Certified and Seven Things (Double Issue): Inklet, #27

By Amy Laurens

Certified to bring tagged people back from the dead, Anna knows responsibility. So when Millicent, local school bully, approaches Anna to raise Millicent's boyfriend Victor, Anna does the right thing: she refuses. Victor has no tag. 

But now? Millicent's steaming mad, and willing to risk anything—and everything—to get her revenge. 

Anna better watch out. This probably won't end well. 

A sassy little story about the consequences of overstretching our limits—and a warning against thinking we always know best.

Young Adult Dark Fantasy / 1300 words

• Language: English
• Publisher: Inkprint Press
• Release date: Feb 1, 2020
• ISBN: 9781393202561

Amy Laurens

AMY LAURENS is an Australian author of fantasy fiction for all ages. Her story Bones Of The Sea, about creepy carnivorous mist and bone curses, won the 2021 Aurealis Award for Best Fantasy Novella. Amy has also written the award-winning portal-fantasy Sanctuary series about Edge, a 13-year-old girl forced to move to a small country town because of witness protection (the first book is Where Shadows Rise), the humorous fantasy Kaditeos series, following newly graduated Evil Overlord Mercury as she attempts to acquire a castle, the young adult series Storm Foxes, about love and magic and family in small town Australia, and a whole host of non-fiction, both for writers AND for people who don’t live with constant voices in their heads. Other interesting details? Let’s see. Amy lives with her husband and two kids in suburban Canberra. She used to be a high-school English teacher, and she was once chewed on by a lion. (The two are unrelated. It was her right thumb.) Amy loves chocolate but her body despises it; she has a vegetable garden that mostly thrives on neglect; and owns enough books to be considered a library. Of course. Oh, and she also makes rather fancy cakes in her spare time. She’s on all the usual social media channels as @ByAmyLaurens, but you’ve got the best chance of actually getting a response on Instagram or the contact form on her website. <3

Book preview

Certified

And Seven Things

INKLET #27

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AMY LAURENS

www.InkprintPress.com

Certified

My name’s Anna and I’m certified to bring people back from the dead. Sometimes they don’t want to come, but that’s neither here nor there.

What matters is that I’m certified. Licensed. Allowed. And I’m the youngest person ever to qualify as a Raiser; but that doesn’t matter either. I’m qualified. And being qualified means I have to follow the rules.

That’s why, when Millicent asked me to Raise her boyfriend Victor, I said no. I’m not allowed to Raise people I know. We’re only allowed to Raise people that have been tagged for us.

The authorities do the tagging; no one knows what they do with the people once they’re Raised. You hear stories, but everyone agrees it’s to help the war effort. So I guess it doesn’t matter what they’re doing.

All that matters is that we can’t Raise people who aren’t tagged. The authorities think that if we could Raise anyone willy-nilly, it would lead to self-indulgence, Raising everyone we ever loved who died.

I don’t think so. Some people are better off dead, and I like to think I’m mature enough to realise that. If they were supposed to be alive, the authorities would have tagged them.

That didn’t convince Millicent, though. You bitch, she said. You’d bring him back if he was your boyfriend.

I wouldn’t, I said,