Lips the colour of blood, the sun an unprecedented orange, train wheels that sound like guilt, and guilt, and guilt: these are just some of the things Mary Ventura begins to notice on her journey to the ninth kingdom. n n But what is the ninth kingdom? she asks a kind-seeming lady in her carriage. It is the kingdom of the frozen will, comes the reply. There is no going back. n n Sylvia Plaths strange, dark tale of independence over infanticide, written not long after she herself left home, grapples with mortality in motion. n