Any Questions?

[knifeedgefic]

Well, it's over. I'm not sure what the actual final word count is (I'm still compiling chapters and ditching author's notes to get an accurate tally), but the sites I've posted it on put it at anywhere between 361,000 words to 404,000 words (though it might be counting html script, too). Either way, it's a monster. I started "West of the Moon" back

Comments

[knifeedgefic]

Actually (there's more clarification of this in my response the comment above yours, if you like), this story started out being inspired directly by "East of the Sun." The Cupid and Psyche connection didn't hit me hard until part way in.

"East" has always been one of my favorite fairytales. I can't actually remember the first version of it I read. I know I was actually in my early twenties when I did finally come across it, and I immediately fell in love with it. There aren't too many fairy tales where the guy is the one in distress and the girl is the one who has to go on the quest to save him.

One of my favorite retellings of it is a young adult novel called "East" by Edith Pattou, which I utterly adore. It has some flaws, but overall it's probably the best retelling of it I've found.

I've always wanted to do my own version of it, and writing a Spike/Buffy interpretation of it fulfilled that desire better than I could have imagined. It was SO much fun sitting down and figuring out how to hang my story on the fairytale's framework.

I still remember sitting bolt upright in bed one night, after fretting over how to do the "Winds" and realizing that I should do it using "dead" women who had majorly influenced Spike's path. There's some major correlations in there, too, if you know what to look for. If you put Buffy=Sunnydale at the center of your compass, then Nikki (NewYork) was East, XinRong (China) was West, Drusilla (Brazil) was south--and yes I'm aware that's a slight stretch, and Anne (England) was of course North. I think I jumped online immediately and starting babbling to my beta, explaining how this could work while she patted me on my (virtual) head and told me to go back to sleep.

Anyway, that's probably more of an answer than you were looking for, but I really had so much fun writing the story, and there's SO much to it and buried in it--I hope someday you'll get a chance to reread it (and maybe comment when you do?). It's a story that was specifically written to be re-read (like all good fairytales are).

[deborahc]

The first time I read the Cupid and Psyche myth - In the Golden Branch Bough, IIRC - I immediately connected it to East of the Sun. The girl married to a prince or god who comes to her only at night and whom she's forbidden to look upon, is persuaded to disobey and look at him while he's sleeping. She's caught, he's banished to a terrible fate, she's bereft and goes through hell performing seemingly impossible tasks to free him. That was the immediate connection I drew between the two. I remember thinking 'So, this is where East of the Sun came from', surmising it had been spun into that form from the old myth. I've always thought it was a unique, later version of the same story, or I guess an outgrowth of it. I've never studied these things so I'm speaking as a general reader, not an expert. It reminds me of all the various versions of old of folk songs; i.e. "Come All You Fair and Tender Ladies" and "Silver Dagger" etc...

...OMG, I just now got up to look through my old story book for the version of East' I know, and the illustration above its title "East O' the Sun and West O' the Moon" is of the girl riding on a great polar bear. I'd forgotten about that. Now I really do want to read it afresh and then follow up with a second reading of your story. I'll also look for "East" by Edith Pattou at the library; it would be interesting to compare the two versions.

Btw, ever since I was a HS sophomore and randomly plucked it from the shelf of my school library, one of all time favorite books has been "Til We Have Faces" by CS Lewis, his novelization of the Cupid and Psyche myth. If by any chance you've not read it before, I strongly recommend it.