Ghostlands

Francesco Helios, a groundskeeper in New Shining Capital, runs a “mower,” a seventy-ton leveling machine that keeps the Lawn free of the bloom of mushrooming monuments. Like an unruly yard, structures shove their way up through the turf: the obelisk of the Washerman Monument, the temple of “Old Frog Face,” and a thousand other stubborn relics from a half-recollected past that refuse to stay mowed down.

While Francesco is mowing, a ghostly woman appears on the Lawn. Unlike oth...