Showing posts with label Review+2020. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Review+2020. Show all posts

Wednesday, August 19, 2020

The Transubstantiation, by Evan Dicken

[BCS]
★★★★★ When Heroes fall, there are still heroes.

(Fantasy Adventure) Deff and his team hunt the countryside for illegal Heroes, whom they kill and then sell the body parts. Something truly terrible happened with these “Heroes” in the recent past, and it’s not entirely done. (11,386 words; Time: 37m)


Fire and Falling, by Andrew Dykstal

[BCS]
★★★★☆ Plenty of Excitement in an Interesting Setting

(Steampunk Thriller) Mir’s mission to deliver codebooks gets complicated when she realizes she’s being followed—and followed by more than one person at that. (15,229 words; Time: 50m)


The Bone-Stag Walks, by K.T. Bryski

[Lightspeed]
★★★☆☆

(Horror) In mid-winter, a skeletal stag comes to the village begging for food, but it eats anyone foolish enough to talk to it. (3,379 words; Time: 11m)


All These Guardians of Order and Clarity, None of Them Can Abide a Free Witch, by Benjamin Rosenbaum

[Lightspeed]
★★★☆☆

(Fantasy Adventure) Maghd of Ilmak Dale, the “White Witch,” feels that Marish’s account of their encounter and the destruction of Ilmak Dale is very slanted, so she tells her side of the story. (7,796 words; Time: 25m)

It’s possible this is a better story if you have already read "A Siege of Cranes.” (2006), which was reprinted in Lightspeed last month.

Sing in Me, Muse, by Katherine Crighton

[Lightspeed]
★★★☆☆

(Generation Ship) A young woman on a generation ship sings reports back to an Earth that may not even exist anymore. (1,941 words; Time: 06m)


Still You Linger, Like Soot in the Air, by Matthew Kressel

[Lightspeed]
★★★☆☆

(Far-Future SF) Gil teaches students how to communicate with the Numens, vast, star-spanning alien intelligences indistinguishable from gods. (5,664 words; Time: 18m)


Tuesday, August 18, 2020

Nameless He, by Robert Reed

[Clarkesworld]
★★★☆☆

(Space Opera; Great Ship) A captain on the Great Ship gives a nameless robot the task of studying the enigmatic wreck of an ancient starship. (8,983 words; Time: 29m)


The Immolation of Kev Magee, by L.X. Beckett

[Clarkesworld]
★★★☆☆

(SF Thriller) A young refugee on a floating arctic city struggles to find a role making videos and meets an unexpected mentor. (11,116 words; Time: 37m)

Note: Although the title relates to the short poem, “The Cremation of Sam McGee,” by Robert Service, there’s no serious connection between the story and the poem. But by all means read the poem anyway; it’s short and it’s fun.

An Important Failure, by Rebecca Campbell

[Clarkesworld]
★★★★★ A story of an obsession to make something beautiful in a world that’s falling apart.

(Climate SF) In a world desperate for wood for fires and paper, a man and his brother look for a tree good enough to make a world-class violin. (9,702 words; Time: 32m)


The Plague, by Yan Leisheng

[Clarkesworld]
★☆☆☆☆

(Epidemic SF) A plague that turns people to stone is depopulating the planet, and the narrator has the job of incinerating the bodies. Weirdly, some of them scream. (5,692 words; Time: 18m)


Drawing Lines Between the Stars, by Frank Smith

[Clarkesworld]
★★☆☆☆

(New Age SF) Bexar's life changes when his ship rescues a young woman whose ship was hit by a passing comet. (6,104 words; Time: 20m)


The Lori, by Fiona Moore

[Clarkesworld]
★★★★☆ Worth it just to see a realistic story about AI failure.

(Military SF) After corporal Cooper recovers from the disastrous battle of Kuching, he’s sure the sentient tank he worked with is still there somewhere, so he takes extended leave and goes to hunt for it. (3,623 words; Time: 12m)


The Mysterious Study of Doctor Sex, by Tamsyn Muir

[Single]
★★☆☆☆

(Future Fantasy Mystery) Two young students are attached to a team reopening Dr. Sex’s study after 400 years. But someone seems to have got in 200 years ago and left his or her skeleton there. (8,632 words; Time: 28m)


Satin and Velvet, by Robert Minto

[BCS]
★★★☆☆ Honorable Mention

(Magician’s Apprentice) At just 16, Greta is pretty young for an apprentice, but somehow she’s drawn the attention of a satin ghast, which only seems to want to help her get her work done. But this is what got the last apprentice killed. (2,869 words; Time: 09m)


The Many Lives of an Abiku, by Tobi Ogundiran

[BCS]
★★★☆☆

(Yoruba Horror) Sola loves her family and wants to be a good girl. The shaman’s claims that she’s really an evil spirit come to cause pain can’t possibly be true—even if her invisible friend says otherwise. (5,212 words; Time: 17m)


The Physicians of Vilnoc, by Lois McMaster Bujold

[Single]
★★★★☆ A Satisfying Adventure in the Company of Great Characters

(Fantasy Adventure; Five Gods) Penric tries to deal with an epidemic, which stretches his powers to the breaking point. (42,806 words; Time: 2h:22m)

To fully appreciate this story, you need to have already read the seven before it, starting with “Penric’s Demon.” If you have not at least read the first two, this will likely be confusing.

Yellow and the Perception of Reality, by Maureen F. McHugh

[Single]
★★★☆☆

(SF) June’s sister Wanda suffered some kind of brain damage in an experiment aimed at learning the nature of reality. Two other people died in that experiment, and June would like some answers. (8,800 words; Time: 29m)


The Stitch Beneath the Ice, by Ranylt Richildis

[Strange Horizons]
★★★☆☆

(Horror) During Prohibition, a coffin maker who often brings bodies over the frozen St. Lawrence river in the winter decides to earn some extra cash bringing a coffin full of liquor instead. (5,651 words; Time: 18m)


Everything's Fine, by Matthew Pridham

[Single]
★★★☆☆

(Slipstream Horror) Today’s a big day at work, but just walking there looks to be a death-defying challenge, what with people randomly turning into monsters and such. (4,732 words; Time: 15m)


Juice Like Wounds, by Seanan McGuire

[Single]
★★★☆☆ Honorable Mention

(Portal Fantasy; Wayward Children) In the Market, every exchange has to give fair value to both sides. Lundy and her friends want to do a quest that’ll generate so much fair value that they never have to work again. But they’re just kids. (5,894 words; Time: 19m)