Wonderful to see the Under the Poppy trailer mentioned recently on Galleycat as a good example of engaging the viewer (and potential reader) while telling the story of the book, not merely illustrating the story in the book.  A fine distinction, and one we’re proud to exemplify.  Viva the shadows!

“Under the poppy” can have any number of meanings.  This is very useful: from the knowledgeable Paghat we learn that the poppy is “valued for its perfume and as an incense offering…for food, as a drug, for its pods’ resemblance to pomegranates [referencing Persephone and the underworld]….A symbol of blood for the red varieties, death for the black center, and used as a love-charm or aphrodesiac [italics mine, and I sure wish I'd known this earlier].”  Plus the whole taste of lethe, which is not to be despised. (This sexy specimen is papaver somniferum “Black Cloud” peony poppy.)

I also think I’d better get one of these to wear to the opening.  Don’t you think?

Someone pointed out to me the other day that the YA novel I’m working on, called Planchette, is set contiguously – timewise, that is – with the world of Under the Poppy; she wanted to know if I was hot for the Victorians, or proto-Edwardians, or just deeply into top hats or what.  And that question made me examine for a moment what is so seductive about writing of a time not your own.

It’s never a conscious choice to step out of the contemporary frame: each story takes place where it does, not where it might be fun to write about chronologically.  And research, while a juicy joy to begin with, can turn into quicksand, you can start obsessing over each and every buttonhook and curlicue and spandyjack until you’re not feathering your nest, a la Flaubert, you’re building one of those Lego sets where every block needs to go in a particular place, which destroys the aspect of play entirely, or it would to me anyway.

What I’ve found about operating in this imaginative Victoriana is that it’s a strange and comfortable period to examine, it’s horseshit and corsets and broken glass and la vie moderne, cold-eyed and hysterical both.  Change is constant.  Death is less the emotional insult that it is to, say, certain 21st century subsets of society; yet no less terrible or mourned when it appears.  Sex is what it always is, restricted and ubiquitous. And desire cuts its path through human flesh, scattering the fat jet beads and lover’s eyes as it goes.

And all the fun I’ve had there makes me want to have some more.

Isn’t this gorgeous?  My French is nil so I refer you here. And here.  [Photo by Spleen de Paris.]

I’m thrilled to be able to announce that Joe Stacey, who both wrote and performed the gorgeous, and gorgeously catchy, theme from the trailer, “In the Dark,” will be in charge of the music for Under the Poppy onstage. And will he not look rockin’ in a top hat?!  Welcome back, Joe.