REVIEW: “Perisher” by Crystal Frasier

Review of Crystal Frasier, “Perisher” in Gwen Benaway, ed., Mother, Maiden, Crone, (Bedside Press, 2019): 134-148 — Purchase here. Reviewed by Sara L. Uckelman. (Read the review of the anthology.)

Content warning: Murder.

Aggie is a Perisher, someone who, through the violent killing of another person, is connected to the ghost of the person they murdered. Fuchs is a German soldier who refuses to learn to speak any English or Spanish — Aggie’s fluent languages as she lives and works in Florida — but he can speak to other ghosts, and in this unlikely pairing the two of them hiring out their services to people who need answers only ghosts can give.

The tenor of this story was quite different from the much-more-fantasy oriented ones of the rest of the anthology. It felt much more like a crime drama than a fairy tale. I enjoyed the contrast that it provided, and the idea of Perishers in the first place — not like anything I’d read before.

Sara L. Uckelman1 Comment

REVIEW: “Failure” by Casey Plett

Review of Casey Plett, “Failure” in Gwen Benaway, ed., Mother, Maiden, Crone, (Bedside Press, 2019): 127-134 — Purchase here. Reviewed by Sara L. Uckelman. (Read the review of the anthology.)

The first-person narrator is a reviver, traveling from place to place, always on her own. Revivers rarely ever stay long in one place, or spend much time with other revivers (which makes me wonder how a reviver gets trained in the first place). Along the way, she (all revivers “grow from boys to women” p. 130) meets a stranger unlike any she’s ever met before, and they force the reviver to contemplate an awful decision.

I think many people reading this story can sympathise with the idea of never doing, never being, enough. It’s hard to practice self-care when there is always someone else that could be helped, something more that could be improved. (If you don’t sympathise with this, then you are very lucky or very privileged or both.) In the end, I think the reviver made the right decision.

Sara L. Uckelman1 Comment

REVIEW: “Dreamborn” by Kylie Ariel Bemis

Review of Kylie Ariel Bemis, “Dreamborn” in Gwen Benaway, ed., Mother, Maiden, Crone, (Bedside Press, 2019): 108-126 — Purchase here. Reviewed by Sara L. Uckelman. (Read the review of the anthology.)

Content warning: Misgendering, kidnap, allusions to child rape.

This was a harsh story of invasion, colonisation, betrayal, lies, and loss. But it was also a story of deep, abiding love. It’s a tough story to read, but good.

Sara L. Uckelman1 Comment

REVIEW: “i shall remain” by Kai Cheng Thom

Review of Kai Cheng Thom, “i shall remain” in Gwen Benaway, ed., Mother, Maiden, Crone, (Bedside Press, 2019): 97-107 — Purchase here. Reviewed by Sara L. Uckelman. (Read the review of the anthology.)

This was a rich, sensual story full of old myth and modern realism, and threaded through with a gruesome interpretation of Christianity (I don’t know if this was intended or not, but it certainly read that way to me). It was distinctly different from the rest of the stories in the anthology, not only in content and in choice of trans characters, but also in its literary style, with a systemic eschewing of capitals except for proper names and phrases, and sometimes (but not always) “I”. I think this was my favorite story of the volume.

Sara L. Uckelman1 Comment

REVIEW: “Undoing Vampirism” by Lilah Sturges

Review of Lilah Sturges, “Undoing Vampirism” in Gwen Benaway, ed., Mother, Maiden, Crone, (Bedside Press, 2019): 92-96 — Purchase here. Reviewed by Sara L. Uckelman. (Read the review of the anthology.)

Vampire stories have been so overdone in recent years that whenever I come across another one, I admit, I sigh a bit.

But there were NO SIGHS whatsoever in this hilarious (“but I realized even then that the desires to be a girl and to eat them are unconnected” p. 94), unpredictable, unexpected take on modern-day vampires. I absolutely loved it.

Sara L. Uckelman1 Comment

REVIEW: “The Knighting” by Alexa Fae McDaniel

Review of Alexa Fae McDaniel, “The Knighting” in Gwen Benaway, ed., Mother, Maiden, Crone, (Bedside Press, 2019): 83-91 — Purchase here. Reviewed by Sara L. Uckelman. (Read the review of the anthology.)

Daphne has long admired Sir Thais — the first woman of Epirus to ever have been knighted. Now, two more women have become knights, but female knights are still the minority. Part of Daphne longs to be what Sir Thais is, but another part of her knows she could never be what Sir Thais is; not because she’s a woman, but because she’s a transwoman.

The focus of this story was Daphne’s grappling with the difficulties of being a transwoman in a male dominated field. As a cis woman, I realised I would probably make many of the same arguments that Sir Thais did, to persuade Daphne to take up the accolade; so it was important for me to read Daphne’s arguments in return. Now, I’m not so sure which choice Daphne should make, or even, at the end of the story, which choice she did make.

Sara L. Uckelman1 Comment

REVIEW: “Freeing the Bitch” by Ellen Mellor

Review of Ellen Mellor, “Freeing the Bitch” in Gwen Benaway, ed., Mother, Maiden, Crone, (Bedside Press, 2019): 65-82 — Purchase here. Reviewed by Sara L. Uckelman. (Read the review of the anthology.)

Content warning: Explicit misgendering and some internalised transphobia.

It’s funny the little things that can catch you out when reading a story: I was so distracted by the fact that two of the MCs started a forest fire and then proceeded to do nothing about it (including showing remorse) that I could hardly pay attention to the rest of what was going on.

That distraction aside, I enjoyed the multi-species cast (all varying flavors of queerness!), and can’t help but approve of a story that tells us: “There is nothing we can’t do because we are amazing women” (p. 72).

Sara L. Uckelman1 Comment

REVIEW: “Potions and Practices” by gwynception

Review of gwynception, “Potions and Practices” in Gwen Benaway, ed., Mother, Maiden, Crone, (Bedside Press, 2019): 50-64 — Purchase here. Reviewed by Sara L. Uckelman. (Read the review of the anthology.)

I’m not sure if this story suffered from a lack of thorough proofreading, or if the duplicated phrases and weird sentences that felt like they were missing words were intentional, but whichever is the explanation, I found the prose of this story difficult to read; quite a bit of the time, I really wasn’t sure what was going on. Then again, the same is also said by Violet, the MC: “I’m sorry I’m not sure if I know what you’re talking about” (p. 52), so maybe the gappy and repetitive writing was intentional. I’m afraid, though, that this wasn’t a story for me.

Sara L. Uckelman1 Comment

REVIEW: “The Vixen, With Death Pursuing” by Izzy Wasserstein

Review of Izzy Wasserstein, “The Vixen, With Death Pursuing” in Gwen Benaway, ed., Mother, Maiden, Crone, (Bedside Press, 2019): 39-49 — Purchase here. Reviewed by Sara L. Uckelman. (Read the review of the anthology.)

The titular death that is pursuing the vulpemancer is a pestimancer, a pestilence-mage. He first attacked Ravenna, the fox-mage’s lover, and how the fox-mage is the only one left who can find the herbs that will heal Ravenna and all the other struck down by blood lung. But in order to escape the vulpemancer and bring the herbs back, the fox-mage is faced with a dangerous, and potentially life-altering choice.

In this strongly written, compelling story, Wasserstein gives us a different take on what being trans.

Sara L. Uckelman1 Comment

REVIEW: “Mountain God” by Gwen Benaway

Review of Gwen Benaway, “Mountain God” in Gwen Benaway, ed., Mother, Maiden, Crone, (Bedside Press, 2019): 7-25 — Purchase here. Reviewed by Sara L. Uckelman. (Read the review of the anthology.)

Content warning: A lot of death.

The mage Aoyas has three strikes against her: She’s a mercenary; she was born in Lerani, the most recently conquered and still not quite subjugated province of the Empire; and she is a Marked woman, someone who has changed her born gender. Her mercenary partner Rais isn’t that much better; he was born in the capital city but his father was an outlander who abandoned him and his mother when he was young. Neither Aoyas nor Rais set out to become mercenaries, but fate put them in each other’s paths and together they became lovers and survived their first — hardest — year of mercenarying.

It took five-and-a-half pages to set up all the history and backdrop for the story, rather a long in something only about 20 pages long; but I’m a sucker for good worldbuilding so the lack of action or activity didn’t bother me too much. I was surprised at how transphobic and misogynistic the setting was — it made me sad that Aoyas didn’t get a better story, a better life. While some people might say she got her happily ever after, I’m not entirely convinced.

Sara L. Uckelman1 Comment