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Characters in the Skeeter Kitefly Books

(presented more-or-less in the order of their appearance)

  Page Two 
 


The Ups and Downs of Skeeter Kitefly

Part One
Part Two
Part Three
 

Skeeter Kitefly's Sugardaddy Confessor

Part One
Part Two
Part Three

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Skeeter Kitefly's
Titular Assets

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COMPACTIFICATION
behind the scenes


RoBynne O'Ring's
GRUNTS OF
PASSION

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TO BE HONEST


FINE LINEAGE


13 BLACK CATS
UNDER A LADDER


BOLSTER,
NOT MOLEST HER


MARAT À LA MODE


BAGELANNA


OLD LITTER


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Last Updated

February 05, 2010




 


Mercedes (Sadie) Benison

Skeeter's stepsister and role model in
Demortuis and beyond, playing Madwoman
to her Madgirl.

 


...Pushing thirty now, anxious about the future, having to juggle breadwinning with single parenthood and now this scheme to get back into art school, Sadie could get stressed at the drop of a hat—very stressed, depending on what kind of hat...

KITEFLY IN THE OINTMENT
 


ARnold Benison

Sadie's father, Skeeter's stepfather, and
Carrie's second husband: manager of a
Kleinsteins drugstore.
 


...There was a war going on in the Middle East or somewhere, with a lot of talk about embargoes and shortages, and ARnold—normally the sweetest-hearted of stepfathers—was always sending Skeeter back upstairs to make sure she’d turned off her lights or radio or hairdryer...

SPOOKACIOUS
 


Nana Gubel,
Alexis Benison Czolgosz and Lenny Czolgosz

Sadie's grandmother, older sister and
brother-in-law (eventually parents of eight
little Czolgoszes).
 



...Nana Gubel wouldn’t recognize Desi as her great-granddaughter any more than she would accept Skeeter Kitefly as anything but a step-interloper.  Which was peachy-fine with Skeeter, who regarded Nana Gubel as a dismal old snuffdipping crone of a bitch...

THE CLEARING STAGE
 


Ginny Kirschwasser

Skeeter's very best friend in Demortuis (sixth
grade).
 


...The girls’s first vis-à-vis encounter came when Ginny turned to pass back that week’s spelling test, and found a Grand Guignol funnyface being made for her benefit.  The sight caused Ginny to let out a shrill sharp bleat, like a lambkin tossed in a blanket...

THE FIRST OF THE SVENS
 


Troy Janssen

The first "Sven" in Skeeter's love life, but
hardly the last.
 


...So then I moved to the big city Demortuis and “took a shine” to this Cool Boy named Troy Janssen, who was a Laplander through and through.  I mean he had a chin-dimple and hair like flax and these tell-tale empty-bedroom eyes—the whole Nordic smörgåsbord...

LUSTDAZE
 


Archie, João, Bridget Costello and Bernie Farkas

Guests at Sadie's New Year's Eve party in
1972.  Bernie Farkas (the partial Marxist)
reappears years later as Skeeter's philosophy
instructor.
 


...João was at ease in tight situations, having a natural affinity for bottlenecks.  He lounged in Bernie’s abandoned chair; found accommodation on his knees for Sadie’s fair bottom; bobbed a nodding wink at Bridget; and turned Archie into an icebreaker by asking if he’d seen any good movies lately.  “Indeed yes, the one called 1776,” said Archie.  “What an education it was besides an entertainment too.  I liked best the Benjamin Franklin, he did a funny dance...”

VISIONS OF SUGARBONGS
 


Waif and Stray, the Stonehenge Twins

"Caterers" to students at the University of
Nilnisi.
 


...This was entirely too much for Skeeter.  “Are you saying you gave me catpoop to smoke and sat there watching me inhale it?  How the hell’m I supposed to practice getting high on goddam CATPOOP?”  She might have sprung upon the Stonehenges then and there, had her stomach not let out a terrible caged-beast growl.  “I,” she discovered, “have got a serious case of the munchies.”  Waif grinned, and “You’ll get used to ‘em in time,” said Stray...

VISIONS OF SUGARBONGS
 

CHARACTERS:

Page One
Page Two
Page Three
Page Four
Page Five
Page Six
The Wunderlichs





 


Pamela Pillsbury(-Beckett)

"The Dough Girl," Skeeter's archest rival;
later a Yuppie televangelist.
 


...The Totalbitch Queen of the Teases was a personal acquaintance of mine, back in high school.  Her name was Pamela Pillsbury and some cockeyed idiots were stupid enough to say we looked a lot alike.  Untrue!  There’s more to “looking alike” than both of us being blonde and short.  (And built; I’ll grant you that...)

LUSTDAZE
 


Lonnie Fesso and
Malcolm Twist

Present at Skeeter's first high school
Halloween dance.
 


...Remember Lonnie Fesso, who came as Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde and busted the Halloween piñata, then went around walloping everyone with the piñata stick?  I ran into him a few years later and guess what—he’d just started medical school, was going to study neurosurgery.  I said to him, Lonnie! are you that into brains?  And he said no, he just liked cutting people’s heads open…

THE DEMON BAG LADY OF SKEET STREET
 


Natalie Horndt

Skeeter's very best friend in Demortuis (tenth
grade).
 


...“Wait!” cautioned Natalie, acting as handmaiden.  “What if when you’re an old lady you turn all saggy and baggy and wrinkly—”  “Aw PEEshaw,” Skeeter snorted, pausing in her doffing to punch Nat on the arm.  She glanced down with fond complacency at her own unpropped upper deck, so obviously firm for life at age fifteen...

INITIALLY ILLUSTRATED
 


Elmer

Skeeter's first car.
 


...The first car that Skeeter was allowed to drive on her own, without an adult accompanist, was ARnold’s big old Thunderbird that Skeeter claimed wasn’t a Ford but a Fudd and so dubbed Elmer...

PROJECTILE
 


Sally Whistletoe

Skeeter's all-time idol: a Demortuis brasslungs
legend.

 


...I got coached by Sally Whistletoe on how to project myself.  Not my chest, my self—voice, presence, aura.  Sally tutored kids from all over town about all sorts of things: cheerleading, gymnastics, jujitsu, Being a Good Citizen.  She told me, “You’ve gotta be a Hype if you don’t wanna be a Ciphe, so go out there and carpe that diem!...”

PROUD TO BE SHORT
 


Desirée (Desi) Benison

Sadie's daughter, sired by a Ramon-like
individual during an economy cruise.

 


...So now Sadie’s a Mommy and I’m an Auntie and we have this permanent person to play Pong with.  She’s a smart little baby, too; knows how to have a rockin’ good time already, and cries along with The BeeGees.  Sadie named her Desirée.  I think that is so COOwull, being named after a famous streetcar like that...

LITTLE ARTFUL ANTICS
 


Joe Biggins and Missy Trace

Skeeter's improv partner and roommate at
Nilnisi University.
 


...Missy Trace!  She wasn’t bad-looking, just sort of mousily nondescript.  And nervous and timid and shy and naïve.  So naturally Joe Biggins tormented her every chance he got—hiding behind curtains or around corners and then leaping out at her, putting her in headlocks and half-nelsons—“C’mon, Missy!” he’d say, “Two falls outta three!  Winner has to give the loser a sponge bath!”  I thought Missy was literally going to FAINT...

THE QUICKER TO ANGER
 


Charles Wallace

Skeeter's coworker and neighbor in downtown
Demortuis.
 


...and one indeterminate fellow with the wonderful Wrinkle in Time-y name of Charles Wallace, who had little in common with Madeleine L’Engle’s uncanny character other than a willingness to make people sandwiches...

THE CLEARING STAGE
 


Others in Demortuis

include sixth-grade teacher Mrs. Maybrick; "that little dribble" Droan Webster, his sister Charlene Webster
and her skag-gang the Buzzettes; tattoo artist Madame Zelda; bartender Vince; Mrs. Browning the English
teacher; Mr. Minie the music teacher; LaFayette Smith the Donna Summer lookalike; drugstore customer
Definitely Gertrude; Elvis-freak Loretta; Trish the bitch receptionist; Westport Willie the indigent; and
Bevan the swing-shift bouncer.
 


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