Reseña de historias cortas: Metal Like Blood in the Dark. Juvenilia. Anchorage. The City of the Tree. In the Space of Twelve Minutes.

Uncanny Magazine Issue 36: September/October 2020

by Lynne M. Thomas (editora). Varios autores.
 

ASIN: B08GKWS4XP

Edition Language: English

 Estas revistas tienen una editorial, relatos y podcasts, además de entrevistas de autores. Por lo gra. leo una o dos hiostorias cortas de autores conocidos o que mis amigos recomiendan.

My rating: 3 of 5 stars

-"Metal Like Blood in the Dark" by T. Kingfisher - 3.5 stars sci-fi.
An isolated inventor built two machines on a planet: Brother and Sister. Nanite AIs that later are released to eat and grow. Sister is the main character and her awakening to moral dilemmas.

Or a coming of age of Gretel to save Hansel ;)

https://uncannymagazine.com/article/m...

-"Juvenilia" by Lavie Tidhar - 2 stars. Fantasy.
Meh. going for a gothic tale furbling on metatale. After ww1, a woman took a job as caretaker at Wildfell Hall>; an isolated place and strange rules.

-"Anchorage" by Samantha Mills - 3.5 stars
Space opera scifi short story about a ship, it crew, and Geneve , with a background of internal battles and losing Earth, and an encounter with an Anchorage, a sort of space eremite. Had some twist in it.

-"The City of the Tree" by Marie Brennan -4 stars. Fantasy.
wow, another unknown author. I really like the style of the story, about clans of people of the trees, and invaders, traditions, and bringing help, and choices. Reminds me a bit to Martha Wells in Raksura.

Simkitsi gave him a pitying look. “The rituals were meant to placate the archon, to keep him asleep. They won’t do any good now that he is gone.”
“Do we know that?” Aptachi challenged her. “We only know that he woke after the rituals stopped. Maybe their purpose was to strengthen the tree, and he woke because it began to weaken.”

https://uncannymagazine.com/article/t...

-"In The Space of Twelve Minutes" by James Yu - 2.8 stars Scifi
chinese astronauts are hindered by personal problems, so they gave them artificial androids avatars to the spouses. Mmm, a bit awkward idea, and a lot predictable.

Reseña de ARC: The Tangleroot Palace: Stories by Marjorie M. Liu

 +My thanks to Netgalley and publishers for the digital ARC.+

The Tangleroot Palace: Stories 

by Marjorie M. Liu

 

 256 pages

Published June 15th 2021 by Tachyon Publications

ISBN: 1616963522 (ISBN13: 9781616963521)

Edition Language: English

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

For those that still are confused: NOT A COMIC BOOK.

Anthology of short stories and novelletes , ranging from fantasy to horror and post-apocalypsis.

Apparently a good portion of readers know Marjorie M. Liu from the graphic novel "Monstress, Vol. 1: Awakening", but I have been a fan of her ever since I read "The Iron Hunt" from her incredible urban fantasy series Hunter Kiss. Here she presents us with some of her short stories, of which I knew a couple; At the end of these Liu gives some comments from when they were written, some of which she considers to be part of the universe of her ideas (like Dirk & Steel), that is to say full of magic.

Reseña de historia corta: Loneliness is in Your Blood. Redcap.

Nightmare Magazine, Issue 52 by John Joseph Adams
 

"Loneliness is in Your Blood" by Cadwell Turnbull (3.5 stars)

A story about a creature of myth, leaving her skin behind, living of blood and with a life stretching to immortality but solitary. Something that got my attention from the book No Gods, No Monsters.


http://www.nightmare-magazine.com/fic...


"Redcap" by Carrie Vaughn (3 stars)

A fairytale about the younger sister , always told of warnings about dangerous things , and an... encounter. A bit in the mocking side, and not really understanding rules or knowing it. Though it looks more like a teaser for a bigger story.

http://www.nightmare-magazine.com/fic...

View all my reviews

Reseña: Fantasy Magazine, Issue 60 - Dec. 2016

Fantasy Magazine, Issue 60 - Dec. 2016: People of Colo(u)r Destroy Fantasy! Special Issue 

by Daniel José Older (Editor) y Varios Autores

 

 200 pages 

Published December 1st 2016 by John Joseph Adams

ASIN: B01EXJ8P50

Edition Language: English

"The Things My Mother Left Me" by P. Djéli Clark. 

"Eyes of Carven Emerald" by Shweta Narayan. 

"Red Dirt Witch" by N.K. Jemisin 

My rating: 3 of 5 stars

"The Things My Mother Left Me" by P. Djéli Clark - 3 stars

Fantasía mágica donde una huérfana de quince años decide escapar del prospecto de que sus tías la casen , y llega hasta donde un circo con un sujeto que da mala espina y seres encadenados.

Reseña de relato corto: The Best We Can

The Best We Can 

by 

 

Carrie Vaughn

 

 

 

32 pages

Published July 17th 2013 by Tor Books

ISBN:  1466850442 (ISBN13: 9781466850446)

Edition Language: English

My rating: 2.5 let-it-flow stars

Out of the thousands of asteroids we tracked and photographed, this one caught my eye, because it was symmetrical and had a higher than normal albedo. It flashed, even, like a mirror. Asteroids aren’t symmetrical and aren’t very reflective. But if it wasn’t an asteroid . . . .

Relato corto y bastante realista de una astronomo cuando descubre un objeto de origen no-terrestre en el espacio. Bueno, ciertamente no pasa como en una pelicula de Hollywood.

Primero debaten de cuando anunciarlo, y a quien le corresponde, las empresas que deben ser auspiciadoras, y ¿en serio vale la pena hacer algo cuando el objeto (sin todavia saber lo que es) esta por años solamente ahi?

Reseña de relato corto: Dislocation Space

 

Dislocation Space 

by 

Garth Nix

  

44 pages (first published December 11th 2019)

ISBN: 1250768659 (ISBN13: 9781250768650)

Edition Language: English

URL

https://www.tor.com/2019/12/11/dislocation-space-garth-nix/

 

My rating: 3.5

Go on. Try to stay alive.

Maybe something would change.

Stalin might die. Aleksandra might die. The Americans might drop lots of their new bombs…

-----------------

Aleksandra es un zek, una prisionera de gulag, y un día dos oficiales vienen con una nueva misión para ella, no como francotiradora sino como contorsionista talentosa en un destino secreto en otra parte de Siberia. Es eso o consecuencias nefastas para su familia, las amenazas habituales.

Los soviéticos están intrigados por una anomalía y quieren explorarla. Para Aleksandra es otro campamento, otra misión mortal o tal vez ... podría ser un posible escape.

Rseña: In Xanadu (short story)

In Xanadu 

by 

Lavie Tidhar

Illustrated by John Anthony Di Giovanni

My rating: 3.5

This sounds like the prologue of a more longer story . Was just the first taste of a space opera conspiracy or war.

Nila is part of a Clan with the mission of protect Others (like digital entities). She is bored in Titan because nothing ever happen (so a young one) but one day the patrol found intruders.

-----------
‘Yes, I know you are Banu Qattmir.’

‘How?’ Nila demanded, outraged. In all this time she’d never met anyone from the outside. No one had ever come in, only authorised members of External Audits. To have someone just barge in like this through the perimeter, as though it were nothing!

‘I did some work for the Clan a couple of centuries back,’ the robot said. ‘Off-site contract work. After that we kept in touch…You know how it is.’
-----------

I was a bit confussed until well part of the last third of the story and when is was just getting to the good stuff... the end. I hope the author is thinking of continuing this.

Aqui en linea: https://www.tor.com/2019/11/06/in-xanadu-lavie-tidhar/

Reseña: The Yorkshire Mammoth (relato corto)

"The Yorkshire Mammoth" 

by 

Harry Turtledove

3 stars

Lo curioso del caso es que escuche Yorkshire y me saltó inmediatamente a la cabeza el autor de unos cuantos de mis libros favoritos acerca de un veterinario en Escocia en los años anteriores y posteriores a la segunda guerra mundial. Si no has escuchado de James Herriot y te gustan los animales, te esta faltando tiempo para leerte sus libros que son muy divertidos. 

Este relato corto es una historia alternativa de Escocia donde aun existen glaciares y las granjas al borde del mismo pues usan ...mamuts lanudos. El resto esta en la tónica de uno de los libros de Herriot, parece un homenaje, donde se ve la via dura, el veterinario honesto y esforzado y una anecdota que te deja nostalgico.

Reseña: Running the Snale (relato corto)

"RUNNING THE SNAKE" 

by 

Kage Baker

 Publicada en: Clarkesworld Magazine, Issue 128

May 1st 2017 by Wyrm Publishing 

My Rating: 3.5 politeistas stars

La fallecida Kage Barker en este historia corta trata acerca de un embacucador: Will Shaxpur que toma ventaja de todo esto de los numerosos templos que se levantan en un Londres con una reina pagana que es la imagen de Boudicea con sus druidas, y hay una tolerancia por gran numero de deidades.

Inventar una religion en ese entonces era más fácil. Que se te muera un feligres de sangre noble seguida siendo igual de complicado y mortal en ese entonces.

Es entretenida en su forma de relatar un pequeño misterio-intriga.

Reseña: We Who Live in the Heart (relato corto)

"WE WHO LIVE IN THE HEART"

 by 

Kelly Robson.

2018 Finalist: Theodore A. Sturgeon Memorial Award.

Publicada por: Clarkesworld Magazine, Issue 128 
Mayo 1, 2017

My rating: 4 stars

Un relato corto donde en una era post-cataclismo y lejos de la Tierra, la gente vive bajo tierra, pero todos no estan conformes y asi los rebeldes investigadores y cientificos y aventureros descubren que pueden vivir en forma parasitaria dentro de unas criaturas que son unas especies de balones aereos vivientes. La forma en que esta planteada es original en caunto a la organizacion de la sociedad distopica y en formas recuerda a su reciente obra "Gods, Monsters, and the Lucky Peach", Pero eso de criaturas que deben soportar humanos excavanadole dentro? brrr, me recuerda a la pobre Moya, y porque no me gusta el steampunk de otras novelas con sus criaturas vivas que son manipuladas para servir de naves.

Igual, muy interesante. Debates morales y sociales.

Reseña: Sun, Moon, Dust

 Sun, Moon, Dust 

by 

Ursula Vernon

 

Relato corto

Publicado por: Uncanny Magazine Issue 16: May/June 2017

My rating: 4.5 stars

La última voluntad y herencia de una abuela es una espada enjoyada que deja a su nieto. La espada es mágica y alberga 3 espiritus que se encargan de enseñar el arte al portador de la espada por varias generaciones y generaciones. Sin embargo , el joven no es más que un apacible granjero cuya mayor ambicion es tener un cultivo bueno para no pasar hambre.

Ursula Vernon (A.K.A. T. Kingfisher) es una de mis autoras favoritas, tiene enorme imaginacion y buena pluma. Siempre es un deleite leerla.

Reseña: And Then There Were [N-One] (relato corto)

And Then There Were [N-One] 

 by
Sarah Pinsker   

40 pages

Published March 1st 2017 by Uncanny Magazine

Edition Language. English

URL

http://uncannymagazine.com/article/and-then-there-were-n-one/

 

Blurb: When physicist Sarah Pinsker is murdered at PinskerCon—an interdimensional convention where everyone is Sarah Pinsker from a different alternate timeline—only insurance investigator Sarah Pinsker can solve the case.

 

 2 stars

Género : Ciencia ficción. Misterio-muerte. Realidades alternativas.
Nominada a tropocientos premios en 2018.

Sarah Pinsker (que es una inestigadora de seguros) recibe invitación  va y acude a una convención de esas otras Sarah Pinsker de varias realidades alternativas en una realidad diferente, o no tanto.

Cuando recién la protagonista estaba abriendo los ojos a todas las semejanzas -lesbiana y vegetariana- y diferencias -profesiones más que nada- de las otras Sarahs , le piden ayuda porque una de ellas aparece muerta.

Who was she? In what ways was she me, in what ways was she not? Who would mourn her? I tried to imagine the shape of my own absence from my own world.

Pese a su propio comentario acerca de la famosa novela de Agatha Christie no se le parece ni de lejos. Queda la idea de los puntos de divergencia , las decisiones que conducen a una u otra vida. Pero igual sigo esperando diferencias mayores en esas otras personas, no hay exploracion del tema (es una historia corta?, pero igual sigo esperando que me anuncien que no pueden encontrarse todas juntas a riesgo deuna implosion por materia/anti.materia o a Sam Carther balbuceando acerca de una falla entrópica en cascada.

Sin embargo, NO me convenció, ni tampoco la escritura.
(5-feb-2019)

 

Reseña: Fandom for Robots

Fandom for Robots
by
Vina Jie-Min Prasad

 7 pages

Published September 2017 by Uncanny

Edition Language: English

Literary Awards:

Hugo Award Nominee for Best Short Story (2018)

 

URL

https://uncannymagazine.com/article/fandom-for-robots/

 

TEASER: Computron feels no emotion towards the animated television show titled Hyperdimension Warp Record (超次元 ワープ レコード). After all, Computron does not have any emotion circuits installed, and is thus constitutionally incapable of experiencing “excitement,” “hatred,” or “frustration.” It is completely impossible for Computron to experience emotions such as “excitement about the seventh episode of HyperWarp,” “hatred of the anime’s short episode length” or “frustration that Friday is so far away.”

My rating: 2.5 robotics stars

A sentient robot is the protagonist of this short-short story about a solitary existence as an obsolete object in a museum whose non-existence sees a change for an iniquitous question of a girl about an anime series. From there, the fandom consumes it.

During the wait for episode eight, Computron discovers a concept called “fanfiction.”

I think that many fanfiction fans will be very recognized in some lines and will start more than some smile. However, the idea, despite being charming and ingenous, does not manage to catch me in a revealing way, maybe because the metafandom is something very seen in my case.

Reseña: Jackalope Wives and other stories

Jackalope Wives And Other Stories 

 by 

T. Kingfisher

278 pages

Published May 2nd 2017 by Red Wombat Studio

ASIN: B071946RLN

Edition Language: English

Juraria que habia leido antes esta historia corta, pero parece que no ^^;

Bueno, no se la pierdan :D

Jackalope Wives

 5 ★★★★★

La abuela Harken vive en el borde del desierto de Arizona , donde entre cactus saguaro  danzan las esposas jackalope.

They had faces like no mortal woman and they moved like quicksilver and they played music that got down into your bones and thrummed like a sickness.

Historia agridulce con todos los elementos de cuento de hadas/mito/leyenda , con raices que probablemente sean célticas (por las liebres) o indigenas, pero que bellas imagenes nos entrega.

Reseña: Dragos Meets Stinkpot (Elder Races #9.6)

Dragos Meets Stinkpot 

(Elder Races #9.6)

by 

Thea Harrison

 Short-Story from May 2016 newsletter.

Published May 2016

Edition Language:English

My rating: 3 of 5 stars

URL

http://theaharrison.com/extras/dragos-meets-stinkpot/

Dragos use his powers to get to know his youngest.

Sweet and funny.

[“Well, I don’t know, Dragos,” she replied. “How territorial do you think YOU would be about me? Only of course in a “that’s my mommy” way, not in a “that’s my mate” kind of way.”
(hide spoiler)]

/SPOILER--->

“Well, I don’t know, Dragos,” she replied. “How territorial do you think YOU would be about me? Only of course in a “that’s my mommy” way, not in a “that’s my mate” kind of way.”

<---SPOILER/

Going to be a handful. even more than Peanut it seems :)

Reseña: A world to Die for

A WORLD TO DIE FOR 

by 

Tobias S. Buckell

This a post-apocaliptic scenario where a young woman survives living with a sort of warrior tribe (Mad Max original type) and encounter mercenaries/traders/dealer guy that throwns her in a wild path.

If you manage to get out of this and back to the clusters, they’ll all owe you big. Maybe even get you a promotion. You could end up a driver inside the shielded cockpit of an attack pickup. Maybe even get some scrip for hydroponic fruit from down near Fort Wayne.

Reseña: In the House of the Seven Librarians

IN THE HOUSE OF THE SEVEN LIBRARIANS 

BY 

ELLEN KLAGES

 3 stars

Encantadora historia corta.

A fantasy whimsical tale about Librarians world, a girl, and dewey system.

Sin duda, existe todo un mundo dentro de un libro, ¿y entonces que ocurre con una biblioteca vieja? Cuando Carnegie es cerrada dando paso a una nueva biblioteca más moderna, las bibliotecarias cierran las puertas quedándose adentro. El paso a cuento de hadas ocurre cuando un bebé es depositado en las devoluciones junto con un viejo libro, a modo de multa.

Su crianza entre libros, sin duda deleitará a más de un bibliofilo.

By the time she was four, or thereabouts, she could sound out the letters for simple words—CUP and LAMP and STAIRS. And that’s how she came to name herself.

Olive had fallen asleep over Make Way for Ducklings, and all the other librarians were busy somewhere else. The child was bored. She tiptoed out of the Children’s Room, hugging the shadows of the walls and shelves, crawling by the base of the Circulation Desk so that Marian wouldn’t see her, and made her way to the alcove that held the Card Catalog. The heart of the library. Her favorite, most forbidden place to play.

online here

Uncanny Magazine Issue 3: March/April 2015

Reseña: Dr. Polingyouma's Machine

DR. POLINGYOUMA'S MACHINE 

BY 

EMILY DEVENPORT 

 4 stars

Si más gente fuera responsable e hiciera su trabajo a conciencia, mejor serian las cosas en este mundo. Y tal vez hasta en otros, quien sabe.

First lines: Dr. Polingyouma’s machine is still running, that’s what they tell me. Just what that machine does depends on whom you ask. And they’ve made it pretty clear that I’m not being paid to ask questions. Since I’m being paid so well, I don’t push it.

The well paid job, every 24-28 days, is janitorial. And Harris does it with her best of abilities, because among other things best left alone, her life is at stake.

Reseña: Where Would You Be Now? (The Coast Road 0.5)

Where Would You Be Now? (The Coast Road 0.5)

by 

Carrie Vaughn

My rating: 3 of 5 stars

¡Donde estarias ahora? Se preguntan entre si los sobrevivientes en una clinica donde el hambre es el dia a dia, y se plantean seriamente el controlar la poblaación. ¿en la universidad? de vacaciones? ¿con tu novio, tu perro, tus padres, comiendo helado o bailando en una disco? ... ¿Esto pasará o solamente va a empeorar?

Short dystopian piece about life in America after a post-disaster, day-a-day reality with problems with famine and worry about armed gangs, like many other tons of dystopia show. Still... I'd like to know more, is too short.

A clinic still working with doctors and nurses trying to help and survive, worried about fed their members and colaborators. Still uncertain about the world or if this it.

This keep remind me of another story, and yes is similar to Amaryllis ---Amaryllis and Other Stories

This is a prequel to Bannerless. Could be read online here. 

https://www.tor.com/2018/02/07/where-would-you-be-now-carrie-vaughn/

Reseña: Helen O'Loy

Helen O'Loy 

by 

Lester del Rey

First published December 1938

Edition Language:English

Literary Awards:Hugo Award Nominee for Best Short Story (Retro 1939)

 

My rating: 2 of 5 stars

Relato corto publicado en 1938. Dos científicos cumplen su fantasía de implementar una doméstica robotizada a nivel diosa doméstica.

Por supuesto, ella adora al primer hombre que ve al despertar. Después de todo, sus ideas básicas las saca de telenovelas y libros de fantasia adolescente.