Quick Sips - Apex #80

Fuck this is a huge issue of Apex Magazine. And I know, I know, that's the whole point, because this is the publication hitting eighty issues! It's also the reward issue for the subscription drive from late 2015, which means there is...a lot of fiction and poetry. Six pieces of original fiction and seven original poems make this the largest I've read this month, and it's not like the stories are all that short, with no flash and one story tipping the scales at 14k. So yes, it's big. But is it good? Yes. So much yes. Two stories by Ursula Verson bookend the fiction, circling around age and friendship and changing roles, and the gooey center features stories about inequality and difference and the unseen that exists all around us, about worlds within worlds, about danger and otherness and it's dark and effective and yes, very good. The poetry mixes science and love, loss and grief. All in all, it's a hell of an issue, a giant thank you to fans of the publication, and I'm going to review it, okay?

Art by Matt Davis