bibliogramma: (Default)
This short fiction post is a bit short, Morgan must have wanted to write up a few more pieces before posting, but she never did.

---

Most of these stories are listed on the Locus recommended reading List or on other Hugo recommendation lists.

“A World to Die For,” Tobias Buckell; Clarkesworld, January 2018.
http://clarkesworldmagazine.com/buckell_01_18/
Excellent. Climate futures are variable; the good ones are worth fighting for. Novelette.

“Nine Last Days on Planet Earth“, Daryl Gregory; Tor.com, September 19, 2018.
https://www.tor.com/2018/09/19/nine-last-days-on-planet-earth-daryl-gregory/
Excellent. Earth is slowly taken over by a new vegetative life form while a man’s life evolves around these new species, and the old ways of connecting to each other. Novelette.

“The Tale of the Three Beautiful Raptor Sisters and the Prince Who Was Made of Meat,” Brooke Bolander; Uncanny Magazine, July/August, 2018.
https://uncannymagazine.com/article/the-tale-of-the-three-beautiful-raptor-sisters-and-the-prince-who-was-made-of-meat/
Excellent. A prince of great promise and little brain suddenly takes matters into his own hands, to his detriment. Short story
bibliogramma: (Default)
I have been very ill, and the prognosis for recovery is not good. If I must choose in my limited time whether to read more, or write reviews if what I read, I choose to read more. While I’m still going to write about most books, for short fiction, I’m just going to give you my opinions as simple ratings unless there us something I really need to say. Short fiction will be rated excellent, very good, good, no comment or not my cup of tea. Interpret these as you will.

“No Flight without the Shatter,” Brooke Bolander; Tor.com, August 15 2019.
https://www.tor.com/2018/08/15/no-flight-without-the-shatter-brooke-bolander/
Excellent. A bittersweet requiem. Novelette.

“Firelight,” Ursula Le Guin; Paris Review, Summer 2018. Paywall; subscription required.
https://www.theparisreview.org/fiction/7176/firelight-ursula-k-le-guin
Excellent. Le Guin bids a final farewell to Ged, and to us. Short story.

“The Starship and the Temple Cat,” Yoon Ha Lee; Beneath Ceaseless Skies, February 1 2018.
http://www.beneath-ceaseless-skies.com/stories/the-starship-and-the-temple-cat/
Very good. Short story.

“The Starfish Girl,” Maureen McHugh; Slate, July 23, 2018.
https://slate.com/technology/2018/07/the-starfish-girl-a-new-sci-fi-short-story-about-gymnastics.html
Very good. Short story.

“A Brief and Fearful Star,” Carmen Maria Machado; Slate, June 27, 2018.
https://slate.com/technology/2018/06/a-brief-and-fearful-star-a-new-short-story-from-carmen-maria-machado-author-of-her-body-and-other-parties.html
Good. Short story.

“Asphalt, River, Mother, Child,” Isabel Yap; Strange Horizons, October 8 2018.
http://strangehorizons.com/fiction/asphalt-river-mother-child/
Excellent. Powerful use of traditional Philippine religious figures to tell a modern, and all too widespread, story. Short story.

“Music for the Underworld,” E. Lily Yu; Motherboard, March 29, 2018.
https://motherboard.vice.com/en_us/article/8xkxqx/music-for-the-underworld
Excellent. Powerful and disturbing. Short story.

“Ruby, Singing,” Fran Wilde; Beneath Ceaseless Skies, September 27 2018.
http://www.beneath-ceaseless-skies.com/stories/ruby-singing/
Very good. Eerie, like a folktale. Short story.
bibliogramma: (Default)
Brooke Bolander’s The Only Harmless Great Thing, a novelette published in chapbook format, is a complex, tragic, and angry cry of j’accuse to humanity for its lack of understanding, compassion, self-awareness and ability to take responsibility for its own mistakes.

The narrative is based on two historical events, both of which in their own way show humans to be cruel and thoughtless beings in aggregate. The first is the story of Topsy, an elephant taken into captivity to be exhibited to the public as a performing elephant. Topsy was involved in several violent incidents, most if not all of which seem to have ben provoked by thoughtless spectators, or careless and cruel handlers. In 1903 she was publicly executed - poisoned, strangled and electrocuted. Her execution was filmed for the edification of those eho could not attend personally.

The second historical event was the tragedy of the ‘radium girls’ - women who had been hired to paint watch dials with luminous paint containing radium. The women, who have been assured that the paint was harmless, were instructed to ‘point’ their brushes on their lips to make a smoother line, and as a result, ingested deadly amounts of radium. When some of the women, severely ill with radiation sickness, took their employers to court in the 1920s, they were alleged to have become ill, not from exposure to radium, but from syphilis contracted due to their ‘immoral’ lifestyles.

Bolander brings these two events together in an alternate Earth where elephants have long been known to be a sentient species, and a sign language developed to allow humans and elephants to communicate. There are three narrative threads in Bolander’s story. First, one on which Topsy, having too bad a reputation to exhibit, is sold to a watch manufacturer where Regan, dying from radiation sickness, is teaching her how to paint the watch dials while she waits for her court-ordered compensation comes through so she has some money to leave her family after she dies. Second, a mythical story about the sacrifices made by an elephant matriarch that enabled elephants to have a kind of group racial memory maintained by the mothers. And third, a future scenario in which humans hope to bury all the world’s nuclear waste under a mountain in Africa, and persuade a band of elephants to mind the mountain in perpetuity, warning future generations of humans against the dangers buried under the earth they protect; the humans come up with the ironic idea of altering the genetic makeup of these elephants so that they will glow, to remind humans of radioactive dangers.

The weaving of these ideas - radioactivity and poison, human cruelty and carelessness, the memory of elephants, the human urge to make others responsible for the mistakes of humanity, the implication that elephants will remember and protect better than any human agency could - is a powerful indictment of humanity and its relationship to other humans, to other life forms, and to the planet itself.
bibliogramma: (Default)




Last year, on International Women's Day, Tor.com published a series of short stories on a theme drawn from the silencing of American Senator Elizabeth Warren during the confirmation hearings for Jeff Sessions as Attorney General. Commenting on the silencing, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell said:

"She was warned. She was given an explanation. Nevertheless, she persisted."

The phrase has quickly become a feminist slogan, a cry of resistance against the worst injustices of the new American administration.

I read most of these last year, but wanted to bundle all the comments on them together in one post, so here, very late indeed, is that post. Links to all the stories can be found here: https://www.tor.com/series/nevertheless-she-persisted/


Kameron Hurley, "Our Faces, Radiant Sisters, Our Faces Full of Light"

The title is, of course, a direct reference to a short story by James Tiptree Jr (Alice Sheldon) writing as Racoona Sheldon - a woman who certainly persisted, writing about a woman driven mad by warnings and explanations, who resisted to the end. And the story is a grim, but somehow glorious fable of women’s persistence across the years, the centuries.


Alyssa Wong, “God Product”

This is not a happy story. It’s a story about a woman led to believe she is nothing, that she must destroy the thing she values in order to gain the respect she craves.


Carrie Vaughn, “Alchemy”

A paean to every woman who has ever labored, thankless, hindered, belittled, mocked, in a field designated as being “for men” and who has succeeded against all odds.


Seanan McGuire, “Persephone”

A bitter tale that touches powerfully on many painful things - poverty, desperation, the futility of hope in a capitalist dystopia, the delegitimising of non-standard relationships, the traffic in human flesh and blood, the dehumanising of the underclass by the powerful, and the anger that grows from all these and more.


Charlie Jane Anders, “Margot and Rosalind”

A slightly comic, slightly snarky, quite delightful story about a female “mad scientist” who’s building a brain in her basement, despite the efforts of everyone trying to stop her.


Maria Dahvana Headley, “Astronaut”

Reimagining the story of the first primate to survive a flight in space. It’s an all-too-familiar story with a sweetly triumohant ending.


Nisi Shawl, “More than Nothing”

Cora knows what’s expected of her, the sister if a pastor’s wife, a member of a black community, but Cora feels the call of other ways, and even more dangerously, she dares to hope.


Brooke Bolander, “The Last of the Minotaur Wives”

This story speaks of an inheritance of hope, generations of quiet resistance that build to the culmination, the moment when all is ready for the last in the chain to stand, to run, to leave the prison behind.


Jo Walton, “The Jump Rope Rhyme”

Important lessons are often encoded in children’s games and rhymes. Walton, an accomplished poet as well as writer of fiction, has built a skipping rhyme for future generations on the theme of persistence. A poem of hope.

“Persisting, in bad times, with only hope,
For you, in space, for the dream we share
Of a better future everywhere.”


Amal El Mohtar, “Anabasis”

Fir those who do not recognise the reference, Anabasis, which means, in the Greek, journey/expedition up from below, is the title of a book written by Xenophon describing the experiences of an army of Greek mercenaries fighting for the Persian would-be emperor Cyrus the Younger. After Cyrus was killed in battle, the Greeks faced a long and dangerous journey home, and it is this journey out of civil war that occupies most of the account.

El Mohtar writes in this powerful short story about a woman struggling to bring her child to safety, to a new home, and about her own identity as an Arab, a Muslim, a Canadian immigrant, a writer, a voice crying for justice. It’s a story about being a refugee, about borders and documents and human lives. It calls up the specific memories of Muslims trying to cross out of a suddenly far less welcoming US and into Canada during the winter of 2017 and Donald Trump.

Ironically, several months after this story was published, El Mohtar, a Canadian citizen traveling on a Canadian passport, was detained by American Customs agents while on her way to a writers’ retreat in the US. As a result of the interrogation, she missed her flight and was traumatised. (http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/ottawa/ottawa-author-calls-out-canadian-government-border-questioning-1.4430916)


Catherynne M. Valente, “The Ordinary Woman and the Unquiet Emperor”

In a world where everything that is not required is forbidden, an ordinary woman has the chance to change everything. She is warned. She is given an explanation. She persisted, and the world changed.

bibliogramma: (Default)


"The Great Detective," Delia Sherman; tor.com, February 17, 2016
http://www.tor.com/2016/02/17/the-great-detective-delia-sherman/

Steampunk and spiritualism, in an alternate literary universe where noted mechanical inventor Sir Arthur Cwmlech and his apprentice Miss Tacy Gof turn to colleague Mycroft Holmes and his masterwork the Reasoning Machine to solve a mysterious theft. A young Doctor Watson, recently returned from Afghanistan, seeks a new life as an inventor. All that is missing from the tale is the Great Detective himself - and if he does not yet exist, then surely someone will have to invent him. A light and witty tale that should appeal to fans of Holmes and the steampunk genre alike.

"Our Talons Can Crush Galaxies," Brooke Bolander; Uncanny magazine, November 2016
http://uncannymagazine.com/article/talons-can-crush-galaxies/

This was a short piece, essentially flash fiction, a stunning gut-punch. Hard to read, hard to breathe afterward. Searing and powerful indictment of male entitlement and rape culture.


"Seasons of Glass and Iron," Amal El-Motar; first published in The Starlit World (2016), reprinted online at Uncanny Magazine
http://uncannymagazine.com/article/seasons-glass-iron/

There are many fairy tales about women. Women who must do impossible things, or accept impossible circumstances, because of men. Men who say they love them, men who want to test them, men who want to woo and win them. Sometimes, though, these women walk out of those tales and live their own lives instead, creating new kinds of tales.


"Lullaby for a Lost World," Aliette de Bodard; Tor.com, June 8, 2016
http://www.tor.com/2016/06/08/lullaby-for-a-lost-world/

De Bodard has said that of this story that it is "a sort of answer to “The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas” (one of my absolute favourite short stories)." It is very much a story about the prices paid for security, stability, and the like - and who makes the decisions on what prices are acceptable, and who pays those prices. A worthy counterpart to the story that inspired it.


"Things with Beards," Sam J. Miller; Clarkesworld, June 2016
http://clarkesworldmagazine.com/miller_06_16/

A meditation on monsters and how they walk undetected in the world, both the monsters and evil aliens of speculative fiction (the backstory of the protagonist evokes the classic sf/horror film The Thing), and the monsters that have always been a part of the human race, the callous, the cruel, the killers of those who are labeled less than human.


"You'll Surely Drown Here if You Stay," Alyssa Wong;
Uncanny Magazine, May 2016
http://uncannymagazine.com/article/youll-surely-drown-stay/

A young boy with an uncanny heritage to communicate with, and control, the dead is forced to use his powers for the greed of others. A supernatural Western with a deep friendship that survives dead and retribution at its heart.


"An Ocean the Color of Bruises," Isabel Yap; Uncanny Magazine, July 2016
http://uncannymagazine.com/article/ocean-color-bruises/

Five young people, former college friends, take a vacation together to a second-class resort with a tragic past. When that past awakens, the quality of their own lives is called into question.


"A Fist of Permutations in Lightning and Wildflower," Alyssa Wong; Tor.com, March 2, 2016
http://www.tor.com/2016/03/02/a-fist-of-permutations-in-lightning-and-wildflowers-alyssa-wong/

A story about two sisters with unimaginable power, the depth of grief and guilt, and the futility of trying to change the past. Deep truths about grieving, accepting and moving on - and the tragedy of refusing to do so.


"Red in Tooth and Cog," Cat Rambo; originally published in Fantasy and Science Fiction, March/April 2016, republished online February 21, 2017
http://www.kittywumpus.net/blog/2017/02/21/story-red-in-tooth-and-cog/

A young woman frequenting a park has her phone stolen by an unlikely culprit, leading her to discover a new ecosystem in development. An interesting perspective on the definitions of life.


“Blood Grains Speak Through Memories”, Jason Sanford; Beneath Ceaseless Skies, March 17, 2016
http://www.beneath-ceaseless-skies.com/stories/blood-grains-speak-through-memories/

Sanford's novelette is set in what seems to be a far distant future, long after the ecological disasters of pollution and the exploitation of natural resources have resulted in massive social change and, one infers, biological engineering on a vast scale. The land is infused with "grains" - semi-sentient beings, possibly organic, possibly cybernetic, it's never made clear - that infect people thereafter known as anchors - who are responsible for protecting the land and its ecosystems. Anyone not part of an anchor's family is doomed to a nomadic existence, destroyed by the anchors and other beings created/controlled by the grains if they tarry to long in one place, or injure the land in any way. Frere-Jones is an anchor dissatisfied with the way the grains control the anchors and limit the lives of the nomadic day-fellows. Her husband, who shared her opinions, was killed by the grains, and if they could replace her, Frere-Jones suspects the grains would kill her too.

I was both intrigued and dissatisfied with this novelette. I enjoyed the themes of rebellion and of sacrifice, but I was frustrated at knowing so little about the grains, the biomorphing of the anchors, and how it all came to be that way. Perhaps a longer format might have allowed more worldbuilding.

bibliogramma: (Default)

Two of the finalists in the Best Novelette category were stories I'd already read - “Folding Beijing” [1] by Hao Jingfang, translated by Ken Liu, which was one of my own nominations, and Brooke Bolander's "And You Shall Know Her by the Trail of Dead," [2] which had been on my 'for consideration' list right up to the final cut. Both were reviewed earlier in the year - URLs are in the footnotes.

While I don't feel that Stephen King's "Obits" is quite as powerful as either of these, it is nonetheless a creditable finalist. Dark fantasy rather than outright horror, it tells the story of a young journalist who inadvertently discovers that he kill anyone he chooses by writing their obituary. King explores both the addictive power of the ability to decide between life and death, and the visceral recoil of the average human from it. In the end, though, it is a story of hope, arguing that it is possible to turn away from the seductive draw of such power.

"Flashpoint: Titan” by Cheah Kai Wai, published in the anthology There Will Be War X, is a relatively straightforward milsf story about a battleship, its captain, and a battle in space that is won at significant cost. The writing is clear, with minimal infodumping, the story stripped of all narrative elements other than those which further the military encounter. Commander Hoshi at least emerges as a well-developed character - though this cannot be said about most of the other characters. The leanness of the narrative means that we have little sense of the political milieu in which the encounter takes place, and no real understanding of the motivation of the enemy combatants. This is essentially battletech porn - each manouevre is detailed, every strike and counterstrike described. The opening gambit, the set up, and the battle are the story. Competently written, but too limited in scope for my taste.

On the other hand, “What Price Humanity?” by David VanDyke, the second finalist in the novelette category from the There Will Be War X anthology, is a well-written and thought-provoking piece with much to recommend it. The premise of the story is that Earth is under sustained attack from aliens with superior firepower, the defense of Earth and its colonies is going poorly, and the only way to survive is to push both technology and ideas of appropriate use of personnel to the limits - and possibly beyond. The story begins with a crack pilot waking up in a virtual simulation. At first he assumes he has been injured and the simulation's purpose is to communicate with him and check on his healing while his body regenerates. But as time passes, the simulation widens to contain 23 other pilots, all of whom he's served with, some of whom he's sure were killed in action. There are simulations within the simulation, as the pilots are given the opportunity to train on a different kind of individual fighter ship, with new mission parameters and tactics.

While I was able to figure out quite easily what was really happening and why, the 'twist' at the end isn't really the point of the story. It's more about establishing the essential humanity of consciousness - done through solid characterisation and a deft balance between the simulated actions of the pilots and the introspective ruminations of the key protagonist - and asking each reader to decide the title question for herself. A good and thoughful story.



[1] http://bibliogramma.dreamwidth.org/185839.html
[2] http://bibliogramma.dreamwidth.org/178331.html
bibliogramma: (Default)

"The Occidental Bride" by Benjanun Sriduangkaew, ClarkesWorld, #108, September 2015
http://clarkesworldmagazine.com/sriduangkaew_09_15/

Fascinating story on many levels. A young woman compromised by an innocent association with terrorists is forced by her government to help set up a trap for yet another terrorist by entering into an arranged marriage. And yet there is still the possibility of love and hope.


"Fabulous Beasts," Priya Sharma, July 27, 2015, Tor.com
http://www.tor.com/2015/07/27/fabulous-beasts-priya-sharma/

This is not a comfortable story. It is, however, a compelling one. Sharma's dark fantasy novelette is about family secrets, especially the ones that can't be told in the clean light of day, about mothers and sisters and daughters caught in those secrets, finding love as best they can. It's about living through the horror and pain, about surviving despite the wounds. Warning: sexual abuse, incest, rape.


"And You Shall Know Her by the Trail of Dead," Brooke Bolander, February 2015, Lightspeed Magazine
http://www.lightspeedmagazine.com/fiction/shall-know-trail-dead/

Rhye is a foul-mouthed demobbed cyborg supersoldier with nothing left to do but cage fighting for spare change when she meets Rack, a cyberhacker and security expert. They make a good team, right up until they are hired to break into a data storage environment protected by a security system Rack himself designed. Then it all goes to hell. Adrenaline charged cyberpunk novelette with more than a few twists. A fast-paced, well-written novelette with strong characterisation, and fun to read.


"Look at Me Now," Sarah Norman, March 5, 2015, Omenana
http://omenana.com/2015/03/05/look-at-me-now/

An undocumented black woman living in London finds that she is able to become invisible, especially when upset or distressed - which is frequent enough in her day to day life in London, but becomes more and more common, as the news of political unrest and violence from her home country grows worse. Strong characterisation and one hell of an ending.


"Discovering Time Travel," Suleiman Agbonkhianmen Buhari, January 15, 2015, Jalada
http://jalada.org/2015/01/15/discovering-time-travel-by-suleiman-agbonkhianmen-buhari/

Interesting experiment in style. Aside from a brief introduction and conclusion, the story is told entirely in dialogue - an interrogation scene, in fact - and the reliability of the main character is in doubt throughout the entire scene. I found the dialogue awkward but the story it unveils interesting. And the end gave me a chill.


"Devil's Village," Dayo Ntwari, WRITIVISM Short Story Competition shortlist
http://munyori.org/writivism-2015-shortlist/devils-village-by-dayo-adewunmi-ntwari/

Tautly written milsf-flavoured story about factional violence and government malfeasance in Nigeria. A mercenary on a mission to deliver a priest to an outlaw village discovers just how great the gap is between reality and political propaganda.

Profile

bibliogramma: (Default)
bibliogramma

May 2019

S M T W T F S
   1234
567891011
12131415161718
19202122232425
2627282930 31 

Syndicate

RSS Atom

Style Credit

Expand Cut Tags

No cut tags
Page generated Jul. 3rd, 2025 05:58 pm
Powered by Dreamwidth Studios