Black Gate

I know I said last time that I’d limit myself to covering issues of Analog that have dinosaurs on the cover. But Bob Eggleton’s cover for the June issue is so good I made an exception (click the image at right for a super-big version. You’re welcome.)

To be honest, I kinda gave up on Analog during the Stanley Schmidt era. The science was great, but the fiction just didn’t cut it for me. And since he was the longest-serving editor in the magazine’s history (34 long years, from 1978 to 2012), that’s virtually all of my adult life. I want to like Analog, I really do, but at this point it’s kinda like trying to date the girl who kissed you on the playground in Junior High… the memories are magical, but there’s been a lot of years, and a whole lotta great kisses, between then and now.

But I hear good things about the new editor, Trevor Quachri. Promising things. And Quachri sure knows how to pique my interest with his issue summaries. Here’s his enticing words for the June issue.

It’s rare that we’ll pick a later installment in a series to be the lead in an issue, but when the story is as good as Michael F. Flynn’s “The Journeyman: In the Great North Wood,” we make an exception. As the title suggests, we find Teodorq sunna Nagarajan in the Great North Woods, where he and his compatriots are roped into protecting a team of proto-archeologists, but of course, there’s more going on than anyone expects or understands. (And as ever, the story rewards close reading.)

We also have part two of Edward M. Lerner’s time travel fact piece, “Here we go Loopedy Loop,” as well as a story about time travel, Bill Johnson’s “When the Stone Eagle Flies”; and a story about, well, the opposite of time travel, in Marie Vibbert’s “Hold the Moment”; as well as Christopher L. Bennett’s tale of “Murder on the CisLunar Railroad”; Jay Werkheiser’s “The Anthropic War”; J.T. Sharrah’s tongue-in-cheek (but not entirely unrealistic) “The Nult Factor”; and Brandon Ghislain’s take on the dangers of taking some proverbs too literally in “That Which Grows on Trees.”

There’s a Bill Johnson story? I love Bill Johnson! We shared an office at Motorola about a hundred years ago, around the time he won a Hugo for his magnificent tale “We Will Drink a Fish Together.” I even bought a novella from him, “Mama Told Me Not to Come,” which I published in Black Gate 4. Okay, if Bill Johnson is back in Analog, things are definitely looking up.

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The cover story in the May/June issue of F&SF is Ted Kosmatka’s cave man tale “The Stone War.” Kevin P Hallett reviews it at Tangent Online, saying:

This novelette length fantasy reveals a world where a stone man lives with total indifference to the people passing through. The one brutal truth is that he kills anyone who directly or indirectly attacks him. At first, the consequences seem unimportant and localized. Until a king determines to find a way to use the stone man as a weapon to forward his desire for conquest. However, that proves to be much more of a challenge than he imagined. An interesting new look at what deterrent means and trying to curb our impulse to grow at the expense of others… well-written and engaging.

In fact, Kevin seems to like a lot of the May/June issue. Here he is on Albert E. Cowdrey’s “Steamboat Gothic.”

A horror mystery about a Louisiana sheriff investigating the gruesome murder of a film crew. Sheriff Chew has his own agenda that blurs the lines around justice, using fake evidence to pin the crime of someone who deserved to be jailed – a Deep Southern view. However, the real criminal turns out to be someone even the sheriff didn’t imagine. Cowdrey’s style quickly pulls the reader into the story, getting them invested in the characters and storyline. An enjoyable story to be sure.

The cover is by Max Bertolini. Here’s the complete Table of Contents.

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The contents of the May issue of online magazine Nightmare are now fully available at the magazine’s wesbite. This issue contains original short stories from Adam-Troy Castro and Lisa Goldstein, and reprints from Joe Hill and Sarah Langan.

Original Stories

“The Old Horror Writer” by Adam-Troy Castro
He’s harder to find than most. I have the basis for comparison because I’ve gotten to all of them sooner or later, from the big names to the obscurities. There are some who give up so thoroughly, and disappear so completely, that it’s as if they never existed at all. This guy’s far from the worst. He’s an old man now, twenty years removed from his last novel and ten from his last short story; he’s no longer a member of HWA or SFWA, and the agency that used to handle his interests now has him in their estate file.

“Sawing” by Lisa Goldstein
Clarissa watched from the wings as the Great Bertoldi sawed a woman in half. Down went the saw through the coffin-like box, then up, then down again. A cigarette burned at the side of his mouth, on the edge of his smile. The saw broke through the box. He put it down and slid metal plates between the two halves, then rolled the sections apart. The woman’s head poked out from the end of one of the sections, feet from the other.

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Last month we announced that Sean Wallace’s quarterly magazine of dark fantasy and horror The Dark was making some welcome changes — including switching to monthly publication, relaunching their podcast series, and starting up a Patreon account. Their last quarterly issue, May 2016, is now available, with original stories by Steve Berman and Kali Wallace, and reprints by Kaaron Warren and Angela Slatter.

The Dark is edited by Sean Wallace, with assistance by Jack Fisher. Here’s the Table of Contents.

“The Haferbräutigam” by Steve Berman
“The Body Finder” by Kaaron Warren (from Blurring the Line, 2015)
“Caroline at Dusk” by Kali Wallace
“The Jacaranda Wife” by Angela Slatter (from Dreaming Again, 2008)

You can read issues free online, or help support the magazine by buying the ebook editions, available for the Kindle and Nook in Mobi and ePub format. Issues are around 50 pages, and priced at $2.99 through Amazon, B&N.com, Apple, Kobo, and other fine outlets. A six issues sub used to be just $15, but I can’t find anything on their website (or at Amazon) about subscriptions — but you can still buy back issues.

If you enjoy the magazine you can contribute to their new Patreon account. Read the complete announcement, and sign up here. You can also support The Dark by buying their books, reviewing stories, or even just leaving comments.

Read the May issue here, and see their complete back issue catalog here. The cover for May is by Vincent Chong. We last covered The Dark with Issue 11; the next issue is due in June.

See our May Fantasy Magazine Rack here, and all of our recent Magazine coverage here.

The complete May issue of Lightspeed is now yours to enjoy free online. The month offers new fantasy by Seanan McGuire and Wole Talabi, and fantasy reprints by Tim Pratt and Elizabeth Hand, plus original science fiction by An Owomoyela and Mari Ness, and SF reprints by Haris A. Durrani and Tora Greve.

It also features author spotlights, book reviews by Amal El-Mohtar, a movie review by Carrie Vaughn, and an interview with Charlie Jane Anders. The ebook also includes a reprint of Hugh Howey’s “The Plagiarist” and a new excerpt Paolo Bacigalupi’s The Water Knife, out in trade paperback this month from Vintage Books.

The cover artist this issue is Goñi Montes. Here’s the complete contents for the May issue.

Fantasy

“The Jaws That Bite, The Claws That Catch” by Seanan McGuire
Mist flowed through the Tulgey Wood like treacle, slow and thick and unyielding. Squeaks and muffled chitters came from the underbrush as rabbits, foxes, and adolescent toves that hadn’t sensed the weather changing were caught and drowned in the gray-white mire. It would clear by noon, burnt off by the sun, and then the scavengers would come, making a feast of the small mist-struck creatures.

“North Over Empty Space” by Tim Pratt (Originally published at Patreon.com, 2015)
Sigmund came back to himself after a gray interval of unknown time, hunched in the yellow vinyl booth of an appallingly bright diner, his head aching from the night’s exertions. His partner Carlsbad sat across from him, drawing no attention at all, which struck Sigmund as strange even in his exhausted state. Carlsbad was a human-shaped figure, but he was unclothed, his face was entirely featureless, and he was composed of a viscous-looking black substance instead of flesh.

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The June issue of Asimov’s Science Fiction contains “What We Hold Onto,” a huge novella from Jay O’Connell, “Rats Dream of the Future” by Black Gate alum Paul McAuley, and a short story by Sarah Pinsker — who just won a Nebula for her short story in last year’s June Asimov’s, “Our Lady of the Open Road.” All that plus stories by Dominica Phetteplace, Mercurio D. Rivera, and Rick Wilber, and lots more. Here’s the full description from the website:

Jay O’Connell’s giant June 2016 novella takes an exquisite look at “What We Hold Onto” as well as what we are capable of letting can go. This story brilliantly imagines the future in robust details. With her marriage over and her mother dying, Sophia’s life is falling apart. To cope with the chaos, she hires a “Simplifier” and changes her life in ways she’s never anticipated. You won’t want to miss this remarkably inventive tale!

Paul McAuley envisions terrifying consequences when “Rats Dream of the Future”; as she is “Unreeled” back to reality, Mercurio D. Rivera’s astronaut may or may not be changed by her mission to a black hole; join Sarah Pinsker for a charming off-season visit to an Orchid Beach souvenir shop that has unusual post cards and tchotchke on sale in “Clearance”; Rick Wilber introduces us to a “Rambunctious” and unforgettable character; and this time, Bel speaks for herself as she explains what it’s like to live with a watcher in Dominica Phetteplace’s“Project Symmetry.”

In “My Trip to the Future,” June’s Reflections column, the intrepid Robert Silverberg muses on a brave new world; James Patrick Kelly’s On the Net reveals why “There’s Something About Mars”; Norman Spinrad’s On Books analyzes novels by David Walton, Ted Kosmatka, and Kim Stanley Robinson that could be all called “Very Hard Science Fiction”; plus we’ll have an array of poetry and other features you’re sure to enjoy. Look for our June issue on sale at newsstands on May 3, 2016.

Here’s the complete Table of Contents.

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Now that I’m home from the Nebula Awards and the Windy City Pulp and Paper show (and aaalmost finished unpacking all the great loot I brought back), I can start getting caught up. I’m way behind in my reading at Tor.com for example, and they do some darn fine stuff. The Fantasy/SF tale “Recalled to Service” by Alter S. Reiss looks like a splendid place to start.

Ao Laiei does not know what happened to the great revolutionary war hero Uroie Aei since she resurrected him, but she has long intended to find out. Finally, a clue from an unlikely information source – the confusing art of dream-diving – enables her to be present for a surprising strike against an academic aligned with the revolutionary government. Laiei quickly discovers that it is not the physical target she is concerned with, but his field of study, which may unlock the secret of what mysterious deeds the elusive Uroie Aei has been up to since his disappearance. This compelling tale from writer Alter Reiss is a rich look at the world of the Shoesi and the magic that drives Ao Laiei’s unique abilities.

Alter S. Reiss is the author of the Tor.com novella Sunset Mantle. “Recalled to Service” was posted at Tor.com on February 24. It was edited by Liz Gorinsky, and illustrated by Sung Choi. It’s available here.

We last covered Tor.com with Delia Sherman’s science fiction detective story “The Great Detective.” For more free fiction, see our recent online magazine coverage.

As it nears its landmark 200th issues, Beneath Ceaseless Skies has kicked off a subscription drive aimed at enabling the magazine to publish novellas for the first time (yeah!) The details are on the website, but here’s the basics.

BCS ebook subscriptions, available exclusively at WeightlessBooks.com, are only $15.99 for a full year/26 issues. (That’s less than 30 cents a story!) Subscribers can get issues delivered directly to their Kindle or smart phone, and they get new issues early, a week before the website. Forthcoming authors in BCS include Marie Brennan, Gregory Norman Bossert (whose first BCS story “The Telling” won the World Fantasy Award), Mishell Baker, KJ Kabza, Stephanie Burgis, Tony Pi, Catherynne M. Valente, Kameron Hurley, A.M. Dellamonica, Claude Lalumière, and more.

From now until June 3, if you buy a BCS ebook subscription or renew your existing subscription (you can renew at any time), you can help unlock our drive goals. Since BCS #1 in 2008 – 200 issues, 419 stories! – over a third of our fiction has been novelette-length or longer. Longer stories work great for awe-inspiring fantasy worlds, like you’ll find in every issue of BCS. Our word-count limit for submissions, 10,000 words, has always been among the longest if not the longest of pro-rate online magazines. With your help, we’d like to make it even longer!

• At 25 new/renewing subscribers, BCS will raise our submissions word-count limit to 11,000 words.
• At 50 new/renewing subscribers, we’ll raise our word-count limit to 12,000 words.
• At 100 new/renewing subscribers, we’ll raise it to 13,000 words.
• At 200 new/renewing subscribers, we’ll raise it to 15,000 words!

Every subscription makes a difference in helping us pay our authors, for their great stories of all lengths.

Beneath Ceaseless Skies is one of the top markets for adventure fantasy, and I’d be thrilled to see it start buying longer stories. At only $15.99 for a full year, it’s a terrific bargain. I bought my first subscription today, and I challenge Black Gate readers to follow my example. Let’s see if we can add 10 new subscriptions to the total.

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There’s plenty of great news for fantasy fans in May — including the successful launch of new top-tier magazine, Skelos, helmed by Jeffrey Shanks, Mark Finn, and Chris Gruber. We also wondered if Weird Tales was dead (it probably is), and started our coverage of Shock Totem — just in time for the magazine to go on hiatus. In the meantime, Rich Horton took a look at the January 1955 issue of Science Fiction Stories, containing short stories by Algis Budrys, Wallace West, and Raymond F. Jones, the author of This Island Earth.

In his April Short Fiction Round Up, Fletcher Vredenburgh reviews the latest issues of Swords and Sorcery Magazine and Heroic Fantasy Quarterly.

Swords and Sorcery Magazine #51  presented its usual complement of two stories in April… Jason Ray Carney. “The Ink of the Slime Lord” gave me nearly everything I could want from a S&S story: a wicked sorceress, dire magics, a dashing pirate, and plenty of monsters…. Carney’s complete lack of restraint and deeply purple prose are a large part of what made me dig this story completely. If you’re going to be extreme, go to 11. Good fun.

In James Lecky’s “But the Dreams of Men,” a man wracked by guilt over the horrible sins in his past inadvertently finds a path to redemption of sorts… Lecky does it quite well.  He consistently finds the right balance between characterization, narrative, and action. If you haven’t read him before, this is an excellent place to start.

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