Quick Sips - Fireside Magazine #81

Fireside Magazine closes out July with four new stories that deal with family and with bargains. Often with bargains that don’t exactly go as planned. A faerie queer who kidnaps a child only to find herself getting involved in the life of the mother. Spice traders opening up a new market in the shadow of colonialism. Workers trapped in a place where they are always outsiders, exploited, making connections no one expects. A magical being of water making a bargain much deeper than the words used to contain it. The works look at how bargains are often made with one side trying to cheat the other, and how that can be avoided, and how sometimes it can’t be. It's a lovely bunch of stories, and I’ll get right to my reviews!

Quick Sips - Translunar Travelers Lounge #1 [part 3: House blend]

I’ve finally come to the third and final section of the menu for the first issue of Translunar Travelers Lounge. “House blend” promises a dark roast with a sweet finish, and there’s no arguing that these stories deliver on that. The world build and settings are intricate and largely built around loss and tragedy. These are worlds and places that have seen better times. Where humans or whoever is left have to figure out ways to live under the constraints of their surroundings and their histories. Often there is danger, oppression, fear, and destruction looming. But even in the most desolate of places, the stories feature characters reacting with compassion and resilience, coming together instead of splintering apart. So let’s close out this first issue and get to those reviews!

Quick Sips - Apex #115

Art by Ronnie Jensen

It’s beginning to look a lot like winter in this latest issue of Apex Magazine, with three short stories that capture the feel of decline, loss, grief, and a desire to escape. The stories look at place, both in terms of physical location (a city, an island) but also in a more psychological sense. They look at people who feel trapped by their own thoughts and feelings. By the sense of loss or grief or decline around them. And they all yearn for escape, for release. How they go about working for that, though, is very different, and often quite dark. To the reviews!

Quick Sips - Glittership Spring 2017 part 2

For this second half of Glittership’s Spring 2017 issue there’s still a lot to read and experience. There’s a bit more reprinted fiction than in the first half of the issue/releases, including “She Shines Like a Moon” by Pear Nuallak, which I’ve already reviewed here back in 2015 when it appeared in Lackington’s Skins issue. As such, I won’t be reviewing the story again, but I will definitely say people should check it out. Of the four remaining works, there’s one original story, one new poem, and two other reprints, and in case anyone was wondering it is all fucking good. I absolutely love that Glittership has added poetry and between the original and reprint fiction it’s definitely the publication to go to for gloriously queer content. I heartily point people toward their Patreon, especially if you want the awesome ebook delivered to you every quarter. Do it, people. Do it. But ahem, yeah, to the reviews!