Book Promo and Vignettes by Luke, Mary Catelli and ‘Nother Mike

Posted on by Sarah A. Hoyt

Book promo

If you wish to send us books for next week’s promo, please email to bookpimping at outlook dot com. If you feel a need to re-promo the same book do so no more than once every six months (unless you’re me or my relative. Deal.) One book per author per week. Amazon links only. Oh, yeah, by clicking through and buying (anything, actually) through one of the links below, you will at no cost to you be giving a portion of your purchase to support ATH through our associates number. A COMMISSION IS EARNED FROM EACH PURCHASE.*Note that I haven’t read most of these books (my reading is eclectic and “craving led”,) and apply the usual cautions to buying. I reserve the right not to run any submission, if cover, blurb or anything else made me decide not to, at my sole discretion.– SAH

FROM SARAH A. HOYT: Barbarella: The Center Cannot Hold #4

Prepare to enter the ultimate unknown! Barbarella, Vix and Taln know where to go to discover the galactic secrets of the Unnamable. Unfortunately, that means travelling beyond the edge of our galaxy and into the next — assuming they survive the termination shock on the way through! It’s a massive risk, but the chance to avert a galactic war that would kill trillions makes the lives of two females and a male hologram seem small by comparison — though maybe not to them!

FROM JONATHAN SOUZA: The Winter Solist: The Last Solist #2

Adelaide Taylor has survived her first semester at school and as a Dawn Empire Solist. She’s found her first Companion, Sayuri Suisha. Sayuri’s grandfather wants to meet his only grand-daughter’s new friend. In Japan, just before New Years. Along with that, she’s gotten a warning-one of the High Fae is hunting her and is planning to ensnare Adelaide in her schemes.
There’s a girl in her school that has been set up as a tethered goat for Solists.
Her local and very Catholic high school is putting her into places that shouldn’t happen at a Catholic high school.
And there’s a monster eating prostitutes in Queens.
Nobody ever said being a Solist would be easy…

FROM C. V. WALTER, JACK WYLDER, JESSE A. BARRET ET AL, AND WITH A COVER INSPIRED BY BRIAN LEE GNAD: Postcards from Foolz: Postcards from Foolz .

The rules of the game were simple: one image. Fifty words.

Twenty authors met the challenge and excelled, and this volume records their efforts. Between these covers are complete stories that will take a moment to read, and ages to forget.
If your appetite is whetted, you’ll also find that images have been provided for you to practice your wordsmithing skills. So that you, too, can try the next Postcards challenge.

Go on. Write!

FROM DALE COZORT: Snapshot II: The Necklace of Time

For eighty million years, the Tourists have taken Snapshots of Earth, creating living replicas of continents. Life in the Snapshots quickly diverges from the real world, creating a universe where humans and animals from Earth’s history fly between Snapshots, exploring, fighting, and sometimes meeting their alternate history selves. In 2014, the Tourists create a Snapshot of North America in a snow-globe shaped artificial universe, linked like pearls on a necklace to other copied times and places. In that timeline, Simon Royale—a.k.a. Simon-2014— is a legendary best-selling author. When he was only seven-years-old, his sister mysteriously vanished. Simon-14’s writing—and the power in it—is born from his obsession with discovering what happened to her. But now, cut off from the life he’d known, he may never find out.US-53 isn’t really the past. Thanks to the Tourists, it’s a mutant off-shoot, the 1950s grown up and sneaky, with sharp elbows. In this version of the timeline, Simon Royale—a.k.a. Simon-53—is just an aspiring author with a trunk full of unpublished novels. Then the two worlds connect. For an ambitious publishing company, it looks like a golden opportunity for Simon-53 to leverage Simon-2014’s fame.Can the clashing versions of Simon Royale coexist in the unnaturally linked timelines? Simon-2014’s legal battle over the right to his own work and identity are the least of his worries. In the 1953 timeline, his sister is still alive. What made her disappear in one reality but survive in the other? Is something dangerous hidden in his memories or his first novel? As Simon inches closer to the truth, one thing is clear: it’s a secret someone is willing to kill to keep.
FROM LEIGH KIMMEL: The Secret of Pad 34

Who would put a ceiling on humanity’s expansion into space?

That’s what Gus Grissom wants to know. While fishing offshore from Cape Canaveral, he glimpses a mysterious undersea city of unearthly geometries, marked with a strange three-armed cross symbol.

His efforts to research it bring him veiled threats from strangers at his door. Trouble blights an exemplary career. However, Gus refuses to be cowed into silence, and pursues every lead he can find.

HP Lovecraft wrote that we live on a placid island of ignorance and were not meant to travel far. This is the Space Race in a world where the Soviet Union is not our only adversary.

FROM DANIEL ZEIDLER: The Standard-Bearer’s Oath

Avenge the fallen. Restore honor to her people. Someone else can be inspired to liberate the kingdom.

Fourteen years after Sarbotel fell to the armies of a mad alien mage, Ilse is the last surviving member of her resistance cell. When she’s offered a chance to return to her homeland, she chooses vengeance instead. Allying with an immortal Guardian who has reasons of his own to want the mage slain, she’s out to put an end the Tyrant’s despotic rule.

The stakes are higher than she knows, for if Ilse fails to defeat the Tyrant, the entire planet may be destroyed…

FROM KAREN MYERS: Monsters, And More: A Science Fiction Short Story Bundle from There’s a Sword for That

A Science Fiction Story Bundle from the collection There’s a Sword for That

MONSTERS – Xenoarchaeologist Vartan has promised his young daughter Liza one of the many enigmatic lamedh objects that litter the site of a vanished alien civilization.

No one can figure out what they’re good for, but Liza finds a use for one.

ADAPTABILITY – The Webster Marble Deluxe Woodsman, Model 820-E, has been offline for quite some time. Quite some time indeed.

Good thing Webster has a manual to consult, and a great many special functions.

FROM MARY CATELLI: Enchantments And Dragons

A wizard must produce justice enough to satisfy a dragon.

A young man tries to rob a tiger’s lair.

An enchantress tries to keep a court safe while they ignore the perils of misusing her magic.

A lady finds that court intrigues can spread even to the countryside.

And more tales.

Includes “Over the Sea To Me,” “Dragonfire and Time”, “The Maze, the Manor, and the Unicorn”, “The White Menagerie”, “The Dragon’s Cottage,” “Jewel of the Tiger,” and “The Sword Breaks.”

Vignettes by Luke, Mary Catelli and ‘Nother Mike.

So what’s a vignette? You might know them as flash fiction, or even just sketches. We will provide a prompt each Sunday that you can use directly (including it in your work) or just as an inspiration. You, in turn, will write about 50 words (yes, we are going for short shorts! Not even a Drabble 100 words, just half that!). Then post it! For an additional challenge, you can aim to make it exactly 50 words, if you like.

We recommend that if you have an original vignette, you post that as a new reply. If you are commenting on someone’s vignette, then post that as a reply to the vignette. Comments — this is writing practice, so comments should be aimed at helping someone be a better writer, not at crushing them. And since these are likely to be drafts, don’t jump up and down too hard on typos and grammar.

If you have questions, feel free to ask.

Your writing prompt this week is: SEEMLY

97 thoughts on “Book Promo and Vignettes by Luke, Mary Catelli and ‘Nother Mike”

  1. Backing away she said “Sir! That’s not very seemly!”.

    Advancing toward her, he said “But dear lady, it is very seemly in my culture”.

    [Evil Grin]

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    1. Another man says “I’ve never understood why it is unseemly to kill a man when he’s attempting to rape a woman.”

      The first man turned growling said “Stay out of my business!”

      “But I think it is my business to kill people like you.” His gun fired killing the would-be rapist.

      The woman laughed nervously and said “That was very unseemly of you but thank you.”

      “You’re welcome. May I escort you home?”

      “Yes, thank you good sir.”

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    2. “It’s also very seemly for a lady of my rank to ensure my own security,” she sighed, letting the small blaster drop out of her sleeve. “Do take a step back, please. This is a new dress and I don’t want to get fresh blood on it.”

      Liked by 1 person

            1. Extra-Dimensional Monsters fear Lelia Chan Lestrang’s anger. :twisted:

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            1. But of course, “ladies of breeding” might have strong protectors around them, but the best strong protectors find it useful when the protectee can “assist” in the task of protecting them. :wink:

              And when the protectee is a young pretty harmless-looking female, it useful when the bad-guys under-estimate her. :grin:

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            2. “How do you know to do all of this…,” Emily waved her hands around the kitchen.
              “My mother insisted,” Lady Desides shrugged as she chopped up the potatoes. “Six months in the kitchen, six months doing dishes, six months cleaning rooms to the maids standards…Mother made it clear that I had to know how do all of this. It’s also why I know how to shoot a blaster and defend myself hand-to-hand as well.”

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  2. Charlotte chuckled and looked smiled. “You are not being seemly, Adelaide.”

    I shrugged, “I’m still trying to figure out what would be seemly under the circumstances. Who’s standards do I follow and how?”

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    2. Looking forward to it! Sorry I’ve been slacking a bit on keeping up with yours recently.

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      1. Since Orvan already claimed ‘Moo,’ I wanted to find a suitable form of c4c posting. The flyby’s worked quite well for me thus far… At least, when I’m not getting threatened with surface to air missiles or caught by the resident Drak Bibliophile.

        Liked by 2 people

        3. The Reader observes we only carp the folks we like. As to the SAMs, well we were due to upgrade the delivery vehicles…

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      1. I don’t think I want to try to sew a seam of a furlong. Heck my Mom tried to teach me to fix something on her Necchi-Elna sewing machine and after probably an inch I got my finger in the way. I still won’t touch the damnable machines…

        Liked by 1 person

    3. But it’s QUITE seemly to shoot punsters. Just to wound, of course. WHERE depends on how bad the pun was.

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      1. Hereabouts, the PUNishment is pelting with Carp, launched from any number of fanciful contraptions ranging from Trebuchets to Howitzers to Ballistic Missiles. :-D

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  5. I fail the 50 word challenge. ~:D

    “One must keep up one’s efforts to tame and civilize the beasts which surround us,” said Charlotte waving her fingers at George and company in a tolerant sort of way as she poured the tea with the other hand. “It would be unfortunate to waste an opportunity such as this.”

    “I see,” said the Prime Minister of the Loyalty with good humor. “Please Miss Brunhilde, a bit of each.”

    “One lump then,” said Brunhilde depositing a sugar cube in the cup, “and a touch.” The milk was added with a judicious air, being sure not to pour too swiftly or too much. “There we are. Perfection!” She extended the cup to him gracefully. “To your good health, Mr. Prime Minister.”

    “Thank you, my dear,” he said with a twinkle. “To what do we owe this magnificent effort at courtly presentation?”

    “Charlotte and I are playing tea party,” said Brunhilde without an ounce of concern. Miss Smith coloured a touch but nodded gravely, acknowledging the truth of her statement. “We are not even a year old yet, and a bit of playing seemed most attractive this afternoon.”

    “Ah,” nodded the Prime Minister after a blink to research ‘tea party’. “We are all your dolls then?”

    “Indeed sir,” agreed Charlotte in a very formal way, but with a wide smile. “It is more enjoyable when the dolls and teddy bears can join in the conversation.”

    “I am delighted to be included in your game, dear Miss Smith, dear Brunhilde.” The Prime Minister stood and bowed to them both over his cup and saucer. “May my elders join in as well?”

    “Yes, please,” said Charlotte, absently wiping away a happy tear that gathered in the corner of her eye. “So gracious of you, Mr. Prime Minister.”

    “Nonsense my dear,” he said grandly as he blinked to extend the invitation to his subordinates. “The pleasure is ours, I assure you. After all, how many can say they have received tea from the hand of Miss Charlotte Smith and Brunhilde, the Queen of the Valkyries? My colleagues and I will brag of this day to all our friends. The entire Loyalty will be green with envy.”

    “You are kind to say so, Mr. Prime Minister,” said Brunhilde. “Here are some more of my sisters, all quite determined to play. Isn’t that right, Athena my dear?”

    Valkyrie Athena arrived armed for a short war with a long javelin on her back, a broadsword in a leather baldric at her waist and a boxy black plasma gun on a sling in front. She was at the head of a skirmish line of Valkyries, likewise armed to the teeth and looking dangerous. “May we join you, your Majesty and Miss Smith? Prime Minister, I see you have received your tea already. You couldn’t have waited for me? I’ve been dying to shed these unseemly encumbrances and pour a few cups.”

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    1. The blue mice and pink elephants will hunt you down and punish you for exceeding the limits. When they get through the list of prior offenders. I think they have yet to start.

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      2. I suspect I should start looking for mousetraps, just in case they do start… As well as heffalump traps. (‘Pink elephants,’ says you. I know a heffalump when I hear of one! Those dreaded beasts shall not steal my – actually, I don’t even like honey. They’re welcome to it. But nothing else!)

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        1. Be sure they are certified for BLUE mice. (And they may send in the green imps for reinforcements.)

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          1. I’ve heard of pink elephants and green imps but not of blue mice. :wink:

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              1. True, but I was wondering if there was some sort of pop-culture thing I was missing.

                Oh, in one of David Weber’s Honorverse books, there was mention of “Space Hamsters” that I had to look up. :wink:

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                  1. And apparently, that’s the first appearance of pink elephants. :grin:

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  6. “There is something,” said Autumn, cautiously. Silence would be unseemly, but she could be no more definite. Hard to test whether haste or delay was the imprudence to be feared.
    “It is a building,” she conceded. The boat floated no more than a stride onward, and the chapel came clear.

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  7. “When dealing with the fae, you must always be on your best behavior, even when they are not.”
    “I thought the fae were very scrupulous about their manners.”
    “Most are. But there are a few who are not. Mostly the ones from the Unseemly Court.”

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  9. Rose gingerly stepped over the body laying in the trash strewn alley. Dutch her ever present shadow used the toe of his boot to flip the body over.
    “Looks like you’re late this time Rose, he’s been dead for about an hour” Dutch replied.
    Dutch didn’t mention the loss of a payday, it would not be seemly at this point.

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    1. “How can you be sure about the time” Rose asked.
      “It’s drizzling, under the body is dry along with his suit front” Dutch replied.
      “What can you tell me about his wounds?’ Rose asked.
      “Professional, looks like it was done by someone with military training, came up on him from behind, knife to the kidney then under the ribs” Dutch replied.
      “I certainly don’t like people who use professionals to murder others, it’s just not very seemly” Rose replied.
      “So we are going to do this anyway, payday or not?” Dutch amusingly asked.
      “I also hate when people steal my paydays Dutch” Rose forcefully said.

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      1. Of course, the murderer could be a professional but he killed that man for reasons other than he was paid to do so.

        Does Rose think it unseemly to kill somebody “not for pay”? :wink:

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  10. A few peasants remembered seeing a young man head toward the castle, and leave again, though they were not certain. Might have been some kind of woodcutter or forester, and perhaps not so young. Someone who went by the castle. A month before.
    “Or maybe it was two,” said old Dobinet.
    As they chattered, trying to determine the day, Rosaleen bit back a sigh. A princess must act in a seemly manner always. She would not have Lady Gilliane ashamed of her.
    Though, certainly, Lady Gilliane would have no shame in that Rosaleen chased after the prince with unseemly haste

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  11. “It is said that you will be leaving for West Francia after market day” said Chlothilde, addressing Simon the Magister. She was no longer alarmed by his dark skin, curly gray hair, or short stature as she had been a week before. His courteous and kindly demeanor made him less of a monster than other men of her acquaintance. “If that has been the rumor, it is true,” Simon replied. “I do have business there”. He gave her a searching look. “What is your interest?”.
    “I meant to inquire after your traveling companions”.
    “To see if you might join us?”
    She summoned he courage. “That thought had crossed my mind:.
    He shook his head. “No, fraulein. I usually travel alone, swiftly, and not by the common roads. You would find my way too hard and dangerous.”
    “Oh. I see”. She turned away, crestfallen.
    “Wait. I see your disappointment. You hope for something there, or fear something here”.
    “Yes, both. I was brought here as a child, but tragedy befell my parents and I have attracted attention I do not want. I have kin there, who may take me in”. Simon heard her tale calmly, and helped dry her tears. ”
    “I have troubled you” she said. “Forgive my intrusion, I will find another way”.
    “Stay.” he commanded. “Plans are made to be changed, and I am changing mine. Make what preparations you can, and be ready to leave early in the morning the day after market day. I will find us traveling companions and a less perilous road: my business is not that urgent. Although any road is dangerous in some fashion, and I cannot accompany you far. ”
    “Can you find companions so fast? It is only a couple of days until market day”.
    Once again, although she knew better by now, the brilliant white teeth of his smile in his dark face make him look vaguely sinister. “Like most things, it is not hard if you know how. I can adopt a guise that will make our travels seemly. You need not fear”.

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        1. Plotting is one of the best parts of writing! (Particularly when someone asks what you’re doing staring off into space like that, and you can truthfully answer “I’m plotting.”)

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  12. Not one of my usual settings or characters this time! I have no idea what, if anything, this will end up turning into. I just had a rather demanding sort turn up for this!

    “You son of a -”

    The adventurer’s curse was cut off as a jagged mass of sod and stone formed at the tip of the sorcerer’s scythe before he launched it at the useless wretch, putting him out of his misery. He returned the weapon to its usual place on his back after the spell’s amber light dissipated, turning towards the entrance of the ruins. The fool. It was well-established in these parts that if you saw a green cloak with a grey lining on the most convenient post for it a ruin had to offer that you proceeded at your own risk. If the monsters inside didn’t kill you the sorcerer who left the cloak surely would. Perhaps if you were lucky he might let you live if you didn’t get in his way. It would be unseemly to turn down assistance if the situation called for it, after all. This fool had been fortunate enough to have some usefulness, but in the end he overestimated himself and paid the price when he turned out to be every bit the nuisance Amon imagined him to be.

    It didn’t take long for the sorcerer to find his cloak. No one had been idiotic enough to bother it, though he always had a few enchantments to discourage would-be thieves. They recognized the cloak’s rightful owner and he fastened it on, pulling up the hood to cover up the half-white hair and red, reptilian eyes that were the clearest markers of his inhuman heritage. He might not be any closer to avenging his long-gone family but the black diamond he found in the ruins would make for a worthy addition to his collection or perhaps a nice addition to his pile of gold after selling it.

    “…Wait. Lady Mallory will want to see this.” he thought, though without any of his characteristic venom. He did owe House Rosaura much over the centuries so taking a loss on this if Lady Mallory required it of him would not trouble him at all. With no further business here he walked towards the highway that would take him to the family estate.

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      1. I will. I do need to set up a section on my computer for stuff that doesn’t fit anywhere else like this.

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      1. Antihero is it, though I expect him to be more of a supporting character than a lead in whatever this is should anything come of it. Not that you’d be likely to know either character but he definitely took after both Albel Nox from Star Ocean: Till the End of Time (military commander nicknamed “Albel the Wicked,” mainly personality and mannerisms) and Magus from Chrono Trigger (scythe-wielding wizard who led inhuman creatures in a war who specializes in shadow magic, though in this case Amon was relying more on his earth magic), both of whom are enemies who can potentially join up with the heroes for their own reasons. I’m still not sure what I’d end up doing with him or what kind of cast might spring up around him, though.

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        1. Fair enough! You’re right, I’m unfamiliar with both. The night ‘Albel Nox’ seems interestingly ironic, though – from the Latin roots, it could translate to something like ‘White Night/Knight.’

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          1. Heh, it is, especially considering that the military division he leads is called the Black Brigade and his personality is quite bloodthirsty. Here’s the scene where the hero Fayt and his friends Cliff and Nel meet him for the first time. Crispin Freeman’s voice work is a huge part of why he ended up being one of my favorite characters from the game:

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              1. He is, and he’s actually one of the better characters in terms of gameplay, too, though the best team is still considered to be Fayt, Cliff, and Maria last time I checked. I still like taking him with me as a permanent party member, though, for his playstyle, a side quest that explains a bit more about why he turned out like that (which ties into his clawed gauntlet, his other weapon type aside from katanas), and his many, many memorable lines. For another example outside that video, when the team rescues a particular character most of the party says how glad they are that she’s safe. Albel’s comment on the matter? “Don’t make me do it again.” delivered with exactly the exasperation you can imagine from that clip.

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  13. As Shelly watched the lander lift off for the Soviet moonbase, she hoped her face didn’t betray how badly she wished she were aboard. Her work with cryogenic fuels should’ve had enough applicability to the crisis to put her on the mission.

    However, she also knew she mustn’t show the slightest hint of resentment at being left behind. For all she knew, NASA wanted to keep the team as small as possible in order to avoid additional burdens on a compromised life-support system.

    And you’d better look enthusiastic when you’re called upon for Tiger Team here.

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  14. Young Nigel emitted a raucous belch while the other boys laughed.

    Spotting impropriety, Lily invoked her indigence routine. “Nigel Slim-Howland, you stop that at once! It’s quite unseemly!” Servomotors furrowed Lily’s brow and added more color to her cheeks.

    Young Nigel blushed while the other boys laughed all the harder.

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  15. Bottling the latest batch of moonshine, Delbert was unhappy. “Aw, Clem,” he complained, “don’t you think this act: hollering, shooting off guns, acting like we’ve got a feud going on – isn’t it a little unseemly?”

    “We’re a-makin’ ‘shine for Martian tourists,” said Clem. “Unseemly is the name o’ the game.”

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  16. “And then she’d scold me for my manners!” reminisced Nigel Slim-Howland with a laugh. “Sometimes I think that’s why she was built!” Growing serious, he said, “I suppose I’m boring you with all this.”

    “Not at all, Sir,” replied Gwendolyn as she dusted. “A bit of nostalgia is not unseemly.”

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  17. Letters From Foolz: “I am Gandalf the Upgunned, and I come back to you now, with superior firepower.”

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  18. “Then he’ll be gone,” said Petternella, as they walked. “That was why they sent for us. We will be able to tell Master Stephanos that his tower is free, which is only fitting.”
    “Better to catch him,” said Julianna.
    “As a rule,” said Theudo. “But here we must convince the villagers they are protected again, as they were not under the late king. Heaven only knows what the necromancers did to them.”
    “They won’t feel protected, they won’t be protected if he comes back,” said Julianna. “It is a knight’s duty to actually protect, as is only seemly and proper.”

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  19. She had done all that was seemly and proper. Sat her vigil, scrubbed herself clean, dressed herself in white and black and red, and presented herself at the chapel near the hour of dawn. Despite jests about how she would sleep as soon as she could, without having a tourney.

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  20. Genevieve! Your strange young gentleman-friend is here.

    She smiled and put a slip of card where she’d been reading; not carefully, the book wasn’t even as old as her parents. Its words, though… Toward a Social Ethics of Liberty by Methusaleh Graham. New revised edition of 2089. Printed by Charlottesport Press. Twelfth printing, 2963.

    Swiftly put it away, on its shelf right above the famous and wildly useful Tables of Logarithms, Trigonometrics, and Elliptics of “only” a century ago.

    Now perhaps, she thought as she grabbed up the hamper and fled the library for the stairs to the ground floor — mustn’t keep both Richard and her lady mother waiting at once! — that sort of interest and effort might be unseemly, in someone like herself; surely it would be a scandal if she said, oh, “differential equations” to one of her gentleman peers at some social function (at least if he’d the foggiest idea what those were). But her family tolerated her interests and even supported them — given she was always discreet.

    Meanwhile, it was not unseemly that her mother had used her most powerful speaking voice to summon her downstairs. Scrupulous and deft as she was in proper behavior elsewhere, Sylvia Bertrand settled deep in her own domain made her own rules, and no-one quite dared rein her in.

    (Of course some houses had apparatus to do such. Given only a few bits of tinkerage, a microphone, a magnetic amplifier with an alternator to run it, and a loud speaker to say your words at what distance your wires ran, no bellowing was required. All of it no more… insidious, than a clever collection of wire, magnets, and similar moving parts. But even the most redoubtable Sylvie Berthollet de Bertrand drew a line short of such daring.)

    “Ah, Genevieve! It’s wonderful to see you,” said Richard, dapper in a suit and loose sort of tie (all the better to stuff in his pocket later) with warm jacket. “And you’ve heeded my intimations we’d likely go for a ride and a walk out in the countryside.” (She’d dressed for an expedition, sensible shirt and waistcoat and long-ish wool dress — the last with those clever inner buttons one could join with string to shorten it up to a more wieldy length for far-walking.)

    “Yes, Richard, likewise and as always,” she said warmly.

    “Scoot, scoot, you two! It’s almost noon and I expect to see my youngest daughter back by twilight at worst.”

    Richard smiled in that way of his. “By sunset, surely, or failing that by the first stroke of midnight.”

    “You jest, young man, but one of these days…” with that merry edge of steel Genevieve had grown up knowing so well. “Scoot, off with you! Sooner departed, sooner returned!”

    He and she did not grasp hands as they walked the short distance out the tall main doors to the drive. “Richard, what is that?”

    “I believe the older-times used to call it a ‘jeep’ — though this one is widened for stability and strengthened for durability, the oldest examples being treacherously prone to flip.”

    “Richard, this is not a usual car.” Her hamper went easily into the open back, and they climbed in to the separated front seats.

    “No, it is not. Likely a bit noisier than you’re used to, it’s an internal combustion engine instead of the Stirlings you’ll be accustomed to around here, and a few other ways different too. But remember when I said I’d likely be widening your horizons? This is part of that.”

    And when he turned the key, indeed there was no soft gurgling of fuel, no quiet swish of blowers to the burners; rather a raucous sort of rumbling, rhythmic roar that was its own sort of exuberant. “Ready?”

    “Always an adventure, Richard.” Her voice was half-chiding, half-charmed.

    And he grabbed a long lever, worked pedals with his feet, and smoothly but swiftly they were off down the long driveway. “This right palace you live in, Jenn, always manages to amaze.”

    “Hardly a palace, Richard. You know, as an archeologist and, um, historian that it’s modeled closely — ours, and everyone’s here — on Britain right before the Old Millennium, what they called the Victorian Era.”

    “Not too closely, Jenn. Your ‘upstairs’ is pretty palatial indeed, they’d have fit your three and a half floors of family and servants’ quarters in two of theirs.” But then again, he bit back, you’ve never seen such a thing as a pocket library, that holds fifty times what you and all your neighbors have in your library rooms all together. “I’ll grant you that once-contemporary guff about ‘Dark Satanic Mills’ was mighty hard to credit, given their local alternatives.”

    And they fell within a mile or two into their accustomed rapport, as miles and minutes melted away like late-spring snow. As she thought, once more again, he’s the only person I’ve ever known I can be myself with, just exactly myself, no Engine clattering away in the background to sort seemly from unseemly — literally the only one.

    It’d been something like an hour when she had to say, at last, “Richard, we’ve been heading steadily northeast, and I know what’s that way just as surely as you must. Soon we’ll reach the Forbidden Zone; so I have to ask, will you turn us aside, or have you some magic key to let us pass onward?” Asked playfully.

    And answered forthrightly. “The latter, now that you mention it, Jenn. Here.” He held out his hand, palm down, signalling she should take what was in it.

    Which turned out to be a dull-gray metal box, several jewel-like lights on top (one lit green) and one clear-covered button. “Richard my dear, you’ve been consorting with Tinkers!” Not nearly so scandalized as any proper daughter ought to be.

    “Tinkers had nothing to do with that. Stand by, it’ll be in the next mile or two that… ah.”

    And there they were, floating in midair maybe two yards off the ancient, serviceable pavement. “Monitors!” Blobby, boxy things the size of a draft horse’s body, looking as menacing as experience had proved them to be.

    Already the light had turned a clear yellow, like amber. Echoed by a like glow around the monitors, that seemed to rise from the very air itself.

    “Quickly now, Jenn, push the button, there’s only one.”

    And just that swift, almost as soon as she’d pressed it, the light on the box had turned green again — and raising her eyes, she saw the Monitors lifting silently higher and higher, soft green pulses of light coming from the air around them. “Richard, that never ends well — only it did.”

    “No hackin’ or crackin’ needed, Jenn — old public-safety protocols. Once upon a time this was a big, fiery-hot impact crater. Dangerous, to most.”

    “Just impact? I’d thought… wonder-weapons, with their deadly radiations.” She was proud she’d said the words, not whispered ’em.

    “Half a ton of dropped rock gets you the ‘boom’ of ten tons of explosive, or more. Not like H-bombs or antimatter; but lots o’ rocks up there.”

    And they talked of, or more like around, the Recent Unpleasantness of two centuries ago; that made people so skittish, wary, or downright snake-bit of what Genevieve called “tech” — pronouncing it like it were Scottish, half-way between “tekh” and “Czech” — what his psychology books called ‘a distancing mechanism.’ As they drove on down the old road, as if the whole Forbidden Zone… wasn’t.

    They crested another rise in the mountain-ridge of the ringwall — and Jenn flat-out gasped, because now you could see, inside, square miles of savannah. “Ringwall makes a rain forest here, makes a rainshadow in the bowl. So, fewer trees. Now, just wait.”

    He took out another box; fiddled with it, said things to it, fast Scottish words like “cloud” and “field” and “sleep” — then words like “Eto prikaz, eto pravda.”

    And ‘mists’ in the crater cleared, to show… a rocket-ship. Pure raw legend.

    “Ride with me up by the moons and back, Jenn. Widen your horizons a bit more. You’ll be home ‘fore the sun sets here.”

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      1. Not so much you-can-buy-it published, or even “published” otherwise, so far; though I’m working on several things aimed at that. This one, like a lot of my vignettes (or “bignettes” since 50 words is madly aspirational for some of us), is its own little thing; but it’d be easy to expand into a full story with what I know (easier than editing it back down to 8 K for posting without moderation anxiety!). There is a bit more background, see response below.

        And by now, there’s gotta be a few years of weekly vignettes collected here on ATH; once posted, always available. (If you’re at all satisfied by the writing equivalent of popcorn.)

        I do have a few ‘Net domains, and once I collect enough stuff to put it up there it’s pretty much a flip of a virtual switch to do that… and it’s comments like yours that give this effort somewhat of a push. (And thank you kindly for that!)

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      2. Look a little further below, for some “more” — it doesn’t ‘advance the plot’ much further in story time, but should be worth the trouble of reading!

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      1. The world-building, which is interesting even to me, mostly comes for free with the “gateway writing” (and this is one of the most gateway-ish pieces I’ve ever written); it’s necessary enough to these characters and these events you can largely just sit back and watch the story go where it goes.

        And yes, he’s an impressive person; but then so is she, and both in many of the same ways. Though he didn’t do all this by himself, there’s a whole group of people (“Revivalists”) lacking the general techno-phobia… and a lot of long-lived, self-diagnosing or self-repairing goodies left lying around.

        “I grew up on the not-so-bad wrong side of the tracks in Charlottesport, marinated in semi-illicit tinkerwarez. And then one day, when I was still in school, I answered a little ad in the paper…” [[think Glory Road, but without the transdimensional magic and hero-quest parts]]

        “And all the ‘social graces’ stuff, that’s really not so hard, as long as you are paying attention and willing to learn.” And they both smiled, and shared a little laugh. And if wishes were horses, then beggars would ride. [[as in, there are people who can make a triple-axel in figure skating look easy…]]

        In the longer run, he’s interested (one of the few R’s) in trying to bring some of the benefits of the Old Tech to their society (without, of course, breaking it, which is the hard part), while she’s obviously been ‘pushing the envelope’ from within all her life… thus ‘two of a kind.’

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  22. Moonlight shone through the great colored windows of St. Kailen’s Cathedral, dappling the white marble floor with strange shades of red and gold. This building, the greatest marvel of modern magic, stood taller than the King’s palace, spires like the steepled hands of worshipers rising towards the heavens. When dawn came, Sigfrey’s rising light would touch the statue built in the tallest of the spires, entering the enchanted crystal orb in the saint’s hand and shining forth like a beacon over the entire city. The great temple had been constructed in eight days, coming to completion at noon on the summer solstice.

    Kailen himself, the newly-sainted Lion of Sigfrey, knelt before the altar, nearly prostrate upon the cold marble. Silence held in the vaulted chamber, interrupted only by the saint’s nearly muffled sobs.

    Bells in the distance tolled the early hour, yet Kailen did not stir. The shining armor he had worn when on parade before the cheering city lay before the doors of the sanctuary, his golden shield set against the wall beside it. The sword with which he had won the Second Conquest was nowhere to be seen.

    As the bells’ last echoes died, a new sound shattered the stillness of the cathedral: the tapping of a cane, joined by soft footsteps. As the footsteps drew nearer, constant and even in spite of a slight limp, the saint’s figure tensed for a moment. Then he relaxed.

    “Just me, my old friend,” a gentle voice murmured, and the saint let out a long breath, straightening enough to give a nod in greeting.

    Leaning against one of the nearby pews, Lord Fyreheart looked down at the kneeling figure for a moment before laying a hand on one broad shoulder. “It’s late, Kailen. Won’t you be leading the dawn sacrifice tomorrow?”

    A long moment passed before Kailen gave answer: “I suppose I must.”

    “You are reluctant? It is a great honor.”

    “It is not right. The priests have that authority, a mere warrior -”

    “- the Lion of Sigfrey, my friend, is hardly a mere warrior.”

    “Do not call me by that title!” Kailen’s voice rang throughout the sanctuary, and he shrank back at its loudness. “Forgive me,” he murmured finally. “I did not mean -”

    “I know.”

    Silence held court until Lord Fyreheart broke it again. “It would be unseemly for the celebrant to collapse in the middle of the ceremony.”

    “That will not happen.”

    “Cylene’s potions are powerful tools, my friend, but should be used in moderation. Even the greatest weapon, if treated incautiously, will turn in its master’s hand.”

    “Do not presume to lecture me, old man. I will do what I must.” The words might have been cruel, had the voice not been so tired.

    “As you always have, my friend.” The lord’s hand tightened on the Lion’s shoulder briefly before letting go. “As, perhaps, you always will.”

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    1. Interesting and evocative. I find myself curious as to why Kailen feels this way. I feel like I kind of lose track of where they’re going with this when Fyreheart says he-Fyreheart can’t be the one handling the dawn sacrifice because he has health problems and needs to not overdo the potions that treat those health problems. I got that part. Kailen’s response feels like it’s a bit orthogonal to what Fyreheart has been talking about, but if Fyreheart is in the habit of dropping double-meaning aphorisms that seem to reproach Kailen, his-Kailen’s defensiveness makes more sense.

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      1. Okay, looks like I wasn’t clear enough here; there was never meant to be a suggestion that Fyreheart could or would handle the sacrifice, although I can see where you got that impression.

        Fyreheart was referring to how little sleep Kailen was getting, and the likelihood of him collapsing during the ceremony. Cylene’s potions are meant to be fantasy-caffeine that Kailen’s been relying on, perhaps to a dangerous degree.

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          1. Yeah… Even my 500-1000 word excerpts. How much worldbuilding is too much? How much is too little? Especially when the centerpiece of the scene is the characters interacting?

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            1. I’m using them to work on novels. The fun point is when I work in a transition. It looks extremely weird.

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      1. Thank you! Listening to Anima Christi really helped me visualize this scene.

        I want to continue and develop this story, but I’ve got so many freaking projects already… sigh

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    3. Looks good to me, too, though my brain’s a bit fried and I don’t have much more to offer than that!

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    4. Very nice, very cinematic (appropriately so, of course). Even more than a little Deryni-esque, which is also a compliment.

      And if my bits and pieces of Norse haven’t led me astray, ‘Sigfrey’ actually translates as ‘Great Lord’ more or less (e.g. Frey and Freyja = Lord and Lady of the Vanir). So neat, whether you did or didn’t mean to do that…

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      1. Thanks! Mostly, ‘Sigfrey’ sounded about right for a made-up god of the sun. (Although there was a brief period where I ended up thinking Galfrey, before remembering that was already taken.) Some familiarity with Norse mythology may have played into that subconsciously.

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  23. [By request, more of that vignette, picking up near the end. On ‘cliology’ see Michael Flynn’s impressive “In The Country of the Blind.”]

    “Half a ton of dropped rock gets you the ‘boom’ of ten tons of explosive, or more. Not like H-bombs or antimatter; but lots o’ rocks up there.”

    “You mean kinetic bombardment — I’ve seen several books mentioning that, but always from before the… Unpleasantness.”

    “There’s a lot of, well, cultural battle fatigue you could call it, about and around all of that. Thus our widespread… resistance, to things like electricity and, well, most post-Victorian levels of useful arts. Stirling hot-air engines, for instance, don’t need a high-tension electric spark coil to ignite their fuel, it just burns steady… internal combustion engines like this one do. ‘Loud speakers’ need ‘amplifiers’ to work, but ‘telephones’ don’t… so almost nobody uses the first, while we have commercial and public-leased networks of the second.” There was a bit of silence broken by engine sounds, and gear-shfting before and after each sharp curve (of which there were many, by now).

    “I suppose we are… snakebit. Spooked. Perhaps… scarred, in the wake of the, uh, Great War. It’s as if we blame, somewhere deep below the surface where we never have to speak of it or even look at it, the useful arts for that happening. Every time that lightning crashes, we flinch like it had been a real shellburst or fusillade.” Her voice got less haunted sounding, almost normal. “Terror blocks. Post-traumatic-stress syndrome. Battle fatigue. Shell shock. Soldier’s heart. The names change, the horror endures. For a man, a family, a town, a province, a country, a world.”

    “Or far bigger yet, Jenn. The Convulsion — what they all seemed to call it then — was at least a few dozen star systems in extent. Maybe hundreds.” His voice was very quiet, just loud enough to be heard over the vehicle noise. “Soldier’s heart? Never heard that one.”

    Genevieve smiled. “American Civil War Between the States, 1860s. Said by many to be the first ‘modern’ war, like some precursor or preview of the Twentieth Century’s ‘world wars’ — some say it’s as if the old Americans practiced on themselves, first, so they could win all the big ones later.”

    Richard smiled a twisted smile. “That verges on trying to comprehend Fate itself, Jenn. Even amusedly avoiding calling myself a ‘historian’ much of the time, so people don’t get ‘spooked’ — I find I fear to tread a bit on that eerie ground myself, where such considerations lie.”

    There was an interval of silence, as they climbed the increasingly steep and winding road. Which was never in poor repair, she thought. Oh, but wait, they hadn’t called it “permacrete” for nothing, had they?

    “Richard?”

    “Yes, Jenn?”

    “What really caused the Un… I mean, the Convulsion?”

    “Never read or heard from anybody who knows. Maybe no-one’s ever known, at least who’d tell or did. Quite possible no-one ever will, for humanity at large to know. Suddenly, there was a lot of ‘saber rattling’ as they used to say, far more threat and bluster, then… actions, instead of words. So much of the very little contemporary information I’ve seen focuses on what was happening or what people were afraid was about to happen. It wasn’t anything like an aggressor steadily seizing more and more territory, like ‘World War II’ was; or a small trigger event catalyzing a conflagration by running cascade, as ‘World War I’ seems to’ve been, either.”

    He ‘downshifted’ for a particularly nasty bit of curve-and-recurve, like so many mountain roads Jenn had known. “Would you say you understand, and I’m assuming you’ve read much around it up in your cozy library, the cause of the ‘Crazy Years’ right after the Old Millennium, for instance?” His question wasn’t one she’d heard before, but she pounced anyway.

    “The social fragmentation and, well, bifurcation almost, that’s not hard at all to see, especially in hindsight. But the cult-like aspect of some of the beliefs and, well, loyalty-tests and loyalty-rituals is a bit eerie even after all this time. Almost like that scene from back on a few centuries more, Shakespeare’s little ‘No, ’tis the moon’ dialogue. As if you had to prove that your loyalty to ‘their’ cause and faction was higher than to plain facts in front of your eyes.” Genevieve shuddered.

    “That’s pretty… pathological, Richard. There are plenty of things in my world, in our world, that you see but don’t remark on out loud or even acknowledge if someone else does. But you never seem to have to actually lie, outright, to prove you ‘love’ something else more than the plain and obvious truth itself. No ‘Taming of the Shrew’ for us!

    “But I really couldn’t tell you how or why that infected them, either.”

    “Well, Jenn, that’s one of the theories — and we’re outside the domain of actual historical data by now — about the Convulsion. That two or more social-cultural complexes, ways of seeing and being in the world, somehow got on a collision course. Sort of like National Socialism vs. the rest of the world in the mid-1900s; sort of like The King vs. The Pretender way, way too many times in Europe in the half-millennium or so before. If they did, it’s not at all clear to me what those complexes might’ve been.

    “But one of the most interesting ideas is actual cliosophical dissonance.”

    “Okay, I think I get that Clio is the muse of history, so cliosophy would be a wisdom or study of history… but a discord between hostile camps of historians, say, ought not be able to set worlds on fire!”

    “It’s a bit worse than that. Cliosophy or cliology, or moral science back in the mid-1800s, or only-sometimes psycho-history, is — or is alleged to be — a precise and quantitatively predictive theory of history, a sort of statistical mechanics but for people. With that, you could try to find points where a small change you could really make avalanches into a far bigger diversion of history — and so bend it to your will, at least somewhat. But beyond practical considerations, there’s a huge theoretical problem, too.”

    “So dissonance… would be two or more groups trying to do it at the same time? Without being obvious to each other? But that would invalidate the very theory you’re trying to use to, um, rule the world. You could put in the… ‘back reaction’ it would be called, in physics, of your own little fiddlings with the system; but you couldn’t ever know what to add in for the others’ efforts, without knowing what they were trying to do and how.”

    Richard smiled, warmly. “And how would that affect the whole, Jenn?”

    “There’s no way to tell, it would depend. But wait, that means the entire system’s behavior could be affected! The entire historical system could become unstable, like a moon circling too far away from its planet, like those fox-and-rabbit equations I studied years ago. Oh, wait, that’s the point.” She was silent a moment. “You’re meaning they bent history back and forth, until it broke. ‘Oops.’ Until we broke. Crap.”

    And she felt, as she’d not really done before, what it meant she was riding this far above what had used to be the landscape, before. And shivered, all over, more than a little.

    “Yeah. That’s what I thought, exactly. Still only a speculation though.”

    And again there was a near-silence, but not for long.

    “Okay, then, so where did your little gray box come from?”

    “You remember back when your mother asked me if I meant to become a Master Tinker? In that soft-but-razor-sharp way she has?”

    “And next you said, ‘I’m not nearly so unambitious as that.’ And she and all the rest of ’em figured your plans had nothing to do with tinkerin’. But it seems now they all were wrong.” Her voice was… wistful, or almost so, very far from upset or affronted. Almost all her earlier carefulness had gone.

    [end part 2/3]

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  24. [and, part 3/3 of extended vignette]

    “Tinkering is different. More practical. I grew up with it, Jenn, on the not-so-bad wrong side of the tracks there in Charlottesport, soaked and marinated in semi-illicit tinkerwarez. But truly I was never all that much a Tinker; it’s all about bending the edges of what you have a tad further, till you get an ‘edge’ on someone else. All I ever wanted to do was plot my careful course, then move on in bold straight lines. Which didn’t seem open to me, till I answered this ad in the paper one day. And passed their tests. Right about then the whole world changed for me. Opened up like a book, like my first day in a library ever. Me still in school and all.”

    “Yeah. Like the day you realize equations can tell you how the stars move, how the moons and the sun do. Or… but you know all that, already.”

    The view down across the flatter lands was by now breathtaking, the very few times she could see. Which was all right with Genevieve; she wasn’t so comfortable near deep drop-offs, and also she did not like the possibility someone might see them, up high here in the lands of the Forbidden Zone, where no-one had gone and come back and told the tale for… time out of mind.

    “It took me a while to find all this out, but they’re a group called the Revivalists, and what holds them together is they lack this fear, this techno-phobia as it was called, our reluctance to get any nearer the arts and works of pre-Convulsion society than we pretty much are right now. And you ought to realize there are many, many things left behind from before the Great War, as you called it, that were made to be long-lived, many of ’em self-checking or even self-repairing. Not ‘Artificial Machine Intelligences’ or ‘Friends’ as they were called, only running very large stepwise programs, like truly huge card-strings on a Babbage Engine. Some are still going.”

    “Enduring. Like this road we’re riding on. Like those ‘haints’ we met at the edge of the Forbidden Zone, ‘monitors’ people call them. Like other things I’ve heard of, like a whole library that fits in your pocket; you tell it what page of what book to show and it does.” She sighed a wistful sort of sigh. “Now that’s a piece of tinkerage I’d dearly love to have; if only I could keep and use it, not be deathly afraid every moment I’d be caught with it.”

    And suddenly she laughed. “Wait… did you just tell me a pun wrapped in a personal story? An inter-linguistic one at that? A-M-Is = Friends?”

    “Not my carnival, not my monkeys; that one was old when our grandparents were a naughty gleam in some ancestor’s eye. And if you’d really like to get your hands on an authentic pocket library, that can indeed be arranged. Remember, most everyone’s scared half to death of those little wonders; so many were destroyed, but a lot of ’em only dumped in someone’s attic, or barn, or whatever. Many ended up with Tinker bands, gathering dust because they were too ‘high tech’ as they used to say, to be any good to either sell or modd.”

    “And so found their way into the hands of these Revivalists. Who somehow managed not to get themselves completely ostracized from society, polite or otherwise, for their bold tinkerage-touchin’ trouble.”

    “Yes, well, therein lies a tale. Involving such eminent personages as, for example, the current Lady Astenga. But here we are,” and he slowed their ‘jeep’ considerably, “about to cross the Divide. Instead of seeing the far country below and around us, we’ll soon see the inside of the Crater.”

    “And therein would be the big surprise you brought me here to see.” Only a faint touch of question in how she said it.

    “That, and particular of its features. And to enjoy your peerless company, Genevieve, of course. I’m still not sure you have any idea how remarkable if not unique you actually are. Or what a magnificently different kind of conversation we can have, where you’re not measuring and monitoring every last word you say against some inner trip-threshold of unseemliness.”

    “Oh, I’m unique all right and for sure; even after all these weeks you’ll still have barely a clue how unique I am, to my folks’ enduring if not quite absolute despair.” She was, obviously, talking of her prospects.

    “So many of the Revivalists understand their nascent little society isn’t one they can just drop down into place within ours; such a clueless kind of shock would destroy theirs and maybe ours too, so needs must. But what that means, in turn, is that they’ll just go their way and let us go ours; which sounds good, except then it means you have to choose one and not the other to live in. And they can’t go back to ours, without giving up all of the glittery new treasures they’ve found.”

    “And you’re not a one to be content living in Tinkerland Coventry forever and aye, I daresay. Just as I would not likely be either.” And then their slow progress, creeping on in low-low with the torque converter almost at neutral, brought them further up a rise and around a bend…

    And Jenn flat-out gasped, because now you could see, inside, square miles of savannah. “Quite the little secret-garden you have here, Richard. Maybe the fairest one I’ve seen in awhile. I’m more than a little in awe of its sudden wild beauty.” And there he stopped, set the brake.

    “Ringwall makes a rain forest on the windward slopes, makes a rainshadow in the bowl. So, fewer trees. And it’s not really mine, of course; but you can’t hardly get in here without the codes, so it’s a sort of ‘vivalist preserve in practice. But that’s only part of it.

    “Now, just wait.”

    And he brought out another box, looking much like a ‘radio’ as she’d seen in a few engravings; but about the size of a loaf of bread, not a cabinet or a loveseat. “Not any high-powered bit of tinkerage, ‘only’ a wireless telephone. On this end. Watch the center of the crater, now, down where the mists are thickest.”

    And he flipped a few switches, not waiting for any vacuum tubes to warm up and with no huge heavy B-battery wired in — but it was far bigger than the gray box. Said something, in what she thought might be Russian, then something else in Scottish, so fast she could catch only a few words like “fog” and “field” and “sleep” — then more words in that maybe-Russian, like “Eto prikaz, eto pravda.”

    And ‘mists’ in the crater cleared, to show… a rocket-ship. Raw legend.

    “Richard?” And then… “You just told that, ah, ship to turn off something that was, uh, knocking the corpuscles of light aside, didn’t you? What I once read they used to call a… blur field, except the writer said it was pure moonshine hogwash, ‘magical thinking.'”

    “Man who helped get the first Space Age off the ground — who invented the three radio-satellite stationary ‘triangle’ configuration, to cover all of a world — once said any sufficiently advanced, um, set of useful arts is indistinguishable from magic; there’s some fine, antique magic for you.

    “Ride with me up by the moons and back, Jenn. Widen your horizons a bit more. You’ll be home ‘fore the sun sets here.” His smile was — wide as the sky, all this wide blue sky you could see from up here.

    And hers, she could feel, was too. “It happens I know the minimum-energy ‘transfer orbit’ from right around Edenvale to either moon takes about two days, simple celestial mechanics and no ‘tech’ to it. One way. That’ll not get me back ‘by candlelight.'”

    “Who said anything about minimum-energy, Jenn? We can lift off using the same sort of short-range repulsion that lifts the Monitors, then do, well, a few fancier things to get there pretty fast. Never have to use rockets unless we truly want to. And it’s one of those self-diagnosing systems, a clean-package unity, the real high old almost-like-magic.”

    Suddenly she laughed, held out her hand to him. “Lots o’ girls say they’re over the moons with love, Richard. I’d like to be one, for real, at last.”

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