In case you weren’t aware, Winging It starts out during a wedding (which is fully portrayed in Monsters! Incidental Wedding Guests) and then the main characters go to Everdome. This book has a humungous cast of characters, and I thought it might be helpful to highlight a few of the secondary characters in both Westmeath and Everdome.
You can find a lot of the important characters from the first half of the book in the Monsters! Dream Casting: Main, Family, Other. Here are some of the missing ones:
Margery Door
Appearance inspired by Reba McEntire
Age: 78
Date of Birth: September 19, 1924
Appearance: Curly red hair with white streaks, brown eyes, mysterious, white
Job: original CEO of Door Technology, now mostly retired, but runs their summer camp
Family: daughter Ellen, 11 other children not mentioned in this book
Todd
Appearance inspired by William Zabka
Age: mid-50s
Appearance: Blondish-brown hair, grey eyes, boy-next-door-grown-up, block-party-Dad, white
Job: anything and everything
Dome: Gaulan
Es’Sem
Appearance inspired by Jessica De Gouw *Note that this character is inspired by a friend, but I couldn’t use her image here!
Age: unknown
Date of Birth: unknown
Appearance: Light brown hair with sun-dyed blond streaks, hazel eyes, extremely physically fit, mysterious, white
Job: training the Queen’s Guard
Dome: Wild Nations
Winging It by Jen Desmarais is available June 3rd, 2025! Cover Art by Pinkpiggy93
Please note that Kindle links will be working on May 4! (Barring unforeseen circumstances!)
The story and myth of Zorro is based on the “Fox” archetype. (Robin Hood, Reynard the Fox, or The Scarlet Pimpernel) I like the addition of the apprentice and especially the nod to Joaquin Murrieta. It’s an extremely good example of how to adapt a story.
Score: 1
Characters
Each character was perfectly written. The only part I had issue believing was Antonio Banderas needing help on how to be charming. The villains were nuanced enough to be realistic but evil enough to deserve their fate. The parallel stories and character development between the older and younger characters was excellent.
Catherine Zeta-Jones manages to balance damsel and kick-ass in an extremely believable way.
Score: 1
Dialogue
I’d give full points for, “So the devil will know who sent you.” alone. The rest of the dialogue balanced heroics, humour, drama, and romance in a perfectly believable way.
Score: !
Visuals and Music
This film, thankfully, came out before shaky-cam. The fights are wonderfully choreographed and the practical effects have aged fantastically.
The music is equal to any modern superhero and really amps up the emotion.
Score: 1
Fun
Swashbuckling, explosions, witty one liners, and at its core a big heart. I’m sounding old but this kind of movie isn’t made anymore and that makes me sad. The whole family loved it.
Score: 1
Overall
One of the best adventure / swashbuckling movies. The emotion and character drama anchor the action and heroics, making everything feel so much more. Modern superhero movies could learn a lot from this movie.
Final Score: 5 Stars out of 5*
*A 5 star review doesn’t mean the movie was perfect nor that it is perfect for everyone but it is a movie I believe is as close to perfect as possible.
Chapter 4: My team is ambushed by cryptids and I lose my cousin
Wednesday the 11th of October, 2006 – Shields Crossing, Ontario
“What the hell is that?” Ursula asked.
“I think ‘Hell’ is exactly what it is,” replied Grant.
I could tell neither of them had heard the scream through mindspeak, which meant it was Sylvie. “The other group’s in trouble, we’ll look into this place later.”
Turning to run, I hoped they would follow.
Al, get over here. I don’t think I can fight this off for much longer. Sylvie’s voice sounded strained but also excited.
Give me a sign as to where you are, I said. The woods were huge, and other than south, I had no idea where they’d gone.
The mosquitoes seemed to get thicker. They buzzed and bit before suddenly disappearing. I attributed it to the dropping temperature. Between the sun setting and moving away from the house, it was getting colder fast.
A bright pillar of light slashed the sky. Thanks. We’re on our way.
She didn’t reply and a few moments later the light went out. The forest got thicker and I fought my way through until we reached the edge of a cliff overlooking the shore. I almost fell but managed to stop.
“Where are they?” asked Grant between breaths. He needed more running practice.
“There!” Ursula said, pointing at a cave on the rocky beach.
The sunset turned vivid red and a cool wind swept up the river. Just as I was going to argue, a small bear-like creature came out of the cave and started howling. Its jaws opened to a ninety degree angle and froth dripped from its mouth.
The sound of its howl sent a shiver of fear through me, and just as quickly as it had started, the howl was replaced by the most amazing sound. Like music, love, and warmth had been combined. I wanted nothing more than to go toward that sound.
I heard Grant swear and felt him try to grab me, but I fought him. I ran straight for the cave, not caring that there was a six foot drop to the beach. I felt the freedom of running on air followed by a fall but not the landing.
The next thing I knew, I was waking up in the cave with the rest of the group, covered in blood, with a massive headache.
Grant stood over us wearing earbuds and brandishing his sword. “Are you okay?” he yelled.
I patted myself down and gave him the thumbs up. He took out the earbuds and gave a deep sigh.
There were three creatures around us. Each had been hacked by a sword, none were moving.
Seeing the creatures closer up, I recognized the short soft grey-brown fur and the shape of its head. Mostly I recognized the large venom sacks under its neck. “Grant? How did you take out three adlats?”
Adlats are some of the most dangerous cryptid creatures on earth. They lure people in with their song and then pump them full of venom that both paralyses and heals. They slowly eat a person’s quintessence, their soul, and drain their blood. The older the adlat, the longer they can feed on one person.
“I put in my earbuds the moment I heard the howl and blasted The Kings of Rock. I tried to stop you from running off that cliff but you fell, and wow were you broken. Like, your legs were both bent the wrong way and I saw you wheezing really bad. Then one of those things bit you, and your legs popped back into place like an inflatable mattress but, like, gross.”
“Gross,” Ursula repeated in a flat voice. “Stick to drawing because your descriptions are terrible.”
Robin gave a little shriek from the other side of the cave and my heart sank until she said, “I’m fine, but I think we’ve found our killers. There are two more bodies back here that are desiccated like the man in the morgue.”
“Can we sound off?” I asked and each person said their name and that they were unhurt, except for Sylvie. “Sylvie? If you’re dead, I’m going to bring you back and kill you.” I was hoping that if she were unconscious, my voice would wake her. I repeated the same thing in mindspeak in case she was out of earshot.
“Can he do that?” asked Grant with fear in his voice.
Once again deadpan, Ursula answered, “Probably not.”
I got up and gave him a stern look. I reached into my pocket for my phone and found it in pieces. I needed light and summoned my sword. It glowed softly and with a thought I turned up the light. The cave was illuminated, showing me my team, two desiccated corpses, dirt, the hacked remains of the adlats, and lots of blood.
“What happened?” I asked Robin.
“We were searching the woods when we heard a roar behind us, and then there was this beautiful music. That’s all I remember.”
“No idea what happened to Sylvie?” I asked.
Clifford said, “No,” and then suggested, “What about the tracking spell?”
I shook my head and said, “I didn’t make a packet for her.” We each had a bag with hair from the others. It allowed us to use a tracking spell if one of us goes missing. In general, Gatekeepers don’t have magic like a wizard but we can use some minor ritual based magic.
“She’s your cousin. You share blood. Assuming she’s physically closer than any other relative you should be able to find her,” he explained.
It was worth a shot. I took my sword and pricked my index finger. Rubbing the blood on my sword, I said the words, “Let me protect my chosen family, let me have the strength to save them, and let me find the one who was lost.” The words weren’t necessary, only the intent, but they didn’t hurt.
The sword swung me around in a full turn and then pointed firmly toward where we had seen the building called “Luc’s House of the Rising Sun.” I was fairly certain that Luc was short for Lucifer and that whatever we were walking into was going to suck.
“Everyone clean yourselves off and let’s get out of here. We’re going to get my cousin and meet the Devil.” I wasn’t a religious man and I didn’t believe in the Devil, but enough people did that an Aetherborn version could be just as bad.
Read Chapter 5 (May 2025)
While you wait for the next chapter, check out the previous serial stories:
One of my favourite parts of being your father is watching your minds develop. You have such different and amazing ideas. It’s also fascinating to see the difference.
Dragon, you’re now old enough that you’re starting to put structure to your thoughts. When we wrote Assassins, you randomly said, “The bad guy should be called The Beast.” It was random and we made it work. Yesterday, I was talking about a story I wrote involving a snowman and you gave me story ideas, a coherent concept, and it was something I’ve never seen or thought of. I’m being vague because I’m going to use it in a future TTRPG session. It’s impressive to see your mind work.
Pegasus, you’re still in the phase of being completely random. I’m sure you’re tired of me asking for explanations but I want to understand. I want to know your process because it’s both fascinating and impressive. You have a mind that grasps a concept, takes it in, and then moves on so fast that I can’t always follow. I can’t wait until I can follow you or you know how to explain.
You both have such amazing and unfettered imaginations. I hope that’s something you’ll continue to nurture. I’ll do what I can to help you as long as I can.
Thank you for the privilege of watching you learn, grow, and imagine. The world is all kinds of sad right now and you give me hope.
The Pocket Library template was made by @thebookishanimator_, and I thought it would be fun to make character editions of it! Here are Tommy and Carter’s Pocket Libraries.
Left: Tommy Fairfield has Everdome, Half Magic, and Essential Elements: Rock Classics as his comfort reads (the Everdome series is actually his favourite, but I was unable to find an image of the covers), and an emergency guitar. Note that math textbooks are sold separately. Right: Carter Batudev has Everdome, Twelfth Night, and Company’s Coming: Desserts as his comfort reads (the Everdome series is actually his favourite, but I was unable to find an image of the covers), and an emergency throwing knife. Note that his ring of Gaulan is sold separately.
Today we’re talking about the 2000 film Titan A.E.
Story
The premise is interesting, but the story is just another take on Treasure Island. The world building and character arcs are interesting, but the end felt a little forced.
Score: 0.5
Characters
Loved the security chief and astrophysicist. The rest were meh. Nice redemption arc for the captain.
Score: 0.5
Dialogue
The dialogue is painfully bad. Too much exposition and whining. Not to mention the love story dialogue was extremely awkward, and I don’t mean in a good way.
Score: 0
Visuals and Music
The animation was finished by multiple companies and it shows in their quality. The ships are amazing, the people are passable, but some of the locations look like they never got rendered. The planet Bob at the end looked like an bonus feature scene.
The soundtrack was nostalgic for me and filled with awesome music. The non-pop music was good.
Score: 0.5
Fun
Despite its flaws, it kept everyone on the edge of their seats. The kids liked it and so did the adults.
Score: 1
Overall
An ambitious film that pushed the boundaries of animation, unfortunately its flaws in dialogue and wildly fluctuating quality of animation hurts the film. If you really want to watch Treasure Island in space, rewatch Treasure Planet instead.
I received the edits for The Copper Tarnish and it reminded me how much I loathe editing.
Footage of me editing.
It’s not the editor’s fault. They’re fantastic and doing their best to make my book even better. I’m just very emotional about the story.
While editing, I go through 4 phases (To be clear this is just me talking to myself. I don’t harass my editors):
1. NO!
At first I alternate between hubris, “How dare someone want to change my perfect words. They just don’t understand my genius.” and despair, “This is such a mess how can I possibly fix all the horribleness in this typo ridden mess.”
2. Why?
Then comes the confused indignant questions of, “Why is this important? You obviously don’t understand.” and, “Why the hell did I forget this or write it this way?”
3. Fine
I finally get to acceptance where I realize that it’s fixable and agree to change it. I don’t always use their suggestions but I try to fix what they’ve pointed out as a problem.
One of the most useful pieces of writing advice I ever got was that if an editor points out that something is wrong, they’re probably right; if they tell you how to fix it they’re probably wrong. (It’s a generalization but gives you permission to fix it your way.)
4. Okay, that’s better
In the end, in my experience, a good editor will be right the majority of the time. Again, an editors goal is to make the book better.
So the last stage is to recheck the edits and go, “Damn this is good.”
I should go back to editing. The faster I finish, the faster I can get back to writing The Hounds of Bakerville.
The Copper Tarnish by Éric Desmarais available June 3rd, 2025.
The Pocket Library template was made by @thebookishanimator_, and I thought it would be fun to make our own editions of it! Here are Jen and Éric’s Pocket Libraries.
