The EM systems could run for decades, but in time, after the ship left the solar system, they would have to be shut down. The Freeman would coast along on any final inertial vector, forever. The captain’s voice, with urgency. “STAN?” STAN made an instant decision, logged an internal note accessible only to itself: “Is … Read more
But I knew there was something out there. I knew that, while Citizens hid away after curfew, others ran free. I could hear them through my window, the tiny window in my bedroom in the attic of the house in Streatham. I could hear their distant howls, deep into the night. Winner of The Letter … Read more
“Look at him, Steward. Until the traitors who did this are found, he is the source of your continued existence. He is the beginning and the end of your pursuit. Take your time to examine him.” Winner of The Letter Review Prize for Unpublished Books Graemist PROLOGUE Through the diminishing rains a bell tolled, an alarm ringing out … Read more
I didn’t upset Mam. Continued to live with her, just as she continued to live with her story of the paintings by her great-grandfather, the ‘moonlight man’, Edwin Tate. Who left the dockside tenements to live in a Jacobean Manor overlooking the bay, just like the one on the books. Whose paintings reach six-figures. Whose … Read more
Winner of The Letter Review Prize for Unpublished Books SPRING 1. In the beginning was C/r. If a bond pays a periodic payment of C in perpetuity, its value is cash flow divided by the interest rate. Assume yearly payments of $100 and an interest rate of 5%. That bond is worth $100/.05, or $2,000. Every other cash-flow … Read more
The Cantacuzene Family Crest (Quae Nocent Docent – What Harms, Teaches) Winner of The Letter Review Prize for Unpublished Books PROLOGUE The Waters Off Greenland September 1899 The steamship surges forward, its prow lifting and falling over the swells of the North Atlantic. At each new wave, the ship hesitates and shudders, leaning backward towards America, … Read more
Winner of The Letter Review Prize for Unpublished Books I.I The first eight years of Dai’s life smelled like stone. Like the smoky musk of sunbaked battlements and the salty nip of sea-soaked tunnels. And they smelled like gonalei, the roots of the bone white gona flower that grew in abundance at the base of … Read more