A Cover for Hades Speaks!

Illustrator J.E. Larson has outdone himself, for real! I wish you could see the "foil" effect on the eyes. So. Delightfully. Creepy. This book, I think, really hits the sweet spot for kids ages 9-12 interested in mythology.

Hades Speaks! A Guide to the Underworld by the Greek God of the Dead (Boyds Mills Press) releases this October--just in time for Halloween!

Many of you know that I'm a docent at the Carlos Museum at Emory University. It occurred to me that, without realizing it, I'd turned both Anubis (Anubis Speaks!) and Hades into "docents" or tour guides of their own mythological worlds. Each god walks the reader through their respective afterlife/underworld landscapes, sharing bits of history and ritual along the way.

Keep an eye out for giiveaways of the advanced reading copies (ARCs) coming up soon, though I'll likely wait until after Curses and Smoke: A Novel of Pompeii (YA historical fiction) releases at the end of May. If you are (or know of) an elementary school librarian who would like a copy of the ARC in exchange for an honest review, contact me by either leaving a comment or emailing me directly.

Go Hades!

The Zany Genius of Zeus Grants Stupid Wishes

Available now. Go. Read it!

My teenage daughter happened to walk by as I opened the package containing this book. One look and she ripped it out of my hands, exclaiming, "OMG, this is awesome!"

"I know," I said. "The publisher sent it to me so that I can review it."  But she wasn't paying any attention to me. She had whipped out her phone and was sending the image of the cover to her friends and texting them about it.

We read excerpts out loud to each other and ended up laughing so hard, we were wiping tears away with our forearms. 

She then took it to school to show all her friends and to share with her Latin teacher. It was a while before I saw it again.

But when I did, I confirmed my first impression--this book is a riot and a great antidote to PC versions of ancient myths. The author, Cory O'Brien, is proud of his retellings of the myths, well aware that some stick-in-the-muds will bemoan them as an example of "the death of intellectualism." 

"Myths have suffered from severe intellectualism overdose," he explains in the introduction. "Everybody's always studying them in school or reading watered-down versions of them to little kids, and what that means is that hardly anybody has the time to actually sit down and look at how f*cking funny these things are."

Amen.

The cover itself--with it's middle school-like scribblings of Apollo in a Led Zepplin t-shirt and Zeus with an erm, "disturbance" in his nether regions--sets the tone. Yes, it's totally immature but that's what makes it so damn fabulous. Because, let's be honest, most of us really are middle-schoolers trapped in grown-up bodies (okay, I'll just speak for myself then).

Of course, with a subtitle of "A No-Bullsh*t Guide to World Mythology," you know from the get-go that O'Brien doesn't shy away from the bawdy, batsh*t craziness inherent in most myths. But here's what I discovered--the stories are way funnier if you already know the originals. So, of course, the Greek, Egyptian and Judeo-Christian retellings often had me in stiches. But the Japanese, Hindu, Chinese and African myths? They were funny, but I found myself wishing I knew the original versions so I could compare them against O'Brien's irreverent retellings. Which, of course, has inspired me to read the original stories. See how that works?

The young author is a grad student (MFA in writing) in Chicago and it's clear he's mastered the art of a unique writing "voice." He was kind enough to answer some of my questions:

Q:  Why myths? 

A:  My blog started as sort of a joke between friends. I used to assault this one friend of

The young turk's twitter: @tachaberdash

mine on gchat to yell different myths at her, and finally she was just like "you should make a blog where you do this." (presumably to get me to stop bothering her). I thought it was a great idea because as far as I could tell, no one was doing it. Every re-telling I read seemed like it was holding back, like they were still trying to retain some level of respect for the original text, and where's the fun in that? So I pretty much transposed these mythical chatlogs directly onto a website, started getting attention from fancy folks (including Neil Gaiman), and suddenly Perigee was offering me a contract and re-telling myths became my for-real job.

Q:  When did you become obsessed with myths? What was it about them that hooked you?

A:  My dad is a professional storyteller. He has a children's theater company in LA called "We Tell Stories," and they do myths from all different cultures. So I grew up hearing and seeing those stories, in the fast, loose, silly way they did them, and I guess they kinda burrowed into my brain. I mean, myths are stories from back before we had all the rules about how stories should go. They're pure entertainment, stripped of any pretense of subtlety. I think part of it is just that I wish I was writing way back then, when you could still get away with that stuff.

Q:  What's your favorite one in general? In the book?

A:  The big bang. I like it because no one realizes it's a myth yet. I'm not saying it's not a true thing that happened. I don't really have an opinion on that. I'm saying that the way it's explained in layman's terms, the narrative version, is doing the exact same kind of work that creation myths have done for thousands of years. Ovid's creation myth at the beginning of the Metamorphoses uses all the latest science of his time: Pythagorean elements, a spherical earth... The methods we use to gather information about the world have changed, for sure, but the way we understand the information hasn't, and it's cool to be able to watch that pattern unfold in my lifetime.

Q:  What myth did you cut from the book because your editor/publisher said you had to even though you begged and pleaded?

A:  Elvis. I had Elvis in there and the book was too long so I took him out. He's the best modern myth we've got: He revolutionized music, he's a sex hero, he dresses in crazy god-like costumes, and people say that instead of dying he was taken to space by aliens. People make pilgrimages to his old house to pray at his grave, too. Good stuff, but I had to cut it. I put it up on the site though, so now everyone can enjoy it for free! Here’s the Elvis myth:  http://bettermyths.com/elvis-lives/

Q: Where do you go from here? (career wise; will this be a series?)

A: Japan. I graduate in May so I'm going to go get the hell out of the country and immerse myself in a culture that maybe doesn't worship the Greeks so damn much. Career-wise, I guess it depends on Perigee. I've got plenty more material if they decide I'm worth the money. I desperately want to do a book-length retelling of the whole Arthurian Legend.

Q: Have you gotten any push-back (i.e., serious name calling? death threats?) from religious groups? Scientologists?

A: Nah, I've been lucky. The most I've gotten is a half-coherent paragraph on one of my bible myths about how I "got it all wrong." I actually get quite a few Christians who say they dig my re-tellings of their mythology. The thing about it is, I'm not distorting the stories when I retell them. Most of the humor comes from making the ridiculousness of the original story as clear and apparent as possible. And I think it's hard to get mad about that, especially if you know the original text. I don't really have an agenda here. I'm not trying to tear down religion (as you'll see if you read the epilogue of my book). But Joseph Campbell points out (and Tibetan Buddhism, for one, agrees) that the myths are only the stepping stones that allow initiates to approach the higher understanding that the religion has to offer. They're supposed to be ridiculous. They never weren't. As for Scientology, I think Trey Parker, Matt Stone and Anonymous took all the heat there is to take on that one. I feel pretty safe.

Q:  I noticed Muslim and Christian myths were not included...any particular reason[s]?

A:  Mostly a lack of knowledge. Yes, I know the story of Jesus (I've done a video re-telling of the book of Matthew on my site) but that's too long for a book like this. And I know absolutely nothing about the Qur'an. (Something I'll eventually remedy) I love, absolutely love the Arabian Nights, but my rationale for leaving those particular stories out was that I'm hoping to do a book of just those some day. And maybe a book on Jesus, too...

Here’s the Jesus myth: http://bettermyths.com/jesus-christ-jesus-christ/

Q: What are some of the funniest/favorite responses you've had to different myths on your blog?

I think my favorites are the people who accuse me of destroying literature/culture. Every once in a while I get a comment like that, and it starts a flamewar that lasts a couple months. People jump up to defend me and it's all very heartwarming. But what's funny about it to me is that I'm proud to be destroying culture. Living culture feeds on dead culture. You keep replacing and updating pieces of your old Victorian house, eventually you're going to wake up to find that you're not living in the same house anymore, and that's a good thing, because the plumbing in those old houses is terrible.

Q: What are you doing when you're not posting/publishing?

A: I am building a pair of gloves that will allow the user to type by touching fingers to palms in different combinations. I am also writing a book of fiction, with no myths in. I am teaching a class on retelling mythology and I am sewing a jacket made entirely of pockets. I am doing too many things, mainly.

Recommendation: Get this book and read it aloud with friends. Preferably over drinks. Get it from your local independent bookstore or order it online.

Full disclosure: as stated above, the publisher sent me a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review. 

Shedding Light on Dark of the Moon

I like to keep it simple, so here's my review of Dark of the Moon by Tracy Barrett: I loved it. This re-imagining of the Theseus myth is fresh, fascinating and--most importantly--plausible!

I love books that force me to rethink stories and myths and Dark of the Moon does exactly that. Plus, it looks at this ancient myth from Ariadne's point of view, tying her story to the slow dissolution of goddess worship in favor of patriarchal gods. We also get the story from Theseus's point of view to counter-balance Ariadne's.

Tracy was kind enough to talk with me about her writing process:

1.  The Theseus myth is a classic "hero's journey" and, in that way, very male-centric. What inspired you to look at the story from Ariadne's point of view?

It's pretty clear that the moon goddess played an important role in the religion of Minoan Crete, and perhaps this goddess was at the head of their pantheon. We don't know for sure, but when I'm writing historical fiction (as opposed to nonfiction, when I'm scrupulous about documenting sources and clearly labeling speculation as such), I figure that as long as something is plausible, I can use it.

So I wanted to try to reconstruct a possible society based on moon-goddess worship. That, combined with the facts that I'm intrigued by familiar stories told by a narrator other than the one we're used to and that I'm drawn to a teen voice, made Ariadne a logical choice.

2.  How much do we really know about the culture of ancient Crete?

Not much, unfortunately, and most of what we do know was filtered by the mainland Greeks, who had a much different culture. For example, the Minotaur myth is probably a garbled retelling by Greek (perhaps Athenian) travelers of a set of rituals where the sun-god, imagined by the Cretans as a bull, might have been represented by a priest wearing a bull's head mask. Perhaps this priest engaged in a ritual marriage with the priestess of the moon-goddess. It's possible that the Cretans practiced human sacrifice. The Athenians and Cretans were bitter rivals for supremacy in the Aegean Sea, and it's no wonder that they saw the whole thing as something perverted, or wanted to present the Minoans as bloodthirsty savages who kept man-eating monsters in their basements. All of these elements could have combined to make the wonderful story of the Minotaur.

3. I love how you worked in scenarios that "could have happened" as a way to explain some of the "Tall Story" aspects of the original myth. How did you come up with these moments/scenes?

That's one of those mysterious processes! I love puzzles; I'm always working on a crossword or a sudoku or something else. When I hit an issue like, "Why would someone need a ball of yarn to get out of the labyrinth?" (I've seen the maze of storerooms that were probably the inspiration for the labyrinth, and it wouldn't take much to get out of it), I treat it like a puzzle. I investigated yarn, what its meaning was in ancient Greece (since the Greeks, and not the Cretans, tell the story of the ball of yarn), etc. Then when I find new use for the ball of yarn that fits both the mythological source and my story, it feels like magic, even though it's the result of a lot of researching and thinking.

4.  What was your favorite part of the book?

I really enjoyed writing the part where Ariadne is drugged into thinking she has become the moon goddess (or did she really become the moon goddess?) and surveys the crowd, looking for the incarnation of the sun god.

5.  Why do you think these ancient tales still have the power to enthrall us so much?

I actually have a theory about that! The myths were told and re-told by different people long before they were written down. Each teller had a different life history, a different set of personal beliefs, and a different way of looking at the world, and each left her or his own subtle imprint on the story. This multiplicity of narrators makes the myths and legends so layered and rich that everyone can find something meaningful in them, and they can be read and interpreted in many ways and on many levels.

6.  What's your next book going to be about?

It's so new and fragile that I'm afraid of talking about it for fear of breathing too hard on the bubble and breaking it. Let's just leave it at a slave girl in the ancient Roman world who faces a personal crisis at the same time that her world faces cataclysm.

Wow, that sounds awesome! Thanks Tracy!

Rick Riordan's Magic

Riordan’s latest book had an initial press run of 1 million copies. Can you even imagine? One million in the first printing.

The man who single-handedly inspired countless kids to discover the magic of Greek mythology with his Percy Jackson series is about to do it again with his new series on Egyptian gods and monsters.

Riordan was in Atlanta recently promoting THE RED PYRAMID. Nearly 1,200 kids and their families showed up. Wait. Let me repeat that. More than 1,000 kids chose to meet an author over playing video games, watching TV, or whatever else they could’ve been doing.

The Carlos Museum at Emory University raffled off a private tour with Rick and I had the honor of tag-teaming the tour through our Greek and Egyptian galleries with him. It was a blast.

After his speech, Rick signed oh, about 800 to 1,000 books, saving a smile for each awe-struck child that approached him. Not to sound too star struck myself, but he was pretty awesome.

Meanwhile, I have a signed copy of Rick’s latest that I want to give-away as soon as I figure out how other bloggers do these things. But (in case my editor reads this) I am much too busy—yessiree—way too busy working on those edits right now to figure out the details.

So, keep an eye out for details on how you can win a free autographed copy of THE RED PYRAMID. Later. My novel is calling...