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Spoilers for Critical Role Campaign 2/The Mighty Nein follow.

If you ever need proof of just how mighty an entertainment empire Critical Role is, just point to the New York Times bestselling Tusk Love. The romantasy novel, written in our universe by Thea Guanzon, began its existence as a Campaign 2 running gag - in the world of Exandria, the novel of the same name (and plot) is a favorite of The Mighty Nein's Jester Lavorre, played by Laura Bailey. Funnily enough, though, fan-favorite Jester just can't get the main character's name right.

Well, according to one incredibly reliable source, Tusk Love the novel almost gave us an answer for that.

The reliable source in question is Dani Carr, Critical Role's lorekeeper extraordinaire and all-around hero to Critters everywhere. In 2025, Carr did an interview with YouTuber Jordon Brown about a whole host of Exandrian subjects, and at one point in the discussion, delved into her time plotting out the real-world Tusk love with author Guanzon.

But before we get into that, you should know - technically, there's already an implied reason that Jester keeps mistakenly calling Tusk Love's main character, Guinevere, by another name. That is, the name she keeps calling her, Genevieve, just happens to be the name Jester herself was given at birth. There are a whole lotta parallels between the relationship between Guinevere and paramour Oskar to the one between Jester's relationship with soulmate Fjord Stone, so you can understand where she's coming from.

Now that that's out of the way, let's get into the story within the story.

At one point in her discussion with Brown, Carr brought up that, in the universe you and I live in, the reason for the Tusk Love name mixup was, well, forgetfulness.

 "Laura [Bailey] kept forgetting what the name of the main female character was," Carr explained, laughing, "And I finally had to message her and be like 'What is her name?' It is a written book, there can only be one name. [...] It makes sense that Jester doesn't remember - she's focused on Oskar."

"It was funny," the lorekeeper continued, "When we were working on Tusk Love I was like, 'You have to pick one name.' [...] Even then, I think we originally had an idea, I think we ended up dropping it for the actual book, but I think we had the idea that she took the second name as, like, a road name. To kind of hide her identity. And that was one of the reasons that Jester kept forgetting which one it was."

"But then when we actually started working on the book," Carr concluded, "With the incredible Thea Guanzon, I was like, 'Eh, it's not a big deal. We don't need to try to work that in; Jester can just have forgotten.'"

In her defense, with an orc chest as muscled as it is on those Tusk Love covers, I'd forget about names too.

You can learn more about Jester Lavorre by watching Critical Role's The Mighty Nein, streaming now on Prime Video. And for those of you who want to learn more about Guinevere & Oskar (for science purposes, obviously), you can purchase Tusk Love wherever books are sold. 

With two animated series on Prime Video, Campaign 4 in full swing, and so much more Exandrian lore to come, Critical Role is showing no signs of slowing down. That's why the adventuring party at Popverse are here to bring you everything we can from those nerdy-ass voice actors & Bo., including:

• Critical Role release schedule
• Critical Role's Campaign 4 characters ranked
• How to watch Critical Role in order
• Ways for you to relive the Critical Role panel from ECCC '26
• Taliesin Jaffe on playing Mollymauk Tealeaf for Campaign 2 vs. playing him for Prime Video
• Matt Mercer's homebrew warrior class (created originally for Vin Diesel)

...and much, much more. Roll initiative, player. Magic awaits.