This week Rue Allyn joins us with some literary facts behind her fiction: why she named her female character after a male mongoose.
According to Google’s AI, “Rikky is a feminine name that evolved as a diminutive or variant spelling of Ricki, which itself originated as a nickname for names like Erica, Richelle, or Patricia.” However, the heroine in True Love’s Kiss is definitely named in honor of a male mongoose.
Inspiration for Romantasy stories (or any fiction for that matter) can come from some rather strange sources. True Love’s Kiss—my novella in the Bluestocking Belles collection Moonlight Madness—is a combination of the Victorian version of Snow White and Kipling’s Rikki TiKKi Tavi. Most of you know Snow White fairly well. However, some of you may be less familiar with Kipling’s tale. So, here’s a bit about Rikki Tikki Tavi paraphrased from Google’s AI
Original illustration by Henry William Drake from Kipling’s Jungle Book
Rikki-Tikki-Tavi is a classic short story by Rudyard Kipling about a brave Indian mongoose who, after being rescued from a flood, protects the rescuers, British family in India, from two deadly cobras, Nag and Nagaina. The story, originally published in The Jungle Book, follows Rikki-Tikki-Tavi—the mongoose—as he uses his natural instincts and courage to fight the snakes, ultimately saving the family and becoming their garden’s fearless guardian.
Key aspects of the story and how I adapted them.
- Protagonist (Heroine): Rikki-Tikki-Tavi, a young, courageous mongoose. In my story Rikki Tikki Tavi becomes a young tuatha warrior maiden named Rikki Tabormaen de Aether
- Antagonists: Nag and Nagaina, two venomous cobras who want to take over the garden and in the process plot to kill the child, Teddy. In True Love’s Kiss this couple becomes a single villain who steals young children—a favorite meal of demons—and trades the children to the demons in exchange for magical powers. The goal is different. The snakes want the garden for their home. My villain wants power. However, the method is very similar. The death of a child will achieve the desired goal. Another aspect of Kipling’s tale is the villain’s use of poison in some of his weapons. This poison is a primary link between all three stories—Rikki Tikki Tavi (the cobras are poisonous), Snow White (the evil queen employs poison against Snow White) and True Love’s Kiss (the villain’s use of poison on his weapons).
- Setting: A bungalow named Garden Grange and its garden in India. I transformed this ‘garden’ setting where snakes and mongeese are likely to reside into a Scottish forest where fantastical creatures like my heroine and villain are likely to appear.
- Plot: For Kipling’s story. The mongoose, Rikki-Tikki-Tavi (heroine) is rescued by a family (including a boy named Teddy) and, after a brief scare, embraces his duty to protect them from the cobras, who plot to kill the family. Rikki defeats the snakes in a series of battles, including a final confrontation with Nagaina over her last egg. For True Love’s Kiss, we skip the initial half concerning the flood and the mongoose’s rescue to focus on saving the missing, endangered children.
- Themes: Courage, instinct, loyalty, and the conflict between humans and the unseen or ‘other’ world.
- Literary style: Features fantasy beings— human. tuatha, and firbolgs with fully developed goals, motivations, and conflicts, using a traditional, 20th/21st century romance genre stranger to lovers trope.
- Hero: Since Kipling’s story includes only one heroic figure, my hero is not modeled on anything in that tale. Instead, Hugh is a combination of the hunter and the prince characters in Snow White. And of course, it is his kiss that is antidote to the poison threatening Rikki’s life in the story’s black moment. (Or is it? You’ll have to read the story to find out whose kiss might really be responsible for saving Rikki’s life.)
If you are interested in Kipling’s mongoose fable you can find free digital copies from Project Gutenberg.
About Moonlight Madness by the Bluestocking Belles and True Love’s Kiss by Rue Allyn
When the year grows colder and the veil between worlds grows thin—or so they say—comes the time for stories to make you shiver. The Bluestocking Belles bring ghosts, and ghoulies, and spirits of all kinds, each leading to love, the greatest madness of all.
Jude Knight – Moonlight Becomes You in which a lady sees, but cannot hear, a ghost who attempts to warn her about a man who will die if she doesn’t find him soon.
Alina K. Field – The Duke, the Diamond, and the Ghastly Ghoul in which a house party at a haunted abbey brings together a duke, a ghost-hunting lady, and two ghosts determined to right old wrongs.
Aileen Fish – Mad about the Marquess in which a lady known for communing with the dead is forced to bring unwanted messages to the marquess next door from his dead father.
Rue Allyn – True Love’s Kiss in which a hunter seeking his kidnapped son in the forest stumbles upon a fairy with a similar mission. Together they may succeed if they stop squabbling.
Caroline Warfield – Not Again, Harry in which a lady takes shelter in a creepy old house only to find haunting, prowlers, strange artifacts, and a man from her past. A wish-granting mouse complicates it all.
Sherry Ewing – Finding My Way To You in which a ghost meets a determined lady who leaps at a chance to alter his past in spite of his efforts to convince her to leave the past where it belongs.
Barbara Monajem – The Haunted Hoyden in which two friendly ghosts help a lady to rescue a handsome, wounded man—who proves to be just what she needs to escape a dastardly plot.
Elizabeth Donne – Always With You in which a man pressed-ganged into service in the Royal Navy promises his wife he will come back to her. Whether it’s in this life or the next remains to be seen.
About the Author
Award winning romance author, Rue Allyn has a lifelong passion for happy ever after. She lives south of the border with her husband of more than forty years and their cat, Tanto. She has two sons and is a proud veteran of the US Navy. She writes heart melting romance in all sub-genres, but her favorite is historical romance, especially medieval. Subscribe to Rue’s News where you may learn more about Rue and receive a FREE download. https://rueallyn.com/mailing-list