Check out our episode here! (and the bonus episode here with audiobook producer Elece Green)
Three not-sisters (who are actually orphans who were once told that their birth mothers were all called Pookie, The Pookies, they lived on a... farm. It was a... garlic farm.) Gertrude, Dee-Dee and Eugenia Porch, attend Mrs. Wintermacher’s School of Etiquette, but aren't interested in etiquette at all. They are interested in explosions and rocks and machines and catapults and beetles and the bat currently residing in Gertrude's pocket. When called upon to demonstrate having a perfectly 90° angled back whilst sitting upon a velvet fainting couch, one of the most difficult couches to sit upon with its at least 85 proper ways of sitting, Gertrude sits at a 39 degree angle until she uses her Bat Straightener which, upon releasing a bat strapped to a harness, will straighten the spine to the perfect angle. This happens, but also the bat causes chaos and lots of bad things happen, including but not limited to a candelabra setting fire to the velvet curtains and making the wooden chandelier collapse, ending with the expulsion of the Porch sisters. On their walk home, Gertrude pulls a mysterious invitation from her backpack inviting them to the Marjory Questions* School of Etiquette for Young Ladies*.
At home with their adoptive semi-permanent mother-aunt and father-uncle, Aunt Desdemona and Uncle Ansel Parquette, their Grantie Lettuce (Aunt Desdemona’s grandmother) who always smells silly sallies, and all the sisters called Lavinia (Lavinia-Anne, Lavinia-Vanessa, Lavinia-Jennifer, Lavinia, Lavinia Lavinia, Lavinia-Gwendoline, and the youngest, Lavinia-Steve) and the Lavinias individual Bichon Frisés, the Porch sisters are informed that they will be sent to an etiquette school in Austria called Die Versagenschule which is a school for failures. It's very expensive. Luckily Gertrude remembers the invitation in her backpack inviting them to Marjory Questions* School of Etiquette for Young Ladies* which frankly sounds made up, what with the asterisks and all, but it's free, so off they are sent. When they arrive, they see the name of the school Marjory Questions* School of Etiquette for Young Ladies* written in moths? And then the moths rearrange themselves to spell Millicent Quibb School for Young Ladies of Mad Science and then they are greeted by Millicent Quibb herself!
Of course the Porch sisters are terrified of Millicent Quibb because there is a jump rope rhyme about her which details her pickling of children's brains, so they run away, screaming in terror. Using her handheld extendable hermit crab, Leo, Millicent lassos the children back inside. She asks them what their favorite kind of mad science is, but they are too frightened to answer at first. Finally she tells them she knows what they like because she's been watching them, but not since that time that Gertrude remembers from back when she was seven about hearing a moon crab tell her it was watching, oh no no no, that would be weird! When the children still don't want to have anything to do with Millicent, she begs them to stay for just one mad science expedition because bad things are happening in their town of Antiquarium and she wants to save it.
On their one mad science expedition, Millicent takes the Porch sisters on a walk around Antiquarium, pointing out various chips in marble staircases, cracks in sidewalks, breaks in brickwork and, finally, most ghastly of all, the missing ponytail of the statue of Amanda the genius Bichon Frisé of the first mayor, Jacobus DeWeen. Millicent describes this broken dog ponytail statue as a sign of the coming KRA, the Krenetics Research Association, the cohort of evil mad scientists, a cult that quests for eternal life. Then the mayor, Gertrude's hero, Majestina DeWeen gives a speech about the broken dog ponytail statue and how terrible it is. Afterward, Millicent and the Porch sisters follow a crack to a cobblestone street and find a hole in it that may or may not be a bite mark from a Kyrgalops worm. To the library!
But not the regular library, oh no, to the Mad Scientist Library in the swamp that requires feeding leeches to a horn flower to reveal its secret marble steps. Upon traveling down the steps, the Porch sisters realize mad science is real! This requires a song! This is amazing! Mad science is real! And I feel a sense of Ziiiiinusssss... ! (Zinus being a magical feeling, a special tingling, the joy of life, a sense of adventure that Millicent of course described to them earlier when she was trying to convince them to stay.) The group travels through the library to the Hall of Viology where mad scientists have created new disturbing creatures from other disturbing creatures. It is here they discover the Kyrgalops worm’s display and see that one of its eggs is missing! Found nearby is a purple feather that looks just like the purple feathers on Mrs. Wintermacher’s hat!
Millicent drives the Porch sisters back to the school that they were only expelled from yesterday. She gives them a spy snail from a hidden compartment in her gerbilcar (a car that looks like a regular car but is actual powered by gerbils) and instructs Gertrude to wear it like a helmet, Eugenia to feed it chocolate lest it make a horrible sound, and Dee-Dee to spray perfume to cover its horrible smell whilst hiding in a trunk and spying on the headmistress. First, of course, they have to be reenrolled at the school which requires a lot of begging, but Mrs. Wintermacher, after telling the sisters that she grew up poor and eating pigeon guts, then she stole all her grandfather's money, became the leader of a gang of pickpockets, created her own brand of etiquette schools that she then sold and how has tons of money, but soon that won't even matter anymore. She goes to retrieve a form and while she is gone, the sisters hide in a trunk and spy with their spy snail.
Whilst they are hiding and spying, Mrs. Wintermacher, thinking the sisters are being hosed down and deloused, reveals a hidden hole in her wall behind a portrait wherein she is keeping her Kyrgalops worm. She takes a phone call and tells whomever is on the other side that everything will be ready for Sunday. During her call, the sisters see a tattoo of KRA on her hand, and then the call ends with “In the name of our gracious leader, Talon Sharktüth-may he reign forever!” It is then that the snail starts whining because Eugenia has run out of chocolate. Luckily, before they can be discovered, Millicent shows up, pretending to be a terribly Scottish teacher looking for a job, which allows the sisters to escape. Unfortunately, they leave behind their chocolate wrappers, the smell of perfume, and a tag from the snail that says it is a spy snail belonging to Millicent Quibb.
The Porch sisters run to their safe space, the duck pond, where they are approached by a goose with a notecard. The notecard is of course from Millicent, though going by her alter ego Marjory Questions. The notecard says she doesn't blame them for running and tells them of what they will have to do next: Go to the lab of the Inventor of the Kyrgalops worm Fifi Bubblegumme. It will be harrowing and dangerous and will require training. Will the sisters participate? Gertrude is undecided and Eugenia wants to go to Paris, but Dee-Dee wants to see Fifi Bubblegumme’s lab. While Gertrude decides, they go back home to the Parquettes wherein they eat buttered noodles, Gertrude having to fashion a lasso from a spaghetti noodle to fetch salt that no one will pass to her. While the Lavinias play a game called Critique, only Lavinia-Steve paying them any attention, and Grantie Lettuce smells silly sallies, Mrs. Wintermacher drags a boulder by on the sidewalk and stops to ask the Parquettes if they have any spare boulders. It is then that Gertrude decides they will return to Marjory Questions’ school.
Back at Millicent's, or Marjory's, there is a training montage, or, there would be if that were a thing in books. Millicent is too overwhelmed to teach the sisters anything because of the giant worm, so she gives them each a textbook about their subject and tells them to bring her a glass of lemonade in the gazebo. Of course each sister must learn a lesson in order to complete the task, Gertrude's involves singing deeply to worms with mustaches that live inside lemons, Eugenia must clean a glass containing an unknown substance, and Dee-Dee must build a bridge to make it safely to the gazebo. They all succeed using their textbooks about Unnaturalism, the study of unnatural animals, Gemistry, the study of impossible substances, and Fryzzics, the building of impossible machines. Dee-Dee also has an as-yet-undescribed ability to hear inanimate objects speaking to her, so she also uses that to help.
Lemonade delivered and montage complete, now they must go to a silver spoon shop which conceals the passageway to Fifi Bubblegumme's lab. Everyone in Antiquarium gets a silver spoon when they turn 10, but Gertrude did not because she was grounded for storing a dead chipmunk under her bed. Neither her sisters nor Millicent ever got one either. In order to select a silver spoon, one must be dressed as a sailor, so the Porch sisters are wearing improvised spray painted dresses. There is a party going on and a bored girl is taking forever to choose her spoon, and, needing a distraction to get into the secret lab, for reasons untold, the Pastramibird concealed under Gertrude's hat and only revealed just now gets upset, releasing a horrible beef-scented stench and the spoon store clears out. They are able to get into the secret tunnel under a secret blue spoon, though not the way they intended. Lavinia-Steve was at the party and saw the whole thing.
They travel through the tunnel to the doorway to Fifi Bubblegumme's lab, but once they're inside, they will only have one minute before bad things happen. All of this is in a riddle posted right by the door. They use the Azure Spoon of Aziza to open the door and inside, they see lots of worm-related things, for Fifi Bubblegumme was a Vermologist. They find lots of diaries and notes and intend to make a conveyor belt from bolts of silkworm silk to get them all out but they run out of time. The bad things that they knew were going to happen start happening. Millions of worms rain down on them from the ceiling. Gertrude screams a high-pitched scream and then remembers singing at the mustache worms earlier. Everyone starts singing, making the worms flee, then Dee-Dee thinks to use the fleeing worms to power the makeshift conveyor belt and they are able to escape. Unfortunately, two people watch them as they leave. One person is Ursula Wintermacher. The other is Lavinia-Steve.
Back at Millicent's, they spend hours and hours going through all the diaries and notes and then finally find out about the Kyrgalops worm. It was created by a poor young Transylvanian Fifi Bubblegumme in the 1600s to help an evil king kill lots and lots of people. It prefers to live in saltwater eating algae and old shells, but it can live on land and eat boulders. The only thing it cannot eat through is Prismuth and it really really loves to eat Bichon Frisés, in fact, it is drawn to them. So that's why it ate Amanda the genius dog’s marble ponytail!
To celebrate their discoveries, Millicent gives each sister a silver spoon, making them feel special for once, and then they eat pizza. Unfortunately, the pizza is topped with rapier seeds instead of olives and then Dee-Dee spouts terrifying vines from her mouth that climb up to the ceiling and snap the iron chandelier. Millicent gives them all orange juice, the acid killing the vines, and then they all laugh and laugh once they stop freaking out. Outside, Ursula Wintermacher eavesdrops.
Later that evening, the Porch sisters go back home to the Parquettes where their newly felt specialness impresses their aunt who insists that they invite their new headmistress to tea the next day. Gertrude calls and does so and Millicent is excited to pretend to be a fancy etiquette school headmistress. Afterward, the sisters discuss everything they've done so far and then notice that Lavinia-Steve is eavesdropping. She, having seen lots of their exploits so far with Millicent Quibb, wants to hang out with them but Eugenia shuts her down quickly.
The next day, Marjory Questions arrives and performs an excellent act as an etiquette school headmistress. She sends the sisters to her car to retrieve her purse which contains a gift for their aunt, but she has also left them a note detailing how she once ate dry halibut while investigating a secret meeting that turned out to be a book club. Whilst watching, she saw that one of the women was wearing a brooch made of Prismuth and that woman was their aunt. Inside, Millicent Marjory is listening to their aunt describe in great detail all of her brooches and how her husband traveled all over the world, killing many animals for ivory and just for fun, gathering them. She shows off the ugliest one, the Prismuth one, and then reveals an entire closet full of Prismuth. Millicent Marjory insists that the sisters tidy everything up and quietly steal all the Prismuth. Lavinia-Steve was of course there the whole time, listening.
After retrieving the Prismuth, the sisters montage-create a cage for the Kyrgalops worm and devise a plan to capture it involving a fluffy pillow that looks like a Bichon Frisé. They drive the Prismuth cage slowly across town in a fake parade to Mrs. Wintermacher’s School, which is empty because it is Saturday. Inside her office, they discover that the cave behind the portrait no longer contains the Kyrgalops, but is now a tunnel to a secret hideout. Leaving Dee-Dee behind as a lookout, Millicent, Gertrude and Eugenia crawl down the tunnel where they witness a secret meeting of adults wearing cloaks and animal masks in a room obviously meant for secret meetings of mad KRA scientists.
The secret KRA meeting is obviously where Mrs. Wintermacher, just a junior member, shares what she has discovered by eavesdropping on Millicent, that Kyrgalops worms love to eat Bichon Frisés, the town dog that literally everyone has. They will kidnap all the dogs and take them to the place where they will complete their OTV plan, the plan to Open Talon’s Vault, to uncover the secret hidden laboratory of their hero, the evil shark-toothed Talon Sharktüth. No no no, they can't kidnap all the dogs, that's a stupid plan. Instead, they will have a Dog Show. Just as they are turning to leave the secret tunnel, Millicent stubs her toe and they are discovered! The leader of the KRA meeting releases a creature called a stub rat to deal with them.
Luckily Dee-Dee simultaneously stubs her toes back up in the office, confusing the stub rat, which has a long and interesting creation story involving child labor and dam destroying. They are able to escape and plan to meet back up in the morning to save the day or, more likely, be killed by an angry mob. Millicent has pretty much resigned herself to die by violent mob because no matter what, she's going to be blamed for what happens, whether it be kidnapping the dogs, releasing the worm or unveiling the vault. The sisters don't know what to do, so Dee-Dee suggests they prepare themselves in their own ways. Then Gertrude gets an idea. Lavinia-Steve follows.
Gertrude goes to see the mayor, her hero, Majestina DeWeen, who is singing to a group of orphans and sharing with them a one dollar giant check donation. Gertrude tells the mayor to not have the Dog Show because the dogs are going to be eaten by a giant worm, rambling everything she knows about what's going on, and then the mayor, now knowing the entire plan, leaves her office for a moment, only to return to tell Gertrude that she is in trouble and must return home.
At home, Gertrude is locked away in a turret (or small tower) of the house, Lavinia-Steve having told her parents everything. Eugenia and Dee-Dee were also locked away. Gertrude is spiralling in sadness, worried about everything—the dogs being eaten, the Kyrgalops worm being destroyed for its choice of snack and no longer having any purpose after Opening Talon’s Vault, and Millicent, just for trying to help. She apologizes on the dusty window that her sisters can see and they reply in their own dusty window something that looks like a bat. Then Gertrude realizes she's in a turret (or small tower) filled with bats and she still has her Bat Straightener Vest on. The bats soar her out of the turret (or small tower) and down to safety. Gertrude releases her sisters and then Millicent flies overhead on a Flycycle with the Prismuth cage to capture the Kyrgalops worm.
They fly to the town fairgrounds to the dog show, which is in a wrought-iron circle with a padlock. Majestina DeWeen is singing onstage about Bichon Frisés wearing a coat that looks shockingly like it is made from Bichon Frisés. The Porch sisters and Millicent stand nearby, trying to figure out what they're going to do, when Mrs. Wintermacher sneaks up and dumps their Prismuth cage into a small pool. Everyone but Gertrude laments the loss of the cage. She doesn't realize why they are so upset, but then she realizes the cage is melting in the chlorine of the pool, making the once-strong cage limp as spaghetti. Mrs. Wintermacher reveals that she knew they would be there because Magistin-uh, her friend Susan told her they would be there. Oh no. Majestina DeWeen, Gertrude's hero, is in on the whole thing?! Then, the worm appears.
As everyone in the dog show cage is about to be eaten, Millicent steals Majestina’s coat, trying to lead the Kyrgalops worm away, but then Majestina tells everyone that Millicent, the mad scientist, is behind everything and is going to feed them all to her giant worm creation. Lavinia-Steve, who is also inside the dog show cage because all the Lavinias have Bichon Frisés, apologizes to Gertrude for her, what turns out to be, jealousy of them going on adventures with Millicent because she herself has no real friends and her sisters Lavinia often ignore her. It is then that Gertrude remembers the rapier seeds in her pocket. She eats the seeds, spewing out the vines that were previously able to destroy a metal chandelier. The vines destroy the cage, freeing the prisoners inside who then become the violent mob destined to kill Millicent.
Still needing to trap the worm, Gertrude looks back at the spaghettified Prismuth cage and remembers when she made the spaghetti lasso as her sisters fly off on the Flycycle after pelting the violent mob with invisible rocks that Eugenia has had in her pocket since she learned about rocks back at the beginning-middle of the book when they all learned all their important lessons. Gertrude is able to lasso the giant worm and sings to it and it becomes her friend. She rides it to the ocean where it wants to be but then is stranded there. Luckily her sisters fly up on the Flycycle to rescue her. Unfortunately, Millicent is gone.
Under the town in the secret lair of the KRA, the secret members have a secret meeting in which they dismiss Mrs. Wintermacher for her failures. The secret leader sits down at her vanity and removes her mask, promising Talon Sharktüth that she will open the vault. Who is the secret leader? Who knows. Meanwhile, the Porch sisters are sent off to Austria to the school for failures. Their aunt reveals that they were given lots of money to watch over them until they came of age, but she didn't mean to say that. They manage to trick their uncle into stopping by Millicent's on the way to the boat that will take them to Austria, but her house is completely gone. Several weeks later, the sisters are shown to their small dingy room in the school for failures where they crack open their textbooks given to them by Millicent. They have to save her, and they have to save their town. Luckily there is a Flycycle just outside the school, piloted by Millicent who has to save her pupils.