NT ASFM March 2006 - science fiction
A prison guard on Uranus’s moon Ariel records his last testament. He sought to capture a vat-grown assassin who was killing political prisoners from the Quiet War.
A decent story that contains, in my opinion, overly graphic violent details.
NT ASFM March 2006 - sci-fi
The three galactonauts of the Defiant refuse to cancel their mission. They take an interceptor ship with two British space-cops along when they make a space leap. They find a planet with no sun that is strangely warm and has breathable air.
SF cliché story with updated, sometimes humorous, trimmings.
NT ASFM March 2006 - science fiction
Scientists on the alien world of Masada study its unusual lifeforms. Jonas researches the dangerous hooders which take apart humans to small fragments and are repelled only by powerful weapons such as proton cannons. Shardelle studies the huge gabbleducks whose speech is frustratingly untranslatable. Jonas travels with Shardelle in an ATV to do work in the field.
An impressive science fiction story set on another world. This novelette worked for me despite some technobabble jargon and enigmatic references to other things in this fictional universe. I’d like to read more by Neal Asher.
SS ASFM Mar 2006 – science fiction
A young girl is told by her father how a planet could be colonized cheaply. Then the tale shifts to the enormousness of such an event on Earth, and how inhumanely humans can act to one another.
A powerful short story.
SS ASFM Mar 2006 – fantasy
Steeplejack North lives a mainly solitary life on the Roof of the Cathedral which covers thousands of square miles. Ghosts of the recently departed, revenants get caught in steeples and spires making work more difficult for him. A psychocomp frees most revenants, but sometimes a specialist, a necromancer, needs to be called in.
An odd, but interesting tale featuring ghosts and mythical creatures.
SS ASFM March 2006 – Modern fiction
A sixteen-year old girl wants to go to Alaska because she thinks aliens will be landing there June twenty-first. Her evidence is text messages on her cell phone.
A fun, slang-filled, story about a teenager with a wild dream.
NV F&SF Jan 2006/Feb 2006
pulp fiction sci-fi
<<- F&SF Jan 2006 cover by Max Bertolini for "Planet of Mystery"
A manned space mission to the planet Venus improbably discovers a cool surface and breathable air on Venus. Astronauts Aeneas Hall and Lu-Hsun Chang are captured by amazon women riding centaurs. Lost robotic lander RB1011, or Robbie, has gained sentience. Chang falls in love with Queen of the Amazons Sha-Nee-La. After Hall reports seeing a flying saucer, orbital pilot Collins says that she considers the UFO more plausible than the centaurs and amazons because it's more scientific.
This is a lightweight tale that pokes fun at the ridiculousness of some old time sci-fi. Mission Control is mentioned as Houston and Burroughs (Mars). This novella was serialized. Part one is in the January 2006 F&SF issue, part two in the February issue.
NT F&SF Jan 2006 - modern fantasy
Native American boy Raven Dream is banished from his people. Angry ghost One-Less follows him to ranch of Blue Clad and Stone Face, otherwise known as Edward and Clare. The hidden Lakota people call others demons.
Part of a series, which I haven’t read the other stories. Nonetheless, this novelette was well-written enough to hold my interest.
NT F&SF Jan 2006 - fiction
Retired operative tells of tells of his South American missions for the CIA in the 1960s. He was spreading pneumonic plague, trying to make it look natural, germ warfare. Doing this work put him in therapy.
Interesting but uncomfortable story. It reads more like fact than fiction. Made me wonder where the facts ended.
SS F&SF Jan 2006 - horror/science fiction
Young man, Damien, who tortures cats and thinks serial killers are "interesting people" is occasionally being watched. He calls his watchers shadow men.
A short, creepy, unsettling story. Not my sort of thing.
SS F&SF Jan 2006 - modern fable
Western woman born in the Oriental Year of the Tiger, hears of bad things about Year of the Horse women from her martial arts teachers. Later she meets a young woman, Thera, who is a Horse-Year woman. Old time fables of horse-year women and horse folk are mixed in with the tales of the ups and downs in Thera's modern day life.
A well-done story.
SS F&SF Jan 2006 - science fiction
Paul gets paid for brain processing power. He wears a CApp, a Cerebral Appliance, like other CAptives. Woman he saw traces of, visions of, appears in his real life. She and her Jesus-like boyfreind like that Paul questions, want to tap into his CApp. Homeland Security alerted.
SS F&SF Jan 2006 - fantasy
Woman becomes too big for her town, goes upland seeking giants to kill, She becomes a giant. Travels upland some more and becomes a tiny person. Eventually she returns home and is the right size. Fanciful fable about growing up?
