Radiance

BOOKS BY CATHERYNNE M. VALENTE

The Orphan’s Tales:

In the Night Garden

The Orphan’s Tales:

In the Cities of Coin and Spice

Palimpsest

Deathless

The Dirge for Prester John: The Habitation of the Blessed

The Dirge for Prester John: The Folded World

Six-Gun Snow White

Silently and Very Fast

The Fairyland Books

The Girl Who Circumnavigated Fairyland

in a Ship of Her Own Making

The Girl Who Fell Beneath Fairyland

and Led the Revels There

The Girl Who Soared Over Fairyland

and Cut the Moon in Two

The Boy Who Lost Fairyland

This is a work of fiction. All of the characters, organizations, and events portrayed in this novel are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.

RADIANCE

Copyright © 2015 by Catherynne M. Valente

All rights reserved.

Cover art and design by Will Staehle

Sappho translation here by Francis Fawkes

A Tor Book

Published by Tom Doherty Associates, LLC

175 Fifth Avenue

New York, NY 10010

www.tor-forge.com

Tor^® is a registered trademark of Tom Doherty Associates, LLC.

The Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is available upon request.

ISBN 978-0-7653-3529-6 (hardcover)

ISBN 978-1-4668-2148-4 (e-book)

e-ISBN 9781466821484

Our e-books may be purchased in bulk for promotional, educational, or business use. Please contact the Macmillan Corporate and Premium Sales Department at (800) 221-7945, extension 5442, or by e-mail at [email protected].

First Edition: October 2015

Contents

Dedication

Chronology

Locations

Epigraph

Come Forward!

Oh, Those Scandalous Stars!

PART ONE - THE WHITE PAGES

The Radiant Car Thy Sparrows Drew

 (Oxblood Films, dir. Severin Unck, 1946)

From the Personal Reels of Percival Alfred Unck

Preproduction Meeting, The Deep Blue Devil [working title]

 (Tranquillity Studios, 1959, dir. Percival Unck)

The Deep Blue Devil: Come Find Me

Newsreel

From the Personal Reels of Percival Alfred Unck

Self-Portrait with Saturn

 (Tranquillity Studios, 1936, dir. Severin Unck)

Oh, Those Scandalous Stars!

Look Down

The Ingénue’s Handbook

Ship’s Manifest, Small Commercial Craft Clamshell

I Left My Sugar Standing in the Rain

How Many Miles to Babylon?: Episode 764

From the Personal Reels of Percival Alfred Unck

The Deep Blue Devil: The Dame in Question

All-Clear

PART TWO - THE BLUE PAGES

The Radiant Car Thy Sparrows Drew

 (Oxblood films, dir. Severin Unck)

Production Meeting, The Deep Blue Devil

The Man in the Malachite Mask

 (Tranquillity Studios, 1960, dir. Percival Unck)

The Deep Blue Devil

The Man in the Malachite Mask:

My Sin

Your Friend Pluto!

 (Patriot Films, 1921)

The Deep Blue Devil

The Man in the Malachite Mask:

Totentanz

From the Personal Reels of Percival Alfred Unck

And the Sea Remembered, Suddenly

 (Oxblood Films, 1941, dir. Severin Unck)

Look at Her Face

The Miranda Affair

 (Capricorn Studios, 1931, dir. Thaddeus Irigaray)

The Ingénue’s Handbook

How Many Miles to Babylon?: Episode 1

His Master’s Voice

Oh, Those Scandalous Stars!

The Deep Blue Devil

The Man in the Malachite Mask:

The Murder of Gonzago

“Calliope the Carefree Callowhale” PSA

PART THREE - THE GREEN PAGES

The Radiant Car Thy Sparrows Drew

 (Oxblood Films, dir. Severin Unck)

Production Meeting,

The Deep Blue Devil

The Man in the Malachite Mask

Doctor Callow’s Dream

 (Tranquillity Studios, 1960, dir. Percival Unck)

The Deep Blue Devil

The Man in the Malachite Mask

Doctor Callow’s Dream

The Land of Milk and Desire

The Famine Queen of Phobos

 (Oxblood Films, 1938, dir. Severin Unck)

From the Personal Reels of Percival Alfred Unck

The Ingénue’s Handbook

Kansas

From the Personal Reels of Percival Alfred Unck

The Deep Blue Devil

The Man in the Malachite Mask

Doctor Callow’s Dream:

The House, the Eye, and the Whale

From the Personal Reels of Percival Alfred Unck