Fiyah, Beneath Ceaseless Skies, and Diabolical Plots: Short Fiction Reviews by Charles Payseur
Fiyah 10/24
Beneath Ceaseless Skies 10/3/24
Diabolical Plots 10/24
The October Fiyah is themed around spacefaring aunties, and it opens with a bang with Tatiana Obey’s “Fuck Them Kids”, which finds Jaz visiting her mom and sister (and her sister’s kids) for the spacer holiday celebrating the settlement of Europa. It’s something Jaz’s mom participated in personally as a botanist on the first settlement ship, and under that shadow Jaz has always felt somewhat uncomfortable, drawn much more to space and the speed and thrill of flight rather than to the ground and the plants her mother loved. When she slips away from the family to take part in a race, she discovers that she’s accidentally taken a stowaway along, and finds that, even though the domesticity of home life doesn’t really appeal to her, there are perks to keeping family close. It’s a joyous and exhilarating read, where Obey explores the complexities of families and conflicting personalities while also embracing a definite need for speed. It’s so fun! C.M. Lockhart also focuses on family in “My Mother’s Daughter”, which follows Serena, whose mother has always been rather controlling and cruel when she wants to be, cutting Serena down whenever she starts to be confident and assert herself. In response, she’s built up mental and emotional armor to help her cope, but when a close call in space grounds her on a distant planet and she meets a young woman struggling with the same kind of treatment, it causes her to reevaluate. Lockhart does careful and fantastic character work with Serena, capturing a moving and relatable picture of a woman trying her best to please everyone else, and deeply tired because of it. The story pushes her into confrontation with herself and her desires, and finds in them something warm and wonderful, strong and courageous and worthy of true love and respect.
Beneath Ceaseless Skies celebrated its birthday in October with a special double issue full of adventure-fantasy goodness, including a new novella from Chris Willrich, “To Hunt the Grey Lady”. In it, Captain Bloodglow is chasing a former lover and rogue sentient ship in the hopes of returning it to its sultan and being rewarded for the trouble. Bloodglow, who throughout the story is coming to terms with his gender and history, must make a series of increasingly dangerous moves to try and stay ahead of the competition to be the one to bring the quarry back alive and safe. With a magical sentient ship that might have some form of dementia and a mental link with their entire crew, that’s much easier said than done. The world building on display is impressive, exploring the magic and history of this flat world across which privateers and pirates sail the seas made more dangerous by monstrous creatures, obstacles both natural and human-made, and wild magic capable of just about anything. And under the rollicking adventure is a careful and touching story about a man trying to come to terms with his childhood and all the decisions he’s made since then. It’s a breathtaking experience.
October’s Diabolical Plots is centered on death, paranoia, and violence. In D.S. Ravenhurst’s “Bone Talker, Bone Eater” the focus is on Suvi, who can hear the voices of the dead through their bones. It’s made her a pariah in her community, kept safe only through a bargain her mother made with a local witch – a bargain that hastened her mother’s death. Alone now, Suvi has to face the fear and paranoia of the villagers and their suspicion that because she can talk to bones she must be a bone eater, a kind of monstrous force that preys on the living and the dead. But in banishing Suvi to the catacombs beneath the village, what the mob might have done is seal their own fate, as Suvi discovers the connection between the bone talkers and bone eaters. And the story’s trajectory suggests a rather tragic cycle of ignorance, desperation, and violence that makes for a somewhat depressing but still lovely read.
Recommended Stories:
“Fuck Them Kids”, Tatiana Obey (Fiyah 10/24)
“To Hunt the Grey Lady”, Chris Willrich (Beneath Ceaseless Skies 10/24)
Charles Payseur is an avid reader, writer, and reviewer of speculative fiction. His works have appeared in The Best American Science Fiction and Fantasy, Lightspeed Magazine, and Beneath Ceaseless Skies, among others, and many are included in his debut collection, The Burning Day and Other Strange Stories (Lethe Press 2021). He is the series editor of We’re Here: The Best Queer Speculative Fiction (Neon Hemlock Press) and a multiple-time Hugo and Ignyte Award finalist for his work at Quick Sip Reviews. When not drunkenly discussing Goosebumps, X-Men comic books, and his cats on his Patreon (/quicksipreviews) and Twitter (@ClowderofTwo), he can probably found raising a beer with his husband, Matt, in their home in Eau Claire, Wisconsin.
This review and more like it in the December 2024 issue of Locus.
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