Quick Sips - Uncanny #37 [November stuff]

Art by Julie Dillon

The November Uncanny Magazine brings three short stories and three poems to make for a full issue full of advanced technology, ancient incest, and some monsters for good measure. The fiction leans heavily into science fiction, providing three tales of super science and the very quiet, mundane, intimate things that go into big, dramatic, shattering breakthroughs in physics and AI. These are wrenching stories of people struggling and sometimes failing to reach for what they know is right, and the aftermaths that come when the decisions have been made and people have to live with what comes next. It’s an emotional and wonderfully imagined set of stories and poems, and I’ll get right to the reviews!

Quick Sips - Uncanny #35 [July stuff]

Art by Kirbi Fagan

A new Uncanny is out and the July offerings including four short stories and two poems. There’s a lot in the works about communication, about worlds ending, about people reaching out despite that, finding comfort and strength amidst the chaos and destruction. That might mean people kindling a friendship as the rain forests burn half a world away, or parents uniting to fight the monsters that seem legion, or a couple struggling under the shadow of an asteroid bearing down on the planet. Whatever the case, the works feature complex and careful takes on time, destruction, and effort, and before I give too much away, let’s get to the reviews!

THE SIPPY AWARDS 2019! The "Time to Run Some Red Lights" Sippy for Excellent Action!!! in SFF

If you were around for the first Fast and the Furious movie, you might remember the news articles about how people coming out of the movie were more likely to make risky driving decisions. Not that they were just copying what they saw in the movie, but that it left them amped! Well, rounding out my categories that are primarily about an emotional response (horror=pain, ugly-cry=pain), this category is all about EXCITEMENT! FUCK YEAH!!!! So hold onto your butts and get ready for the...

“Time to Run Some Red Lights” Sippy Awards 

for Excellent Action! in Short SFF

As I said yesterday, I'm a bit of an emotive reader. Which means when a story hurts, it hurts. And when a story scares, it scares. But it also means when a story pumps it up, it makes me want to punch the sun in a mech suit the size of a planet! You know, like a normal person. Heh. But I love stories that really make me want to stand up, to run, to arrive somewhere breathless, alive. And these stories do just that, featuring characters fighting with all they have against what seems like an overwhelming situation. A threat to destroy their city, their world; a tournament where dreams are made or broken; an attempt by the actual devil to take the one person in the world you kinda tolerate--these are stories with some high stakes and some intense action.

As for where they came from...kinda all over. From the sadly-on-hiatus Apex Magazine, and from the always defiant Fireside Magazine. From Fiyah, from Tor, from GigaNotoSaurus (which came back from a bit of a hiatus this year). These are often sources for stories that get the blood pumping, the mind racing, the muscles twitchy and electric. So let's get to the awards already!!!

Quick Sips - Uncanny #32 [January stuff]

Art by Nilah Magruder

Uncanny Magazine kicks off the new year with three short stories and two poems that bring energy and resilience in a time when it's very desperately needed. The fiction ranges from post-disaster to rather dystopian (but warm and queer) sci fi race to touching and careful fantasy about ghosts and immigration. The poems complicate fairy tales and traditional depictions of monsters while interrogating identity and navigating some very complex space. The work here reiterates what Uncanny has been publishing since it began—a wonderful mix of genres with resonating characters and richly built worlds.

Quick Sips - Uncanny #28 [June stuff]

Art by Galen Dara

June's Uncanny Magazine brings a bit of heartbreak, a bit of horror, but also a bit of romance. At least, two of the stories feature some rich romantic themes, and develop characters reaching out in compassion even as the world around them seems to descend into some very dark waters. The works explore worlds dominated in many ways by cruelty, and seek to find compassion and empathy, sometimes rather forcibly. Throw in a pair of poems taking on some different meta-fictional lenses, and it's an issue that will make you think even as it entertains. So let's get to the reviews!

Quick Sips - Fireside Magazine #64

Art by Ashanti Fortson

Four stories and a poem make February a rather full month for Fireside Magazine. Though most of the fiction is fairly short, the pieces end up packing a rather palpable emotional punch, from a story about sentient spaceships to a piece about gods and grandmothers to a guide to surviving on Mars. The longest piece, too, is a great exploration of the magical girl idea through a very new lens and split between different perspectives that have some disagreements on What Actually Happened. Throw in a poem full of history and hurt and hope and the issue is a strong one that shows just what makes short SFF so wonderful. To the reviews!

Quick Sips - Apex #111

It’s a special Zodiac-themed double issue of Apex Magazine this month, guest edited by Sheree Renée Thomas (who also just guest edited the SEUSA Strange Horizons special issue in late July). There’s A LOT of fiction and as with most of the Apex special issues, poetry is back! There’s actually six short stories and well as six poems in this issue, making it perhaps the biggest I’ve read from the publication. And it all swirls around the idea of the Zodiac, of divination, of astrology. Not always literally, though the actual signs and horoscopes make an appearance or two. Instead, the stories look very much at the stories that we tell. At the ways these stories then become everyone’s stories, our minds making them personal, intimate, and topical. Because our lives have a way of getting into the stories we tell and the stories we take in, and then we might mistake our pulling them out again like a bit of magic and mysticism. But there’s a lot of different takes on stories and truth to find in these SFF works, and I should just quit talking about reviewing them and get to reviewing them!

Art by Stacey Robinson

Quick Sips - Uncanny #23 [July stuff]

It’s dinosaur time at Uncanny Magazine, with the first half of the special shared-universe series of stories. These works (the fiction, at least) sets up a Jurassic Park-esque world, except instead of using DNA to recreate dinos, there are portals and a bit of magic going on. And some of the stories take on the world-building of the setting a bit more than others. In that respect the issue starts strong, with back-to-back stories about the history and development of the dinosaur programs and science as filtered through the very personal lenses of characters struggling with betrayal, loss, and identity. And really the stories as a whole show just how much space the setting opens up to explore. Basically, I love it all, and I can’t wait to see what’s in store for the second half of the issue! Until then, to the reviews!

Art by Galen Dara

Quick Sips - Uncanny #21 [April stuff]

It’s a full March at Uncanny Magazine, with three original stories and four poems to kick off what in most places is the start of spring. And in many ways these are stories about cold and warmth. About numb moments and numbed hurts and the awakening that spring can bring. Not an erasing or easing of pain but a revealing of it. A thawing, and through that thaw a return of sensation. Not always free of pain (in fact, often full of pain), but also full of the hope that spring can bring. That healing is possible, that live can continue, even after the hurt and desolation of winter. It’s just a powerful issue and I’ll get right to the reviews!

Art by Nilah Magruder

Quick Sips - Uncanny #21 [March stuff]

March brings a bit of spring to Uncanny Magazine, with three stories and three poems that feature music and rebirth and love and hope. These are also stories and poems that look at places, though. At haunted houses and magnificent cities and hometowns. That look just as closely at relationships. At the way that interactions build. How in big cities inspiration can seem to grow out of the creativity concentrated in one spot, synergize into something bigger and bigger. How in smaller towns isolation can give way to resentment and fear and depression, but where single gestures can come to mean the universe. These are stories of friends and family, poems of art and love and prayer. And without further delay, the reviews!

Art by Nilah Magruder

Quick Sips - Uncanny #18 [September stuff]

September brings a heavy strangeness to the pages (screen?) of Uncanny, with three original stories and two poems that all are a bit weird in their own ways. Especially the fiction seems to ooze a certain surreal quality that is unsettling even as it’s compelling, revealing worlds where the rules are just a little off, or else mapping areas of our own world where the rules are much different than we might have assumed. There is magic here, but not always the most obvious kind. And there is certainly a pervasive darkness to many of the pieces, a pain at the heart of many of the stories. But there’s also a reach toward empathy, and understanding, and community. Many of the pieces involve a community trying to build a place for themselves, to carve out something from a hostile world where their rules can hold sway. But before I drift too far afield, to the reviews!

Art by Ashley Mackenzie

Quick Sips - Strange Horizons 05/01/2017 & 05/08/2017

May opens with a pair of stories and a pair of poems from Strange Horizons, all of them interested in the lines between achievement and destruction, success and oblivion. The stories look at two strikingly different situations stitched together with a thread of oppression and the looming threat of violence. These pieces are about struggle, whether through art or through organized action, and show characters moving according to their inner drives and needs. The poetry is interesting because both pieces take on an almost archaic feel in order reveal very modern concerns and warnings. There's a lot to see and experience with all this content, so I'll just jump right into the reviews!

Art by Matthew Filipkowski

Quick Sips - Uncanny #15 [March stuff]

March seems to be particularly concerned this year with two things. Horror and resistance. Probably not surprising, given everything. But these are certainly themes that run strong through Uncanny’s March offerings. With three stories, two poems, and two nonfiction pieces, many of the works linger on darkness and fighting back against adversity. Against oppression. Against wrongs both personal and societal. These are works that are very aware of our current moment but also reach beyond it, also capture something to bring forward, something hopeful and resilient and defiant. There’s something beautiful about the way the works all push us toward confronting loss and building communities. It’s a wonderful issue and it’s time to review it!

Art by Julie Dillon

Strange Horizons 08/01/2016 & 08/08/2016

Well, I'll try not to be too sad that Our Queer Planet is done with and instead focus on the fact that Strange Horizons continues with two more weeks of SFF fiction, poetry, and nonfiction. There's a return of the multi-part story (and a nicely subverted fairy tale, at that) which clocks in just into novelette range (by my count), two poems that really don't pull their punches, and two nicely paired nonfiction pieces that examine popular art and what to do when certain aspects of a text don't seem to work quite as well as others. All in all it's a great two weeks of content and helps to relieve a bit of the sting left by Our Queer Planet only having lasted a month. To the reviews! 

Art by Melissa Pagluica

Quick Sips - Uncanny #9 (April Stuff)

Spring might be in the air but Uncanny Magazine is keeping things in April rather fucking dark. In the best of ways. These are stories that hit and hit hard. Some of them very hard, with characters that shine but situations that are a bit outside their control. Where tragedy seems like that rolling boulder in Indiana Jones and the characters are quite fast enough to...well, the stories and the poetry mix tragedy and happiness, love with loss. It's a challenging issue but also a very good one, with exciting worlds to explore and emotions to feel. So time to review!

Art by Katy Shuttleworth