Today on the blog I am pleased to welcome Chantel Acevedo, author of Song of the Red Cloak. I read this book based on a recommendation from Rachel Hawkins (author of Hex Hall) via twitter. It was really more of an order than a recommendation 😉 I was so impressed. I loved the time period, the mythology, the characters… it was all so weel done! I had a number of questions for Chantel and she was gracious enough to answer them. Check out what she has to say!
About the Book:
Two Spartan boys grow up together, and become inseparable friends. One is a prince of Sparta , destined to rule this ancient Greek state, the other a slave, or helot, who serves the young prince. In the harsh training camps, or agoges, where boys are groomed to become the great warriors of Spartan fame, their skills are honed and brutally tested. Only citizens may aspire to the warrior’s Red Cloak, and one of the tests is the annual crypteia, or hunting of the helots. A beautiful and mysterious young Sibyl speaks of an uprising of the slaves. The Oracles warn of a deadly conflict between two ruling factions. Evil forces will challenge the two boys and test their loyalties, as secret truths about their own identities are revealed.
Author Interview:
I love the time period and setting for this book! As I was reading I wondered how much you knew about the culture before you got the idea for the story. Had you done a lot of research before you got the idea for Galen and Nikolas or did they drive your research? Did your story change as you learned more about the place/time?
I thought I knew a lot about Sparta before starting! Aside from Athens, it’s the Greek city-state we all learn about in school. What I didn’t realize is how villainous I’d cast the Spartans in my head. Athenians were the good, democratic, intellectual sort, and the Spartans were the barbarians. Ultimately, that’s all I knew! I was so wrong, though. Galen and Nikolas definitely drove the research. For Galen, I had to learn about the helots, or Spartan slaves. What were their lives like? For Nikolas, I needed to learn about Spartan royalty. Two royal houses! So cool and complex. The research shaped the story a great deal. For example, I imagined the helot slaves as, literally, shackled. A very limited, constrained population. The truth is that they had a lot more freedom to roam than I’d expected. And they outnumbered the Spartans by thousands and thousands. That freed me to write Galen in interesting ways–he’s bound to someone, and at the same time, can run off on bursts of adventure, too.
While you were learning more about the place and time did you come across any interesting facts or customs that you weren’t able to include in your story?
Oh, yes! The marriage customs were super crazy and interesting in Ancient Sparta. Here’s how they went–a boy and girl fall in love, typically after they’ve both finished school. So, these folks are about 19 or 20 usually. They agree on a wedding date in secret. Then, they stage a fight and abduction on that day. Somewhere public, the two of them get into a brawl. Let it be known that Spartan girls were taught to fight, just like the boys. It’s all fixed, of course, and she lets him win, and “drag” her faux-kicking and screaming to their bedroom, wherein the honeymoon begins. End of ceremony. I’d love to write that scene, but Galen and company are only fifteen, and, unlike the Athenians who married at that age, the Spartans waited until they were more grown-up to take the plunge.
I always wonder about the process of writing fiction set in a historical time and place. Was it difficult to work your story in with the actual history? Did you have to modify historical events/customs to fit your story?
Historical fiction isn’t necessarily 100% accurate. I leave that to the writers of history and nonfiction, who make a pact with the reader regarding truth. I tried to be as accurate as possible with SONG, down to the weight of a spear, which I had a historian friend point out as wrong in the first draft. But I did have to modify certain things. The story is set a few years after the events at Thermopylae, which most people remember from the movie 300. The kings I name in SONG OF THE RED CLOAK are not the kings of that moment in time. There was also an earthquake in Sparta that was a significant event for the city, and I’ve bumped that up in time a good deal. Finally, I loved the idea of the Spartan tombs, or tholos. They were shaped like a bee-hive. Spartans of the era I’m writing about had already stopped designing those tombs. But I loved them so much, I KEPT them. Take that, history!
What led you to choose Sparta as your setting?
The Spartans are such badasses, that’s why! They were warriors, first and foremost. They were the only Greek city-state to send their girls to school, to allow women to own land, to send female athletes to the Olympics. They were one of the only city-states to eschew WALLS to surround their city. Forget walls, they said, we are Spartans! We don’t NEED walls. Sure, they were superstitious, and brutal, and VAIN (Spartans combed their hair and beards before battle IN FRONT OF the enemy, just to show off their manly good looks!), but they were so different from their Greek peers. You have to love that “stick it to them” mentality.
You incorporate some of the different gods and myths of the time. Do you have a favorite Greek god? Favorite Greek myth?
Athena. Goddess of wisdom. Gray-eyed Athena. She’s a modern woman in an ancient world. Clever, wise, hangs out with owls, which are pretty cool creatures. She burst out of Zeus’ head at birth, making him the only man to know what childbirth feels like. Love Athena. The Spartans were more the Ares-type. But the Bronze House, a temple in Sparta, belonged to Athena. The Spartans knew that to be successful in battle, you needed brains AND brawn.
As for myths, my favorite is the Orpheus story, which makes an appearance at the end of SONG. Orpheus, the father of music, loses his bride on their wedding day to a snake bite. His music so moves Hades, god of the underworld, that he’s allowed to bring Eurydice, his wife, back to life. But he’s warned not to turn and look at her. Orpheus, desperate and in love, DOES turn around, and Eurydice goes poof. So tragic. So lovely. The best love stories are like that, aren’t they? Full of longing and sadness. I like to imagine Orpheus and Eurydice in the underworld now, he playing music for her, she lying dreamily in his arms…
What books do you recommend for readers who are interested in learning more about the Sparta that Galen and Nikolas know?
GATES OF FIRE, which depicts the battle of Thermopylae, is wonderfully rich and exciting. Sort of bloody, but it’s about Sparta, after all. The graphic novel, 300, by Frank Miller, is also worth a look. Obviously, it’s the inspiration for the movie. It’s surprisingly accurate as far as history goes.
If you could travel to any time/place in history where would you want to go and why?
This is SUCH a hard question for a history geek like me! Can I have two choices? Elizabethan England. I’d visit the Globe and see a play by Shakespeare. And I’d tell Shakespeare that, while he doesn’t know it yet, he’s changing the world. And he’ll think I’m some awkward person with a horrible accent and sic the theater guards on me. While I know I’m all about Sparta, I think I’d visit Athens, and listen to Socrates for a while.
I’m always looking to add more books to Mt. TBR. Any books you’ve read and loved recently?
I had to look at your master list of books to find a YA book you haven’t read! My goodness, you’ve read a lot! MISS PEREGRINE’S HOME FOR PECULIAR CHILDREN was quite good. I loved the way the author interspersed these very, very eerie photographs into the narrative. Really original. A book that came out a few years ago, which really inspired me to write SONG, is Susan Fletcher’s ALPHABET OF DREAMS. It’s set in Ancient Persia, featuring a pair of exiled children–a prince and princess–who somehow find themselves on the caravan with the three wise men of the Christmas story. It’s beautiful, and historically riveting, and not at all holiday-ish, if that makes sense. It’s a book for any time of the year.
I love the time period and setting for this book! As I was reading I wondered how much you knew about the culture before you got the idea for the story. Had you done a lot of research before you got the idea for Galen and Nikolas or did they drive your research? Did your story change as you learned more about the place/time?
I thought I knew a lot about Sparta before starting! Aside from Athens, it’s the Greek city-state we all learn about in school. What I didn’t realize is how villainous I’d cast the Spartans in my head. Athenians were the good, democratic, intellectual sort, and the Spartans were the barbarians. Ultimately, that’s all I knew! I was so wrong, though. Galen and Nikolas definitely drove the research. For Galen, I had to learn about the helots, or Spartan slaves. What were their lives like? For Nikolas, I needed to learn about Spartan royalty. Two royal houses! So cool and complex. The research shaped the story a great deal. For example, I imagined the helot slaves as, literally, shackled. A very limited, constrained population. The truth is that they had a lot more freedom to roam than I’d expected. And they outnumbered the Spartans by thousands and thousands. That freed me to write Galen in interesting ways–he’s bound to someone, and at the same time, can run off on bursts of adventure, too.
While you were learning more about the place and time did you come across any interesting facts or customs that you weren’t able to include in your story?
Oh, yes! The marriage customs were super crazy and interesting in Ancient Sparta. Here’s how they went–a boy and girl fall in love, typically after they’ve both finished school. So, these folks are about 19 or 20 usually. They agree on a wedding date in secret. Then, they stage a fight and abduction on that day. Somewhere public, the two of them get into a brawl. Let it be known that Spartan girls were taught to fight, just like the boys. It’s all fixed, of course, and she lets him win, and “drag” her faux-kicking and screaming to their bedroom, wherein the honeymoon begins. End of ceremony. I’d love to write that scene, but Galen and company are only fifteen, and, unlike the Athenians who married at that age, the Spartans waited until they were more grown-up to take the plunge.
I always wonder about the process of writing fiction set in a historical time and place. Was it difficult to work your story in with the actual history? Did you have to modify historical events/customs to fit your story?
Historical fiction isn’t necessarily 100% accurate. I leave that to the writers of history and nonfiction, who make a pact with the reader regarding truth. I tried to be as accurate as possible with SONG, down to the weight of a spear, which I had a historian friend point out as wrong in the first draft. But I did have to modify certain things. The story is set a few years after the events at Thermopylae, which most people remember from the movie 300. The kings I name in SONG OF THE RED CLOAK are not the kings of that moment in time. There was also an earthquake in Sparta that was a significant event for the city, and I’ve bumped that up in time a good deal. Finally, I loved the idea of the Spartan tombs, or tholos. They were shaped like a bee-hive. Spartans of the era I’m writing about had already stopped designing those tombs. But I loved them so much, I KEPT them. Take that, history!
What led you to choose Sparta as your setting?
The Spartans are such badasses, that’s why! They were warriors, first and foremost. They were the only Greek city-state to send their girls to school, to allow women to own land, to send female athletes to the Olympics. They were one of the only city-states to eschew WALLS to surround their city. Forget walls, they said, we are Spartans! We don’t NEED walls. Sure, they were superstitious, and brutal, and VAIN (Spartans combed their hair and beards before battle IN FRONT OF the enemy, just to show off their manly good looks!), but they were so different from their Greek peers. You have to love that “stick it to them” mentality.
You incorporate some of the different gods and myths of the time. Do you have a favorite Greek god? Favorite Greek myth?
Athena. Goddess of wisdom. Gray-eyed Athena. She’s a modern woman in an ancient world. Clever, wise, hangs out with owls, which are pretty cool creatures. She burst out of Zeus’ head at birth, making him the only man to know what childbirth feels like. Love Athena. The Spartans were more the Ares-type. But the Bronze House, a temple in Sparta, belonged to Athena. The Spartans knew that to be successful in battle, you needed brains AND brawn.
As for myths, my favorite is the Orpheus story, which makes an appearance at the end of SONG. Orpheus, the father of music, loses his bride on their wedding day to a snake bite. His music so moves Hades, god of the underworld, that he’s allowed to bring Eurydice, his wife, back to life. But he’s warned not to turn and look at her. Orpheus, desperate and in love, DOES turn around, and Eurydice goes poof. So tragic. So lovely. The best love stories are like that, aren’t they? Full of longing and sadness. I like to imagine Orpheus and Eurydice in the underworld now, he playing music for her, she lying dreamily in his arms…
What books do you recommend for readers who are interested in learning more about the Sparta that Galen and Nikolas know?
GATES OF FIRE, which depicts the battle of Thermopylae, is wonderfully rich and exciting. Sort of bloody, but it’s about Sparta, after all. The graphic novel, 300, by Frank Miller, is also worth a look. Obviously, it’s the inspiration for the movie. It’s surprisingly accurate as far as history goes.
If you could travel to any time/place in history where would you want to go and why?
This is SUCH a hard question for a history geek like me! Can I have two choices? Elizabethan England. I’d visit the Globe and see a play by Shakespeare. And I’d tell Shakespeare that, while he doesn’t know it yet, he’s changing the world. And he’ll think I’m some awkward person with a horrible accent and sic the theater guards on me. While I know I’m all about Sparta, I think I’d visit Athens, and listen to Socrates for a while.
I’m always looking to add more books to Mt. TBR. Any books you’ve read and loved recently?
I had to look at your master list of books to find a YA book you haven’t read! My goodness, you’ve read a lot! MISS PEREGRINE’S HOME FOR PECULIAR CHILDREN was quite good. I loved the way the author interspersed these very, very eerie photographs into the narrative. Really original. A book that came out a few years ago, which really inspired me to write SONG, is Susan Fletcher’s ALPHABET OF DREAMS. It’s set in Ancient Persia, featuring a pair of exiled children–a prince and princess–who somehow find themselves on the caravan with the three wise men of the Christmas story. It’s beautiful, and historically riveting, and not at all holiday-ish, if that makes sense. It’s a book for any time of the year.
Thank you so much Chantel. I loved finding out more about your research and the culture. I’m a sucker for ancient settings and mythology! You can buy Song of the Red Cloak on amazon, Barnes & Noble, createspace or Book Depository. The ebook is also available.
Giveaway:
Chantel was gracious enough to donate a signed copy of her book to giveaway. Must be 13 or older to enter. US only. Enter using the Rafflecopter widget below!
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