REVIEW: “Vale of the Firefae” by Jalyn Renae Fiske

Review of Jalyn Renae Fiske, “Vale of the Firefae,” Luna Station Quarterly 64 (December 2025): 113-124 — Purchase here. Reviewed by Sara L. Uckelman.

One of the things I want out of a fantasy story is something different from reality — the very best of worldbuilding can deliver something so utterly unlike what is actually the case that in addition to reading for escapism one can also marvel at the ingenuity to imagine something so unreal. Now, not every fantasy story can have the very best of worldbuilding, and I don’t measure stories against that very best. But there is something both disappointing and unsettling about a wildly fantastic story whose worldbuilding structures replicate — whether consciously or unconsciously — problem structures in our own world. I found that to be the case with Fiske’s story: She has constructed a society that is, on the one hand, not at all like any actually existing society; but on the other hand, the misogynist and patriarchal norms that are encoded in the structure are depressingly familiar.