September brought three new fiction releases from Tor's digital arm, two short stories and a novelette with a bit of a mind-bending feel to them. From the "real world" slipping into fantasy to scientific proofs of life after death to a kind of disease that takes away people's sleep cycles, the works explore things happening that completely change how people live. How people adapt. How people strive for something better, even when they are afraid, and challenged, and tired. To the reviews!
After a breakneck pace during the first two months of the year, March slows things down only marginally for Tor.com, which still released five original fiction stories. The second half of the month has been dominated by clever twists on genre classics and a sense of loss and hope. In each of the stories there has been great pain, great loss, both personal and more sweeping. Wars and catastrophes and paradigm shifts. But there is something that remains, something aching and human and hopeful, something that stares into the heart and feels empathy, a bond that cannot be broken. It makes for a rather sad but beautiful set of stories that I should just review already.
So I've been reviewing Terraform for a year now, and I must say that I think it does a nice job of collecting science fiction stories that provide a mix of social commentary and tech idolatry. Not that these stories are especially different or necessarily more innovative than anything else being published in short SFF, but as a publication Terraform has a vision and does a good job of delivering on it. Not so much on sticking to its published guidelines (namely the under 2k bit), and I might personally not care for the practices of any place that doesn't actually respond to all submissions with at least a form rejection, but I'm here to look at the stories and I continue to find myself digging the directions these visions of the future take. So yeah, here's to another year of looking forward!
I'm probably missing one story from the October Terraform, but as it might be coming out on Friday (I'm pretty sure that's what their schedule has changed to, rather than the previous Monday releases), I'm just going to roll it into the November Terraform reviews. It's a nice mix of stories this month, with a look at income inequality and...pets. Which might seem a strange pairing but which work nicely here. There are a number of interesting plot twists (and not just that there is a 5K+ story at a publication that claims to stick to under 2K) and a fun range of characters. To the reviews!
Another month, another handful of stories from Terraform to review. This month the stories are mostly on the longer side for the publication, but they are an interesting mix. I suppose now would be a good time to reiterate my review policy, though, in regards to negative reviews. Some stories...well, they bug me. I either find the messages that I pull from them a bit offensive or else I just find them not effective at doing what they seem to set out to do. As always, that a story did not work for me does not mean that I think it is "bad." These reviews are only my quick reactions to stories. Unfortunately, given the amount of time they take, I cannot always linger and reread and really figure out every story. So I might miss things. How I interpret a story might not be how it was intended. That said, these are my interpretations and thoughts and I feel that I should keep them honest. So what they hell am I talking about? Read on to find out!
