D. T. Kane reads chapter 3 of his epic fantasy fiction novel, The Acktus Trials, and discusses the chapter with his audience. http://dtkane.com
Purchase The Acktus Trials: https://dtkane.com/books/the-acktus-trials/
Map of Oration: https://dtkane.com/resources/map-of-oration/
Inspiration for the outside of the Conservatory, Bodleian Library, UK: https://www.thetimes.co.uk/imageserver/image/%2Fmethode%2Ftimes%2Fprodmigration%2Fweb%2Fbin%2F4154e115-713e-303a-a15f-2ad927668d62.jpg?crop=1500%2C1000%2C0%2C0
Inspiration for inside of the Conservatory, Biblioteca do Convento de Mafra, Mafra, Portugal: https://i.guim.co.uk/img/media/d1e315ebc0633e661ef2028dea1cd0507dd6c202/0_0_4134_3097/master/4134.jpg?width=1010&quality=85&auto=format&fit=max&s=73f43b9248c47182862f76b8fe1e1d1e

Below are my notes/script for the episode, not a verbatim transcription.

Welcome back! Hope you all enjoyed chapter 3. A quick personal update, then we’ll get into our discussion.

PERSONAL UPDATE

Declaimer’s Discovery, Part II of the Spoken Books Uprising, is still in the queue with my editor and I continue working away on my own edits to Declaimer’s Flight, Part III of the Spoken Books Uprising. We’ll be reading each of those together as well once we finish the Acktus Trials.

Also, as I said last episode, by the time you listen to this, The Acktus Trials will be available for purchase, but as I record this, I’m in the midst of getting everything ready for release. It’s exciting, but also a bit overwhelming–there’s always one more thing to do, one more error in the manuscript, or one more box to check. I’m also going wide with this book and the whole series, meaning it will be available pretty much everywhere you can buy books, not just Amazon, so a lot goes into getting it setup in at the various retailers.

I guess I’ll also spend just a minute discussing just why I decided to do this podcast. I want to be as open and honest as I reasonably can be with all of you, so obviously part of my motivation is to expand my reach so I can hopefully sell more of my books. And this, at least, is a way more fun way of marketing than running ads on Amazon and Facebook.

But selling books isn’t my only goal here. I’ve thought long and hard about my writing. For a long time I was in denial about even putting pen to paper, or fingers to keys. Writing was something normal people do. But I’ve realized that’s a bad way to think about it. There probably are some truly blessed writers out there, who just churn out amazing prose without a second thought. But most successful writers don’t ride their talent to success, but their tenacity. Writing a book takes a long time, and most people simply can’t grind it out for the long haul.

The fact is, I’d keep writing even if I never make a dime, because I have all these stories in my head and I want other people to hear them, even if they don’t have the money to buy my books. So that’s a big reason I’m doing this podcast. I want to share my stories, hopefully give a few people a good time with them, and maybe inspire a few of you along the way too. If it sells more books, great, but getting my stories out into the world and into your ears is great too, and I appreciate all of you for tuning in.

Alright, enough chit chat. Let’s get into chapter 3!

ANAYLIS CH. 3

Intro

So right off the bat, we’re explicitly told this is ten years later. As a rule, I don’t like giving such express cues–I’d rather work the timing into the text and trust my readers–that’s all of you listening–to be sharp enough to figure it out. But here, I couldn’t think of a good way to do that without spending a lot of otherwise needless words on it, so I gave you this guidepost.

So it’s ten years after the episode with Baz’s brother, Deliritous, and Rox in the Reading Room from Chapter 2 from last episode. Baz is running errands for Deliritous, so apparently if Baz did suffer any punishment for what happened that day ten years ago, it hasn’t kept him from remaining Deliritous’s slave. Torchsire’s still poor apparently–as Baz notes, he doesn’t wear silk robes like Speakers from other Libraries. Just ordinary black cloth for him, with a pair of sigils stitched on the front. One is a crossed pair of torches with a book between them. That’s the symbol for Torchsire Library we learn. That seems odd, right? Usually you want to keep fire as far away from books as you can, particularly books as valuable as the ones in this world. We’ll have to wait and see the significance of this symbol.

The other symbol on Baz’s black cloak is a dragon , which we’ve already learned marks him as a Destroyer, one of the three types of Speakers. Baz makes a point to lament his lack of a hood on his cloak–the Readers don’t want the Speakers hiding what they are by covering up their brands. This sort of has the effect of making hats a sort of status symbol. As we saw, Deliritous wore a giant hat, and we’ll soon see that most other Readers do as well, while Baz isn’t permitted to wear one at all.

In the opening paragraphs, we also learn that there are nine Libraries in Erstwhile, and Xavier is the largest. They have a big tower that’s the prime landmark in the city, and apparently hold Helfax Erstwhile’s original collection of Spoken Books. We don’t get any other details on who this Helfax was, but obviously he’s the city’s namesake, so must have been someone important.

Encounter with Illit

So we get that all in the first few paragraphs, then we move to the first of three major interactions in Chapter 3. Baz has a bit of an abrupt run-in with a peasant, who are called Illits in this world. Did you like how I wrote the start of this scene? “A door suddenly flew into the street.” I assume most of you read that metaphorically at first, as in, someone opened a door very quickly. But no! Literally a door goes flying off its hinges and nearly flattens Baz. Ah, and we’re introduced to the fine art of swearing in Oration. “Torn pages!” Baz cries as he jumps back from the door. You’ll notice that most of the curses in this world are related to bad things happening to Books–I think it’s a fun way to get creative with language, inventing curses like that. I don’t really have anything against usual swearing, but in writing it often just seems a little lazy to me, particularly in fantasy. If you think about it, most of our curse words don’t make any sense. At least here, they’re linked to something really bad–Books being destroyed is one of the worst things that can happen in a society that treasures them so highly. I’d love to hear what you think about this–drop a comment on YouTube, or email dtkane@dtkane.com. Maybe even suggest some other creative curses centered around bad things happening to Books.

Right, so the man who comes out of the house that’s now doorless is an Illit. Basically a peasant who can’t read. And he’s essentially helpless. I mean, the man doesn’t even know what a hammer is when Baz asks if he has one. And this isn’t an accident or isolated incident–Baz comments that the Libraries like to keep the Illits dependent on them. We already saw that they make money by having Illits come to them for Readings, and now we see that the Libraries also send Speakers out into the city to perform Readings that the Illits need for things as simple as fixing a hinge on a door. Typical sort of mandated dependency in an oppressive government, right? If you need the government you can’t really rise against it, even if it is corrupt. That’s the idea, anyway.

We actually see the suggestions of a rivalry between Xavier Library and Torchsire here briefly, too. Xavier’s encroaching on Torchsire’s turf, the Illit  saying he usually pays Xaviers to Read and fix things for him, even though he’s in Torchsire territory. Keep that in mind, as this isn’t the last we’ve heard of Xavier Library.

Interestingly, the Illit shows respect to Baz because he doesn’t want to get in trouble with Baz’s Duke, which flabbergasts Baz, but again just goes to show how far under the thumbs of the Readers these Illits are. For Baz’s part, he internally notes that he never even speaks to the Duke, so the Illit’s worries are entirely misplaced. Still, Baz offers to help the man with the door–internally we see Baz deny he’s really interested in helping–he’s just trying to get out of his chore for Deliritous. This is something we’ll see Baz do a lot of. Deny his true feelings, even when there isn’t anything wrong with them. You might recall from last time, Baz helping that old woman when she dropped one of her chicks. Baz has plenty of issues as we’ll come to see, but deep down he’s a good dude, even if he denies it.

Of course, Baz’s attempt to help goes south in a hurry. The man hands him a box full of various fasteners and when Baz suggests the man label the different compartments, he immediately takes offense, even asserts that Baz accused him of a crime. Baz realizes his mistake, as he’s implied the man might be able to Read. Just another reminder how no one but the Readers are permitted to learn how to read in this world. We can see by the man’s reaction just how conditioned most people are to abhor even the idea of reading. “I’m a law-abiding citizen,” the Illit man tells Baz. “Never even looked at the page of a Book.” He kicks Baz out of his house and we move on to the Conservatory.

Just one other note before we go there. Baz makes a brief note of the Burning, and that there was a Second Burning shortly after. No real details, other than apparently society for a short time tried to let others learn to Read between the first and second Burnings, but that didn’t work out for whatever reason. We’ll hear a lot more about the Burning soon, so tuck this away for now and stay tuned.

The Conservatory

So we get to the Conservatory, where Baz apparently needs to go to run an errand for Deliritous. I give a pretty detailed description of the outside and inside of the building. A lot of the time, I’ll look for real life buildings to model structures in my writing after. For the Conservatory, the outside is modeled after Bodleian Library in England, and the inside after Biblioteca do Convento de Mafra, Mafra, Portugal. I’ll toss a couple photos of those up on the screen if you’re watching on YouTube, and I’ll link to them in the show notes if you’re audio only and want to check them out.

Baz takes a moment to remind us what the Conservators do and how Spoken Books work. Only Conservators know the process for restoring Spoken Books. Baz tells us: “The Books’ inks faded as spells were read from them, the elements infused within them deteriorating with each use. Eventually, the Books wouldn’t work at all until they were re-inked, a costly and time-consuming process that only Conservators knew.” Lots of implication packed in here. First, another reminder that the Spoken Books deteriorate after each use–remember, that’s because in order to cast a spell, you draw power from the elemental inks the Books are written in. And now we learn that only the Conservators know how to restore Books. So they must have some pretty significant pull in society, right? All the Readers have to go to them to have their Books fixed. We see a suggestion of this when Baz notes that the Conservatory is the largest building in Erstwhile other than Xavier Library.

So Baz enters, and it’s pretty impressive on the inside, bright white marble everywhere, and there’s this statue at the center of the atrium he enters into. Baz calls it a Book Dragon. Does that sound familiar? Here, let me read the description for you again:

The center of the atrium was occupied by a large statue. Made of white, polished porcelain, it had a round, winding body like a wyrm, though it had limbs. One end terminated in a massive head with gaping jaws and eyes each as large as the moon. The body was covered in writing inlaid with gold. It was gibberish, though legend told that Words of the Trinity had been tattooed upon the hides of the actual creatures. Book Dragons, the great assistants of the Scribes. None had been seen since the Burning, some three hundred years prior.

Maybe I’ll make this the quest for today. One experience point to everyone who tells me correctly what this statue is referencing from earlier.  Email the answer to me, dtkane@dtkane.com.

We also get another reference to the Burning here, learning it happened 300 years ago and that Book Dragons haven’t been seen since. Interesting. So were all the dragons killed in the Burning? We don’t know, but it certainly doesn’t sound good.

And then we finally get our first look at actual Conservators, men in white robes conducting a ritual. The Conservatory is also called the “Conservator’s chapel,” so we already have the implication that there’s some religious aspect to them, and that’s born out here. The Conservators are praying to the “Scribes” and asking for protection from the “Dark Ones” and to maintain the barrier between this world and the Elsewhere. Sounds like the Scribes are thought of as gods and the Dark Ones the devil or some equivalent. The barrier between this world and the Elsewhere? Maybe this world’s equivalent of hell?

You might remember, we did see reference to the Scribes once before this, back in Chapter 1 Tax mentioned the “Scribes’ grammar.” Their father was killed for beginning to grasp the basics of the Scribes’ grammar. Ah, a connection! So whoever these Scribes were, it appears they were responsible for the language in the Spoken Books. Well, there you go. That’s enough to gain some understanding why they’re worshipped–they created the powerful Spoken Books.

We get more of a feeling for Baz’s irreverent personality next. What’s he call the Conservators? A “stuffy lot”? And when they finish their prayer but don’t acknowledge him, he sort of  just butts in, yeah? “Uh, pardon me?” They tell him he’ll need to wait. “I will?” he responds. Hah. I still chuckle when I read that reply. He’s about to get himself in hot water, but he’s saved by the entrance of a new character, Leanna.

Leanna

Leanna, we learn is Torchsire’s Librarian. Each Library has its own Conservator assigned there. Makes sense, right? Every time you need a Spoken Book touched up, you don’t have to go running out to the Conservatory. You’ve got some help in-house. Sort of like having a mechanic on call. Tune up your Spoken Books! Leanna also apparently cares for Torchsire’s “retired” Speakers. Not a lot of detail on that yet, but they’ve outlived their usefulness except for breeding because they can produce new Speakers. One, here’s some more evidence of cruelty toward Speakers–just keeping them around because they can breed? Geese.

And two,  they must not be that old since they can still reproduce, yet they’ve outlived their usefulness? The picture’s still a bit murky, but you get the idea it’s not a good one. You don’t want to find yourself a Speaker in this society it sounds like.

Let’s take a look at Baz’s description of Leanna:

She was tall. Taller than him, which Baz pretended didn’t bother him, even though it most certainly did. And she had deep chestnut hair that fell in a pleasant way down to her shoulders, and deep amethyst eyes. And a nice smile. And… well, all right. So there wasn’t much to dislike about her. Except that she was just, well, so burning nice to him. It drove Baz nuts.

Maybe a bit of a crush going on here, maybe? Baz internally denies even liking her, but you’ll see he’s a bit of an unreliable narrator. He’ll think one thing, but his actions will say something else. Keep an eye out for that.

We also learn that Leanna is a driven young woman, aspiring to rise through ranks of Conservatory. She doesn’t even like being called by her current title, Librarian, as it reminds her of how far she has to go. Baz actually decides against calling her by that title, which seems to be saying something since he apparently doesn’t have an issue running his mouth with others. See, for instance, Leanna’s reference to Baz having run afoul of the Conservators in the past and having to do penance, staring at a wall all day praying.

Mention of the Trials

So Leanna gets Baz out of hot water and takes him out of the Conservatory. We learn in their subsequent conversation that Deliritous is leaving in a couple days for the Trials. Ding ding ding! If you picked up on this, congrats. A+ for the day–here’s our reference to the novel’s title. We get a few details, apparently the Trials involve competitors leaving the city and bringing back new Spoken Books. And they are dangerous–Baz notes that it’s likely at least one competitor will die, and he hopes it’s Deliritous. A bit unclear how serious he is about that. “It’s just statistics!” he says when Leanna chides him for his impropriety. But he clearly doesn’t have a high opinion of Deliritous, and I guess we can’t blame him after what he did to Baz’s brother back in Part I.

We also see some of the playfulness between Baz and Leanna. Maybe she likes him too, eh? “Too bad you aren’t going with him,” she says to Baz after he says it’s likely someone will die out on the Trials, clearly joking it’s too bad he won’t go out and die too. Also an interesting tid bit here, though, is the revelation that Baz isn’t going on the Trials with Deliritous.

Leanna also notes that she thinks Deliritous is afraid to use Baz because of Baz’s brother, implying there’s concern that Baz might try to get revenge. Baz, in what we’re quickly coming to learn is his characteristic sarcasm says that’s crazy: “And get a shave from Rox’s razor for my troubles?” As we’ve seen, Rox’s razor would give you much more of a shave if he used it on you. Baz does admit to dreaming of Deliritous jumping off a tower, though. Then he cuts Leanna off form further conversation on the topic–obviously anything touching on Baz’s brother is a touchy topic.

We end with Baz turning the conversation to why Leanna was looking for him in the first place. She says Deliritous has asked for Baz to meet him at Xavier Tower. They’ve captured a Citiless. What is that? We don’t know, but it excites Baz. And there the chapter ends. We’ll have to wait until next week to learn what’s so exciting about a Citiless.

CONCLUSION

Homework: OK, so homework for next week. We’ll be reading Chapter 4. A pretty long one. We’ll see some more interaction between Baz and Leanna. She tells a sort of sappy story, but there’s a lot of backstory packed into it, so keep an eye on that. And we learn more about what a Citiless is. And then we move on, going to Xavier Tower and meet a whole bunch of Readers, along with their retinues of Speakers and Harbours. We learn a whole lot more about society in these pages, so pay attention to the world building. Then we’ll meet this Citiless who’s been captured–he’s not exactly being treated kindly. He’s muttering gibberish, or is he? Finally, at the end of the chapter, Baz makes a big decision. Think about that, and what it means for his character. 

Listener Question: How do you keep track of all the details and characters in your books?

Quest: I already gave out your quest earlier. What is that statue of the dragon in the Conservatory calling to mind from earlier? Email your answer to dtkane@dtkane.com. 1XP And remember, you have until the first episode of March 2022 to send me your answers for the quests from episodes 1 and 2.

Quote: “The trouble with having an open mind, of course, is that people will insist on coming along and trying to put things in it.”

That is from the beloved late Terry Pratchett. Our more casual fantasy fans may know him best as the co-author (along with Neil Gaiman) from the recent hit TV show Good Omens starring David Tenant and Michael Sheen, but in fantasy circles he’s probably best known for his Discworld series, which is a satirical take on the fantasy genre. I like this quote in particularly because it’s funny, but has some depth too, and it sounds like something Baz might say.

Until next time, this has been D. T. Kane’s Epic Fantasy Book Club.

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