THE SIPPY AWARDS 2016! The "Where We're Going We Won't Need Categories" Sippy for Excellent I Don't Know What in Short SFF

Welcome back to the last entry in the Second Annual Sippy Awards! The short SFF award that no one asked for is back and things are definitely…well, kind of…or, that is to say…fuck it, I don't know but WE'RE DOING THIS ANYWAY!

There are some stories that just sort of take me by surprise. That work so incredibly well but that I can't really figure out what to call. I'm notoriously finicky when it comes to genre and so sometimes it's best to just embrace the nebulous. The undefined. The meta. Today I want to look at works that do interesting things not just with character and plot and conflict but with SFF as an idea. With art as an idea. Stories that push the boundaries on what should be considered the beating heart of SFF. Many of these stories have a lot to say on why people create. Why stories are important. Why giant wasps are scary. Err…well that last one might be a little specific but still!

SFF exists because some people a long time ago weren't satisfied with the conventions of storytelling. Because they wanted to tap into the imagination directly and hell with the establishment. And today that urge still lives and the breathes. Only now it comes against a different establishment, the one that tries to define what SFF is and should be. But I want to celebrate some stories that refuse to sit quietly, that refuse to stay confined. Today I want to present…

The "Where We're Going We Won't Need Categories" Sippy

for Excellent I Don't Know What in Short SFF

THE SIPPY AWARDS 2016! The "Time to Run Some Red Lights" Sippy for Excellent Action!!! in SFF

Welcome back to the Second Annual Sippy Awards! The short SFF awards that no one wanted is still going on for some reason! I've shipped my favorite relationships. I've shivered in fear of my favorite horror. I've bawled until I was nothing but a husk of raw feels. And now I'm back again. I'm better than ever! Because it's time to get exicted!

SFF has the power to tug at our hearts, but it also has the ability to get our heart pounding. To get our blood hot and our fists clenched. There's a lot of SFF that tends toward the cerebral side of things, but there's also SFF out there that sweeps everything onto the floor, tips over the table, and uses it for cover in a sudden blaster battle. And today I want to look at the stories that shoot first. That jump out into the open air without a parachute. That drive a hundred miles an hour in heavy traffic because there are cyborg-ninjas on motorbikes who will destroy the future unless you get the enchanted chinchilla back to his home dimension.

Ahem, well maybe not exactly that last one. Still, these are stories that do that cool slow walking away as the explosion happens. That tell the others to go on ahead and then ready their shotgun, waiting for the enemy to round the corner. It's time for…

The "Time to Run Some Red Lights" Sippy 

for Excellent Action! in Short SFF

THE SIPPY AWARDS 2016! The "There's Something in My Eye" Sippy for Excellent Making Me Ugly-Cry in Short SFF

Welcome back to the Second Annual Sippy Awards! The short SFF awards that no one asked for is here again because I said so, dammit! I've shipped my favorite SFF relationships. I've kept the lights on for my favorite SFF horror. So now it's time to examine yet another dimension of SFF short fiction.

Okay so yes, as a reviewer I tend to wear my heart on my sleeve. Part of the joy of engaging with stories is being effected by them. Is following where they lead, intellectually and emotionally. So for me stories that can move to tears are incredibly valuable. They hit and they hit hard. They draw blood.

They also inspire. Each of these stories can be a lesson in empathy. In really trying to understand what the characters are going through. Their grief and their loss and, through it all, their hope. More than anything else, it's the hope that gets me, that moves me, that breaks me and put me back together again. There is despair, yes, and pain. Sometimes far too much pain. Some of these stories are bleak. But none of them are without hope. And so while they all make me a large puddle of feels, when I solidify again I am the stronger for it. And that's why I love these stories, and why I can say without shame that these are the stories that made me cry the most in 2016. Yes, it's time for…

The "There's Something in My Eye" Sippy 

for Excellent Making Me Ugly-Cry in Short SFF

The 108 Recommendations of Destiny (2016 Edition)

Yes, that is a Suikoden reference, for any wondering. But welcome to my 2016 recommended reading list! Now, I'm kind of lazy, I will admit. This list really isn't new. It compiles all twelve of my 2016 Monthly Round choices and gives them to you as one large list. But, as The Monthly Round represents my favorite stories from each month, this mega-list does stand up pretty well. There's probably stories that I would add because some months were really packed and it was very difficult to pick, but I think that for now this is a pretty good place to start for my recommended reading list for 2016. If you're looking for more, then you'll just have to check out The Sippy Awards. So yeah, enjoy!

The Quick Sip Reviews Long List (aka my fave reads of 2016)

"While I Wait" by Layla Al-Bedawi (Fantastic Stories of the Imagination)

"Spirit Tasting List for Ridley House, April 2016" by Alex (Rachael) Acks (Shimmer)

"Das Steingeschöp" by G. V. Anderson (Strange Horizons)

"Under Dead Marsh" by Julia August (Lackington's)

"The Old Man and the Phoenix" by Alexandria Baisden (Apex)

"The Marvelous Inventions of Mr. Tock" by Daniel Baker (Beneath Ceaseless Skies)

"Muse" by Nicola Belte (Flash Fiction Online)

"Choose Your Killer" by Abhishek Bhatt (Mithila Review)

"Our Talons Can Crush Galaxies" by Brooke Bolander (Uncanny)

"Director's Cut" by Matthew Bright (Harlot Media)

"The House That Jessica Built" by Nadia Bulkin (The Dark)

"Applied Cenotaphics in the Long, Long Longitudes" by Vajra Chandrasekera (Strange Horizons)

"Nothing But the Sky" by Gwendolyn Clare (Beneath Ceaseless Skies)

"1957" by Stephen Cox (Apex)

"Breaking Water" by Indrapramit Das (Tor)

"The Life and Times of Angel Evans" by Meredith Debonnaire (The Book Smugglers)

"Braveheart's Homecoming" by Dilman Dila (Mithila Review)

"The Mama Mmiri" by Walter Dinjos (Beneath Ceaseless Skies)

"The Exemption Packet" by Rose Eveleth (Terraform)

"The Artificial Bees" by Simon Guerrier (Uncanny)

"Butter-Daughters" by Nin Harris (Sockdolager)

"Morning Cravings" by Nin Harris (Lightspeed)

"Tower of the Rosewater Goblet" by Nin Harris (Strange Horizons)

"The Automatic Prime Ministers" by Kate Heartfield (Lackington's)

"Vesp: A History of Sapphic Scaphism" by Porpentine Charity Heartscape (Terraform)

"The Venus Effect" by Violet Allen (Lightspeed)

"A Spell to Retrieve Your Lover from the Bottom of the Sea" by Ada Hoffman (Strange Horizons

"The Scrape of Tooth and Bone" by Ada Hoffmann (GigaNotoSaurus)

"The Indigo Ace and the High-Low Split" by Annalee Flower Horne (Mothership Zeta)

"Can't Beat 'Em" by Nalo Hopkinson (Uncanny)

"The Marriage Plot" by Tendai Huchu (Omenana)

"The Calculations of Artificials" by Chi Hui, translated by John Chu (Clarkesworld)

"Nobody Puts Baby in a Chamber" by Alexis A. Hunter (Mothership Zeta)

"Life in Stone, Glass, and Plastic" by José Pablo Iriarte (Strange Horizons)

"The City Born Great" by N.K. Jemisin (Tor)

"Love Letters on the Nightmare Sea" by Rachael K. Jones (Flash Fiction Online)

"The Night Bazaar for Women Becoming Reptiles" by Rachael K. Jones (Beneath Ceaseless Skies)

"All Souls Proceed" by K.J. Kabza (Flash Fiction Online)

"The Girl Who Escaped From Hell" by Rahul Kanakia (Nightmare)

"Rooting" by Isha Karki (Mithila Review)

"Ndakusuwa" by Blaize M. Kaye (Fantastic Stories of the Imagination)

"Breathe" by Cassandra Khaw (Clarkesworld)

"Some Breakable Things" by Cassandra Khaw (The Dark)

"Everything that Isn’t Winter" by Margaret Killjoy (Tor)

"Fragile Insides" by Jason Kimble (Orthogonal: Code)

"All the Red Apples Have Withered to Gray" by Gwendolyn Kiste (Shimmer)

"Whaling With Clowns" by Chris Kuriata (Unlikely Story)

"Postcards from Natalie" by Carrie Laben (The Dark)

"Superior" by Jessica Lack (The Book Smugglers)

"Espie" by Richard Larson (Terraform)

"The Book of How to Live" by R.B. Lemberg (Beneath Ceaseless Skies)

"The Desert Glassmaker and the Jeweler of Bereyyar" by R.B. Lemberg (Uncanny)

"Black, Their Regalia" by Darcie Little Badger (Fantasy)

"Her Sacred Spirit Soars" by S. Qiouyi Lu (Strange Horizons)

"The Drowning Line" by Haralambi Markov (Uncanny)

"Ye Highlands and Ye Lowlands" by Seanan McGuire (Uncanny)

"Now Watch as Belinda Unmakes the World" by Lynette Mejía (Flash Fiction Online)

"Angel, Monster, Man" by Sam J. Miller (Nightmare)

"Things with Beards" by Sam J. Miller (Clarkesworld)

"Plantation | Springtime" by Lia Swope Mitchell (Terraform)

"Plea" by Mary Anne Mohanraj (Lightspeed)

"Talking with Honored Guests" by Alexander Monteagudo (Fantasy Scroll)

"How High Can Your Gods Count" by Tegan Moore (Strange Horizons)

"Old Customs" by Rajiv Moté (Unlikely Story)

"You, an Accidental Astronaut" by Sonja Natasha (Mothership Zeta)

"u wont remember dying" by Russell Nichols (Terraform)

"The Company" by Sanya Noel (Omenana)

"Creation" by Sara Norja (Flash Fiction Online)

"Omoshango" by Dayo Ntwari (Lightspeed)

"Godfall" by Sandra M. Odell (GigaNotoSaurus)

"Afrofuturist 419" Nnedi Okorafor (Clarkesworld)

"Screamers" by Tochi Onyebuchi (Omenana)

"The Mourning Hour" by Anya Ow (GigaNotoSaurus)

"Three Points Masculine" by An Owomoyela (Lightspeed)

"Unauthorized Access" by An Owomoyela (Lightspeed)

"The Four Gardens of Fate" by Betsy Phillips (Apex)

"The Sweetest Skill" by Tony Pi (Beneath Ceaseless Skies) 

"Painted Grassy Mire" by Nicasio Andres Reed (Shimmer)

"Kid Dark Against the Machine" by Tansy Rayner Roberts (The Book Smugglers)

"Fylgia in the City" by Ian Rose (Plasma Frequency)

"The Sky, Falling" by Anton Rose (Terraform)

"A World Alone" by Lauren Rudin (GigaNotoSaurus)

"The Gentleman of Chaos" by Merc Fenn Wolfmoor (Apex)

"The Cedar Grid" by Sara Saab (Clarkesworld)

"A Menagerie of Grief" by Kelly Sandoval (Flash Fiction Online)

"None of This Ever Happened" by Gabriela Santiago (Nightmare)

"The Sound a Raven Makes" by Mathew Scaletta (GigaNotoSaurus)

"Chimera" by Gu Shi, translated by S. Qiouyi Lu and Ken Liu (Clarkesworld)

"What Pada-Sara Means to the Elephant" by Jeremy Sim (Beneath Ceaseless Skies)

"The Jeweled Nawab Jungle Retreat" by Priya Sridhar (Beneath Ceaseless Skies)

"That Which Stands Tends Toward Free Fall" by Benjanun Sriduangkaew (Clarkesworld)

"Standing on the Floodbanks" by Bogi Takács (GigaNotoSaurus)

"Toward the Luminous Towers" by Bogi Takács (Clarkesworld)

"Songbird" by Shveta Thakrar (Flash Fiction Online)

"The Singing Soldier" by Natalia Theodoridou (Shimmer)

"Terminal" by Lavie Tidhar (Tor)

"America, America" by Okafor Emmanuel Tochukwu (Flash Fiction Online)

"The Portal" by Debbie Urbanski (The Sun Magazine)

"Polyglossia" by Tamara Vardomskaya (GigaNotoSaurus)

"The Tomato Thief" by Ursula Vernon (Apex)

"War Profiteering" by M. Darusha Wehm (Mothership Zeta)

"A Fist of Permutations in Lightning and Wildflowers" by Alyssa Wong (Tor)

"Rabbit Heart" by Alyssa Wong (Fireside Fiction)

"Secondhand Bodies" by JY Yang (Lightspeed)

"An Ocean the Color of Bruises" by Isabel Yap (Uncanny)

"Hurricane Heels" by Isabel Yap (Book Smugglers)

"Love Out of Season" by Caroline M. Yoachim (Fantastic Stories of the Imagination)
"Welcome to the Medical Clinic at the Interplanetary Relay Station" by Caroline M. Yoachim (Lightspeed)

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THE SIPPY AWARDS 2016! The "I'm Sleeping with the Lights On" Sippy for Excellent Horror in Short SFF

Welcome back to the Second Annual Sippy Awards! Last week my heart melted as I went through my favorite SFF relationships. This week…things het a bit more creepy.

Those who know me know that I am a scaredy-cat. Horror movies? Yeahmaybenotthanks. But I will admit that I am still drawn to being scared. To being frightened. It's something that gets the heart racing and the blood pumping. And, in SFF, things aren't even as simple as a serial killer on the loose. From cosmic horror to body horror to monsters to…cooking? SFF horror definitely knows how to keep things interesting and innovative. And today I want to honor those stories that make me want to hide under the covers and wish for sunlight to save me from the dark. Which means, of course, that's time for…

The "I'm Sleeping with the Lights On" Sippy

for Excellent Horror in Short SFF

THE SIPPY AWARDS 2016! The "I'd Ship That" Sippy for Excellent Relationships in Short SFF

Welcome to 2017! Quick Sip Reviews is officially two years old! And what better way to celebrate than by kicking off the SECOND ANNUAL SIPPY AWARDS!!!

For those who might be new to QSR or missed last year's awards, the Sippys exist primarily because I wanted to give some special love to my favorite SFF. Wait, though, don't I already do that? YES I DO! But where The Monthly Round is my monthly recommendation column, I really wanted to do something annually. And wait, don't I sort-of already to that, too? YES I DO! But not here, on Quick Sip Reviews, and so I wanted to make something EXTRA SPECIAL. Enter THE SIPPY AWARDS, the SFF awards that no one asked for or really cares about!

These aren't just my favorite stories of 2016, though. The Sippys have categories, five in all, celebrating different aspects of SFF. From stories that made me afraid to go to sleep or left me a ball of tears and feelings huddled in the corner, I want to look at the different ways that SFF can be effective. And my categories might seem a little…odd, but that's just part of the fun. Each category has five picks, four Sippy Award winners and one Big Sip Award winner. So yes, without further ramblings on my part, let's kick things off with…

The "I'd Ship That" Sippy 

for Excellent Relationships in Short SFF