Review of William Alexander, “Found Objects”, in Marieke Nijkamp, ed., Unbroken: 13 Stories Starring Disabled Teens (Farrar Straus Giroux, 2018): 90-103 — Purchase here. Reviewed by Sara L. Uckelman. (Read the review of the anthology).
Take the feel of an episode of Buffy the Vampire Slayer, throw in some Shakespeare and make the Buffy-character Hispanic and disabled, and that’s basically what this story felt like, and I loved it.
Review of Kayla Whaley, “The Leap and the Fall”, in Marieke Nijkamp, ed., Unbroken: 13 Stories Starring Disabled Teens (Farrar Straus Giroux, 2018): 38-59 — Purchase here. Reviewed by Sara L. Uckelman. (Read the review of the anthology).
Spoiler alert
I wasn’t expecting this story, the way it started off, to become a horror story! But that’s what it was, complete with ghosts, a haunted carnival, and two best friends, Gemma and Eloise, who can only save each other by admitting their love. This was another story with a definite romance arc in it, but Whaley used it to good effect, making it a necessary part of the resolution.
Review of Marieke Nijkamp, ed., Unbroken: 13 Stories Starring Disabled Teens (Farrar Straus Giroux, 2018) — Purchase here. Reviewed by Sara L. Uckelman.
This was one of my WorldCon ’19 recs — a book that was mentioned during one of the panels I attended, where I thought “I want to read that”. I especially wanted to read it to see if it would be something that I could recommend to one of my nieces, who I have a suspicious would be interested in SFF, but hasn’t yet gotten the right route in.
Not all the stories in this collection are speculative in nature — some of them are straight up realistic fiction (including some whose authors are best known for speculative fiction, which was a bit of a surprise!). Both queer and non-queer romance arcs were strongly represented across the anthology. It was this perhaps more than anything else that marked this book out as a collection of YA stories; whenever one of the romantic developments felt a bit too much, too fast, I had to remind myself that I’m not a teenager anymore and that if I’d read these stories as a teenager, they probably would’ve felt more real.
The stories don’t shy away from the difficult subjects. The range of disabilities represented was wide, from wheelchairs to anxiety to terminal illnesses. The characters are confronted with not only the ordinary vagaries of romance and other aspects of teenage life, but also with the worry of burdening others, the anguish of never being enough, the guilt of it all. One thing I really liked about this anthology as a collection was the way in which so many of the narrators voiced these sorts of internalised ableism, and the ways in which the stories themselves pushed back against those narratives, made it clear that they were not the right narratives. On the flip side, one of the things that made me uncomfortable was how some of the stories were variants on “even though a disabled person might think themselves unworthy, they can still do things that are valuable to society!” in a way that felt, to me, like it bordered on inspiration porn. Such stories were, however, the minority, and loaded towards the front of the book, so that by the end such early impressions were mostly memories.
As is usual, we’ll review the stories individually, and link the reviews below as they are published.
Having read all of them, yeah, I probably will get this book for my niece. They may not all be to her taste, as they weren’t all to mine, but if she derives joy from even one of them, it’ll be a worthwhile purchase. (And I really hope she likes Benwell’s and Duyvis’s, the two outstanding stories of the volume in my opinion.)
Review of Bethe Goder, “Rite of Passage”, Analog Science Fiction and Fact September/October (2020): 79–80 (Kindle) – Purchase Here. Reviewed by John Atom.
Julia visits an AI that can allegedly read a person’s brain patterns and produce their perfect version of a work of art. But when Julia goes through the process, all she gets is a blank painting with nothing but layers of white on it.
Reading “True Colors,” I got the impression that there’s a deeper meaning in the painting metaphor, but I’m not entirely sure I get it. Something about the “deeper layers” of Julia’s personality, perhaps. I don’t there’s enough there to really come to a conclusion. Still, it was an a neat story and I enjoyed the idea of the artistic AI using something akin to machine learning to generate someone’s “perfect” work of art.
Review of L. M. Magalas, “A Few Minutes More”, Luna Station Quarterly 28 (2016): Read online. Reviewed by Sara L. Uckelman.
Content note: Suicide.
The premise of this story is simply: Susanna, by committing suicide, has forfeited her right to the remainder of her allotted days, but she is allowed to designate someone else as recipient.
I wouldn’t have ever thought a suicide story could be heartwarming, but this one was. Magalas handled the delicate subject matter with care and sensitivity, exploring the ways in which our actions affect those around us, positively and negatively, in a story full of warmth and hope.
Review of Michael Boatman, “Thresher of Men”, in Zelda Knight and Ekpeki Oghenechovwe Donald, ed., Dominion: An Anthology of Speculative Fiction From Africa and the African Diaspora, (Aurelia Leo, 2020) — Purchase here. Reviewed by Sara L. Uckelman. (Read the review of the anthology).
Content warning: Transphobic and ableist language; death; shooting of Black people by cops; murder; structural racism; rape.
Oooh, this was one uncomfortable story to read, with plenty of places in the first few pages that had me squirming in my seat. The focus of the opening scene is Officer Greg Fitzsimmons, member of Lincolnville P.D. and white. He embodies a lot of what I dislike in contemporary American culture — the ambient level of unconcern for people who are not like him is just gross. This story illustrates the power that a story’s author has over it: If this story had been written by a white person, reading it would have been a very different experience. As it is, what would have looked like callousness and ignorance looks instead like a very incisive criticism of contemporary American society and racial structures. There’s a reason I should feel so damn uncomfortable: Boatman’s depiction of how white people view Black people is not wrong.
But it wasn’t all uncomfortable squirming: At the end of the opening, vengeance in the form of the goddess Kisazi slams into the scene and lights the story up — figuratively and literally — and all the white bastards get the comeuppance they deserve. Thoroughly satisfying.
Review of Mame Bougouma Diene, “The Satellite Charmer”, in Zelda Knight and Ekpeki Oghenechovwe Donald, ed., Dominion: An Anthology of Speculative Fiction From Africa and the African Diaspora, (Aurelia Leo, 2020) — Purchase here. Reviewed by Sara L. Uckelman. (Read the review of the anthology).
Ibrahima, by his own description, has many problems. Despite what his friends say, thinking he knows better is not one of them. No, his problems are the dreams that haunt his sleep, the way that sometimes “every muscle in his body contracted, and somewhere, deep in his mind, something opened up.” His problems are all connected to the beam boring down out of the sky, mining the earth for minerals: But what the connection is, and how it came about, and why he doesn’t know — and that’s another problem, one that must be solved.
The mining company that is destroying his homeland, and which is the source of the beam that he feels such an attraction to, is in the background for almost all of the story. And yet, there is no escaping it: Whether for Ibrahima or the reader.
This was another gorgeously long piece, full of meaty depths to sink your teeth into. I enjoyed the way I was able to slowly piece together Ibrahima’s history and the history of his country, and the deep sense of family and community bonds that pervaded his life — how those bonds were forge, and how they were broken.
Review of Céline Malgen, “The Mad Cabbage”, Analog Science Fiction and Fact July/August (2020): 81–85 (Kindle) – Purchase Here. Reviewed by John Atom.
Contains spoilers.
One day, Nicole is stunned to find that the environment of her cabbage bacteria has gone incredibly acidic. She investigates and discovers that thanks to a childish prank by her lab mate Xavier, her bacteria have mutated in a way that could be very beneficial for her research.
Unfortunately, there’s not much to like in “The Mad Cabbage.” The author explores some neat ideas in microbiology, as well as giving an accurate – well, mostly accurate – portrayal of what graduate school life is like. However, the story suffers from bad writing, so much so that I’m a bit surprised it even made it in print. The prose is clunky and overly expository, full of infodumps and, in some cases, poor English. It’s hard to focus on the narrative when the prose constantly bombards you with unnecessary information.
The plot’s central mystery is mostly well-crafted, with an interesting, albeit scientifically questionable resolution. The character of Xavier, however, is so cartoony that he might as well have a thin mustache to twirl. As a graduate student, he’s simply too villainous to believe.
Review of Marie Vibbert, “On the Changing Roles of Dockworkers”, Analog Science Fiction and Fact July/August (2020): 90–93 (Kindle) – Purchase Here. Reviewed by John Atom.
Contains spoilers.
Mary is a dock supervisor in charge of maintaining the dock’s robot workers. One day, while investigating a malfunctioning robot she discovers that the damage was self-inflicted. Digging deeper, Mary finds out that the robot is trying to prevent a new update that will take away its recently obtained sentience. Now, Mary faces a dilemma: should she help the robot, or wipe its consciousness away?
An enjoyable story, on the short and sweet side. Vibbert manages to give her robot a “motivation,” so to speak, without making it unrealistically emotional. The scenario is plausible, even if a tad unlikely. Some of Vibbert’s metaphors err on the side of silly, like “These logs record every time an electron farts.” However, they rarely detract from the story.
All in all, an excellent short story.
Review of Marian Denise Moore, “Emily”, in Zelda Knight and Ekpeki Oghenechovwe Donald, ed., Dominion: An Anthology of Speculative Fiction From Africa and the African Diaspora, (Aurelia Leo, 2020) — Purchase here. Reviewed by Sara L. Uckelman. (Read the review of the anthology).
This piece is halfway between flash fic and poetry and tells, in sparse, beautiful language, the story of a seven-year-old girl who has runaway from being enslaved. Across two centuries, Moore reaches out to this girl and offers her hope of a better ending. Very touching.
SFF Reviews