Author Topic: EP612: The Sixes, the Wisdom, and the Wasp  (Read 3847 times)

eytanz

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on: February 03, 2018, 01:30:30 PM
Escape Pod 612: The Sixes, the Wisdom, and the Wasp

AUTHOR : E J Delany
NARRATOR : Nadia Niaz
HOST: Divya Breed

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Fereshteh Nemati was scared.

She knew she was gripping her bow too tightly. She knew she should never ever aim at another person. But it wasn’t bad technique she was thinking of, or breaking her father’s golden rule. It wasn’t even the sight of poor Mr. Heke lying unmoving by his desk.

What bothered Fereshteh most of all was the girl on the opposite side of the classroom: the one standing with arrow notched and back elbow held high, staring at her across the small wooden desks and half-open tidy trays.

That’s me. I’m shooting at me!

Watching herself in the mirror was one thing. There she’d be, every day, cleaning her teeth and brushing her hair, wrapping her head scarf and tying it just left of her chin. Her reflection did everything the opposite way. Her reflection held the brush in its left hand, and tied its roosari to the right.

The girl in front of her was no reflection.


Listen to this week’s Escape Pod!



Katzentatzen

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Reply #1 on: February 08, 2018, 05:56:50 PM
I had a hard time following this story, the narrator has a nice voice but her affect was very flat, and I wasn't sure what parts were important. I missed that the teacher tripped himself to divert attention away from Fereshteh, that was really sweet. I do love multiverse theory but even when reading the text (LOVE that Escape Pod makes that available) I'm still unsure what happened. I loved the multi-ethnic cast, though.

"To understand a cat you must realize that he has his own gifts, his own viewpoint, even his own morality."
--LILIAN JACKSON BRAUN


irishlazz

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Reply #2 on: February 10, 2018, 10:11:53 PM
Leave it to a grade school brainiac to invent the means for inter-dimensional travel.  What a frightening way to meet an alien - they become you.  God help the planet if they'd have met X or Y or Z first.  Or even a typically nice person on a very bad day.  Brought to mind, a small bit, the Empathy Gun from Hitchhikers' Guide.

"We can't solve problems by using the same kind of thinking we used when we created them." A.Einstein


CryptoMe

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Reply #3 on: February 12, 2018, 02:50:42 PM
I loved this story (and had no trouble following what happened). My only quibble during the story was that it took Fereshteh a long time to figure out that she needed to put her bow down, but that was redeemed when she resolved the problem of the principal, so I give it a pass. Otherwise, this was a great story. I loved the characters, who were all complex, right down to the two screaming girls who, Fereshteh assures us, could think as soon as they stopped screaming. The teacher was great, and actually was one of those really good people who had just had a bad day, or he would have tried to catch and release the wasp rather than hit it. And I particularly loved the ending, where Fereshteh realizes that her crushed experiment is not the end of the world (literally). 

Very well done!



Ichneumon

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Reply #4 on: February 26, 2018, 06:46:43 PM
Very wholesome sci-fi. The story took some unexpected turns, but I wouldn't call it confusing.