Quick Sips - Fireside Magazine #65

Art by Bernard Lee

March brings a four short stories and a poem to Fireside Magazine, each of them full of darkness and light in warring measures. In each piece, people grow up hoping to find a place to belong. A world that matches the hope and brightness of their dreams and the stories they are told. But as they grow they find other fates waiting for them, trying to claim them. Trying to make them victims of the hunger darkness around them. Without the protection of a just system, these shadows do try to take many of the characters. But not all of them fall into the dark. Some of them are able to rise up, to join with others to fight back and seek to build a space to be true to themselves. It’s a defiant, inspiring issue of fiction and poetry that acts as a sort of extended hand to the weary, urging them up and forward to further the fight. So let’s get 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 - Strange Horizons 07/30/2018 Special SEUSA Issue

It’s a special issue of Strange Horizons to help close out July, which focuses on SFF from the Southeastern USA. The stories range quite a bit in style and location, but they are linked by their connections to the American South as well as to magic. Of the six short stories, all of them land on the fantasy side of things, focusing on gods and ghosts most of all. And perhaps that’s not surprising, because the story looks at power, and systems, and the ways that South is built on injustice, on suffering. On how it can be such an oppressive place, but also a place of power for the oppressed. Because they have connections there, a well of pain and resolve and survival that they can draw on to keep them moving foward. It’s a wonderful bunch of stories and poetry, so let’s get to the reviews!

Art by Geneva Benton

Quick Sips - Fireside Fiction November 2017

The content continues to pour out from Fireside Fiction, with three flash fiction pieces, a short story, and two more chapters of the serial novella they've been releasing. It's a lot to take in, from pieces that feature a lot of fun but sneak in some incredibly profound and stilling moments as well. These are stories that capture a feeling of people struggling against injustices, against the limitations of their realities, against forces that want to keep people still and controlled. And it's about rebellion and the cost of rebellion. But the reward as well. Some of the pieces feature characters able to fight back, to win openly against injustice. Others must accept a more measured gain, a more incremental victory. And others still find that their victory is tenuous and might be taken from them, leaving them voiceless and abandoned. It's a neat mix of SFF stories, so let's get to the reviews!

Art by Max Cole-Takanikos

Quick Sips - Fiyah #2 Spilling Tea

It's the second issue of Fiyah and the theme this issue is Spilling Tea. Actual tea does feature in a number of the stories, but more than that is a sense of conversation and community. There are stories about families and about bridging distances. In space, yes, but also in ideology and culture. In perspective and time. About creating connections between people that might act as lifelines to keep people from plummeting to their doom. The stories capture a sense of awe and wonder, as well, revealing distant worlds and magic right under our noses. There's action and there is humor and there is also a lot of heart, an emotional weight that stayed with me long after I put the issue down. These are seven short stories that deliver one hell of an SFF roller coaster so keep your arms and legs inside the blog at all times and let the reviews begin!

Art by Geneva Benton