Short Fiction #5

More short fiction from here, there and everywhere.

"Never Chose This Way" by Shira Lipkin, July 7, 2016, Apex Magazine
http://www.apex-magazine.com/never-chose-this-way/

Powerful and painful story about surviving the ways our culture tries to police conformity and learning to live comfortably beyond the definitions of acceptable gender roles, in which a group of non-conforming girls use the tropes of fantasy snd science fiction to create their own identities.


"All in a Hot and Copper Sky" by Megan Arkenberg, September 2015, Lightspeed Magazine
http://www.lightspeedmagazine.com/fiction/all-in-a-hot-and-copper-sky/

Dolores is a survivor. Many years ago, she and her lover Socorro were part of an experiment, a simulation of a Mars colony biosphere gone horribly wrong - and rightly or wrongly, it was Socorro who took action in the crisis, and Socorro who paid the price with her reputation and her life. Yet, as the story of what happened, and of how Dolores' life has unfolded since, is revealed in a series of reminiscences and letters never sent, it becomes clear that Dolores has paid the price as well, her life becalmed in hell just as the ship of the Ancient Mariner referenced in the title, Socorro and her deeds - and Dolores' love for her - hung like an albatross around her neck. Powerful story.


"The Body Corporate" by Mark Pantoja, September 1, 2015, Giganotosaurus Magazine
http://giganotosaurus.org/2015/09/01/the-body-corporate/

In a universe where corporations own everything, the settlers of an unterraformed world struggle to maintain some kind of freedom. When a wounded, genetically altered Corporate soldier is found by a backwoods farmer after a battle with rebel forces, she faces a dilemma - kill the Corporate and bring down the full force of the Corporation on her, or help the Corporate and betray her people? Thought-provoking.


"And the Ends of the Earth as Thy Possession" by Robert B. Feingold, July 1, 2015, Giganotosaurus Magazine
http://giganotosaurus.org/2015/07/01/and-the-ends-of-the-earth-for-thy-possession/

In an alternate universe, anti-Semitism has resulted in the expulsion of Jews from the planet after a bloody religious war that destroyed most of the Jewish communities of Palestine. The survivors are being transported to a new planet, when a series of unexplained deaths among the crew bring to the surface old fears and prejudices. A deeply moving story of guilt, revenge, and the nature of the soul.


"The World in Evening" by Jei D. Marcade, September 14, 2015, Strange Horizons
http://www.strangehorizons.com/2015/20150914/evening-f.shtml

Harley is a taxidermist; the monster that lives inside him is something else altogether. Mouse is his newly moved in neighbour, a young girl with her own inner secrets. A chilling story about monsters, hunters, and the games they play.


"And We Were Left Darkling," Sarah Pinsker, August 2015, Lightspeed Magazine
http://www.lightspeedmagazine.com/fiction/and-we-were-left-darkling/

All over the world, people are dreaming about children they have never known, but who they feel are unquestionably real, and their own. And then one day, those children appear. Haunting and moving piece.


"When Your Child Strays from God," Sam J. Miller, August 2015, Clarkesworld Magazine
http://clarkesworldmagazine.com/miller_07_15/

A pastor's wife believes her son is lost to them, and will do anything to find and save him - including taking the illegal, mind-linking drug she believes him to be addicted to. But in the end, it is not so clear who is truly lost, and who most needs to be found and saved.

Mercedes Lackey: Closer to the Heart

Closer to the Heart is the second of Mercedes Lackey's Herald Spy novels, featuring Herald Mags as the spy and his lover Herald Amily as the King's Own Herald.

Mags' network of former pickpockets and street kids is now running smoothly - the "littles" working as messengers and errand boys in taverns and inns throughout Haven, and some of the older ones now being trained to service and placed in the homes of the upper class and wealthy. Not to be outdone, Amily comes up with a new scheme for placing observers in every home of note in the country. And Mags finds an unusual source of clever gadgets for the discerning secret agent or assassin. Meanwhile, there is a plot afoot to drag Valdemar into a very messy political situation, and that occupies our heroes for the latter half of the book.

I must confess to a degree of ambivalence about where this series is going. I like reading about spycraft, and this series, while light on adventures and battles and the like, spends a lot of time looking at the daily lives of people who gather information for their government. Being Heralds, they all have the purest of motives, but still... this is getting uncomfortably close to the paranoid state of many governments today, where there are as many surveillance cameras capturing every moment of our lives as possible, and laws protecting privacy are being eroded left, right and centre.

It's still fun to read about this stuff in a fantasy world, but the darker implications of spywork aimed at people not even suspected of wrong-doing is leaving a bitter aftertaste.