Interzone #290/291, August 2021
“A Hollow in the Sky” by Alexander Glass
“The Andraiad” by Tim Major
“Pace Car” by Lyle Hopwood
“An Island for Lost Astronauts” by Daniel Bennett
“A Stray Cat in the Mountain of the Dead” by Cécile Cristofari
“Nemesis” by Matt Thompson
“The Mischief that is Past” by John Possidente
“The Egg Collectors” by Lavie Tidhar
“Without Lungs or Limbs to Stay” by Shauna O’Meara
Reviewed by Kevin P Hallett
After a brief hiatus, Interzone has returned with a double issue #290 and #291. It includes nine original stories, including three novelettes. It was an entertaining collection of stories well worth the effort to pick up and read.
“A Hollow in the Sky” by Alexander Glass
This SF novelette is set in a possible future where humankind has formed the Gathering, a collective of minds where everyone is subservient and dedicated to the collective. But there are a few, like Mateo, that defect and are known as scatterlings. Mateo lives now at a monastery and tends to its pulp-creating wasps.
Years before, the Borers first entered the dimension near Earth, drifting in and then out of that dimension. The Gathering sees the Borers as a form of validation for their advanced life-form.
One day a node from the Gathering appears and tells Mateo that his friend and fellow scatterling, Tomoko, has reappeared after passing through another dimension with the Borers. Mateo goes to where the Borers have reappeared and finds a hibernating Tomoko. When she wakes, she has news from the Borers that shakes the Gathering’s confidence.
The author developed the characters well and created a story with enough mystery to keep the reader’s attention.
“The Andraiad” by Tim Major
Martin is not entirely a good man in this SF short. He is a good father and musician, playing the church organ on Sundays; he loves his daughter and is unfaithful to his wife. And so, it isn’t a surprise that some other woman’s husband attacks him. The surprise is when he wakes up a changed man.
His daughter, Ruth, pays for the new Martin, and she gets all that she ever wanted from her father. He becomes a model member of the community. But there is a secret that only he and Ruth know.
The author did an excellent job of revealing the story’s secrets slowly, letting the reader find out for themselves what had happened. And then it had an emotion-twisting ending.
“Pace Car” by Lyle Hopwood
Alisa is a gearhead and survivor of the Gate apocalypse in this original SF novelette. The Gates are scattered all over the planet by an alien civilization to allow humans to teleport between places instantly. Mana from heaven, the people thought, but the Gates enable diseases to spread and create lazy people. Over a short time, billions die, leaving behind people more interested in living like hermits.
Alisa has a collection of muscle cars at her isolated house in the hills of Southern California. She invites Ben, a mechanic, to come and check them all out. She wasn’t expecting Ben to be half goat and half man. And his presence forces her to reevaluate her feelings about the Gates and the eventual fate of humankind.
This was a thought-provoking read with good world-building and a unique source for a human apocalypse.
“An Island for Lost Astronauts” by Daniel Bennett
He lives in a drowned part of East City in this post-climatic SF short. This is the place where the unwanted go. People who have completed their prison time, like him, or were one of the astronauts from the failed attempts at space colonization.
On these islands outside the city’s high dykes, the unwanted live a life of companionship and mutual support but little long-term hope. And eventually, as the seawaters continue to bloat, the islands are not safe. He is one of the last to leave, leaving behind the lost astronauts who continue to look wistfully across the waters.
The author developed a fascinating world but did not set much of a story in that imaginative future.
“A Stray Cat in the Mountain of the Dead” by Cécile Cristofari
In this short fantasy, Fethia works in a home for the elderly during a sweltering summer. Many people are dying at the hospice, and the authorities look for reasons beyond the hot temperatures. A stray cat, Gaspard, becomes a suspect. No one thinks he kills the elderly, but somehow they die soon after he sits on their lap.
Fethia does her best to cheer up her patients and play down any role Gaspard could play. But she has her own health concerns. Then one day, she finds Gaspard sitting on the lap of her favorite patient.
Cristofari’s story had a faint hint of a strange spiritual presence. It was a short read with few speculative elements.
“Nemesis” by Matt Thompson
A woman is in therapy after a nervous breakdown in this SF short set in the next century. Hari takes drugs morning and night to help get her back to reality. But things don’t seem right. Her wife seems standoffish and the therapist impatient.
Hari’s dreams don’t change; she sees another person with a massive solar system tattoo. And then she begins to notice a strange woman who warns her that not all is as it seems, including the year she thinks she is living in.
The author steeped this story in many mysteries. And gave it an ending with many twists, but it was an ending that felt contrived.
“The Mischief that is Past” by John Possidente
Debin is a journalist on the Earth-orbiting Humboldt space station in this SF short. He faces a double-play of problems as his girlfriend wants to add a third person, and the authorities revoke his journalist license for some shady reporting.
Because of the revoked license, he flees the space station and runs into a stranger spinning a crazy story that Sacagawea didn’t die in 1812. The story gets past Debin’s ‘that’s garbage’ defenses, and he becomes convinced Sacagawea hides in the ice-making equipment on Humbolt.
This is another story in the author’s Humboldt series, and it twists three subplots together but concludes none, leaving the reader suspended from three strings as if waiting for the next tale in the sequence.
“The Egg Collectors” by Lavie Tidhar
Two sisters, Mona and Lina, sail under their balloons on Titan in this SF short. Titan has a thriving human colony, but Mona prefers her solitude. It is a point of contention between the two siblings after their parents disappeared years before.
After an ice storm forces them to land by the polar region, they seek shelter in an underground oasis building. But even this is claustrophobic to Mona, and she convinces Lina to join her for a walk. In the nearby hills, they find three mysterious black eggs melting their way into the ice. They remind Mona of her time as a soldier during a war.
This character-driven story had plenty of world-building, but the plot fizzled away at the end.
“Without Lungs or Limbs to Stay” by Shauna O’Meara
Two Watchers watch over Chrissa’s hibernating body in this SF novelette set on a ship cruising deep space to nowhere. They watch the video of Chrissa’s last days on Earth as they prepare the cryo-pod and its contents for reclamation in the crop area. They and others before them had done this over two thousand times.
But something in the video holds their attention, Chrissa was a sea biologist, and sea dragons are swimming in the tanks of the videos. It is against the rules, but the Watchers decide to wake Chrissa first to ask her about these creatures. But Chrissa has been asleep for many generations, and the ship’s environment has changed. Still, Chrissa’s waking stirs many emotions in the Watchers and the other crew members.
The author has written a story that grabs the reader’s attention from the mysterious beginning to the poignant ending.
You can follow Kevin P Hallett’s writing on www.kevinphallett.com