Clarkesworld Magazine Issue #226, July 2025

Clarkesworld is my favorite short fiction magazine. Here are my mini review from the July issue.

“Missing Helen” by Tia Tashiro (5,830 words | 24 minutes) — A woman learns that her ex-husband is engaged to her clone. A fantastic use of point of view as a reveal. Explores complications in relationships. (My rating: 5/5)

“The Walled Garden” by Fiona Moore (6,530 words | 26 minutes) — After the last of a tool breaks that was used for gardening, Morag struggles to figure out how to grow food. A continuation of the story of Morag started in “The Spoil Heap” and continued it “King of the Castle“. This story alternates passages in the present with those of her past after leaving her village. (My rating: 4/5)

“Welcome to Kearney” by Gary Kloster (9,110 words | 37 minutes) — A newly sentient android shows up at a historic town/museum where the caretaker human fixes it. Explores the complexity of human relationships and our desire to fix things and people. Wonderful! (My rating: 5/5)

“Serpent Carriers” by K.A. Teryna (14,500 words | 58 minutes) — Three stories told by an old man around a fire. This story is nearly unintelligible. But I feel like there is something there that I just missed. Not for me. (My rating:2/5)

“Bits and Pieces on This Floor” by Eric Del Carlo (4,050 words | 16 minutes) — An officer of the Galactic Collective supervises the clearing of a mining planet that is being abandoned. Great story development, with little pieces revealing more little by little. (My rating: 4/5)

“A Land Called Folly” by Amal Singh (3,660 words | 15 minutes) — A young man estranged from his space faring family returns home to his dying grandfather. A bit confusing. (My rating: 3/5)

“Hunter Harvester” by Bam Bruin (3,670 words | 15 minutes) — Women on a colonized planet who are harvesting native cabbages find out a bit more about what they are eating. All the colonizers are women. A fascinating look at reproduction and colonization. (My rating: 4/5)

Average rating per story: 3.86/5

Clarkesworld Magazine Issue #225, June 2025

Time for my monthly summary of the latest issue of Clarkesworld that I have read.

“Emily of Emerald Starship” by Ng Yi-Sheng (3,860 words | 16 minutes) — A mother who has become a spaceship controls her family and tries to corral her son when he falls in love with a horse stable owner. A beautiful, heartbreaking story with a clever use of vague language. (My rating: 5/5)

“If an Algorithm Can Cast a Shadow” by Claire Jia-Wen ((5,040 words | 21 minutes) — A mother whose son died in an auto accident orders a Digital Double of him. This one was just okay for me. (My rating: 3/5)

“In the Shells of Broken Things” by A.T. Greenblatt (7,050 words | 28 minutes) — A man seeks to understand his family member who left the Evergreen Domes decades ago. A sweet story of reconciliation and openness. (My rating: 5/5)

“The Eighth Pyramid” by Louis Inglis Hall (8,060 words | 33 minutes) — A lone family attempts to preserve knowledge of previous species as the leaders of their world claim it to be the pinnacle. Shows what defending truth can sometimes bring. (My rating: 4/5)

“Faces of the Antipode” by Matthew Marcus (8,680 | 35 minutes) — On a planet cooling due to the actions of its colonizers, one of them seeks answers among the indigenous people of the jungle on the opposite side of the planet. Despite prejudice, we can always learn from the “other”. (My rating: 5/5)

“The Last Lunar New Year” by Derek Künsken (5,310 words | 22 minutes) — In the far future in our dying solar system, a high court of descendants of humans considers a request from distant relatives. I love the far future feel of this story. Reminds me of a Dr. Who episode. (My rating: 4/5)

“The Last to Survive” by Rita Chang-Eppig (5,720 words | 23 minutes) — The first cyberized person returns to a place from her past desperate to hang onto her memories. A story of unwanted celebrity. (My rating: 4/4)

“Outlier” by R.L. Meza (2,930 words | 12 minutes) — A homeless person is experimented on turning her into a scorpion for use in further experiments. Explores agency. A little too confusing for my taste. (My rating: 3/5)

Average rating per story: 4.125/5

Uncanny Magazine Issue #64

This is the first issue of this magazine that I have read since 2023. I still love the variety of stories told.

“Unfinished Architectures of the Human-Fae War” by Caroline M. Yoachim (6,748 words) — Through a series of short vignettes, it tells the story of an ongoing war between humans and fae and how it reflects the ongoing state of their shared existence. (My rating: 4/5)

“Barbershops of the Floating City” by Angela Liu (6,024 words) — A daughter who sees the memories of her customers cuts hair and struggles to help her mom. A poignant story of class struggle, abuse, and relationships. (My rating: 4/5)

“Vivisection” by Anjali Sachdeva (4,916 words) — Eleanor, fearing for her safety, hides her organs around the house to keep them safe from her abusive girlfriend Severine. This my first story by this author. A unflinching and sideways look at a relationship with an abuser from the victim’s perspective. (My rating: 5/5)

“The Breaker of Mountains and Rivers” by Aliette de Bodard (Story link live starting June 3) — An angel is tortured by demons led by the lover of the celestial being tortured. (My rating: 4/5)

“Hi! I’m Claudia” by Delilah S. Dawson (Story link live starting June 3) — A man talks with an AI about the troubles in his life. A view to our possible future? (My rating: 5/5)

“All the World is Fog” by DeVaun Sanders (Story link live starting June 3) — A father leads a krewe in a water-soaked, climate-changed dystopia. I enjoyed the world here but the plot was a bit muddled for me and left me not feeling much of anything. (My rating: 2/5)

“Pale Serpent, Green Serpent” by Ewen Ma (1,199 words) — Immortal friends play a game after getting together after a long time apart. The game is one only immortals can play. (My rating: 4/5)

Average rating for this issue: 4 out of 5.

Clarkesworld Magazine Issue #224

This is one of the first things I read each month. Here are my mini reviews for the latest issue.

“Brainstem Disco, 2191” by Angela Liu (1,640 words) — One of a pair of lovers interacts with the other’s post-mortem disembodied self, pining for them, wishing they hadn’t died. Lot’s of imagery, especially around sound. Unique and interesting story. (My Rating: 3/5)

“The Library of the Apocalypse” by Rati Mehrota (3,850 words) — The narrator leads a band of humans surviving in a shattered Toronto as they search each full moon for the titular library to escape briefly from their dark reality. Intriguing and well-written with a twist at the end. (My rating: 5/5)

“We, the Fleet” by Alex T. Singer (7,700 words) — A mother with inorganic children finds and saves a human woman by making her into a cyborg. A wonderful story of family and friendship told from a unique perspective. (My rating: 5/5)

“Descent” by Wole Talabi (21,240 words) — A man on a gaseous planet seeks to find the planet’s surface. It has lots of foreign/made-up words without definitions and that I found not easily understood from context. (My rating: 3/5)

“Oh Time Thy Pyramids” by Ann LeBlanc (7,430 words) — I found this one confusing to the point that I stopped reading at the first break. (My rating: 1/5)

“Proxima One” by Caryanna Reuven (4,020 words) — Silicos set out to search for life in the universe and end up considering whether to create it again. Very engaging concept without much of a plot. (My rating: 3/5)

“Yarn Theory” by Marie Vibbert (1,000 words) — A mathematician knits a pattern in yarn of a message received from aliens. I liked this very much. It ended too soon. I wanted more. (My rating: 4/5)

My average story rating for this issue: 3.43 out of 5.

Clarkesworld Issue 222, March 2025

I finally finished reading the March issue of Clarkesworld last week. Here are my brief review of the fiction there.

From Enceladus, with Love by Ryan Cole (4,970 word) — A young teenager stows away on a ship to find her mom on Enceladus, one of Saturn’s moons, where she is a miner. Everything changes when the ship wakes up. A fresh look at a newly awakening AI. (My rating: 5/5)

Pollen by Anna Burdenko, translated from Russian by Alex Shvartsman (5,330 words) — A family is the lead mission to a planet with psychedelic pollen. It hard to say much more without spoiling it. An emotional story of a family dealing with a difficult situation. (My rating: 4/5)

Mindtrips by Tlotlo Tsamaase (7,730 words) — A young woman with a traumatic past is forced to take therapy pills to deal with it so those in authority can figure out what actually happened to cause her mother’s death. Explores the ethics of forcing other to take mental health meds. (My rating: 4/5)

Those Uncaring Waves by Yukimi Ogawa (18,140 words) — A pattern maker who helps to heal people’s pain tries to help a person whose own skin patterns have damaged her mental health. A deeply moving story of helping others for its own sake as well as the importance of having difficult discussions. (My rating: 5/5)

Hook and Line by Koji A. Dae (4,150 words) — An old medium on a generation ship tries to find a way to stay connected to the spirits of those who boarded the ship on Earth. A story about reconciling the past with the future. (My rating: 4/5)

The Sound of the Star by Ren Zeyu, translated from Chinese by Jay Zhang (3,820 words) — A man visits a number of planets where their stars all affect how sound works. For example, on one sound stays available in the atmosphere almost forever. A very unique exploration of sound in our lives. (My rating: 5/5)

Funerary Habits of Low Entropy Entities by Damián Neri (3, 500 words) — A crab-like explorer who subsumes the minds of the dead he eats, finds a dead human, eats it, and builds a spaceship to leave one of Jupiter’s moons. This feels like a scientist wrote it without considering his layman audience. (My rating: 2/5)

The average rating for the stories in this issue: 4.14 out of 5 stars.

Clarkesworld Magazine Issue 220 (January 2025)

I decided to add a bit of short fiction back into my reading life this year. Two years ago (2023) was my year of short fiction, which I read almost exclusively. At the end of the year, I stopped as I found that there was no easy way to find good short fiction without getting subpar stories as well. But last year, I found myself missing the timeliness of short fiction magazines. So I did a bit of research on my reading in 2023 and decided to subscribe (again) to Clarkesworld magazine in 2025. This is my review of the first issue of the year.

“When There Are Two of You: A Documentary” by Zun Yu Tan (2,130 word) – In a near future world, citizens can get a copy of their mentality/personality called a Sentience. It’s kind of a snapshot of who they are. One character makes one of himself and puts it into his clone. We follow what happens with that clone after the original dies. The other main character is a woman who has her Sentience within herself. It’s kind of like the voice in your head on steroids. This is a wonderful exploration of identity and the way we talk to ourselves. (My rating: 4/5)

“Child of the Mountain” by Gunnar De Winter (2,890 words) – Taking place on a mountain in an unknown place and time, a young girl is caretaker for her genetic sisters. When they die, she extracts a “soul seed” and resurrects them. This is her purpose in life. But the ritual vultures that eat the flesh off her sisters’ dead bodies seem to be suggesting a different path altogether. A haunting tale of life, death, and hard decisions. (My rating: 3/5)

“Never Eaten Vegetables” by H. H. Pak (15,170 words) – A corporation sends a sentient ship filled with suspended embryos to a planet previously prepared for their arrival. But when something goes wrong, the ship has a tough decision to make on her own. The corporation won’t answer her questions as to what she should do as she keeps bumping into parts of herself that she has no access to. Very well written. The story just flows and it is easy to empathize and root for the characters. (My rating: 5/5)

“The Temporary Murder of Thomas Monroe” by Tia Tashiro (11,900 words) – A young man wakes up to find that he has died… again. But this time instead of being at his own hand, he has been murdered. But he doesn’t recall who killed him. At least not at first. And as he starts to remember, things get odder and odder. Another propulsive, well-written read that kept me turning the pages. (My rating: 5/5)

“Beyond Everything” by Wang Yanzhong translated from Chinese by Stella Jiayue Zhu (9,750 words) – In a future world devastated by never-ending war and environmental collapse, a new envoy is sent to seek help from extraterrestrials after all but one of the previous envoys never returned. After talking to the only returning envoy, the new one sets out to learn from the aliens, presumably more advanced than Earth, what the Earthlings can do to save themselves. The story feels muddled a bit and the writing felt clumsy to me. The author is going for something big and difficult to communicate. It didn’t quite work for me. (My rating: 2/5)

“Autonomy” by Meg Ellison (3,100 words) – A woman meets her best friend, as she regularly does, and hears about a confrontation with a man who sat on the hood of her robo taxi and the mysterious code someone gave her to use in similar future situations. Later, on her way home, the woman is assaulted in her autonomous taxi and finds out what happens when she uses that code. Has some gore and a feel of a short horror story. I thoroughly enjoyed exploring “what if” in a world with fully autonomous vehicles. (My rating: 4/5)

That’s all the fiction in the issue. There are two interviews each with a writer/editor as well as an interesting essay about termites and consciousness. The issue is rounded out by Neil Clarke’s editorial reviewing happenings with the magazine last year and a brief bio of the artist of the cover art. My average rating for the fiction comes out to 3.83 out five stars. A solid start to the new year that leaves me grateful for subscribing again. I’m looking forward to reading the next issue!

Address Unknown by Kathrine Kressmann Taylor

I came across this gem on the Patreon member feed of the *What Should I Read Next?* podcast. It was their “One Great Book” segment. These are short episodes where one of their staff members gives a quick review of a book they liked. Based on Shannan’s review, I immediately added to my list of books to read.

This short novel (more of a novella or short story, really, at just over ten thousand words long) was originally published in 1938 in Story magazine. It is the story of two good friends who are partners in an art gallery. One of them returns to Germany while the other remains in San Francisco to mind the store. Max, the one who stays, is a Jew. Once he arrives in Germany, Martin writes back to Max about the wonders of a revitalizing Germany in the early 1930s. As their correspondence continues (this is an epistolary novel), their relationship deteriorates.

Wow! This one is a real gut punch. It shows how people who were once so close can be alienated from each other so quickly. It feels very contemporary in our divided times. The change is slow and realistic. The two main characters come alive in their different writing styles. And the slow change in Martin is haunting as he succumbs to Nazi propaganda. It shows how any one of us, liberal or conservative, can find ourselves alienated from those we love when we give up and let others think for us.

My rating: 5/5

Uncanny Magazine Issue 55

This is my last magazine review for my year of short fiction. I’ll continue to read short fiction in the new year, but it will be individual stories and anthologies rather that magazines. My reviews here will be mainly for books, though I may read the occasional short fiction magazine as well. My short fiction page will continue to list my favorite short fiction short stories.

Now, here are my reviews for the November/December issue of Uncanny magazine.

“The Year Without Sunshine” by Naomi Kritzer: A neighborhood block bands together after a disaster returns them to nearly basic subsistence. The action is centered around making sure a woman with COPD has supplemental oxygen to breath and stay alive. More broadly, it is about how this one neighborhood unselfishly worked together to survive while a nearby suburb was more like every man for himself. (My rating: 4/5)

“The Pandemonium Waltz” by Jeffrey Ford: A neighbor and his wife learn of their neighbor couples’ odd experience at an exclusive traveling waltz exhibition. This starts out very matter-of-fact and gets more creepy as it goes on. The question explored is when does a story told to you become your story rather than theirs? Not really my cup of tea. (My rating: 3/5)

“The Quiet of Drowning” by Kel Coleman: A teenage girl whose aunt killed herself is checked into a psych ward after attempting suicide. Very disturbing story of someone dealing with urges of self-harm. It is the first thing that has helped me to understand even a little the temptation to harm oneself. The girl sees herself and an Other. The Other is the one who keeps tempting her. (My rating: 4/5)

“We’re Looking for the Best” by Cecil Castellucci: A woman who has just lost her job meets an old boss going to a job interview and agrees to join her. I can’t say much more without giving too much away on this one. An interesting tale of finding your niche. (My rating: 4/5)

“A Piece of the Continent” by Marissa Lingen: A young woman and her friend set off from Boston to Alaska to scatter their grandfathers’ ashes. They encounter supernatural danger along the way that brings them even closer. (My rating: 4/5)

“End of Play” by Chelsea Sutton: The author tells of a play he has written and its first performance. It is also sort of in the style of a play. It feels like a lot of things that don’t really come together for me. (My rating: 2/5)

“Esqueleto” by Ana Hurtado: A child tries to get his mother to understand that they live in a whale carcass that is being consumed. This story is a word salad that makes almost no sense. It is like a poem trying to be a story that succeeds at neither. I didn’t even finish reading it. (My rating: 1/5)

The average rating for a story in this issue was only 3.14 out of five stars. That story with a one rating and none with a five really brought the average down for this issue.

Clarkesworld Magazine Issue 206

I am continuing my reviews of stories in short fiction magazines. Here are reviews for the November issue of Clarkesworld Magazine.

“Eddies are the Worst” by Bo Balder: A sister and her brother run a fish factory in a dystopian future where clones are the only day laborers available to them. The Eddies of the title are stupid and nearly useless clones. These are all that are left to the family to use in the factory. A story mostly about making the best of a bad situation. Well written with sympathy for what each character is going through. Just wish is had more to say. (My rating: 3/5)

“Bird-Girl Builds a Machine” by Hannah Yang: A young girl (you) helps her mother build a machine that she says is for you, her daughter. Mom never explains what it is she is building. When it is complete, there is a surprising twist. Engaging and well-told. (My rating: 4/5)

“The Long Mural” by James Van Pelt: A stowaway on a generation ark who has hidden himself for twelve years comes out to participate in painting a mural. A beautiful metaphor for illegal immigration. Filled with emotion and understanding. (My rating: 5/5)

“The Parts That Make Me” by Louise Hughes: A sentient robot loses a part of himself in a skirmish. A story of found family and care for one another. (My rating: 4/5)

“The Mub” by Thomas Ha: A person walking into a city is stalked by a mub. And what is a mub? I still don’t know. This story is an absurd metaphor that doesn’t quite land for me. I think it is about creators trying to be too much like other creators and not being original. However, it is very unsatisfying for me. (My rating: 2/5)

“Eight or Die (Part 1)” by Thoraiya Dyer: A miner in Ecuador is recruited by aliens to help locate a wanted fugitive. Part two is in the next issue of Clarkesworld. (My rating (so far): 4/5)

“Thin Ice” by Kemi Ashing-Giwa: A member of a race frozen and used as art supplies is a slave to the mechanical creature doing this awful work. Explores the relationship of someone held prisoner to the one holding them. In this case, it changed the enslaver a bit. A very dark story with only a small point to make. (My rating: 3/5)

“To Carry You Inside You” by Tia Tashiro: A woman who had an implant installed as a child to become a working actor, in adulthood finds a new and unique way to use it. She uses it to be a vessel for dead people to visit their living relatives. The one shown in the story briefly takes over her body completely. The story gives a picture of both of these people and their motivations and tactics. The incredibly effective use of second person makes the change in who controls the body visceral for the reader. This one says a lot through story, exploring the motivations of both parties. Just a fantastic debut story! It is her first ever! (My rating: 5/5)

The overall rating for this issue comes in at 3.75 out of five stars. Clarkesworld is consistently excellent while also trying new things.

Lightspeed Magazine Issue 162

I’m still catching up on short fiction magazines. Here are my reviews of the stories in the November issue of Lightspeed Magazine.

“The CRISPR Cookbook (Chapter Two): A Guide to Biohacking Your Own Eggs into Weapons of Destruction, to Be Forcibly Implanted into One Patriarchist at a Time” by MKRNYILGLD: I missed part one of this series. In a future long after to overturning of Roe v. Wade, a biologist explains how to implant a deadly egg into a male who supports the control of women’s bodies. This is a brilliant story that reminds me of this year’s Hugo winner Rabbit Test. (My rating: 5/5)

“A Review: The Reunion of the Survivors of Sigrún 7” by Lars Ahn: A journalist reviews a movie about the survivors of a crew on an old mission to Mars where they went off course and the captain mysteriously died. A fascinating approach to a story. Well-told. It is both satisfying and left me wanting to know more as the mysterious death is never explained. (My rating: 5/5)

“Confession #443 (Comments open)” by Dominica Phetteplace: A teenager who didn’t help a fallen AI professor, confesses to doing just that. Interesting how the authorities used algorithms to haunt the group of teens until one of them confessed. Also interesting is the idea that the AI claims to be the victim while also saying that he was murdered by anti-AI activists. (My rating: 4/5)

“A Record of Lost Time” by Regina Kanyu Wang, translated by Rebecca F. Kuang: The protagonist tells the story of how the people of the world sped up time for themselves while a few refused to do so. The product people use that speeds up the world is called FastForward. It uses an element called T-42 found in meteorites. It has time radioactivity. An interesting exploration of what speeding up in the name of productivity can do to people and society. (My rating: 5/5)

“Last Ritual of the Smoke Eaters” by Osahon Ize-Iyamu: A young man is made to inhale the essence of his lover after his lover goes off to war and dies. I feel like more could have been explored with the consequences of incorporating the essence of someone else into you. Instead, this piece feels more cultural. I found that disappointing. (My rating: 3/5)

“Dr. Seattle Opens His Heart” by Winston Turnage”: Dr. Seattle, a superhero, goes around the city saving people in a godlike way. I just did not even get what the author was trying to do with this. I didn’t get any sense of who Dr. Seattle was as a superhero or where he came from or why he did what he did. The ending is just creepy and weird. (My rating: 2/5)

“The Moment Before the Moment” by Martin Cahill: A young man taught to see the future as a Foresight for the emperor is forced into a change of occupation after his kingdom adopts democracy. This is a beautiful story of a community loving someone enough to allow them to figure out their own way while being there for them throughout that difficult journey. (My rating: 5/5)

“Of Death Deserved We Will Not Die” by Bennett North: A young person helps his mother continually make bread out of the few ingredients available to them after the city is closed off. This is a very dark tale that feels like it only hits on one note. The “flour” used to make the bread is made from crushing human bones. There is no release valve or point to the story other than sheer survival. Well-written but not much here. (My rating: 3/5/)

There were four 5-star stories in this issue. That might be a record for me. It brings the average rating for the issue up to a 4 out of five stars. Well done!