Quick Sips - Beneath Ceaseless Skies #319

Art by Avant Choi

The penultimate issue of Beneath Ceaseless Skies that I’ll be covering in depth brings two stories about cities. Cities that couldn’t be more different from each other, but cities all the same. And the decisions that people make in leaving, or approaching those cities. In one, the city is complicated by a spell and a grim bargain. In the other, the city is a living being, able to long and to love. The pieces find the characters weighing their options, deciding whether to take the safer route or strike out into the unknown. It makes for a fascinating issue, and I’ll get right to the reviews!

Quick Sips - Beneath Ceaseless Skies #283

Art by Artur Zima

This issue of Beneath Ceaseless Skies brings two stories that embrace the weird and magical. That find characters struggling with their desires of freedom and peace even as they are a part of a military system that thrives on order and, most importantly, the sacrifice of the “expendable” so that those with power can maintain it. Both feature monsters to fight against but also to twist in service of the state, and characters trying to use those creatures as a tool to do some actual good. So let’s get to the reviews!

Quick Sips - The Dark #51

Art by grandfailure

The two stories from The Dark Magazine this month follow characters who are in some ways trapped. By a curse. By a haunting. By guilt. By fear. They each seem to be waiting, and luckily (or not) for them, their wait seems to be over with the arrivals of mysterious women. With these new companions, the main characters are sent into a confrontation with what has been holding them back, and are given a change to change the context of their chains. They are strange, sometimes sensual, and very much worth spending some time with. To the reviews!

Regular Sip - "The Owls of Juttshatan" from Prime Books

With the end of the month approaching, I’m taking a quick diversion today from regular releases to look at another short story from Prime Books. Like the two I reviewed a while ago, this one takes a military science fiction seed and grows an entire galaxy of ships, wars, and women kicking ass. It features sharp prose, a gritty setting, and a poignant ending. So let’s get right to the review!

Quick Sips - Two Stories from Prime Books

In something of a departure from my normal schedule, I’m looking at two short stories released individually from Prime Books. The stories fall heavily into military science fiction, with wars that take place across solar systems and beyond, and soldiers trapped, for all the broad horizons of warfare, into suffocating roles thanks to loss, grief, and the drive for conflict. Nestled into narratives about corrupt empires and delicate subterfuge are themes of family, resolve, and the way that justice blurs into something else in the face of atrocity. These are stories of soldiers facing the unknown, cut off from orders or the immediacy of battlefields, having to change the way they think about conflict, or else be ground up by it. So yeah, without further dalliance, to the reviews!

Quick Sips - Beneath Ceaseless Skies #232

It’s another masterfully paired issue of stories at Beneath Ceaseless Skies, with two pieces that weaves power and poison, duty and servitude. Both stories find characters who have had no choice about where they are, who are essentially slaves, though that they are treated somewhat well is supposed to make them loyal to their captors, to their owners. And in both stories the characters have to face what they’re doing and their desires—for freedom perhaps, or for worth. In both, the characters seem to know their trajectory, their fate, and it is violent and quick. And though they seem at peace with that, there is a tendril of doubt that works through them, making them question if there might be another way. To live. Let’s get to the reviews!

Art by Jordan Grimmer

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

Quick Sips - Apex #88

It's another fairly large issue of Apex Magazine with three fiction pieces and four poems, exploring a number of interesting different worlds that all seem to reflect back on our own. With the fiction, the stories are all rather more fantasy than science fiction this issue, though perhaps science fantasy might fit some of them better, with mixtures of magic and mortality. The poetry takes things in a bit more science fictiony direction, though, with glimpses of post-apocalyptic Earth as well as other worlds that might be experiencing catastrophes of their own. It's an issue that brings the dark but doesn't forget to pack some extra hope just in case. So yeah, to the reviews! 

Art by Mélanie Delon

Quick Sips - Beneath Ceaseless Skies #204

The second issue of Beneath Ceaseless Skies this month features a pair of stories that look at quests and stagnation, hope and transformation. In both stories characters confront the trajectories of their lives, the directions that seem inevitable but which are made by their choices. And both face regrets and face a future that is full of possibilities and yet defined by duty and care for others. There is a balancing of the selfish desires of life and knowledge that sometimes environments are kinds of prisons. Systems oppress. But belonging is not impossible. These are some complex and moving stories and I'm going to jump right into those reviews!

Art by Martin Ende

Quick Sips - Harlot Media March 2016

I said recently that I wanted to review more erotica, so when I saw this story I immediately thought it was about time to put my money where my mouth is. Because it's a stand-alone story published for free at an online venue, the time commitment is rather low and the quality of the writing and the presentation (lots of non-erotic artwork and a slick website design) is quite high. Indeed, Harlot is filled with a lot of great nonfiction work, and if this first venture into fiction is anything to go by, I'll gladly be tuning back in to see what they serve up. There's nothing specifically spec about the site, or its goals, but the story itself is decidedly near-future SF with a great aesthetic and I should probably just get to my review. Here we go! 

Art by Ben Passmore

Quick Sips - Apex #81

After an absolutely packed January issue, Apex Magazine is back down to its normal output. Three original stories this month and four poems. I debated reviewing the reprint (which I do recommend people go out and read) but as it's quite long and I'm a bit crunched for time (sorry!), I'm just looking at the original work this month, which is still amazingly good. The fiction hits just the right balance of dark and all hell and yet compelling and entertaining and fun, and the poetry mixes subversive elements with plain ol' weird. Everything works and captures the darkness that Apex is known for, while not really getting bogged down in grit or grim. Anyway, to the reviews!

Art by David Demaret

Quick Sips - Clarkesworld #113

I think it might be stretching things a bit to say that the February Clarkesworld is Valentine's Day themed. However, there are a number of stories that do a fine job of being romantic at the same time they are action-packed and morally dense. Most of the stories here lean science fictional, but there is fantasy as well, and a 15k genre-bending story that makes the issue a rather heavy one. No new translations this month, but a fine mix of stories that challenge and provoke. About AI and about  dragons and about the humanity of everything. So let's get to those reviews!

Art by Julie Dillon

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

The Sippy Awards are upon us! Know ye excellent short fiction and despair...er, wait, no...rejoice! Yes, that's the ticket. Rejoice, for the hour of the award that no one asked for has come. I mentioned a while ago that I'd be running these, and here is the first. The format will be the same for each award. There will be five total awards, and five stories will be featured, with one "Big Sip" and four regular-sized Sippy Awards. First up is--

The "I'd Ship That" Sippy 

for Excellent Relationships in Short SFF

That's right, it's all about relationships today. I'm a sucker for a good love story, but not all of the stories below are happily-ever-afters. Indeed, a good relationship is one that's messy, that's complex. That's alive. These are stories with relationships at their hearts, and that do a damn fine job of showing people trying to find in each other a great many things: forgiveness, escape, redemption, acceptance. And these are the stories that I picked out as containing my favorite relationships.

Quick Sips - Clarkesworld #108

This issue of Clarkesworld is pretty much all science fiction. Which is not a bad thing, especially with some of the stories this month, but it does strike me a little bit. The theme of the issue can definitely be seen as sorts of post disasters. The disasters take all forms, from a suicide to a global economic shift to a series of wars. There are some striking takes on this idea, and I think all the stories are worth checking out, even if I wasn't a fan of all of them. At the very least it provides a great many futures to see, to confront and struggle with. So to the reviews!

Art by J. Otto Szatmari

Quick Sips - Beneath Ceaseless Skies #178

As always, two stories anchor another issue of Beneath Ceaseless Skies. Both take the second world push of the publication to rather satisfying extremes, showing in both reflections of our own world distorted in interesting ways. In the first, the world is explained as being like our own but grown on the leaf opposite us, like a branch with opposite leaf structure. In the second, the setting involves time travel of a sort and an examination of insurrection and love. Both are interesting, building worlds that live and breath, but I should just get to the reviews already!

Art by Julie Dillon

Quick Sips - Clarkesworld #103

Today I'm looking at the latest from Clarkesworld. Four new stories, most of them on the longer side of things, but a good mix of the serious and the lighter hearted, the luminous and the sarcastic. Pretty much all what I would call science fiction, too, this month, which is a bit different from what I'm used to with Clarkesworld but not in a bad way. In any event, enough with the into; let's get to the stories!

Art by Julie Dillon

Quick Sips - Tor.com January 2015

That is, except for the story by Daniel José Older that I reviewed earlier this month. The rest from Tor.com means four more original stories. They are, by and large, on the longer side, but definitely manageable with only one novelette. Great to be read one at a time or, like me, all at once. So here we go!

Stories:

"A Beautiful Accident" by Peter Orullian (10983 words)

This isn't a terribly long novelette but boy does it seem to feel like it. Not in a bad way, really, but reading about extended torture, both physical and emotional, is just draining, and I did feel a bit drained by the time I got to the end of this. The setting is fascinating, and the culture of the Mal is obviously one that supposed to inspire some revulsion in the reader. A place that tortures all of its citizens, that believes pain unavoidable and so denies the smallest easing of it. I mean, the work is Mal, so it's kind of obvious they're supposed to be "bad." That there is another side to their philosophy is interesting, that there are those among them that believe and who find virtue in that way of life is interesting and a credit to the story. Of course, it doesn't really work to alleviate the problems with the Mal, because if there are ways that people didn't have to suffer and die, then it seems inhumane to take away people's choice in if they want to accept it. And by indoctrinating the children to this, that choice is effectively taken away. So it's a layered story, and well done and well balanced. The relationship between the characters is one of friendship and is well done and refreshing, but I think drawing any conclusions from this story out is fraught. I liked the story over all, though, and for it being a lot about torture means it's done something right.

"And the Burned Moths Remain" by Benjanun Sriduangkaew (6275 words)

Another story dealing with a different sort of torture, though this is much more psychological, as a a woman who betrayed her empire is trapped inside a sort of computer, one that doesn't allow her to die, that captures her every memory and creates more and more instances of her. It's an interesting and rather disturbing idea, because the instances are male and female and while they are all her they are also rather distinct. She fights herself, and she holds onto her guilt at having led to the downfall of her people, despite the fact that her people would have let her be destroyed. Her betrayal, though, led to her world being assimilated by an outside power, a power that now wants the last of her secrets, wants the key to the eternal existence that she is stuck in. The prose is elegant but was a little difficult for me to decipher at times. I think I understood all that was going on but I feel that I missed something near the end. This is another story filled with pain that just feels longer than it really is. But it has some killer lines and a strong central idea, that forgiveness is a stalk of thorns that just keeps on going, that it's not a destination but something to always be striving toward. And that's a strong, resonant idea that works for this story.

"Damage" by David Levine (7449 words)

Well that one was a lot more fun than the other two stories, and for one centered around death and loss and hopeless war, that's saying something. But there's something charming about the ship main character, programmed to love an ass of a pilot and yet with a core of morality that doesn't allow it to commit the greatest of crimes, doesn't allow it to kill millions of people in a desperate attempt at revenge. And though the action of the story is frantic and harsh, and though there is a lot of loss and death, this is still a triumphant story. The ship manages to escape, finally, manages to be something other than a tool of war. And that is something to hope for. I liked that this was a war the main character was on the "wrong" side of, though perhaps that was a bit heavy-handed, with no real explanation given as to why the two sides were fighting. But the story is fun with some great action and a nice message, that sometimes doing the right thing means giving up the things you love, and that even when you think yourself unequal to a task, sometimes you have to try anyway. Good stuff.

"The Sound of Useless Wings" by Cecil Castellucci (3308 words)

Another funner story despite some rather sad business, this one follows an alien who finds himself an outcast among his people. Smaller and more open to the unknown, to space and all its mysteries, he is excited when he is chosen to move to a new world, and that hope emboldens him to hope for more, to perhaps hope that he can succeed as a member of his people, to get a mate and sire broods. Fortunately or unfortunately, he is taught that it's not to be, and is betrayed by a brother so that he has no choice but to flee. But in that flight he gains what he had always hoped for. It's a strange story, but one that shows how what we want is something we're not always aware of. And while the main character thinks that his life is over when he loses the dream of having a family, instead he finds that he just needed to look elsewhere, just needed to find himself among the stars that he yearned to see. It's a sweet story, a nice way to finish off the month.