Mothers are Dragons
The quiet joy of writing with my daughter (A guest post by novelist Evelyn Skye)
Hello, folks. Tara here. This week, I am delighted to introduce a guest author to the Quiet Reading community.
writes fiction for adults, young adults, and middle graders. When you read about the innovative way she developed her novel Damsel, it won’t surprise you that she is a New York Times bestselling novelist or that Netflix released Damsel earlier this month as an original film. What may surprise you is that she carries her honors with such down-to-earth authenticity. Evelyn is a Quiet Reader at heart and a welcome new friend.Today she stops by our newsletter to share a little backstory about an unusual line on the cover page of Damsel. At the end of the post, you can find out where to read more of her work.
Welcome, Evelyn! See you all in the comments.
At first glance, Damsel doesn’t seem like a quiet story. Both the book and the Netflix movie are about a young woman from a poor land who accepts a marriage proposal from a prince, only to discover she’s destined to be sacrificed to a dragon.
But beneath the surface of the fiery anti-fairy tale is a story about the power of mothers and their daughters—biological daughters, stepdaughters, lost daughters, and adopted ones.
When Netflix reached out to me to write a novel about the subtle, often unseen strength of women, I said yes right away. They wanted me to expand on their draft screenplay—to build out more of the world, deepen the characters, explore additional plot lines. Books and movies are different forms of entertainment, and there are things you can do in the 400-or-so pages of a novel that can’t be accomplished in a two-hour film.
One of the very first things I knew I wanted to do was give more backstory to the dragon. I wanted her to be a fully fleshed out character—an intelligent, emotional being whose actions were driven as much by her experiences of love, loss, and pain as the human characters.
And yet, the dragon ought not be too human. So I turned to my 13-year-old daughter Reese, who is a linguistic phenom (she is self-taught and fluent in Japanese and Spanish and has an incredible grasp of grammatical structure in a way that even most adults don’t have). And I asked if she would invent a language for my dragon.
Like J.R.R. Tolkien who created his first language at age 13, Reese invented a beautiful language—Khaevis Ventvis—for my novel. Usually, my writing is done in total isolation. So imagine what a delight it was to collaborate with someone else, and that someone was my own flesh and blood!
Reese not only wrote the dragon’s dialogue in the book, but she also wrote the appendices of Damsel, including the grammar tables, verb conjugation charts, and abridged dictionary. At my publisher’s request, she also made recordings of all of the dragon’s dialogue in the novel, as a pronunciation guide for the audiobook narrator.
For her contribution to the novel, Reese’s name appears on the title page along with mine—evidence of the time mother and daughter spent together, working side-by-side on this story about mothers and daughters (and sisters) and what they will do for love.
On release day, Reese baked dragon-fire cupcakes for my launch party.
Earlier this month, we flew to New York and attended the Netflix World Premiere together.
But best of all? I got Reese to autograph my copy of Damsel.
It will forever sit in a place of honor on my bookshelf.
For more of Evelyn Skye’s writing, you can find her at WORDPLAY with Evelyn Skye, a warm and uplifting community for readers and writers where she shares author interviews and behind-the-scenes peeks at a New York Times bestselling novelist’s life, and runs the very fun WORDPLAY Book Club for Writers and Curious Readers (where you not only share your thoughts on the book of the month but also get to listen to writers analyze what did and didn’t work in the story, and why).
Damsel is available anywhere books are sold, and the movie is now streaming on Netflix.
Subscribe to Wordplay with Evelyn Skye
Behind the Scenes of author life, interviews, and WORDPLAY Book Club for Writers & Curious Readers, with New York Times bestselling novelist and Netflix collaborator Evelyn Skye.
I consider myself incredibly fortunate to be deeply connected to my two adult daughters. We joke about finding ways to go into business together (even though part of us knows that might be a big mistake!). This, though. Just amazing. What a collaboration! What a legacy! Thank you Tara and Evelyn, for bringing this fire to all of us.
The vicarious quiet joy flowed right into the heart of this old dad.