Return to 2016 Best SF/F Short Fiction
Best Stories
Novella
Novelette
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Everyone
from Themis Sends Letters Home by Genevieve Valentine
Time: 30m (Novelette) Issue: Clarkesworld 121
(SF) The crew of the Themis colony
write home about their struggles with a mission and a world that seems to be
more than a little off.
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Head, Scales, Tongue, Tail
by Leigh Bardugo
Time: 00m (Novelette) Issue: Summer Days and Summer Nights
Not reviewed by Rocket Stack Rank.
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(Historical SF) In 1955, Nancy's best
friend Ellen dates a bad boy who introduces her to Bug Town, where aliens
live. Nothing is the same after that.
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(Post Apocalypse) Teenage Tetley lives
in a human settlement (one of the last) built on a miles-wide floating garbage
dump. She explains why everyone hates her now.
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(Metafiction) A black author
accepts the challenge of writing a
black SF hero, but the police just keep shooting him.
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Short Story
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Caspar D.
Luckinbill, What Are You Going to Do? by Nick
Wolven Time: 22m (ShortStory) Issue: F&SF 01.02|16
(SF) When "mediaterrorists"
attack, the disrupt Caspar's comfortable life in a near-future where everyone
is connected.
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Not reviewed by Rocket Stack Rank.
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(Slipstream) Jack has been stranded at
summer camp for seven years, since his parents keep forgetting to pick him
up. On the bright side, his dragon egg is about to hatch.
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Not by
Wardrobe, Tornado, or Looking Glass by Jeremiah Tolbert
Time: 17m (ShortStory) Issue: Lightspeed 69
(Portal Fantasy) Rabbit holes open at
random, summoning people to fairy-tale universes where they are the heroes.
Louisa keeps waiting for one to open for her.
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On the
Fringes of the Fractal by Greg van
Eekhout Time: 13m (ShortStory) Issue: 2113: Stories Inspired by the Music of Rush
Not reviewed by Rocket Stack Rank.
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Not reviewed by Rocket Stack Rank.
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Not reviewed by Rocket Stack Rank.
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(Horror) Four friends meet for a
writer’s critique group, on a stormy night when a dangerous beast is on the
loose outside.
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(Modern Fantasy) A young hustler
discovers that he's supposed to play a big role in transforming New York from
a city to a City. If he can survive it.
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(Chinese Fantasy) Sometimes a unicorn assisted Judge Kao Yu, and because
he was so just and honest, he never feared its judgment. Until now.
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(Fairy Tale) A young, newly minted
witch meets an equally green knight, and they go off together in search of
dragons.
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(Portal Fantasy) Ellie used to travel
freely to the other world, but lately her door doesn’t work. In fact, all the
portals are broken for some reason.
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Not reviewed by Rocket Stack Rank.
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Welcome to
the Medical Clinic at the Interplanetary Relay Station | Hours Since the Last
Patient Death: 0 by Caroline M. Yoachim
Time: 07m (ShortStory) Issue: Lightspeed 70
(SF Humor) A choose-your-own-adventure
story in which you navigate the clinic on a space station full of aliens.
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Not reviewed by Rocket Stack Rank.
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Notable Stories
Novella
Novelette
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(Historical Fantasy) In 1912 Cairo,
the police investigate the apparent murder of an immortal Djinn.
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Not reviewed by Rocket Stack Rank.
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(SF) The end of the world starts when
an ambitious marketing guy gets a cryptic assignment to create an ad campaign
to "make ugly sexy."
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(Military Fantasy) Baekdo, a fox who
wants to become human, needs one more kill to achieve his goal. A collapsing
city in the middle of a civil war seems like a good place to do it but there
are complications.
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(Competence SF) In the 2080s, Humanity
is abandoning Mars, and Steuby and his companions think they can make money
by looting the abandoned settlements at the last minute.
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(near-future SF) At 14, Jeff can get
his first "passion" treatment, which artificially makes you
passionate about something or someone.
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(Near-Future SF; Project Empathy)
Akiko wakes up on a ship bound for San Francisco with no memory of who she
is, but with the voice of "God" telling her what to do.
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(Historical Fantasy) In Eastern Europe
between the wars, Klara works as a kitchen maid. One night she admits a woman
she thinks is a lost fairy-tale princesses into the castle.
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Sooner or
Later Everything Falls Into the Sea by Sarah
Pinsker Time: 25m (Novelette) Issue: Lightspeed 69
(Near-future SF) Bay lives alone and
subsists off things that wash ashore from cruise ships and such. Then Gabby
washes up, alive, and complicates her life.
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(Fairy Tale) Young Miryem supports her
family lending money at interest, but things get difficult when someone from
Faerie makes her an offer she can’t refuse.
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(Post-Apocalypse) 22-year-old Eris
flies a cab in the City. A stranger pays her to elude a follower, and she
gets caught up in intrigue.
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Not reviewed by Rocket Stack Rank.
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Not reviewed by Rocket Stack Rank.
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Not reviewed by Rocket Stack Rank.
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Not reviewed by Rocket Stack Rank.
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(Fantasy) From prehistoric times, the
stone man crouched on a hill. Every now and then a person would find it and
try to get it to do something. But to succeed was to die.
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(SF) Months after mysterious aliens
scattered their spacecraft across North America, no one has a clue what they
want. Avery knows what one of them wants, though: it wants a tour.
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(Hacker SF) Fresh out of prison for
hacking, Aedo gets a request to do an even bigger hack. But why does Energy
Davison want to hack its own systems?
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(Historical Fantasy) In a magical Old
West, young Ellis has a love for the desert and an affinity for dead things.
Both of these attract unwelcome attention from strangers visiting from back
East.
Other
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Short Story
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A Fist of
Permutations in Lightning and Wildflowers by Alyssa Wong Time: 11m (ShortStory) Issue: Tor.com 03/02/16
(Magical Realism) Hannah watched her
sister Melanie die, incinerated with her own magic. Hannah can't accept that
and sets out to use her own magic to put things right.
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(SF) A disabled human veteran takes in
a disabled AI veteran. The AI doesn't talk anymore due to trauma, but Tawn
tries to get through to it, even though his mother thinks it's dangerous.
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Not reviewed by Rocket Stack Rank.
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An Advanced Reader's Picture Book of Comparative Cognition by Ken Liu
Time: 00m (ShortStory) Issue: The Paper Menagerie and Other Stories
Not reviewed by Rocket Stack Rank.
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And Men Will Mine the Mountain for Our Souls by Seanan
McGuire Time: 00m (ShortStory) Issue: Unfettered II
Not reviewed by Rocket Stack Rank.
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Not reviewed by Rocket Stack Rank.
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Not reviewed by Rocket Stack Rank.
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Not reviewed by Rocket Stack Rank.
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(Science Fantasy) Charlotte is tired
of being a disembodied brain; she wants a real body of her own, as soon as
she can afford it.
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Not reviewed by Rocket Stack Rank.
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Dispatches From The Cradle: The Hermit -- Forty-Eight Hours In The Sea
Of Massachusetts
by Ken Liu Time: 22m (ShortStory) Issue: Drowned Worlds 2016
(Post Apocalypse) Around 2650 AD, the
narrator interviews a wealthy recluse who lives above the sunken ruins of
Boston.
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Fade To
Red: Three Interviews About Sebold's Mars Trilogy by Stephen
S. Power Time: 14m (ShortStory) Issue: Lightspeed 77
(SF) Across twenty years, a director
made three films about a remarkable discovery on Mars.
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Not reviewed by Rocket Stack Rank.
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(Climate Change) A tour guide leads
tourists through the remains of a flooded country.
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(Horror) A dead woman sees her
doppelgänger watching over her remains and wonders what she's up to.
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No Matter
Which Way We Turned by Brian Evenson Time: 01m (ShortStory) Issue: People Holding... Spring 2016
Not reviewed by Rocket Stack Rank.
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(SF) Three different people share a
remote robotic body. They have three different reasons and three different
experiences.
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(Hard SF) A corroded railing gives
way, and Kent falls from a Venusian cloud city to near-certain death. But it
takes a long time to fall fifty kilometers.
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(Far-Future SF; Great Ship) An ancient
robot tells a human how it helped build a planet-sized ship and what the
consequences were.
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Not reviewed by Rocket Stack Rank.
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(Black Historical Fantasy) In the
closing years of segregation, Emmaline uses her magic to help neighbors and
protect her children, for trouble is coming.
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Not reviewed by Rocket Stack Rank.
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(Fairy Tale) Tabitha has been walking
a long time, trying to wear out seven pairs of iron shoes; Amira has been
sitting alone on a glass hill that suitors try to climb.
Other
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See The
Unseeable, Know The Unknowable by Maria Dahvana Headley Time: 16m (ShortStory) Issue: Lightspeed 76
(Modern Fantasy) A circus comes to
town, but the tickets are for fifty years ago or fifty years from now.
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(Essay) How to make an SF protagonist
interesting.
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Spells Are Easy If You Have The Right Psychic Energy by Dominica
Phetteplace Time: 10m (ShortStory) Issue: F&SF 07.08|16
(Modern Fantasy) Hruta is a young
American-Norwegian witch. She's great with love spells, but struggling to
figure out how to undo them.
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(SF) Despite not being a telepath,
Calla worked out a way to play chess with her captor, Major Larn, during the
recent war. Now they're going to finish their game.
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(Fantasy Science) Out on Europa,
Marius has vanished and Kotto has come to rescue his partner, Bolaji.
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(Slipstream Horror) Fifteen-year-old
Cillian finds the love of his life buried in the peat of an old bog where she
died long, long, ago.
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The
Carpenter and the Beast of Teeth by Micah Dean
Hicks Time: 11m (ShortStory) Issue: Territory Issue 2
Not reviewed by Rocket Stack Rank.
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(High Fantasy) An immortal assassin
threatens the new king, so he has his sister trained as the ultimate
bodyguard.
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Not reviewed by Rocket Stack Rank.
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(Post Apocalypse) An Arab-American
girl and her mother wander the Dakotas while the girl tries to get in touch
with a boy she once knew.
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Not reviewed by Rocket Stack Rank.
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The Tale
of Mahliya and Mauhub and the White-Footed Gazelle by Sofia
Samatar Time: 11m (ShortStory) Issue: Starlit Wood 2016
(Meta Fiction) Mahliya will be down in
a bit to tell you the story, but we'll begin by telling you a love story.
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(African Fantasy) After her father's
death, Tausi needs someone to take her from Epoulu before her aunts marry her
off.
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The Voice in the Cornfield, the Word Made Flesh by Desirina
Boskovich Time: 17m (ShortStory) Issue: F&SF 09.10|16
(Present-day SF) An alien crash lands
in a cornfield. It tries to get help, but no one can see or hear it. Almost
no one.
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(Horror) Following a disaster in
Antarctica, MacReady spends summer 1983 in New York and starts to wonder what
he might have brought back with him.
Other
Reviews
RSR
Mini-Review [3] Recommended By: SFRevu+1 GDozois+2 RHorton+2 NClarke+2 JStrahan+2 CPayseur+2
Nebula+2 Sturgeon+2
BASFF+1
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Not reviewed by Rocket Stack Rank.
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(SF) On Ariel, some people have
modified themselves to fly. Other people can't accept that. Anna is going to
need to choose sides.
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Unknown Length
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Not reviewed by Rocket Stack Rank.
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The
Adventure of the Extraordinary Rendition by Cory Doctorow Time: 00m ()
Issue: Astro Noise: A Survival Guide for Living Under Total Surveillance
Not reviewed by Rocket Stack Rank.
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The Diamond Girl
by Courtney Bird1 Time: 00m ()
Issue: Fairy Tale Review Ochre
Not reviewed by Rocket Stack Rank.
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Not reviewed by Rocket Stack Rank.
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Big Boss Bitch by Adrienne Celt was reprinted at Lightspeed 101:
ReplyDeletehttp://www.lightspeedmagazine.com/fiction/big-boss-bitch/
(The link you have above is an excerpt.)