Lightspeed Magazine Issue 161

I’ve gotten a bit behind on my short fiction reading. I didn’t finish reading the October issue of Lightspeed Magazine until December. Here are my brief reviews of each fiction story.

“Where the God-Knives Tread” (Part 1; Part 2) by A.L. Goldfuss: A woman and her voidborn partner search for the legendary Eye of a long dead Empress who used the pronoun he. Parts of this story were very confusing, perhaps on purpose. The concept of people stored as data was intriguing. The main character used xe/xem as pronouns. I found it clunky and somewhat confusing, probably just because I am not used to it. (My rating: 3/5)

“The Void Wyrm’s Guide to Devouring Stars” by AJ Wentz: A dying space wyrm teaches a juvenile its lessons for how to live and survive. The storyteller interrupts themselves as if the listener is interrupting them. The tone of story is lighthearted for all its deep subject. (My rating: 3/5)

“Excerpts from a Scientist’s Notebook: Ancestral Memory in Europan Pseudocephalopods” by David DeGraff: These are notes from a scientist on Europa whose mother died studying the same Icypods that she studies. This one had me from the start but the end just shows up out of the blue with a conclusion without explanation. (My rating: 3/5)

“Four Self-Care Secrets for a Long and Happy Life” by Tina S. Zhu: A shape shifting fox gives advice on how to live and thrive among humans. This was humorous but not enough substance to really grab me. (My rating: 3/5)

“Immortality Soup, Or, An Excerpt from the Cookbook of the Gods” by Oluwatomiwa Ajeigbe: A trickster god explains how to get the ingredients and cooks a soup that will make a human immortal. A clever tale well told. Just not really my kind of thing. (My rating: 3/5)

“A Small God” by Jeff Reynolds: A plain god travels the universe on a comet and creates what They can. Plain, ordinary, and not very interesting. (My rating: 2/5)

“What You Are and the Wolf” by Jae Steinbacher: A young girl tries to avoid being given to an unpleasant man as his wife. This is a retelling of Little Red Riding hood with the wolf being the savior and the man Red is to marry being the villain. Very lovely language with much symbolism. This is the best story in the issue. (My rating: 4/5)

Overall, this was a disappoint issue coming in at an average rating of 3 out of five.

The Centre by Ayesha Manazir Siddiqi

I listened to this on my home from a recent trip. I was very much looking forward to reading this book. The premise of a mysterious language learning school that would teach its students to be fluent in any language in ten days really intrigued me. Unfortunately, the author didn’t deliver on that promise.

Ayesha is a young woman who feels lost in her life, not sure of which way to go. She is a translator who writes subtitles for movies but wants desperately to break into translating literature. After an altercation with her boyfriend who is a very successful translator in many languages, he tells her about the secret school called The Centre. He is only allowed one referral and must otherwise never speak of the school. Ayesha attends the school multiple times and becomes more and more interested in how they do what they do. The revelation is shocking and opens up questions of patriarchy and feminism.

I am sorry to say that I was very disappointed with this book. It developed excruciatingly slowly. It was described as a “thriller” by my library. It was most definitely not a thriller. There was too much quotidian detail that seemed completely unrelated to the plot. I like character driven novels, but this was neither character driven nor plot driven. It was as if the author couldn’t decide which kind of book to write. The subject matter and even the reveal offered a lot of interesting content to explore. But it was muddled by the author’s poor handling and needed a better editor.

My rating: 2/5

Killers of the Flower Moon by David Grann

This book is narrative non-fiction at its best. It tells the story of corruption and prejudice in Oklahoma in the early 1900s. When the government came for their land, the Osage tribe negotiated a settlement that gave them rights to everything below the surface. These were called head rights, and every member of the tribe held them in the land. When oil was discovered there, the Osage became rich. The jealous white people appealed to the government that the natives were not fit to manage their own money. But apparently that wasn’t enough. Many tribe members began to die unexplained deaths while other were outright murdered.

The fledgling FBI led by a young J. Edgar Hoover, sent Tom White to investigate. What he uncovered was a deep, dark conspiracy to kill all the members of one family to gain access to their head rights. The worst part was that the ring leader was a self-professed “best friend” of the Osage whose nephew was married a member of the family. The investigation is slow going due to those involved stymieing the investigators at every turn. How it turns out is stranger than fiction.

The most tragic part of this story is covered in the third section of the book where the author uncovers the vast extent of the corruption. It went far beyond the subjects of the investigation covered in the book. The details may never be known and the guilty parties will likely never face justice.

My rating: 4/5

Underground Airlines by Ben H. Winters

I listened to Underground Airlines by Ben H. Winters on audiobook on a recent road trip. It takes place in an alternate modern-day USA where Abraham Lincoln was assassinated on his way to his inauguration in 1861. That same year a series of Constitutional amendments were ratified that enshrined slavery forever. A network of modern-day abolitionists called the Underground Airlines works to help escaped slaves find safety in Canada.

The main character is a former runaway slave working for the US Marshal’s office returning runaway slaves. He is in the process of infiltrating a cell of the Underground Airlines to return his latest runaway assignment. But something is a little off with this assignment.

As the mystery unravels, this world of modern, regulated slavery is laid out in all its horror for individuals and society. The story is compelling and realistic, never descending to polemics or speechifying. It all blends well into a sophisticated story of human complexity dealing with systemic racism enshrined in the Constitution. A fantastic “what if” historical thriller.

My rating: 4/5

Age of Surveillance Capitalism by Shoshana Zuboff

The Age of Surveillance Capitalism: The Fight for a Human Future at the New Frontier of Power by Shoshana Zuboff is one of the most important books of the twenty-first century. It outlines how our economy has largely shifted away from an industrial base to a technological base of surveillance-driven advertising. And like the industrial revolution introduced new ways of economic engagement that required decades of adjustment, we must also adjust to this new economic modality. Unfortunately, the pace of the change this time is so fast that we aren’t adjusting to it quickly enough to head off as much of the negative consequences as we have in the past.

This work is well-researched with extensive notes. What I first thought of as a criticism became a benefit as I continued to read. The author keeps coming back to the basic points and reiterates them in the context of the content she shares. It is a bit like a spiral staircase that turns on itself in order to take you up higher in a limited space. It is just as effective here, ensuring that the reader is able to follow a very complex argument that builds to a very complete picture.

The book is a bit long (over 240,000 words), but is worth every minute of time it takes to read. For those concerned about surveillance, privacy, and inequality it is an essential work explaining how we got here and what we might be able to do to about it.

My rating: 5/5

The Lost Cause by Cory Doctorow

I recently started requesting galleys at Net Galley. It’s a site where you can download and read books before they are published in return for giving an honest review. It helps publishers to build reviews for books before they come out. I am a big fan of Cory Doctorow and requested to read The Lost Cause, due to be published on November 14. I finished it today, so here is my brief review.

The story takes place about thirty years in our future. Climate change has continued to wreak havoc on the world. A new generation has grown up knowing nothing of a time before climate change. There has been a two-term president who signed into law a Green New Deal that has started to address the issues of climate change for real. This is followed by a less effective president of the same party and then a new president after who starts to turn things back. This is where the story begins

The protagonist is a young man named Brooks just graduating high school whose idealist parents died in pandemic when he was eight. He shares their ideals. His grandfather does not. He belongs to a Maga Club whose members are opposed to all the changes and love the new president. When internally displaced migrants from another city come to Brooks’ hometown of Burbank, Brooks and his friends clash with the Maga Club folks.

I really enjoyed this book. It had some cheesy romance, a little bit of political polemics, a whole lot of liberal ideals, and even some food descriptions that made my mouth water. It shows a view of how we might overcome climate change in the near future despite people who deny it happening and clinging to old ways. Both fun and political. One of the author’s better books.

My rating: 4/5

Apex Magazine Issue 140

Apex magazine tends toward the dark side of fiction, so it is appropriate that I finished reading the latest issue just before Halloween. It was definitely more of treat than a trick.

The issue starts with a dystopian story in a world experiencing climate change called “Whisper Songs” by Lyndsie Manusos. A woman experiencing post-partum depression witnesses three birds die in her yard. As required by law, she calls the authorities so they can come collect the birds’ songs. They come but things get off track. A close examination of one of these collectors and the mom. Unique and interesting. (My rating: 4/5)

A new writer with the name Zohair gives on odd story called “Quietus“. A man is condemned to death and put alive into a coffin and floated down the river. As the coffin travels, people seem to see what they want to see and have very different experiences, including seeing an empty coffin. It doesn’t seem to have much to say, at least not to me. (My rating: 2/5)

A game of mahjong centers “Life Wager” by Lucy Zhang. A woman who is the child of a god and a human returns to heaven and plays a series of games with the emperor. But that’s about all that happens. Just kind of meh for me. (My rating: 3/5)

“Kɛrozin Lamp Kurfi” by Victor Forna is an experimental story that I really wanted to like much more than I did. It tells of a mother who chases her son into a story to save him and struggles to get out with her mind intact. I liked the idea of going into the story but the telling was a little disjointed and confusing for me. (My rating: 3/5)

Apex excels at stories with atmosphere that provoke emotions. “Junebug” by Sarah Hollowell is an excellent example. Three friends are traveling to visit their dying friend when they get stuck in traffic on the highway. The emotions build and overflow, leading to unusual experiences. (My rating: 5/5)

“Spitting Image” by Rich Larson is the kind of creepy story that is perfect for Halloween. A boy’s friend leads him to a well in the forest that returns things dropped into it, changed. I shiver just remembering this story. Makes your skin crawl, just like it is supposed to. (My rating: 4/5)

After her grandmother dies, a woman wears the hat she did and starts to experience the same thinning of skin and hair. In “Brainpink Umber“, Chelsea Sutton explores questions like: What makes us who we are? And what happens when that starts to fade? This story feels like a metaphor for dementia running in a family. (My rating: 4/5)

Talk about metaphors that work! “From This Beating Heart, From This Fractured Mind” by Elisabeth Ring tells of a man with a wooden ticking heart and a woman with a glass mind living together and supporting one another. He is a bit cold and disconnected. She can’t seem to wrap her mind around things like she should. It is a tale of mental health and isolation. Well done. (My rating: 4/5)

In a future with sentient biorobots, a young man lives with his male partner while his mother from the old country begs him to get married and have children. At the same time, he struggles with what to do with one of his under performing charges. “Memories of the Old Sun” by Eugen Bacon addresses two tropes but never really brings them together. Disappointing with great writing. (My rating: 3/5)

The issue ends with the beautiful “Through Dreams She Moves” by Tonya Liburd. A woman who can enter other people’s dreams enters those of a man in a coma in an effort to wake him up. What makes this especially poignant and evocative is the clever use of the second person. The story addresses several people as it goes: her mom, then boss, the client’s father, the client, and her great grandfather in the past. It works beautifully. (My rating: 5/5)

My average rating for this issue is 3.7 out of five. Be sure to at least spend the time to read the two best stories in the issue.

Night by Elie Wiesel

On my recent drive home from attending a reenactment weekend with my father, I listened to the audiobook of Elie Wiesel’s memoir Night. It is his telling of his experience as a teenage Jew in eastern Europe before and during the Holocaust of World War II.

He grew up in a small town in Hungary where he studied the Talmud and aspired to study Kabbalah. He had planned to dedicate his life to this study. While he was working toward this, an adult who left the town returned with what the residents thought of as tall tales of what Hitler’s Germany was doing to Jews. No one believed him. Even when the Germans arrived in their town and moved them to ghettos. Finally, they were all marched off to concentration camps.

The descriptions of life there are harrowing. He and his father are separated from his mother and sister. He spends the rest of his teens in multiple concentration camps, on forced marches, trying to keep his father and himself alive. This book should be required reading for high school graduation so that we never forget how horribly human beings are capable of treating one another.

My rating: 5/5

Lincoln in the Bardo by George Saunders

Two decades ago, my father was just getting into Civil War reenacting. When he invited me to join him at one back then I said yes. It was a great time of father/son bonding. Fast forward to earlier this month, he invited me back to the same event. It was a six-and-a-half-hour drive from my home. One of the books I listened while driving was Lincoln in the Bardo by George Saunders.

The Lincoln of the title is actually Abraham Lincoln’s son Willie. The bardo is a sort of purgatory on earth of souls who are not ready to move on yet. After Willie dies, he isn’t ready to move on and teams up with other souls who also don’t realize they are dead in an effort to stay and try to get back to his father. Those other souls, throughout the story, do their best to support and help Willie. The story is very moving and sad. It explores death in a unique way. And it is an incredible portrait of a father’s love for his son.

It uses an unusual storytelling method. Many different character help tell the story from their perspectives. Also, may chapters start with quotes from nonfiction that describe the historical events that lay the foundation for the story. I struggled with the format at first, but I really think it works, especially as an audiobook. I highly recommend that format.

My rating: 4/5

Uncanny Magazine Issue 54

A read-headed young woman has her hand in a bear's mouth as it roars in her face

When I finally picked up the September/October issue of Uncanny Magazine, I was excited. I had been looking forward to reading since early September. Right away I was rewarded with a spectacular story.

Advertising has become so much a part of our culture. In “Can You Hear Me Now?“, Catherynne M. Valente uses that fact to amazing effect. Imagine if a woman in the ads you see was suddenly a real person, aware that they played different roles in each commercial? How would she deal with that? This masterpiece explores that idea while touching on all the real troubles and desires that consumerism covers up. (My rating: 5/5)

I was initially intrigued by the indigenous setting of “We Do Not Eat Much Fish” by Grace P. Fong. A woman called a witch by her father and husband, encounters a fisherman and brings him home to her son with dire results. The story is a bit gruesome for me and doesn’t explore as much as I wanted about the context of a woman taken to strange home by her husband. (My rating: 3/5)

Remember being a kid and peeling Elmer’s glue off your hand in sheets? In Kristina Ten’s “The Curing“, the outcast immigrant kids go a bit further. They cover their whole bodies and peel them off, and the glue copies come “alive”! Now, just one wouldn’t do, right? These kids make multiple copies and absorb all the memories that their copies make. It is a great story with lots of metaphor, subtle, and not too much in your face. (My rating: 5/5)

The longest story in the issue is “The Kingdom of Darkness” by Sarah Monette. In an alternative past, a man protects a demoniac after his witch finder is murdered. I am sorry to say that I could not finish this story. I found myself forcing myself to read it. I didn’t care what was going on. And it seemed a bit all over the place. (My rating: 1/5)

I found “The Girl with a City Inside of Her” by Jeannette Ng to be a little confusing. A girl with a city inside her sits on a stool in the sideshow of a carnival talking to the visitors about her city. The author seems to switch back and forth between the girl literally having a city inside her to it being simply a metaphor. I didn’t really care for it. (My rating: 2/5)

On a doomed mission to look for a replacement planet, a reluctant outfitter does her best to keep the surveyors alive after a deadly pandemic at home. This is “The Coffin Maker” by AnaMaria Curtis, and she really creates a palpable atmosphere. I could feel what was going on in this story. The desperation, the frustration. (My rating: 4/5)

“Four Words Written on My Skin” by Jenn Reese is a kind of a romance with a trope I don’t care much for. A woman follows her wife into the woods where the Fae have stolen her in an attempt to get her back. Their relationship was rocky but once her wife is taken, the main character realizes how important she is to her. That said, it is a good story well-written. (My rating: 3/5)

My excitement at the start of the issue had pretty much petered out by the end. The issue comes to a disappointing average rating of 3.25 out of five. Issue 55 is likely to be the last in my subscription.