Following Footsteps

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It could also be that Ma got me the job because she started working at Antoine’s when she was sixteen, my age. Most parents who want their kids to follow in their footsteps are doctors or senators, stuff like that. But Ma wants me to work in a convenience store. Stay in the neighborhood. Support my community, because that’s another thing about growing up in Jokertown—it’s the only home some of us will ever have.

The Thing about Growing Up in Jokertown (A Tor.com Original) by Carrie Vaughn

Their Story Will Be Your Story

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The worst thing they have done to you, who are my mother’s people, was not to destroy your government, take your food and children, deny your traditions, or outlaw your greatest powers. The worst thing they have done is to replace your version of honor with theirs. They are making you, the Shaftali people, into Carolins. So when you read this book, read it not as a history of the enemy, but as a history of your own future: what will happen to Shaftal when the Carolins are extinct, but live on in you and your children. Rather than defeat the enemies, you must change them—or else, someday, their story will be your story.

Earth Logic (Elemental Logic) by Laurie J. Marks

September 21 is the International Day of Peace

Rehabilitation is Painful

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Her duty is to locate and rehabilitate—or else execute—the villains of the world. She seems to think I can be rehabilitated, though being executed would be less painful.

Earth Logic (Elemental Logic) by Laurie J. Marks

 

Laughing Man

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The storyteller’s fingertip touched the red symbol stamped on one corner. “This glyph means fate, or chance. The Laughing Man’s actions are so unexpected, and their effect is so profound, that his victims think it is a bitter joke. He destroys everything—even trust and hope. But there is one power that can counteract his.” She took out another card: a circle of people, arm in arm. “Fellowship,” she said.

Earth Logic (Elemental Logic) by Laurie J. Marks

September 21 is the International Day of Peace

Fire Insight

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Fire logic is the logic of insight, of seeing in symbols and stories and events more meanings than an entirely sane person could see.

Earth Logic (Elemental Logic) by Laurie J. Marks

Purpose Lies in the Search

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Flippant and sorrowful by turns, he read his books of history frantically, looking for a fact or story that would trigger his insight and give him the broad vision that might explain their actions to themselves. So seers always spend their lives, seeking a perfect understanding that inevitably eludes them; some finally falling into madness, while others realize at last that their purpose lies not in the unachievable goal, but in the seeking of it.

Earth Logic (Elemental Logic) by Laurie J. Marks

Just Walking

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He cooked some oatmeal, cleaned out the bowl, packed his gear, and got moving. Two more days, then he’d turn around. He wouldn’t reach the mountains where the dragons made their homes in that time, but if they didn’t come after him by then, he’d have to assume they didn’t want to talk. Until then, he had to keep putting one foot in front of the other. He tried to imagine he was on some kind of epic quest—which he was, but he didn’t feel very much like the hero in an adventure. Heroes always seemed to know exactly what they needed to do: throw the ring in the volcano; defeat Darth Vader in a duel. This was just walking.

-Refuge of Dragons (Voices of Dragons #2) by Carrie Vaughn

Mom Only Sees Her Little Princess

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But when Ma looks at me she doesn’t see a human whippet—five-three me with scruffy dark hair and a chest as big as a keg, with a wasp waist and the legs like an Olympic sprinter. And the fangs, don’t forget the fangs. Mongoose fangs, which was what got me my nickname—Rikki. My real name is Miranda. Nobody calls me that except the teachers at school. Rikki or Miranda, Ma just sees me as her little princess, her miracle joker baby.

The Thing about Growing Up in Jokertown (A Tor.com Original) by Carrie Vaughn

Fault Assumed and Stories Told

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A person who lacked a family was assumed to be at fault, and so most vagabonds made some effort to counteract this social disapproval by concocting ornate tales of family tragedy or betrayal that made them look like victims or heroes. However, Garland did not know enough about Shaftali families to be able to conduct such an elaborate pretense, so he always declared that his past was too painful to talk about. For nearly five years, that approach had kept people from prying, but it also had kept them from even considering offering Garland a permanent home. He was lucky to have this temporary position…

Earth Logic (Elemental Logic) by Laurie J. Marks