(SF) The army wakes in the new solar system and prepares to face enemy attack. But the enemy doesn’t show up. While they wait, one of them decides to study one of the inner planets. (3,625 words; Time: 12m)
Rating: ★★★☆☆ Average
Wednesday, January 3, 2018
A List of Forty-Nine Lies, by Steven Fischer
★★★★☆ Short but Very Effective
(Dystopia) Levi is not telling this story. He is not a freedom fighter—the world is so perfect no one needs to be a freedom fighter. Secrets don’t exist anymore. (525 words; Time: 01m)
Recommended By: SFRevu+1 RHorton+1 JMcGregor+1
Jewel of the Heart, by Matthew Hughes
★★★★☆ Great Sword & Sorcery Fun
(Fantasy Adventure; Baldemar) Baldemar is just a young henchman for the mage Thelerion, but he’s the only one who can wear the Helm of Sagacity, and right at the moment, they’re doomed without its help. But that help comes at a price. (22,779 words; Time: 1h:15m)
Recommended By: SFRevu+1 GDozois+1
Although this is one of a series of stories about Baldemar’s adventures, there’s no need to read the earlier ones before enjoying this one.
Neanderthals, by Gardner Dozois
(Near-Future SF) The narrator is a cyborg hitman, but the target is guarded by two Neanderthals, either of whom would be a challenge to defeat. (2,208 words; Time: 07m)
Rating: ★★★☆☆ Average
Aurelia, by Lisa Mason
(Horror) Robert meets Aurelia when she comes to his firm for legal help, and he falls in love with her at once. She’s beautiful, sweet, absent minded, and reclusive, but there’s something troubling about her workroom, which is usually off-limits. (7,440 words; Time: 24m)
Rating: ★★★☆☆ Average
Widdam, by Vandana Singh
(Dystopia) Five vignettes showing how three people get by in a horribly polluted world ravaged by climate change where giant, intelligent mining machines chew up the landscape in search of metals and oil. (13,229 words; Time: 44m)
Rating: ★★☆☆☆ Not Recommended
Tuesday, January 2, 2018
Magazine Coverage By Reviewers
Update 3/30/18: Removed reviewer CPayseur per his request.
We're adding Jason McGregor and Charles Payseur to RSR's Recommended By list and changing our criteria for "prolific reviewer" to make up for low coverage of Apex, Beneath Ceaseless Skies, and Strange Horizons magazines, as shown in red in the table below. Without more coverage, stories from these magazines are at a disadvantage in the YTD By Score list and 2018 Hugo Awards page.
The table lists the 11 magazines covered by RSR along with the current five prolific reviewers whose monthly short fiction recommendations and/or "year's best SF/F" anthologies are linked to in the RSR monthly and Year-to-Date ratings.
We're adding Jason McGregor and Charles Payseur to RSR's Recommended By list and changing our criteria for "prolific reviewer" to make up for low coverage of Apex, Beneath Ceaseless Skies, and Strange Horizons magazines, as shown in red in the table below. Without more coverage, stories from these magazines are at a disadvantage in the YTD By Score list and 2018 Hugo Awards page.
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