The Novel: Seeds of Winter
The story is a re-working of the Greek myth of Persephone, set in the present day when the gods no longer walk among us – or do they?
Sefi, at age fourteen, starts to hear the compelling voice of one ‘Harry’ in her head, who calls her to join him and be his bride, his queen. As she keeps trying to follow his heady summons she is soon labeled as mentally ill.
A few years on and the main story finds Sefi now twenty-five and leading a grey half-life, dutifully taking her medication but with no hopes for the future. One day everything changes; a stranger hands her a beautiful pendant representing a pomegranate, telling her that a stranger called Harry has sent it to her. All at once the possibility that Harry might truly exist wakes Sefi up and she starts on a quest to find out. But hardly has she begun when the quest comes to find her in a dramatic fashion. She is abducted from an ordinary English street into a strange Underworld where she is the only living mortal among the shades of the dead. This must now be her home, alongside the god of that place.
Meanwhile Sefi’s mother Carla, her stepfather Graham and boyfriend Dave are left searching desperately for her, not knowing whether she is dead or alive. Their quest takes them to many strange places, not least to the gates of Hades. Some of the supposedly ordinary people who help them along the way are not all that they seem – beware of the sinister chiropodist Wilbur Pate. Rose, the pretty librarian (who is genuinely ordinary), wishes she was taking part in the action but can only help the protagonists along the way.
When the time is ripe for the myth to be resolved the two story lines come together in a dramatic climax in Southern Greece when Carla gains entrance to the Underworld through an old lighthouse. She makes some surprising discoveries and the true nature of someone she has trusted come to light. All are changed for ever by the events that unfold.
Now available in hardcopy and Kindle formats:
In the UK: purchase Seeds of Winter.
In the USA: purchase Seeds of Winter.
To contact Marina email: marina at mmcarthur.co.uk
Extract One
Early on in the story Sefi’s mother Carla (or Demeter in terms of the myth) gets the first clue that their world is about to be turned upside down.
“Carla sat where she could see through the window, revelling in her unusual solitude. Outside the spring evening was little more than a glowing after-thought of the day. The sky was a soft pinky orange and the old apple and pear trees in the orchard were reduced almost to silhouettes. Some bird was hanging onto the day with a few evening chirps, but the balance was now in favour of night…
At that moment the telephone started to ring and Carla leant over to pick it up. “Sefi, its great to hear from you, unlike you to ring so late… No don’t worry, I wasn’t asleep. Is everything ok? Carla, slightly alarmed, sat up so as to listen more attentively to her daughter…
Carla was no stranger to this sort of conversation, and satisfied that nothing more was afoot she sank back against the cushions and resumed cat-stroking… Just then she heard something that snapped her back to full alertness, though she was careful to show nothing in her voice. She sat up again and leaned forward as if that would bring her closer to Sefi. “Harry did you say, what do you mean?… How could it be from THAT Harry?…
The rural idyll now became an irrelevant backdrop as Carla, sitting bolt upright, grimly reviewed the situation. Harry! Of all the names there were, this was the one that most horrified her. That name had led too many times to trauma and trouble. She did not understand what had led to the voice in Sefi’s head being so named, and it was some years since it had been mentioned at all. This time, please God, she must avert the curse of Harry.”
Seeds of Winter is published in electronic Kindle format only at present.
In the UK: purchase Seeds of Winter.
In the USA: purchase Seeds of Winter.
Extract Two
Sefi finds herself in the strange and crepuscular land that is Hades, shocked and disorientated but with all her human needs intact, not least hunger. Here her shadowy attendant Dorindre offers her some irresistible food. Off stage somewhere is the God of the Underworld, known to our heroine as Harry:
“Dorindre smiled at Sefi as she bent down towards the girl. A rough wooden bowl was in her hands and inside it were some beautiful pink and yellow fruits, rough-skinned but infinitely alluring. “Some rodi, some pomegranate, Vasilissa? The most beautiful for you.” Sefi reached out her hand and took a full, crimson fruit. She turned it in her hands. The gloomy surroundings made the humble fruit seem miraculous, and her mind flew to the Horsfield greengrocers where they made a brief appearance every autumn.
“Oh yes, it is beautiful!” she cried, then stopped abruptly in her admiration, something nagging at her mind. Suddenly she was back in the library; it had been the pomegranate. Persephone had eaten of the pomegranate and had then been trapped in the Underworld.
“Eat, Vasilissa, eat!” Dorindre implored. Into Sefi’s mind came another image, lingering from some childhood story; a girl wearing a red bodice and a black skirt, pale skin against black hair. She was choosing an unnaturally rosy apple from a crone’s basket.
“Oh, no, I’m not hungry, not now!” Sefi put up her hands, as much to protect herself as to refuse the fruit.
“Vaseelissa! You must be strong! The god will expect you to be ready and strong for the wedding. These are beautiful fruits. It is long since I saw such fruits, or tasted such…you are so lucky, Vasillisa.” There was a sharper edge now to Dorindre’s voice.
“No, no, NO! Sefi heard her own voice sounding indecently loud and spoilt in that palace of silence. She hugged herself again, and for the first time began to cry. The strangeness of it all now struck her with a sudden horrible intensity. Moreover, she did not know the way out. She had promised her mother that she would be back, but how could she leave? As she wept and rocked herself, blocking out as best she could Dorindre’s imprecations, she became aware gradually of a familiar odour creeping around her. Then Harry was there, a dark shape, and against every instinct she was soothed, her eyes running dry.
“Persephone, you made this choice when still in your own place. Do you remember when I released you from the cage? The fruit is another choice, but refusing it does not send you back. You can eat or not eat, a small choice.”
It was always difficult to think clearly when Harry was there. Sefi unwound one arm and then the other, and slowly reached for the fruit. Dorindre pushed the handle of a small knife into her hand, and she grasped it. Leaning the bright fruit on the pale marble, she split it with some difficulty into two, pink juice running out over her hands. She picked out a few seeds and squashed them in her mouth, releasing the sweet juice and crunching them with her teeth; the sensation was exquisite. Her lips were wet and shiny. She had eaten of the fruit. How would she ever get out?”
In the UK: purchase Seeds of Winter.
In the USA: purchase Seeds of Winter.
The Myth and the Pomegranate
In the myth of Persephone as it is told in ancient classical sources, the maiden-goddess is forcibly abducted by her love-struck uncle Hades, god of the Underworld, while gathering flowers with other maidens. Her fate is sealed because she eats of the food of the Underworld in the form of some pomegranate seeds.
In early versions of the myth, such as the Homeric Hymn to Demeter (c. 7th or 6th C BCE) Hades gives Persephone the seeds to eat knowing that they will tie her to him, and she eats without realising what she is doing. Ovid, weaving his own Latin version of this tale some centuries later, would have us believe that there were well-tended gardens in Hades (though how would they grow in that gloom?). While wandering in said gardens the goddess plucks a pomegranate from a tree herself, and eats seven of its seeds, thus letting Hades off the hook.
Either way, according to a decree of the Fates, this means that Persephone must be tied to that dim kingdom of the dead. But eventually an accommodation is reached between her uncle Zeus (the head of the Greek pantheon), her uncle-husband Hades and her mother Demeter, goddess of the corn. Persephone is to be shared between her mother and her husband, spending six months of the year in each of their kingdoms. Thus when she is in Hades her mother mourns and the world above is drear and cold, and when she re-emerges into the light all nature responds by joyful flowering and fruting, bringing mankind a bountiful harvest. The turn of the seasons hinges on those few seeds picked and eaten from a pomegranate.
In Marina’s own re-working of the myth she felt at liberty to riff upon the old sources; they themselves must have drawn upon earlier oral versions, so cannot be said that there is one truth to be respected. And moreover, we live in diminished times where myths don’t play out in quite the way they once did when people knew their gods. In Seeds of Winter, when Sefi is faced with whether or not to eat of the pomegranate she is forewarned – but it doesn’t mean that she can resist it either.
For comprehensive and authoritative information on this and other Greek myths: www.theoi.com
Getting Into Hades
… without having to die first. This is what happens to Sefi in the story, and she finds herself the sole mortal alive in that place until her mother Carla joins her. It may be that there is enough still of the goddess in them both and they are protected. Two other characters in the story enter Hades too, but they do not have the benefit of protection. One thinks he does, and because of it the plot pivots around him. Careful what you wish for.
In Greek mythology Hades is the Underworld where all the dead must travel. The classical journey involves paying Charon the ferryman to take you across the river Acheron then getting past the three-headed hound Cerberus. There are many legendary entrances to Hades, and Carla finds her way to two of them. In the first she travels up the River Styx, not far from the resort of Parga in the region of North-west Greece called Epirus. Here she visits the so-called Necromanteion but at first it is nothing but a dull series of underground chambers thronged with tourists and lacking any mystical quality. It is only later that she finds her connection to the Underworld through a waking dream.
Carla’s second attempt is more successful, but that is as much because the time is ripe (in more senses than one as they all soon discover). This time she is guided to Tainaron at the southernmost tip of the Greek mainland on the Mani peninsular. Once again the official entrance is a blank and defiled site with no obvious opening underground, and she is desperately disappointed. The portal through which she finally gains access is in a lighthouse perched on the rocks a footpath’s walk away from the official site.
The lighthouse exists and still fulfils its function. It still may be possible to go inside it, though you will not see all that Carla sees; the author has, of course, taken a few liberties. For many years it was possible to squeeze past a metal gate, long wrenched open, and wander at will through the eerie building. When last visited it was being restored to create a local museum, though like many other cultural works in Greece this project may have been put on hold.
