Crossed Genres #31, July 2015

Reviewed by Herbert M. Shaw

Crossed Genres’ July 2015 issue explores a lengthier concept in storytelling: the Novelette. These much longer stories (all around 9000 words) explore the ideas of global extinction, extraterrestrial invasion, and paranoid schizophrenia. Rather than using the extra verbiage to explore more characters or subplots relevant to the story’s general ongoings, these three authors seem to concentrate heavily on the development of their primary protagonists. Each story features a female main character, whose perspective sets the tone in each regard. In general, the plots all develop rather slowly and not to any particularly definitive conclusions save for the main character’s last expressed thoughts.

The first story is about the robotic transcendence of a terminally ill patient’s consciousness in “Elegy for the Green Earthrise.” Without detailing the causes, Joanne Rixon introduces the idea of the dissemination of Earth’s ability to sustain life as we know it, starting with the extinction of frogs. An experiment is proposed for where we will go after, and how the main character, a materials physicist, is dying slowly from skin cancer. Rixon herself is a melanoma survivor, which she said in an interview with CG is why she gave the main character that disease. Although the details of cancer treatments and deterioration are never explored in detail, Rixon gives the reader an honest look into a fantasy she may have had before winning her battle in real life. A fantasy where the fate of the future relies on one physicist’s capability to cope as a sentient robot traveling through space.

Next is “By the Numbers,” a rather entertaining tale about a high-functioning autistic teacher whose fascination with mathematics makes her an unlikely (and maybe unfavorable) candidate to decipher alien messages in a futuristic school in New Mexico, though the R-word won’t be found here. Lynn Kilmore takes the idea of an alien invasion and plays with it in the fashion only an interested scientific mind could appreciate. The process of using mathematics to communicate with extraterrestrial intelligence would have made Carl Sagan proud. Kilmore also perfectly captures the trepidation of the general public as the story progresses and the messages become more advanced. An ambiguous ending might keep the reader guessing as to what happens, but no doubts about the satisfaction of fulfillment.

Last is a primarily fantasy-realmed story with elements of thriller/suspense scattered around. “Little Men with Knives” reads like a cross between Willard and a popular Chuck Palahniuk story. After her husband classically leaves her for his secretary, a woman carrying the burdens of her past examines the ongoings of her surroundings in the late 70s. Amidst her circle of concern are an abusive workplace and an abusive neighboring married couple. She reluctantly and inconspicuously attends to several of the titular small men, who in turn seem to respond to her anxiety by doing her dirty work. But is it really her dirty work they are doing? And is it really them? L. S. Johnson diverts her attention from the aspects of typical science fiction to focus a bit more on horror when the reader gets a chance to really look into the mind of the lead female character, who makes trauma out of drama. Unsettling and disturbing, it does maintain some Hitchcockian allure throughout this last novelette of the issue.