Why an armed man should have been the one worrying, she never explained, but I had seen the tumblers tossing one another in the air and the strongman lifting all six dancing girls on his outstretched arms like they were no heavier than a pair of sleeves. I could guess what would happen to anyone who was caught out.

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Read “Bread and Circuses” by Genevieve Valentine, in Issue #55

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Genevieve Valentine’s World-Fantasy-Award-nominated short fiction has appeared in The Way of the Wizard, Clarkesworld, Strange Horizons, and more. Her story "Bread and Circuses" appeared in BCS #55 and as BCS Audio Fiction Podcast 049. Her first novel, Mechanique: a Tale of the Circus Tresaulti, set in the same world as both "Bread and Circuses" and "The Finest Spectacle Anywhere," was released by Prime Books in April 2011. Her appetite for bad movies is insatiable, a tragedy she tracks on her blog at www.genevievevalentine.com.

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