Persephone's Orchard (The Chrysomelia Stories) (50 page)

The ancient myths usually tend to agree that Hades kidnapped Persephone, completely against her will, traumatizing her and breaking her mother Demeter’s heart. But for reasons I can’t fathom (maybe I simply longed for a prettier story?), ever since I was a teenager I wanted to see a version where Persephone loved Hades, and he loved her too. (It’s possible he did in the original myth, and just had an unhealthy way of showing it. We don’t get a lot of glances into Hades’ mind in those old stories.) But in rewriting the myth that way, it became clear that if Hades wasn’t the villain in the triangle, Demeter would have to be—or nearly so. However, it didn’t feel right to portray the benevolent goddess Demeter as an evil person or even really an enemy. So I hope I’ve found a way to cast her in the role of romantic obstacle and overprotective parent without completely ruining her reputation.

As for matters of history and prehistory: It’s possible, and even likely, that I made lots of factual errors in my depictions of the historic Mediterranean. I relied on Professor Wikipedia probably too much, and I take full responsibility for any mistakes. Though I did try to give some authentic flavor to the setting, I ultimately didn’t worry too much about accuracy, since, let’s face it, this is a novel about magic pomegranates and flying ghost horses. That said, here are a few research notes that might interest readers:

Placing the ancient-Mediterranean action at “roughly 3,700 years ago,” or around 1,700 B.C.E., puts us in the height of Minoan civilization on Crete. Like me, you can read on Wikipedia that ritual human sacrifice does seem likely to have taken place there (we don’t know under what circumstances), though in most ways the Minoans were a highly advanced civilization for their time. The palace complex at Knossos underwent several partial destructions and reconstructions over the centuries, but it seems that it remained the power center of the island for quite a long while. Though I’m unsure what the construction status would’ve been for the palace at the exact time of the story, I chose to depict Knossos at its full glory, complete with the beautiful frescoes glimpsed by Hades on his way out.

The Minoans of that time wrote in hieroglyphics and also in a script archaeologists call Linear A (which modern scholars have not entirely deciphered), and spoke a language we don’t know much about either. Thus I took liberties in making up language and writing-system tidbits as needed for the story. Same goes for mainland Greece: my story takes place centuries before any existing written records appear there, and the language of Ancient Greek as we know it still hadn’t developed. That’s why I call the tongue “proto-ancient-Greek” at times.

The “cloudhair flowers” mentioned by Aphrodite as birth control are inspired by Queen Anne’s lace, which is said to have been used for that purpose in ancient Greece and other places. However, they wouldn’t have called it “Queen Anne’s lace” back then, of course, so I made up a new name.

As to oranges, it appears they and most other citrus fruits have been cultivated for millennia in Asia, but weren’t introduced to the Mediterranean until the 15th or 16th century A.D. So Persephone acquiring orange seeds or seedlings in ancient Greece is unlikely. However, I liked the idea of borrowing an Asian fruit and thus fusing East and West for the secret to immortality (the meditation technique that leads to switching realms is also originally an Eastern secret in this book). In addition, I liked the idea of the “golden apple” being an orange, because I’m told that the Greek language and several others derive their word for “orange” (the fruit) from the phrase “golden apple.”

Then I made the fruit’s flesh blue, just to be contrary.

Further etymological fun: the word “grenade” is French for “pomegranate.” It was really just a fortuitous coincidence, as I was planning to have Thanatos deploy grenades even before I knew that, but I liked how the word relations turned out.

- M.J.R.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

I owe special thanks, first of all, to my beta readers:

- Kate Wharton, not only my sister but a talented and hilarious screenwriter who knows how to pace the action and helped me do it better. Thanks for being so positive and encouraging.

- Jessica Chambers, who took time out of her home renovations to read this and catch my awkward wording details and the plot moments that made no sense. Jess’s novels always show the proper way to handle a large and diverse cast--something I hope I can learn from her.

- Beth Willis, for a fabulous and thorough list of “LOL”s and “squee”s, along with good sound grammatical advice. She even liked my first version from way back in college, so she’s pretty much my ideal audience. But she has her own appreciative audience and you should join them: look up Beth Willis Music and swoon over the woman’s voice.

- Dean Mayes, who commented on the first full draft and caught some Kiwi dialect problems. But he’s Australian and I’m American, so it’s likely we still missed a few between us. Also, Dean’s own novels reminded me of the importance of dogs, which inspired me to invent Kiri and Kerberos.

A huge thanks to my editor, the incomparably friendly and supportive Michelle Halket, who encouraged me by expressing interest in this book even before seeing it, and whose suggestions helped deepen the emotion and romance and ended up making me love the story more than ever. And thanks for helping me keep my poise and professionalism (or as close as I could manage) when dealing with the marketing side of things!

Thanks to my sister Peggy Hawkwood, who pored over the Greek mythology book with me when we were kids, and liked my story so well in its early days that she acquired fans for me among her friends even before this version was ready. Also thanks to Rich Mulvey for answering my questions about technological espionage, and for general IT and moral support, and framed photos of Greek beaches. And thanks to Kirsty Harrison Skok on Facebook, whom the lovely Michelle Murphy introduced me to, for answering a brief flurry of my questions about Kiwi dialect and slang.

And, for that matter, many thanks to everyone on my Facebook author page for cheering me on when I posted updates about writing this novel. Your enthusiasm for yet another Persephone book in the world spurred me along toward the finish line.

Most importantly: immeasurable thanks to my husband Steve, who is always the person most inconvenienced by my obsession for writing novels, but who acts as a wonderful sounding board for my ideas nonetheless, and provided cool and useful facts on everything from botany to how GPS works. Also my sons, the wonderful and brilliant pair, who put up admirably with Mommy’s habit of staring at the computer screen. And my parents, a god and goddess to me in their own ways, wise and lively and funny, always taking their children’s side against the world.

I am so lucky to have you all.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Molly Ringle has been writing fiction for over 20 years, and her stories always include love and humor, as well as the occasional touch of tragedy and/or the paranormal. Her book
The Ghost Downstairs
, was a 2010 EPIC Award finalist for paranormal romance. Molly lives in Seattle with her husband and kids and worships fragrances and chocolate.

She is also the author of
Relatively Honest
,
What Scotland Taught Me
and
Summer Term
.

Catch up with her at mollyringle.com

Table of Contents

Central Avenue Publishing Edition

PERSEPHONE’S ORCHARD

Prologue

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Eighteen

Chapter Nineteen

Chapter Twenty

Chapter Twenty-One

Chapter Twenty-Two

Chapter Twenty-Three

Chapter Twenty-Four

Chapter Twenty-Five

Chapter Twenty-Six

Chapter Twenty-Seven

Chapter Twenty-Eight

Chapter Twenty-Nine

Chapter Thirty

Chapter Thirty-One

Chapter Thirty-Two

Chapter Thirty-Three

Chapter Thirty-Four

Chapter Thirty-Five

Chapter Thirty-Six

Chapter Thirty-Seven

Chapter Thirty-Eight

Chapter Thirty-Nine

Chapter Forty

Chapter Forty-One

Chapter Forty-Two

Chapter Forty-Three

Afterword

Acknowledgments

About The Author