Book 1: Fan Experience

I think a good way to get the fans of Fallen more into the book is to set up a tour of the Sword & Cross Reform School cemetery. A lot of the plot developments and character development happens in this cemetery and it seemed like a reasonable idea to have a place where fans can see where it all happened.

In the book there’s a tour of the cemetery that one of the teachers gives, and I thought I’d follow the same line of thought. There are four main scenes in this book that occur cemetery where big things happen. Towards the beginning of the book Luce ends up with a detention and on her way to detention we get a fairly good description of the cemetery. Luce described it as having a “bowl-like shape” (84). And later on in the page she says that “[towards] the middle, at the lowest point of the cemetery, the path through the grounds twisted into a maze of larger carved tombs, marble statues, and mausoleums.” Now right here is where we get the basic description of the cemetery. You see it as the old cemetery though, it’s just a place that has no hidden agendas it’s just there as a setting; one that would captivate me as much as it does Luce. During this detention Luce has to clean a statue; either a statue of “[an] avenging angel or the fleshy embracing lovers” as Arriane so elegantly puts it (89). Later in the book the main antagonist Cam takes little love-struck Luce on a picnic, during which we learn of her fear of snakes under the live oak tree (146-150). This is where a lot of the competition between Daniel and Cam is starting to be seen. Much, much later Luce returns to the now well-known cemetery to confront Cam on his advances (which have at this point been non-stop throughout the entire book) and to essentially get him to stop because he just doesn’t understand that harassment isn’t a thing that’s appreciated. The exterior fence is described as lichen-speckled and the posts are vine-shaped with dangling Spanish moss (336). This older style of architecture combined with an old problem that’s being seen in a new light almost makes the cemetery look like a sort of oasis, a beautiful place that has the possibility to be dangerous. Walking through the cemetery is almost like walking through Luce’s life at Sword & Cross Reform.

Most of the things one remembers from a book are the big plot changes, those big ideas, and many of those twists and changes occurred in the cemetery, as gruesome as that might sound to some. But this setting implies an old place being renewed and seen again in a new light, much like Luce and Daniel’s relationship. Tours of places that are used in books all the time, yes. They generate publicity, and for Savannah that’s kind of needed due to the fact that Atlanta has most of the cool things (see also: the aquarium, Coke factory, CNN tour thing (probably CNN) a few museums, etc). This encourages new fans of Lauren Kate to try more of her works with a gift shop at the end of the tour in one of the mausoleums, buy book merchandise, see the cast list of the movie, purchase the movie when it comes out, and other things of the sort.  This tour could possibly be a big tourist attraction for fans of the book and make it even bigger once word gets out that you get to hang out in a cemetery after you understand why the cemetery is important.

 

 

                                           The drive up to Sword & Cross Reform School.

                                         The avenging angel statue that attempted to kill Luce