Clarkesworld is a monthly on-line magazine edited by Neil Clarke.
Everything is available in HTML from
the magazine's site, and
it can be bought in various other formats.
"Distant Stars" by P H Lee is one of those terribly clever stories
that tries to do "as above, so below" and make parallels between the
wonders of the universe and the utterly mundane breakup of two
relationships. It's been done. This says nothing that hasn't been said
many times before.
"AirBody" by Sameem Siddiqui posits a system in which people rent out
their bodies (and homes) to virtual travellers. Some decent ideas
about not assuming stereotypes, but it doesn't go anywhere.
"A System for Investigating Recapitulation and Evolutionary Novelty"
by Kyle E Miller has a thoroughly bizarre setting (each person lives,
isolated, on their own "leaf") and some interest in exploring it, but
no people worth speaking of. "L", like any person in this society,
basically knows nothing, not even why she feels an urge to rebel.
"The ThoughtBox" by Tlotlo Tsamaase seems like a tawdry tale of
relationship failure and then gets a bit more interesting.
"Debtless" by Chen Qiufan, translated by Blake Stone-Banks: there's a
good societal revolution here, and an idea about space mining that's
really not as new as it thinks it is, but the author's insistence on
having debt encoded in a blockchain into your genes so that you can
pass it on to your children just died for me at the first plausibility
check. (What if you have more than one child? What if your level of
debt changes after you've had the child?)
"Angel Pattern" by Henry Szabranski is a sequel to last year's
excellent The Witch of the Weave, which should really be read first.
The protagonists of that book travel through the ultra-tech
post-apocalypse and reach their goal. Good mood and description,
decent characters, and a reasonable plot. (And it has a disabled
character whose disability is relevant to the story, rather than just
being box-ticking representation.)
"A Machine for Telling Stories: Tarot and Speculative Fiction" by
Carrie Sessarego is a very brief overview of the history of the Tarot
deck and of its use in F&SF. The latter tends to fall into mere
listing.
"Short Stories and Sad Endings: A Conversation with Martha Wells" by
Arley Sorg reminds me that Network Effect is coming out in May. But
there's also some interesting material on the shape of her career.
"From Kibbutz to Career: A Conversation with Lavie Tidhar" by Arley
Sorg reminds me that I've read three Tidhar short stories and not
particularly liked any of them. Tidhar has that mannerism I've seen in
many Israelis of making everything a brag as well as actually
answering the question; it's probably normal behaviour in that culture
but I find it offputting.
"Editor's Desk: Lockdown" by Neil Clarke talks about, not working from
home, but continuing to do so when other members of the household have
just started.
The Szabranski is very much the stand-out here, though tye Tsamaase
stayed with me more than I expected it to.
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