REVIEW: “Dragons Over Cefalù” by Liv DeSimone

Review of Liv DeSimone, “Dragons Over Cefalù,” Luna Station Quarterly 59 (2024): 143-165 — Purchase online. Reviewed by Sara L. Uckelman.

Content note: Violence against women.

I struggled with what to put in the content note for this story, because it’s more than sexual harassment (what I initially had), but not quite sexual assault (what I toyed with). Whatever it is, it pervades the opening pages of the story so if that isn’t something for you, definitely avoid this story. The harassment feels like it isn’t that awful, because it isn’t quite assault, but the low-levelness of it ends up making it even worse, because as a reader, as a woman, I kept finding myself trying to normalize it, and that made it all the more awful. In the end, a quote from the story gave me what I needed: “After all, none of this had ever been about sex” (p. 162). It’s not about sex, it’s about violence, and power.

Normally I’m not a fan of using violence against women as a means of moving plot forward in a story, but there was something about this that worked. Two women’s separate revenges become intertwined,

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REVIEW: “The Desert” by Carolina V. Mata

Review of Carolina V. Mata, “The Desert,” Luna Station Quarterly 59 (2024): 119-122 — Purchase online. Reviewed by Sara L. Uckelman.

“The desert was created to antagonize”: This one line sets the scene for a short, fierce story of fighting back against despair. There’s not much detail or backstory or world-building, meaning there is a lot of scope for reading into the story whatever you like — generational trauma, climate change, what have you. Its short length makes the story quite flexible and elastic in a satisfying way.

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REVIEW: “Burn, Balefire Heart” by Sara Omer

Review of Sara Omer, “Burn, Balefire Heart,” Luna Station Quarterly 59 (2024): 35-53 — Purchase online. Reviewed by Sara L. Uckelman.

Dragons, slaves, enemies, a plot, freedom, and — eventually — love. This story had it all! I loved the depth of it, though at times I felt like I didn’t quite have all the back-story. I think this could have made a really excellent novella, and hope that Omer tries her hand at something longer form in the future.

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REVIEW: “Field Guide to the UFOs of the Keweenaw Peninsula” by Phoebe Eliza Billups

Review of Phoebe Eliza Billups, “A Field Guide to the UFOs of the Keweenaw Peninsula,” Luna Station Quarterly 59 (2024): 15-32 — Purchase online. Reviewed by Sara L. Uckelman.

Often when I read a slow, protracted story, I put a lot of stake on the ending making itself worth the wait. Billups’s story left a different impression on me: I enjoyed the journey enough that I didn’t need to reach the destination, and the fact that when I did, I didn’t know where I was didn’t take away from my enjoyment.

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REVIEW: “Sparking Joy” by Y. M. Resnik

Review of Y. M. Resnik, “Sparking Joy,” Luna Station Quarterly 59 (2024): 89-96 — Purchase online. Reviewed by Sara L. Uckelman.

After the death of her husband, Sharon is required to downsize the mass of her apartment in order to ensure that valuable resources are recycled and put back into national service — and she’s been sent an AI to help her deal with the process. It’s a solid premise for a story, but what I loved was that I had a good guess as to how it would unfold, and my guess was totally wrong. I loved the twist, resulting in a story that made me smile and also made me shiver.

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REVIEW: “The Weight of Your Own Ashes” by Carlie St. George

Review of Carlie St. George, “The Weight of Your Own Ashes”, Clarkesworld Issue 212, May (2024): Read Online. Reviewed by Myra Naik.

A deeply layered story of identity, and what a sense of self could mean. The protagonist is multi-bodied, with a single soul. What this effectively means in terms of perception, acceptance, and gender identity to themselves, and to other single-bodied organisms, like humans, is the journey of this story.

There are also moments of beauty, like a passage about symphonies, that also show how all those experiences shape Yonder, the protagonist. A great story with many lovely elements.

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REVIEW: “To Harvest a Cloud” by Rich Larson

Review of Rich Larson, “To Harvest a Cloud,” Flash Fiction Online 132 (September 2024): 21-24 — Purchase here. Reviewed by Sara L. Uckelman.

Tso arrived in town on the driest day of a very dry year, bringing his own cloud in tow. On one reading, this starts off as a gentle story of how he brought his cloud to those who needed it within the town, in exchange for the town’s welcome and hospitality; but while I couldn’t help but think of one of my favorite song lyrics (Genesis, “Mad Man Moon”): “Within the valley of shadowless death, they pray for thunderclouds and rain. But to the multitude who live in the rain, heaven is where the sun shines.” What must it like to be Tso, to always live in the shade, to never rejoice in the warm embrace of the sun? That felt rather sad to me. And then the entire story turned much darker, and the lyrics became even more apt.

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