Quick Sips - Beneath Ceaseless Skies #261 [part 2/2]

I don’t think I was expecting another novella in this anniversary issue of Beneath Ceaseless Skies, but it seems like the issue is holding nothing back with a new novelette and novella on offer that explore resistance and corruption. Both stories, after all, focus on people who are drawn into seeing the system they are a part of as standing in the way of progress and justice. Both settings unfold in a sort of wounded state, the people weary after war and loss and flight. And yet in that weariness they have allowed complacency to lead them into tragedy and abuse and folly. And the main characters are out to change that, against all the power and pressure to stay silent, to go with the flow. They risk everything for what they believe, what they know to be right, and to try and save those they love. It’s a pair of beautiful if brutal stories, and I’ll get right to those reviews!

Art by Mats Minnhagen

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

Quick Sips - Beneath Ceaseless Skies #177

This month has really been good at providing issues with strong unifying themes, and Beneath Ceaseless Skies is no exception. The two stories are on the short side, and for once I was rather bummed about that, because this is a very story issue that tackles war and language and the pursuit of peace. In both their are mothers trying to do right by their children, though the stories take very different tracks when it comes to this. The stories are about finding the language of peace and finding it not in the way that's expected. That war cannot exactly be overcome by peace in the abstract but only with the full weight of death and dread. It's a stunning issue which I recommend very highly. So to the stories!

Art by Julie Dillon

Quick Sips - Crossed Genres #29 Failure

This month's Crossed Genres has the theme of Failure. It's an interesting theme to see played out because of how broad and vague it is, but here are three stories that capture different aspects of it. I like that two of them feature failed relationships, though. Because in those failures there is also something else. A failure to cave to the dominant narrative. A failure on the part of the women in the relationships to be defined by the men who acted on then. In the one, a woman whose husband ran off with another woman refuses to let her remaining life be defined by that failed marriage. In the other, a woman who was killed refuses to let the narrative of her death be hijacked and used by her boyfriend. And in all three stories, the failures that are experienced really only open the door for a greater sort of victory. So yeah, let's get to it!