In Age of Iron we got the story of a soul. Here we get the soul of a story. We get to the heart of it. How is a story created, from what painful depths does it come? Perhaps a bit like Petersburg itself, out of the mud and "mosquito-ridden marsh" [1]; from scratch, violently, unjustly (as is history's wont), the wolves at your heels? Or could it be that a story isn't created in the same way an object or a city is created. Could it be that stories are what the world are, what reality is? There is no difference between Art and Life, Truth and Fiction. It is the stuff we are made of. And, just in case we needed reminding (and we do, based on what I read): "Stories can be about other people: you are not obliged to find a place for yourself in them." (page 184).


[1] A Window on Europe