On Spec #124, Summer 2023
“Second Sight” by Rob Gordon
“Oregon Shooters” by Douglas Smith
“Warden Trees” by Brian D. Hinson
“Hairstyle For the Apocalypse” by Brittan Amos
“The Necessity of a Shepherd” by Quinn J. Graham
“Your Body, My Prison, My Forge” by Marie Brennan
“Me, Myself & I: The Adventures of Flick Gibson, Intergalactic Videographer” by Peter G. Reynolds
“The Hidden Heart of Brass Attending” by Christopher Scott
“To Kill a Gorgon” by Colleen Anderson
Reviewed by Victoria Silverwolf
Along with an ennead of new stories, the latest issue of this Canadian publication features poetry and interviews.
In flashbacks, the narrator of “Second Sight” by Rob Gordon describes how he became involved with researchers investigating ESP. After the narrator discovers that he has genuine psychic abilities, he finds out that something much more sinister lies behind what he thought was an ordinary experiment.
Midway through the story, the reader is likely to assume that the plot involves the kind of shadowy government project often found in science fiction. In fact, the truth turns out to be truly outrageous. This makes a fairly interesting, if not entirely original, suspense story highly implausible.
In “Oregon Shooters” by Douglas Smith, a retired private eye investigates two strange deaths that occurred at a seafood restaurant. The solution to the mystery involves a number of related deaths from years before, and a bizarre discovery that threatens his own life.
In a way similar to the previous work, this story begins in realistic fashion but eventually strains the reader’s credibility to the breaking point. The climax is likely to strike one as ludicrous rather than dramatic.
“Warden Trees” by Brian D. Hinson takes place aboard a starship containing multiple ecosystems from Earth. The ship’s artificial intelligence wakens people, apparently at random, from suspended animation. It also performs actions that suggest insanity or malevolence, such as burning down one of the ecosystems and surgically removing a woman’s arms before awakening her.
This brief synopsis makes the story sound like a plot-driven thriller. In fact, it is more of a character-oriented tale. The work’s major conflict is a psychological one, between the woman mentioned above, who wants her arms grown back, and her grandfather, who opposes the medical technology required for regeneration for religious reasons.
There is much to admire in this well-written story, which features fully developed characters, but it also lacks focus. The AI’s actions are never explained, for example. Perhaps expanding this promising work into a longer, more complete account of the starship’s voyage would improve it.
“Hairstyles For the Apocalypse” by Brittany Amos is a lightly satiric piece in which a woman having her hair styled during the collapse of civilization is more concerned with trivia than the fact that the world is ending. The author convincingly portrays a superficial character, with whom many readers are likely to ruefully identify, but the story is overly long for its single idea.
The narrator of “The Necessity of a Shepherd” by Quinn J. Graham works for a woman who is a werewolf. She protects her sheep from attacks by younger werewolves who, unlike her, are unable to control their ravenous lust to kill. After a bloody battle, the woman takes the narrator to see the werewolves in their human form.
This variation on a familiar theme contains vivid descriptions of the attack by the werewolves and the way in which the narrator is forced to fight back. The notion that the werewolves are ordinary people is of some interest, but otherwise there is little new here for fans of lycanthropic fiction.
“Your Body, My Prison, My Forge” by Marie Brennan starts off with the feeling of surreal horror, as the narrator is swallowed alive and then causes the one who swallowed her to ingest metal, so she can create a new being within her cage of flesh. Soon the reader discovers that the author is retelling an old myth.
It may be a matter of taste as to which aspect of this brief tale is more effective. The work is certainly original, even if its disparate nature may disappoint some readers.
“Me, Myself & I: The Adventures of Flick Gibson, Intergalactic Videographer” by Peter G. Reynolds is a sequel to a previous misadventure of the character named in the subtitle. In this madcap comedy, time travel causes him to confront his older self and his younger self, as they work together on a project that will determine (or that has already determined) his fate.
The familiar paradoxes of time travel are used for the purpose of farce in this sophomoric tale. The most amusing concept may be the existence of a religious cult based on financial concepts.
“The Hidden Heart of Brass Attending” by Christopher Scott takes place in a fantasy version of the 1930s in which it is possible to trap the souls of the dead in shapeshifting metal bodies. They are then forced to be servants of the living. The narrator’s business is capturing these souls. For reasons having to do with his past, he decides to allow one such soul its freedom in its new body, an illegal act that could cost him his life.
This is an imaginative story with an intriguing, highly original premise. The souls in new, artificial bodies are portrayed in a believable fashion. The narrator’s motive for allowing one soul to be free is unexpected, but plausible. The portrait of a very different New York City during Prohibition adds interest.
“To Kill a Gorgon” by Colleen Anderson is set after an unspecified apocalypse. The main character’s grandmother was a wise woman who advised people on how to survive. After her death, her followers preserved her severed head. They now use it as a sort of sybil, running electricity through its brain so that it produces random words from its mouth. The protagonist seeks to end what she sees as a grotesque, sickening, superstitious ritual.
The premise has great visceral power, although it may be very hard to believe that people taught practical skills would treat their instructor’s remains in this way. There is not much more to the story than this ghastly image.
Victoria Silverwolf hasn’t been able to use the word “ennead” for a while.