The Smallest Spark

First Published:

29 October 2015
Before she died, Boston Xialanthi was powerful and important, but resurrected in the City of the Saved she finds she is an outcast. In an attempt to find a purpose in her afterlife she sets out to meet someone to love.

‘The Smallest Spark’ was my first story set in the City of the Saved. It is a science fiction romance, inspired both by modern dating stories and Pygmalion/My Fair Lady.

Published in:

Furthest Tales of the City

Furthest Tales of the City - Cover

Even the secular afterlife created for humanity by the Secret Architects has its limits – and there will always be those Citizens who chafe against those limits. Environmentally, culturally, biologically, cosmologically, politically, experientially, some will always seek to go further.

For instance…

A group mind facing the troubling truth of resurrection. A comatose giant with human inhabitants of its own. A civilisation re-enacting an impossible apocalypse. A woman with negligible human ancestry out on the dating scene. A cult who inhabit the deep infrastructure underlying the City. A fictional adventurer starved of the risks his narrative craves.

These are their tales.

Publication Formats:

  • Paperback
    Ebook
    ISBN
    9781909031340

Publication Date:

29 October 2015

Publisher:

Obverse Books

Editor:

Philip Purser-Hallard

Cover Artist:

Blair Bidmead