June GNS

[ann_leckie]

It's June! In this hemisphere summer has begun--no, the solstice is not the first day of summer, do not get me started on that--and popsicles and sprinklers abound. And holidays! Everybody loves the Vestalia, of course, and round about the middle of the month it will be time to grow a little barley or lettuce in a bowl and weep for Adonis. I don't know about you, but I look forward to it every year.

GigaNotoSaurus marks the opening of the summer with "After October" by Ben Burgis.

The Tsar abdicates in February. The Provisional Government gets around to letting Fyodor out of prison in March. In April, he meets his Uncle Grigor at a Petrograd cafe. They talk about magic, death and revolution.

“I don’t care, Fyodka. Romans or Visagoths, Christians or Mohammedans, Tsars or…” The old man waves his hand, making a show of remembering the word. “…Bolsheviks… They’re all just different acts in the same circus.”

Fyodor and Grigor sit at a table by the window. They drink their tea in the Ukranian style, with apple slices.

Most of Grigor’s little sermon is familiar from the letters they exchanged while Fyodor was in prison, but one line rankles. “Politics change. What we do doesn’t. You should remember that.”

Fyodor wants very badly to correct that ‘we,’ to tell his uncle that there’s a reason he hasn’t so much as looked at his magic books since he was fourteen years of age. Instead, he blows on his tea and watches the steam rise up and disappear. When he does speak, his voice is subdued.

“In ancient Rome, who did the work?”

If you don't have time to read it, or you prefer audio, Podcastle will be running it some time soonish--I think this month? I do read slush for Podcastle and chat with the editors, but I have no part in scheduling or such and so I'm hazy on the topic. But I'll be sure and link to it when it runs!