100 words

Picking at a measel my mom told me not to touch. Climbing a lamppost to play on the roof. Rotterdam – The Netherlands. A pub of 3 by 3 with two clocks and a jukebox. Looking out over vineyards farther than the eye can see. Mersault – France. Drifting along the waterways of the inner-city bustle. Refusing a piece of cake and being asked if I was straight-edge. Bristol, England. An albino alligator in the city park pond. Catapulting buckmoths off the shotgun front porch. New Orleans, Louisiana. A rainbow across the ocean. A waiting vehicle towards the unknown. Wales, Scotland, Japan.

My life in 100 words by LunaLouise is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 2.0 UK: England & Wales License.

An exercise in microfiction. All credit to my writing tutor Amanda Rackstraw.

This exercise has to be followed along and not pre-read or you will spoil the clue of the exercise for yourself. So don’t read ahead ! Okay, here we go. Draw three medium-sized circles on your paper. Place eight markers around each circle. In the first circle write Setting and think of and write down eight settings for a story. It can be actual locations but also less tangible things like events in general. Then write Emotions in the second circle and choose eight emotions and link them to the circle markers. Last, think of eight animals and ring the third circle with them. In the last circle write Characters.

Now from each circle pick one listing that appeals to you most. Once you have all three, realise that the animal you chose represents the traits of one of your characters. So for instance if you have picked a lamb, your character can be very innocent and naive, if you’ve picked a mouse, your character can be very shy and so on.

Now write a complete story in exactly 150 words. Note ! It’s microfiction so I’m going to repeat it – it needs to be a completed story in 150 words.

Luna writes;

The sniffing sound was distracting. She was always like this, but it still took effort to get used to it. Her profile took time to get used to, too. Her straightness was inhuman, her gaze astonishing. She had worked in the lab as long as anyone could remember, she was there before I was. She was good at her work. I mean, how could she not be ? At first I was afraid of her, always looked disapproving as if what you were about to do would be the biggest mistake in your life, and she knew it. The sniffing turned into a tongue click. She was at the UV-box and stared at her gel. It was not so much disapproval that I heard in the tongue click this time, but more… surprise. ‘Everything okay ?’
‘My gel didn’t work…’
Well… that happens to us all.’
She turned and stared at me incredulously.

I know… bad girl. I didn’t listen to my own assignment. But then again this was my first shot at microfiction. Having read some examples of microfiction, I realised why mine didn’t make the cut. It’s not a completed story. It’s a scene. A scene that might be part of a bigger story even, but just a scene nonetheless. Next time I’ll try and do better.

The wasp by LunaLouise is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 2.0 UK: England & Wales License.

This is a great warm-up exercise to writing that we did in class. Not for the ambidextrous.
All credit to Amanda Rackstraw, my writing tutor.

Take some time to clear your mind and I know that is about as easy as it sounds. If you are not the meditative kind, it may still help to close your eyes and focus on your relaxed breathing. If you have a thought, recognise it and try, literally, to push it out of your head. Acknowledge your thought and decide this is not the time. It may take some practice (and if you become accomplished at it may also work to calm your thoughts and fall asleep better).

Clear your mind and take your favourite writing utensil. Take that utensil in your non-writing hand, yes, you heard me, your non-writing hand. And draw. Don’t set out to draw or think too much about it. Just put utensil to paper and form a shape. Don’t think what that shape should be or what the shape is becoming. Just make a shape. It can be as small or big as you want it to be. It can take up a few lines of paper or a whole page. Just draw. When you’re done, look at the finished shape and recognise what it is. Still with your non-writing hand, write down next to the shape what the shape is. Then keeping the shape and its name in mind, and also still with your non-writing hand, think about where the shape is and why the shape is interesting in context of its function or location or circumstance. Keeping your utensil in your non-writing hand, write a descriptive sentence that has to do with your object.

Now you can take your utensil in your writing hand and write the scene or story that started as a shape on the page and turned into words or scene in your mind.

Luna wrote;

It was a noise like crackling.
These hands were not my own, but they had an urge to cover ears. The noise was eerie and did not seem to accompany the swaying movement that my eyes saw. It was a narrow path that we walked along. The sun was out, but could only manage a watery light with hardly any warmth. The warmth that we felt did not come from the sun. It came from the direction of the crackling.

The crackling by LunaLouise is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 2.0 UK: England & Wales License.

We are back among the living and I’m writing a quick note to let you know, the read-through review will recommence.

For those interested, Dax posted his personal statement that he had written for the ceremony on stereodax.

The read-through review of The Graveyard Book is temporarily halted. This because of some insignificant event that’s coming up, like Dax and my wedding. Can you believe it?

We will continue after the break. Hope you’ll join me then.

For previous chapters in this review, click here or go there by clicking on the The Graveyard Book tag in the tagcloud in the bottom right hand column.

If you have not already done so, watch Neil read chapter four here.

Chapter 4 The Witch’s Headstone

After foreshadowing being the central subject of the last chapter’s read-through, it becomes clear soon enough that the time has come for Bod to undertake the classical hero’s quest.

At the start of the chapter, Bod, as the central hero of the story, is warned not to go looking beyond the edge of the graveyard. Bod has heard this warning often in the past and since Bod is an obedient boy, he satisfies himself by only asking questions of Silas.

‘[I]n your land, they blessed the churches and the ground they set aside to bury people in, to make it holy. But they left ground unconsecrated beside the sacred ground, potter’s fields to bury the criminals and the suicides, or those who were not of the faith.’

In his favourite thinking spot, the apple tree that he eats the fruit of readily, Bod oversees the potter’s field. While trying to get at a particular nice-looking red ripe apple, Bod breaks the branch that he is on and lands himself right where he wasn’t supposed to go.

It’s great to see the apple as the of symbol of knowledge return in so many forms in as many stories. Here it particularly strikes me that Bod, in his search and reach for knowledge, he finds himself to have ended up in exactly that one place he wasn’t suppose to go. It shows us clearly enough, that while absorbing knowledge, we will never know where we travel until we are there and there is no turning back.

And there indeed seems no turning back for Bod either, when he meets the young girl witch in the potter’s field and hears the tale of her trial. When the attempted drowning didn’t suffice, she surfaced to curse the onlookers to unrest in their lives beyond, which gained her a spot atop a pyre and the unmarked grave at which she still lives. Elizabeth Hemstock with a big E, for Elizabeth, like the old queen that died when she was born, and a big Haitch, for Hempstock.

As befitting a hero, Bod decides that he will have to get Liza a headstone. Since his savings only go as far as the coins that were left in the graveyard by its frequenters, he goes back to the Celt’s tomb and the guardian Sleer to retrieve a treasure large enough to buy a headstone in town. The jewel Bod picks is the red snakestone inlaid in a silver snake with too many heads. But the Sleer warn him that the jewel always comes back.

This passage reminds me of the concept of the false quest object. Although in this case, the jewel that Bod retrieves from the tomb is indeed valuable, it was never his to take and the stolen treasure will never serve Bod’s intended purpose. Hinting at this fact are several things. One is the Sleer’s assertion that ‘It comes back. Always comes back’. Also, the jewel itself. The red snakestone is mounted on a silver body of a snake with too many heads. The trickster serpent symbolism is abound here and the many snake heads leads me to think of another trickster, Medusa. The jewel is a false object in the quest. In truth, it is not, like Bod hoped, the treasure that will bring the quest to a good end, it’s the hero’s cunning and wit that will help him to complete his task and this not without effort and sacrifice on the hero’s part.

Bod goes into town, into the pawn shop of Abanazar Bolger. The name is cleverly chosen. Abanazar is the name of the evil sorcerer that disguises himself as a lamp trader in the tale of Aladdin and who locks the unsuspecting youth in the treasure vault. As soon as Bod shows Abanazar the treasure, Bod is locked in the back room and the snakestone is taken from him. Abanazar remembers the man Jack, who was looking for a boy fitting Bod’s description and weighs the pros and cons of keeping Bod to find more treasure or contacting Jack to gain a reward. As Bod tries unsuccessfully to recall Mr. Pennyworth’s directions for Fading, Liza, who is buried in unconsecrated grounds and therefore not bound to them, shows up to pitch in her tuppence. She overhears enough conversation between Abanazar and his business partner, Tom, to know that they mean Bod harm.

Bod arms himself with a paperweight and paint to chuck at his captors in case of emergency and with help of Liza manages to Fade. Abanazar and Tom believe Bod to have escaped and a fight over the ownership of the snakestone breaks out. Abanazar and Tom manage to take each other down into unconsciousness, which gives Bod the chance to use a piece of paper, a paintbrush, his wit and cunning to get himself safely out of the store room. On the way out, Bod and Liza snatch the snakestone and Jack’s contact card with them.

Off back to safety, Bod runs into Silas, who unfortunately for Bod plays up the ‘I am disappointed in you’ tactic. Bod gives Silas Jack’s card to dispose of and returns the snakestone to the Sleer. Bod realises that he was unable to get Liza the headstone that he had in mind, but gives her an even more precious token. With the paint and paintbrush from the pawn shop, Bod makes a headstone out of the paperweight, swirling with colour. On it he writes, E.H. we don’t forget.

Two hundred miles away, Jack wakes up knowing something has happened.

There are a few more remarkable things hidden in the story that complement the theme of the hero’s journey of this chapter. The snakestone is an item that will corrupt the minds of the greedy and can only be retrieved and wielded by the fearless and pure at heart. A similar item was the One Ring in the epic hero tales of J.R.R. Tolkien’s The Lord of the Rings. The One Ring was also an object that exuded power over the weak and greedy and could only be handled and withstood by the strong and brave.

Also, the hero in a quest will often have to bring a sacrifice of their own to win one of the trials of the task. In this tale, Bod quite literally gives himself up to escape the store room. With help of his friend Liza, he all but fades away completely. If dissolution of one’s self is not the ultimate sacrifice, I do not know what is !

For previous chapters in this review, click here or go there by clicking on the The Graveyard Book tag in the tagcloud in the bottom right hand column.

If you have not already done so, watch Neil read chapter three here.

Chapter 3 The Hounds of God

I am in two minds about this chapter. This chapter has some exquisite foreshadowing in it and that will be the main topic in today’s read-through review. On the other hand, the way Neil uses the vast majority of the elements of foreshadowing in this chapter is a bit disappointing to me.

Maybe I am thinking too complex. Maybe I have become used to foreshadowing being ingeniously hidden in the depths of a story. And maybe I should step away from that expectation to just enjoy the simple, glaringly obvious foreshadowing if it has been lain on the surface with intent and is happy to wave at us passers-by every chance it gets. Maybe I should just stop whining.

The chapter starts with a mood-setting description of a ghoul gate. Water-stained, with scraggly grass or rank weeds and often adorned with a headless statue or coated in fungus. And it’s not being concealed that we are going to see one of them from up close very soon.

Bod is six now and being confronted not only with a leaving Silas, but also a strict, puckering Russian-sounding woman with a pinched face and disapproving expression, who will be continuing Bod’s lessons while Silas is away. I, myself, thought at the initial meeting that Bod could have done without this teacher, but we soon learn otherwise. The woman goes by the name of Lupescu and anyone etymologically inclined will immediately recognise the wolf implication in the name. The new teacher has rented a house alongside the graveyard and will see Bod on a daily basis. Score two for foreshadowing.

Meanwhile, Silas has packed his antique black leather bag, which could have belonged to a Victorian doctor or undertaker, complete with padlock and heavy contents. Silas tells Bod that he will be away to gather information and uncover things. Why, Mr. Silas, would you need an extraordinarily heavy bag to gather information, dear sir ? Is there no such thing as a vampire travelling light ?

Miss Lupescu is here to take on Silas’s duties while he is away, most important of which is providing Bod with the food that the ghosts cannot. And she does this with verve. So much so that she manages to estrange Bod even more than she already had in their first meeting. Let’s just say that that was not a point for the team. And although Silas’s teachings had always been pragmatic and insightful, Lupescu chooses to take the more authoritative approach. She drills Bod on the different peoples of the world – the living, the dead, the day-folk, the night-folk, the ghouls, the mist-walkers, the high-hunters, the Hounds of God and the solitary types – and how to ask for help in all languages known to her. Foreshadowing number three and, yes… four. She even goes a far as reminding Bod that night-gaunts fly the red skies above Ghûlheim. Being Dutch, it’s not much of a secret that the German word Heim means home and it doesn’t take much imagination to figure out that Ghûlheim must be where the ghouls rest their weary heads. That makes five counts of foreshadowing so far.

And this is where we see the titular Hound of God for the first time. After one of Miss Lupescu’s disastrous lessons, Bod walks the graveyard and sees a large grey dog prowling, keeping away and slipping between the gravestones and shadows. Later we hear Bod ask Miss Lupescu whether the dog he saw was hers since it appeared when she arrived. In response, Miss Lupescu straightens her tie and answers no. I think you shouldn’t have lobbed that lump of soil at it, Bod!

Feeling unloved, abandoned and unappreciated, Bod falls asleep on grave with a water-stained, cracked memorial stone adorned by a headless angel hung in robes which look like ugly tree fungus. Hmm… where have we heard this before ? Pay-off number one.

Three ghouls appear. They scamper the walls of the graveyard looking for a gate for them to pass through. On the way they have a conversation about smelling a ‘ware dog’. Now this concept is a glorious one. The adjective ware is a derivative of an archaic form of the verb ‘to be aware’ and stems from its Germanic origin meaning ‘to observe’ or ‘to take care’. But it naturally also puts in mind the well known term of ‘were’ as in werewolf. So the ghouls are already aware of the guard weredog that prowls the graveyard and smell it alongside the graveyard. That reminds me of the fact that Lupescu does not live far away from the graveyard. Pay-off number two. When the ghouls arrive at the gate they find Bod sleeping there. It doesn’t take much convincing for Bod to agree that he will be more appreciated in the ghoul world and through the gate they take him.

The sky is the colour red of an infected wound, hung with an old, small, distant sun. The ghouls Bod meets wear the names of the first main courses that they had after being turned and I am assuming that with it they took nothing of their meals intelligence or I would have expected a bit more eloquence from the ghoul Harry S Truman.

While on the way to Ghûlheim (pay-off number three), Bod has seen enough to have changed his mind about going. He thinks of ways to escape and realises, as we have done, that the creatures flying in the sky are the same ones that Miss Lupescu had told him about – night-gaunts. Bod tries to call one to him with the shrill shriek that he was taught in his lesson, but the attempt is futile. At daybreak, the party of ghouls is noticebly smaller and moves on while Bod starts to worry about the howling that plagued them in the night.

On the second day, to prevent Bod from crying for help again, he is carried in a sack, which he manages to damage. In a bid for freedom Bod falls out the sack and lands on the steps to Ghûlheim hurting his ankle, right under the nose of a huge, grey dog. In panic, Bod tries to flee and trips off of the stair, away from safety and an exasperated and reproachful sounding Miss Lupescu. In the swoop that Bod hoped would come when he first called out to them, a night-gaunt scoops him out of the air and delivers him safely to the ground and Miss Lupescu. She explains that the creature came to Bod’s aid thrice – once when he called out to them and they flew to Miss Lupescu to warn her, the second time when they disposed of some ghouls at the nighttime fire that meant Bod harm and now to fly him to safety. Pay-off number four.

She also explains that she is a Hound of God, the name for the being that men call werewolves or lycanthropes ‘as they claim their transformation is a gift from their creator, and they repay their gift with their tenacity, for they will pursue an evil-doer to the very gates of Hell.’ Pay-off number five.

On Silas’s return, he find Bod and Miss Lupescu in an unprecedented good relation. He arrives with a stiff right arm and a model of the Golden Gate bridge. Hmmm… I won’t say that his trip to San Fransisco is necessary another foreshadowing but the condition of his arm certainly is. Silas questions the two politely by mentioning that he heard a rumour that Bod and Lupescu went further afield than Silas would be able to follow. I wonder if this is because he is a vampire?

The tally is clear. This chapter contains so much foreshadowing, it is seeping through the cracks to the point were it becomes a tad weary. The chapter feels crowded with so many dropped hints, almost all of which are payed-off within the same self-contained tale. Only the very last passage on the return of Silas contains an element of foreshadowing that we have not seen rewarded yet. And of course I might be making the mistake of assuming that all of these instances of foreshadowing are already payed-off and do not foreshadow an even larger event which is still to come, in which case I will gladly swallow my words and not only give the hat-tip that I do now, but the deep bow that is deserved. For the moment, Neil Gaiman is a master shadower if I have ever seen one to get so many of them is so few pages, but to keep the element of surprise at a more satisfying level, I would recommend to not make it all so glaringly obvious.

On to chapter four with what I hope is more suspense.