Publication Day: Date and Time

My third story of the year is out now.

https://dailysciencefiction.com/hither-and-yon/alternate-history/susan-taitel/date-and-time

Gif chosen because publication days always make me want to twirl and because there is a tiny bit of ice skating in the story. Though my characters are not nearly as good at it as Yuri.

The idea for this one started out with me noticing that one of my favorite speculative genres is when a mythical or historical figure gets transplanted into mundane settings and scenarios often without much explanation for how they got there. Neil Gaiman’s Chivalry is a good example of one such story. So I’ve had in the back of my mind that I wanted to try my hand at it. But first I had to come up with both a figure to use and a situation to put them in. I don’t remember how I decided on Lady Jane Grey goes on a blind date, but once I did I knew it should be a good date. Her real story is such a sad one, it was cathartic to show a fictional Jane a good time.

The park they go to is a real park in Minneapolis that does host a holiday fair most weekends leading up to Christmas, though not these last two years because panini.