Show Notes
Today is part one of two where we are talking to Roxy Eloise about her debut novel The Guidal: Discovering Puracordis. Over the next 2 weeks you will learn how her teacher influenced her writing career, the unique way she came up with her story, and her journey to getting traditionally published.
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Roxy’s Website – @Roxyeloise_ on Twitter – @Roxyeloiseofficial on Instagram
Roxy Eloise is a successful participant of Pitch Wars held quarterly on Twitter. During this event, she created a pitch that stood out from the hundreds of thousands, landing herself a traditional publishing contract. Her debut novel, The Guidal: Discovering Puracordis, is the first in a trilogy. Coming April 2022, this exciting new novel was inspired by a dream. Roxy writes the stories she really wants to read. If she finds it boring to write, she’ll find it boring to read, so she’ll always make sure her novels are binge worthy! Her favourite place to write is in bed with country music and a hot drink. On the weekends, you’ll find her out walking her dog, filming videos for YouTube, or spending time with her family.
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Transcript:
Speaker A: Welcome to Freya’s Fairy Tales, where we believe fairy tales are both stories we enjoyed as children and something that we can achieve ourselves.
Speaker A: Each week we will talk to authors about their favorite fairy tales when they were kids and their adventures to holding their very own fairy tale in their hands.
Speaker A: At the end of each episode, we will finish off with the fairy tale or short story read as close to the original author’s version as possible.
Speaker A: I am your host, Freya Victoria.
Speaker A: I’m an audiobook narrator that loves reading fairy tales novels and bringing stories to life through narration.
Speaker A: I am also fascinated by talking to authors and learning about their why and how for creating their stories.
Speaker A: We’ve included all of the links for today’s author and our show in the show notes.
Speaker A: Today is part one of two, where we are talking to Roxy Eloise about her debut novel, The Discovering Purichordis.
Speaker A: Over the next two weeks, you will learn how her teacher influenced her writing career, the unique way she came up with her story, and her journey to getting traditionally published.
Speaker A: In a future where the mention of magic is banned, one paranoid man rules the entire country, adopting children to become his private bodyguards.
Speaker A: They are raised together in a strict Institute where 16 yearold Aurora struggles to follow the rules, finding herself disciplined often, she doesn’t particularly like her endless life of servitude.
Speaker A: Soon she will have to take part in the Institute’s annual unity ceremony, where she could end up engaged to a complete stranger.
Speaker A: Aurora’s fears of being different are realized when she discovers something about herself, something which will make most fear her and her adoptive father will want her killed for friends, bullies, and a touch of something magical.
Speaker A: Aurora’s first year in the grownups quarter is far from ordinary Roxy.
Speaker B: The theme of the show is Freya’s Fairy Tales of Freya being me, and that’s two fold.
Speaker B: It’s one fairy tales.
Speaker B: When you were a kid growing up, what you liked to either watch a movie of or what you liked to read, or whatever the case may be as a kid’s book, or maybe you liked the creepy versions as a kid, whatever.
Speaker B: And also once you’ve written a book and had it published or self published, or whatever the case may be, if you’ve gone through all the time to write a book, that’s got to be some kind of a fairy tale for you.
Speaker B: Getting There So what was your favorite fairy tale to listen to?
Speaker B: Watch read as a kid?
Speaker C: So my favorite fairy tale actually changed from when I was a child to when I was a teenager, and I think it was possibly because my mind was a little bit more simple when we’re children.
Speaker C: So what interested me as a child was completely different to what interested me as a teenager.
Speaker C: And my favorite fairy tale as a child was Rapunzel.
Speaker C: And the thing that used to intrigue me about Rapunzel fascinated me was the length that she could grow her hair.
Speaker C: But more than that, it was like with the darkness.
Speaker C: I think something intrigues us about Dark storyline, and it did as a child.
Speaker C: And what used to fascinate me was she was like, I don’t think she was a Princess, but let’s just pretend she was.
Speaker C: She was kept up in eight hour, so high up off the ground, there was no stairs and no room that she could get out of.
Speaker C: There was no door that she could get out of.
Speaker C: And her captor, who kept her up in that tower, used to ask her to drop her hair down so she could climb up her hair and get in and help her.
Speaker C: So there was this unhealthy relationship where her cater was also looking after her.
Speaker C: And that’s a storyline that used to fascinate me as a child.
Speaker C: But then growing up, it changed.
Speaker C: And my favorite fairy tale became Beauty and the Beast.
Speaker B: That’s my favorite one, too.
Speaker C: Hopefully you have to tell me why it’s your favorite.
Speaker C: But for me, it basically had a message that love is blind and true love is blind.
Speaker C: And for some reason, that scene where they would start dancing used to make me cry.
Speaker C: And there’s a series called Once Upon a Time on Netflix.
Speaker C: That’s how I watch it have, like, an adaptation where Rumple Stiltskin is actually the Beast.
Speaker C: And even in that adaptation where Stilt Skin and Belle did their dance, it made me cry.
Speaker C: So I don’t know what it is about that thing.
Speaker B: Yeah, that show, I watched it.
Speaker B: I waited until it was one of those shows where all of my friends, all of my friends on social media that had watched it went on and on and on about it.
Speaker B: And I was very hesitant because there’s been a lot of times where shows or movies have come out or books even that everybody talked about, and then you read it, and it’s just a letdown.
Speaker B: And so I waited until, like, three, four seasons in before I decided to even watch one episode.
Speaker B: And then I was like, I don’t remember if my husband was out of town or what happened, but I’m like, we’re going to watch an episode and we’re just going to see what all the hype is about if it’s actually that good.
Speaker B: And I ended up binge watching.
Speaker B: I just kept watching and watching and watching that one.
Speaker B: They did a really good job of taking both the classic and the original versions and kind of twisting them to make it combine them together.
Speaker B: But then taking characters from other stories that didn’t even like, for example, the Rumple Stillskin.
Speaker B: The Beast’s name wasn’t Rumple Stillskin and Beauty.
Speaker C: Yes.
Speaker C: When a new character was introduced, I was really waiting to find out which fairy tale character is my favorite bar.
Speaker C: Like, I really liked about Once Upon a Time is how they made the fairy tales so realistic that they could potentially have existed in the real world now.
Speaker C: And I really like how some stories do that where you kind of wonder, if you let your imagination run wild, you could wonder, does it actually exist?
Speaker B: Right.
Speaker B: How they intertwine all of these stories.
Speaker B: Most majority of these fairy tales, and some of them are actually for a Twitter post, I looked up like, what is the first known fairy tale?
Speaker B: And they said, the first known fairy tale?
Speaker B: I don’t remember.
Speaker B: What the name of the fairy tale?
Speaker B: Something about a tallow candle.
Speaker B: No, no.
Speaker B: I don’t remember what the story was, but it’s like 6000 years old.
Speaker B: This story has been circulating and developing, and that’s just the first one that there’s a written record of.
Speaker B: So there could be other ones older than that.
Speaker B: We just don’t have a written account.
Speaker B: Yeah, but a lot of those stories were written for some kind of a moral purpose.
Speaker B: So I don’t know if they were just darker back then to scare the h*** out of these poor kids or what the case may be, what fascinates people.
Speaker C: I think for some reason, dark storyline.
Speaker C: They do intrigue us.
Speaker B: Which is why crime podcasts do so well.
Speaker B: And crime shows do so well because for me, I love those kinds of things, but I’m not in it for the like.
Speaker B: My mom used to always joke with my dad, like, if I ever die or go missing, it’s because he watches all these crime shows to learn how to do it.
Speaker B: I’m more fascinated by how they solve it, part of it, but it’s still a little bit of a dark fascination.
Speaker C: How can another human being do that?
Speaker C: That’s what’s like mind blubbing for me.
Speaker C: I’m like, how does anybody have what it takes to do that?
Speaker B: So your fairy tales changed over time.
Speaker B: At what age did you start thinking, I want to write stories?
Speaker B: Or being a writer would be cool or whatever it was that started you thinking about it.
Speaker C: So growing up, I lived in my imagination.
Speaker C: I had a younger brother that’s a similar age to me, and my mom had horses, so she would let us basically run wild up the stables, and we would play the same game where we were both the characters.
Speaker C: We would adopt the same two characters.
Speaker C: I’d be one, he’d be the other, and we were the characters in the story.
Speaker C: And the next day we would basically continue where the story left off.
Speaker C: And one day we would be bank clocks and one day we would be shop owners.
Speaker C: And the story was always changing, but we were the characters.
Speaker C: So I had such a strong imagination once I grew older and it was no longer acceptable to play anymore, I started continuing the story in my head, and I would literally imagine the characters, the lives, their dialogue.
Speaker C: And I used to think I really should write this down.
Speaker C: I really should write this down.
Speaker C: With these stories in my head.
Speaker C: I was always kind of living in my head.
Speaker C: I think it was a bit of a coping mechanism.
Speaker C: It was definitely escapism.
Speaker C: I thought for some reason that authors were born knowing that they could write a book from start to finish.
Speaker C: And I didn’t know that.
Speaker C: So I kind of wanted somebody to tell me that I could do that.
Speaker C: So I didn’t really write stories down unless it was a school assignment.
Speaker C: And it wasn’t until secondary school that I got given an assignment and it was to write a short story.
Speaker C: And I loved absolutely everything about it.
Speaker C: And I thought, okay, there was this one sentence in this story that I was so impressed with that I thought, if I’m supposed to be an offer, if I’ve got what it takes and I can finish a book from start to finish, my teacher is going to be able to tell me and it’s going to be from this one sentence that I was so impressed with.
Speaker C: Well, she did notice the sentence and she told me it was unrealistic.
Speaker C: I thought, okay, so I haven’t got what it takes to be an author.
Speaker C: So I closed my notebook and I did not write for 15 years, nothing.
Speaker C: And not even did I not write anything for 15 years.
Speaker C: I couldn’t even read fiction books because it used to upset me that this is what I really want to do.
Speaker C: This is what I want to create.
Speaker C: I don’t have what it takes.
Speaker C: But I was fascinated with authors, so fascinated that when I would be in a bookstore, I would stare at all the books, but I was just staring at each officer’s individual name.
Speaker C: I was just staring at their name, thinking, wow, you had what it took.
Speaker C: Wow, you had what it took.
Speaker C: So literally.
Speaker C: My whole adult life, I stopped reading fiction and I didn’t write down a single thing.
Speaker C: And I used to read a lot of nonfiction, but fiction just made me feel a little bit upset that I didn’t have what it took to do it.
Speaker C: And luckily it was a nonfiction book that my best friend gave me called You Are a Badass by Jennison Sarah.
Speaker C: I’m not sure if you pronounce her name like that.
Speaker C: She said in this book, basically, if there is something that you want to do it just do it.
Speaker C: And because she was writing a book, Jen was writing the book.
Speaker C: She kept using writing a book as an example of just do it.
Speaker C: And she was saying like break it down chapter by a tactile and stuff like that.
Speaker C: She was just using her because that’s what she was going through and this is how she does it.
Speaker C: She was breaking it down and it just happened to make me think, you know what, I’m going to do it.
Speaker C: I’m just going to do it.
Speaker C: I’m going to write a book.
Speaker C: And she gave me that one book, gave me the belief and then other motivational speakers and stuff like that.
Speaker C: I used to have to listen to a lot of them.
Speaker C: I did what she said and I broke it down chapter by chapter and didn’t stop.
Speaker C: And I finished the work.
Speaker B: For us in the US, we have three different phases of well, I guess four different phases of school.
Speaker B: There’s like elementary school, PreK if you go to before elementary school, and then there’s middle school and then there’s high school.
Speaker B: So secondary school would have been like what age range for you?
Speaker C: That is high school.
Speaker C: I was I think I was maybe twelve or 13 when the English teacher gave me the assignment back and said my line was unrealistic.
Speaker B: Okay.
Speaker B: And so you started again, I lightly stalked.
Speaker B: So you started writing this book in 20.
Speaker C: 13, 20, 14, 20, 18.
Speaker B: You read, you are a badass you think I can do this?
Speaker B: Is this the first book that now, by the time this podcast airs, your book will actually be released?
Speaker B: Your book releases on the second, right?
Speaker C: Yes.
Speaker B: So this will be airing on the fourth.
Speaker B: So you’ll be officially published live author for two whole days.
Speaker B: So was this the first book you tried to write after reading that nonfiction or was there another one?
Speaker C: No, I actually started writing nonfiction because I didn’t have the story.
Speaker C: I didn’t know what to write.
Speaker C: And as I was writing this nonfiction, in the back of my mind, I was just saying it was telling me, you don’t want to write this, you don’t want to write long fiction, you want to write fiction.
Speaker C: I kept going with it until one night I had this really powerful dream.
Speaker C: It’s the best dream I’ve ever had.
Speaker C: And I woke up in the morning and I was like, wow, that is my story.
Speaker C: I have to write this down.
Speaker C: And so my antagonist, my protagonist and the setting, the Institute, it all came from my dream.
Speaker C: And I woke up in the morning.
Speaker C: And what was being repeated at me during my dream was if you don’t act like everybody else is because I was me in the dream and it was really quite scary because as dreams are, everything feels real, right?
Speaker C: I was put into this Institute and everybody that’s in the same way and everyone seems to know what they’re doing.
Speaker C: And I didn’t because I’ve just appeared in this Institute.
Speaker C: Like, wow, where am I?
Speaker C: As me?
Speaker C: And one guy notice is that I’m not doing the same as everybody else.
Speaker C: And he says to me, if you don’t start acting like everybody else, this guy antagonist guy, he’s going to know that you’re the guidle.
Speaker C: So dream was spent trying to anticipate how I was supposed to act and who I was supposed to be.
Speaker C: And at one point, even in the dream, the antagonist, he detects something in me that I’m not acting right.
Speaker C: And he comes right in my face and he’s applying pain to me and he’s staring right in my face.
Speaker C: He’s so close to me and I don’t know how to act in the situation.
Speaker C: I was thinking, like, how would everybody else act?
Speaker C: So I just pretended it wasn’t hurting me.
Speaker C: And apparently that was the correct thing.
Speaker C: And he backed away and he left me alone.
Speaker C: But the fear was real.
Speaker C: And I woke up in the morning and I was like, Whoa, the guidance.
Speaker C: Luckily, my publishers allowed me to keep the title of my book.
Speaker B: So in your dream, did any of the characters have names in your dream or was it just kind of like nondescript people?
Speaker C: Yeah, nondescript people.
Speaker C: There were no names whatsoever.
Speaker C: So there are a lot of aspects of my book that actually came from just what’s interesting to me, what I find interesting and what fascinates me.
Speaker B: So when you’re writing this book.
Speaker B: So you started it in 2018.
Speaker B: When did you finish writing the book or the original version?
Speaker C: Yeah, the first draft from start to finish.
Speaker C: It took me about nine months.
Speaker C: And then the other three months were revising and editing because I thought at nine months, once I was like, from first chapter to last chapter, I was like, Whoa, I finished.
Speaker C: But it turns out that is just don’t be giving that to anyone.
Speaker B: You mean you can’t publish that?
Speaker C: And it’s crazy as a new writer, how you don’t realize that you think that this is amazing and I finished a book, but, wow, when you start editing from start to finish again and again, you really flesh out the book.
Speaker C: And that is when it becomes you can read it back and you think, Hang on a minute.
Speaker C: This is actually becoming like an actual book.
Speaker C: I can place it in here.
Speaker C: First drafts and rubbish.
Speaker C: So do not be sharing that with anyone.
Speaker B: Now, you are a little bit unique because you actually won your publishing contract, right?
Speaker C: Yes.
Speaker B: So how did that happen?
Speaker C: It’s kind of winning.
Speaker C: It’s a quarterly event on Twitter where you have to write an elevator pitch in a tweet, which is like 160 characters.
Speaker C: So you have to be really clever into how you’re going to write this tweet and how you’re going to grip the agent or the publishers.
Speaker C: And it is put out amongst hundreds of thousands of other people doing the exact same thing.
Speaker C: And then if an agent or a publisher, they like your tweet.
Speaker C: It’s called pit mad.
Speaker C: I’m not sure if I mentioned the competition.
Speaker C: If an agent or a publisher likes your tweet, it means that they like your pitch and they’re basically welcoming you to submit to them.
Speaker C: So it’s like a full manuscript request.
Speaker C: Basically.
Speaker C: That’s what I got off my publishers because I’m pretty sure they commented and asked me for the full manuscript.
Speaker B: Okay.
Speaker C: So I sent them the full manuscript and after a few rounds of questions and just like proving myself and stuff and the series, they offered me a traditional good contract.
Speaker B: Are you contracted for?
Speaker B: Because I know we’ve talked about your series and this is planned to be three books, right?
Speaker B: Yeah.
Speaker B: Are you contracted for all three books or just the first one and see how it goes?
Speaker C: No, I got a contract for all three books.
Speaker C: In the process, when they were asking me loads of questions, they were asking me about the other two books at the same time.
Speaker C: Okay, so when they offered me a contract, it was for all three of the books.
Speaker B: Your writing process before you started book one, did you know this is going to be three books?
Speaker B: Did you pre plan out the timeline of the three books?
Speaker B: Do you now have a plan for the other two books?
Speaker A: You don’t have to give.
Speaker B: Like spoilers or anything like that.
Speaker C: But just let me know.
Speaker C: So I knew I wanted it to be because when I read a standalone book and I get attached to characters, I get a little bit disappointed when it ends.
Speaker C: And my characters that I got so attached to are no longer around.
Speaker C: And I love series for the opposite reason.
Speaker C: I love that they’re coming back and you can wait for them to come back.
Speaker C: So I knew 100% I wanted it to be a series and my idol was JK Rowling.
Speaker C: And I was like, wow, how the h*** did she know that she could write seven books?
Speaker C: Because when I was just about to start one, I didn’t even know if I could finish one.
Speaker C: I used to spend a lot of time thinking, how did she know that she could do that?
Speaker C: How did she plan her books?
Speaker C: Because I didn’t have the confidence to go for seven.
Speaker C: I thought, okay, I’m going to do what I think I can achieve and I’m going to do my three books.
Speaker C: So once I decided it was three books, I then outlined them.
Speaker C: And actually the ending of book one was how this one ends.
Speaker C: It was not supposed to end like that.
Speaker C: When I outlined the book, that wasn’t the ending and it ended a completely different way.
Speaker C: But what I found when I started to write and I started to know my characters better and what I found is actually characters lead you.
Speaker C: They actually lead the story.
Speaker C: And I don’t think non writers would ever grasp that and understand what I mean by characters need you.
Speaker C: You’re the writer.
Speaker B: What do you mean?
Speaker C: But they really do.
Speaker C: I think it’s because you know your characters to a certain extent, but when you invite them into a scene, you Hone in on their personality and their reactions, and sometimes they don’t react initially how you thought that they would react.
Speaker C: So they actually end up turning the story around and leading it somewhere else.
Speaker C: So, yeah, I set out to write three books.
Speaker C: The first book didn’t end how it’s supposed to.
Speaker C: The second book, it is written and it’s being edited now by me.
Speaker C: Meaning the first draft is written and it’s going through its first rounds of edits.
Speaker C: Okay.
Speaker C: And the third book I have started because I couldn’t help myself.
Speaker C: I was after ending book two, I was so keen that I needed to carry the hat.
Speaker B: I need to get this out while it’s on my mind.
Speaker C: Yes, exactly what happened.
Speaker C: But that’s like a quarter done.
Speaker C: And I ended up jumping way into the future and I’ve written the very last chapter as well.
Speaker B: Okay.
Speaker B: Someone who reads a lot.
Speaker B: So your book is in like why a fantasy dystopian group?
Speaker B: And as someone who reads a lot in that genre, a majority of the ones that at least I’ve read are three book series for that genre.
Speaker B: Now, obviously there’s other ones that are longer and shorter, but I’ve read a lot.
Speaker B: That our three book series.
Speaker B: And then they finish it off or they start another one down the road with another main character or whatever.
Speaker B: Now on yours.
Speaker B: I don’t remember the name of the podcast now, but you had mentioned that your main character now didn’t start as your main character.
Speaker B: So who was the main character is your original main character, even in the book still?
Speaker B: And what made you change?
Speaker C: Yes.
Speaker C: So I started writing the book when I thought, right, I’m going to do this, I’m going to write a book.
Speaker C: And I got my laptop out and I put up chapter one and I thought, okay, I’m going to write a book.
Speaker C: I started writing in third person, but I started writing from TEO’s perspective.
Speaker B: Okay.
Speaker C: And I wrote the whole chapter pretty much from TEO’s perspective.
Speaker UNK: Okay.
Speaker C: But realized that the book was not going it was not bright.
Speaker C: There was something about it that was not right.
Speaker C: And I knew that it was not going to be able to have the same effect.
Speaker C: There was like a feeling or an effect I was going for.
Speaker C: And I knew I wasn’t getting it from third person and I just realized it was wrong.
Speaker C: Completely wrong.
Speaker C: And I changed.
Speaker C: I scrapped that first chapter and I started it from the beginning.
Speaker C: Chapter one, fresh page.
Speaker C: And then I started writing it in first person from Aurora’s point of view.
Speaker B: So you had only gotten a chapter in at that point?
Speaker C: Yes.
Speaker B: Okay, that’s good.
Speaker B: It wasn’t like the whole book and then changed your book.
Speaker C: And then I realized like, oh, this isn’t right.
Speaker C: No, I could tell as I was writing it just wasn’t right.
Speaker C: Something about it.
Speaker B: So how many like friends and family and stuff?
Speaker B: Did you have people read your book before you tried getting on the Twitter war thing?
Speaker B: Had anyone read your book ahead of that?
Speaker C: I think I had two readers.
Speaker C: So my mum was reading my first draft chapter by chapter.
Speaker C: As I was finishing a chapter, I was handing it to my mum and she was reading it and she was giving me confidence and saying, I really think you have something here.
Speaker C: You really need to carry on and you need to finish it.
Speaker C: And she started talking to me as if my book was not my book and discussing plot lines and characters and stuff like you do when you’re discussing your favorite friends.
Speaker C: She was doing it with me.
Speaker C: So I realized that, okay, this is exactly what I wanted and it is interesting enough and it’s going exactly as I want it to go.
Speaker C: Then after she was my only reader, then after the first few rounds of edits and I was thinking, okay, this is done now.
Speaker C: I’m pretty sure this is ready to submit it.
Speaker C: I gave it to my mum’s best friend and she greeted me at the park with Serve, honor, protect and defend.
Speaker B: That week with that like Hunger Games type three fingers point.
Speaker C: Which was like a dream come true for me.
Speaker C: That was literally like The Hunger Games.
Speaker A: Roxy’s favorite fairy tale when she was a girl was Rapunzel.
Speaker A: Rapunzel is a German fairy tale recorded by the brother’s Grim and first published in 1812 as part of Children’s and Household Tales.
Speaker A: The Brothers Grimm story is an adaptation of the fairy tale Rapunzel by Frederick Schultz.
Speaker A: That was a translation of Personet 1698 by Charlotte Rose de Camonte de la Force, which was itself influenced by an earlier Italian tale, Petrosinella by Jean Battista Basil.
Speaker A: Today we’ll be reading Petrochemila, but you can also hear the Grim Brothers more popularized version on our Patreon Petrol.
Speaker A: So great is my desire to keep the Princess amused that the whole of the past night, when all were sound asleep and nobody stirred hand or foot, I have done nothing but turn over the old papers of my brain and ransack all the closets of my memory, choosing from among the stories which that good soul Mistress Chiarella Euthiolo, my uncle’s grandmother, whom heaven take to glory, used to tell, such as seemed most fitting to relate to you.
Speaker A: And unless I have put on my spectacles upside down, I fancy they will give you pleasure.
Speaker A: Or should they not serve as armed squadrons to drive away tedium from your mind, they will at least be as trumpets to incite my companions here to go forth to the field with greater power than my poor strength possesses, to supply by the abundance of their wit the deficiencies of my discourse.
Speaker A: There was once upon a time a woman named Pascalausia, who was in the family way, and as she was standing one day at a window which looked into the garden of an ogress, she saw a beautiful bed of parsley, for which she took such a longing that she was on the point of fainting away.
Speaker A: And being unable to resist her desire, she watched until the ogres went out and then plucked a handful of it.
Speaker A: But when the Ogris came home and was going to Cook her cottage, she found that someone had been at the parsley and said, Good luck to me, but I’ll catch this long fingered rogue and make him repented and teach him to his cost that everyone should eat of his own platter and not meddle with other folks cups.
Speaker A: The poor woman went again and again down into the garden, until one morning the ogress met her and in a furious rage exclaimed, Have I caught you at last, Euthief, you rogue pretty?
Speaker A: Do you pay the rent of the garden, that you come in this impudent way and steal my plants by my faith, but I’ll make you do penance without sending you to Rome.
Speaker A: Poor Pascalassia, in a terrible fright, began to make excuses, saying that neither from gluttony nor the craving of hunger had she been tempted by the devil to commit this fault, but from her being pregnant and the fear she had lest the child should be born with a crop of parsley on its face.
Speaker A: And she added that the ogres ought rather to thank her for not having given her sore eyes.
Speaker A: Words are but wind, answered the ogres, I am not to be caught with such prattle.
Speaker A: You have closed the balance sheet of life unless you promise to give me the child you bring forth, girl or boy, whichever it may be.
Speaker A: Poor Pascal, in order to escape the peril in which she found herself, swore with one hand upon another to keep the promise, so the ogres let her go free.
Speaker A: But when her time was come, Pascal dozen gave birth to a little girl so beautiful that she was a joy to look upon, who, from having a fine sprig of parsley on her bosom, was named Petrosinella.
Speaker A: And the little girl grew from day to day until when she was seven years old, her mother sent her to school, and every time she went along the street and met the ogress, the old woman said to her, Tell your mother to remember her promise.
Speaker A: And she went on repeating this message so often that the poor mother, having no longer patience to listen to the music, said one day to Petra, if you meet the old woman as usual, and she reminds you of the hateful promise, answer her.
Speaker A: Take it.
Speaker A: When Petrasinella, who dreamt of no ill, met the ogress again and heard her repeat the same words, she answered innocently as her mother had told her, whereupon the ogress, seizing her by her hair, carried her off to a wood which the horses of the sun never entered, not having paid the toll to the pastures of those shades.
Speaker A: Then she put the poor girl into a tower, which she caused to arise by her art, and which had neither gait nor ladder, but only a little window through which she ascended and descended by means of Petrasinella’s hair, which was very long, as the sailor is used to run up and down the mast of a ship.
Speaker A: Now it happened one day when the Okras had left the tower, that Petrazinella put her head out of the little window and let loose her tresses in the sun, and the son of a Prince passing by saw those two golden banners which invited all souls to enlist under the standard of love, and beholding with amazement, in the midst of those gleaming waves, a siren’s face that enchanted all hearts, he fell desperately in love with such wonderful beauty, and sending her a Memorial of sighs, she decreed to receive him into favor.
Speaker A: Matters went on so well with the Prince that there was soon a nodding of heads and a kissing of hands, a winking of eyes, and bowing thanks and offerings, hopes and promises, soft words and compliments.
Speaker A: And when this had continued for several days, Petra Sonela and the Prince became so intimate that they made an appointment to meet and agreed that it should be at night when the moon plays at Hideandseek with the stars, and that Petra sonnella should give the ogres some poppy juice and drop the Prince with her tresses.
Speaker A: So when the appointed hour came, the Prince went to the tower, where Petra Sonela, letting fall her hair at a given signal, he seized it with both hands and cried draw up, and when he was drawn up he crept through the little window into the Chamber.
Speaker A: The next morning, before the sun taught his steeds to leap through the hoop of the zodiac, the Prince descended by the same golden ladder to go his way home, and having repeated these visits many times, a gossip of the ogres, who was forever prying into things that did not concern her, and poking her nose into every corner, got to find out the secret and told the ogres to be upon the lookout for that.
Speaker A: Petrifiedla made love with a certain youth, and she suspected that matters would go further, adding that she saw what was going on and feared they would be off and away before May.
Speaker A: The ogress thanked her gossip for the information and said she would take good care to stop up the road, and as to Petro Sonela, it was more over impossible for her to escape, as she had a spell laid upon her, so that unless she had in her hands three gall nuts which were in a Rafter in the kitchen, it would be labor lost to attempt to get away whilst they were talking.
Speaker A: Thus together, Petrasinella, who stood with her ears wide open and had some suspicion of the gossip, overheard all that passed, and when Knight had spread out her black garments to keep them from the moth, and the Prince had come as usual, she made him climb onto the rafters and find the gall nuts, knowing well what effect they would have, as she had been enchanted by the ogres.
Speaker A: Then, having made a rope ladder, they both descended to the ground, took to their heels, and scampered off towards the city.
Speaker A: But the gossip happening to see them come out, set up a loud Hallu and began to shout and make such a noise that the ogres awoke.
Speaker A: And, seeing that Petrasinella had fled, she descended by the same ladder which was fastened to the window, and set off running after the lovers, who, when they saw her coming at their heels faster than a horse let loose, gave themselves up for lost.
Speaker A: But petrochindella, recollecting the gall nuts, quickly threw one on the ground and low.
Speaker A: Instantly a Corsican Bulldog started up.
Speaker A: Oh, mother, such a terrible beast, which, with open jaws and barking loud, flew at the ogres as if to swallow her at a mouthful.
Speaker A: But the old woman, who was more cunning and spiteful than the devil, put her hand into her pocket and, pulling out a piece of bread, gave it to the dog, which made him hang his tail and delay his Fury.
Speaker A: Then she turned to run after the fugitives again.
Speaker A: But Petra Sonela, seeing her approach through the second gall nut on the ground and Lo, a fierce lion arose, who lashing the Earth with his tail and shaking his Mane and opening wide his jaws a yard apart, was just preparing to make a slaughter of the ogress.
Speaker A: When, turning quickly back, she stripped the skin off an a** that was grazing in the middle of a Meadow and ran at the lion, who fancying it a real Jackass was so frightened that he bounded away as fast as he could.
Speaker A: The ogress, having leapt over the second ditch, turned again to pursue the poor lovers, who, hearing the clatter of her heels and seeing the cloud of dust that rose up to the sky, conjectured that she was coming again.
Speaker A: But the old woman, who was every moment in dread lest the lion should pursue her, had not taken off the a**’s skin.
Speaker A: And when Petra Sonela now threw down the third gall nut, their spring up, a Wolf who, without giving the ogres time to play any new trick, gobbled her up just as she was in the shape of a Jackass.
Speaker A: So the lovers, being now freed from danger, went their way leisurely and quietly to the Kingdom of the Prince, where, with his father’s free consent, he took Petrazinella to wife.
Speaker A: And thus, after all these storms of fate, they experienced the truth that 1 hour in Port the sailor freed from fears forgets the tempests of 100 years.
Speaker A: Zeza’s story was listened to with such delight to the end that had it even continued for an hour longer, the time would have appeared only a moment.
Speaker A: Thank you for joining Freya’s fairy tales today.
Speaker C: Be sure to come back next week for the conclusion of Roxy’s journey to holding her own fairy tale in her hands and to hear another of her favorite fairy tales beauty and the Beast you.
