#Clare B. Dunkle

[gold-snek-hoe]

Clare said that one of Marak's inspirations was Odin, so I just had to take a swing at making him into Odin. Omfg I'm so happy with how this came out

[the-entity-down-the-street]

Y'know, I've never really talked about this, but somehow I've acquired a circle of niche celebrity friends/colleagues:

1. I know a small-time producer named David Schifter, who I met in an airport once, and now I have a writing credit on a low-budget thriller (Black Balsam is the name)

2. Somehow I because friends with Undertale VA Improvidence (bro was a reference for me for my last job and I've been to his fucking house)

3. Author Clare B. Dunkle almost came to my wedding (she had company the weekend of) and I have an unpublished manuscript she sent me exclusively

Pretty cool for someone who only got their will to live back a few years ago. Love that for me tbh

[willothewispaudio]

How difficult are your werewolves physically to stereotypical werewolves? All the werewolf lore has left my skull and I don’t have the time to rewatch vids lol

They haven't been seen in universe yet, so I am spoilering this!

Enjoy!

My werewolves are more akin to eldritch horrors than giant wolves. They don't have fur, but are made out of shadows, and teeth, and claws. They can have unique attributes, like multiple limbs or antlers or extra eyes. The full transformation only happens during the full moon, but they can have partial transformations leading up to it. The wolf is a more a parasite, it feeds off the host's thaum and needs its body to have a physical form.

They get their name werewolf because of their association with the moon, their pack mentality, and that their heads look like wolfish silhouettes when they howl.

As a bonus, the transformation is kinda like a venom suit transformation: the person gets ingulfed in the shadows as it takes over. I like to think the wolf is literally lurking beneath the skin, so I kinda imagine like a black sludge coursing through the hosts' veins.

[daily-rayless]

A lot of the Hollow Kingdom fandom (rightly) focuses on the unique depiction of goblins, but let's not forget that its take on elves is even more genre-defying. Like the elves of Tolkien, the elves are diminishing, their glory fading, but they're not going out in stately soft-lit pilgrimages to the afterlife amidst some incredible autumn aesthetics. They've lost most of their culture and live in poverty, anxiety, and ignorance.

Sable is one of my favorite characters in the trilogy because of the fear -- and determined self-preservation -- she embodies. Usually, I dislike elves in fiction because I find them cold, snobby, and unrelatable. Sable's anxiety and stubbornness feels incredibly human, and I've always loved how the second book addresses her mindset with logic, sympathy, and respect.

[wonderifshelikesroses]

Forever searching for someone to fangirl with over The Hollow Kingdom Trilogy by Clare B. Dunkle.

[yusukesmomjeans]

"If lying was for humans then by all means let her lie."

[willows-mind]

🖤

[Elena Vanishing by Clare B. Dunkle]

[starwarmth]

Books Read In 2023

Beowulf: A New Translation by Maria Dahvana Headley (1/3/23)

East by Edith Pattou (1/4/23)

Midnight on the Moon by Mary Pope Osbourn (1/16/23)

The Lady or The Tiger?, and The Discourager of Hesitancy by Frank R. Stockton (1/17/23)

The Yellow Wallpaper by Charlotte Perkins Gilman (1/21/23)

Goblin Market by Christina Rossetti (1/22/23)

Tiger Queen by Annie Sullivan (1/22/23)

The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe by C. S. Lewis (1/26/23)

Batgirl, vol. 1: The Silent Knight (1/27/23)

Batgirl, vol. 2: To The Death (1/27/23)

Batgirl, vol. 3: Point Blank (1/28/23)

The Female of the Species by Rudyard Kipling (2/17/23)

Batgirl: Stephanie Brown, vol. 1 by Bryan Q. Miller (2/19/23)

Batgirl, Stephanie Brown, vol. 2 by Bryan Q. Miller (3/4/23)

Christmas in Noisy Village by Astrid Lindgren (3/4/23)

The Queen’s Blade by T C Southwell (3/5/23)

Sacrifice, The Queen’s Blade #2 by T C Southwell (3/9/23)

The Invisible Assassin, The Queen’s Blade #3 by T C Southwell (3/13/23)

Mermaids by Patty Dann (3/14/23) X

The Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyám translated by Edward FitzGerald (3/19/23)

The Mirror Visitor by Christelle Dabos (3/21/23) X

The Missing of Clairedelune by Christelle Dabos (3/22/23) X

I’m Glad My Mom Died by Jeannette McCurdy (3/24/23) X

Ronia, The Robber’s Daughter by Astrid Lindgren (3/27/23)

Kiki’s Delivery Service by Eiko Kadono (3/30/23)

Brine and Bone by Kate Stradling (4/10/23)

Green Arrow: Quiver by Kevin Smith (4/17/23) X

Eugene Onegin by Alexander Pushkin, translated by Stanley Mitchell (4/22/23)

When Patty Went to College by Jean Webster (4/23/23)

The Princess and The Pea by Hans Christian Anderson (4/23/23)

Deathmark by Kate Stradling (4/25/23)

Without Blood by Alessandro Baricco (5/5/23)

River Secrets by Shannon Hale (5/6/23)

The Fairy’s Return and Other Princess Tales by Gail Carson Levine (5/8/22)

Batman Adventures: Cat Got Your Tongue? by Steve Vance (5/14/23)

Batman Adventures: Batgirl — A League of Her Own by Paul Dini (5/17/23)

The Girl From The Other Side: Siúil a Rún, Vol. 1 by Nagabe (5/19/23)

Twenty Love Poems and a Song of Despair by Pablo Neruda. Translated by W. S. Merwin (5/26/23)

Other-Wordly: Words Both Strange and Lovely from Around the World by Yee-Lum Mak (6/21/23)

A Bride’s Story, vol. 1 by Kaoru Mori (6/25/23) X

La Dame aux Camélias by Alexandre Dumas fils (7/17/2023)

Storefront Church by William Waring Cuney (7/24/23)

Golden Slippers: An Anthology of Negro Poetry for Young Readers (1941), compiled by Arnas Bontemps (7/28/23)

Because of Winn-Dixie by Kate DiCamillo (7/29/23)

Strawberry’s New Friend (Flower Fairy Friends series) by Pippa Le Quesne (7/29/23)

Clementine by Sara Pennypacker (8/11/23)

The Whipping Boy by Sid Fleischman (8/18/23)

Convent Boarding School by Virginia Arville Kenny (9/05/23)

The Screwtape Letters by C. S. Lewis (09/18/23)

The Betsy Tacy Treasury by Maud Hart Lovelace (09/27/23)

Sarah, Plain and Tall by Patricia MacLachlan (09/27/23)

Skylark (Sarah, Plain and Tall #2) by Patricia MacLachlan (09/27/23)

Caleb’s Story (Sarah, Plain and Tall #3) by Patricia MacLachlan (09/27/23)

Maelyn by Anita Halle (10/06/23)

Imani All Mine by Connie Porter (10/15/23)

The Perilous Gard (10/22/23)

Enemy Brothers by Constance Savery (10/29/23)

Sadako and the 1000 Paper Cranes by Eleanor Coerr (11/19/23)

Gone By Nightfall by Dee Garretson (12/02/23)

The Dragon’s Promise by Elizabeth Lim (12/08/23)

A Lion to Guard Us by Clyde Robert Bulla (12/10/23)

The Thirteenth Princess by Diane Zahler (12/23/23)

The Hollow Kingdom by Clare B. Dunkle (12/26/23

The Wasteland by T. S. Eliot (12/31/23)

[punch-love]

🕯️🥤🏜️🦴

🕯️ ⇢ on a scale from 1 to 10, how much do you enjoy editing? why is that?

TEN. It's the best part of writing, hands down, bar none. I love nothing more than cracking open one of my documents that someone has edited to hell and slowly working my writing to borderline perfection. The editing process is the cold water bottle at the end of the finish line that I'm downing like a man in the desert.

🥤 ⇢ recommend an author or fanfic you love

@doomed-spectacles is definitely one of my favorites right now. I really love the tragedy of the ending and they do too and all of their works are just painful examinations of the "after" without fixing it which is something I'm always looking for.

I really love their series Happiness is a hamburger; home is not a place. which is post-series work where Mobius and Sylvie (and momentarily flashes of Loki from beyond time itself) meet up and smoke weed in various parking lots talking about their new mundane lives and the underlying grief. I love the way they write, and they just have such a clear, intelligent voice that shines through all of their work.

It's been making the rounds but their newest fic Only to Haunt You is an actual masterpiece. I don't really read works that explore Mobius entering Loki's realm because it takes away the tragedy for me, but this absolutely preserves the tragedy to such a degree that it'll leave you feeling a little hollowed out by the end.

🏜️ ⇢ what's your favourite type of comment to receive on your work?

If I see multi-paragraphs then I'm swooning. I love when someone takes the time to crack the marrow of my piece and show me that all the behind the scenes work I did shines through in the finished product. I love when people highlight quotes that stood out to them too and also play-by-play reactions. I just like knowing how people ingested my work and also, if I was successfully able to communicate my themes and motifs enough for people to understand what I'm actually writing about. (all to say, the type of comments you leave)

I also am a humor writer first and foremost, so any comment that audibly makes me laugh.

🦴 ⇢ is there a piece of media that inspires your writing? 

I think I've mentioned it before, but The Hollow Kingdom by Clare B. Dunkle is one of my favorite romances of all time, in part because of how successfully it sells the antagonism turned budding respect turned begrudging and eventually true, abiding love. It's a book I've read close to 20+ times, in part because it's a childhood favorite and in part because watching the two protagonists stalk around each other until they realize it's love (a little too late) is something I never get bored with. I try to emulate it, a little, in the works I do. I think being able to hold someone's attention enough for them to go back for more is one of the most powerful tools a writer can utilize, and something I'm always looking to hold over my own audiences.

[mo0ngirl]

elena vanishing — a memoir

by Elena and Clare B. Dunkle

I’m not quite halfway through it yet, and it’s steadily growing on me. I found it a bit confusing at first, but sometimes I think that’s just a personal issue—it takes me a minute to adjust to new stories if the writing style is very different from the last book I read (‘:

Elena is highly relatable for me so far. Her neuroticism fits me to a Tee, lol. I also love that the narrative moves into a college setting.

I’m having some sugar free vanilla chai on the side （╹◡╹）

1 cup unsweetened almond milk (30)

1/2 cup water, 1 tbsp SF vanilla syrup, 1 tsp cinnamon

Garden of the Andes Chai teabag

[nordictwin]

10 Characters | 10 Fandoms | Some Tags

Thank you for the tag, @starlight-and-thunder!

Molly aka. Eva Wei (Oban Star Racers) - this precious girl has been one of my favorites since discovering this underrated show. She's got such a great personality, and I love how a show in 2006 really said "we are going to allow this 15 year old girl to be angry, bitter and sad and have the ones responsible for it actually acknowledge their wrongdoings". Absolute gem of a character and story.

Flulu (I Was a Teenage Exocolonist) - as a lot of my newer followers probably know, I absolutely adore Flulu. She works so hard for the colony, all while also trying to take care of Sol to the best of her abilities. I love how, even if you make choices where their relationship isn't the best, you can still tell that she loves them and that everything comes from a place of genuine care.

Arthur Pendragon (Seven Deadly Sins) - my boooooyyyy!!!! Arthur is my absolute SON, and what the author has turned him into is criminal! SDS in general is a big ol' tire fire, but Arthur was the one precious, shining light in the darkness, and I hate what he's become in the sequel. Still love what he used to be, though, and that's the character I cling to.

Su Lüxia (Cheating Men Must Die) - want to see justice done for the characters who suffered, just so the so-called protagonists could have their happy ending? Well, Su Lüxia is here to do just that! She is a Queen and not at all a good person in the traditional sense, but she doesn't need to be. I like Lüxia for the catharsis she brings, whenever the bad people finally get what's coming to them, and for the hints of her true self shining through in those brief moments.

Naven Nuknuk (Epithet Erased) - a mild-mannered little man with a lot of power, who cares for a group of children and probably has a secret agenda? Yes please. I adore characters who are morally grey, but hide their intentions so well, you don't know where you've got them. Add in a soft spot for kids, and I am guaranteed to love them.

Qifrey (Witch Hat Atelier) - a mild-mannered man with a lot of power, who cares for a group of children and definitely has a secret agenda? (Wait... this sounds familiar.) I love Qifrey for all the same reasons, I love Naven, and I'm not afraid to say it. He's also just precious, and I would die for him.

Sidon (Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild/Tears of the Kingdom/Age of Calamity) - I love Sidon so much, I actually squealed at his re-appearing in TOTK. Anytime I see this man, I smile. He deserves good things, end of story.

Orie Harada (Oli Oli Soup) - Orie is a comfort character to me, living the life I dream of. Working as a bookbinder, and spending her days eating good food and being enthusiastic about it. She's funny, creative, and realistic in all the best ways.

Alpha (Yokohama Shopping Log) - Alpha and her story falls into a similar box as Orie and Oli Oli Soup: a character and story that brings me peace and comfort, even in the quiet melancholy. On every re-read I smile, laugh, and cry with Alpha during her time in a world that's slowly falling apart, but even so life still goes on.

Marak Sixfinger (The Hollow Kingdom) - the ones who know me for my Elsewhere University fanfics are aware, that Foxglove is Jareth's (Jim Henson's Labyrinth) son... but Foxglove himself is actually more inspired by Marak of Clare B. Dunkle's Hollow Kingdom books. He's cunning, he's a smartass, he's every bit the tricky goblin king I adore, with a soft spot for his not-fully-human wife. This guy is 100% why I love Foxglove and writing him so much.

100% no pressure tags: @clearwillow @stars-for-thought @lovelesskiaa

[gold-snek-hoe]

New header image

[zombiesun]

Last, Current, Next Read - Tagged by @queer-trashmouth

Last read - The Hollow Kingdom by Clare B. Dunkle

Current read - The Last Sun by K.D. Edwards, README.txt. by Chelsea Manning, Jesus and John Wayne: How White Evangelicals Corrupted a Faith and Fractured a Nation by Kristin Kobes Du Mez, and Fight Club by Chuck Palahniuk

Next read - In Ascension by Martin MacInnes

No Pressure Tagging: @jesustease @boymartyr @saintflint @thepoisonroom @emiliosandozsequence

[the-final-sentence]

Catspaw was becoming a real goblin king.

Clare B. Dunkle, from Close Kin

[daily-rayless]

The Hollow Kingdom trilogy is a series I haven't reread in a long time, but still remember very fondly. It riffs on things like goblin and elf folklore, mythology and fairy tale (Persephone, Beauty and the Beast), and even the proper manners of Regency fiction in ways that feel comfortingly familiar, but also inventive and unusual. And it blends big emotional themes at times with lightness and very sharp humor.

I was very into it around 2005-07ish, and this was always my favorite fan art, the newly married and miserable Kate having tea with her very pleased goblin husband Marak, attended upon by one of Marak's faithful servants. I ended up sharing it with author Clare B Dunkle (she encouraged fans sharing art back in 2007 -- I don't know if she still does), and she sent me the nicest comment about it:

I especially like the picture of Kate having tea with Marak. There's a certain look to Marak's face in your drawing that exists in his image in my mind as well. I can't quite describe it (so much for being a writer!), but it's something to do with his bony cheeks, his smug expression, and his eyes. And Marak's little valet is so CUTE!

All these years later, I'm still so touched when I read that.

[bookcoversonly]

Title: The Hollow Kingdom | Author: Clare B. Dunkle | Publisher: Henry Holt & Company (2006)