Audition For the Fox is easily one of my best-of-year books, the kind of instant fave that you shelve behind your heart forever. So of course I jumped at the chance to interview the author, Martin Cahill!

Audition for the Fox by Martin Cahill
Genres: Adult, Fantasy
Representation: Brown cast, major nonbinary character, secondary sapphic character, secondary disabled character
Published on: 16th September 2025
Goodreads

In this stellar debut fantasy, a trickster Fox god challenges an underachieving acolyte to save herself by saving her own ancestors. But are Nesi and her new friends from the past prepared to defeat the ferocious Wolfhounds of Zemin?

“If you love my worlds, you’re going to love Cahill’s: stunning imagination, daring premises, and deep character dives. A new author to watch.”—N. K. Jemisin, author of the Broken Earth series

[STARRED REVIEW] “A marvelous and heartbreaking tale.”—Library Journal

Nesi is desperate to earn the patronage of one of the Ninety-Nine Pillars of Heaven. As a child with godly blood in her, if she cannot earn a divine chaperone, she will never be allowed to leave her temple home. But with ninety-six failed auditions and few options left, Nesi makes a risky prayer to T’sidaan, the Fox of Tricks.

In folk tales, the Fox is a lovable prankster. But despite their humor and charm, T’sidaan, and their audition, is no joke. They throw Nesi back in time three hundred years, when her homeland is occupied by the brutal Wolfhounds of Zemin.

Now, Nesi must learn a trickster’s guile to snatch a fortress from the disgraced and exiled 100th Pillar: The Wolf of the Hunt.

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You can read my full thoughts on Audition here, but – seriously, people, this one’s something really special.

This interview has been edited slightly for ease of reading, and for brevity (it would be roughly three times as long, and chock full of spoilers, if I’d included all of it!)

The Interview

Sia: Okay, easiest question first: how would you introduce yourself – and Audition For The Fox! – for readers who don’t know who you are? (‘Easiest question’ was a lie, obviously, let’s do the hardest one first so afterwards they only get easier!)

Martin: Thanks again for having me, and thanks again for your enthusiasm and support for me and Audition For The Fox! I’m so happy to be here today!

So, introduction: My name is Martin Cahill, please feel free to call me Marty! I’m a 35 year old neurodivergent writer living in the Hudson Valley. I’ve been writing for over half my life and sold my first story when I was 23. Since then, I’ve had the pleasure and fortune to publish over 20 short stories across a myriad of wonderful magazines, digital and physical. I also have spent a long time in non-fiction, specifically essays and reviews for Reactor, B&N SFF Blog, Book Riot, Strange Horizons, and more. I’ve also been fortunate enough to work in various IPs such as Batman, D&D, and Critical Role, as well as some actual game writing and game design, with more on the horizon. My latest projects on that front include the story, “Under Golden Boughs,” collected in Vox Machina: Stories Untold and Critical Role: Armory of Heroes. Audition For The Fox is my first fiction book and my debut novella.

This novella took over six years to get right; tried on my formats and narrative forms until it decided it looked best in novella, (and I think looks quite dapper). I was trying to explore the whole purpose behind trickster gods; across civilizations and cultures, there’s always been a lil scamp or a dogged bastard or a righteous gremlin or a pompous ragamuffin who is there to throw wrench after wrench into the works; sometimes the wrench is just hilarious. Sometimes the wrench breaks something awful. Sometimes the wrench frees something in pain. And sometimes the wrench is just a wrench and while you were looking at it gum up your works, some tricky little so and so is right behind you, tying your shoes together. From a cultural point of view, it makes sense; sometimes not all goes according to plan, but it’s not always an ultimately evil being who is the cause of that. Sometimes, you need to make sense of shenanigans in life, and who better than tricksters? But their narrative purpose, THAT is what I was caught on. Why do tricksters exist? Why do they have their own stories? What are they for beyond the jokes, the entertainment? And it was then a flash of red-orange caught my eye. And I followed the Fox into the underbrush, intent on figuring it out with them. So far, it’s been an incredible journey. And it has grown beyond my intentions. A story of failure, anxiety, oppression, resistance, and how to fight back with the tools at hand, Audition For The Fox outgrew my own hopes for it, and I’m so proud of what it turned into.

Sia: You managed to answer something like five of the questions I prepared for this already!

Speaking of heroes… Right at the beginning of Audition, your main character Nesi has to choose which of the gods she’s going to audition for next: the god of war, the god of assassins, or T’sidaan. And that feels very deliberate? Traditional fantasy heroes tend to be the kind who would pick war or assassins; T’sidaan is such a stark contrast to that. It’s like you’re telling the reader right away that we’re going off the beaten path here. (I approve immensely.) Did you set out to write a story that goes so hard against genre expectations? Or did that just sort of happen as you were writing?

Martin: hmmmm . . . little bit of column A, little bit of column B! At first, it was meant to illustrate which Pillars out of 99 has Nesi been avoiding for years now, and having a sense of her character, yes, warfare and brutally killing people in cold-blood were just not things that appealed to her. The Lion and the Serpent have their place, of course; they exist to hold up the world and their parts of the world in specific. But Nesi just doesn’t have the stomach for it. And with the Fox, it really came down to simply not knowing what it could look like; as we learn later, the Fox hasn’t had an acolyte or an audition since before she was born. So it really was the final choice of, “Well, this should be better than war and murder, yes?” Readers will have to determine that for themselves; the Fox has plenty of tales with blood on their muzzle, even if Nesi isn’t quite the acolyte for that yet. (Future books might dig into that a little, he said with authorial wink).

Sia: Honestly, that makes perfect sense: I’d have chosen the Fox too (though I’d have been a lot more worried going in than Nesi was!)

Martin: Please include this if you see fit to, but I’ve really loved your note of how little violence there is in the resistance of the Zemini occupiers, and I wanted to speak to that real quick, if that’s okay! Because I totally agree with you; tricks and fear tactics and such can only do so much. And I don’t want to downplay the brutality and violence that was very much a part of the Occupation. But as I was writing and revising and revising, especially with the world in the mostly horrendous state it is and Nesi being who she is, I chose to emphasize that her path forward in her audition and her role in history, was to engage in as little bloodshed as possible. In my mind, there were MANY, many battles and skirmishes and conflicts chock full of resistance as violence and meeting oppressors with spear and shield, and again, those are valid. But for me, I wanted to show one of the ways that was accomplished without murdering every Zemini in sight. 

Sia: I had the violence thing in my list of questions, I promise! But yes, this was the one part of the book I struggled with. It wasn’t the lack of violence that bothered me – I’m very glad to not have to read that! – so much as, the book edged towards ‘violence/murder is always wrong’ at times.

I do think it was implied that there was going to be violence elsewhere in this world against the Occupation, later. But I just get wary when I see anything that sounds like ‘you shouldn’t meet oppression with violence’, especially because it’s historically a very white, Western idea that gets thrown at minorities and colonised people. But as someone who just DNFed a book because I couldn’t cope with the honest depiction of real historical evils…I’m still grateful you didn’t go there with Audition. It would have changed the tone entirely. And I think we do NEED resistance stories that can be inspiring without being bleak. I think you balanced the awfulness of the compound really well with…optimism? Optimism with teeth, maybe. Trickster-optimism!

Martin: you are 100 percent correct that it is a VERY privileged and ignorant position (aka White and Western) to claim violence doesn’t help, because sometimes it is the ONLY way to stand up for yourself, your cause, and your people, and it can often be the line across which your oppressors actually start taking you seriously. But at the same time, exactly, this is not a Game of Thrones style story where disembowelment gets pages of visceral detail dedicated to it, and that level of horror is indulged. I did my best to strike a balance of “Occupation is real, violence against minorities, the marginalized, and the colonised is VERY real and those things exist here in this story, but the way Nesi and T’sidaan (at this point in their life) are trying to address the Occupation doesn’t fully rely on that same level of violence as the Zemini at the fortress.” I have no doubt I didn’t do quite as good a job as I could have and I will learn from this and do better, but at the same time, meeting violence and brutality with tricks, humor, community, being kind and being clever were very much a choice. The violence does exist (as you said, the ending certainly has a lot of uh, violent implications as well as the coming years of conflict), but in this mode of somewhat-fable, somewhat-epic, it was definitely a choice not to focus on it solely. As for a certain spoiler-y moment towards the end, I totally agree on your thoughts, and again, will always listen and do better as I continue to write, but the hope at least was, if people are making declarative statements, those are centered as best as possible in the character’s thoughts and current reality, and not a universal declaration of morality in this world or our world. 

And please feel free to edit as much as you’d like the above, and this, because I will say: I promise by the Pillars, I am not trying to defend myself or explain away anything. Your feelings as a reader are 110% legit and I love that you’ve engaged with the text at this level, and I can only hope others do the same! This story is not mine anymore, and I never want to be one of those writers who was like ::pushes glasses up the bridge of my nose:: WELL, ACTUALLY–lol; that is not how you endear yourself readers, and it’s also not how you become a better writer! Being a better writer means being a better listener, and I’ve loved how your questions and thoughts have made me think of the text in a new way, too! Like I said, I can only listen, engage, and learn to do better without ego or certainty. 

Sia: I know I feel a lot better about it, a lot less uncomfortable about it, after reading your answers and thinking about the book some more. So genuinely, thank you for being willing to talk about it and explain your thoughts and intentions. I do think most of it came through in Audition.

But let’s leave the heavier topics for now and dig in to the fun stuff! Like your WORLDBUILDING, because SIR, your MYTHOS, I was swooning at it the whole way through the book! Where on EARTH (or off it???) were you pulling influences or inspiration from? How did you go about building the pantheon, for example?

Martin: I am so, so glad you enjoyed the worldbuilding in this world, and the Pantheon and the creation myth, all of it. For the Pillars as a whole, 99 Pillars of Heaven is just one of those fantasy terms I threw in on the first draft, and I knew I had a Fox showing up, and then the idea of auditioning for a Whale god was interesting to me, and then we met the Lion and the Serpent, and soon I went, “Huh, I think this is working,” and then I went, “Well, shit, I need to name all of them now, don’t I?” and we went tumbling down from there! As for the creation myth, I realized I had written the Clay and Cloud tales before the creation myth, and so the implication that humanity was formed FROM clay and clouds made me think, “well, where the hell did that material come from?” and I just really loved the idea of a universe not built from scratch but sort of “angel in the stone,” carved away, so that from the detritus, you have humanity. And I love that it is three of the smallest who brought the universe into being and began to shape it, and I love that it is one of the smallest who suggests creating humanity not out of any ego or desire to be worshipped but to learn from when they return to clay and cloud once more. (If you can’t tell, I’m an Invy’thi stan haha). 

Sia: I absolutely LOVED that that the first Pillars were such typically-underappreciated beasties – they’re not animal forms that get considered big and glorious by humans most of the time, and I really liked that. (Oh fear not, I stan Invy’thi right along with you!)

Martin: I love the Three Builders as well, and they ARE underappreciated little friends in my opinion, too. Who else but the smallest could dream reality into being? Who could find the strength to shape it, the ethos to focus? Just a little shout-out to the smallest and unregarded, playing a little with themes that Nesi is a part of =]

For inspiration, I was mostly pulling from animism in total, that the world and each aspect of it contains some spirituality, some divine connection, but when it came to certain Pillars, it was individuals that got more direct inspiration. The Raven has big Morrigan energy with a splash of a gentler Anubis. The Spider definitely has roots in Arachne’s pride but became her own being the more T’sidaan messed with her. T’sidaan themself, an unnamed Pillar who appears later in the story has some Sekhmet to them with a dash of old Mesopotamia. In this story, the Fox has a lot of Anansi by way of Loki, and big shout out to the Fox from Worlds Beyond Number, whose own trickster energy and matter-of-fact slyness informed the final revision of T’sidaan because at the end of the day, sometimes a Fox has to be a Fox, and that means a meal, warmth, or outthinking something much larger than you. And in the end, if I did my job right, you’ll see shades of those inspirations, but my hope is the Pillars really are themselves in the tapestry of the world. (And fingers crossed, if we get a sequel someday, I want to showcase how the rest of the world sees the Pillars, because it’s really only Oranoya and Zemin that see them in an animalistic concept; Qaffinu interprets them as more ecological/nature-based gods, while others interpret them more as concepts; it’s a fun time! That, and what does worship look like a century from Nesi’s time?)

Sia: …Listen, I was already pining for a sequel, but I’m going to have to write Tachyon paper letters demanding one now because DIFFERENT COUNTRIES SEE THE PILLARS THAT DIFFERENTLY?! SIR. SIR IT’S *MEAN* TO TEASE WORLDBUILDING NERDS, OKAY. #RUDE! 

Martin: Ha, I hope we can get into it! The Oranoyan on their supercontinent have majorly shaped the Pillars because of their bestial worship and understanding, but yes, other cultures/countries/communities think of them in different ways and thus see them differently. The Fox of Tricks can sometimes be Coyote-Grinning or Hangman’s Joke or Rainbow-Shadow-Fang-Twirling, depending on the people. And we haven’t even gotten into the various Saints of the Pillars, acolytes who start getting candles lit to them in their names . . . feels like good fodder for a sequel :D

Sia: I can see some of the influences on some of the Pillars, but I think they are all very clearly themselves. T’sidaan especially. How long has the Fox been trickster-ing away in your brain, anyway? Are they a character who’s been with you a long time?

Martin: I’m glad each Pillar stands on their own! I do love each of them for their own reasons, even Nera’je, poor spider. If we get a sequel/another story, we’ll definitely have a bunch more to spend time with as well as one of the Dragons of Chaos . . .

Yeah, T’sidaan has been with me for a long time now. I think they first showed up around 2017? Just sort of snuffling in the underbrush, rolling through the leaves, sneezing at inopportune times, poking me to start their story. And then in 2018/2019, they started to crystallize into who they are now!

Sia: Which is a trickster! I really loved your approach to the Trickster archetype, by the way. I’ve been fascinated by the moral ambiguity of trickster figures for ages, and your Fox, T’sidaan, is even pretty heroic, if maybe not in the usual sense of the word!

Martin: I agree, it does feel like a lot of tricksters have their own ever-shifting perspective on good and bad, but I do think a central thing that ties them together is a sense of justice. To care when no one cares. To hold those accountable that no other can hold to account. To thwart injustice or cruelty or abuse. And yes, sometimes that can be to amusing and silly ends, (you don’t even want to know the incredibly petty grudge the Fox has against their brother, the Pangolin), but I think they find themselves in stories as a way to address powerlessness. What I, and I think many of us, wouldn’t give to have the Fox in my back pocket to cause fascists and wicked politicians migraines and tie their shoes together and make their teeth fall out of their head on live television. I do think you’d have to be careful though with the Fox in your back pocket; like those children’s cautionary tales, if you give a Fox a pocket to live in, they’re going to want a snack, and then perhaps a drink, and then perhaps, maybe a party? It could and will easily get out of hand.   

Sia: Tricksters bring justice when nobody else can; it’s absolutely part of why they’re so vital. But I think the making-people-laugh is almost as important a part as the justice. Making people laugh is really powerful – not just, making them laugh AT scary people, but making them laugh when otherwise things are quite bleak. Those little moments of brightness, when you’re in an awful situation, keep you going. And it made me so happy that that was a big, important part of Audition! Like – okay, they don’t forward the escape plan. But if you don’t keep people’s souls alive, there’s no one to ENACT the escape plan, is there? Because everyone’s dead inside. There needs to be…be reasons to be glad you’re alive. Tricksters are so good for that!

Martin: You’re totally right about not just defending the inherent dignity of life, but also the cherishing of what it means to enjoy life, too! And not just laughter, but those things that are inherent TO that very dignity: joy, community, kindness, comfort, all of these mean something, even if it can only be found or created in small moments. That was a very important part of this story, and something my editor and I decided to really double down on in the edit towards the final version of the story. Sometimes that’s a smile or a bad joke, and sometimes it’s a pastry or an extra blanket or letting others rest. That’s how the bastards win: if you keep people underwater for long enough, drown them in misery, exhaustion, and only alleviate either when they stop struggling, eventually they’ll forget they ever knew what sweet air felt like. In many ways, fascists and bullies and monsters use the tools of a trickster for evil ends; because if you can trick people into rewriting their own reality with yours, then they’ll start to choose it over the consequences of denying that reality. Part of me thinks now that’s why T’sidaan is so invested in the Oranoyan plight during the Occupation, because it’s a reminder of what happens when a trickster’s tools lack a trickster’s heart. And so these little reminders, not only bring the comfort and dignity mentioned, but they also help deny the reality enforced by the Zemini without the Oranoyan risking their safety and each other.

Sia: That is an EXCELLENT point, that fascism uses a lot of the same tools as tricksters! It absolutely does, and it makes perfect sense to me that T’sidaan would Object Vehemently to that. (As they should!) But that means T’sidaan and Nesi’s efforts – the bad jokes and extra blankets – aren’t just denying the Zemini ‘reality’, they’re reinforcing the TRUE reality. And now I think maybe that’s another way of explaining what tricksters do, actually? They reinforce or expose reality when others get lost in their own prideful delusions; they remind people who think they’re better than everyone else that actually, they’re not. Which I think came through very clearly in the fables of the Fox that you included in Audition!

Martin: Just another reason why fascism is so insidious; it uses the tools of storytelling for its own ends. And it doesn’t have to be smart or clever or subtle. It only needs everyone to be saying the same thing and saying it loudly. Definitely I think another reason why those small moments resonate so much, because they’re also reminders of the cultural, social, and religious parts of the Oranoyan way of life. So yes, definitely having Nesi and the Fox each contributing to rebuilding the story of the prisoners, but also objecting to the reality imposed on them by the Zemini, each part is just as important as the other.

Sia: I’m really glad you guys focused on that in final edits, because it comes through beautifully and it’s really, REALLY wonderful to read. Those ‘small moments’ elevate Audition, I think.

Martin: Thank you! Me too. I had a few instances but big shout out to Jaymee for her thoughts on expanding that level of care and those small moments of care and comfort. It was also indicative of Nesi in general; she has some endurance and some magic from her great-great-grandfather, but she isn’t someone who can take on guards or intimidate or make demands. And so a lot of how she realizes she can give back is by helping create those small moments. 

Sia: I actually really liked that despite being a demi-god Nesi ISN’T some big dramatic hero in the typical sense. It made it much easier to relate to her – and to see her as an example, you know? I think a lot of readers will be able to look at her and think, oh, I could do some of this too! She’s inspiring in a way that an action hero isn’t (because, uh, most of us cannot be action heroes!) and her NOT being the usual kind of superhero is a vital part of that. So good call!

Martin: Thanks for seeing that in Nesi. I always wanted her to feel like just another young person struggling with issues of growing up, self-worth, deciding who to be . . . the only “super” thing about her is that her great-grandfather’s blood affords her a little hardiness (think of a 22 year old person in a game of D&D having a Constitution score of 19 or something, ha). To be honest, she’s not even demi-god-ish, (those are our saints, to be discussed below). She’s like . . . 20% godly, ha. Now, depending on training and her life to come, if she works at it, gets her great-grandfather’s blessing, etc., maybe that might change. But yeah, Nesi was always just meant to be a person going through it, who when push came to shove, just had a bit more of an ability to push or take a shove.

Sia: A more writing-craft question for you: HOW did you resist putting in/explaining more of your worldbuilding??? The effect is perfect – the world FEELS immense without drowning the reader in info – but I wouldn’t have been able to resist explaining the saints, for example!

Martin: Sincerely, thank you for that note on worldbuilding! It is one of my favorite parts of writing and it is one of the toughest to get right. I love an en media res story, and it’s funny, I was rereading the beginning the other day and I was like, “Damn, I really don’t explain anything, do I?” But, the hope is that there’s enough context and character and plot drive to get the reader to stick around long enough to get us back to Nesi at the temple. It’s a tricky balance, but for me, it helped to have years to edit this for example, AND when in doubt, stay in your character’s point of view. BE them as much as you can. I have many years of comedy improv under my belt, and when you’re making a character to play, the rule is to play them to the height of their intelligence. So if you’re playing a doctor for example, you won’t pretend a stethoscope is like a pair of binoculars or be surprised to have one. And for Nesi, she is a temple kid with very few friends, a big heart, bigger anxiety, and she’s kind of a history nerd. So she’s going to know the Pillars like a superfan, she’s going to be able to place things like clothing, weapons, etc., and she’s going to be earnest but not great at making friends, (at first), and then she’s going to panic. There’s A TON I could have explored, but especially in the beginning, the reader needs to only know what Nesi knows, and feel what she’s feeling. That keeps the worldbuilding focused, and then, once other factors have been established, you can build out from there. Likewise, the fables were a fun way to worldbuild outside the main plot, so I have a cake and I took a few bites too ;)

TLDR; worldbuilding isn’t the story. The character is the story and so is the world they live in, but if you focus on the latter more than the former, you’re not telling your readers a story, you’re dictating a textbook. Which is fine! But one needs to know the difference, once you know the rules you can break them, etc. =]  

Sia: A lot of implicit worldbuilding comes through in the three ‘Cloud and Clay’ tales that divide the parts of Audition. Do you have more than those three? If so how can I get my paws on them??? Where did the ‘cloud and clay’ line, this world’s equivalent of ‘once upon a time’, come from? It enchanted me utterly! AND: were you at all hesitant about the reaction to the Stallion fable? That was, um, very different to the others! (I do not disapprove!)

Martin: Clay and Cloud Tales! I do love how I stumbled on them. I don’t think the phrase has any major origin beyond I was looking for something mythic/fable sounding and I think a part of my brain was like, “well pillars only connect with the earth and the sky, so let’s . . . go from there?” And we did! Oh, and the stories came WAY before. I think The Fox and the Turtle was the first I wrote, and I’m really happy with how they came out. Meant to illustrate some parts of the world, but also each story deals with the themes and scenes in the next section to come, so hopefully that came across. And no, I was very happy with the story of the Stallion! Balance needs to exist, even in the pantheon, and no family is perfect. As much as T’sidaan is a pain in the ass on purpose, the worst you could do is disrespect those they care about; it’s like, oh I can take a joke, but leave my friends out of it. And is often the one who chooses to act, as we see throughout, as the rest of the family doesn’t want to get involved. (Which only makes them act out more). And I haven’t written many but I do know a few in my head I want to write someday, like the Fox and their brother, Huth’ku, the Bat of Stars, and how he tries to stop T’sidaan from eating constellations out of the sky, or the Fox and the Koala of Sleep, Agi’uhn, in which the Fox tries to get Somni’drom to mess with the Koala during one of her decade long naps, and uh . . . yeah, that doesn’t go well!

Sia: This is not helping my pining for a Clay and Cloud tales collection.

Martin: I will campaign with you for A Book of Clay and Cloud Tales! That would be a lot of fun, especially if we could get some art, ha. And I’m glad you like those stories! It was important to me to show different ways of growth; some people react with shame, others with anger that gives way to knowledge, and with Nera’Je, it really is as simple as: some people won’t change. No matter how much you try. End of the day, her and a few others have their toxic pride, and it’s those siblings the Fox delights in tormenting the most. 

Sia: I don’t think I consciously noticed that each fable showcased a different way of reacting to critique (constructive critique!), but I love that now that you’ve pointed it out!

It makes me think of the Zemini, because – allegedly, they’ve invaded Oranoya because they disapprove, right? Invasion is kind of the ultimate critique (when ‘critique’ is the motive…if it’s ever REALLY the motive…) T’sidaan was doing the same thing to their siblings. But T’sidaan is trying to make their siblings more compassionate, happier people, and the Zemini… I don’t know how to articulate what they want.

Martin: I’ve been thinking about those Clay and Cloud tales a lot, especially since I’m writing a new one for the book launch event (The Fox and the Bat, (and the Butterfly, Eaten)). A lot of the purpose of a Trickster, the use of them as a counterweight to universal hurt, or an instigator toward change, or an individual who has no qualms doing something about It, whatever It may be. In these stories, T’sidaan has their reasons for doing what they’re doing but at the end of the day, they’re doing what they’re doing because there is something about being a rogue force, about forcing the proud, arrogant, and mighty to see themselves for who and what they are, that makes a marked difference for the Fox. There’s something about their siblings, and we see it with the Spider, that some of them refuse to learn the lesson. And with the Turtle, it takes a long time for it to sink in. But there’s something that the Fox can do that others can’t, which could be that there is a level of freedom and risk they can incur because at the end of the day, they’re forcing beings like them to really see themselves in the mirror.

And with Zemin, let’s not forget: they are in communion with only one Pillar and that is a being who knows how to nurse hurt, how to wait in the shadows until the pack is in place, who believes it is their role to corral the weak together and pounce. Think of that attitude trickling down from generation to generation, a sense of hurt being nursed by a nation, your perspective beginning to skew and shift until all you see when you look out are prey that think they’re better than you because they don’t NEED to hunt. They don’t need to cull the weak, don’t see the world as a war yet to be won. And so the Occupation has many reasons for starting, but to relate it back to the Clay and Cloud Tales, it is a very skewed, disturbing twist on T’sidaan’s logic: we know what’s best. We see you and you are Wrong. Your Wrongness is insulting. It’s so insulting, we will do what we must to fix you. Weird how all those pathways lead to facism!

But yes, in a weird way, the Fox exists in the cosmic ecosystem for a reason, and the Pillars, on some metaphysical level, are meant to hold one another accountable. And so the Fox, though they are but one individual, are able to take on that challenge and in fact, it is healthy of them to do so. But with the Wolf isolated and excommunicated, literally excised from the divine ecosystem, we see how his very nature begins to influence Zemin and how that nature needs to be a part of a group. ANYWAY! Long answer but hopefully there’s something there.

Sia: Okay wait one sec – AHHHH YOU’RE WRITING A NEW CLAY AND CLOUD TALE!!!

Ahem. Okay, I can be Serious now. Just had to get that out of my system first!

To circle back to what we were talking about earlier: I think fighting the Zemini in the Trickster way, rather than the physical violence way, actually helped me believe in the Zemini. I often have a problem where I struggle to really buy into villains like them, because it’s so hard for me to imagine real people being like that. (Even though it absolutely happens. My brain just rejects it.) But seeing how they reacted to being made laughingstock – that was so human that I could wrap my head around them. Which is interesting, because that’s what using trickery/trickster methods to combat fascism DOES: it knocks fascists off their pedestals, for us to see but also for THEM to see, themselves. So with Audition, you were kind of – accomplishing what you were doing with the story in a kind of meta way as well? I don’t know how to phrase what I mean! But it’s deeply cool and I wanted to comment on it!

Martin: It’s very real that people, in life and in fiction, hate being laughed at; no one likes becoming a joke, even if T’sidaan says it can be healthy at times. I think what happens after you’re knocked off the pedestal is what matters most: do you get back on it? Or do you stand equal to the person before you, and try to see if what they were saying is true? I feel like that’s the calling card of a lot of bullies, fascist, oppressors, etc… if they can determine what is true, if they can determine what is real, then it always gets to be everyone else who is wrong. People don’t like being laughed at, and no one likes being wrong. 

Sia: 100%! You have to have the – courage, I think? to face the mirror that’s being held up to you, and actually LOOK AT IT. That’s always painful, but some kinds of pain mean healing, damn it! (And we know fascists are cowards, really.)

Something like that was bubbling in the back of my mind, but I couldn’t articulate it until you said it – Tricksters are what they are because they see Objective Reality. Kind of? They can see who needs what lesson, and crucially they are correct. Part of the Wolf’s/Zemin’s problem is that they do not see what’s really there, they are not correct but think they are. T’sidaan teaches lessons that actually need to be learnt (even if not everyone learns them); the Wolf is teaching a lesson that does not need to be learnt, because the problem he sees doesn’t actually exist.

But otherwise, T’sidaan and the Wolf’s actions are…very similar, actually? It’s just a crucial difference of clear-sightedness and motive. Which I guess means they’re two halves of one coin, really. The Wolf is what happens when someone is not…ruthless in constantly checking their own beliefs, maybe? And metaphorical eyesight?

Martin: I love what you wrote about truth and reality and lessons; the Fox and the Wolf in many ways ARE two sides of that same coin. A being of the Hunt, a being of Tricks . . . both a little nebulous, both can used to justify their own ends, both used to deceive and work others into corners; how many times is the pack deployed to lull, corral, and chase another? And in my own brain, the reasoning of T’sidaan often making the Wolf the target of their jokes and tricks is that the Wolf, both as an entity and concept, needed reminding. The Hunt doesn’t exist to serve him, others aren’t just prey and food, the forest is larger than your shadow, there are things you’re not meant to devour. And of course, for every lesson taught, the Wolf would double down, and their singular focus would turn to the Fox and vengeance for trying to teach said lesson. Maybe it wasn’t always like that, and I do believe the Pillars are shaped by their worshippers as much as the other way around, but in those last centuries headed towards the banishment to Zemin, that is who the Wolf was and had become. 

Oh, T’sidaan is NOT always correct, right, or someone to be listened to, haha. Don’t forget, we are only seeing what they want us to see, and there are many stories throughout where they are incorrect or trick out of pettiness or are just plain unhappy and decide to make that everyone else’s problem. As they say in the book, and as we’ve discussed here, sometimes the lesson is to be humbled. If they begin to fiddle outside of the cosmic balance, then of course they won’t be surprised when they’ve had their voluminous tail loped off by a sibling’s saint or get a snoot full of soot for their annoyance. Sometimes, like any good trickster, I feel like the Fox has to have a Homer Simpson moment; my Dad always said that what made Homer a good hero of the Simpsons is that for anytime he’s stupid or does something petty or vain, he usually learns his lesson, even if he might do something silly again. With 98 siblings, the Fox has DEFINITELY had their share of lessons, too.

Sia: *furiously scribbles letters to Tachyon pleading for sequels*

I think we’ve gone through almost all the questions I had ready! This next one is about the book itself: Where do the wonderful illustrations in Audition come from? I absolutely adored them! Related: how did you get T’sidaan to pose for them???

Martin: Elizabeth Story is the artist and designer for Tachyon Publications and she is the absolute best in the world forever and ever! I adore her work, I love the Fox she gave us, all of the illustrations inside are absolutely delicious and engaging and stunning, and I just feel so absolutely grateful to her!! Getting the Fox to pose isn’t really the issue, it’s distracting them long enough so they don’t begin to tweak your rendition of them too much. Treats help, or dangling a nice tasty constellation in front of them and daring them not to eat it.

T’sidaan watching the tasty constellation

Sia: All right, final (and most portentous!) question: If someone offered you a portal leading into the world of Audition…would you step through?

Martin: Yes! I would love to go to the world of Audition. It isn’t perfect by any means, but it is a world where myth and modernity live hand in hand, and the chance to spend time with godsblooded or the Pillars themselves would be too cool. Plus there are all sorts of juicy other spots in the world of Oranoya, Zemin, and beyond to visit, like the Divine Table, the Valley of the Drakes, and more!

Sia: Honestly, I would be RIGHT behind you!

We may not have a functioning portal, but we can at least VISIT Nesi and T’sidaan’s world, because Audition For the Fox is out TODAY!

Get your copy from the publisher Tachyon or bookshop.org!

The post What Does the Fox Say? Interview With Martin Cahill, Author of Audition For The Fox! appeared first on Every Book a Doorway.