Tales Of The Giant Squid A Year And A Day

overview

This serialized novel, told over the course of the 2005 calendar year, follows the Squid's hemp-seed lab assistant, Rob Miller, as he is drawn into the cycle of birth-death-and-rebirth by the Old Gods.

Chapters

• [Part One] Birch
• [Part Two] Rowan
• [Part Three] Ash
• [Part Three and a Half] St. Patrick's Day
• [Part Four] Alder
• [Part Five] Willow
• [Part Six] Hawthorn
• [Part Seven] Oak
• [Part Eight] Holly
• [Part Nine] Hazel
• [Part Ten] Vine
• [Part Eleven] Ivy
• [Part Twelve] Reed
• [Part Thirteen] Elder

Other Squid Pieces Drawn Upon

• [So This Is November] Where the idea of Third Person Writing is Explored
• [The Gifts of OHenry] Where Rob Gives the Squid Cowboy Boots
• [Things to Think About] Where Tom Describes being Dead
• [Your Should Be In Pictures] Where We See a Bit of Rob's Underlying Melancholy
• [Sangs Tale] Where Sang and some version of the goddess interact
• [The Cambrian Revolution] A Meditation on Gender
• [The Final Chapter of Big American] Of course, BA is where everything (well, a lot) starts for this book, but it is in this chapter that we learn that Tom has been killed, skinned, and the skin turned into a jacket. Of course here, Sang claims to burn the jacket and dispose of it ceremonially, but of course we now know he was lying
• [All Creatures Great and Sadistic] Where Tom first raises the issue of the Squid having murdered all of his previous assistants... also, reference to skin being lost in the process
• [And the Band Played On] Tom's first appearance, and where this whole thing started. In the same two columns where Tom is created, his death and skinning are already prophesied, Sang is referenced (though, oddly, as a dead former assistant) and the kernel of all of this is shaped.

It's interesting to see how consistent our interests were, even as far back as the first 20 issues. -Fritz

Characters:

• Suveer
• Rob
• Little Brother
• Donna MacCalister?
• Lemba Silver Cats
• Tom
• Sang
• The Gnome Under the Stoop

The Poem In Question

• 12/24 to 1/21
• I am the stag of seven tines
• Birch
• 1/22 to 2/18
• I am a wide flood on a plain
• Rowan
• 2/19 to 3/18
• I am a wind on the deep waters
• Ash
• 3/19 to 4.15
• I am a shining tear of the sun
• Alder
• 4/16 to 5/13
• I am a hawk on a cliff
• Willow
• 5/14 to 6/10
• I am a fair amongst flowers
• Hawthorn
• 6/11 to 7/8
• I am a god who sets the head afire with smoke
• Oak
• 7/9 to 8/5
• I am the battle-waging spear
• Holly
• 8/6 to 9/2
• I am a salmon in a pool
• Hazel
• 9/3 to 9/30
• I am a hill of poetry
• Vine
• 10/1 to 10/28
• I am a ruthless boar
• Ivy
• 10/29 to 11/25
• I am a threatening noise from the sea
• Reed
• 11/26 to 12/22
• I am a wave on the sea
• Elder
• 12/23
• Who but I knows the secret of the unhewn dolmen?