Fantasy & Science Fiction, May/June 2022
“The Voice of a Thousand Years” by Fawaz Al-Matrouk
“Cold Trade” by Aliya Whiteley
“Give Me English” by Ai Jiang
“The Canopy” by Norman Spinrad
“Green Street” by S. R. Mandel
“Breathless in the Green” by Octavia Cade
“Ninety-Five Percent of the Ocean” by Jennifer Hudak
“The Hunger” by James Enge
“The Mechanic” by Julie Le Blanc
“Modern Cassandra” by Julia August
“An Ill-Fated Girl Happens to Meet an Ill-Fated Man” by P. H. Lee
“Nightmares Come From Stolen Dreams” by Taemumu Richardson
“The Angel’s Call” by Jae Steinbacker
“Mother, Mother” by Shreya Ila Anasuya
“L’Enfant Terrible” by Mark H. Huston
“The Big Many” by Albert E. Cowdrey
“The True Meaning of Father’s Day” by John Wiswell
Reviewed by Kevin P Hallett
F&SF‘s May/June issue has seventeen first publication stories, including two novelettes and three flash stories. As befits such a storied publication, this issue had many worthwhile tales to read.
“The Voice of a Thousand Years” by Fawaz Al-Matrouk
The old man, Haider ibn Hashem, is recreating history lost to the Mongol hordes in this short fantasy. In his workshop is an ancient qanun possessed by an alien spirit from before humans could speak. Through the qanun’s strings, the spirit asks Haider to make him an automaton so it can move about once more.
It is Haider’s life’s work to recover what he could after the Mongols sacked Baghdad, and he sees this as a way to leave one last gift before he must face death. He pours his heart and soul into creating an automaton, but each model fails. Worse still, his son sets out to destroy his work, fearing that he has taken up idol worship. With the world against him, Haider endeavors to persevere.
The sense of impending demise pulls this story through to its end, leaving the reader wondering how it will turn out.
“Cold Trade” by Aliya Whiteley
This short SF takes place on a planet with no name. The Artisan’s crew are the Galaxy’s best traders and have come to trade with the giants, a large species of sea creature that has never responded to anything in the past. Filli watches the giants through the porthole, wondering what these creatures could want.
The Artisan will trade anything, even emotions like anger or resentment. And after two of the five crew members died at the last stop, Filli has plenty of both. So far, nothing has worked, and failure to trade would mean a disastrous loss of reputation.
It was an unusual tale that kept most of its cards hidden until the end. It was an entertaining story that just managed to keep on the correct side of the confusion/mystery boundary.
“Give Me English” by Ai Jiang
Gillian slowly sells her words in this short SF so she can live in New York. She came from China hoping for a better chance in America, but the cost of living here dooms her to run out of words slowly, and when they’re all gone, she will become a Silent.
At first, she clings to her Chinese phrases so that she can talk to her parents back home. But Chinese words sell for a premium, and she had to sell them to get more English words. Soon she has less than five hundred words, and many conversations come as garbled to her. Somehow she had to find meaning in a world where employers were only interested in multilingual people.
This story was a parody of the rich getting richer. Though the story seemed slow at times, the message was clear enough.
“The Canopy” by Norman Spinrad
The elevator to Christine’s fifty-ninth-floor apartment is out of service in this SF novelette. So, she accepts an NYC cop’s offer to take her up to the canopy above the skyscrapers so she can walk to the roof of her apartment building. At least walking down twenty-one floors is easier than climbing fifty-nine.
However, the canopy is where the canos live, the poor and homeless of the ‘Pig Apple.’ It’s a place Christine has only seen in movies and reality TV shows. It wasn’t a place she had thought about before. In fact, she even voted against giving any of the canos access to her building’s elevator.
Now she sees the reality for the canos. And like any group of people, some are good and some bad. But the majority are just people trying to get by.
The author created an imaginative new version of NYC but then wasted it with a story that didn’t become engaging until two-thirds of it had passed.
“Green Street” by S. R. Mandel
A cartographer is searching for mythical Green Street in this short fantasy. It is where people in dire need find solace. And the map makers want to plot a route to the location.
But after interviewing a few people who went there, the Directors decide to stop funding the research. Leaving the cartographer despondent and maybe now ready to find the mythical place.
The author told the story in a humorous way, but even that did little to make this story interesting.
“Breathless in the Green” by Octavia Cade
The author sets this short fantasy/horror in a green scum-covered pond. Ginny Greenteeth is a primordial creature who drowns little children if they venture too close to her pond. She’s been doing this for longer than she can remember. But the death of wildlife and the advent of industrialization has made it too dangerous because people will now miss the children.
Then she meets a little girl who isn’t afraid of her. In fact, the little girl wants to drown people too. She wants to drown the big people who don’t care about climate change. Ginny thinks the girl may have a good point.
This story was an intriguing view of protecting the planet. It made for a quick and entertaining read.
“Ninety-Five Percent of the Ocean” by Jennifer Hudak
In this flash fantasy, a girl grows up aware that she has a doppelganger in the ocean. The ocean version calls to her, saying she is different but also the same. And when she’s a teenager, and the boys ignore her, she wonders if she should join her double under the waves.
Hudak’s story hinted at the challenges of coming of age, but it didn’t engage the reader enough.
“The Hunger” by James Enge
Tilsyni runs away from a life of captivity and toward Skeleton Park in this short fantasy. She either lives or dies; it matters not, so long as she is free at last. Along the road, she encounters a man hobbling in her direction. He agrees to let her walk beside him so she wouldn’t die alone in Skeleton Park.
As the sun sets and the three moons rise, the skeletons begin to appear, intent on killing and eating any trespassers. When the old traveler cuts down three skeletons feeding on another traveler, Tilsyni advises him not to annoy the skeletons that way. Soon hundreds began creeping out from the nearby forest.
This story’s prose was light and easy to read, and the plot was interesting. The mystery effortlessly pulled the reader through the story.
“The Mechanic” by Julie Le Blanc
Le Blanc sets this short SF on a world of cyborgs and androids. Bell has had most of herself replaced with robotic parts, but she is getting old and can’t move too well. Still, she works on repairing Ken, her lover, who malfunctioned a year ago.
Bell needs one more part to finish repairing Ken, and that part exists inside the mostly abandoned town three hours away. A place where pirates roam, looking for anything of value, including whatever Bell can find to barter for the missing part.
This was an easy-to-read character-driven story that was fun to read.
“Modern Cassandra” by Julia August
Apollo fools Cassandra into foretelling the future in this flash fantasy. However, the predictions he gives in her dreams are mundane details that no one cares about, condemning Cassandra to send out emails no one responds to. If only she could get some meaningful predictions that could make a difference.
This tale was a quick and modern take on an old Greek myth.
“An Ill-Fated Girl Happens to Meet an Ill-Fated Man” by P. H. Lee
A beautiful but poor girl loves a magician in this short fantasy set in old China. Their love leads to problems for them both as she becomes a concubine to the Qing dynasty Emperor. When the jealous courtiers execute her on trumped-up court intrigues, the magician’s sorrow causes the heavens to rain salty tears.
The land is devastated, but the only solution the court magicians can devise makes the situation worse, bringing ruination to all in the land.
This story was told like an old parable and made for a light and entertaining read.
“Nightmares Come From Stolen Dreams” by Taemumu Richardson
This SF/fantasy short story is set in the future after the ‘melt’ and tells the tale of Limbed Serpent. She is the snake charmer for Snake, a hydra-like massive snake that raised her from a baby. Limbed Serpent is immune to Snake’s venom and can telepathically communicate with Snake when they touch.
When Limbed Serpent and Snake go to the Full Moon Market, it is to give a show, earn some money, and find a small child for Snake to eat. Limbed Snake secretly hopes they find a child immune to the poison, so she can be freed from being the charmer, a role she has often tried to escape. But at this market, they find the tables turned on them by a group of mercenaries who have their own plans for Snake’s potent venom.
This intriguing story was different and a pleasure to read, keeping the reader engrossed until the end.
“The Angel’s Call” by Jae Steinbacker
In this short fantasy, Bron is growing wings after the angel’s call. But she resists the growth after hearing that the new angels are killing everyone and fears she will do the same to her girlfriend Kayla. When Bron and Kayla try to hide in the hills, they stumble on a clan of pregnant women.
Things soon become dangerous for them both. Would this clan kill Bron to save themselves from an angel? But then, during the night, Kayla disappears, and Bron discovers the truth about this cult.
The author created a fast-paced story that doesn’t let up with its mystery or action.
“Mother, Mother” by Shreya Ila Anasuya
Anasuya sets this short metaphysical fantasy in India. Subah has just lost her mother and is in shock. She throws herself into work, doing the things in the house that her mother did. But finally, Bonbibi, the mother of the forests, comforts her so she can mourn as she should.
The girl dreams of her mother each night and pleads with the Goddess to let her see her mother one last time. Bonbibi grants her request, but the demands keep coming, and the Goddess of the forests must help Subah see what is next for her.
This story was poetic prose set around the Hindu religion. It was a curious insight into another culture.
“L’Enfant Terrible” by Mark H. Huston
The setting for this short fantasy is a wizard’s workshop. Cthylla finds herself in a strange world where time only moves forward. A wizard has caught her and holds her in a peculiar cage as she struggles to make sense of this new concept of one-directional time.
When the wizard leaves her in the care of his foolish apprentice, Cthylla learns the truth of how she got here. So she compels the weaker-minded apprentice to open a portal back to her home. However, things take a different turn when the wizard returns before she can escape.
Told from a unique perspective, this story breathed new life into an old concept.
“The Big Many” by Albert E. Cowdrey
Retired doctor Abel finds himself involved in the periphery of three gigantic natural disasters in this SF novelette. It starts with the ‘Big One’ as the San Andreas Fault lets go. Abel has only recently retired from a medical response center for refugees of disasters and now finds himself left out.
But more disasters are coming, starting with an asteroid shattered out of its safe trajectory. Abel’s geologist daughter has gone to Yellowstone Park to help her boyfriend with the west coast refugees camping there. The astrophysicists predict that one of the asteroid pieces will strike in the upper Midwest in a megaton explosion.
Abel frets about being only able to watch the disaster on the news. And then the asteroid part strikes near Yellowstone’s supervolcano. Days later, he gets a call from his old refugee center, they have just heard from Abel’s daughter, and he is needed once again.
After many post-apocalypse stories, this one dealt with the event itself and told a story of human endeavour mixed with human cruelty.
“The True Meaning of Father’s Day” by John Wiswell
This flash SF tells the tale of four friends who meet each year on Father’s Day at the same restaurant, this time in 1984. As expected, there are many instances of them having brunch, filling the entire place. Soon they get into a friendly competition over who can pay the tab in the most creative way. Of course, they each have to use time travel to do so.
This quirky little story was fun to read and was well suited to the flash format.
You can follow Kevin P Hallett’s writing on www.kevinphallett.com