Short Reviews of Short SFF
Review of S.L. Harris, “Meatball,” Flash Fiction Online 153 (August 2026): 6-9 — Purchase here. Reviewed by Sara L. Uckelman.
When the emotional support hamster’s emotions are more in need of support than the one its supposed to be supporting, you know the story isn’t going to end up well. I do love it when a story surprises me!
Review of G. M. Mitchell, “Pomegranates,” Flash Fiction Online 153 (August 2026): 3-5 — Purchase here. Reviewed by Sara L. Uckelman.
For once, a pomegranate story that isn’t about Persephone! Instead, it’s about unicorns, and while reading it, I couldn’t help but think that after generations and generations, I’m pretty sure unicorns eventually figured out that virgins are always only there to lure them into a trap — and yet even knowing that, they still go willingly.
Review of Ayida Shonibar, “We Decay in the Dark,” Adventitious no. 2 (Apr 2026): 51-85 — Read online. Reviewed by Sara L. Uckelman.
Basically everything Tanika has been told is a lie, and we get to watch her find this out over the course of 30+ pages.
Review of Merc Fenn Wolfmoor, “Fractal House,” Adventitious no. 2 (Apr 2026): 110-133 — Read online. Reviewed by Sara L. Uckelman.
I found this story somewhat annoying to start off with, but the moment at which it stopped from being annoying to being horror was the moment at which I realized we were supposed to find the story annoying up to that point.
Horror, yes, but also: kinda hilarious. I was properly amused by this story by the end.
Review of Natalie Zutter, “Last Edit to THE ALL BANGERS LIST Made By Your Sex Robot at 11:39 A.M.,” Adventitious no. 2 (Apr 2026): 152-161 — Read online. Reviewed by Sara L. Uckelman.
In this very interesting piece reflecting on how sex with a sex robot — especially one who has some level of personhood or at least the capacity to simulate falling in love — compares with sex with a person, the one thing that I found most interesting was the lack of any consideration of consent.
Review of Marie Brennan, “All Under Heaven,” Adventitious no. 2 (Apr 2026): 9-26 — Read online. Reviewed by Sara L. Uckelman.
I loved the way this piece of historical fiction went back and forth between omniscient viewpoint, telling the truth that everyone knows, and an unreliable narrator, questioning the truth that everyone knows. It was a very effective technique that made me wonder just what was fact, and what was fiction — a question any historian knows we can never really know the answer to.
Review of S. I. Fapohunda, “Fire and Brimstone,” Adventitious no. 2 (Apr 2026): 162-178 — Read online. Reviewed by Sara L. Uckelman.
This is a nightmare of a story, where human frailties are far more evil than any witchcraft or sorcery.
Review of Samantha Murray, “Of Sight, Of Mind, Of Heart,” Adventitious no. 2 (Apr 2026): 88-100 — Read online. Reviewed by Sara L. Uckelman.
I knew before I started reading that this was going to be a gut-wrenching story — because in flipping ahead to confirm the page number of the last page, I read the final line. Oof. It was enough of a sucker punch for me to tamp down my usual antipathy to second-person POV stories.
And I was right. What can I say about this story? Only what every parents knows: We love our children fiercely knowing that one day we’ll have to say good-bye, never knowing whether that day will come sooner or later. And also that maybe this was not the story to read the day I waved my own kid off at the airport not to see her again for three weeks!
(First published in Clarkesworld no. 122, 2016)
Review of Michelle Knudsen, “Biter,” Adventitious no. 2 (Apr 2026): 179-186 — Read online. Reviewed by Sara L. Uckelman.
This was a sweet little story of family angst and trauma wrapped up in the form of an animal that can only be described as, well, a biter.
Review of Emma Burnett, “Spirit Alembic Keeper,” Adventitious no. 2 (Apr 2026): 137-144 — Read online. Reviewed by Sara L. Uckelman.
Content note: military conscription
Before the conscripts go off to war, first they go to August — leaving their souls behind, to be preserved untainted, until their bodies are done battling. But of course, bodies don’t go to war to come back. August’s profession is both vitally important and endlessly futile. There’s a feeling of inevitability about this story: You don’t know quite how it’s going to end, but that it will end in the only way it possibly could. When that ending comes, it is very satisfying.
(First published in Uncharted, year unknown)
SFF Reviews