Q: Do you consider Benighted to be a horror novel, or a dark fantasy novel?
KW: Neither, really. Describing a book as this or that genre is useful mostly for book sales reps: they’ve got a fixed amount of time to convince booksellers to buy copies of each title on their list, and if they can say “This is that kind of book and it’ll go on those shelves over there,” it makes things easier. What it doesn’t do is make things better for either readers or writers. Readers who say “I don’t read chick lit” or “I only like science fiction” are missing out on books they might love if they saw them in another cover on a different shelf; a writer who says “I’d love to throw in a supernatural twist, but I can’t because I’m supposed to be a thriller writer” is stopping himself from using all of his imagination. I’d rather just skip the whole issue and call it a Kit Whitfield book.
Q: There is apparently a mental illness known as lycanthropy. What is that?
KW: Basically, the delusion that you really do turn into an animal. People have recurrent fits where they’re convinced that they are no longer a human being but have transformed into a wolf, tiger, or whatever. Nowadays it’s seen as a psychotic illness rather than a capital offense, fortunately. There are a number of medical conditions some people think may have to do with the werewolf myth; porphyria is another one, because it can produce an allergy to sunlight, afflictions of the skin, hair growth on the face, reddish teeth and fingernails, and other symptoms that in really severe cases can make the sufferer look not unlike a movie werewolf—though that doesn’t necessarily mean that the legend originated from porphyria; I suspect it’s more likely that the symptoms of porphyria can remind some people of the legend.
It’s interesting to note that nowadays there’s also a subculture of people who identify themselves as “therianthropes” and claim some kind of spiritual connection with animal-human transformations. I don’t really know enough about that to comment; I gather there’s debate about whether there’s a connection with clinical lycanthropy or whether they’re separate issues, but you’d need to be either a psychiatrist or a member of the subculture yourself to have anything like an informed opinion, and I’m neither. Legally, at least, as long as “therians” aren’t attacking anybody, it’s their own business. Which is a definite step forward from Inquisitional thinking, I’d say, because they would have been in deep trouble with the witch burners. But let’s not kid ourselves that we’re so advanced. Our grandchildren will only laugh at us later.
READING GROUP QUESTIONS
AND TOPICS FOR DISCUSSION
1. Have you ever considered yourself to be part of a minority group? How so?
2. Does Lola indulge in too much self-pity, or is her self-protective nature a believable result of her upbringing?
3. Do you think Paul’s politics influenced his decision to begin a relationship with Lola?
4. Lola and Paul’s relationship seems hopeful at first, though by the story’s end it’s unclear whether they will be able to rekindle it. Do you think they have a chance?
5. How much do you blame Ally for his teenage experiences with Lola? How much do you blame Lola for how their relationship ends?
6. Lola’s mother is never seen in the book, but it’s clear she has little idea how to cope with her non-lyco daughter. Have you had an issue with your mother that has kept you further apart than you’d like?
7. How would you relate to a daughter like Lola?
8. Lola’s sister, Becca, is a much more sympathetic character than their mother seems to be, but she pushes Lola away in her time of greatest need. Was Becca right to turn away her sister in favor of protecting her child?
9. The “beast within” is a concept that has led to a number of interesting movies, from The Wolf Man, starring Lon Chaney, to John Landis’s An American Werewolf in London. Many of these films portray the werewolf as a tragic hero. Benighted takes quite a different point of view. How would moviegoers react to a film version?*
10. What kind of story would a male author have told about this world?
11. Lola experiences her society as very badly run. Could it be managed better? How would you organize such a society?
12. Where do you stand on Parkinson’s experiments? Do you think he makes any good points?
13. Which character do you identify with most, and why?
FOOTNOTES
*Note: Warner Bros. recently bought the film rights to Benighted.
Return to text.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
KIT WHITFIELD lives in London; Benighted is her first novel. She has trained in her time as a masseur and a chef, and has worked as a website editor, quote hunter, toy-shop clerk, and publisher. She spends most of her free time writing, reading, or gazing at the animals in London Zoo.
Benighted is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
Copyright © 2006 by Kit Whitfield
Reading group guide copyright © 2006 by Random House, Inc.
All rights reserved.
Published in the United States by Del Rey Books, an imprint of The Random House Publishing Group, a division of Random House, Inc., New York. Published in Great Britain as Bareback by Jonathan Cape, an imprint of the Random House Group Limited, London.
DEL REY is a registered trademark and the Del Rey colophon is a trademark of Random House, Inc.
www.delreybooks.com
eISBN: 978-0-345-49550-1
v3.0
Benighted Page 46