For some reason, I’ve never really been much for subscribing to fiction magazines. I like a fair amount of short fiction, but I usually read it in anthologies for some reason. Every once in a while I pick up an issue of this magazine or that magazine and it usually sits in my stack unread. I don’t know why.
The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction posted an offer to bloggers though. Free July 2008 issue if you blog about it. Something like what Matthew Hughes offered on his book Template. So I signed up. Mostly because I am not obligated to read the issue, and maybe that will get me off my butt and read some fiction magazines. However, I won’t be commenting on the non-fiction stuff in this review. If something strikes my fancy, I may put up an opinion piece inspired by one of the columns or non-fiction pieces. Here though, just thoughts on the stories:
Fullbrim’s Finding
, Matthew Hughes- Coincidentally, Matthew Hughes has a story in this issue. I liked it better than I did Template, as it doesn’t have the
clunky
constructions and dialog that bothered me about the novel.Fullbrim’s Finding
is a story set in the Archonate universe, starring Henghis Hapthorn, Old Earth’s foremost discriminator. I’m not sure exactly what a discriminator is in Archonate parlance, but in this story it means Henghis is looking for Doldan Fullbrim. Kind of like a private investigator. Fullbrim was working on a theory of everything, and then disappeared, worrying his wife Caddice. Hapthorn follows Fullbrim to a remote world where pilgrims come to find out the meaning of the universe. Most everyone else who sought it there, found it, but all seem burnt out by the experience. It’s a nice take on the theme. The Roberts
, Michael Blumlein- I didn’t really get into this story. It’s a bit too scattered for me. Robert is an architect. He keeps falling in love with women. They inspire him, and get gets too into his work as a result. And then he neglects the women, and then he loses his inspiration because they leave him. Solution! Create a woman through cloning that fits his specifications perfectly, both conscious and unconscious. Not shockingly, this doesn’t actually solve the problem Robert has of getting too into his work. Then things get more complicated. The problem I had is that the story is all over the map: architecture, bio-engineering, cloning, self-fulfillment, and group marriage (of a sort).
Enfant Terrible
, Scott DalrympleEnfant Terrible
is Scott Dalrymple’s first published fiction, according to the blurb introducing the story. I really liked it, though it’s not particularly original. A common trope in S.F., fantasy, and horror is that where kids find out that adults are really aliens or demons or something like that. Dalrymple has a nice twist on the trope. It’s cute. It’s short. And I think it gets kids right.Poison Victory
, Albert E. Cowdrey- An alternate history story about
what if the Nazis had won World War 2
. It’s okay, though treading old territory. A war hero has second thoughts about Nazi Germany. The Dinosaur Train
, James L. Cambias- Jurassic Park meets carnies. Really really fun story! One of the dinosaurs in the circus is sick, and the carny doesn’t want to get help for fear his dinosaurs will be taken away. Nice interplay of father, son, and grandfather in this one too. By far my favorite story in the issue.
Out of five six stories, I really liked two three, two were middling, and one never engaged me (unfortunately the longest one). That’s not awful though a pretty solid issue for a fiction magazine. For the just-over-$2.50 per issue special blogger subscription price it’s worth it, so go grab that now before they yank it, and I don’t even get a cut of that.
So, just before I posted this, I went and read some of the other reviews of the issue. Mostly because I was looking for an image of the cover art so I wouldn’t have to go scan it myself. (I’ll probably just post without a cover image for now and insert it when F&SF posts the image.) Then I figured something out from reading these reviews. I thought Reader’s Guide
was non-fiction about something author Lisa Goldstein had just written. I just skipped it. But it’s not. It’s fiction in a different format. So now I go read that and add a review of it.
Reader’s Guide
, Lisa Goldstein- Well, damn. I’m glad I went back and read this. Part fiction, part humor, part essay. It’s a Reader’s Guide to the non-existent Winter Swan by non-existent Mary Bainbridge. Or at least I think non-existent as an author. I didn’t Google® it. Said reader’s guide being unauthorized and inserted into the book by an otherworldly shelver working in the library of the Lord of Story, whence all story ideas come. Inventive. Original. Funny.
6. How would the story be different if the characters were lemurs?
Yup, go read this.
The publishers of The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction provided me the copy that I reviewed for this post free of charge on the condition that I write something about it. There were no restrictions on the content.
