Clarkesworld Magazine, Issue 79, April 2013

by Neil Clarke (Editor), Benjanun Sriduangkaew (Contributor), Kali Wallace (Contributor)

FICTION
“Annex” by Benjanun Sriduangkaew
“No Portraits on the Sky” by Kali Wallace
“Melt With You” by Emily C. Skaftun
“Spar (The Bacon Remix)” by Kij Johnson
“Guest of Honor” by Robert Reed
“Finisterra” by David Moles

NON-FICTION
“Gathered in Translation” by Ken Liu
“The Military, Magic, and the Misery Ethic: A Conversation with Myke Cole” by Jeremy L. C. Jones
“Another Word: Literatures of Despair” by Daniel Abraham
“Editor’s Desk: How Did This Happen?” by Neil Clarke

Genres: Science Fiction, Short Stories, Fantasy

127 pages, Kindle Edition

First published April 1, 2013

About the author

Neil Clarke is best known as the editor and publisher of the Hugo and World Fantasy Award-winning Clarkesworld Magazine. Launched in October 2006, the online magazine has been a finalist for the Hugo Award for Best Semiprozine four times (winning three times), the World Fantasy Award four times (winning once), and the British Fantasy Award once (winning once). Neil is also a ten-time finalist for the Hugo Award for Best Editor Short Form (winning once in 2022), three-time winner of the Chesley Award for Best Art Director, and a recipient of the Kate Wilhelm Solstice Award. In the fifteen years since Clarkesworld Magazine launched, numerous stories that he has published have been nominated for or won the Hugo, Nebula, World Fantasy, Sturgeon, Locus, BSFA, Shirley Jackson, WSFA Small Press, and Stoker Awards.

Additionally, Neil edits  Forever —a digital-only, reprint science fiction magazine he launched in 2015. His anthologies include: Upgraded, Galactic Empires, Touchable Unreality, More Human than Human, The Final Frontier, Not One of Us,  The Eagle has Landed, , and the Best Science Fiction of the Year series. His next anthology, The Best Science Fiction of the Year: Volume Seven will published in early 2023.

He currently lives in New Jersey with his wife and two sons.

Reviews

[Hirondelle (not getting all notifications)]

I have only read of this issue Spar a short story by Kij Johnson. It won the Nebula award in 2009 and was a finalist for the Hugo and Locus award but I only noticed that now I am linking it again, I read it over some references to being memorable. It is. I do not know quite what it is, what it is meant to be: a fever dream, hallucination, a psychotic episode (over a breakup with Gary?), literally? What? An experiment at writing sex as untantalizingly and unsexy as possible? A deconstruction of the whole concept of sex with aliens? I don't know.

It's really unusual, somewhat stomach turning, but really very interesting. I do not know why I did not hate it, maybe because it felt there were points to what it was doing and it kept raising questions in my mind (like "what is this?") . It does do something I value, which is stick in my mind and make me see something differently.

[Ro]

I've only read “No Portraits on the Sky”, and it was marvelous. Can't wait to read more os Kali's work 🙌

[Amy]

I skipped the new "Classic Fiction" section here. Just stuck with the Original Fiction and the Non-Fiction.

The fiction section was once again all women, yay!
3 stars for "Annex" by Benjanun Sriduangkaew. Far future post-human doing stuff...not bad but didn't really peak my interest.
5 stars for "No Portraits on the Sky" by Kali Wallace. Woah! Humans(?) living in a dense tented forest, apparently forgetting that there is anything beyond it. More stories about this, please!
4 stars for "Melt With You." Dark and absurd post-apocalyptic story where people have been reincarnated as knickknacks and garden gnomes.

Non-fiction:
Ken Liu talks about translating stories; Jones interviews Myke Cole (woo-hoo!); Daniel Abraham talks about grimdark fantasy; and Neil Clarke celebrates the magazines Hugo noms.

[Tara]

Unfortunately I feel like this was the weakest of the Clarkesworld I've read (only the last 8). I was a bit torn because I really enjoyed "Guest of Honor" and "Finisterra" (though I'd read the latter before), but none of the new stories (and the bacon story O_o) really made me excited. I did especially like the non-fiction piece on literatures of despair, and "Gathered in Translation" was also fairly thought-provoking if dry. Overall, I was a bit disappointed.

[Terri]

My favorite items were the stories: 'Melt With You' by Emily C. Skaftun and 'Guest of Honor' by Robert Reed. I additionally really liked the articles about the difficulties of translating speculative fiction stories by Ken Liu and the article 'Another Word: Literature of Despair by Daniel Abraham

[Shawn]

Every story this time around couldnt get me remotely interested. The story about bacon had a slight glimmer of hope but in the end the only thing I got out of this issue was the review on Shadow Ops interested me to tag those books to read in the future.

[Miguel Ángel Moreno]

Me han gustado todos los cuentos, especialmente las ambientaciones.