Ellen Klages. Amicae Aeternum. (Reach for Infinity)
When one embarks on a long, one-way journey, there is loss and there are people left behind, as Klages adeptly shows in a tender, bittersweet story.
Karen Lord. Hiraeth : a tragedy in four acts. (Reach for Infinity)
Young Janik falls on the moon, and against the odds needs to have his damaged eyes replaced with a cyborg pair, and this is the first in a long step of augmentations that take him very far from home.
Val Nolan. Diving into the Wreck. (Interzone #252, May-June 2014)
The wreck in question being The Eagle, the ascent stage of Apollo 11, long-lost on the Moon.
Katharine E.K. Duckett. The Mortuaries. (Interzone #252, May-June 2014)
Strange and unsettling story in a world gone to pot, and with plastinating the dead and displaying them in mortuaries the norm.
Megan Arkenberg. Houses Without Air. (The End is Nigh)
Seven sections, or in fact seven matches, each match, like those of the fairytale Little Matchgirl, throwing light.
Pat Cadigan. Report Concerning the Presence of Seahorses on Mars. (Reach for Infinity)
Inventive setting and nice narrative from Cadigan, as a young woman narrates a visit to their Martian colony by a representative from Earth.
Karl Schroeder. Kheldyu. (Reach for Infinity)
Further near-future science thriller from Schroeder, featuring the return of Gennady.
Gordon Eklund. I Said I Was Sorry Didn’t I. (Fantasy and Science Fiction, Mar/Apr 2014)
Eklund has been writing high-quality SF as long as I have been reading it, and I’m pleased to say that this story is of as high a standard as his best
D.M. Armstrong. Butterscotch. (Fantasy and Science Fiction Mar/Apr 2014)
Chilling story of an expectant couple plagued by a regular visitation from one of the shambling, dead ‘travelers’ (and the mother-in-law).
Asimovs July 2014
Stories by Reed, Jablokov and McDonald the pick of the bunch for me.
Allen M. Steele. The Legion of Tomorrow. (Asimovs July 2014)
A lengthy look at the very early days of SF fandom,
M. Bennardo. How Do I Get To Last Summer From Here? (Asimovs July 2014)
They say the past is a foreign country, but what if going back there was as simple as saying ‘there’s no place like home’, except that you don’t need a pair or ruby slippers, just the right mindset??
Karl Bunker. The Woman from the Ocean. (Asimovs July 2014)
A story with a simple point to make – if we could remove humanity’s obsession with ‘us’ and ‘them’, would the world be a better place?
Sandra McDonald. Story of Our Lives. (Asimovs July 2014)
An excellent story which, in structure, mood and tone, minded me of Ted Chiang’s ‘Story of Your Life’.
Evan Fuller. Five Six Seven. (Asimovs July 2014)
The first in a series of tales, we are told, about human and corporate bodies in 2030s America.
Ian McDonald. The Fifth Dragon. (Reach for Infinity)
A beautiful, elegaic story from McDonald that looks at the sacrifices made to turn the Moon into a place to live.
Asimovs June 2014
Book-ended by stories at the beginning and end of the volume which I enjoyed, but with the rest of the issue not doing as much for me.
Alexander Jablokov. The Instructive Tale of the Archeologist and His Wife. (Asimovs July 2014)
An intriguing, thoughtful read.
Robert Reed. Blood Wedding. (Asimovs July 2014)
A story that looks at motivations, and hidden strengths, and is a page turner.