#3

To T., from Lydia Millet's How the Dead Dream.

Dear T.,

I haven't much to say to you right now because I am not done reading about you yet, but, I just had to say, you're just getting strange. I'm not really understanding the road you are taking, or why you are reacting so oddly to things, but my goodness. I can't wait to see what happens to you.

- Phantom Inkheart.

#2

To Kommandant Richwalder, from Pam Jenoff's The Kommandant's Girl.

Kommandant,

I don't even know where, or how, to begin telling you how stunned and devastated I was at your actions. I truly felt you loved Emma and would never harm her, even if she was a Jew. I thought, that after all you'd been through previously, that you, of all people, would never do such a thing. I understand the pain you must have felt and the shock of her own deceptions, but, to turn so quickly on the woman you'd let into your life after such tragedy had befallen you, I just cannot understand. But still, I felt so bad when you were killed.
I guess I just had so many hopes for the two of you, and for just you really. While reading your story I wondered at the end, what would really happen? Would you find out about Emma's secrets...? And if you did, what would you do...would you just leave everything and run away with her? Or would you turn her in? I didn't have to wait very long to find my answer because I couldn't stop reading until I knew what would happen. To find that perhaps, your heart was too cold and there was a horrifying darkness in your soul...or maybe, there was just a broken man who was as torn and broken as I felt while reading your book. I don't think I'll ever really understand, I don't even know if I want to.
By writing you this letter I wanted to try to figure it out, but I just can't. So for now, I will say goodbye, and maybe you will hear from me again someday.

- Phantom Inkheart.

#1

To Erik, The Phantom of the Opera by Gaston Leroux. (Was there ever any doubt that my first letter here would be to him? :p)

Dear Erik,

When I first saw you in a movie, I was dumbstruck. It was a musical and I became completely captivated at that glimpse of your story. I then looked to the novel, that wonderfully done story about your tortured life. The book that hooked me forever. And yet then, I saw you come alive again right before my very eyes on a stage, just a few feet away. It was maddeningly hypnotizing. I thought I could not be anymore attached to your character, but I was. I think you will always be one of my favorite characters. And I just wanted to say thank you for being so mysteriously comforting.

- Victoria, the Phantom Inkheart.