A fictionette from last month, "And Did You Bring Enough For Everyone?" was indisputably fanfic of E. Nesbit's Psammead Trilogy. This week's offering is more of a satire.
Nesbit's eponymous Five Children live in a household staffed with "servants" whom, it must be said, they treat abominably. Quarrels that between equals would be merely infuriating become deeply unjust and downright life-threatening. The children prank the staff vindictively, blackmail them with threats of dismissal, and visit potentially terrible consequences on them via magical misadventure. And, for the most part, the author seems to approve.
The four friends in this week's fictionette might be imagined as teenaged or college-aged versions of Nesbit's protagonists in a world whose class divisions are post-apocalyptically sharp. But I'm not sure the effects of their vices on the underclass are necessarily more fatal than those hinted at, or downright demonstrated, in The Phoenix and the Carpet or Five Children and It.
Cover art incorporates public domain images, "Insides of a Amethyst Geode" and "Liotard, Jean-Étienne - Still Life- Tea Set," sourced from Wikipedia Commons.
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A Fine Day for a Picnic (Excerpt)
Short StoryIt was a splendid outing, and nothing at all went wrong for anyone who mattered.
