minette danby ❚ and then the kraken sneezed!
CHARACTERName: Minette Danby
Series: Monster Mission ( IBBOTSON, Eva ).
Age: 10.
Role In Canon: Protagonist.
Appearance/PB: As written by Eva Ibbotson:
The child had a crumpled, pinched sort of look; she was small for her age and very thin and looked as though she had been born tired. [ ... ] in her long brown hair [ ... ]. ( PB: Cassandra Sawtell ).
HISTORYThere are always many stories to tell from the day you are born to the day of your tenth anniversary, but this particular story only begins when Minette Danby, at the age of ten, is going on her forty-eighth train ride from London to Edinburgh. Her father, Professor of Grammar, Mr. Danby, lived in Edinburgh and her mother, the aspiring actress Mrs. Danby (who would be a real actress if only she was given work), lived in London, and they were divorced since Minette was only three years old. So, this journey begins at the train station, on Minette's forty-eighth time to Edinburgh in what she expected to be yet another stomach-aching travelling course (it's very taxing, you see, changing families, and it would always give Minette belly aches).
Every time she travelled, Minette was put in the charge of an aunt, usually from an office called Useful Aunts, but on that forty-eighth time, the office that had sent an aunt was called Unusual Aunts, which in itself was a little... Well, unusual, one would suppose and the aunt they had sent surely fit the image. She was called Etta and she was very tall with a small moustache and carried a large holdall which smelled slightly of fish and she had a deep voice and she had very long grey hair. At first, Minette wasn't very keen on Aunt Etta, but once they sat inside the old fashioned compartments of the train and Aunt Etta began to talk of weird things like believing in ghosts and moving seals about in a canvas, Minette began to think she really was unusual, which is not necessarily a bad thing.
During the journey, Minette told the aunt about her endless trips back and forth to her mother and father and asked, "Do you think there might be a third place? No my father's house or my mother's flat but somewhere else - by the sea perhaps? And that one day I might find it?"
Had she known her words would indeed make Aunt Etta take her to that third place, Minette would have been very scared indeed (she was not a very brave child, you see, in fact, she was a bit of a coward and it was even one of the few things her parents agreed on). Because Aunt Etta was far more than an Unusual Aunt. She had come from a very far island in the middle of the sea where she lived with her two sisters, their old father Captain Harper, Art the cook and, most impressive, many, many monsters! But the monsters weren't like those that the spooky tales told to children said, no, not at all. The creatures were, most of the time, actually quite nice. There were seelies that liked to listen to Mozart and mermaids in need of a scrubbing because they had been caught in an oil spill and a very, very, very long stoorworm that needed to be distangled from the trees and there was an egg-bound boobrie and so many wonderful things!
Of course that at first, Minette didn't like it at all. She had been kidnapped by an aunt! She guessed she had drugged her cheese and tomato sandwich on the journey and she hadn't been the only one. There were two other children there. One was Fabio, who had been also kidnapped by Aunt Coral, one of Aunt Etta's sister. He was supposed to go to the Greymarsh Towers to learn how to become an English gentlemen, but he didn't want that. Fabio was from Brazil and he didn't want to go to the Greymarsh Towers. Aunt Coral had given him a hamburger. There was also an obnoxious boy called Lambert but he was very spoiled and Aunt Myrtle had made a mistake to bring him there but she had had no other choice and was very sad about that.
Soon the children learned the Aunts had kidnapped them with a purpose. They were getting old and they were afraid that they might go extinct and then nobody would be able to take care of the Island and even though kidnapping children is not a good idea, sometimes it must be done.
Minette and Fabio were set to work, but Lambert was kept in his room throwing tantrums and breaking things and screaming and generally being a very evil brat. They weren't told right away that there were monsters on the Island, just many injured animals in the need of help. There was a puffin with a splint on its leg, an octopus with eye trouble, an eel with scabbies, stranded jellyfish and work didn't stop, from morning to night, and though the children (Fabio and Minette, not Lambert because Lambert was a horrible child who cried out for his daddy and for his mobile telephone) always discussed that they absolutely must get out of the Island, they ended up falling asleep every time.
But then, the Aunts had decided that they had been good and they would be fit to go into the de-oiling shed (which Minette thought it was a very odd reward for someone being good). And there, they saw mermaids! Four of them and a very fat baby mermaid who was a boy named Walter.
The two children began to help with the monsters too and they began to think that it wasn't so bad, there on the Island. They ended up liking it very much and Minette and Fabio became good friends and they began to like the odd company of the Aunts and they loved to help around and even fed peppermints to the long stoorworm, who was an Icelandic wingless dragon that liked to think about important things like Where has yesterday gone?
But Fabio thought they very seriously should think about running away and though Minette agreed, she wanted to wait until the boobrie had laid her egg; it was a very big black bird of the size of an Indian elephant that honked through her very yellow beak. She was a distant cousin of the dodos and had been egg-bound for a long time and the children had been helping Aunt Etta with the egg stuck inside the bird. Fabio always made sure Lambert would never ever see a monster because the boy was horrible and he kicked him until he began to help out around the Island. He told him that the food he ate was drugged and that he was seeing things that weren't there so he should ignore him and Lambert believed him.
In London, however, Minette's careless parents finally figured out Minette was missing and so did Fabio's grandparents, the old Mountjoys. So they all went to the police and the Great London Aunt Hunt began.
But back on the Island, a Very Magical Thing was about to happen and everyone was feeling it. Well, everyone except Lambert but he was not really important to the Island, even if he was helping around after getting kicked by Fabio. Unfortunately, one day they all had left Lambert in the house alone and he had gone up to his luggage and taken his mobile telephone and he began to try to reach his father, Mr. Sprott.
That went unnoticed however and the Island was beginning to hear the Great Hum of the kraken, the sea giant that cleaned the seas as he swam very slowly. He came from the Arctic and was headed to the Island and everyone was very excited, even the children that did not understand quite yet what the kraken was but once he arrived, everyone understood - even the Aunts realized that their need for kidnapping children had a greater purpose because the kraken had brought with him his son and was mostly pleased to see children on the Island. He was going to take a very long journey around the seas that would take a year and a day and couldn't take the little kraken with him and he wanted to leave him with children his age.
Minette and Fabio's main concern was the baby kraken from that point on. They still helped with the Island, but they mostly played with the kraken and fed him and taught him to say "no" to the food he didn't want and "more" to what he wanted. But once the daddy kraken left, the little kraken was very sad and would always say "no soss" or "no spag" to food and "no ball" to play. Minette was beginning to get very worried and she didn't want him to just fade away and die, so Fabio had an idea; they picked a couple of buns Art made and went to the beach and the kraken's little head peeked from behind a rock when he saw the two children pretend to eat buns. And he was so curious he wanted to try a bun and when Fabio gave him one, his golden eyes glowed and he said, "Ah, buns!" so they fed him more. Minette was so happy that she covered her face but the tears squeezed right through them anyway.
The children were so happy on the Island that they kept making up excuses to stay. Minette said that they couldn't leave the Island until the little kraken's father returned, which wasn't that long, just a year and a day, less back then.
But unfortunately, Lambert had been able to ring his father and Mr. Sprott was riding the Hurricane which had been a military boat but was now his pride and joy. After many tries, The Hurricane found the Island and the Aunts told everyone to go hide, but Queenie, one of the mermaids, had been curious and was almost caught by Des, Mr. Sprott's bodyguard. The Aunts invited the hideous man to lunch and gave him Lambert (because they didn't want him there anyway) and then the horrible man tried to buy the Island. When he was refused, he left very vexed and along the way, he caught Queenie and tortured her until she told him what was on the Island and though she did tell them about everyone, neither her nor Lambert said a thing about the baby kraken.
Minette and Fabio, who knew all about the evil men from their world, knew that Mr. Sprott would not give up easily and would try to return to the Island to buy it - or worse - so when they found out Queenie had been kidnapped they told the Aunts and soon everyone began to hide after Aunt Etta brought up a Council of war. In the meantime, Aunt Dorothy, who had been arrested in Hong Kong for hitting a chef in the head with a pan for serving pangolin meat, returned to the Island of Aunts along with her came Boo-Boo and Little One, the children of their sister Betty, who did not care for the Island at all and instead raised those two spoilt brats. The baby kraken was the Aunts biggest concern. However, Minette and Fabio took blankets and lots of food to the grotto he was to be hidden and though the aunts objected at first, the children stomped their foot down and stayed with the kraken anyway.
But as expected, Mr. Sprott attacked the Island of Aunts with guns and men and viciousness. He took all the creatures. Des had found her and Fabio and the kraken and then blown the whistle to bring reinforcements. Minette had dove and cradled the kraken's head to protect him but a net fell on them. Des thumped Fabio on the head and pulled out Minette from the net and took the baby kraken. Everyone was so very sad and Minette lay on the bed and waited for Fabio to wake up with a deep nervousism clutching her stomach. When Fabio woke up, they decided to go rescue the kraken as Hurricane was still there.
The police had been called to the Island however, and a helicopter came and though Minette and Fabio thought the adventure was over, Boo-Boo and Little One ran straight to the policewoman's arms and begged her to take them out of the Island. Back in London, the Danbys and the Mountjoys were not amused when two unknown children appeared.
While that happened, Herbert, who was a seal turned into a man, the aunts and the children climbed aboard the Hurricane to rescue the kraken. Minette managed to crawl over to the tethered thing and cradle him and encourage him to Hum because all krakens can hear the Hum. The baby kraken did Hum, calling his father from far away, but everyone got caught by Mr. Sprott's men and they were going to be sent overboard with weights all around them.
However, when all hope was lost, the kraken appeared, angry and roaring, causing a turmoil in the sea, making the ship sink. He almost killed everyone, but the baby kraken climbed to his father's shoulder and put his mouth to his ear and spoke very fast in Polar so that he would rescue everyone - except the evil men that had taken the creatures. So the children, the aunts, Herbert and all the creatures were put on his back and safely taken to the Island. Days later, the kraken decided to keep his Healing Hum but he would take not a year and a day but two years and two days or three years and three days for his son to accompany him.
Minette and Fabio knew that soon the police would come for them but the last days on the Island of Aunts were so very happy. The last day, not so much, because the police not only took Minette and Fabio but they also arrested the aunts. The children were vexed and frightened when they got to London, but mostly because they were dreading what would happen to the aunts when on trial, but once they were there, they made sure everyone knew that they hadn't been kidnapped. They had been chosen.
And so, the aunts were proclaimed not guilty and back on the Island, they wrote their will that, once they died, the Island would belong to Minette and Fabio. And the children promised they would return.
PERSONALITYBy the time her great adventure on the Island of Aunts ends, Minette is a different child from the one changing outfits on the train to please both her parents. Staying there for the time she did changed the girl for the better and made her grow out of her shell quite a bit - and even helped her overcome her cowardice. And the ache of parting became a different sort of ache - an ache of happiness...
Monster Mission
➡ THE FORTY-EIGHTH TRAVEL;
When she first meets Aunt Etta, the woman sees her as a wet and feeble child that could prove herself to be useless on the island. But her appearance does not say a thing about her for you see, Minette dressed as her parents want her to, not the way she likes; this can translate in a bit of a desperate need to make everyone else happy and forgetting about herself. In fact, when Minette is given mean messages to pass on to her father or mother, she always makes up pleasant greetings for each other. She tends to daydream a lot of herself being driven to the hospital and her parents, concerned for her health, reuniting over her bleeding body. Now, this isn't to say that the child is morbid, because she isn't, she just seems to have an intricate need to be loved by her parents.
And because they don't seem to pay much attention to her, the child tends to drift into daydreaming, which she indulges a lot except when she is distracted. She loves to hear stories, can hardly get enough of them, and that has not changed since she lived her wonderful adventure - if anything, it merely made her love stories even more.
➡ FROM COWARD TO COURAGE;
While in the beginning Minette was a coward (she even admits this herself, saying "I don't have the courage. [...] I'm a coward. [...] I'm frightened of the dark and of diving off the top board and of being bullied.") by the end of the book she is clearly far more self-assured and has driven off that coward side of her. She can still be nervous, of course, and she still has doubts, but living on the Island has given Minette the courage to go against grown men to save the kraken and even to hold on to dear life as the angry sea tried to swallow because of the kraken's wrath.
On the Island of Aunts, she grew far more than she would ever grow going back and forth with her parents. The girl who once was frightened of the dark stopped being afraid and although she can get scared and nervous, Minette has learned how to be sure of herself. She is modest, yes, but that does not stop her of being proud of her when she does a good job (although she does enjoy being told that instead of being only to herself).
Because of Fabio, Minette has learned how do proper teamwork. Once, she was most likely a bit of a loner that liked to read books and talked to only a few people, but nowadays she is okay with working with someone else, although only if said someone else is someone she knows.
➡ "I AM NEVER GOING TO HAVE CHILDREN. NEVER. IT'S AWFUL.";
Here is where it gets tricky. While Minette seems rather mature, she is only ten-years-old. She is a child. However, the girl is very intelligent for her age and she does seem to know what she wants - and what she doesn't. You see, while she has said that she never wants children, she is actually pretty good with the creatures on the Island of Aunts, even to the point of being motherly to the baby kraken and restless when it comes to helping the monsters and animals getting all better.
At the same time, Minette is a very emotional child. She cries very easily - mostly because she has one big heart - and feels things very intensely, which makes it easier for her to be very perceptive of others and, because of that, she can be empathic towards other. It's something adults tend to forget about most children: they are very intuitive and you can hardly hide sadness from them. Minette won't go out of her way to help a stranger (unless said stranger is an animal), but she will try to pat a friend's back when they are sad.
It's because of how sensitive she is that she can be very moody and sometimes say things she doesn't mean to say or blow things out of proportion. She can be a little bit overdramatic, though not obnoxious. She is usually worried about something, which relates to the fact that she can be very protective of those she loves. Sure, she is a child, but ever since she has gained courage she is willing to take risks for others and make her stand, as proven by the rescue of the baby kraken and the firmness of her voice when called to witness at the aunts' trial.
➡ ALWAYS PLEASING OTHERS;
Undoubtedly, Minette is a sweet child. Maybe because her parents are divorced and she is used to try and please different types of people (that are always quarrelling), she has learned how to be very polite and how to act around people. She's pleasant and she will always say please, and she has the sweetest smile, though she does not smile all that often. It's not that she is a serious person, but while she has broken out of the coward shell, she is still a rather coy child. Not the timid type that runs off when she's faced with social gatherings, but more of the type that smiles genuinely but would rather listen than speak.
She can be a bit clinging - not quite possessive, though - and can attach herself to people easily (like she did to the aunts and the baby kraken and, ultimately, the Island as a whole) and it's very hard for her to let go of those she loves and mostly, those that love her back and show it. She has a bit of a necessity of actually feeling that people are nice to her.
➡ ONE DAY, A GREAT AUNT;
All in all, Minette does gather a lot of qualities that would make her an amazing Aunt, one of them clearly being a hard-working girl that is very intuitive and even the fact that she is imaginative (she does spend a lot of her time daydreaming).
On the other hand, she has still a lot of overcome, namely the fact that she is indecisive. She hesitates and hardly ever takes the first step, but as soon as she gets a pat on her back, she's ready to go. It's not that she is dependent, she can simply be very needy.
However, her time on the Island has made her a better person (at least, she believes so). She still worries to please everyone and she daydreams a lot (less morbidly now and more happy thoughts of the Island), but she is not afraid of the dark anymore and she is sure she can face a bully on her own.
ABILITIESGenerally speaking, Minette has no abilities whatsoever, at least, not anything supernatural. What she does is a natural gift to take care of creatures and she has gained a lot of knowledge with the aunts. She's very good at figuring out people (or as good as a child can be, at least) and she deems herself a very good swimmer, but that's about it.