Pandora Hope. The Ferryman. (Interzone #256, Jan-Feb 2015)
Hope draws on Norse mythology for this story, although to the non-expert on Norse mythology, as there are no hammer-wielding blonde-tressed Vikings in the story, this is rather opaque.
Reviewing short SF since 2000
Hope draws on Norse mythology for this story, although to the non-expert on Norse mythology, as there are no hammer-wielding blonde-tressed Vikings in the story, this is rather opaque.
As with many series, the law of diminishing returns meant that I stopped reading The Company stories some time ago.
Twp cops have to try to find out just exactly what it was that came down from the sky, and what exactly it was, other than ‘big’
Neat story from a new writer, as young Altair, who is a few steps more than most of us into the autistic spectrum, finds his brain, hard-wired into numbers and odds, is not just something for him to use in betting, but, as the title suggests, has an even more out-there relationship with the betting markets.
Stories by Rand B. Lee (the pick of the issue for me), Michael Libling, Paul Di Filippo, Albert E. Cowdrey, Tim Sullivan, Justin Barbeau, Scott Baker, KJ Kabza, David Gerrold. Cover by Mondolithic Studios.
There are some dark secrets in the otherwise quiet town of Trenton, Ontario, which are gradually revealed in this lengthy story.
A cautionary tale from an old SF writer, which looks at current trends and ponders just what chance there might be for old-fashioned storytelling in decades to come.
Stories by Nick Wolven, Eneasz Brodski, and Derek Kunsken the pick for me.
There’s a recurring theme of Shakespeare’s ‘Macbeth has murdered sleep’, and it’s a dark dystopian future but with some lighter, nicely sardonic touches thrown in.
A story about which I have reservations.
The anthology took me a while to get through, probably (looking at it in retrospect) that it didn’t have enough really top quality stories in it for me to be eagerly reaching for the volume with eager anticipation for the next story. Some good stories, but nothing really cojonal grabbing.
The anthology finishes with a look back at, a reliving, of deaths in a child labour factory on the subcontinent, as those who died, and will continue to die, furnish those that live on, digitally, with a view of death, an ending that will become increasingly rare.
Are there strange forces at work, and/or is it simply a case of a little lost girl?
The wreckage of a crashed Vulcan bomber, missing since the days of the Cold War, gives an opportunity to reflect on the ‘what ifs’ of that period, the nuclear payload being at once a Pandora’s Box into which Schrodinger’s cat is put.
Brodski packs some detail and some depth of the type you rarely see in a first published story, which bodes weill for the future.
A short look at a future in which a super-rich elite have longevity/immortality, leaving others on Earth to manage the economic and social consequences, and climate change.
Not much by way of a speculative element, so whilst a nice enough character study, and using non-mainstream sexuality/gender, it’s missing that little bit extra I look to SF to deliver.
Chan Davis makes his second appearance this issue, by way of being the name of a research department in a university where some leading-edge research in underway.
An interesting read, particularly in this age when geneological databases, family history research, and even Facebook can keep you closely attached to the past in a way that wasn’t the case pre-Internet.
It’s been quite a while since I’ve read anything by Michael Bishop, and was quite looking forward to it, having seen his name on the cover.