Quick Sips - Beneath Ceaseless Skies #243

Normally with Beneath Ceaseless Skies, it’s pretty easy to tell the binding theme or element that holds the two two together. It’s one of the reasons I always look forward to sitting down with a new issue, because of this resonance that allows the stories to act in synergy, and if D&D has taught me anything, it’s that synergy bonuses are the best. Now, this second issue of 2018 might seem oddly paired at first glance. Certainly the mood of the stories is very different, one wrenching and one fun. But I think the element that binds and complicates these stories, and this issue as a whole, is the idea of banishment. In each, a character finds themself cast out of what they thought of as their home, looking for a way back to the way things were. In each, it’s not really through any fault of these people that they’ve lost a place, and there’s a part of them that feels it’s unfair that they should be cast out. Only, in both, getting back seems an impossible thing, though for very different reasons. So yeah, let’s get to the reviews!

Art by Dimitrije Miljus

Quick Sips - Beneath Ceaseless Skies #190

Beneath Ceaseless Skies is officially into 2016 and it's first issue of the new year is full of tales of blood and loss, of lives cut short before their time only to be given a second chance. Both stories feature charactesr who experience loss and violence and the threat of violence. And both, ultimately, are about justice and what it means to pay for one's sins. For all that, I'd hesitate to call these stories of revenge. There's something deeper to them, not just an eye for an eye but more an atonement, a balancing of scales, and both stories end with a sort of righteous hope and a promise that while some things can never be made right, they can at least be moved on from. I love the way these stories show characters defined by loss who find a way through that, who shake off such simple definitions and embrace realities more complex. But I should stop pontificating and just get to those pesky reviews!

Art by Xiao Ran