Summer in Orcus is a portal fantasy novel by T. Kingfisher (Ursula Vernon).
Summer is an eleven-year-old girl who lives with her overprotective mother. An encounter with the witch Baba Yaga results in her being sent on an adventure to the world of Orcus, which is threatened by the warlord Zultan and the mysterious Queen-In-Chains.
The book was originally published as a free web serial, but the online accessible version has since been taken down. It can still be read via the Internet Archive.
This novel contains examples of:
- Arc Symbol: More of an Arc Color, but when Summer seeks guidance on her quest at the Wheystation, a prophetic cheese indicates that her path will be marked in turquoise; several times, she encounters objects or creatures with a turquoise color somewhere about them and knows she's on the right path.
- Be Careful What You Wish For: Summer is told a tale about a woman who wished to be a dragon, only to find that her dragon body's instincts were stronger than her human willpower and she was unable to stop herself going on a rampage that destroyed her home city and everyone in it.
- Body Horror: Wight-flies, which grow in other creatures and eventually hatch out. They normally grow in sheep; humans who drink wight-liquor eventually metamorphose into larger, more powerful wight-flies (as eventually happens to Grub). Zultan Houndbreaker, a Dog who has been using wight-liquor to extend their life says they won't molt into a fly, but their body is riddled with wight-flukes that die in their flesh.
- Carnivore Confusion: Summer meets a talking weasel and a talking bird, and the latter politely but firmly declines to help the weasel find an egg to eat, and Summer finds herself wondering if there are any animals in Orcus that don't talk, "and whether that made it awkward at mealtimes."
- Cheesy Moon: One of the exotic cheeses at the Wheystation is a green cheese labeled "Fresh from the slopes of Mare Imbrium".
- Chekhov's Gun: The lock from Summer's back gate, which she puts in her pocket when she sneaks out, ends up playing a significant role in the climax.
- Chronic Backstabbing Disorder: The antelope women are a group of tricksters who glory in causing chaos. The antelope woman Summer meets is very open about being completely untrustworthy — indeed, she betrays pretty much every party that she is involved with.
- Cool Mask: Zultan Houndbreaker wears a helm shaped like the head of a snarling hound, which commemorates his genocide of the Dogs and hides the fact that he is himself a Dog.
- Eyes Are Mental: Summer meets a dragon trapped in a human body, who has reptilian eyes. Later, Summer meets the human trapped in the dragon's body and realizes who she is because she has human eyes.
- Fantastic Fromage: The Wheystation sells "every kind of cheese you can imagine", including green moon cheese and cheese made from the milk of harpy, manticore, and unicorn, in addition to the more mundane varieties. Some of the exotic cheeses also have exotic effects; for instance the manticore cheese that was ripened on grass where heroes have slept bolsters the courage of whoever eats it, and the harpy cheese that was aged in moonlight and washed in the pool of the Oracle can tell the future.
- Feather Fingers: Averted. The narration makes a point of mentioning that bird wings aren't manipulatory appendages; their feet double as hands instead.
- For the Evulz: The villain's plot revolves around destroying beautiful things in the world. Not for any particular reason, just that they're wonderful and ruining them will hurt people.
- Funny Animal: The population of Orcus includes a nation of anthropomorphic birds. There was also a nation of anthropomorphic dogs, but they were wiped out by Zultan in the backstory.
- Genre Savvy: Summer has read a lot of Trapped in Another World novels, so she has some idea what to expect. The extent to which her foreknowledge is actually helpful varies.
- Guardian of the Multiverse: The Dog Soldiers tried this in a small way, setting up an enclave in another world as peacekeepers. It ended badly due to treachery.
- Hive Mind: Reginald Hoopoe travels with a flock of valet-birds, who share a flock-mind — they're individually not much more intelligent than normal birds, but the more of them there are in close proximity, the more intelligent they all become. The Queen-in-Chains is attended by an enormous hive of wasps who function much the same way, though on a much larger scale — there's enough wasps to create a truly deific intelligence.
- Intelligent Gerbil: The birds' society bears a considerable resemblance to Regency England, but with details that reflect the fact that they're birds.
- Laser-Guided Amnesia: Discussed. Summer knows that Trapped in Another World stories often end with the protagonist being made to forget the whole thing, and is determined that she doesn't want it to happen to her, even after Baba Yaga points out that it means having memories she will never be able to discuss with anyone else for the rest of her life.
- Last of His Kind:
- Zultan Houndbreaker is notorious for his genocide of an entire peaceful and enlightened race of anthropomorphic Dogs. In his youth, Reginald's father journeyed with a Dog that believed he was the last — still possessed of the same goodness of his people, but old and sorrowful, and seeking a way back to the world the Dogs came from so he could die there with the rest of his kin.
- Summer eventually learns that there is one more Dog left alive when she sees Zultan without the face-concealing helmet that he always wears in public.
- The Legend of Chekhov: The cautionary tale of the woman who wished to be a dragon isn't just a colorful background detail.
- Literal Metaphor: In Orcus, "house hunting" is the profession of tracking and trapping wild houses, and breaking them in to be sold on the domestic market.
- Magic Feather: Proof that describing something impressively can, in the right circumstances, be more important than the actual effect. A lock from another world, which no one in this universe has the key to, is an ordinary lock from Summer's garden, easily breakable with a little effort. But it's the idea of a lock that cannot be opened that is most important to a Reluctant Monster who wants nothing more than to be sealed away for all time.
- Monster Protection Racket: A complex example, since the one being 'protected' is in fact the Reluctant Monster themselves. They are being threatened that, unless they help the villain with his schemes, he will unleash them to cause even greater destruction.
- The Multiverse: This is specifically a different universe than Black Dogs, but various details like the presence of Dog Soldiers from another world imply that it is part of the same larger multiverse.
- My Beloved Smother: Let's just say there's a reason Summer's heart's desire takes the form of an extremely dangerous quest in another world.
- Our Werewolves Are Different: In Orcus, werewolves are wolves who turn into other things, and not always at full moons; mention is made of one who turns into a skylark on solstices. They are still weak to silver, however, which burns them and removes their ability to speak. The one Summer meets turns into a cottage, and is in peril from house hunters.
- Public Domain Character: Summer's chance encounter with Baba Yaga is what sets her on her adventure. Luckily for Summer, Baba Yaga happens to be in a good mood. Luckier, Summer is very polite and well behaved. Baba Yaga, for her part, is visibly struggling to contain her more vicious instincts but seems to want to be the good guy this time.
- Reluctant Monster: The Queen-in-Chains. Once a poor and powerless human girl, she was granted an ill-conceived wish that swapped her body with that of a dragon's. Unfortunately, a human mind is too small to control a dragon body, and her body is inclined to rampage and devour without her consent — everything she does is so she can stay locked away and not have to destroy anything else.
- Sealed Evil in a Can: The Queen-in-Chains has, fittingly enough, been chained up in a remote location guarded by an enormous hive of wasps. This is by her own choice — she's a human trapped in a dragon's body who chose to be sealed away so her body wouldn't rampage across the countryside destroying and devouring everything in its path. Zultan Houndbreaker's threats to unchain her are what drives her to send her wasps out to poison the wonders of the world, and it's the reinforcing of the seal that gives her the peace of mind to go back to sleep.
- Sliding Scale of Anthropomorphism: Examples run across the scale. Summer's weasel companion is an otherwise ordinary weasel who can speak. Glorious is a huge talking wolf who turns into a cottage at night, but is otherwise ordinarily wolf-shaped. The bird characters are all normal-shaped birds, though they're generally larger than normal birds and can speak and wear clothes. Before their destruction, the Dogs had doglike features and faces, but walked on two legs and had hands.
- Species Surname: Reginald Hoopoe and the other inhabitants of the nation of birds.
- Taking You with Me: Zultan Houndbreaker attempts to drag Summer off a bridge with him when he goes. The weasel bites his hand and forces him to let go.
- Talking Animal: Baba Yaga gives Summer a talking weasel as a traveling companion. It tells her not to expect magic or great wisdom from it, because it's a completely ordinary weasel; all weasels can talk, it says, it's just that humans aren't very good at listening. Summer later meets a civilization of talking birds.
- Trapped in Another World: Summer is sent to the magical land of Orcus in search of her heart's desire. While she isn't trapped there — nothing is preventing her from turning around and leaving the way she came, and she's offered a couple chances to turn back — she still sees her adventure through, and the ending suggests that she may return to Orcus in the future.
The author's notes state that the purpose of writing Summer in Orcus was for Ursula Vernon to have her own take on writing this genre of story. - The Trickster: Antelope women are not to be trusted. They're tricksters, and they have a grudge against the world so all their tricks have some unpleasant end.
- The Wise Woman: Features none other than Baba Yaga taking this role for a change, sending Summer on her adventure and giving her some good advice as well as a helpful (if snarky) weasel as a familiar. And while she clearly struggles with her desire to eat Summer, she manages to keep it under control.
- The Worm That Walks: The wasps that attend the Queen-in-Chains can band together to make person-shaped puppets to communicate with others. Their puppets can speak, in a buzzing sort of fashion, but have quite a bit of the Uncanny Valley about them nonetheless.
- The Wonderland: Orcus, a land with nations of sapient birds, trees with leaves that turn into animals when they fall, towns built around and on enormous tortoises, and more.
- Year Inside, Hour Outside: Discussed. Summer doesn't know whether this will apply to her sojourn in Orcus, and worries about it a bit before deciding that there's nothing she can do about it and she'll just have to deal with it as it comes. In the end, it turns out that Baba Yaga has arranged for her to get back immediately after she left.