Aurealis “Suburban Canticle” by DJ Daniels
Reviewed by Clancy Weeks
“Suburban Canticle” by DJ Daniels tells the story of Mellie Lovelock and her daughter Lily, both caught up in an urban fantasy yarn of unknown stakes, proportion, and resolution. Set in present-day Sidney, Mellie has a hipster’s coffee habit, and magical abilities of some repute. The cast of characters around her include minor demons and/or warlocks, and (possible) goddesses and angels. Dan the angel (?) is kidnapped by MeBeThree, and Mellie works to gain his release in a dance that has become routine. It is also a ruse, and there are other forces at work. Once again I find myself hunting for the name of our protagonist, because of some unspoken aversion to giving it to the reader up front. From the very beginning we are told the names of just about all of the players—both major and minor—but it takes until near the end before we see the protagonist‘s name. I get that it’s a consequence of writing in first person, but any interaction (such as the one at the beginning at Lily’s school) offers a perfect opportunity to clear up the confusion. Regardless, there is some very nice writing here, even though the story has no real resolution. I get that it is a metaphor for the loss of a child to maturation, but such tales have been done to death. I kept waiting for the payoff from a very well-done bit of world-building that never came. Disappointing.
I can’t decide if Tracie McBride‘s “Breaking Windows” is SF, Fantasy, or just straight Horror. With many elements of each in place, it is a bit of all three. It’s the ending, though, that tips it over the edge to horror for me. Jess and Leo are your garden-variety suburbanites—though in a society dealing with a plague of demons systematically possessing human hosts. The only way to be absolutely sure they can’t get in is to replace your perfectly good human eyes with ocular prostheses. As the plague progresses, Leo pushes Jess to trade hers as he did, becoming less than human in the process. This is what demons do—frighten you into becoming something you’re not, giving up your humanity to save it. Recommended.
Clancy Weeks is a composer by training, with over two-dozen published works for wind ensemble and orchestra—his most recent work, “Blue Ice, Warm Seas,” was premiered in Houston on March 28, 2015—and an author only in his fevered imagination. Having read SF/F for nearly fifty years, he figured “What the hell, I can do that,” and has set out to prove that, well… maybe not so much. His first short story, “Zombie Like Me,” will appear in an upcoming issue of Stupefying Stories. He currently resides in Texas, but don’t hold that against him.