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standback's review
I found this a stellar issue. Almost every story hit home for me. Minor spoilers for all stories; major ones for "Price of Silence."
The Spiral Briar: Excellent fairy/engineering story... I love the portrayal of the fairies and how they interfere in mundane life - right on key. The entire conspiratorial tone was very well done; it certainly built up suspense and excitement. The ending had a surprise revelation I felt was a bit unfair, in the sense that it came very conveniently out of nowhere, but there were enough other great things going on that I didn't mind much.
"A Wild and Wicked Youth": I wasn't crazy about this one, but it was certainly very engaging. I wonder if I'm missing something important by not being familiar with Kushner's "Swordpoint"; I felt as if the story lacked direction, but I might well have been missing the significance of important links to the original novel. To some extent, I felt as if the author was using sex as a whip to move the story along every now and then; without the sex, the plot wouldn't be much to speak of, and I wasn't crazy about this. On the other hand, it's clear the sex is very central to the story, the atmosphere, and to Richard's development, so it's not really gratuitous. And again, it's an engaging story about the youth of an interesting character, so I definitely enjoyed it despite it not being my cup of tea.
The Price of Silence: Urgh. The one big misstep of the issue, to my taste. To be fair, I came in with a fairly negative bias, after reading a forum thread on the story, but it wasn't just the military bit that bothered me.
Basically, it felt like a particularly poorly written episode of Star Trek - ship investigates mysterious devastation, crew enters spooky abandoned station, station blows up, moral dilemma turns out in retrospect to have A) existed, B) been solved off-screen. In addition, I was completely cold to the characters - they seemed to have no personality except for their relative positions on a relationship diagram. Given this, the main thrust of the story was almost laughable.Devlin's so awed by being "one of the good guys", but all I, the reader was getting, was the author insisting that the crew is very warm and welcoming and Devlin is getting some indescribable feeling of belonging. Very convenient. I get the feeling that if the military had sent a couple of girls instead of March, and they'd flouted oh-so-inviting lines like "Our last doctor was one of us" and "Oh, Devlin! Hungry?" at him, he'd have been just as comfortable with them. He certainly doesn't seem to have any motivation other than that.
And as for the military bit... yeah, that was a bit annoying too. There were very few damning details about March and about the military he represents, except that "they're military, so they must be evil." On the other hand, the military's innate evil is no better established than the scientist's innate good.Oh, and have I mentioned how little sense it makes that the military send a representative before the destruction is generally known about, but they send him on a civilian ship full of people who hate the military? If they actually knew about this, then why not just send a military ship and be done with it? *sigh*[SPOILERS END]
One Bright Star To Guide Them: I enjoyed this one a ton, not the least for its balancing act between retreading Narnia et all, and deconstructing its tropes. Very quick, immediately engaging; seemingly simple but clearly hinting at more. I'll be rereading this one soon enough, trying to grasp it by the tail again.
The Avenger of Love I found pleasantly bizarre; maybe I'm not lost to slipstream yet after all. I think what I liked about it, as opposed to "Catalog" an issue or two back, was that the surreal journey was much more directed, much less aimless. I didn't know what was going on, but I had the protagonist and his quest to keep me anchored, and so I felt the surrealism wasn't just random weirdness - it was directed weirdness, yay!
Andreanna was lovely. Amazing short story. So full of personality and emotion, and fun on the way. Kudos.
Stratosphere I liked as well. The eventual outcome is fairly obvious from the beginning, and I think it's intended to be; I like the way that getting there was made so interesting, and the way the story continues to completely turn around the significance of that outcome. That's a lot of its point, really: making a strong impression doesn't make something true. The story carries this off exquisitely; baseball is a perfect analogy (or so I gather from the story; I'm not too familiar with the game beyond basic rules, but the story is very convincing...), and the story brings the most out of it.
It's late and I've written at length, so I'll skip the two reprints, save to say: I adored "Brave Little Toaster," "Sea Wrack" I felt that I didn't quite get; ce la vie.
Thanks for an excellent issue. I'll definitely be passing this around...
The Spiral Briar: Excellent fairy/engineering story... I love the portrayal of the fairies and how they interfere in mundane life - right on key. The entire conspiratorial tone was very well done; it certainly built up suspense and excitement. The ending had a surprise revelation I felt was a bit unfair, in the sense that it came very conveniently out of nowhere, but there were enough other great things going on that I didn't mind much.
"A Wild and Wicked Youth": I wasn't crazy about this one, but it was certainly very engaging. I wonder if I'm missing something important by not being familiar with Kushner's "Swordpoint"; I felt as if the story lacked direction, but I might well have been missing the significance of important links to the original novel. To some extent, I felt as if the author was using sex as a whip to move the story along every now and then; without the sex, the plot wouldn't be much to speak of, and I wasn't crazy about this. On the other hand, it's clear the sex is very central to the story, the atmosphere, and to Richard's development, so it's not really gratuitous. And again, it's an engaging story about the youth of an interesting character, so I definitely enjoyed it despite it not being my cup of tea.
The Price of Silence: Urgh. The one big misstep of the issue, to my taste. To be fair, I came in with a fairly negative bias, after reading a forum thread on the story, but it wasn't just the military bit that bothered me.
Basically, it felt like a particularly poorly written episode of Star Trek - ship investigates mysterious devastation, crew enters spooky abandoned station, station blows up, moral dilemma turns out in retrospect to have A) existed, B) been solved off-screen. In addition, I was completely cold to the characters - they seemed to have no personality except for their relative positions on a relationship diagram. Given this, the main thrust of the story was almost laughable.
And as for the military bit... yeah, that was a bit annoying too. There were very few damning details about March and about the military he represents, except that "they're military, so they must be evil." On the other hand, the military's innate evil is no better established than the scientist's innate good.
One Bright Star To Guide Them: I enjoyed this one a ton, not the least for its balancing act between retreading Narnia et all, and deconstructing its tropes. Very quick, immediately engaging; seemingly simple but clearly hinting at more. I'll be rereading this one soon enough, trying to grasp it by the tail again.
The Avenger of Love I found pleasantly bizarre; maybe I'm not lost to slipstream yet after all. I think what I liked about it, as opposed to "Catalog" an issue or two back, was that the surreal journey was much more directed, much less aimless. I didn't know what was going on, but I had the protagonist and his quest to keep me anchored, and so I felt the surrealism wasn't just random weirdness - it was directed weirdness, yay!
Andreanna was lovely. Amazing short story. So full of personality and emotion, and fun on the way. Kudos.
Stratosphere I liked as well. The eventual outcome is fairly obvious from the beginning, and I think it's intended to be; I like the way that getting there was made so interesting, and the way the story continues to completely turn around the significance of that outcome. That's a lot of its point, really: making a strong impression doesn't make something true. The story carries this off exquisitely; baseball is a perfect analogy (or so I gather from the story; I'm not too familiar with the game beyond basic rules, but the story is very convincing...), and the story brings the most out of it.
It's late and I've written at length, so I'll skip the two reprints, save to say: I adored "Brave Little Toaster," "Sea Wrack" I felt that I didn't quite get; ce la vie.
Thanks for an excellent issue. I'll definitely be passing this around...
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