Mammoth Snows: An Unexpected Moment (March 2024 Newsletter)

Isolated in the American suburbs, eight-year-old Brennan finds unexpected connection with another boy while waiting for mammoths.

On snowy days, there would be mammoths. The songbirds, scratching crooked sentences with identical four-toed letters no creature could read (though Brennan swore he nearly had it), would flush at the first noiseless footfall. It took keen senses and rapt attention to notice the towering forms through great swirls of flakes, looming, loping, sloping.

Mammoth Snows began as an exercise for a monthly writer's group. There had recently been a record winter storm and snow was a somewhat obvious choice for a prompt. I wrote the first paragraph in the few minutes allotted. The following night and morning, the story filled me and I knew it had to emerge.

I wanted one focus of the story to be the resourcefulness of neurodiverse folk. From an early age, we learn to accommodate ourselves where others refuse. Often without realizing, we create spaces of freedom and vulnerability (however small) in a world where others' reactions force us to mask everywhere else.

Perhaps it was the age Mom and Dad always complained about- any mention of the great tuskers would elicit only a sigh. Brennan hasn’t said a word of them for ages- not that he minds. The beasts’ presence (awe, comfort- a curious mix) would be for him alone.

Similarly with queer folk: when I had my first crush on a friend (another boy) when I was eight, I didn't dare ask adults what it meant- some instinct told me they wouldn't respond well. And yes- in case there is any doubt as to the nature of the boys' connection- this is unequivocally a love story.

The love here, though, goes deeper than romance. Much like the titular tiger of Bill Watterson's Calvin and Hobbes, the "reality" of the mammoths is ambiguous, limited only by the mind of the beholder. What magic shows itself depends on how much one is willing to accept. For Brennan and the boy he meets, this relationship is more profound than acceptance. The magic is both embracing and expansive. It thrums in the bones and is inseparable from them- in other words, it is home.

Deeply interwoven themes of paleontology and natural history are universal in my work as embodiment and reminder of great change, and the perilous hope that comes with it. Mighty beasts have been born, lived, and died. Earth has oscillated from icehouse to hothouse and back again. Glaciers have ground down mountains and floods have swept their remains to the sea. Vast forests have been incinerated and turned to stone by volcanoes, only for green to grow anew and creatures to again call it home. So too can the sensitive emerge from secrecy into sun. So too can we.

~august primeval

You can find Mammoth Snows on my Patreon shop, Creator Spring store, and Lulu bookshop.

A version with image descriptions is also available on Lulu, Patreon shop, and Creator Spring.

Be sure to subscribe to queer-affirming creature design zine August Beasts and flash fiction blog Tokens & Spheres on Patreon!

You can also buy the debut episode of August Beasts, now available in my Patreon shop.

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August Tian is a queer author and illustrator of Taiwanese descent. He makes his home in places seen and unseen where dwell plants and dirt, birds and books, clay and colors, wild creatures, other worlds, and various combinations thereof. One can find traces of their presence in ink and graphite, wax and pastel, sketches and prose, clips, comics, and other curious craft. As they roam deep time, they haunt the Pacific Northwest (itself a home of mammoths).

natural-history-based science fantasy stories and art

for queer and highly sensitive youth and young adults

that addresses trauma while grounding itself

in life, wonder, and expansiveness,

so they feel safe, loved, and powerful 

© 2024 August Tian