One for All, page 34
But now the far wall was covered with the largest mural I’d ever seen. Off in the corner was a propped ladder surrounded by empty paint containers. There was something about the stark black brushstrokes against the off-white wall that made our likenesses look even stronger. The four of us in an arc, swords’ points down, arms extended so our blades met in the middle. Steel intersecting steel intersecting steel intersecting steel.
Henri rushed to speak as my eyes watered. “I’ll go to the market and see if I can’t find some colored paint that’ll work. It’s expensive, but—”
“No.” I held up my hand “Don’t change it. It’s perfect.”
“Well, it wasn’t difficult. I just sketched you—I mean all of you! And then went over the outline with paint. And then filled in the sketch with charcoal. And then painted over that. And then did some more shading with charcoal. It wasn’t that much trouble at all!”
“And you”—I turned to Madame de Treville—“you had to agree to this.”
“It’s not as if I had a more efficient use for the wall space,” she declared, nose upturned as she examined her nephew’s work. “I suppose I can see the likeness.” By the joy on Henri’s face, you would’ve thought she’d called him the next Simon Vouet.
“Did all of you know?” I asked the others.
“Found out today. Good thing, too, as I had a chance to point out some of the flaws in his shadowing. Now, this one saw Henri coming through the hall a few nights ago. Nearly scared the poor boy to death.” Portia looked pointedly at Aria beside her.
“How was I supposed to know what he was doing?” Aria said. “It was my duty to question him.”
Madame de Treville shook her head at Henri’s mortified expression. “Mon neveu, it seems you don’t have a future as a spy, a fact I’m sure will leave you utterly heartbroken. But as for your future adjacent to the Order … well, the last line of defense for France will always have good use for a code breaker.”
Portia rushed Aria over to me and Théa, positioned us so we mirrored our larger-than-life images. “Look—the Four Musketeers!” Portia said. Then she hesitated, as if the title might be too painful—might remind me of Papa. But I smiled. Seeing myself how others saw me, this glorious, powerful creature—knowing that we were seen as these glorious, powerful creatures … I was finally able to firmly tether myself to the ground. Before I’d been drifting, unsure, some cloud-like thing.
But not anymore. We found one another. We were together.
“The Four Musketeers,” I murmured. “Un pour tous, tous pour un.”
I’d been wrong about so many things. And as I stared up at Henri’s mural, I discovered another: I’d believed that one dance, one kiss, was as close as I’d ever get to flying.
But standing here, surrounded by les Mousquetaires de la Lune—this was how it felt to fly.
I could feel Henri’s gaze on me like the sun. Could see the pride in Madame de Treville’s eyes. Could hear Papa’s voice lingering in my ears.
Tania. Tania. Tania.
I breathed out, long and slow.
And I smiled.
AUTHOR’S NOTE
One for All is a work of fiction, but Tania’s chronic illness is very real.
Postural Orthostatic Tachycardia Syndrome (POTS) was first diagnosed in 1993, but there were patients with POTS symptoms much earlier. From early examples like “Soldier’s Heart Syndrome” diagnosed after the American Civil War, POTS and POTS-like cases certainly predate the early ’90s. It’s impossible to know how many patients suffered from POTS in the past centuries … especially when you think about the long history of society dismissing women’s health complaints as hysteria, since POTS is most often diagnosed in young women. Girls like Tania were everywhere, are everywhere, even if they aren’t in textbook pages. Tania having POTS, as a girl in a fictionalized version of seventeenth-century France, is the least fantastical element of One for All.
POTS is different for every individual. Tania’s experience is just one of hundreds of thousands of unique experiences. She does not, and cannot, represent every person with POTS—or for that matter, every person with a chronic illness. But she does represent my experience as a chronically ill young woman. I was never a teen in seventeenth-century France, dueling in ball gowns … but I was the girl in high school who hid in the bathroom between classes in order to take medication without anyone seeing. I was the girl who was pulled off the school’s elevator because she didn’t look sick enough to “belong” there, who sat on the sidelines during fencing practice because she was too dizzy to stand, who promised herself the night before she left for college that she would tell absolutely no one about her condition because nothing good could come of people knowing the truth—who would want to be friends with or date a sick girl?
When I was at my most sick as a teenager, I lost myself in books, despite never seeing myself in their pages. I thought that meant stories like mine, about people like me, weren’t worthy of being told. That chronically ill, disabled girls couldn’t be main characters. That because I was sick, I’d never be the hero of my own story.
I can’t go back in time. I can’t reach out to that girl and tell her that she is worthy and good and that it is okay to trust others. That there is nothing, absolutely nothing, to be ashamed of. But what I can do is use what I am good at—turning words into stories—to prevent disabled readers from feeling that way now.
I am not Tania, but Tania is a part of me.
A sick girl, a brave girl, a girl who learns to love herself. The hero of her own story.
And now, here she is. She belongs to all of you.
ABOUT POSTURAL ORTHOSTATIC TACHYCARDIA SYNDROME
POTS is most often characterized by a drop in blood pressure, accompanied by an increase in heart rate, upon standing—to a heart rate increase of at least thirty beats per minute in adults and forty beats per minute in adolescents. The jump in heart rate is the body’s response to the blood pressure drop; the heart is trying to pump blood faster to get it through the body. Common symptoms of POTS include dizziness, brain fog, fatigue, headaches, nausea, heart palpitations, and many others. Doctors say POTS symptoms are most similar to congestive heart failure symptoms.
Today, most POTS patients are forced to see multiple doctors to finally receive a diagnosis (the average diagnosis time is five years and eleven months). More than half of people diagnosed with POTS will be told by doctors that their symptoms are “all in their head.” Over a quarter of patients will be forced to see over ten doctors before they finally know the truth.
For more statistics, information, materials, and/or to donate to POTS and dysautonomia research, readers can visit:
-Dysautonomia International
-National Institutes of Health
-Hopkins Medicine (Johns Hopkins)
-Mayo Clinic
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
I have looked forward to and dreaded writing One for All’s acknowledgments in equal measure: I could fill another book with gratitude for everyone who has helped me reach this point. But I also know I will inevitably forget someone, because such is the way of things, and for that I apologize in advance.
Thank you to my agent, Jennifer Wills, who got me to believe in myself by sheer force of will: We did it. We finally did it. To Nicole Resciniti, for pulling me out of the query trenches.
As always, to my editor, Melissa Warten: It was worth three years on submission, all those near misses, to end up with you and FSG. I can’t believe how lucky I am to work with you.
Thank you to everyone at FSG and MCPG, including but not limited to Rich Deas and Kevin Tong for bringing back the girls in fancy dresses on YA covers trend so disabled girls could finally have their moment. Jamie and Isabelle, interns extraordinaire. Special thanks to Ilana Worrell and John Nora for making sure OFA was the very best book it could be, and to Cynthia Lliguichuzhca, Angela Jun, Kathleen Breitenfeld, and Molly Ellis.
To Estelle Paranque, for her expert eye and attention to detail.
In addition to encyclopedias and textbooks, I am in debt to This is Versailles blog series, World4.eu for costume and fashion history knowledge, Dancetime Publications (and many sleepless nights of watching minuet reenactments), Party Like 1660 (bless you, Aurora von Goeth and Jules Harper), and JStor, you shining star of a database. To thirteen years of French teachers, merci beaucoup. Especially my Yale professors, who taught me how to love the language that had been the source of so much frustration since age six. And Alexandre Dumas for providing the foundation for it all.
Enormous thanks to the writers who read an early version of OFA and/or cheered me on, including Tana Mills, Jessica James, Brittney Arena, Miranda Asebedo, Tochi Onyebuchi, Kati Gardner, Leigh Bardugo, Melissa See, Cara Liebowitz, Gabe Moses, Rae Castor, Bethany Mangle, Laura Genn, Kess Costales, Alaina Leary, and K L Pennington. My fellow 22 Debuts: I’m so happy to be on this journey with you.
Kerri Maniscalco, who made me think “wait, hold on, people might actually like this book?” To Kami Garcia, Chloe Gong, Joy McCollough, Emily Lloyd-Jones, June Hur, Tamora Pierce, Jennieke Cohen, Carly Heath, and Marieke Nijkamp, for your generosity of time and kind words for OFA.
Sabina Nordqvist and Lara Ameen: What would I do without you? Thank you for never letting me give up hope. I can’t wait until our books are on shelves together.
Tracy Deonn, I am eternally grateful for your friendship, guidance, and wisdom. Somewhere, in an AU crossover, Tania and Bree are dueling side-by-side. Alice Wong, you didn’t have to help a random unknown disabled writer all those years ago, and yet you have supported me and inspired me (in a badass disabled activist way) ever since.
To Disabled Kidlit Writers: I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again. Today it’s me. Tomorrow it’s you.
My endless gratitude to every blogger, bookseller, librarian, and reviewer who’s championed One for All.
To the NY State Writers Institute, Iowa Writers’ Workshop Summer Program, Yale Writers’ Workshop, Sackett Street Writers’ Workshop, and all the faculty I studied with, especially T. Geronimo Johnson, Rick Moody, Terra Elan McVoy, and Ted Thompson.
Thank you to my Yale professors who inspired me, challenged me, taught me: Liz Miles, Anthony Reed, Lynda Paul, Jill Campbell, James Berger, Camille Lizarribar, Rebecca Tannenbaum, Brian Scholl, Katie Trumpener, Joanne Freeman, and Jill Richards, who handed me my first book of disability theory.
One for All wouldn’t exist without my creative writing professors at Yale whose generous advice and guidance shaped (and continue to shape) me as a writer and a person: Richard Deming, Michael Cunningham, Caryl Phillips, Leslie Jamison, Adam Sexton, and John Crowley (it was an honor to be your last advisee).
To Yale University and Jonathan Edwards College for putting me on the paths of other students who changed my life. To the dean’s office, the admin staff, and all the dining hall workers, especially Connie, Tim, and Theresa. (Theresa, I hope this makes up for the whole “graduating and leaving JE” thing.)
To the teachers and administrators who got me there: Anna Wilder, Jonathan Shea, Paulette James, Patrice Maites, Kathy Richardson, Rachel Gayer, Eser Ozdeger, Sesame Frasier, Carole Hurwitz, Grace Katabaruki, and Kajal Guha. To Sandy Wright: I wish you were here to see this.
To the doctors who took thirteen-year-old Lillie seriously, and to Mayo Clinic.
All my love to my real-life Order, my sisters in arms: Kristy, Sai, Sarah, Claire W., Claire C., Leigh, Michaela, Steph, Julia, Taylor, and Liz.
Thank you to my UEA Creative Writing Prose Fiction cohort, and to my UEA professors. To Twishaa and Becky, the newest additions to my Musketeers, and all the other wonderful women at UEA who supported me and my writing through a difficult year.
To my fencing coaches Janusz Smolenski and Coach Harutunian, and especially Dariusz Gilman: You didn’t give up on me when I was at my most sick. There is so much of you in this book.
To Hockley, Eleanor, and Henry. To Sarah, the very best big sister.
To my family. To Grandpa and Grams, who never got to read this book: Grandpa, who taught me to love stories, and Grams, who told me she just wanted to live long enough to see what I accomplished. Getting an offer from an agent a couple weeks after you passed? I refuse to not let that mean something. And to Grandma, who I already miss very much. You were so excited for me. I wish you could’ve held OFA in your hands.
To Dad, who asked me once why I write so many stories with absent or dead fathers. I didn’t answer then. (Come on, Dad. It’s a YA novel.) But I’ve thought about it, long and hard, and my conclusion is this: It is my way of making a story as fictional as possible. Because I could never imagine my world without you. To Charles—no, I’m sorry. You will always be Charlie hugging Pooh Bear at Disney World to me. It isn’t easy to have a big sister like me. And yet you still love me, and I love you. Mama, this book is dedicated to you, and is for you. Everything I ever write will be for you.
And finally, to my brave disabled girls, the ones in doctors’ offices and hospital waiting rooms, the ones fighting to be taken seriously, to get a diagnosis. The ones learning to navigate the world in chronically ill bodies. You are worthy of so many books and so many stories. One for All is only the beginning.
ADVANCE PRAISE FOR
ONE FOR ALL
“Lainoff’s female Musketeers beguile and swashbuckle their way into the ornate citadel of power that was Louis XIV’s court with wit, tenacity, and stirring sisterhood. You will cheer for them to carry the day in this sweeping story about becoming your best self in the midst of a society trying to relegate you to a specific category.”
—JENNIEKE COHEN, AUTHOR OF DANGEROUS ALLIANCE AND MY FINE FELLOW
“One for All is a reimagining that is both poignant and fiery—and like no other Musketeer story you have ever read. Just like the blade her teen protagonist Tania wields, Lainoff’s prose is effortlessly precise, fluid, and sharp. What I love about One for All is that it’s a breathtaking adventure story set in the past that also speaks to our present and future—the best type of historical fiction. Tania’s story is for anyone who has wondered how to carve a path through a world that does not accommodate your whole self.”
—TRACY DEONN, NEW YORK TIMES–BESTSELLING AUTHOR OF LEGENDBORN
“A captivating, stereotype-shattering fantasy about defying the odds and finding your place in the world. A heartfelt, gender-bending read featuring a disabled heroine whose differences give her the strength and courage to fight for her dreams.”
—KAMI GARCIA, #1 NEW YORK TIMES–BESTSELLING COAUTHOR OF BEAUTIFUL CREATURES
“A story brimming with strength. One for All will whirl you away to a 17th century France of pulse-pounding duels in beautiful ball gowns, following a sisterhood knitted together by duty and an indomitable heroine to cheer for.”
—CHLOE GONG, NEW YORK TIMES– BESTSELLING AUTHOR OF THESE VIOLENT DELIGHTS
“A thrilling, big-hearted novel that is sure to become a classic in the canon of YA historical fiction, One for All is everything readers could want in a feminist adventure … A stunning debut that hits all the right notes.”
—CARLY HEATH, AUTHOR OF THE RECKLESS KIND
“Fierce, breathtaking, and absolutely unputdownable. One for All is an adventure-packed historical retelling that you won’t want to miss!”
—JUNE HUR, AUTHOR OF THE FOREST OF STOLEN GIRLS
“A rousing tale of lady spies and swordplay, with a dash of romance. Tania is a formidable heroine, driven to carve out a place for herself among the Musketeers. Lillie Lainoff has crafted a story as thrilling and compelling as any fencing match.”
—EMILY LLOYD-JONES, AUTHOR OF THE BONE HOUSES
“A thrilling mystery from start to finish. Lainoff has masterfully created a feminist retelling of The Three Musketeers with a strong, determined heroine. Chronically ill readers will delight in seeing themselves starring in their own adventure. Lainoff is a fierce new talent to watch out for.”
—KERRI MANISCALCO, #1 NEW YORK TIMES–BESTSELLING AUTHOR OF KINGDOM OF THE WICKED
“The fierce, disabled heroine of One for All discovers her strengths and defies expectations in this swashbuckling tale of girls who have each other’s backs. A delightful, empowering adventure!”
—JOY MCCULLOUGH, NATIONAL BOOK AWARD–NOMINATED AUTHOR OF BLOOD WATER PAINT
“A dashing tale full of heart, courage, and friendship, with an unforgettable disabled heroine. One for All is revolutionary in more ways than one.”
—MARIEKE NIJKAMP, #1 NEW YORK TIMES–BESTSELLING AUTHOR OF THIS IS WHERE IT ENDS
“There are no limits to the will—and the strength—of this unique female hero.”
—TAMORA PIERCE, WRITER OF THE SONG OF THE LIONESS SERIES AND THE PROTECTOR OF THE SMALL QUARTET
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Lillie Lainoff is the author of One for All, and received her B.A. in English from Yale University, where she was a varsity fencer and one of the first physically disabled athletes to individually qualify for any NCAA Championship event. She has also won the 2019 LA Review Literary Award for Short Fiction, was a featured Rooted in Rights disability activist, and is the founder of Disabled Kidlit Writers on Facebook. She is currently an MA candidate in Creative Writing Prose Fiction at the University of East Anglia, and lives in Washington, D.C. You can sign up for email updates here.
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