bibliogramma: (Default)
Most of these stories are from the Locus recommended reading list or other online recommendations lists.

“The Court Magician,” Sarah Pinsker; Lightspeed Magazine, January 2018
http://www.lightspeedmagazine.com/fiction/the-court-magician/
Excellent. Concerning actions desires and their costs. Short story.

“The Last Banquet of Temporal Confections,” Tina Connolly; Tor.com, July 11 2018.
https://www.tor.com/2018/07/11/the-last-banquet-of-temporal-confections-tina-connolly/
Excellent. Novelette.

“And Yet,” A.T. Greenblatt; Uncanny Magazine, March-April 2018.
https://uncannymagazine.com/article/and-yet/
Very good. A scientist must choose between her research and her brother’s life. Short story.

“She Still Loves the Dragon,” Elizabeth Bear; Uncanny Magazine, January-February 2018.
https://uncannymagazine.com/article/still-loves-dragon/
Very good. Short story.

“A Witch’s Guide to Escape: A Practical Compendium of Portal Fantasies,” Alex E. Harrow; Apex Magazine, February 6 2018.
https://www.apex-magazine.com/a-witchs-guide-to-escape-a-practical-compendium-of-portal-fantasies/
Excellent. Heart-breaking, but with a breath of hope. Short story.

“Snake Season,” Erin Roberts; The Dark Magazine, April 2018.
http://thedarkmagazine.com/snake-season/
Very good. A horrifying tale of love and madness. Short story. CN: infanticide, murder.

“Flow,” Marissa Lingen; Fireside Magazine, March 2018.
https://firesidefiction.com/flow
Very good. About disability, nature, knowing and healing. Short story.

“Pistol Grip,” Vina Jie-Min Prasad; Uncanny Magazine, March-April 2018
https://uncannymagazine.com/article/pistol-grip/
Good. Evocative, provocative. Short story. CN: Explicit violence, sex.

“Cast Off Tight,” Hal Y. Zhang; Fireside Magazine, June 2018.
https://firesidefiction.com/cast-off-tight
Very good. Memory, grief, and knitting. Short story.

“Blessings,” Naomi Novik; Uncanny Magazine, May-June 2018.
https://uncannymagazine.com/article/blessings/
Excellent. Be careful when asking fairies for blessings on your children. Shot story.

“A Study in Oils,” Kelly Robson; Clarksworld Magazine, September 2018.
http://clarkesworldmagazine.com/robson_09_18/
Excellent. A study in remorse. Novelette.
bibliogramma: (Default)
The Hugo finalists are out, and while quite a few of the short fiction pieces were ones I’d nominated, there are a few I hadn’t read. So, I’ve gotten my hands on those (much thanks to Sarah Pinsker for making a pdf of her novelette available on her website) and corrected those gaps in my reading.

Short Story

“The Martian Obelisk,” Linda Nagata; tor.com, July 19, 2017.
https://www.tor.com/2017/07/19/the-martian-obelisk/

The Earth is dying. Slowly, from ecological breakdown and climate change and loss of infrastructure and antibiotic resistant diseases and natural disasters and sporadic violence and all the things we’ve been fearing in recent years. A series of slow apocalypses. Susannah is an architect, and with the backing of one of the world’s remaining millionaires, she has spent the last 17 years building a soaring monument to the memory of humanity - on Mars, remotely accessing the technology of a Mars colony that was prepped but never settled. And then the unthinkable happens. A message from a survivor of the last functioning Mars colony, previously thought lost, is received. A woman and her children, the only ones left alive on Mars, have battled halfway across Mars and are asking for the resources of the monument to build a place where they can survive just a little longer. Susannah must decide, what will be the final shape of the Martian monument - the obelisk she’s spent years building, or a few more years of life for a doomed family. Powerful story, both in its depiction of the end of the world - not with a bang, but a long slow series of whimpers - and in its examination of the irrational, irrepressible, persistence of hope.


Novelettes

“Wind Will Rove,” Sarah Pinsker
(Originally published in Asimov’s September/October 2017, available for download as pdf on Pinsker’s website: http://sarahpinsker.com/wind_will_rove)

In this novelette, Pinsker explores the tension between preservation of the past and creation of the future through the situation of a generation ship that, through an act of sabotage, has lost its cultural and historical databases. This results in a concerted decision by the passengers to restore and preserve as much of the lost material as possible, not just through the creation of new databases, but through continued repetition and accurate reproduction of the restored material - music, plays, art, and Earth’s history. The narrator, Rosie Clay, is a history teacher and traditional fiddle player, challenged by one of her students who rejects the emphasis on the history and creations of the past, of an Earth that means nothing to them. Forced to look beyond the truism that those who forget history are destined to repeat it - questionable in a world that is entirely different from the Earth where that history took place - Rosie finds herself examining her own assumptions. Quiet but very thought-provoking.


“Children of Thorns, Children of Water,” Aliette de Bodard; Uncanny Magazine, July/August 2017
https://uncannymagazine.com/article/children-thorns-children-water/

This novelette is set in the world of de Bodard’s Dominion of the Fallen series, and requires some familiarity with that world to be fully understood. It’s a world where Fallen angels wield magic and rule Houses, life for the houseless is bleak and often violent. The novels are set in an alternate late 19th century Paris and deal largely with relationships, politics and power - within houses, between houses, and in the larger postcolonial society. In this story, Thuan, a dragon in human form and member of the Dragon kingdom based in the waters of the Seine - the dragons, being drawn from Annamese (Vietnamese) tradition, are water beings) seeks to enter one of the Houses, House Hawthorn, as a spy, to gain information on what the tensions between houses might mean for the dragon kingdom. The day of testing, when new house dependents are chosen, is interrupted by a magical assault by creatures made of thorns, manifestations of House Hawthorne itself. Thuan proves useful to the Fallen in charge of the the tests in dealing with the crisis, and thus wins his place in the House. It’s a well-written piece, but I’m not all that fond of this secondary world. I read and enjoyed the first novel in the series and found it interesting - but not compelling enough to have pushed me to read the second volume. Good story, not quite my cup of tea.


Novellas

River of Teeth, Sarah Gailey

In her foreword, Gailey says: “In the early twentieth century, the Congress of our great nation debated a glorious plan to resolve a meat shortage in America. The idea was this: import hippos and raise them in Louisiana’s bayous. The hippos would eat the ruinously invasive water hyacinth; the American people would eat the hippos; everyone would go home happy. Well, except the hippos. They’d go home eaten.” It was this unfulfilled notion that spurred Gailey to imagine the alternate history of this novella, though she places the introduction of hippos into the American ecology and economy some decades earlier. In Gailey’s version of the American South, marshes have been encouraged to allow for the development of hippo farming. Hippos serve instead of horses for cartage and personal transport, and there are canals and pools for the animals to use as rest stops, and instead of stables. Part of the Mississippi has been dammed up, forming a marshy lake area called the Harriet where feral hippos range, interfering with water trade along the river. This lake region is controlled by a shady - and very wealthy - man named Travers, who operated gambling riverboats on the lake, and is known to feed people he dislikes to the feral hippos. The story begins when adventurer Winslow Remington Houndstooth is hired by a government agency to clean out the feral hippos. The general plan is to get them through the barrier at the downstream end of the Harriet by any means necessary, and encourage them to migrate south into the gulf, freeing the river for trade, and not quite incidentally interfering with Travers’ business. In addition to the large payment offered to him and any members if the tram he pits together, Houndstooth has a strong personal motivation for injuring Travers, who burned out his hippo farm sone years ago, leaving him penniless.

The first part of the novella is devoted to assembling the team, which could not be comprised of a more diverse group of characters: Regina “Archie” Archambault, a cross-dressing conwoman; Hero Shackleby, a nonbinary demolitions expert; Cal Hotchkiss, fast gun, card shark, and former employee if Houndstooth who may or may not have betrayed him to Travers; Adelia Reyes, a pregnant lesbian assassin; and Houndstooth himself, a mixed race Immigrant from England whose dream and passion is to rebuild his hippo farm. Gailey also spends time letting us get to know, not only the characters, but their hippos, their personalities and distinguishing traits. It’s clear in this society that people form bonds with their hippos not unlike those with other working or companion animals like dogs, cats or horses. As for the plot - everything goes wrong, of course, and there are double-crosses and hidden motivations and a tangle of cross purposes, and this is not a light-hearted caper, not everyone survives. But it is very entertaining, and I hear there’s a sequel.


Down Among the Sticks and Bones, Seanan McGuire

McGuire uses a delightfully arch and ironic tone in beginning this story - the backstory of Jaqueline and Jillian, Jack and Jill, two of the distinctly different children from the first of the Wayward Children series, Every Heart a Doorway - by introducing Chester and Serena Wolcott, two self-absorbed people who chose to have children to complete the image of their perfect nuclear family. Things go wrong, of course, from the beginning. As soon as they knew they were having twins, they assumed they would have a boy and a girl, thus efficiently creating the ideal family in one swoop. They never considered the possibility of two girls.

Parenthood does not suit the Wolcotts, being too disorderly and entirely too loud and messy. Chester’s mother is almost immediately recruited to actually raise the girls. At least until it becomes inconvenient to have her around, so at age five the twins lose the only person in their lives who saw them as people to be encouraged to grow, rather than accessories to be programmed for the benefit of their parents.

Those who have read Every Heart a Doorway already know a little of what happens to Jack and Jill. One day, they find a doorway where no doorway should have been and it takes them to a strange land where nightmares are real, but at least here they have some choice over which nightmare they will live in, where their parents gave them no choices at all. It is a strange place, a cruel place, and each child is changed in ways that do not bear much thinking about.

This is part of why, while I appreciate McGuire’s skill and invention in writing these stories, I don’t like them. I am not good with reading about abused children who don’t get to really escape their abuse - because we know that while Jack and Jill will someday find their way home, they will be damaged, perhaps permanently, perhaps beyond any hope of being ... normal, happy, able to function in a world of ordinary people. Of course, you can say that of many traumatised children, because the scars of some hurts never heal. So there is a fundamental truth underneath the fantasy here. As it happens, it’s a truth I live with, and reading about it requires accommodations that McGuire doesn’t offer, like the possibility of grace and hope.
bibliogramma: (Default)


Sarah Pinsker's novella, And Then There Were (N-One), starts out strange, but in a way that grabs and teases and doesn't let go. The conceit is fascinating - in the vastness of the multiverse, the Sarah Pinsker (or at least, one of the Sarah Pinskers) who is a quantologist and who discovered the multiple universes and how to traverse them, holds a conference to which she invites a wide selection of the other Sarah Pinskers.

Who hasn't wondered what their lives might have been like, what they might have been like, if.... So many kinds of if. If they'd made different decisions, if their childhood had been different, if they had been born in a different kind of world. Obviously, Sarah Pinsker has, and she's used that to create a compelling situation for a story, any story. That this story is in fact a murder mystery inspired by the Agatha Christie novel referenced in the title makes it even more strange and compelling.

The novella deftly portrays the confusion of the protagonist - the only Sarah Pinsker at the convention who has any experience in detective work, albeit as an insurance investigator - called upon to unravel the circumstances of the death of one Sarah Pinsker among many. As the mystery unfolds, so do the philosophical questions about responsibility, reality, and 'the road not taken' that fascinate us all.

(Published in Uncanny Magazine March/April 2017. https://uncannymagazine.com/article/and-then-there-were-n-one/)

bibliogramma: (Default)

Short fiction

"The Maker Myth," Ahmed Khan, Inkitt
https://www.inkitt.com/stories/scifi/15673/chapters/1?ref=v_114318f5-c460-4e6d-8bbc-692f62cad08c

A nice twist on the creation vs. evolution debate, though the writing is a bit flat. It's more of an idea piece than a character and plot piece, and suffers somewhat from the narrow focus.


"The Vault of the Beast," A. E. Van Vogt
http://www.prosperosisle.org/spip.php?article236

One of the finalists for the 1941 Retro Hugos, this can be read as a cautionary tale about mistreating your minions if you happen to be an evil overlord, although I suspect that wasn't Van Vogt's primary theme. This is one of those stories in which a hidden and ancient evil lies trapped in a ruined old Martian city, scheming to get out and conquer the universe, beginning with humanity. It's an early and not very remarkable piece by one of the Golden Age masters.


"That Which Stands Tends Toward Free Fall," Benjanun Sriduangkaew, Clarkesworld, February 2016
http://clarkesworldmagazine.com/sriduangkaew_02_16/

In the midst of a global war, a specialist in developing and guiding AIs is approached by old comrades. Beautifully written. Sriduangkaew excels in allowing a story to unfold, revealing both backstory and future direction indirectly but never missing out on the essentials.


"43 Responses to 'In Memory of Dr. Alexandra Nako'," Barbara A. Barnett, Daily Science Fiction, February 5, 2016
http://dailysciencefiction.com/fantasy/religious/barbara-a-barnett/43-responses-to-in-memory-of-dr-alexandra-nako

Told entirely as a (very realistic) series of comments on a memorial to a scientist who apparently died during a Near Death Experience experiment, this thought-provoking story builds to a chilling conclusion. Horror or religious fantasy? You decide.


"Left the Century to Sit Unmoved," Sarah Pinsker, Strange Horizons, May 16 2016
http://www.strangehorizons.com/2016/20160516/pinskercentury-f.shtml

Just outside of town, there's a pond with a waterfall, where people go to sun, and swim, and climb to the top of the waterfall and jump. Not everyone who jumps comes back, and no one quite knows why. There are rules that are supposed to keep you safe if you follow them, but they aren't always reliable. The protagonist's brother jumped - or so it's assumed, because his car was found parked at the head of the trail leading to the pond, and he's never been seen since then. But no matter how many the pool takes, people still jump. Pinsker never resolves the mystery, which makes this story all the more powerful. No one knows where the taken go, but people still jump. And in all the reasons why lies a big chunk of what makes us human.

bibliogramma: (Default)

"Trollbooth," Maureen Tanafon, April 2015, Crossed Genres
http://crossedgenres.com/magazine/028-trollbooth/

While the men around her bluster around violently in an attempt to save two children lost to supernatural captors, a courageous young woman takes another path to win their freedom.


"And the Balance in Blood," Elizabeth Bear, November 2015, Uncanny Magazine
http://uncannymagazine.com/article/and-the-balance-in-blood/

Bear's fantasy novelette is a marvellous story about an unusual hero, a grey-haired cloistered religieuse named Sister Scholique who has the gift of the gods' grace; her prayers are often answered by the gods, from small things like a prayer to allow her to overhear a conversation just beyond the range of her hearing, to prayers for the souls of the dead. In fact, it is this latter purpose that takes up most of her time, praying over wax recordings of prayers for the dead as she turns these cylinders in her chantry. When a dream gives her an idea of how to build an automated chantry that will give her more free time, she sets her church on a path that leads to potential abuses. A beautifully written tale that asks questions about the influence of the wealthy in accessing practices meant to be available to all.


"The House of Surrender," Laurie Penny, January 11, 2016, Der Freitag
https://www.freitag.de/autoren/der-freitag/the-house-of-surrender

In the future, people have learned to live mostly in harmony. Captialism, the belief in hierarchies and the idea that one person can with impunity interfere with the autonomy of another are all distant memories of the past. But sometimes people, being people, offend against others, and if there is no way for them to live among others, they come to the island of the House of Surrender. And there they stay. Until one day a man arrives at the House who claims to be from the past.


"Two to Leave," Yoon Ha Lee, May 28 2015, Beneath Ceaseless Skies
http://www.beneath-ceaseless-skies.com/stories/two-to-leave/

Yoon Ha Lee writes in a style all his own, lyrical, elegant, packed with images and delicate allusions. His writing seems to speak to the heart and the unconscious - when I read one of his stories, I often feel that I've just encountered something deeply profound, yet something I cannot quite capture in words, something that partakes of the nature of our dreams. So it is with this story, and deservedly so, for this is a story of a ferryman, and a river that cannot be crossed without sacrifice, a mercenary who kills with a swarm of bees, a messenger raven, and of eyes, and vision, taken and given. Of life and death and the states inbetween and the ways to reach them.


"Vulcanization," Nisi Shawl, January 2016, Nightmare Magazine
http://www.nightmare-magazine.com/fiction/vulcanization/

King Leopold of Belgium seeks to rid himself of the ghosts of the Congo. A steampunk meditation on atrocity, remembrance and guilt. Powerful.


"Our Lady of the Open Road," Sarah Pinsker, June 2015, Asimov's Magazine
http://www.sarahpinsker.com/our_lady_of_the_open_road/

In the future, people's fears of mingling with those they don't know, combined with increasingly sophisticated technology that makes possible holographic displays of concerts and sports events in the safety and security of one's home, have almost destroyed the idea of live performance and the travelling band. But a few artists remain on the road, committed to the belief that performance art involves the immediate relationship between performer and audience, no matter how high the cards are stacked against them.


"The Killing Jar," Laurie Penny, January 2016, Motherboard
http://motherboard.vice.com/read/the-killing-jar

In the not too distant future, the simulated murders of television and film are no longer sufficient to satisfy the public craving for blood and circuses. Society has recognised and legitimated a new kind of performance, the serial killer - who is free to kill as long as he follows the rules.
bibliogramma: (Default)

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.

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 Jun. 14th, 2025 01:27 am
Powered by Dreamwidth Studios