REVIEW: “When to Choose the Snake God” by Jennifer Jeanne McArdle

Review of Jennifer Jeanne McArdle, “When to Choose the Snake God,” Luna Station Quarterly 61 (2025): 15-31 — Purchase online. Reviewed by Sara L. Uckelman.

Content note: child slavery.

I found this story intriguing because it rejects a lot of tenets that we might ordinarily take for granted — that a captured child might prefer a life of servitude in the empire than the life in the provinces that they’d left behind; that given a choice to return home, that choice might not be worth making; that sometimes it is better to die for a god than to live for it.

Sara L. UckelmanLeave a comment

REVIEW: “Those Uncaring Waves” by Yukimi Ogawa

Review of Yukimi Ogawa, “Those Uncaring Waves”, Clarkesworld Issue 222, March (2025): Read Online. Reviewed by Myra Naik.

A hauntingly beautiful novella. So well written, richly layered, and very detailed. This was an absolute treat to read.

A story with an intricately created world usually has that as the highlight of the story. Here, it was the background for another beautiful story. I cannot overstate how lovely this story is – the plot, the emotion, the scale, the world building, the structure – everything so so good.

This novella is a must-read. I can’t even try to put it in a genre or explain “key points”. Read for yourself and see; thank me later!

myra naikLeave a comment

REVIEW: “Wind Whisperers” by Anna O’Brien

Review of Anna O’Brien, “Wind Whisperers,” Luna Station Quarterly 61 (2025): 233-247 — Purchase online. Reviewed by Sara L. Uckelman.

Noma’s job is to whisper to the wind, the trick it into no longer agitating the skyscrapers and their inhabitants. Her job is not to mentor new wind whisperers, but Bryce, her newly assigned mentee, isn’t going to let that stop him.

Noma may find Bryce intensely irritating, but his earnestness is just sincere enough that I found him highly entertaining. This story made me laugh many times, and made me glad to have read it when I reached the end.

Sara L. UckelmanLeave a comment

REVIEW: “Intent of Form and Function” by Erin Stubbe

Review of Erin Stubbe, “Intent of Form and Function,” Luna Station Quarterly 61 (2025): 127-153 — Purchase online. Reviewed by Sara L. Uckelman.

Content note: Unwanted pregnancy, abortion.

As I started reading this story, something in its essence felt very much like it was a modern-day Rumpelstiltskin retelling, which I was enjoying very much — and when this was confirmed, I enjoyed it even more. But at the same time, it’s also so much more than that, it’s a story of redemption.

Sara L. UckelmanLeave a comment

REVIEW: “Roil” by A.C. Luke

Review of A.C. Luke, “Roil,” Luna Station Quarterly 61 (2025): 113-119 — Purchase online. Reviewed by Sara L. Uckelman.

As a child, Alsea was marked out as special, taught the songs that only few know how to sing in order to calm the ghosts and put them to rest. Now that she’s an adult, she spends her days waiting for ghosts to cross through the wall, to find them and sing to them.

What kept this story from being just another ordinary/run-of-the-mill ghost-exorcism story was the breathless hints of what lies on the other side of that wall — what, and who, and how did they come to be there, and how did they all die.

It was a curious little story.

Sara L. UckelmanLeave a comment

REVIEW: “The Climacteric” by Caren Gussoff Sumption

Review of Caren Gussoff Sumption, “The Climacteric,” Luna Station Quarterly 61 (2025): 167-172 — Purchase online. Reviewed by Sara L. Uckelman.

This is a story that probably all too many women will identify with — a story of how women are taught to make themselves small, to not ask for too much. For me, it was the sort of story that leaves me feeling worse off after having read it, weighed down by a sad, heavy depression. I did like the cat, though.

Sara L. UckelmanLeave a comment

REVIEW: “A Moon Goddess to Watch Over Me” by Susan Kaye Quinn

Review of Susan Kaye Quinn, “A Moon Goddess to Watch Over Me,” Luna Station Quarterly 61 (2025): 385-389 — Purchase online. Reviewed by Sara L. Uckelman.

Quinn’s story was an enjoyable mix of near-earth space exploration and ancient Chinese, Greek, and African mythologies, an unusual combination to say the least. It had a little bit too much reporting of back story, and not quite enough character or development of story, for my taste, because it was quite short, but it was still enjoyable nonetheless.

Sara L. UckelmanLeave a comment

REVIEW: “Is That New?” by Rosamund Lannin

Review of Rosamund Lannin, “Is That New?,” Luna Station Quarterly 61 (2025): 33-46 — Purchase online. Reviewed by Sara L. Uckelman.

There was something positively magical about how Lannin wove together the excessively mundane with the delightfully unexpected. At the end of a long train at the end of a long week which was the last week of a long academic term, this story broke through my exhaustion and made me smile, right up until it caught me by surprise. Fantasy with a twist of horror — what a fun read!

Sara L. UckelmanLeave a comment