Interview with Author Kendra E. Ardnek!

Kendra E. Ardnek is the author of many books, four of which are published.  I had the honor of interviewing her to celebrate the publishing of her fourth novel, The Ankulen.

1.  I’m so excited to be interviewing an author again and sharing about another wonderful novel with my blog!  First of all, tell me about yourself.

Hello there! I'm a eighteen year old author of four self-published books, The Ankulen being my newest, and the eldest of four siblings.  I fell in love with stories before I could talk (and I was an early talker, incidentally) and started writing them as soon as I figured out how. I published my first book at the age of sixteen. Fantasy is my favorite genre, thanks to an overdose of Fairy Tales and Nutcracker as a child. I blog at knittedbygodsplan.blogspot.com and my official site is kendraeardnek.weebly.com.

 2.  In a nutshell, what is The Ankulen about?

(I'm resisting the urge to make a snide, nutshell-themed joke here)
The text on the back of the cover reads, "Fifteen-year-old Jen can't remember her imagination. She knows she had one once, though, and honestly, she'd like it back. It's been eight years. One day she finds a young boy who claims to be one of her imaginary friends and that her imaginary world is being eaten by a hydra-like monster called the Polystoikhedron. He helps her find the Ankulen, a special bracelet that had given the ability to bring her imagination to life and together they embark on a quest to find friendship, healing, and perhaps even some family."

 3.  Speaking of the title, I’m sure a lot of my readers are wondering what on earth an “Ankulen” is.  Care to enlighten them?

In short, an Ankulen is a piece of jewelry that brings imagination to life. Jen's is a bracelet, mine is a ring. The owner is called an Anka or Anku, depending on whether they're a girl or a guy.

  4.  I’ve always enjoyed the stories of how authors came up with ideas for their novels.  What inspired you to write The Ankulen?

This book began as a play that my younger cousin wanted to perform at our next family get together. We were both really into acting, and we had a "stage" in our backyard (Actually it was part of a really expensive bed, but it worked!), so we wanted to do something together. So we assigned ourselves names (I was Jenifer and he was Chris) and started making stuff up as we went along.
We could never come up with an ending that we could pull off with our limited special effects, so eventually we gave up. But the idea wouldn't go away. Eventually I decided to change it into a book, and in January of last year, I pulled up a word document, started typing, and never looked back.

 5.  Are you working on any other novels so far?

Several. Right now I'm focusing on three. My Kingdom for a Quest, the third book in my Bookania Quests series which is my personal retellings and mash-ups of various myths, legends, and fairy tales. Worth of a King, which I'm co-writing with a friend, is the story of a pair of royal twins who were separated at birth, he to be raised as a peasant, she as a princess and the intended of the son of their father's assassin. Water Princess, Fire Prince, the first book in my Rizkaland Legends, which are hard to explain without comparing them to Narnia and Oz, which sounds cheesy. The next book I plan to publish, however, is a short story collection.

 6.  Do you listen to music when you write?  If so, what kind?  What’s in your current favorite playlist?

Not often. Sometimes I'll pull out my MP3 player and listen to a playlist that I've set up, but I've never noticed any real change in my writing for either positive or negative. When I do listen, my playlist is made of some Mozart, some songs from "Songs from a Broken Heart" (look them up - they're really good Christian group, all the ones I've listened to are theologically sound, and they're all FREE), and the songs off my Isaac's CD. (A Christian Bluegrass group).

 7.  Do you like to drink coffee, tea, water, or anything else while you write?  What about chocolate???  : )
Call me a strange author, but I can't stand coffee, and there are only a few teas that I will drink. I do like some lemon tea during the winter, but that's because I get really bad sore throats. I always have water on my desk, because I don't want to dehydrate myself.
As for chocolate, I can take it or leave it. I'm more of a vanilla person. I'll drink hot chocolate, and if you give me chocolate, I'll probably eat it, but I prefer white chocolate. On another note, I really like hot apple cider, but I don't get it as often as I would like.

 8.  Besides writing, what are some of your other hobbies?

Knitting, crochet, various other handcrafts (but not sewing - embroidery I can don, but add a machine and I'm lost), pretending I'm an artist, putting together 500+ piece puzzles, helping my younger siblings in school, cooking, washing the dishes, building sand castles, growing herbs ... oh ... so I do have a life outside of my writing ...

 9.  Tell me about the latest book you read!

The last book I finished was Abolished Impracticality, which I was beta reading for a friend of mine. It's the unpublished second book of her steampunk series. It's a good series, I highly recommend it.

 10.  What’s some advice you would give to an aspiring author?
Don't talk about writing. Write. And read, both the classics and modern works. If you don't read, you forget how the written word is supposed to look. Classics because they're good enough to last, modern because you want to know what people want to read now.


Thanks, Kendra!

I hope you'll all go and buy The Ankulen.  It's a great book!

~Eowyn~

Celebrate Musicals Week Tag!

Well, this week is Celebrate Musicals Week, hosted by Amy over at Yet Another Period Drama Blog.  We're supposed to do at least three posts on a musical we've picked to celebrate, but I've been extremely busy and will be really busy this week, so I'll be lucky if I get two posts done.  Be happy with two posts on one musical and my IMHO post on Wicked.  (Green yet?)

Onwards with the tag questions!

1.  What musical did you pick to "spotlight" this week and why?

Daddy-Long-Legs.  I picked it because I think it's one of the lesser-known musicals out there (being an off-off-Broadway musical...), and I think it needs to be talked about more!  (I'm going to leave most of the talking about it for later this week as it's very late and I don't want to give up too many details!  I don't care if you look up the musical yet or not.  But I guarantee....  You'll want to by the time I post my review.)

Basically, the story is about a girl named Jerusha Abbott (awful name, I know...) who is the oldest orphan in the John Grier Home, a home for orphans.  (Yes, thank you, Mary.)  One of the trustees of the Home decides to pay for Jerusha's education on the condition that she write to him once a month telling him about the things she's learning and that she doesn't know who he is.  The musical goes on through the next four years and follows Jerusha's education, her letters to Daddy-Long-Legs (the name she gave to her benefactor because she saw his long shadow as he was leaving the Home and decided he must be very tall), and her relationship with Jervis Pendleton, the young uncle of one of the girls in Jerusha's dorm.

2.  How did you discover the musical you picked (hereinafter referred to as "your musical")?

(Heehee....  I consider Daddy-Long-Legs to be my musical already cuz I love it so much and I feel like I'm one of the only people on the planet who know about it!)

Well, I read the book by Jean Webster of the same title and instantly fell in love with the story, the method of writing, and Jerusha Abbott!

3.  If you had to pick three favorite songs from your musical, which ones would they be?

Oh, golly Pete.  Only three?!?!?!  Fiiiiine....  In no particular order, here they are.

'I Have Torn You From My Heart'

'Lock Willow'

'Mr. Girl-Hater'

4.  What's your least favorite song from your musical?

I literally do not have a least favorite.  They're ALL good!!  If you held a knife to my throat and made me pick, Amy, I'd pick....  'The Oldest Orphan in the John Grier Home.'  Because it's just the introduction to the musical and, listening to it for the first time, you have no idea how great it's going to get!

5.  Who are your favorite characters (choose up to three)?

Well, considering this musical only has two.... *cough*  Jerusha Abbott and Jarvis Pendleton.  C :

6.  Which versions of your musical have you seen/listened to, and which is your favorite?

Well, I've listened to the Original Cast Recording (which is the only recording out there) and the other three actors who have starred in it.  I like the original the most.

7.   Is this your favorite musical of all time?  If not, what is?

No, but it's probably tied for third with Cinderella.  My favorite musical of all time is Les Miserables.  Just because.  (Second favorites are Phantom of the Opera and Wicked.)

8.   Which cast album/musical soundtrack in your collection do you listen to the most?

(Instead of repeating my answer to #6, I'll assume you mean my entire collection of musical soundtracks.)  Either Daddy-Long-Legs, Little Women, Les Miserables, Phantom of the Opera, The Little Mermaid, The Lord of the Rings (YES, there IS such a thing!), or Annie.  XD

9.   What is your favorite costume from your musical?

Hmmm....  I dunno!  I really like all of Jerusha's outfits.  They're so pretty!

10.  If you could change anything about your musical, what would you change?

The fact that it's only being preformed in Japan and the West Coast at the moment.  Yes, Cosette... this is true.  *weeps*

11.  Which role(s) would you most like to play in any musical, if you had the opportunity to do so on stage?

Meg Giry.  It's a small enough role that I don't have to blow the audience away with, but big enough that, HELLO, I'M IN A MUSICAL!!!

I'd also like to play Elphaba, G(a)linda, Jerusha, Christine, Meg, Jo, Beth, Amy, Fantine, Cosette, Eponine, Ariel, or someone else.  C :

12.  If you could choose one performer to play any part in your musical, who would you choose and which part would you have them play?

I'd pick Megan McGinnis to be Jerusha again because she was just soooo good in the Original Cast Album!

And Aaron Tveit could be Jervis.

It would be epicness.

13.  Do you consider yourself a musical theatre fan in general or do you just like a few musicals?

I'm a musical theatre BUFF. Hello, I asked to go to NYC to see a musical on Broadway for my graduation present!! I LOVE musicals. They're astonishing and they've changed me for good. C :

14.  Are you tired of the word "musical" yet?

NO. And I NEVER WILL BE.

15.  Turn your music playing device on shuffle (or utilize Pandora if you don't have one) and tell us the names of the first three show tunes that come up-- no cheating!  How do these rank on your favorites/most-listened-to list?

'Drink With Me' from the 10thAC of Les Mis. I love this song and this version. : ) Ummm.... It's probably one of my top-ten favorite songs from Les Mis.

'She's In Love' from The Little Mermaid: The Musical. LOVE IT! I think this is my second or third favorite song from this musical. (The first being 'If Only.' Sighhhh....)

'Off to Massachussets' from Little Women: The Musical. I love this musical! I didn't love this song until I listened to Daddy-Long-Legs and realized that Megan McGinnis, who plays Jerusha, plays Beth in the Original Cast Recording of Little Women! WOOT!

Which brings me to

Daddy-Long-Legs. Y'all are going to love it. My review should be posted by the end of this week!

~Eowyn~

IMHO: Wicked

The In My Honest Opinion Series (IMHO) is a series of posts for the purpose of declaring my opinion on certain subjects.  My honest opinion.  (Yes, thank you, Mary.)  These posts will be my totally unbiased, totally unaltered-on-any-grounds opinion.  Each and every one of my readers are entitled to the right to comment below with their own opinion and an argument, if they so desire.  Let us begin.

(Behold.  The first IMHO post!  Seems fitting that a series that has been in my mind so long should start with my now-tied-for-second-favorite musical, Wicked.  C :)

The synopsis of Wicked could probably be very (very, very) summarized by saying that it's about what happened Before Dorothy Dropped In.

Wicked is the story of Elphaba, the Wicked Witch of the West, and G(a)linda, the Good Witch of the North, and how they became friends.  They start out simply loathing each other and taking things that don't belong to them, then ending up both being changed for good.  (Brownie points for everyone who knows how many quotes I just quoted!)

I had never seen Wicked before seeing it on Broadway (which is the best place to see a musical for the first time, btdubs!!), but I'd heard a few of the songs.  Namely because of Ally.  C :  Anyway, when I heard that I was going to be able to see a musical on Broadway (then wheedled my way into seeing two, muahahaha...), I first thought of Wicked.

Before seeing it, the only things I knew about it were a) it had been running on Broadway since 2003, peeps, b) the two (give or take) songs I'd listened to from it were astonishing (excuse the quote from another musical), c) my friend saw it when she was in NYC yeeeears ago and said it was good, and d) many people who had seen it or listened to it that I knew and respected (*cough*Ally*cough*) absolutely loved it.

So I thought, 'Heyyyy....  Might as well, deeds!'  (Okay, enough quoting from things other than Wicked!)

Now we come to the IMHO part.

I LOVED IT.

From the opening notes (y'all know what I'm talking about) to the closing of the curtain after the bows, I was totally enraptured in all of it.

I loved a great many things about this musical.  First of all, I LOVED my cast.  Lindsay Mendez (GRACIOUS SAKES....  she had SUCH a powerful voice!), Tiffany Haas (who was an understudy, by the way, and I won't go into my theory in understudies and just say that, nine times out of ten, I've observed they play the part better than the person who is actually cast for the role!), Derek Klena (WOW....  Let me just say.... his "Let the green girl go!" was allllllmost as good as Aaron's!), Carol Kane (as Madame Morrible....  Don't recognize her name?  Does "Humperdink, Humperdink, Humperdink!" ring a bell???) and allll the rest....  I was literally just BLOWN AWAY.

During the intermission, my dad and I stepped out to get a drink (non-alcoholic....), my dad looked at me and said, "Wow....  That was actually.... pretty good."  That made me really surprised, cuz, HELLO, this is the guy who watches most of the movies I love and hold dear to my heart and says they're "cute."

I won't go through all of the songs and tell you which were my favorite (I'll just list the ones I really like - No One Mourns the Wicked through Finale: For Good (Reprise)!), I'll just say that I loved all of them.  C :  The one I sing the most, howevs, is probably The Wizard and I.  Just cuz.  C :

Now for the extremely biased part.

I hope you guys agree with me about how amazing this was after seeing all of these videos.  If not, feel free to start a comment war.  I have my caps lock ON.)

Lindsay Mendez singing 'The Wizard and I'

 

 

 

Derek Klena and Lindsay Mendez singing 'As Long As You're Mine'

 

 

 

Lindsay Mendez singing 'No Good Deed'

(Hey...  I really love her voice....)

 

 

Tiffany Haas singing 'Popular' (with Anne Brummel)

 

 

 

Derek Klena singing 'Along the Way'

(Not from Wicked, obviously, but it gives you a glimpse of what a great voice he has!)

 (I can't post this video here....  : (((((  Just click the link.  Click it.  Do it.)

 

 Tiffany Haas and Lindsay Mendez singing 'What Is This Feeling?'

(The picture is of the best cast EVAH)

I wishwishwiiiiish there was a video of them singing this....  They played off each other soooo well!!!

 

 And here are some pictures to make y'all completely and totally jealous.  C :

The usual cast....

Plus one of the sweetest ladies on the planet!

The wall was painted with the map of Oz.
And everything in the theater was green, which, if any of you really know me, you'll know it's my favorite color.
So I was literally in heaven.  C :

The staaaage....

 

 

Okay, this is too cool to be in a caption.  We were right on the edge of the balcony, front Mezz left, and we had a reeeeally good view of practically everything.  The rope hanging from the ceiling on the far right was where the first personal flying monkey (sorry.... couldn't resist!) came down, the black shape on the stage to the right of it is a small trap door, and the ramp on the right of the stage leads down to another trap door which the cast uses frequently.  When I took the picture, I was like, "It's a TRAPDOOR, DAD!  This is going to be AWESOME!!!"

 

Meeting the Cast.  C :

 

(If you're already turning green [heehee.... green....], you can just stop now.  Cuz it'll only get worse.)

Me and Catherine Charlebois, who played Nessarose.  So good!

Me and Derek Klena, who played Fiyero.  (Stop gushing, KarMarie....)

Me and Tiffany Haas, who played G(a)linda.  She was so sweet!  She stayed and talked with my dad and I for the longest.  : )

 

Me and Lindsay Mendez, who played the green girl herself!

 

The stuffs I got.  C :

My autographed Playbill.  (Which is an ACTUAL Playbill, by the way!!)

My autographed Playbill, cont'd.

 

The cup that is ONLY sold at the Gershwin.

I use it every day.  No joke.

Well, that's Wicked.  IMHO.

Care to comment?

~Eowyn~

NYC: Day Two

(Sorry it's taken me so long...  School....  Anywhoz, here bees Day Two!)

 



Day Two: Wonders Like I've Never Seen

 

Dad and I got up semi-early, visited the post office next door, and started making our way into the city.  There was literally so much to see.

 



Macy's.  THE Macy's.  I'm not a shopper, but if any of you are... be jealous.  C :

The Empire State Building!

The Empire State Building was soooo tall!!  It's great to look at from the ground... which is where I wanted to stay... so it was all good.  : )

The Starbucks on the first floor of The Empire State Building.  (I got Arwen a NYC mug from here, and she "LOVES IT!"  She claims she alternates between it and her North Carolina one.)

Grand Central Station!  Celebrating 100 years.

Before I go on, I need to explain something.  My mom is a huge Meg Ryan fan, and after we got a ClearPlay (best. thing. ever.), she showed us You've Got Mail.  Gracious, I was addicted the first time I saw it!  I mean, what's not to like?!  Anastasia and Woody fall in love over the 90's internet!!  Anyway.  It was set in NYC, and after I found out that I was going there, I started making a list of the places it was filmed and making Dad promise we could go.  We didn't visit Café Lalo ("Well... if you don't like Kathleen Kelly, I can tell you right now... you ain't gonna like this girl.") or Riverside Park on 91st Street (where the famous "Brinkley!" scene was filmed), but we did make it to Bryant Park, where they went through and bought a mango, among other things, and made plans to bump into each other "over there."  : )  Great scene.  : )  (Disclaimer: There's some language/objectionable content/STUFF in You've Got Mail that isn't really great, so... yeah.  Totally recommended if you have a ClearPlay or MommyPlay.  I might even do a review.  It's that good.)

Sooo pretty!

The Stage.  As in, this stage.  Totally totally spazzing out (to borrow a phrase that a friend uses frequently) when I took this picture!!!  Aaron was here!!!



 

This place is just so gorgeous!  It's a quiet haven in the middle of all of NYC's craziness.

 

 

 Behold.  I WAS THERE.   : )  After walking around the whole park and discovering that there weren't any benches, Dad just took my picture in front of a fence.  : )

 

We left Bryant Park, got a little lost, then headed towards Times Square.

THE PLACE WHERE THE BALL DROPS!!!  (And they keep the year up there just in case the Doctor comes and wants to know what year it is or something....)

Every major Broadway production had its own bus that they put their ads on.  So excited!!  Cinderella didn't have a whole bus, and it drove by before I could take a picture.  : (

Okay, so then we went into the Disney Store.  (I'm a child at heart.  C :)  It was two floors - the first one had Disney/NYC stuff (which I browsed for longer than I needed to but didn't buy) and Monsters University paraphernalia.  There was an escalator to go upstairs to the (HUGE) second floor.  Check out what was above it!

 

TANGLED LANTERNS!!  It was hard to take a picture while you're going down.  They look a ton better in real life.

The Hershey Store!!
To the right, outside of the frame, was the M&M Store.  Heehee....

This is where we ate dinner.  Sooooo good!

We stopped to eat lunch before our 2pm showing of Wicked (GAHHHH!!!!) at about noon and didn't want to be late.  We had no idea where we were in relation to the Gershwin and I wanted to be there by 1:15 (to allow time for fangirly gushing over the theater), so we just stopped and decided we'd find it later.  When I was done eating, I decided to take a picture of the sign, looked out the window in front of me, and CHECK OUT WHAT I SAW.

 

GAHHHHH!!!!!  I was literally bouncing in my seat, pointing it out to Dad.  We left the pizza place and headed towards the Gershwin.

 

Okay, so I uploaded all of my Wicked pictures, then decided that it needed its own post.  I mean, TOO MUCH AWESOMENESS!!!!  Seriously.  (I then took all the photos down and found out that they made up of, like, half my post!  Ha!)  So that post will be posted SOON.  I can't wait to tell you all what I thought, so it'll definitely be soon!

We ate dinner at Carnegie Deli, where we had a huuuuuuge sandwich!  So yummy!

World's Largest Hershey Bar in the Hershey Store!  Stopped in here to get a Reese's shirt for my younger sister, "Beatrice."



The ads in Times Square were just.... awesome.  : )

See what I mean???  Cinderella and Newsies!!!

The theater for The Lion King!  My grandma saw it when she went to NYC and loved it so much, she's taking us to see it next year!!  (Unfortunately, not in NYC.  Someday, Grandma - SOMEDAY!!!)

After scoping out the area to find the Broadway Theater where Cinderella was playing, we walked back to the hotel, got our luggage, and went to our second hotel....

 

...Which was significantly smaller.  I enjoyed it, though!  They had a "Galley" on each floor where you could make chai tea and cappuccinos.  I had a mocha cappuccino every night and peppermint tea every morning.  Sooooo yummy....

The view from our window!

 

Sadly, that's the end of Day Two.  It seems soooo short because I took out all my Wicked pictures.  : (  Next time, my fellow Ozians - next time!

 

~Eowyn~