What's in a name?

Someone asked me the other day what the title of my novel was.

“The Graces of Mercy and Circumstance,” I replied.

“Wow! That’s a mouthful,” he frowned and walked away, clearly afraid that I would elaborate. (That day, someone also laughed at my use of an allegedly non-existent word: “unmown”. Clearly, it was not a great day for literature or the English language.)

Had the man not run away before I could have defended my title, here’s what I would have said.

I love phrases that stir up multiple meanings—not double entendres, but triple, even quadruple, entendres. A phrase that can be read simply for what it is or, if you’re so inclined, can be shredded into tinier bits of a greater whole, put back together, and leave your mind reeling with myriad images.

The three characters of “The Graces of Mercy and Circumstance” are imperfect personifications of the three mythological Graces, the handmaidens to Venus, who represent beauty, charm, and creativity.

Karin is physically beautiful, although she’s either unaware of it or doubts it altogether. She spends most of her energy exercising—in particular, running—to the point of exhaustion. This is how she copes with her regrets in life and then, later, the loss of her son. As she gets older and more embittered, she and her body become increasingly hardened to the world.

Trisha, on the other hand, charms everyone with her cooking—especially with her specialty: comfort food. She learns early on as a child that her baked goods appease the people around her but she partakes too much in her own delicacies in an attempt to comfort herself, as well. By the time she’s in her late thirties, her doctor has told her she’s pre-diabetic and a good candidate for heart disease if she doesn’t lose weight. Trisha has a hard time giving up the one thing she believes everyone loves her for and subconsciously refuses to lose the protective layer of fat that envelops her.

Alaina, the third of the main characters, studies photography at a fine art school after high school as she’s drawn to the creative expression of her camera, but ends up as an event photographer with her own business. Eventually, her creativity is stultified with repetitious wedding ceremonies, demanding clients, and rigid, predictable poses. Gradually, her profession feels more like commerce than creativity. She quits her photography business but is then plagued with boredom. When she picks up her camera again, she rediscovers her creative energy during her long morning walks, as though she has just noticed the landscape around her. It’s on one of these morning walks that she’s serendipitously reunited with her childhood friend, Karin.

So, although Karin, Trisha, and Alaina represent the graces of beauty, charm, and creativity, their graces are flawed by personal circumstances.

As for mercy, there’s the concept of God’s mercy—when God chooses to forgive instead of punish—as well as the grace of God—the bestowal of unmerited blessings, such as the salvation of sinners. The women are faced with the option of extending mercy upon the recipient of their intended act of vigilantism but ultimately—and without giving up too much of the ending—they’re spared much of the punishment that could have befallen them as a result of their sins, at least temporarily. Nonetheless, they start out—and end up—with the power to act mercifully toward themselves and others; however, the power to either forgive or punish will weigh on them for the rest of their lives.

Yes, I guess he was right. It is a mouthful.