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I had a fun idea for an alternate history story the other day.
In a world where there was no Mongol Empire, the Ottomans never conquered Constantinople, and the Black Death never occurred, 21st century Eurasia is a collection of comfortably senile monarchies and empires. Trade along the Silk Rode between Central Christianity (centered on the Bosporus) Great Khwarezm, and Song has steadily grown, although the Three Great Powers are by no means friendly. When fishermen's tales from the backwater region of Scandinavia spark rumors of a vast unexplored island in the northwest Atlantic, the Great Powers prepare their zepplin fleets and embark upon an "ocean race" to see who can be the first to explore and exploit the forests of the newly discovered world.
In a world where there was no Mongol Empire, the Ottomans never conquered Constantinople, and the Black Death never occurred, 21st century Eurasia is a collection of comfortably senile monarchies and empires. Trade along the Silk Rode between Central Christianity (centered on the Bosporus) Great Khwarezm, and Song has steadily grown, although the Three Great Powers are by no means friendly. When fishermen's tales from the backwater region of Scandinavia spark rumors of a vast unexplored island in the northwest Atlantic, the Great Powers prepare their zepplin fleets and embark upon an "ocean race" to see who can be the first to explore and exploit the forests of the newly discovered world.
Fellow Tetrapod
Alright, here we go! My speculative-evolution serial novel Fellow Tetrapod is finally live on Royal Road. Go check it out. If it looks like your sort of thing, follow the story. It updates every weekday. (if you want to know more…) Koenraad Robbert Ruis used to be a paleontologist, but now he’s a cook at the United Nations embassy to the Convention of Sophonts. His bosses must negotiate with intelligent species from countless alternate earths, and Koen must make them breakfast. It turns out, though, that Koen is rather better at inter-species communication than any other human in this world (all nine of them). Everyone loves to eat (certain autotrophs excepted). Fellow Tetrapod is an speculative-evolution office comedy about food preparation, diplomacy, and what it’s like to be a talking animal. Serialized every weekday on Royal Road (https://www.royalroad.com/fiction/59198/fellow-tetrapod) and (one week earlier) Patreon(https://www.patreon.com/danielmbensen) Cover art by Simon
The Cicada
So, there I was, stalking the East Aegean cicada*. Its insistent, gearbox cough rose out of the electric pulse of the other insect life on the hillside behind the restaurant in northern Greece. When the buzzing stopped, I knew I was close, but it still took me another minute of looking before I picked it out against the bark of a sycamore**. The bug's spotted olive-gray shell matched the tree perfectly, but its symmetry gave it away. I called over Maggie and her cousin and pointed the cicada out to them. They went off to find a half dozen cast-off molts. I showed them the folded, piercing mouth-parts, telling the girls how the nymphs suck sap from tree roots until they climb out of the ground and molt into adults with wings but no mouths. If that's a metaphor, I don't want to use it. And I don't have to! Doing research for this newsletter, I found out that at least some adult cicadas do feed. Anyway, so do I. The reason we were at this restaurant in the first place is because I was
Doing Good
So there we were, giving this stranger 200 leva. "What? Are you serious?" He wasn't being sarcastic. He really wanted to check that what he thought was happening was actually happening. His face scrunched up, trying not to cry. That was when I was finally sure this wasn't all a scam. read on
Congratulations, Your Nightmare Came True
(see posts like this a week earlier on my Patreon for $1 a month) Our little blue car emerged from the tunnel and hummed up Botevgradsko Boulevard. To our left: a mural of chains melting off someone's forearms. The kids were looking out the windows, there was nobody to interrupt us and nothing that needed cleaning, and I relished the ability to complete a thought. "Ha!" I said. "What?" asked Pavlina. We stopped at a red light. "Congratulations," I said. "My nightmare came true. I've been called a racist on the internet." "Well, not exactly," said Pavlina. "Okay, I was called – " I corrected myself, " – my work was called 'problematic' in an email. That's like halfway there. That's a benchmark." "Yeah, okay. Congratulations." She wasn't being sarcastic. We turned and headed south toward Mount Vitosha, and I burned with joy. (see pictures and good formatting here: https://www.patreon.com/posts/63082454 ) In Man's Search for Meaning, psychologist Viktor Frankl talks about his brand of
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An interesting thing to consider is whether the Anglican Communion would exist here... (I mean, it is one of the defining factors of why Great Britain considered itself as being "different" from the rest of Europe)
and I think I know what *iconRainbowdragon-ny* meant by Zoroastrians, it's the first form of religious system embracing monotheism, created by Persian Zarasthura, it still survives in the Middle East and Southern Asia (here's a link of Wiki reference: [link])
and I think I know what *iconRainbowdragon-ny* meant by Zoroastrians, it's the first form of religious system embracing monotheism, created by Persian Zarasthura, it still survives in the Middle East and Southern Asia (here's a link of Wiki reference: [link])