Elle VanGilder’s Reviews > The Year's Best Science Fiction & Fantasy, 2015 > Status Update

“Sadness” by Timons Esaias - Can’t quite place my finger on why this rubbed my brain in an unsatisfying way, but trust that it was a let down of a last story. 2/5

“Aberration” by Genevieve Valentine - Very very pretty but ultimately felt like nothing was being said. Loved the prose; got lost in the swirl of it; content evaded me. Maybe I’m dumb? 2/5

“Collateral” by Peter Watts - Rumination on morality and ethics by the most ethical cyborg in the world. I fw this. 3/5

“Witch, Beast, Saint: An Erotic Fairy Tale” by C.S.E. Cooney - A story for all the monster fuckers in your life. 2.5/5

“Grand Jeté (The Great Leap)” by Rachel Swirsky - Ye-owch! Another sad story about doubles and the questions of identity or WHATEVER! Very melancholy, very Jewish, low sci-fi slay. 4/5

“Sleeper” by Jo Walton - Sometimes you’ve gotta remake history for the good of the masses or whatever. Sort of kind of a story about the power of organizing. 3/5

“The Hand is Quicker” by Elizabeth Bear - Very unsatisfying nothing ending, but the conceit of the story is interesting enough to give it a pass. I would love to read something longer in this setting. 3/5

“The Magician and Laplace’s Demon” by Tom Crosshill - The free will question finds grounds outside of theology (but also not really, because this narrator is definitely godly, although one with a creator) and I go WHOA!! I enjoyed this immensely :). 4/5

“Fift and Shria” by Benjamin Rosenbaum - Fun space biology (love a Weird Life, it’s been wired in me since the early days) but not much happened in it. I believe this is a story that’s expanded on in Rosenbaum’s new(-ish) book which leans more heavily on the gender-fuckery so! May have to check that out. 2/5

“The Instructive Tale of the Archeologist and His Wife” by Alexander Jablokov - Once again, an enjoyable story, now in an alternative future. I enjoy the speculation and the open ending. The question posed at the top of the story is ultimately unanswerable and the narrative maintained that. 3/5