Analog, September/October 2022
“Shepherd Moons” by Jerry Oltion
“The Power of Apollo” by Marianne J. Dyson
“Return Blessing” by Raymund Eich
“Companion” by Ron Collins
“The Butcher of Farside Hover” by Jonathan Sean Lyster
“One Night at the Wandering Comet” by Liz A. Vogel
“Shoot Your Shot” by Rich Larson
“Inheritance” by Hannah Yang
“Self-Regulation” by Ian Creasey
“Jebeni Problem” by P.K. Torrens
“Out of the Red Lands” by Marissa Lingen
“Doom Patch” by James Sallis
“Bumblebot” by Marie Vibbert
“The Rebel Feed” by Ted Rabinowitz
“No One the Wiser” by Tom Greene
“Web Accessibility for Aliens” by Sean Vivier
“What was Your Inspiration?” by Sloane Leong
“Stepping Out” by Timons Esaias
“Taking the Waters” by Tim McDaniel
“A Stone’s Throw” by Gregory Feeley
“Each Separate Star” by Jonathan Sherwood
“Kingsbury 1944” by Michael Cassutt
Reviewed by Mike Bickerdike
This bimonthly issue of Analog has a lot on offer, containing a novella by Michael Cassutt, 4 novelettes, 15 short stories and 2 pieces of flash fiction.
“Shepherd Moons” by Jerry Oltion, is a novelette in which the real-life impact of a spacecraft with an asteroid, occurring this year, is given a fictional treatment. The DART spacecraft (Double Asteroid Redirection Test) is being undertaken by NASA to determine how much an asteroid can be redirected by collision, with impact due on 26th September 2022. In Oltion’s story based on these contemporary events, the impact and damage to the asteroid reveal an alien presence in our solar system, which is followed up by a manned mission to the asteroid. It’s quite a nice idea, but it unfortunately fails to translate into a particularly interesting or believable story. The protagonist doesn’t convince as a lead astronaut, and the tale would have been more engaging if the prose axiom of ‘show don’t tell’ was more often adhered to. Overall, rather a missed opportunity for a cool real-life tie-in.
“The Power of Apollo” by Marianne J. Dyson is a lunar adventure novelette and follows a long history of tales of lone astronauts stranded—or otherwise in dire straits—on the moon. In this tale, an astronaut travels out to the site of the old Apollo 16 lunar module (the ascent stage crashed back onto the moon in 1973) to recapture its generator. Rather like the first story in this issue, this tale unfortunately fails to succeed, as it creates little tension, and presents another unconvincing heroine, who lacks the skill, poise and confidence one would expect would be necessary to be chosen for the mission.
“Return Blessing” by Raymund Eich is quite an enjoyable short story. A lazy young man stationed on an alien world, living off his father’s stipend, spends one day a week sending back film of the native aliens to his father. His easy life is interrupted, however, when one alien stops him and requests that he “return blessing’’—a request he must fulfil but doesn’t understand. It’s quite a nice idea and is brightly written. The aliens are well presented, and in tone it’s rather reminiscent of a ‘golden age’ SF tale.
“Companion” by Ron Collins is a very short story, but it’s rather a good one. The story is told from the perspective of a robot, with which there appears to be a significant fault. But in seeing into the robot’s thoughts and motivations, we see that things are more complex. While this doesn’t perhaps have quite the impact or pathos of classic tales of this type (such as Simak’s “I Am Crying All Inside”), it is sufficiently thought-provoking to raise it above the average and it’s recommended reading.
“The Butcher of Farside Hover” by Jonathan Sean Lyster is a kind of brief reworking of Tom Godwin’s classic idea in his story “The Cold Equations.” In this version, however, a brutal and slightly unsavoury solution is found. This also marks the second example of a lunar disaster story in the same issue. Space-based disasters are so commonplace in short SF that it requires a superior plot or surprising twist to bring something new to the sub-genre. This short tale doesn’t quite successfully achieve that.
“One Night at the Wandering Comet” by Liz A. Vogel is humorous flash fiction and doesn’t really have very much to offer—flash fiction is rarely especially impressive in truth, as it generally cannot immerse the reader in so brief a tale. Here, an encounter with aliens in a bar leads to a messy conclusion. It’s perfectly readable, but also skipable.
“Shoot Your Shot” by Rich Larson is a short tale of a club pick-up. A young man gains confidence and energy from a hit of cocaine and manages to pick up a beautiful girl. His night concludes with unexpected results. It’s a little too short but is well written and is quite an entertaining read.
“Inheritance” by Hannah Yang tells the story of an aging Chinese US immigrant with dementia, who wills her memories to her daughter—a process that can occur through memory transfer before the woman’s dementia becomes too far advanced. The story alternates between the perspectives of one daughter, Grace, and key memories of the mother that relate to her relationship with her daughter. Exploring the causes of a rift between the two women, the story is thoughtful and well-constructed.
If some of the stories in this issue of Analog seem a little mundane or lacking in imagination, the same cannot be said for the novelette “Self-Regulation” by Ian Creasey. In a far future of infinite multiverses, the technology to hop between universes has been invented, leading to instances where certain people exist (and work together) with alternates of themselves from across the multiverse. With an infinite number of universes to play in, travelling salesmen hop around the multiverse selling planet-destroying warheads for mass entertainment. This is written in a tongue-in-cheek, irreverent style and makes for quite an interesting read. It’s certainly science fiction, but it’s so extreme in its ‘speculation’, it bears more relation to the boundary-pushing New Wave of Moorcock than to Analog’s typical hard SF.
“Jebeni Problem” by P.K. Torrens is a rather densely written, sober story that relates a Yugoslav space mission to an alien world. The process of waking from cryosleep upon arrival at the distant planet led to one of the two astronauts acquiring aphasia and motor skill impairments. Moreover, the crew of two are a couple who lost a baby to miscarriage. Despite these emotional and physical challenges, they must analyse and better understand the biology on the planet. This concept had the potential to be an immersive and engrossing read, but unfortunately it’s presented in an overly dry style, and it fails to draw the reader in. The reason why two Yugoslav citizens have been sent to the world is not addressed, and the biological mystery of the alien ‘Sacks’ manages to be poorly explained, despite the author providing a surfeit of technical detail regarding their molecular biology. It doesn’t make for easy reading, unfortunately.
“Out of the Red Lands” by Marissa Lingen is too short to effectively convey the story it sets out to tell. In a dystopian post-climate change Earth, a woman in Luxembourg invents a mining robot that can transform the stalled colonisation efforts of Mars. Unfortunately, there are too many threads here to develop any one of them satisfactorily in only a few pages, and the tale’s brevity also undermines the believability of the tale.
“Doom Patch” by James Sallis is described in the contents as a short story, and it is, but at only 2 pages, this is effectively flash fiction. An artist stuck in a rut is looking for some sort of spark to jolt him back into a happier frame of mind. He takes a patch that should provide what he needs. The tale is okay and the relationship between the artist and his wife rings true, but the SF element is minimal, and it’s rather a slight offering.
“Bumblebot” by Marie Vibbert is also short but manages to express quite a clear and engaging plot and is therefore more successful than some other entries here. A divorcee runs an urban allotment and brings in a mechanical bee to help the dwindling natural bee population. Her interactions with her ex-husband reveal a parallel in how small contributions can potentially have a big impact. Vibbert has proven to be a highly reliable writer of short form SF, and this continues her successful run in recent years.
“The Rebel Feed” by Ted Rabinowitz is quite an imaginative story, set on a backwaters colony world, supported by the occasional visit of slower than light ships. Research and its funding on-world is dictated by the receipt of information signals coming in from approaching ships, years ahead of their arrival. Traders gamble on technology futures based on interpretation of these information feeds. One such researcher and trader hopes to gain advantage from the interpretation of a ‘rebel feed’ from an approaching fleet. The tale is quite inventive and presents an intriguing consequence of slower than light interstellar travel.
“No One the Wiser” by Tom Greene is an entertaining novelette, set after the ‘Breakdown’ of civilisation on a future Earth that now swelters under very high temperatures. In the hills near a small outlying town a band of back-to-basics humans who have ‘gengineered’ themselves to live on foliage (folivores), may have infringed corporate intellectual property rights. A representative of the genetics company visits the town with a view to interview the folivores. But is the man what he seems? The tale is well told, provides good imagery and SF ideas and is one of the more entertaining stories in this issue. While not a criticism of this tale, per se, readers who enjoy SF for its escapism may not find that escape here. The dystopian world Greene envisages, with its breakdown of society, paucity of fresh water, and almost unbearable temperatures is not only well-drawn, but all too likely to actually occur. This isn’t escapism, so much as dread realism. It’s good and well realised, but it’s also slightly depressing.
“Web Accessibility for Aliens” by Sean Vivier is a short story that describes how a web tool of the future should be developed differently to accommodate the cultural and biological differences between alien races. As a story, it lacks tension and falls a little flat. As allegory, on the need to accommodate diversity given how different cultures interact with technology, it contains reasonable ideas and is quite inventive, but it’s perhaps slightly blunt in its messaging.
“What was Your Inspiration?” by Sloane Leong concerns the creation of a multimedia virtual reality sculpture by a young artist who is sensitive to how her work will be received. Once her latest piece is displayed, it comes into criticism from online viewers and ‘trolls’. The story highlights how the misinterpretation of art is the reviewer’s problem, not the artist’s, and how web-based comments can get out of hand. It’s very topical in subject and approach, of course. That said, it doesn’t really present much of a plot—or contain any SF ideas—and so it fell short for me, accordingly.
In the flash fiction piece, “Stepping Out” by Timons Esaias, a man goes for a short walk on the surface of Venus, with ill consequences. It’s very short and a bit silly.
“Taking the Waters” by Tim McDaniel is a light, comedic short story. Aliens have arrived on Earth and are siphoning away our seas for their own uses. Two oceanographers on a beach meet and negotiate with one of the aliens. Minimal attention is given in this story to providing a realistic or believable scenario, instead it offers a wry and light-hearted tale in the vein of a golden age SF joke. It does offer commentary on the state of our oceans’ pollution, however, and offers a light change of pace from some of the issue’s more sombre content.
“A Stone’s Throw” by Gregory Feeley is a short but quietly impressive story. Two tiny moons orbiting Neptune travel in oppositely circling orbits: one retrograde, one prograde. Only coming into close proximity on fleeting occasions, two lovers are separated between the moons. One hatches a plot to travel between the moons to reunite. It’s very short, and this is the main criticism; there’s enough mood, imagery and style here to suggest it could be expanded into an improved longer tale.
“Each Separate Star” by Jonathan Sherwood is a well written, successful short story. A young worker at a space debris tracking station in the present day seems to have detected an unusual small object approaching Earth. She and her boss investigate the strange phenomenon. Full of little details that ring true and which also bespeak the author’s knowledge of current space tracking sites and technology, this is a short but gripping little tale. Recommended.
The novella “Kingsbury 1944” by Michael Cassutt concludes this issue of Analog. This superior tale gives a fictional account of life at the Kingsbury Ordnance Plant in 1944, at a time when the lab head was one Edward E. ‘doc’ Smith (of Lensman fame) and the administration manager was Charles O. Finley, who in real life later became a famous businessman and the owner of the Oakland Athletics baseball team. Into this fascinating true scenario the fictional character of Kramer is dropped. An ex minor league baseball player and now a young chemist who failed the war draft, Kramer is brought in to Kingsbury by Finley, to join E.E. ‘doc’ Smith’s ordnance chemistry team (optimizing mine charges and so on) and also to act as a ‘ringer’ in the company baseball team. Kramer learns there is more to the work being undertaken by Smith’s team than management realises however, and his discovery provides tension and conflict. The portrait Cassutt paints of Smith is appealing and fascinating, showing a good man in difficult circumstances who is self effacing about his sideline: writing ‘scientifiction’. Finley is a much less sympathetic character, but Cassutt rounds out all the players so no one seems wholly good or bad. It will be particularly interesting for many to read a fictionalised account of Smith’s time at Kingsbury, given that the 1941 section of his Lensmen novel Triplanetary was so closely based on his own experiences during the war at the ordnance plant. Overall, this was an engrossing and well-written tale that will especially appeal to anyone who’s enjoyed Smith’s classic SF books.
More of Mike Bickerdike’s reviews and thoughts on science-fiction can be found at https://starfarersf.nicepage.io/