Before our cities lit the night and banished the stars, a gauzy band of faint light and shadows vividly cleaved the night sky. Our name for this band, “Milky Way,” originates in Greek mythology.
Heracles, it is told, was born to Zeus following one of his many infidelities. To grant him protection and superhuman powers, Hermes snuck Heracles up to Olympus and placed him at Hera’s breast as she slept. But when Zeus’s wife woke up and realized what had happened, she flung the baby from her breast and some of her milk spilled out across the heavens. Hence the Greek term kuklos galaxías (κύκλος γαλαξίας), or milky circle.
South of Tampa Bay, Florida, wedged between a quiet neighborhood and a mangrove forest, custom-designed aquariums are home to thousands of sea urchin larvae that tumble and drift through the water. Scientists with The Florida Aquarium and the University of Florida care for the little urchins, checking them daily under microscopes for signs that they’re maturing into juveniles, which look like miniature versions of the adults. Few will make it. For every one million embryos conceived in the lab, only about 100,000 become larvae. Of those, only up to 2,000 become adults.
And at this particular moment, coral reefs in the Caribbean need all the urchins they can get.
Kat Tang’s debut novel, “Five-Star Stranger,” follows one man over a months-long spiral as he realizes he’s getting attached to his clients — a violation of his first rule for himself as a rental stranger — forcing him to confront his past and examine why he got into the business in the first place.
Maybe it’s something close to the meaning of life, as understood by a man with much lived experience now mindful of his own mortality.
Kristin Vuković's debut novel is a mouthwatering platter of culture, history, and the everlasting struggle for balance between tradition and progress.