Challenge 896

You the Troll Will Defeat

In Jef Coburn’s Going in Circles:
1. How does Neil’s analysis of his relationship with Jade progress from chapter 1 to chapter 5?
2. Appearance aside, how do Neil’s relationships with Jade and Carly differ from one another?
In Brian Clark’s That Other Guy, chapter 8: How does the story indicate the stages by which Richard gradually becomes aware of Ricky’s reality? Would you expect Richard to be seeking medical advice by now?
In Ralph Benton’s Visions of Glory:
1. Does the opening sequence overstep Bewildering Stories’ “dream stories” guideline?
2. If the story of Jarl Bromin, Captain Shirvold and the sorceress Therabine is an embedded allegory, whom might the characters represent in Bromin’s waking life?
3. If Bromin’s dream sequence is an episode in the quest to conquer a tyrannical witch, why is the witch depicted as Bromin’s mother?
In John Didday’s The Proverbial Sword:
1. How is the sword defined initially? Why is it “proverbial”?
2. Why does only the hero of the embedded story, Rickard, have a proper name?
3. What does the uncle want to communicate to his niece? Why can he not simply tell her rather than resort to remote telepathy and a magical book?
In K. A. Williams’ The Missing Hunter: Tayron and Harus live in a hunter-gatherer society. How far would they likely have to travel to find a society that has taverns? Is there any chance the two would have a language in common with the foreigners?
In Michael Wooff’s The Dog, the Fish and the Angel:
1. Did Leonardo paint all or part of “Tobias and the Angel”?
2. Does “meanest task” mean “most menial task” or something else?
3. English is classified as an “SVO” (subject-verb-object) language. What sentence in the poem breaks the rule? To what effect?

Responses welcome!