The Twisted Ones

In The Twisted Ones, T. Kingfisher explores the fragility of “reality” by showing a mundane world suddenly fracturing to reveal a terrifying, logic-defying supernatural order. The novel suggests that rationality is not about distinguishing fact from fiction as they are conventionally defined but about surviving the revelation that the world is far more strange and hostile than previously believed.

The initial breakdown of Mouse’s rational worldview occurs through impossible geography: the discovery of a bald hill where no hill should exist. Her attempts to rationalize it, guessing that she must simply be in unfamiliar country, represent a desperate clinging to a reality that no longer fits the evidence. This logical approach is contrasted with the folk wisdom of her neighbor Foxy, who casually accepts the hill’s transient nature, stating, “Sometimes it’s there; sometimes it ain’t” (105). This exchange highlights the conflict between a modern, rigid understanding of the world and an older, more flexible one that allows for the existence of the supernatural. The impossible hill demonstrates that the foundations of Mouse’s reality are not as solid as she assumed.

This conceptual collapse is further reinforced through physical artifacts that defy categorization. Mouse initially dismisses her step-grandfather’s journal as the product of “dementia,” a rational explanation for its bizarre contents.