Flash Fiction Online, Cast of Wonders, and Escape Pod: Short Fiction Reviews by Charles Payseur
Flash Fiction Online 9/24
Cast of Wonders 9/29/24
Escape Pod 9/19/24
September’s Flash Fiction Online starts strong with Stefan Alcalá Slater’s “Tornado Breakers Don’t Cry”, which finds siblings Ethel and Edgar living in the shadow of their father, a famous tornado breaker, long after he’s gone from their lives. Ethel has taken up the mantel, but when she fails to break a tornado that comes through their town, she loses herself to the doubt and fear and inadequacy that her father instilled in her despite the joy she once took from riding tornadoes. And it might just take Edgar, whose own path was much more domestic and caring, to remind her why she started riding tornadoes to begin with, and how she can get her confidence back. Slater captures both the toxic and affirming sides of the Midwestern United States, where community expectations can stifle and constrict even as a deep well of nurturing and generosity can help people overcome almost anything. It’s a delightful and well-imagined story!
The latest from Cast of Wonders is A.W. Prihandita’s “My Mother’s Voice and Shadow”. In it, Marie has learned book-mending from her father but wants to learn more about the strange condition that leaves her mother mostly non-communicative and unable to fully interact with the world around her. When her father sternly warns her away from magic as a means to bridging the gap between daughter and mother, though, it leads Marie to question a lot of what she’s been taught, and she discovers some grim truths about the world and those closest to her. Prihandita uses the mystery of Marie’s mother well, leading readers down a rather unsettling avenue of investigation as Marie grapples with what has been done to her, her mother, and magic in general in this tense and rewarding read.
Escape Pod’s September included Arden Baker’s postapocalyptic spy story “This Little War of Ours”, which follows the coded communications of two spies on different sides of a conflict that has left Earth shattered and might have destroyed all human colonies off-world as well. The story explores the utter pointlessness of this war, waged for ideological reasons and ultimately so that men with very fragile egos didn’t have to admit they were wrong. What remains is the connections people made, both within and between people in the factions. Baker looks at fatalism, blame, hope, and survival in a way that resonates as… human. Flawed and terrible at times – destructive and violent and seemingly incapable of living up to the promise of our abilities. And yet there’s something there, despite everything, that holds on, and might be worth rooting for.
Recommended Stories:
“Tornado Breakers Don’t Cry”, Stefan Alcalá Slater (Flash Fiction Online 9/24)
“My Mother’s Voice and Shadow”, A.W. Prihandita (Cast of Wonders 9/24)
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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