We are all made of Stardust.
Here lies those whose truths were not heard
A single voice can change the world
So hundreds of years from now, people will look at this wall and say “This use to be a City of Beasts. They were true and existed.”
It will not surprise those who know me that I play a lot of tabletop roleplay games (TTRPGs). MY current character from the slums of the greatest city of his world belongs to the world portrayed in The Lost Soul Atlas by Sana Fraillon.
In it people live lives of desperate poverty and because of it, of pure love. Our hero Twig starts knowing nothing of his world except his father’s love in the tenament towers. When his father goes missing, Twig discovers a new family in Flea and the Beasts, a gang of street kids.
This book explores the concept of family, of blood and of our own creation. It explores the concept of memory. Memories making us who we are and it is through memory that we find our true immortality. The most important concept, at least for Zana who gave over her end notes to discuss it, homelessness.
Often seen as a blight on society, a symptom of a system gone wrong, the results of poor education or morals, Twig, his father, Flea, The Preacher, Squizzy and the little ones remind us they are people. They are voiceless, powerless and forgotten by most, but they are people. It is Twig and Flea that show us that they are true and they exist and that they are worth remembering.
My bard has found his forgotten. In his world, those who came before, those tied closer to the land are the ones being lost. But with the words of The Lost Soul Atlas to guide him, I’m sure he will give them back their voices in the new world to come.
There’s really only one question left…
So why did the chicken go to the seance?
Blug... 