Excerpts Fantasy Read an Excerpt From School of Shards by Marina and Sergey Dyachenko The story of Sasha comes to a revelatory climax as she learns to take control of her powers and reshape the world… or destroy it forever. By Sergey and Marina Dyachenko | Published on May 21, 2025 Comment 0 Share New Share We’re thrilled to share an excerpt from School of Shards, the final chapter in the Vita Nostra series by Marina and Sergey Dyachenko, out from Harper Voyager on June 17th. The Institute of Special Technologies teaches students just one thing: the magic that allows them to become parts of speech, and in doing so, transforming into a specific piece of grammar (a verb, or an adjective, or an article) so they will be able to shape the world around them. As the new provost, though, Sasha is facing an enormous problem: the students in the world she just created, her “world without fear,” are unable to master the curriculum. Whether it’s the magic or the natural order of things, what they need to learn and become—Speech—is the basis of the material world.And if she can’t teach it, Sasha knows that matter will soon cease to exist.To protect the world, Sasha must collect fragments of her former reality. Only three people carry these fragments within themselves: her younger brother, Valya, and the Grigoriev twins, Arthur and Pashka, the sons of her former lover, Yaroslav Grigoriev. Sasha must lure these three to the Institute and make them learn—and understand—at any cost.But she knows how difficult the path is, even more so from the other side of the teacher’s desk. Forced to act ever more ruthlessly, Sasha also notices the faster the world around the Institute changes. It is a vicious circle.And one she must break.To do so, she will have to shape reality again, one in which communication doesn’t break down and Speech once again needs to evolve and grow and flourish.Sasha has already given up so much in pursuit of this dream—often her nightmare—and she might be asked to make one more sacrifice so that the world and Speech might live on. “As you know, Alexandra Igorevna, yet another incoming class is a disaster,” Adele said. “All first years are going to fail their winter finals. The second years are a bit stronger, but half of them are having trouble recovering from deconstruction. How will any of them pass their third-­year final?” Adele had a deep, velvety contralto; she spoke with authority and conviction. The more trouble the department was in, the more elegant were her choices of perfume and makeup. Sasha had no idea where Adele found her bespoke jackets, suits, designer bags, and shoes, but she also didn’t care enough to find out. “They are incapable of making an effort,” Adele continued. “They are wet noodles, not real students. Zero motivation, no matter what song and dance we’re performing in front of them, no matter how hard we’re trying to engage them.” “They are showing quite a bit of potential in Phys Ed,” Dima Dimych said. He was perched on the desk, one leg crossed over the other. “Incidentally, I’d like to bring up the pool question again.” Sasha looked at him without saying a word, and Dima immediately backpedaled. “I mean, I know it’s not the most convenient time, but we talked about it at the end of last semester…” Still silent, Sasha lit another cigarette. Dima wrinkled his nose and stopped speaking; a devoted athlete, he despised smoking. Adele, unfazed, spoke again. “The issue isn’t just a matter of passing, but who is passing. The grammatical composition is unbalanced. There is a dramatic shortage of verbs. And most of the verbs we do have are in the conditional mood. Very few are in an indicative mood. And we do not have a single imperative one.” “To put it bluntly, the Great Speech is degenerating, and the grammatical structure is declining,” Portnov said quietly. Unlike the others, he’d remained unchanged, and even his jeans, sweater, and glasses were the same as Sasha remembered from her own first year at Torpa. It made it all the more painful to see how much Portnov was changing from the inside. He held it together—­he resisted the simplification of the Great Speech—but now and then he would get stuck like a second year during a routine exercise. Watching him, Sasha knew: every time he struggled, yet another block of meanings would break off, disintegrating into incoherent lowing, and eventually ceasing to exist. And so would Portnov himself. Buy the Book School of Shards Marina and Sergey Dyachenko Buy Book School of Shards Marina and Sergey Dyachenko Buy this book from: AmazonBarnes and NobleiBooksIndieBoundTarget “We will have to sift and eliminate,” Adele said, knocking on the desk as if calling to order. “Let us keep one group, even if it’s only ten people, but the ten capable of mastering the curriculum.” “They won’t make it,” Sasha said softly. A smoke ring glimmered dangerously, folding into a flat spiral with a dark cloud in its center. Sasha flapped her hand, forcing the emerging projection to disperse. The room fell silent. The basement had no windows, so no noise came from Sacco and Vanzetti Street—­no birds singing, no passing cars. The only sound heard was the humming of an old air-­conditioning unit. “This world that I created has a built-­in defect,” Sasha said. She winced at the inexact and false nature of human words, so inefficient in describing the processes of true Speech. “Yes, this world exists, and it’s not that bad—­some people enjoy it. It even has some ability to develop. But Speech cannot be fooled.” She looked at Portnov. “Oleg Borisovich is right: all of us can see what’s happening with the grammatical structure.” “Shocking,” Dima said, batting his eyelashes. “We will recruit a new class,” Sasha said, putting out her cigarette. “Dmitry Dmitrievich, you will have to give up your current champions, because the recruiting efforts will take place last summer, three months ago.” “We’re just running in circles,” Portnov said, wiping his glasses with the hem of his sweater. “Our students are the product of their reality; you simply don’t have anyone to choose from. Another round of recruiting won’t solve anything.” “It will if I execute a grammatical reform,” Sasha said. Adele stared at Sasha like at a shiny shop window. Dima Dimych rocked back and nearly fell. Portnov narrowed his eyes. “Are you planning to bring back prerevolutionary orthography?” I am so lucky to have Portnov at my side, Sasha thought. Even as tired, wounded, and disintegrating from the inside as he is right now. Dima swung his feet in their white sneakers, seemingly hypnotized by the bright yellow shoelaces. “Dmitry Dmitrievich, please sit up properly,” Sasha said. “You’re attending a department meeting, not hanging out at a street corner.” “The local athletic society has a nice pool,” he said, reluctantly moving to a chair. “We can get hours for the students, and we won’t even need to pay—­it’s just paperwork.” “And what sort of a reform are you proposing?” Portnov cut in, returning his glasses to the bridge of his nose. “I am not proposing anything,” Sasha said. “This is my will.” At half past midnight, she ran out of cigarettes. Portnov showed up at twenty to one with a new pack. “You smoke too much,” he said disapprovingly, as he lit up his own cigarette with Sasha’s lighter. “At least that’s something I excel at,” Sasha said. Her basement office had no windows either. Sasha could have easily opened a new window onto Sacco and Vanzetti, or Montmartre, or into space, but she didn’t bother. What she needed was nowhere to be found. “This new reform of yours is quite an interesting way of getting things done,” Portnov said, straddling a chair. “You are an assassin of reality. Everything is happening the way you wanted.” “No,” Sasha said. “The world, as you see it, is not real. And the way you imagine—­it doesn’t even come close.” He nodded appreciatively, smirking at the memory of the very first Specialty lecture for Group A and the first year named Alexandra Samokhina standing by the blackboard and staring into the darkness behind her blindfold. Today, she paid him back. “The world exists the way you created it, Samokhina. Once a book reaches its audience, it’s too late to rewrite it.” “Thank you for the cigarettes,” Sasha said by way of dismissal. “I’ll get you another pack, I promise.” From School of Shards by Marina & Sergey Dyachenko. Copyright © 2025 by Sergey Dyachenko and Marina Shyrshova-Dyachenko. English translation copyright © 2025 by Julia Meitov Hersey. Reprinted with the permission of Harper Voyager, an imprint of HarperCollins Publishers. The post Read an Excerpt From <i>School of Shards</i> by Marina and Sergey Dyachenko appeared first on Reactor.