*oh look a chicken

It’s a mistake—a wrong number, per se. No witch it’s ever known has lived in such an, ah, dated, home. Furthermore, no practitioner that ever summoned it has been absent, as if they’d up and ding-dong ditched it. No, it didn’t work that way. Not at all. Not if they want to survive the encounter.

It hears the clinking of movement in the room adjacent—the kitchen, going by the pungent, bitter scent of cooled coffee and soggy, sweet sponge cakes, but more jarring is the smell of blood. It moves—feels something slip beneath its clawed foot as it does, and sees a crocheted blanket of whites and greys and deep black yarn, wound intricately, perfectly, into a summoning circle. Its summoning circle. There is a small splash of bright scarlet and sharp, jagged bits of a broken curio scattered on top, as if someone had dropped it, attempted to pick it up the pieces and pricked their finger. It would explain the blood. And it would explain the demon being brought into this strange place.

As it connects these pieces in its mind, the inhabitant of the house rounds the corner and exits the kitchen, holding a damp, white dish towel close to her hand and fumbling with the beaded bifocals hanging from her neck by a crocheted lanyard before stopping dead in her tracks.

Now, to be fair, the demon wouldn’t ordinarily second guess being face-to-face with a hunchbacked crone with a beaked nose, beady eyes and a peculiar lack of teeth, or a spidery shawl and ankle-length black dress, but there is definitely something amiss here. Especially when the old biddy lets her spectacles fall slack on her bosom and erupts into a wide, toothy (toothless) grin, eyes squinting and crinkling from the sheer effort of it.

“Todd! Todd, dear, I didn’t know you were visiting this year! You didn’t call, you didn’t write—but, oh, I’m so happy you’re here, dear! Would it have been too much to ask you to ring the doorbell? I almost had a heart attack. And don’t worry about the blood, here—I had an accident. My favorite figure toppled off of the table and cleanup didn’t go as expected. But I seem to recall you are quite into the bloodshed and ‘edgy’ stuff these days, so I don’t suppose you mind.” She releases a hearty, kind laugh, but it isn’t mocking, it’s sweet. Grandmotherly. The demon is by no means sentimental or maudlin, but the kindness, the familiarity, the genuine fondness, does pull a few dusty old nostalgic heartstrings. “Imagine if it leaves a scar! It’d be a bit ‘badass,’ as you teenagers say, wouldn’t it?”

She is as blind as a bat without her glasses, it would appear, because the demon is by no means a ‘Todd’ or a human at all, though humanoid, shrouded in sleek, black skin and hard spikes and sharp claws. But the demon humors her, if only because it had been caught off guard.

The old woman smiles still, before turning on her heel and shuffling into the hallway with a stiff gait revealing a poor hip. “Be a dear and make some more coffee, would you please? I’ll be back in a jiffy.”

Yes, this is most definitely a mistake. One for the record books, for certain. For late-night trips to bars and conversations with colleagues, while others discuss how many souls they’d swindled in exchange for peanuts, or how many first-borns they’d been pledged for things idiot humans could have gained without divine intervention. Ugh. Sometimes it all just became so pedantic that little detours like this were a blessing—happy accidents, as the humans would say.

That’s why the demon does as asked, and plods slowly into the kitchen, careful to duck low and avoid the top of the doorframe. That’s why it gingerly takes the small glass pot and empties it of old, stale coffee and carefully, so carefully, takes a measuring scoop between its claws and fills the machine with fresh grounds. It’s as the hot water is percolating that the old woman returns, her index finger wrapped tight in a series of beige bandages.

“I’m surprised you’re so tall, Todd! I haven’t seen you since you were at my hip! But your mother mails photos all the time—you do love wearing all black, don’t you?” She takes a seat at the small round table in the corner and taps the glass lid of the cake plate with quaking, unsteady, aged hands. “I was starting to think you’d never visit. Your father and I have had our disagreements, but…I am glad you’re here, dear. Would you like some cake?” Before the demon has a chance to decline, she lifts the lid and cuts a generous slice from the near-complete circle that has scarcely been touched. It smells of citrus and cream and is, as assumed earlier, soggy, oversaturated with icing.

It was made for a special occasion, for guests, but it doesn’t seem this old woman receives much company in this musty, stagnant house that smells like an antique garage that hadn’t had its dust stirred in years.

Especially not from her absentee grandson, Todd.

The demon waits until the coffee pot is full, and takes two small mugs from the counter, filling them until steam is frothing over the rims. Then, and only then, does it accept the cake and sit, with some difficulty, in a small chair at the small table. It warbles out a polite ‘thank you,’ but it doesn’t suppose the woman understands. Manners are manners regardless.

“Oh, dear, I can hardly understand. Your voice has gotten so deep, just like your grandfather’s was. That, and I do recall you have an affinity for that gravelly, screaming music. Did your voice get strained? It’s alright, dear, I’ll do the talking. You just rest up. The coffee will help soothe.”

The demon merely nods—some communication can be understood without fail—and drinks the coffee and eats the cake with a too-small fork. It’s ordinary, mushy, but delicious because of the intent behind it and the love that must have gone into its creation.

“I hope you enjoyed all of the presents I sent you. You never write back—but I am aware most people use that fancy E-mail these days. I just can’t wrap my head around it. I do wish your mom and dad would visit sometime. I know of a wonderful little café down the street we can go to. I haven’t been; I wanted to visit it with Charles, before he…well.” She falls silent in her rambling, staring into her coffee with a small, melancholy smile. “I can’t believe it’s been ten years. You never had the chance to meet him. But never mind that.” Suddenly, and with surprising speed that has the demon concerned for her well being, she moves to her feet, bracing her hands on the edge of the table. “I may as well give you your birthday present, since you’re here. What timing! I only finished it this morning. I’ll be right back.”

When she returns, the white, grey and black crocheted work with the summoning circle is bundled in her arms.  

“I found these designs in an occult book I borrowed from the library. I thought you’d like them on a nice, warm blanket to fight off the winter chill—I hope you do like it.” With gentle hands, she spreads the blanket over the demon’s broad, spiky back like a shawl, smoothing it over craggy shoulders and patting its arms affectionately. “Happy birthday, Todd, dear.”

demon: you’re not blind here – but you’re not surprised. when…?

anette: oh, toddy, don’t be silly, my biological grandson’s not twelve feet tall and doesn’t scorch the furniture when he sneezes. i’ve known for ages.

demon: then why?

anette: you wouldn’t have stayed if you weren’t lonely too.

demon: you… you don’t have to keep calling me your grandson.

anette: nonsense! adopted children are just as real. now quit sniffling, you silly boy, and let’s go bake a cake. honey, heel!

Steklyannaya (glass) beach on Ussuri Bay, east of Vladivostok, Siberia. Once a dumping ground for broken bottles and glass waste, the ocean waves have shaped the debris into beautiful glass pebbles.

Norse Mythology

Victo Ngai

I am so excited to reveal the cover for @neil-gaiman ’s Norse Mythology paperback, hitting the shelves on March 6th, 2018. I have always been a fan of mythologies and fantasies as well as Neil’s books and lectures, so unsurprisingly I devoured this book when it first came out in hard cover format, adorned by Sam Weber’s beautiful cover. It was a beautiful surprise when the paperback cover fell into my lap, and I was able ready to jump right in without needing to read the manuscript. 

Water and stars have always feel timeless to me, I imagine Mjölnir being washed up on a shore of stars. How did the hammer end up in the sea? Maybe the not-the-brightest Thor has lost it, yet again, or maybe the gods and human have been long gone. Either way, the mythologies endure, and the cycle continues. Another reason behind the water concept is that the Norse world is flooded both when it is created and destroyed. What fascinates me the most about Norse Mythology is its cyclic perspective on time, which Neil has elegantly written in this book’s introduction: “Had Ragnarok happened yet? Was it still to happen? I did not know then. I am not certain now. It was the fact that the world and the story ends, and the way that it ends and is reborn, that made the gods and the frost giants and the rest of them tragic heroes, tragic villains. Tagnarok make the Norse world linger for me, seem strangely present and current, while others, better documented systems of belief felt as if they were part of the past, old things.” This image can be from any point of time in the world of Norse Mythologies. 

Personally I think a good illustration doesn’t just create a scene, it creates a believable mythology. The richer the story-telling details, the more believable the myths are. The decorations on Mjölnir are inspired by the world which the hammer defends: we have Midgard and Asgard in the middled, connected by the World tree are and the rainbow bridge, surrounded by the Midgard serpent. The world tree extends to the handle where we can find the dragon Nidhogg. The two circular symbols on the side are the sun and moon.

There are lots of books out there; how to choose which to give this holiday season? Easy: LISTEN TO ME. Or at least you can listen to me if you’re looking for something Stiefvatery.  

Here are ten books to give to people who also like my books.

1. For the lover of the Raven Cycle. I get asked a lot what folks should read that feels like the Raven Cycle, and honestly, how the hell should I know? That series is weird, man. What does it feel like? Like you suspect a dark, enigmatic presence is watching you eat an egg sandwich that might be your last. Instead of chasing that nebulous feeling, how about digging into some of the physical magic from the series? Give the Raven Cycle lover in your life a tarot deck. You could give them the deck I drew, or you could give them one of my favorites, the Wild Unknown.

2. If you don’t think they want to get into magic, perhaps they want to get into other Gansey-related pursuits, like obscure fact discovery and wandering the world instead of facing their actual psychological problems. In that case, they’ll need to read the bulky but fascinating The Lost Art of Finding Our Way, a book that breaks down the different ways cultures have learned to navigate through the wilderness.

3. For the lover of the Scorpio Races. For all that the Scorpio Races features flesh-eating horses, it really is a gentle and nostalgic book about noshing on baked goods in places that feel like they might have been featured on a BBC program twenty years ago. This makes the old classic I Capture the Castle an excellent gift for the TSR fan, and they just released a new edition of it that is delightfully restrained in its packaging.  

4. If it’s the bizarre horses-that-are-not-horses in the Scorpio Races that really appealed, however, you could also gift them the exceptionally beautiful UK edition of The Secret Horses of Briar Hill, a brief illustrated historical novel featuring magical “horses” and “dead children.” I don’t know why I put the “children” in quotes. They are super actually dead children.

5. For the lover of the Shiver Trilogy. Casual readers of this novel’s jacket might presume this book is about werewolves. In actuality, this is a book about laying around, kissing people, and admiring German poetry while being cold. As such, give fans of the Shiver trilogy a copy of Rilke. My favorite translations are Stephen Mitchell’s.                                        

Again and again, however we know the landscape of love and the little churchyard there, with its sorrowing names, and the frighteningly silent abyss into which the others fall: again and again the two of us walk out together under the ancient trees, lie down again and again among the flowers, face to face with the sky.

6. For the lover of Sinner. Sinner, a standalone spin off from the Shiver trilogy featuring bombastic Cole St. Clair and mercurial Isabel Culpeper, is totally different from the trilogy. A book, I told people on tour, that I hoped one hated or loved, nothing in between. It’s a novel about broken people falling back into holes that sometimes have werewolves or reality TV or fear of commitment in the bottom of them. For those who enjoyed being unapologetically bitten by their fiction about broken people, I recommend Kathleen Glasgow’s Girl in Pieces, a story about broken people falling back into holes that sometimes have addiction or cutting or coffee shops in the bottom of them.

7. For the lover of the Books of Faerie, Lament and Ballad, those novels of homicidal faeries and unending Celtic music references, I recommend a somewhat obscure retelling of Tam Lin — Fire and Hemlock, by my favorite Diana Wynne Jones. A weird, soft-focus, slow-motion romance featuring that old trope Wait-A-Second-My-Mentor-Is-Younger-And-Hotter-Than-I-First-Thought + cello-playing.

8. For lovers of the Curiosities & the Anatomy of Curiosity, my flash and short story collections featuring stories that are also available online for free, I recommend Brian Coldrick’s Behind You. They’re also speedy little stories in one page (my full Goodreads review is here) available online for free. 

9. For lovers of All the Crooked Saints, a novel/ tall tale/ parable/ word caper about learning to grapple your inner darkness, I recommend Less, a novel I delighted in earlier this year. Although Less has no magic in it, it feels like it belongs in the same room as ATCS — both of them are novels that believe strongly in happiness and should hopefully make you laugh out loud, if you still have any soul left as we near the end of 2017. 

10. For people who like my blog. Weirdly enough, there are a fair number of people who read my blog and Twitter but have never read any of my books. A great place to start for them would be, like, with my books. But if they are unwilling to break that seal after all this time, you could give them When Breath Becomes Air, a brief little nonfiction book about a man who suddenly discovers he has a lot less time on the planet than he thought. 

My GR recommendation of it is very short, so I’ll copy it here in its entirety:

A gasping, desperate, powerful little book, bigger on the inside than outside. It’s a little bit about dying, but more about being alive.

This is stunning:

make new art. make bad art. ignore the posts about “tumblr poetry,” write the hell out of cigarettes and ashes and kissing, use arial bold italics. ignore the posts about “indie girl singers,” sing about your lettuce and avocados in a husky voice, write countless pop songs about boys, write songs about being sexually inventive. ignore everything. dance because you made popcorn. cook odd dishes, be proud of it even if it’s ugly. be an actor only in subversive inaccessible plays, write plays because your friend wants to be satan and you might as well give her the role.

ignore posts like this. the internet is a time we have been able to see a massive shift in the accessibility of art, because now people from all over can be seen and heard and noticed - the same people who would have never had the option. people like me, who learned their art slowly, over many years, people who were new and bad first (i am still kind of bad). people like me who just wanted to create. who are poor queer cuban girls who want to show off i exist and am a person. who want to throw a tantrum, because no one else has ever listened. who has finally gotten a chance to communicate instead of being silenced. who writes sometimes in concepts because it’s fun and i can do that. and people like me who don’t have the time, who don’t have the money, who don’t have anything but a song or a painting or a dance or a stupid poem in our hearts and who just want to share that; even if it’s rotten, even if it’s a war cry, even if other people see it and flinch. 

i will protect artists and particularly new artists with my last breath. i will protect your art about boys and rocket science and concepts and fragments. never be afraid to create. to make mistakes.