Halfway! Let’s tap into some newer stories, more recently written. The next few take us farther across time than the ones before.

10 – A Song From The Sahel, Or A Bard’s Tale:

It is the middle of the 14th century in Mali, Africa. One of the richest civilizations in history. A young djeli (or griot), a musician and storyteller from a famous line, is invited to join others in the palace of Sulayman, who is hosting a famous traveler, Ibn Batutta. In secret this man tells the musicians of a strange song that makes time thin and shows people and places from other eras.

What follows mixes travels, deception, and grief, along with the longer history of Malian music, and how it formed much of what we know today.

This story is the first in Book 2, as well as the first in Volume 5: Spectacle.

-PB