One of Our Thursdays Is Missing

3. Scarlett O’Kipper

After taking a pager off the counter so Mrs. Malaprop could reach me in case a reader turned up unexpectedly, we stepped out of the main gate and walked down the street. The remade Geographic BookWorld was as its name suggested—geographic—and the neighborhoods were laid out like those in an Outland housing estate. A single road ran down between the books, with sidewalks, grass verges, syntax hydrants and trees. To the left and right were compounds that contained entire novels with all their settings. In one was a half-scale Kilimanjaro, and in another a bamboo plantation. In a third an electrical storm at full tilt.

“We’re right on the edge of Fantasy,” I explained. “Straight ahead is Human Drama, and to your right is Comedy. I’ll give you Wednesdays off, but I expect you to be on standby most of the time.”

“The more first-person time I can put in,” replied Carmine, “the better. Is there anything to do around here when I’m off-duty, by the way?”

“If Fantasy is your thing,” I said, “plenty. Moving cross-genre is not recommended, as the border guards can get jumpy, and it will never do to be caught in another genre just when you’re needed. Oh, and don’t do anything that my dodo might disapprove of.”

“Such as what?”

“The list is long. Here we are.”

We had arrived on the top of a low rise where there was a convenient park bench. From this vantage point, we could see most of Fiction Island.

“That’s an impressive sight,” said Carmine.

There was no aerial haze in the BookWorld, and because the island was mildly dished where it snuggled against the interior of the sphere, we could see all the way to the disputed border between Racy Novel and Women’s Fiction in the far north of the island, and beyond that the unexplored Dismal Woods.

“That’s the Metaphoric River,” I explained, pointing out the sinuous bends of the waterway whose many backwaters, bayous, streams and rivulets brought narrative ambiguity and unnecessarily lengthy words to the millions of books that had made their home in the river’s massive delta. “To the east of Racy Novel is Outdated Religious Dogma.”

“Shouldn’t that be in Nonfiction?” asked Carmine.

“It’s a contentious issue. It was removed from Theology on the grounds that the theories had become ‘untenable in a modern context’ and ‘were making us look medieval.’”

“And that island off the coast of Dogma?” she asked, pointing to a craggy island partially obscured by cloud.

“The smaller of the two is Sick Notes, and the larger is Lies, Self-Delusion and Excuses You Can Use to Justify Poor Behavior. South of Dogma is Horror, then Fantasy, with Adventure and Science Fiction dominating the south coast.”

“I’ll never remember all that.”

I handed her my much-thumbed copy of Bradshaw’s BookWorld Companion. “Use this,” I said, showing her the foldout map section and train timetables. “I’ve got the new edition on order.”

Whilst we had been sitting there, the recently evicted book had been unbolted by a team of Worker Danvers.

“ Raphael’s Walrus has been unread for over two years,” I explained, “so it’s off to the narrative doldrums of the suburbs. Not necessarily permanent, of course—a resurgence of interest could bring it back into the more desirable neighborhoods in an instant.”

“How come your series is still here?” she asked, then put her hand over her mouth. “Sorry, was that indelicate of me?”

“No, most people ask that. The Text Grand Central Mapping Committee keeps us here out of respect.”

“For you?”

“No—for the real Thursday Next.”

A smattering of soil and pebbles descended to earth as Raphael’s Walrus rose into the air, the self-sealing throughput and feedback conduits giving off faint puffs of word vapor as they snapped shut. This was how the new Geographic BookWorld worked. Books arrived, books left, and the boundaries of the various genres snaked forwards and backwards about the land, reflecting the month-to-month popularity of the various genres. The Crime genre was always relatively large, as were Comedy, Fantasy and Science Fiction. Horror had gotten a boost recently with the burgeoning Urban Vampires sector, while some of the lesser-known genres had shrunk to almost nothing. Squid Action/Adventure was deleted quite recently, and Sci-Fi Horse Detective looked surely set to follow.

But the vacated area was not empty for long. As we watched, the first of many prefabricated sections of the new book arrived, fresh from the construction hangars in the Well of Lost Plots. The contractors quickly surveyed the site, pegged out strings and then signaled to large transporter slipcases that were hovering just out of sight. Within a few minutes, handling ropes were dropped as the sections moved into a hover thirty feet or so above, and the same small army of Worker Danvers, cheering and grunting, maneuvered the sections into position, and then riveted them in place with pneumatic hammers. The first setting to be completed was a semiruined castle, then a mountain range, then a forest—with each tree, rabbit, unicorn and elf carefully unpacked from crates. Other sections soon followed, and within forty minutes the entire novel had been hauled in piecemeal from the overhead, riveted down and attached to the telemetry lines and throughput conduits.

“It’s a good idea to be neighborly,” I said. “You never know when you might need to borrow a cupful of irony. Besides, you might find this interesting.”

We walked up the drive and across the drawbridge into the courtyard. Notices were posted everywhere that contained useful directions such as THIS WAY TO THE DENOUEMENT or NO BOOTS TO BE WORN IN THE BACKSTORY and even DO NOT FEED THE AMBIGUITY. The contractors were making last-minute adjustments. Six were arranging the clouds, two were wiring the punctuation to the main distribution board, three were trying to round up a glottal stop that wasn’t meant to be there, and two others had just slit a barrage balloon full of atmosphere. The ambience escaped like a swarm of tiny midges and settled upon the fabric of the book, adding texture and style.

“Hello!” I said to the cast, who were standing around looking bewildered, their heads stuffed unrealistically full of Best Newcomer prizes and a permanent place in every reader’s heart. They were about to be published and read for the first time. They would be confused, apprehensive and in need of guidance. I was so glad I wasn’t them.

“My name’s Thursday Next, and I just dropped in to welcome you to the neighborhood.”

“This is indeed an honor, Miss Next,” said the king, “and welcome to Castle of Skeddan Jiarg. We’ve heard of your exploits in the BookWorld, and I would like to say on behalf of all of us—”

“I’m not that one,” I replied, before it all got embarrassing. I had denied I was the real Thursday Next more times than I would care to remember. Sometimes I went through an entire week doing little else.

“I’m the written Thursday Next,” I explained.

“Ah,” said one of several wizards who seemed to be milling around. “So you’re not Jurisfiction, then?”

“I got as far as a training day,” I replied, which was still a proud boast, even if I had been rejected for active service. It was annoying but understandable. Few make the grade to be a member of Fiction’s policing elite. I wasn’t tough enough, but it wasn’t my fault. I was written to be softer and kinder—the Thursday who Thursday herself thought she wanted to be. In any event, it made me too empathetic to get things done in the dangerously dynamic landscape of the BookWorld.

They all returned my greeting, but I could see they had lost interest. I asked them if I could show Carmine around, and they had no objections, so we wandered into the grand hall, which was all lime-washed walls, flaming torches, hammerhead beams and flagstones. Some of the smaller props were only cardboard cutouts, and I noted that a bowl of fruit was no more than a Post-it note with “bowl of fruit” written on it.

“Why only a Post-it?” asked Carmine. “Why not a real bowl of fruit?”

“For economic reasons,” I replied. “Every novel has only as much description as is necessary. In years past, each book was carefully crafted to an infinitely fine degree, but that was in the days of limited reader sophistication. Today, with the plethora of experience through increased media exposure, most books are finished by the readers themselves.”

“The Feedback Loop?”

“Precisely. As soon as the readers get going, the Feedback Loop will start backwashing some of their interpretations into the book itself. Not that long ago, books could be stripped bare by overreading, but since the invention of the loop, not only do books suffer little internal wear but readers often add detail by their own interpretations. Was that a goblin?”

I had just seen a small creature with pixie ears and sharp teeth staring at us from behind a chair.

“Looks like it.”

I sighed. Pickwick would have something new to complain about.

“What is Thursday like?” asked Carmine.

I got asked this a lot. “You’ve heard the stories?”

She nodded. Most people had. For over fifteen years, Thursday Next had worked at Jurisfiction, tirelessly patrolling the BookWorld like a narrative knight-errant, bringing peace and justice to the very edge of acceptable prose. She was head and shoulders above the other agents—giants like Commander Bradshaw, Emperor Zhark, Mrs. Tiggy-winkle or even the Drunk Vicar.

“Did she really take Hamlet into the RealWorld?” asked Carmine, excited by my mentor’s audaciousness.

“Among others.”

“And defeat Yorrick Kaine?”

“That, too.”

“What about the Great Samuel Pepys Fiasco? Did they really have to delete two weeks of his diary to make everything okay?”

“That was the least of her worries. Even Thursday had occasional failures—it’s inevitable if you’re at the top of your game. Mind you,” I added, unconsciously defending my famous namesake, “if Samuel Pepys hadn’t set Deb up in a pied-à-terre in the backstory of Sons and Lovers with Iago coming in for halfcosts on alternate weekdays, it would never have escalated into the disaster it became. They could have lost the entire diaries and, as a consequence, anything in Nonfiction that used the journal as a primary source. It was only by changing the historical record to include a ‘Great Fire of London’ that never actually happened that Thursday managed to pull anything from the debacle. History wouldn’t speak to the council for months, but Sir Christopher Wren was delighted.”

We walked back out into the courtyard. The king and queen invited us around for a “pre-reading party” that evening, and I responded by inviting them around for tea and cakes the following day. Thus suitably introduced, we made our way out to the street again.

“So how do you want me to play you?” asked Carmine.

“You’re not playing me, you’re playing her. There’s a big difference. Although I’ve been Thursday for so long that sometimes I think I am her, I’m not. I’m just the written her. But in answer to your question, I try to play her dignified. I took over from the other written Thursday—long story, don’t ask—soon after the Great Samuel Pepys Fiasco was deleted—even longer story, still don’t ask—and the previous Thursday played her a little disrespectfully, so I’m trying to redress that.”

“I heard that the violent and gratuitous-sex Thursday had a lot more readers.”

I glared at Carmine, but she simply stared back at me with big innocent eyes. She was making a statement of fact, not criticism.

“We’ll get the readers back somehow,” I replied, although I wasn’t wholly convinced.

“Can I meet the real Thursday?” asked Carmine in a hopeful tone of voice. “For research purposes, naturally.”

“She’s very busy, and I don’t like to bother her.”

I was exaggerating my influence. Despite overseeing my creation, the real Thursday didn’t like me much, possibly for the very same reasons she thought she might be improved. I think it was a RealWorld thing: the gulf between the person you want to be and the person you are.

“Look,” I said, “just play her dignified—the individual interpretation is up to you. Until you get into the swing of it, play her subtly different on alternate readings. Hamlet’s been doing it for years. Of course, he has twenty-six different ways of playing himself, but then he’s had a lot of practice. In fact, I don’t think even he knows his motivation anymore—unless you count confusing readers and giving useful employment to Shakespearean scholars.”

“You’ve met Hamlet?”

“No, but I saw the back of his head at last year’s BookWorld Conference.”

“What was it like?” asked Carmine, who seemed to enjoy celebrity tittle-tattle.

“The back of his head? Hairy,” I replied cautiously, “and it might not have been him. In any event, keep your interpretation loose, and don’t telegraph. Let the readers do the work. If you’re going to explain everything, then we might as well give up and tell everyone to stick to television and movies.”

“Were there any goblins?” asked Pickwick as soon as we walked back in.

“I didn’t see any. Did you, Miss O’Kipper?”

“No, no, not a single one.”

“Mrs. Malaprop,” I said, “we’ll be having royalty for tea tomorrow. Better bake some silver and have the buns cleaned.”

“Very good, Mizzen Exe.”

“Here,” I said to Carmine, handing her the complete script for my part. “I have to go out for an hour. I’ll test you on it when I get back.”

She suddenly looked nervous. “What if someone starts to read us while you’re away?”

“They won’t,” I replied, “and if they do, Mrs. Malaprop will point you in the right dictation. Just take it smooth and easy. The rest of the cast will help you along.”

“What do I do with Skimmers?” she asked with a faint tinge of panic in her voice. All rookies feared Dippers, Skimmers and Last-Chapter-Firsters.

“There’s no hard-and-fast rule. Skimmers move in a generally forward direction, and with experience you’ll figure out where they’re going to land next. But the main thing is not to waste time with the nuisance reader—in a word, prioritize. Find the stable, methodical, bread-and-butter readers and give them your best. Leave the Skimmers and Dippers high and dry if there’s a crisis. When things die down later, you can pick them up then.”

“And students?”

“A breeze. They’ll pause at the end of each sentence to think quasi-intellectual deep thoughts, so as soon as a full stop looms, you can be off dealing with someone else. When you get back, they’ll still be pondering about intertextuality, inferred narratives and the scandalously high price of the subsidized beer in the student union.”

She was quiet and attentive, so I carried on.

“You should show no discrimination with readers. Treat the lip movers as you would the New York Times critic. You might not be able to distinguish between the two at first, but you soon will. Yossarian said that you can get to know individual readers by the way they read you. Mind you, he’s been doing it a long time, and Catch-22 gets reread a lot.”

“You’ve met Yossarian?”

“He was just leaving the room after giving a talk. I saw his foot.”

“Left or right?”

“Left.”

“I met someone who was beaten about the head boy Sir John Falstaff,” remarked Mrs. Malaprop in an attempt to show that she, too, hobnobbed with celebrities.

“I talked to someone who held Pollyanna’s hat for three whole pages,” added Carmine.

“Small fry,” remarked Pickwick, eager to outdo us all. “Sam Spade himself actually spoke to me.”

There was silence. This was impressive.

“What did he say?”

“He said, ‘Get that stupid bird out of my way.’”

“Well, pretend to be a soldier and elope with my ward,” remarked Mrs. Malaprop, her word choice rendered clean and clear by the sarcasm. “You can dine out on that one for years.”

“It’s better than your dumb Falstaff story.”

“The thing to remember,” I remarked, to stop the argument before it got to the next few stages, which were insults, crockery throwing and punches, “is that the more readers there are, the easier it becomes. If you relax, it actually becomes a great deal of fun. The words spring naturally to your lips, and you can concentrate on not just giving the best possible performance but also dealing with any readers who are having problems—or indeed any readers who are trying to cause trouble for you and change the book. You’ll be surprised by how strong the power of reader suggestion can get, and if you let readers get the upper hand, it’ll be Smilla’s Sense of Snow all over again.”

Carmine looked thoughtful. The Sea Worms incident was a sobering lesson for everyone, and something that no one wanted to repeat.

“I’ll be back as soon as I can,” I said, preparing to leave. “I have to meet with Commander Herring. Mrs. Malaprop, will you show Carmine around the series and do the introductions? Start with the Gravitube and the Diatryma. After that it’s all fairly benign.”