Challenge 1115

Where, When and Why

In D. A. Cairns’ A Walk Along the Edge:
1. Where is the setting of the story?
2. Is Billie actually Ross’s mother or does she sound like she might be someone’s mother?
3. What is special about the “Gundungurra people”?
In Kris Faatz’s A Small, Priceless Thing:
1. Does Nicky perform literal magic or is it Desmond’s figurative perception that he does?
2. In what time in U.S. history is the story’s setting?
In Jeffrey Greene’s Birth Rights:
1. “The Beltway [traffic] was jammed, as usual.” Where is the setting most likely to be? Why might the setting be logical? Why might it be alluded to but not overemphasized?
2. How does the status of males in “Birth Rights” compare with that in John Knych’s A Good Male in issue 1064?
3. Why might some readers consider Sister Lily the heroine of the story? Why might others side with Reg? What might account for the conflict?
In Huina Zheng‘s The Fourteenth Day:
1. What might the story imply about differences between urban and rural industry in China?
2. Yao‘s brother once recommended that a son be “sold” to cover some costs. Would the same be said of a daughter? Taken literally, would the “sale” be a form of slavery or adoption?
In Gary Clifton‘s Johnny One Spot: What clues does the story provide for approximating a time setting in 20th-century U.S. urban culture?
In Channie Greenberg‘s Tomorrow’s Limerences:
1. What might the word ”limerance” mean?
2. The line lengths are remarkably equal. What might be the unit of measurement? Spaces? Word length? Number of letters?
In Bill West‘s Going Over the Top: What did the expression “Over the top” mean in WW1? What other meaning might the poem be giving to the expression?

Responses welcome!