Novel
Facing Out · Book Six (Book 6 of 7)
The Shelf Gardens
The lift runs a few days a month, when the coats feed it, and Tamsa's letter does not show what is at the top.
In a cliff shop with a child at the table learning strips, a letter says the lift in the hills runs this hot. A factor has been asking in the Keel for Names who can read a heart, and a girl of seven asks what a shelf is, and expects the answer.
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Reading order
- The Size of a DoorBook One
- The Second DateBook Two
- The Held StretchBook Three
- The Dry SeaBook Four
- The Ladder CoastBook Five
- The Shelf GardensBook Six
- The Short ClockBook Seven
Previous in the series: The Ladder Coast
Next in the series: The Short Clock
New to Facing Out? Start with Book One, The Size of a Door.
See all seven books in Facing Out on the Novels page.
The book
Tamsa's letter lies on the bench under the window, in her square hand. The lift runs this hot, a few days a month, when the coats feed it. A map from Halbeck's office shows the road up and a mouth in the rock where the lift comes down. It does not show what is at the top. A factor in a good coat has been asking in the Keel for Names who can read a heart. He asked politely. He did not say whose heart.
Pell writes Shelf on a clean page. Linn, seven, copies the word onto her slate, facing in, and asks if they are going. Sira will ask the band on the knife if they go up. Brask writes to Hesk: they are coming on the Pact Road before the lift, and they put Ruddle's name in the letter. Omber finishes a dug-well method and does not send it yet.
At a gate in the hills a man named Kellun keeps the arch. He is a coat. The lift comes down at dusk, or you wait a month. This is a warm, clear-eyed coming-of-age fantasy told in three dated parts. It is about a lift you cannot see from below, a child who asks one question at a time, and a bill written before anyone has gone up.
Read the opening
Nobody said anything for a while after he finished.
"A heart," said Omber, to the tongs on the rack. "That's not a door. That's not a gate. That's somebody."
"Yes," said Pell.
"And a lift," said Brask. "In the hills. Fed by coats."
"Yes."
Linn had her head on one side, looking at a point past the wall. "What is a shelf?" she said.
Pell looked at her. She was seven, and she asked questions one at a time and expected each of them to be answered. He had been answering them for seven years and had not yet run out of ones he did not know.
"I don't know yet," he said. "Not properly. I've heard of it. It's a place. Up. Where people go who are finished with being tired."
"Are they finished?" said Linn.
"They say they are."
Linn considered this carefully, as she considered everything. "Are you going?"
He looked at Sira, who was looking at the letter, at the word heart, with her hands folded in her lap; she did not look frightened, but as if she had been expecting the letter for a long time and was only now being told she had been right.
"Yes," said Pell. "When the lift runs."
He got out the list, and sat at the bench by the window, and wrote, on a clean page, in his small square hand:
Shelf.
He did not write anything under it. He did not know yet what to write. Linn climbed up beside him and looked at the word, and copied it onto her slate, facing in, the right way round, and did not ask anything else that morning.
Back-cover copy
Tamsa writes that the lift runs this hot, a few days a month, when the coats feed it. Halbeck's map shows the road up and the mouth in the rock. It does not show what is at the top.
A factor in a good coat has been asking in the Keel for Names who can read a heart. Pell reads the letter aloud. Linn is seven and asks what a shelf is. He tells her it is a place, up, where people go who say they are finished with being tired.
He writes Shelf on the list. Brask writes to Hesk's warren, and puts Ruddle's name in the letter, not knowing if Hesk still has a Ruddle. Linn asks if she can come. Brask says no: somebody has to hold this mouth.
Kellun keeps the gate. He is a coat, tired, and the lift is down at dusk. He will show a Name the collar as courtesy, and not the name inside it.
Portraits
Package
- Back-cover copyIncluded
- Cover artIncluded
- Character portraitsIncluded
- Full manuscriptNot on this site
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Continue the series, or inquire with the desk.
The Shelf Gardens is Book Six (Book 6 of 7) in Facing Out by Ryujin. The manuscript stays off this site. Readers can continue through the series in order; producers, development executives, and representation can use the inquiry desk or browse the feature slate.