The world constructed in the pages of Mandrake Petals and Scattered Feathers situates itself quite comfortably between the dirt and hardship of real medieval life and the strange otherness of half-remembered myths. This is a world where you’d pay a man to hang both animals and people, but also a world where girls can magically transform into birds. These two elements from two different stories feel complimentary rather than contradictory.
The trouble was, he’d never counted on her love dying. At first he didn’t believe it. Assumed it was a mood, a temporary sulk. Reached for her hand, she pulled away, and he grumbled good-naturedly: ‘Ah sweetie, stop teasing.’ ‘I’m not teasing,’ she said kindly but distantly. ‘Yeah, right.’ Then a week later, feeling a Read More
A woman, a certain kind of woman, loves a red dress. She seizes upon it; she is not afraid. She selects the dress from rack upon rack of dresses, takes it up in her hands, in her arms, tries it on and keeps that dress for her own. This woman, this certain kind of woman, Read More
