Quick Sips - Tor dot com April 2017

It's another fairly full month from Tor dot com, but still nowhere near as busy as last month. There are five stories to explore, one novelette and four shorts, and the pieces all center science and study. These are pieces that look at the role that humans can play in researching other species as well as humanity itself. They look at how medical science can be used to ease burdens and to create them, how studying and interacting with other species can teach us more about ourselves and more about the universe. These are stories about pain and disease and exploration, and people coming to terms with a universe that is vast and sometimes very cruel. And they are at turns beautiful and ugly, affirming and devastating. So let's get to the reviews!

Art by Micah Epstein

Quick Sips - Beneath Ceaseless Skies #171

I'm reviewing the latest Beneath Ceaseless Skies today. Two stories, as always, and quite different in their themes and styles this time. Sometimes the stories in an issue have some clear links, but here I can't quite find any. One is a second-world fantasy with action and magic and the other is a historical weird fantasy with a much slower style and not as much overt magic. Still, for all their differences they are still both entertaining and the issue itself stands up pretty well. But you don't have to take my word for it—to the reviews!

Art by Christopher Balaskas