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Lilly Inkwood and the Fantasy Spy Thriller · Mythmakers

• 0:00
  Hello and welcome to MythMakers. MythMakers is the podcast for fantasy fans and fantasy
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  creatives brought to you by the Oxford Centre for Fantasy. My name is Julia Golding, I'm
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  an author and director of the Centre and one of the things we really love doing at the
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  Centre is meeting new to us authors who are writing in the area of fantasy and today I am
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  joined by Lily Inquit who has a novel called The Kingdom is a Golden Cage which is coming out
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  with HarperCollins in the summer. So good morning to Lily. Lily tell us a little bit about yourself
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  and where you are to be found. Hi Julia and thank you so much for having me on the podcast. I am
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  absolutely thrilled to be here and talk to you about the first book in my upcoming fantasy series.
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  I have been writing for a few years. I've started by writing historical fiction. I've always been
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  fascinated by history. I read a lot of history even when I was a student and I just loved reading
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  that and full takes and myths and I think I needed quite a few years before realizing that my
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  favourite books, favourite movies, favourite series were fantasy and before I tried to make a
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  foray into the genre. So this is The Kingdom is a Golden Cage and as you said it's coming out
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  this year and I'm very very excited for the readers to meet my characters and this crazy world
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  inspired a bit by medieval Europe but with very very bonkers blood twists I hope you'll agree with me.
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  Now Lily is also a full-time mum as many of us are who take to writing and so if you hear a few
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  happy noises of there are a few children in the household. So Lily where are you based? Where's
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  your home? I live in Germany but I am an immigrant so actually English is well foreign language to
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  me. I write in English. I started writing English when I took that up a few years ago
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  but if you think that my accent is a bit fine you well. No, not at all. I'm just actually
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  reeling with astonishment that actually you're writing in English and there's been no translator
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  in between us and this because you would not know everybody. I've read the book and there's
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  actually no feeling of it having been translated or your brilliant or English is brilliant.
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  Oh well, it just puts me to shame. I could not do that. I could not do that. So before we talk
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  about the process of your writing can we have a little tiny plot summary? What are you putting
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  on the back of your book so people can locate it as a read? So Celine is a princess who is being
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  pressed by her father to marry but she didn't want to do that for years and years since her love
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  were Hugo simply vanished of the face of the earth when he tried to claim his birthright, the dirty
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  of Langley. The problem is when Hugo comes back five years later he comes back in the shape of a cat.
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  Well, Hugo has always been a shapeshifter. The problem is he cannot switch back to his own shape,
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  the one of a human, but he has a plan. How can he enact that? Destroy the spells that are binding
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  him and get a grip on the virtue which he thinks is at least. So yeah, within that we can see
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  there are fairy tale elements but I first want to talk to you about the use of real history because
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  what that summary doesn't give a sense of and it can't because it's a summary is that this is
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  actually it feels as though it's part of real politics and you said it was based on the
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  politics of medieval Europe. How do you go about getting ideas from real history? Are you
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  trained as historian or you're just a reader of historical works? How do you go about it?
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  Oh, as a high schooler and as a student I've read tons of history from ancient history,
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  Rome, Greece, medieval history, historical books and I've been very passionate about it. I actually
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  think I should have studied that probably but it wasn't considered as a career choice by my parents
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  that could earn me money in the long term. Remember I come from Eastern Europe and I think it's
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  really difficult that to make living as a historian as a writer. So I went on to study something
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  else completely but the thing is every time I start writing, everything I've ever read sort of
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  seeps into what I'm writing. So I always have a very loose plan of what I'm about to write.
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  For instance, I had a few plot twists in mind when I started writing the Kingdom is a golden cage
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  and I was at a point last year when I wanted something fun and the scapest and I couldn't find
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  it. So I thought, okay, I'm going to write it. I'm going to live in this world. I will leave it
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  what I'm about to write and as the plot unfolded as I put that into page, everything I've ever
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  read I think stepped into that and then of course I started doing research when I thought, okay,
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  I could make this a bit more realistic. I've read a lot about town and city in the medieval ages
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  about the Middle Ages also in Germany about the Emperor Friedrich Barbarossa, maybe, okay,
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  this is an alphabetical tale of August. So you may notice the metaphor of the Falcon.
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  Did you know that Barbarossa was a very passionate Falconer and he actually wrote the manual
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  in the Middle Ages about Falconing? So that's exactly a really good example of how something
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  about a real person and a real sort of thread in history can then be wonderfully productive
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  for fantasy. I think it is it. Mark Atwood who says she never writes anything that's not happened
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  somewhere. So there is this reliance that we all have as fantasy writers on real things.
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  So moving away from medieval Europe with its multitude of little nations and rivalries and
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  armies and all the rest of it and moving over and I wish of course we're familiar with
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  and use differently and play things like Game of Thrones. Moving over to your take which is to
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  meld this with a fairy tale. The first fairy tale I noticed as I was reading it was
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  Pussin Boots because it starts with one of the ways that Pussin Boots persuades
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  the passing king to take. His master with him is to leave him naked by the side of the road saying
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  he's close been stolen and that's more or less a version of that. More or less happens,
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  doesn't it, with Philippe? Yes precisely. Pussin Boots was a very thank you for pointing that out,
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  of course. Pussin Boots was a very important source of inspiration for the kingdom as a golden
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  cage because I love reading fairy tale retellings and I always wondered with Pussin Boots the folktale.
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  You see this plot developed where the Puss and his master tricked the king and the princess
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  into a thief into a castle so to say and into the princess's hands and I always wondered how did
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  the princess feel about that? We never hear in the story how the princess felt about being tricked
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  into marriage with a man whom she actually doesn't know. So basically that's the kingdom is a golden
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  cage. It's Pussin Boots from the scene from the perspective of the princess. How would she feel
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  about it about being tricked into it and how would it be if the princess tried to do some tricking
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  herself? So in addition to Pussin Boots, were there any other of the sort of great well-known fairy
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  tales that you were using? More like tropes I suppose rather than fairy tale whole plots.
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  I think a big theme in fairy tales and myths is shape shifting. I think you can find it across
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  all Europe in one shape or the other including in the Nordic mythology and Scandinavian mythology.
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  Loki is in the end a shapeshifter, maybe the most famous shapeshifter of them all. Even Freya
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  has a falcon skin which she uses to shape shift into a falcon and visit the underworld. So I think
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  people have always been fascinated by shapeshifting and how would it be to assume the skin of
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  different animals and I also find it particularly interesting how shapeshifting is used as a trope
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  in fairy tales across all Europe and I mean also Eastern European fairy tales. I've grown up in
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  Eastern Europe I've mentioned that and of course I've grown up with those fairy tales so the heroes
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  they're often shapeshift to trick the villain into something and I think that's basically what
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  Loki also does when shapeshifting she gets into a lot of trouble and then he has to solve the
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  situation somehow in the advantage of the gods so I think I wasn't thinking cautiously about that
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  when I wrote the kingdom is a golden cage but I think that stepped into the structure. So while
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  you're using the sort of fairy tale structure of a kingdom with a king animals like a shape changing
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  cat and things like that actually I really got into the book when I realized that what you were
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  doing underneath all of those other layers is you were writing a spy thriller because that's
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  the kind of plot it is it has lots of twists lots of people who have there are pairs of people with
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  the genders who are trying to knock each other out and undermine each other it's like one great big
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  game of that board game diplomacy where different people are competing for the kingdom
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  well you were conscious that you were doing that have you got like spy thriller writers that you
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  admire that you were thinking of emulating or is it something you just came upon by almost by
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  exploration and mistake I do read thrillers I think I read about everything from literary to
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  thrillers and fantasy historical romance but I wasn't thinking cautiously about it I was just
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  so into the story and I thought okay how can I make this even more surprising to the reader
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  and what would this character do now and just by laying out the situation with the different
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  foreign parties you get these situations of conflict that maybe I hadn't consciously planned
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  but just stepped into the page just poured out into the page and I think what I should mention is
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  that I'm a huge fan of game of thrones and I think what I admired most in the song of ice and
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  fire series was exactly the use of history I mean you can completely see with George Armarkin how
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  he uses the sources of European history and Asian history into creating these different folks and
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  this worrying parties and I didn't set off consciously trying to emulate that but I think that's
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  what appeals to me as a reader also so it would make sense that I would try maybe to write something
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  like that yeah so if if you're out there thinking I don't want to read a fairy tale actually you're
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  not really reading a fairy tale you're reading a spy thriller that has a fairy tale world setting
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  which I think was was a really fun take on the retelling of a fairy tale and another thing I
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  noticed is I was reading it that you have a repeated trope or you know not trope a repeated
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  structural point where you say you change point of view and you say here's my story this is how
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  it happens so sometimes they're flashback and and sometimes they are descriptions of what's in
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  the mind of an author you know I would say the main character was Celine who's the princess in
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  the story but there are other main characters including Magali who's I suppose I suppose you
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  would say she's in the wicked stepmother role if there is such a thing you know she she sort of
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  you're not quite sure if she's good or she's bad or or what she is which and as a shape
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  changer that stands to reason but we get quite a few moments where we switch to her point of view
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  what were you trying to achieve with that I mean I know what the effect on the reader is
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  but what was your aim as you set out with that structural idea thank you so much for this question
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  I've been rearing to answer it because I did have a plan um I think history is awfully subjective
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  and even the way we remember things that might have happened to us even 10 or 15 years ago
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  that's always distorted and if you sometimes ask the say two different persons about the same event
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  they might recount different versions of the same event or from their perspective the event
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  played out differently and I think you can see that a lot in the way legends are built around
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  certain personalities even nowadays through social media um I think that's also an element of
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  gossip because some events may be changed into something completely different when you try to
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  see the best or the worst in a person and I think what I've been most consciously doing that
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  was when I told the story of how the Duchy of Langley was created and the people um at its heart
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  two generations before the events in the kingdom is a golden cage um have actually set up the
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  Duchy so you hear different stories about the first Duke um and the Duchess and you don't know which
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  to believe but I think that's also very valid for the ways legends were born um I think I've read
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  some quite a while ago that many of the god and goddess figures um in ancient mythology were born
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  from real people real rulers who grew into legends so I think that's what I'm trying to show in
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  this fantasy world how real people grew into those legends and I hope to have the opportunity later
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  in the series to go back from the stories that have been woven around these personalities back to the
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  real people and see what happened there what really happened there what changed the course
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  of the history in this kingdom so um and I think one of the things about doing that is of course you
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  you're you end up with split sympathies so you may think oh I'm on you know team saline or team
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  philippe or whatever it is um but then you'll see Magalie looking at saline thinking
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  oh that annoying princess you know why does she do what I tell her so you get um you don't settle
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  as firmly as you might otherwise do as a supporter of one particular version of this this history
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  um so I want to also there's two big themes in the novel which we haven't touched on
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  are only briefly touched on one is shape changing and the other is the issue of freedom
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  so let's take shape changing first you mentioned that uh Loki does this I mean it's all over
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  Greek myths isn't it of definitely trans transform me into a bush and all that all that stuff um
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  in your magic of shape changing in your world when somebody changes into a shape like an animal
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  or another person is it purely a skin that they put on so that when they are being a lion that they
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  are letting out the ferocity that's theirs or do they actually sort of become that creature
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  so there's a difference there I think yeah they're always themselves but with a different skin
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  um so in order to answer that question I'd have to tell you a bit about the rules of this world
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  which is that um there are gifts um that the mages exhibit in the red kingdom and there are scales
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  but spells are forbidden um they are um arcade knowledge only known to very few people uh which is
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  mostly the duayan of the magic school the golden pavilion so when a shapeshifter uses their gift
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  to change into a creature then they would still be themselves uh thinking and acting as themselves
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  but when they have changed into a shape and they are bound by spells to keep that shape
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  unable to change back into their own human form then do the changes at a mental level
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  come in and then they began feeling acting thinking more like the animal they have changed
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  themselves into before being bound into that shape so the process of transformation by having
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  the physical experience of being something else so um a character not and mentioning any names but
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  say a character is transformed into a mouse they aren't a mouse to start with but the longer they're
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  a mouse the more mouse like they would come yeah there's a danger of trapping somebody in a shape
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  like that differently yeah so that goes into the second theme which is oh and I should just say
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  it's very important for anyone who's writing a fantasy to work out the rules of your magic
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  it's like one of the first things you can you should think about is there magic and what what are the
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  rules is it infinite magic limited magic yeah um anyway so going to the theme about um caging and
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  uncaging almost everybody in your book seems to want to cage people either literally cage them
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  or um put them in a position that traps them so caged by the nature of their role in life
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  and there's one person who sort of um moves against that who doesn't want to be caged I don't
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  think he's a plot spoiler to say that because philipp is always like this from the beginning um he's
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  more living outside that but I would say there's evidence that even even he ends up I mean there
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  are some things which I think where everybody ends up going along with this idea that everyone
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  has to be trapped engaged so is this how you see um that world based on the sort of medieval
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  kingdom world that actually nobody can really be free and who would be free in in that world
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  um yes I do think in the medieval times there were a huge amount of rules um by which people lived
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  and very little social mobility from a certain level so if someone was born a farmer they would
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  most likely die a farmer they just didn't have the possibility to move upwards into the world
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  and I think that was even more caging as you've said than nowadays and I think it was particularly
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  true for women um there were very few that could move outside of the rules that were prescribed
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  to them and I think and what I would like the reader to do when reading the kingdom is a golden
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  cage is thinking that saline and magali in their mentality they are products of that age I wish
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  they would look at these characters not through the eyes of someone or a woman who lives nowadays who
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  has access to education um who can who is allowed to work um I think I would like saline and
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  magali to be looked at as products of that society because society and how we grow up shapes the way
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  we see the world and I think we can still see that in Celine because she does not want power for
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  herself um she isn't the realm breaker that we upturn the laws because it is hard to break out of
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  a certain mindset that we grow up with it even magali's mindset we have to remember she is in her
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  forties now she's much more experienced she has lived through very difficult times and that is
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  also a product of her experience but we are often set up to live by the rules we grow up with
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  and I really hope that the reader feels that when it comes to saline and how she sees the world
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  and her own goals yes and I think that saline is definitely the one who for me goes on the
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  biggest journey up to maturity that working out well if I get this power what do I do with it
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  is really the question that she's grappling all the way along um okay so I hope that we've done
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  justice to your book I noticed that you have mentioned at the end that you're hoping to
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  carry on and expand this world into a trilogy will you be staying with the same characters or
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  have you planned it or is it just an idea in your head at the moment where are you on that
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  um that's a journey I have written two and a half books already so the question is just the first one
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  and um I think it's very helpful because I wrote my first quartet which is for children um the
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  companion's quartet I wrote that all before the first one was published which meant I was able to
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  go back and put in the first one things that I only thought of when I was writing the last one
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  so it looks as though it you know it ties it all together nicely so it's not no bad thing to have
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  it all in the bottom drawer it's it's the best because it it helped me come to grips with the
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  world building and isn't it so cool when you have written much of the books that are supposed to
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  come after the first one and then you can just layer it all in the first one and I think the reader
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  can really see that and drop some maybe tongue-in-cheek kids to something that would come out later which
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  maybe don't make much sense now like um the mention of Mermaid's Lake when Celine travels with
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  her father towards Langley might want to think about that or when Celine is in the library and
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  she comes across a book about her grandparents practically and someone has written on the edge
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  ha yeah yeah you can put these little hints and be a little smug about it and think you'll see
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  later what I mean yeah yeah yeah it's one that's great fun it's part of the final writing isn't it
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  so we always have a section in the podcast where we say where in all the fancy worlds is the best
• 24:19
  place for something and and because I've been describing your book lily as like a fairy tale
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  spy thriller I thought it'd be fun to ask where in all the fantasy world is the best place to set
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  a spy thriller outside obviously our own worlds if you were going to you know have another go at
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  this but in a completely different zone where where would you go um I think the format works
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  very well with the Game of Thrones I I think that doesn't come as a surprise a huge surprise
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  no no no no it's the perfect setting of backstabbing and the spies and people minding their own
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  business when claiming to do something else entirely and I think it's also written as a
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  spy thriller from certain points of view so I've said I'm a huge fan of George R. Martin what
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  he's created um there of course I've been reading much more romanticy lately interesting trivia
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  I did not know that such a thing as romanticy exists before I'd actually written the kingdom
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  is a golden cage um I was always fascinated by fantasy and I thought yeah I'd be terrible at writing
• 25:35
  fantasy because it would be too soft and too inclining towards romance because that's what I'd like
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  to read and it was like the biggest regret of my life I can't I write battles better or um
• 25:48
  grittier fantasy and then I wrote this book because the impulse to do it was just too strong I sent
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  it to my editor and while I was waiting for Charlotte to see what she says about it um I came across
• 26:00
  Sarah J. Mass and Stephanie Garber and Jennifer Arman-Trout and it was a huge revelation it was like
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  I have found my tribe these are my people these people right what I love to read um yes so it's
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  been a journey for me too as a reader also yeah so that that gives away we share the same editor uh
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  Charlotte uh at Harth Collins who have potentially the coolest building have you visited them ever
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  um try and try and put it go go to London because they're right by um the river right by London
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  bridge and from their offices you can see all my favorite parts of London the Tower of London
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  the old city the globe it's just fantastic um they're right by the shard that the
• 26:45
  tallest building in London um and I I in answer to my own question uh I think I would quite like
• 26:53
  to have a go at writing a spiderilla in the world of Indiana Jones because if you remember Indiana
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  Jones has magic some of those and it sometimes verges in a spiderilla but I'd just love to write a
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  sort of just before the war second world war somewhere exotic um spiderilla about some key artifacts
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  that'd be great fun um not something I've ever done but that's what I'd like to do and you get a bit
• 27:19
  of Fedora wearing and you know bullwhip cracking um action and chases across deserts yeah
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  no no that would be a good place for a spy thriller um okay I want about a fantasy tip have you
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  got a tip either of something you might want to recommend to read or um a place that you
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  something you've watched or a place you go for inspiration to share with people listening
• 27:46
  well since we touched upon that a few minutes ago I think that the best tip would be
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  even if you don't know what's going to happen to the your first fantasy book even if you're
• 27:59
  unsure if your publisher will if your editor will want to publish that or not if the impulse is
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  there keep writing because the more you write in that world the more you write yourself into that
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  world and it would make the first book better it would make the world building better um and even
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  by going farther along the series with the plot then you can see where your characters need to be
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  in the first one or maybe you have a bit a few secondary characters that are loose ends and then
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  you definitely see a purpose for them while you have written another book or another two books
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  in that series I think that helps enormously um with world building and everything so for instance
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  when I first wrote the kingdom is a golden cage I had no idea who Hugo's mother is she was
• 28:47
  Hugo's mother now I definitely know after the second book who Hugo's mother is and you are
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  going to love this she is so wicked so you have to write to discover your own plot in that case um
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  so I think my tip yeah my tip would be for people writing the fantasy novel out there is rather than
• 29:05
  sitting down or thinking I am writing a fantasy novel actually go dig down a bit further and say
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  am I writing a fantasy detective story a fantasy war epic fantasy love story of you know
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  find what other genre you're actually writing in because um you'll probably find a lot of your
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  plot moves your characters your twists from understanding what other genre you're working in
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  rather than oh it's some vague fantasy quest type thing um dig down a bit further and you'll
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  find it a much more enriching experience so Lily thank you so much for joining us today and
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  wish you all the best of the publication of your book I look forward to seeing it uh
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  with young Kindle presumably first and then on the shelves or however it's coming out these days um
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  so the book we've been talking about is by Lily Inkwood the kingdom is a golden cage um thank you very
• 29:59
  much thank you Julia for having me this has been a blast and uh thank you for your questions they
• 30:06
  were absolutely amazing you never really feel that you understood my book um and this has been a
• 30:11
  wonderful experience thank you so much for having me thank you
• 30:20
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