THE PERFECT CIRCLE, exploring the odd geometry of Love

THE PERFECT CIRCLE
CLAUDIA PETRUCCI (Tr. Anne Milano Appel)
World Editions (non-affiliate Bookshop.org link)
$14.99 ebook, available now

Rating: 4.25* of five

The Publisher Says: Two women far apart in time, a mysterious unsellable mansion in Milan that connects them: two lives that start to overlap as impossible parallels are revealed in this story of passion, betrayal, and selfish desire.

In the round house on Via Saterna, its Palladian square exterior nothing but a trompe-l’oeil, the sun pierces through the central skylight. Its rays pass three floors unobstructed, before reaching the circle below at the heart of the house: four fingers of water filling a little silver basin. It is here that young Lidia dies, setting an end to her clandestine love affair with the ambitious architect. It is this house that real-estate agent Irene is asked to sell, decades later, as the climate catastrophe escalates, cloaking the divided city in a permanent orange haze. Returning to her native Milan for the sale, Irene feels the brunt of her father’s judgement. He is a proud Italian and prouder architect—how could his own daughter make a living selling cultural patrimony to the highest foreign bidder?

As she faces this new Milan and the old family tensions she had avoided while living in Rome, Irene throws herself into the impossible sale, getting to know Via Saterna intimately—this space that is as unsettling as it is hostile, with the slowly emerging traces of Lidia’s interrupted life. In every room of the house, the burden of a mysterious, unresolved past can be felt, remnants of a selfish and manipulative love.

The Perfect Circle tackles themes like time, death, and repetition with depth and originality, while carrying its philosophy lightly. Through it all, the novel is a subtly disturbing page-turner, every new page adding a new layer and twist.

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My Review: The Performance, my previous experience by this author/translator duo, was not a success the way this read was. It was not the prose that presented me with a problem, it was the story the elegant and insightful prose was telling that turned me off. "Positive gaslighting" is a bridge too far for this old-man brain to go along with.

Thank all those useless gods I'm not confronted by this issue in The Perfect Circle. I remember the Milan of the 1980s, and it's evoked very clearly in the setting of this strange, almost sentient-seeming house at 7 Via Saterna. I spent my earliest years in a house that, like this one, felt deeply and unnervingly like it was aware. I hope whoever lives there now has made friends with the house, otherwise it will eat their happiness the way my house and the Via Saterna did to its earlier inhabitants. I'm clear about why Lidia, the owner from 1985 and Dario, the architect she hired to revamp the place ended up the way they did. Their passionate, relationship-destroying affair, the tragedies (see the "CW" tag and heed it) that come from it...all of it was that damned house! In truth, the house should be exorcised.

If you're not clear which house I'm referring to, both is your best assumption.

The evevnts of the 1980s provide the foundation for a story in the near future, in a Milan that's more entombed than protected from a dystopian world as the smog of the 1980s is now...um...fog/mist/atmospheric weirdness. 7 Via Saterna is unoccupied, never was, and will finally be sold once Irene gets to work on the problem of how to present it to buyers. She didn't count on discovering the unoccupied house is lived in by a young woman called, interestingly, Lidia. Now what can she do to shift this property as she's contracted to do? Who is the mysterious young Lidia, who can't be the 1980s woman who owned the house or a descendant of hers as there were no descendants?

What's so wonderful about Author Petrucci's Italian text and Translator Appel's rendering of it is how sinuous and beautifully recursive it is. The clues as to your place in time during any given moment of the story are subtle, easy to miss; I missed them all...I was only aware that I had missed them once I twigged to the storytelling technique that had worked so perfectly on me.

I'm a pretty experienced reader. It takes a masterful hand to wave my attention away without also losing my interest in so doing. I was left feeling really impressed, really delighted, when at the very end of the story I caught on to what was happening.

That sounds like a five, or even five-plus star review. There aren't five full stars on the rating scale. What happened? The hints and tickles of a lesbian attraction, that's what. It was so underdeveloped as to be pointless, a distraction that added nothing to the story. In 2026 that feels like queerbaiting, not character-building; it could easily be snipped out without the smallest change to anything being needed. So no, no perfect rating...but a whole huge leap up over the first Petrucci I read in my esteem.

I hope this team will bring more stories to the anglophone world.

THE LOST BOOK OF ELIZABETH BARTON, Tudor times religious shenanigans with your second course in darkest academia

THE LOST BOOK OF ELIZABETH BARTON
JENNIFER N. BROWN
St. Martin's Press (non-affiliate Bookshop.org link)
$14.99 ebook, available now

Rating: 3.75* of five

The Publisher Says: A dual-timeline murder mystery set in an English country manor, when an ambitious professor discovers the long-lost manuscript of a Reformation-era prophetess

Historian Alison Sage has made a groundbreaking archival discovery―she found a manuscript containing the prophecies of a 16th century nun, Elizabeth Barton. Barton’s prophecy condemning Henry VIII and Anne Boleyn led to her execution and the destruction of all copies of her prophecies―or so the world believed.

With Alison’s discovery, she is catapulted to academic superstardom and scores an invitation to the exclusive Codex Consortium, a week of research among a select handful of fellow historians at a crumbling manor in England, located next to the ruins of the priory where Elizabeth herself once lived.

What begins as a promising conference turns into a nightmare as the eerie house becomes the site of a murder. Suddenly, everyone is a suspect, and it seems that answers lie at the root of a local legend about centuries-old hidden treasure. Alison’s research makes her best-suited to solve the mystery―but when old feelings resurface for a former colleague, and the stakes of the search skyrocket, everyone's motives become murky.

Alison’s cutthroat world of academia is almost as dangerous as Elizabeth Barton’s sixteenth-century England, where heretics are beheaded, visions can kill, and knowing who to trust is a deadly art. The Lost Book of Elizabeth Barton is a thrilling novel, crackling with the voices of the past and propelled by a mystery that will leave readers in suspense until the very last page.

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My Review: A woman of faith such as the factual Elizabeth Barton, but no education or privilege such as the factual Elizabeth Barton, who has visions and claims they're sent by her god such as the factual Elizabeth Barton, and whose country...world, really...is rocked by religious and political strife is going to be very useful to The Powers That Be. No matter what the factual Elizabeth Barton says, believes, or promotes, both sides o any fight are going to do everything they can to gain control over her person and her message. That she already lives in a convent is the first big win for the Catholic/anti-Lutheran/no-divorce-for-Henry pole of the Tudor social spectrum.

Elizabeth Barton was not educated but also was not stupid. She knew what her handlers wanted her prophecies to point towards, and while I believe her statements were sincere in representing her god's will I'm in no doubt that she made the statements to align with her handlers' interests. Not least because she shared them, though also because she believed her god was of one mind with herself and her handlers.
Was the factual Elizabeth Barton a pawn, a manipulated victim of powerful men seeking a political edge in a very consequential power struggle? Or was she a canny survivor who put her credibility behind what turned out to be the losing side in a societal upheaval, with catastrophic consequences? My response to that is yes.

In the 21st century another woman living through a time of upheaval, fictional Alison Sage, discovers the book of prophecies written by Elizabeth Barton during her lifetime. As there are many, many juicy tea-spills that resolve seriously vexing issues of faith, foreknowledge of events, and Elizabeth Barton's real thoughts, fictional Alison Sage becomes famous and powerful overnight. In a passage of History where megalomaniacal murderous tyrants are suddenly back in fashion as heads of state, Elizabeth Barton's true thoughts and honest purposes in making her prophecies bid fair to be as powerful in shaping public opinion as they were when the Royal Serial Killer was on the throne.

If the story had stayed in this register I'd've lapped it up like a camel hittin' the oasis after crossing the entirety of the Empty Quarter on a mouthful of salty water. Alas, fictional Alison Sage is a Good Girl who still reminds her ex that his mother's birthday is coming up, defers to the men in her academic discipline while getting infodumped on, and doing her own infodumping, gets entangled in the literal dopiest fatal entrapment-cum-treasure hunt scheme ever devised...you know there's really no point in trying this story wanted to be a romantic novel but Clio, Muse of History, said "Ἄρα οὐκ" and made it a chase/quest mystery with too much talking...even for academics.

It all hangs together, Author Brown doesn't drop any story-threads, the ending is the one that best fits the developments in the story. It just does this while taking its own sweet time to get from A to B while everyone infodumps each other, which even academics who luuuv them some monologuing would not put up with their colleagues giving the 101 course synopsis to everyone they meet at a conference. Of subject matter experts.

Nope.

Nor does fictional Alison Sage deciding to trust someone from her past with crucial information about her career-altering discovery. Nor...well, my point is made. Structural integrity does not make for structurally supported magnificence of edifice design. I'm not sorry I read the story because I think Author Brown made her historical-resonance points obvious enough to be meaningful, made the factual Elizabeth Barton aka "The Holy Maid of Kent" or "The Mad Maid of Kent" or other such obscurative labels as suited the dismissive purposes of male historians of different eras take a more solid shape than she usually does, and managed still to leach all the propulsive drive I thought would be inherent in this set-up, a female Cotton Malone tale of derring-do, out.

It's a sadness to me because this is the kind of idea I batten on finding in a novel.

LIVONA CHOW MEIN, amazing how long scumbaggery can go on without causing a revolution

LIVONA CHOW MEIN
ABIGAIL SAVITCH-LEW
Simon & Schuster (non-affiliate Bookshop.org link)
$14.99 ebook, available now

Rating: 3.5* of five

The Publisher Says: In the vein of Happiness Falls and Family Lore, a gripping story of family history and political upheaval centered around a Chinese family-owned restaurant in Brownsville, Brooklyn and its impact on the neighborhood’s Jewish and Black residents over the course of a century.

In 1978, two tenements on Livonia Avenue in Brownsville burn to the ground, killing one resident and displacing dozens of others. It remains unclear who set the buildings ablaze, but the survivors are convinced the culprit is Mr. Wong.

Who exactly is Mr. Wong, and what allegedly drove him to this extraordinary act of violence, is the question that consumes this novel as it plunges into four generations of Wong family history. First is Koon Lai, an immigrant who runs a Chinese restaurant on Livonia Avenue; second, his son Richard, a man desperate for his own chance at the American Dream; and third, Jason, a poet who seeks his escape in the bohemian counterculture of the 1970s, but finds himself an unwitting participant in Brooklyn’s gentrification. In the 21st century, Jason’s daughter Sadie returns to Brownsville as a journalist, determined to unravel the mystery of what happened decades earlier on the night the buildings blazed.

Joining together the present and the past is the community organizer Lina Rodriguez Armstrong, who was also displaced by that fire and who has spent the intervening years fighting for the rights of Brownsville’s residents and organizing a Livonia Avenue community land trust.

A stunning debut from a new talent, Livonia Chow Mein contemplates how the American pursuit of freedom relies on a collective amnesia and challenges us to consider what it would take for us to truly live in harmony.

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My Review: As debut novels go, Author Savitch-Lew picked a doozy of a topic...the arson plague that hit New York's working-class and immigrant housing, the war on the communities that were criminally negligent of their duty to provide landlords with their just and fair profits, and had the audacity not to be white or, often enough, to speak English. The communities that were forming and re-forming and growing also were guilty of demanding the landlords obey the laws of New York City! Can you imagine such arrogance? It costs actual money, money that could be profit!, to obey all those idiot safety and health rules!

It's a shameful, revolting tale of greed and racism.

It's also an immigrant descendant's reckoning with US racism and capitalism at their most nakedly unabashed. Ambitiously attempting to use dual timelines to tell different stories in different eras and (fatally for my reading pleasure) suspense-destroying levels of intertwinedness, the result is two good stories about a family dreaming the "American Dream" as evidence of its fictionality mounts in their faces. Had these been presented in sequence, the 1940s then the 1970s, much more could have been wrung from each era's challenges. As it was, the effort to keep the reader in suspense felt misplaced...obviously this situation worked out we've already seen that person in the 1970s!...so I was left sitting there with my teeth in my mouth wondering "why am I here again?"

Because both these stories are trenchant and apt for today's developing social landscape, that's why. I'm not the biggest fan of the execution but I am deeply interested in the Toisanese diaspora now. I liked what I learned if not deriving pleasure from how I learned it.

Social-issues readers (like me) encouraged to get a sample to see if your mileage will vary.

CARLO F. SENTE'S PAGE: Sword Shatterers series—THE PLAGUE OF GOD & THE SUN KING'S MAN

THE PLAGUE OF GOD (Sword Shatterers #1)
CARLO F. SENTE
self-published (non-affiliate Bookshop.org link)
$17.99 paperback, available now

Rating: 3.5* of five

The Publisher Says: Two intertwined tales, both driven by the irresistible allure of gold:

In the present day, Baron Tim de St. Clere faces ruin and desperation, his family legacy slipping away. Enticed by rumors of hidden treasure, he plunges into a perilous quest, only to find himself locked in a dangerous race against a relentless foe, a politician hungry for the same riches. Tim's journey brims with betrayal and sacrifice, yet ultimately unveils a newfound purpose amid the shadows of his past.

Meanwhile, amidst the tumult of ninth-century Europe, Bera Haraldsdatter grapples with the consequences of her allegiance to a ruthless warlord. As realization dawns upon her, she heeds the call of maternal instinct, embarking on a solitary mission to safeguard innocent lives. Against the backdrop of Viking conquest, Bera's defiance echoes through the ages, a testament to the enduring strength of the human spirit.

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My Review: I'll be honest: Tim de St. Clere and his modern-day timeline did not grip me. I comprehend the author's point in making this a dual-timelines story was valid. A modern angle on the story of people making moral choices around wealth, power, and the uses they are put to (in opposition to the way they are, in the stories, used) allows him to present this as a thriller. The dreaded label "historical" or, even more limiting, "time-travel/fantasy novel" would seriously erode the commercial appeal of this tale. Or so he thinks, I assume....

Happen I disagree. Tim and the utterly pointless and barely characterized Julia, and the somewhat haphazardly included Frank and Tamara, are pressured by the expectations and the bedazzlements of twenty-first century life, to no satisfying end. The ninth-century timeline, with Bera fighting tooth and nail to preserve some sense of personal honor and family integrity, is more compelling (if just a bit more, um, leisurely of pace shall we say than is conducive to maintaining suspense) than Tim's efforts to recover material wealth contrast unflatteringly with Bera's powerfully moral quest to dissociate from the immorality seen in the misuse of power by a revolting suzerain.

Well, maybe an inconclusive result to the modern storyline is somehow resolved in book two. I was more than invested enough in Bera's efforts to make reading book two a certainty.

Anyone who enjoyed the National Treasure franchise ought to check out this debut novel.

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

THE SUN KING'S MAN (Sword Shatterers #2)
CARLO F. SENTE self-published (non-affiliate Amazon link)
$17.99 paperback, preorder now for delivery on 22 April 2026

Rating: 3.75* of five

Two men separated by centuries. One legendary treasure. A ruthless enemy willing to kill to claim it. Baron Tim de St. Clere’s quest for his ancestor’s hidden treasure is no mere hunt for gold; it is a battle for redemption, family honor, and a fierce determination to right the wrongs of history. As he plunges into the depths of the past, Tim and his allies must confront not only the ghosts of yesteryear but also the ruthless ambition of Alain Lesczinsky, a man whose thirst for power threatens to consume them all.

Against the bloody backdrop of war-torn Europe lies the legacy of the courageous Quentin de St. Clere and his lifelong servant and confidant, Nicklaus Brenden. Their bond, forged in childhood and tempered in the fires of conflict, embodies an unwavering and relentless pursuit of justice. As Quentin fights to save their honor and their lives, Nicklaus stands firmly by his side, a testament to the power of loyalty in the face of overwhelming adversity.

In The Sun King’s Man (Part II of the Sword Shatterers Trilogy), the saga of the St. Cleres unfolds as a breathtaking epic woven through the centuries, resonating with the timeless echoes of honor and betrayal.

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My Review: The scoobygroup reunites! I still think the modern timeline's not the most compelling one, though. I got more interest from the political dimension added by including Alain Lesczinsky's quest to become president of France in addition to the treasure-hunting for its own sake. (It makes little sense when viewed practically, but it's a thriller so roll with it.)

Tim's ancestor, Quentin, in this story is in service to the Sun King (Louis XIV) a man of very questionable morals by modern standards but one of the most powerful people in recorded history...funny how often those things go hand-in-hand. Quentin and his man Nicklaus felt like they were more intimate than master and servant are usually, so of course I enjoyed them through my own headcanon. Quentin's desire to curry favor with the perpetually strapped-for-cash Sun King by sending him a vast fortune in gauds and baubles to help fund his forever wars is very much something I was glad to see *not* come to pass.

I'm surprised by the level of buy-in I have with these characters in their history-inflected treasure hunts that end as usual with enough wiggle room for there to be more storues. Please, Author Sente, develop Tim without his inexplicable desire to be with the bland Julia. Pretty please?

ANTOINE LAURAIN'S PAGE: THE PORTRAIT, firstborn fiction by the author; & FRENCH RHAPSODY, meditation on Les Jadis and how much today is the same

FRENCH RHAPSODY
ANTOINE LAURAIN (tr. Emily Boyce & Jane Aitken)
Pushkin Press (non-affiliate Bookshop.org link)
$13.99 ebook, available now

Rating: 3.9* of five

The Publisher Says: Middle-aged doctor Alain Massoulier has received a life-changing letter—thirty-three years too late.

Lost in the Paris postal system for decades, the letter from Polydor, dated 1983, offers a recording contract to The Holograms, in which Alain played lead guitar. Back then The Holograms had believed in their cutting-edge sound. However, the music industry remained indifferent, and eventually the band split up, each going their own way.

Alain is overcome by nostalgia, and is tempted to track down the members of the group. But in a world where everything and everyone has changed . . . where will his quest take him?

Antoine Laurain's new novel combines his trademark charm with a satirical take on modern France.

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My Review: Republication of these titles comes after Gallic Books' acquisition by Pushkin Press is picking up steam. I'm all over it, I loved Gallic Books and am (obviously) fond of Pushkin Press (and imprints).

In this rather odd tale, we go down the rabbit hole of missed chances. Every person this accident of fate changed came under Author Laurain's scrutiny in separate chapters, with life stories and so on. It made for nice reading...but what was I supposed to get from these stories? I know them but possess no framework to see what I'm to make of the fates of the post-The Holograms members. Maybe I'm insufficiently au fait with modern French society to get the full import of the meaning.

That said, I really resonated to the right-wing politician's trajectory, he who was the bassist. I've forgotten his name because I despise his politics (and his screed-spouting lectures) and, like Endora from Bewitched, I forget the names of those I dislike. Nonetheless, I thought it was very interesting to read about whatsisname's trajectory. How he got into it, what he does...all very timely. Especially for a book first published in 2015....

The others stuck with me less but were absorbing enough that I kept picking the book up to read more every time I put something else down. A clutter of wacky neighbors and hero's-journey cicerones detract from the central story's momentum, none of whom end up making a real difference. I found the ending...pat.

So I'm rating it only a tad under four stars. I got chuckles, I got angry mutterings, but I never got bored. That, my olds, is worth a lot in a literary month cram-jam full of heaps of nothing interesting.

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

THE PORTRAIT
ANTOINE LAURAIN (tr. Emily Boyce & Jane Aitken)
Pushkin Press (non-affiliate Bookshop.org link)
$13.99 ebook, available now

Rating: 3.75* of five

The Publisher Says: A Parisian antiques collector finds himself in a case of mistaken identity after buying a portrait which curiously resembles him

While wandering through a Paris auction house, avid collector Pierre-François Chaumont is stunned to discover the eighteenth-century portrait of an unknown man who looks just like him. Much to his delight, Chaumont's bid for the work is successful, but back at home his jaded wife and circle of friends are unable to see the resemblance. Chaumont remains convinced of it, and as he researches into the painting's history, he is presented with the opportunity to abandon his tedious existence and walk into a brand new life.

Chaumont needs a fresh start—he and his wife fell out of love long ago, and the only thing that holds meaning for him anymore is his search for perfect objects. But this portrait is more than just a painting. The first night he owns it, Pierre-François dreams of another life, lived as the Comte de Mandragore, in a rural chateau, with a beautiful young wife. Awaking from the dream he’s determined to find this place—but it will take all his collector’s avidity, ingenuity, and unscrupulousness to make it his own. And when he finally has the chance to do so, will he be willing to pay the price to make it last?

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My Review: Republication of these titles comes after Gallic Books' acquisition by Pushkin Press is picking up steam. I'm all over it, I loved Gallic Books and am (obviously) fond of Pushkin Press (and imprints).

This is the novella that started it all. Told in first-person, it's as immediate as a récit but takes place outside the narrator's skull, so it's not one. It's a sweetly-smiling stab at modern greed, the lust for Stuff that fills the gaping emotional holes in many modern people.

There's a sharp edge here, a flensing eye that spares no one...the unloved, unloving wife, their circle of "friends", the man himself...no one looks all that good under the pithy judgment of Author Laurain:

Modern eyes? They have no soul; they no longer look up to heaven. Even the most pure are only concerned with the immediate. Vulgar lust, petty self-interest, greed, vanity, prejudice, cowardly appetites and envy. Those are the abominable emotions swarming in today’s eyes. We have the souls of notaries and cooks. That’s why the eyes on the portraits in museums are so spectacular; they reflect prayers and tortures, regrets and remorse.

What a pompous peroration! What a quiet proof that simply being misunderstood and softly maligned does not equal being Right.

It's an afternoon's read. It will keep you involved if, like me, you think Stuff is an addiction that speaks more loudly about what it is...about greedily stuffing yourself...than what it isn't...a fulfilling and worthwhile use of you one wild and precious life (that endlessly apt and beautiful phrase from Mary Oliver).

I think it's evident it's a first work, the sheer improbability of the plot is up there with Thorne Smith that whole school of magical objects that open portals from modern to ancient (ot just other) times. The characters are, as is almost inevitable in novellas, not developed beyond the necessity of moving the plot forward.

It's a pleasant and worthwile read. Maybe don't hunt for it everywhere, but if you have the budget and the device, download it of a dull Sunday afternoon to enjoy its real pleasures.

THE PHOENIX PENCIL COMPANY, debut magical-realism Chinese culture novel...very worthy Reese's Book Club pick for #PrideMonth

THE PHOENIX PENCIL COMPANY
ALLISON KING
William Morrow (non-affiliate Bookshop.org link)
$14.99 ebook, available now

Rating: 4.75* of five

The Publisher Says: A REESE'S BOOK CLUB PICK!

In this dazzling debut novel, a hidden and nearly forgotten magic—of Reforging pencils, bringing the memories they contain back to life—holds the power to transform a young woman’s relationship with her grandmother, and to mend long-lost connections across time and space.

Monica Tsai spends most days on her computer, journaling the details of her ordinary life and coding for a program that seeks to connect strangers online. A self-proclaimed recluse, she's always struggled to make friends and, as a college freshman, finds herself escaping into a digital world, counting the days until she can return home to her beloved grandparents. They are now in their nineties, and Monica worries about them constantly—especially her grandmother, Yun, who survived two wars in China before coming to the States, and whose memory has begun to fade.

Though Yun rarely speaks of her past, Monica is determined to find the long-lost cousin she was separated from years ago. One day, the very program Monica is helping to build connects her to a young woman, whose gift of a single pencil holds a surprising clue. Monica’s discovery of a hidden family history is exquisitely braided with Yun’s own memories as she writes of her years in Shanghai, working at the Phoenix Pencil Company. As WWII rages outside their door, Yun and her cousin, Meng, learn of a special power the women in their family possess: the ability to Reforge a pencil’s words. But when the government uncovers their secret, they are forced into a life of espionage, betraying other people’s stories to survive.

Combining the cross-generational family saga and epistolary form of A Tale for the Time Being with the uplifting, emotional magic of The Midnight Library, Allison King’s stunning debut novel asks: who owns and inherits our stories? The answers and secrets that surface on the page may have the unerasable power to reconnect a family and restore a legacy.

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My Review: I so very badly want Meng's superpower of Reforging that, once I encountered it, I was unable...okay, unwilling but really, really unwilling...to stop reading the story. Injecting an author's actual words directly into my veins?

Magical pencil me, Yun! (Or Monica, if you're now possessed of the power.)

So there you have it, laddies and gentlewomen. My officially enthroned favorite fantasy trope that utterly bypasses my usual Chosen-One Hidden Powers flush button. There really is a way around every prejudice. What didn't really ring for me was Monica's modern-day iteration of these magically delicious pencils made by Yun and her cousin Meng in 1937 Shanghai (all you Iris Chang readers know what the implications of that are already; if you haven't read Chang, go do so.) EMBR, Monica's boss's startup, seems to be a not-evil iteration of Facebook, in my own crude and unnuanced terms, and that's a concept so toxified by that fuck Zuck and his henchrats that I was preemptively squicked out by it.

It's a cool idea for a story, and one that feels like Author King has really gone into to develop her world's natural development. I think the decision not to go into how and what Meng and Yun have as a power paradoxically let me just accept it...use one of the pencils they created and in a future that's never defined by length or relationship, someone hip to the trick can utterly exist within the words you've created. Trying to build out a system around this would not have made it easier to believe.

As to *why* these pencils exist, this brings me to the almost-all-five starrèdness of the read: The entire book is suffused with a deep and highly loving sadness as memory, its utter unreliability, its undeniable centrality to one's identity and selfhood, are examined. Monica, Yun, all their ties and all the facts of their family's life, swept away in the fires of war; recoverable with this one astonishing instrument, writing itself entire in a new head. Monica's journey to understanding this...power, gift, supernatural geas...is tied back to Grandmother Yun and forward to new lover Louise. I've said elsewhere that reading is the act of thinking with another head.

Writing, creating stories, are under direct and explicit threat in a time of rampant and overly successful suppression of books, ideas, and fields of study. NASA's proposed budget eliminates entirely astrophysical research, funding for space-sciences fellowships, all Earth sciences research. Libraries suffer huge challenges to remove particularly queer books and media...all orchestrated and funded by certain religious groups. This is something I'm morally certain Author King is indirectly, and all the more effectively for it, commenting on with Yun and Monica's interconnectedness via the magic of stories to pass forward the truth and the facts of a violent past.

If you wonder how this can happen in the modern world, look at what's under attack...learning, information-gathering, all the weapons against ignorance and chaos. Resisting this, refusing to simply accept it, why this is a thing to be worked toward and desired, you should trust Shakespeare:

Not marble, nor the gilded monuments
Of princes, shall outlive this powerful rhyme;
But you shall shine more bright in these contents
Than unswept stone, besmeared with sluttish time.

When wasteful war shall statues overturn
And broils root out the work of masonry,
Nor Mars his sword, nor war’s quick fire, shall burn
The living record of your memory:

’Gainst death, and all oblivious enmity,
Shall you pace forth; your praise shall still find room
Even in the eyes of all posterity
That wear this world out to the ending doom.

So, till the judgement that yourself arise,
You live in this, and dwell in lovers’ eyes.

It is impious to speak after Divinity has spoken.