From the acclaimed, award-winning author of Among Others, a tale of gods and humans, and the surprising things they have to learn from one another
"Here in the Just City you will become your best selves. You will learn and grow and strive to be excellent."
Created as an experiment by the time-traveling goddess Pallas Athene, the Just
City is a planned community, populated by over ten thousand children
and a few hundred adult teachers from all eras of history, along with
some handy robots from the far human future — all set down together on a
Mediterranean island in the distant past.
The student Simmea,
born an Egyptian farmer's daughter sometime between 500 and 1000 A.D, is a brilliant child, eager for knowledge, ready to strive to be her best self. The teacher Maia was once Ethel, a young Victorian lady of much
learning and few prospects, who prayed to Pallas Athene in an ungaurded
moment during a trip to Rome — and, in an instant, found herself in the
Just City with grey-eyed Athene standing unmistakably before her.
Meanwhile, Apollo — stunned by the realization that there are things mortals understand better than he does — has arranged to live a human life, and has come to the City as
one of the children. He knows his true identity, and conceals it from
his peers. For this lifetime, he is prone to all the troubles of being
human.
Then, a few years in, Sokrates arrives — the same Sokrates
recorded by Plato himself — to ask all the troublesome questions you would expect. What happens next is a tale only the brilliant Jo Walton could
tell.
