'Nathan Burgoine's Blog, page 57

Short Stories 366:32 — “The Ones Who Stay and Fight,” by N.K. Jemisin

[image error]I’ve been a fan of N.K. Jemisin since I basically stumbled upon her Broken Earth series, so when I saw her collection, How Long ’til Black Future Month?, on audible, I snapped it up. Before anything else, I want to point out how fantastic the introduction was—Jemisin takes us on a tour of early 2000’s SF, and what it was like, and how she was advised to work with short fiction (to my great joy as a lover of short fiction and to the richer of everyone who loves SF short fiction), and—of course—the disaster that was early 2000’s SF when it came to voices other than that of the straight-white-cisgender-male.

“The Ones Who Stay and Fight” opens the collection with the description of a holiday, The Day of Good Birds, being celebrated in a city, Um-Helat. The holiday is pretty and fun and bright—and not all obligatory—and the city is likewise gentle and open and, in fact, a kind of utopia. The voice walks us through this city, shows us a few nooks and crannies, and then the story turns into something else: a glimpse of a world on the other side of a possibility from our own, and then a step further, and a step further, and then…

Well. I won’t ruin the story, but this is, to my mind, a perfect example of how you can raise a moral reflection with science fiction, exposing something raw of our own world with a deft words and clever speculations. I loved this story, which speaks to the reader via its own conceit, and instead of offering up Um-Helat as solely a contrast to all the evil we’ve done, offers just enough of hope to leave the reader conscious of potential.

Short Stories 366:31 — “A Burglary, Addressed By a Young Lady,” by Elizabeth Porter Birdsall

[image error]This short story, performed incredibly well by the narrator for the audiobook version of Women Destroy Science Fiction, was outright amusing and borderline adorable. It was a nice reminder, to me at least, of how science fiction doesn’t exist outside the realm of humour, and how often—unintentionally, I hope—there’s a bias against science fiction that doesn’t dare to keep things grim or dire or directly serious in every way.

If you’re at all a fan of etiquette-centred periods of history, burglary stories, or heist tales, then I think there’s going to be something to love in “A Burglary, Addressed By a Young Lady” for you. We meet a young woman railing against the demands of her mother to choose an appropriateness for her debut—that her debut is one of burglary assisted by stealth technology circuitry sewn carefully into her pantaloons is quite beside the point. There is a man she’d love to burgle, for whom she’d gladly leave a token so her theft might be traced back to her, which would mean their families could meet and, alongside returning a pilfered item, a potential courtship could occur.

Instead, her mother’s insistence on a higher status target leaves her out on her debut, moving through shadow, and wishing there was some way to have a more direct control over her own destiny and burglary target. And opportunity knocks when, by chance, she encounters another young woman on a similar mission. From there, the story just delights with dialog, the give-and-take of potential new friendships, and a great deal of world-building that makes me wish I could visit this setting again, for more stories.

Short Stories 366:30 — “Search for the Heart of Ocean” by A.J. Fitzwater

[image error]I was not expecting cute, and I certainly wasn’t expecting adorbs-aww-squee! levels of cute, but here we are, at the last story from Scourge of the Seas of Time (and Space) and I am overwhelmed with squees and adorbs and cutes and awws. Frankly, it’s a great choice to end the collection with, and as anchor stories go, it left me with a smile on my face as I closed the book and that’s definitely a solid end to an anthology, no?

A.J. Fitzwater brings us anthropomorphic pirates in this tale of a ship in search of a legendary jewel. Chincillas and marmosets and other wee mammals make up the crew, and the captain—Captain Cinrak the Dapper, of course—is taking the crew on this mission to try and replace a jewel she broke out of the queen’s crown previous to the telling of this tale, and as such, only the best will do.

There are genderqueer characters, trans characters, the most fabulously described mermen, and unexpected appearances of other, larger sea creatures that turn this from a tale of jewel-seeking into something much more sweet, and the overall effect is, well, adorable. I’d love to see this one in graphic novel form. But! More importantly? There are more voyages to come, thanks to the upcoming The Voyages of Cinrak the Dapper, a collection of stories about this very Capybara pirate and her crew!

Short Stories 366:29 — “Empire Star,” by Samuel R. Delany

[image error]This brings me to the end of the short(er) fiction in People of Colo(u)r Destroy Science Fiction and I have to say the journey was fantastic, and the final story, “Empire Star,” is just… wow. I mean, it’s Samuel R. Delany, so it’s not like I thought it wouldn’t be amazing, but it’s a novella length piece and it’s just like a master class on character progression and evolution (and world-building, too) and I kind of wanted to just sit back in awe for a few days once I finished it.

This one’s hard to discuss without spoilers, so I’ll begin with: just read it. That said? Narratively, the being telling the story is doing so from a unique POV, and follows a single character from (very) humble beginnings. He’s tasked with making a delivery of a message, and on the way has his mind and thought processes widened in ever-increasing increments (a world-building piece here is how the various civilizations of the world consider others to be ‘simplex,’ ‘complex’ or ‘multiplex’ and that recurring theme of ever-more increasing complexity is paralleled perfectly in the progression of the story). It becomes clear that it’s not just a delivery of a message, but something far, far more important, but the journey and the unfolding of this? Sheer magic.

“Empire Star” will be following me for ages, settling in my brain and making me reconsider so many things about narrative structure, POV, character progression, but all of that pales beside just having freaking enjoyed the hell out of reading it.

Short Stories 366:28 — “Justice Systems in Quantum Parallel Probabilities,” by Lettie Prell

[image error]This story, from The Best American Science Fiction and Fantasy 2018, was as much thought exercise as story, and not a straightforward narrative per sé, but the idea behind it was really captivating: Cole, a man in a prison cell, is listening to one of the other prisoners, Marco, randomly talk about other justice systems, and something happens.

Cole seems to go on a series of visits to other realities, where—for a short amount of time—he is witness to, or a part of, the justice systems in these parallel worlds. He sees places where the victims set the punishment, or where crime is considered an illness, and treated as such, or places where the over-criminalization of nearly everything has made having criminality in one’s past (or one’s family’s past) a nearly nonchalant thing.

Through it all, Cole wonders if any of these would be better than what he himself is facing, and as the story winds down to conclude, it’s left more in the hands of the reader than anywhere else, with a particularly on point few lines of dialogue to drive home the sentiment of the piece. “Justice Systems in Quantum Parallel Probabilities” isn’t subtle, but it doesn’t have to be to get its point across.

Short Stories 366:27 — “The Stars Above,” by Katharine Duckett

[image error]I have a soft spot in my heart for stories set in futures where humanity has no choice but to try previous technologies or skills to adapt. Katharine Duckett’s “The Stars Above” in Disabled People Destroy Science Fiction plays right into this from the start, as we join a caravan of people using adapted yurts to make their way to potential safety. They’re fleeing an alien invasion, and it’s obvious the aliens have won our world, but don’t seem to care much for humanity if humanity stays out of its way and lets them have what they want—which basically involves all the resources of the cities on the planet.

Duckett grounds the story in Jack, a Peace Corps volunteer who was working in Kazakhstan when stories of the alien invasion first start to spread. The invasion itself is revealed in flashbacks, and I have to give Duckett some props for the method by which the aliens catch humanity off guard, as it’s so topical and wonderful (and dreadful and on-point) a use of science fiction to point a giant finger at our culture that it had me grinning. Jack is far from his family, has a genetic disorder that leaves him with chronic pain and inflammation and mobility issues (somewhat alleviated with medication, but in the post-invasion world, that’s going to be a rare resource).

The conflict of “The Stars Above” isn’t about the alien invasion, though. It’s about two pulling desires in Jack: his desire to try to make it back to his family, and his attraction to Alibek, a local. Given where they are, if Alibek ever felt the same way, it wasn’t something he could say, but now that aliens have changed everything, that’s perhaps no longer true. Survival is one thing. Choosing between the two things, though, leaves Jack in a no-win situation, and the deft handling of making that decision is where “The Stars Above” really works its magic.

Short Stories 366:26 — “Angela and the Scar,” by Michael Janairo

[image error]It’s not just the different times and places and historical events but the sheer volume of new-to-me legends, folklore, and cultural mythology to be had in reading Long Hidden: Speculative Fiction From the Margins of History that has kept me so hooked. “Angela and the Scar” takes place in 1900 Philippines, and right away we’re introduced to the kapfre, a kind of forest spirit guardian of the woods, and Angela herself, a young girl who has already lost her father to violence and is now missing her mother.

What I adored about this story was very much in play right from the beginning: the seamless way everyone involved is just aware and in touch with the notion of the kapfre. Angela and the kapfre have spoken before. When Angela mentions the kapfre to adults, they don’t immediately question her reality (especially in the face of her having covered a huge distance in nearly no time). And more, the kapfre is still quite other, and doesn’t really care all that much about war or loss or anything beyond enjoying Angela’s company and riddles until it’s made clear that war has—and will—damage the forest.

From there, the story turns into a race against time to save the rebels, her mother, and defeat an invading force that outguns and outnumbers them—with nothing really to work with on their side but he cleverness of Angela, the bravery of all involved, and her relationship with the kapfre and—maybe—his co-operation and help, if she can get him to understand how important these things are. The notion of the time and place here is so very key, this is Angela facing a world under violent change, and it will leave no one the same, and yet the story still manages to leave everything on a positive, importantly hopeful note.

 

Short Stories 366:25 — “Undercurrents,” by Charles Payseur

[image error]When I mentioned in passing to Charles Payseur on twitter that I loved “Rivers Run Free” and the world it was set in, he let me know there was a sequel, and I was immediately on the hunt. Even better? Since it was printed in Beneath Ceaseless Skies, it was also available as an audio performance via their podcast, which is how I listened to “Undercurrents.”

Where “Rivers Run Free” gave us the point of view of the hunted—rivers in their humanoid form desperately trying to get away from the dowser hunters of the empire that enslaves rivers in wheels of magical/technological binding to power cities, “Undercurrents” gives us the point of view of the bounty hunters themselves, the humans with dowsing ability, employed by the empire to find and hunt down rogue rivers. At first, I was nervous, as it literally puts you onto the side of those enslaving others, but very quickly Payseur makes it clear there’s more going on than the obvious evils, and that kept me going long enough to truly enjoy the whole of the performed piece (the audio performer, by the way, was excellent).

Again, there’s queerness just casually tossed into the tale (I love that so much), and Payseur’s world-building is just brilliant, and finding out the hows of dowsing, and glimpses of what life was like before the empire came along and enforced their ways was done with just enough to give the reader a sense of how much was at stake. It is almost too late for this world to be saved, if it’s possible at all. But “Undercurrents” ends with just enough hope that I was so very glad to have come along for the journey into this setting a second time.

Short Stories 366:24 — “The Lonely Sea in the Sky,” by Amal El-Mohtar

[image error]One of the really enjoyable things about listening to audiobook anthologies like Women Destroy Science Fiction is how neatly they fold into walking the doggo. I end up glancing down, seeing how long the story will be, and adjusting the walk accordingly. Sometimes, though, I end up outpacing a story and starting a new one and that’s what happened with “The Lonely Sea in the Sky.” The doggo says thank you, Amal El-Mohtar. He got a super-long walk for this one.

The story here started in such a strange place—with a woman writing a journal, and quite angry, about her diagnosis of a rare mental disorder where she’s, well, obsessed with diamonds. It takes a while for “The Lonely Sea in the Sky” to give the reader enough details to start to see what’s really at play, but it’s worth the wait, and the unreality of the start of the tale frames the rest in sharp relief. A lake of liquid diamond on Neptune. Quantum entanglement. A new technology that will change everything. And, again, a woman obsessed with diamonds.

The psychology of the woman, the unfolding events (read by a whole cast of voices, which really added pop to the performance), and the ultimate destination of “The Lonely Sea in the Sky” all come together to bring the reader to a payoff worth the journey and then some.

 

Short Stories 366:23 — “Tenari,” by Michael Merrian

[image error]We’re back in space today with Scourge of the Seas of Time (and Space), specifically with Michael Merrian’s “Tenari,” and oh, I enjoyed this so very much. One of things I was worried about heading in to this anthology was the idea of pirates as protagonists, and how often I’d likely be pretty much rooting for them to fail, given what pirates do. They’re not nice people, right?

Well, “Tenari” is a great example of how many of the authors dealt with this: by giving us a character who is absolutely flawed, yes, but who has turned to piracy for reasons that aren’t completely unsympathetic, and then presenting the reader with a situation where not only is the pirate sympathetic, the reader really, really wants them to succeed. Here we have a pirate crew deciding to take on a small cargo ship only to discover the cargo isn’t riches, it’s something far more valuable and puts the pirates in the position of having to defend it against a far greater evil.

Ultimately, the story works because the characters make the switch, become borderline heroic, and the plot allows for this growth despite it being a short story and despite the characters in question beginning in a place of moral lacking. There’s also just enough world-building that the sci-fi aspect gets to be front-and-centre as a motivator, and—something I keep saying in this anthology—I’d love to read more about this crew, picking up from where the story leaves us.