Quick Sips - Uncanny #35 [July stuff]

Art by Kirbi Fagan

A new Uncanny is out and the July offerings including four short stories and two poems. There’s a lot in the works about communication, about worlds ending, about people reaching out despite that, finding comfort and strength amidst the chaos and destruction. That might mean people kindling a friendship as the rain forests burn half a world away, or parents uniting to fight the monsters that seem legion, or a couple struggling under the shadow of an asteroid bearing down on the planet. Whatever the case, the works feature complex and careful takes on time, destruction, and effort, and before I give too much away, let’s get to the reviews!

Quick Sips - Uncanny #27 [March stuff]

Art by Christopher Jones

Three short stories and two poems usher Uncanny Magazine’s March offerings in with style, revolution, and heartbreak. The pieces move around survivors. Not people who have outlasted others, but those who are surviving their own personal hells and oppressions, their own personal griefs and losses. They are survivors by necessity, their worlds condensing in a squeeze of despair that makes everything seem impossible. And yet at the same time, these stories work to show people helping people. Showing main characters able to move to more active resistance and freedom because they are not alone, because they have the support they need to make their stories about more than just enduring the hardships they face, but rather excelling in the face of them to find healing and hope for the future. So yeah, let’s get to the reviews!

Quick Sips - Tor dot com July 2018

It's just a pair of stories this month at Tor dot com (two novelettes, to be specific), and both deal with memories, paranoia, and family. Though, as one is a second world fantasy with magic and the other is a contemporary/near future science fiction/horror, they go about approaching these themes very differently. But at their cores I feel like there are links, with showing a situation where someone is trying to hide their true face in order to approach something they feel is evil and expansive. Now, in one of these situations the character is facing an authoritarian and brutal regime, and in the other something much different and much less defined, but in both there is a sense of hiding and waiting for the right moment to strike. To the reviews!

Art by Anna & Elena Balbusso

Quick Sips - Uncanny #19 [December stuff]

The holidays come a bit early this year with an extra-big issue of Uncanny Magazine, stuffed with four short stories and four poems. Of course, perhaps because we are finally in winter’s talons, the work has a decidedly complex and not-exactly-happy feel to it, the pieces confronting some very heavy issues and finding characters not always able to escape the harsh realities of their situations. From new gods born from misery and exploitation to an android finding their future grim indeed, from a young girl dealing with trauma and stress to a hero who knows that heroes are anything but always heroic, the stories are tinted windows into humanity, revealing us not always through contemporary humans but through our stories, our creations, and our works. It’s not the brightest of pictures, but it does create for some captivating and compelling short fiction, with a whole slew of poetry that ranges from sweet to brash and back again. To the reviews!

Art by Julie Dillon

Quick Sips - Fireside Fiction July 2017

The July stories from Fireside Fiction keep things rather short and sharp, with three flash pieces and a short story. The fiction is moving and rather violent, showing characters faced with difficult or even impossible situations—the betrayal of a sibling, the dangers of unknown worlds, the end of human life on Earth. The stories all take a rather measured look at people who are willing to make the ultimate sacrifice, and asking if they really have to. In some of the stories, the answer is a resounding yes, reported with a gun's firing. In some, the answer is no, as people can decide to step back from the brink, to change their role from active to support. And in some, the answer is more nebulous, less certain. But in all of them the characters must look within and ask how far they will go for their cause. I would also be remiss if I didn't mention that the new BlackSpecFic report is up for 2016 and the numbers are…less than ideal. In any event, very much go read the report by Cecily Kane and then all the commentary by a slew of contributors. Do it!!!

Art by Galen Dara

Quick Sips - Tor.com August 2015

Providing nothing comes out in the next few days, there are four stories this month from Tor. Things lean a bit more fantasy than science fiction this month, with an alt-historical fantasy leading things off and leading into two stories that blend genres quite well, part science fiction, part fantasy, and ending with a story of witches and magic and birthday parties. There are certainly some fine stories in the bunch, most of them about seeking for something without quite knowing what it is. Seeking a miracle, perhaps, or seeking the truth about one's heritage, or seeking to stop an injustice from being committed. What is found, though, is normally something more than expected, something that opens up for the characters whole new worlds of possibilities. A fine month of stories that I should just review already.

Art by Chris Buzelli