89 posts tagged with shortfiction by brainwane.
Displaying 51 through 89 of 89.
“A bold and brassy trumpet melody?”
"He smacked me the other way and my head naturally followed suit. Right, left, right, left. I might have been a front row spectator at Wimbledon if it weren’t for the balloons of blue and purple swelling across my immaculately sculpted cheekbones. They always go for the cheekbones first, don’t they?" "A Recurring Theme (Song)" by Mei Davis (published this year) is a light-hearted James Bond parody in which secret agent Achilles Lee has an accessory he can't get rid of.
Those who exist, have existed, or will exist in the vicinity of Omelas
"That child is going to feel the same either way. We might as well do our part to get the tourist industry back on its knees....You want to go to Mendocino. You think no one ever suffered in Mendocino?" John Holbo's "The Ones Who Take The Train To Omelas" is a parody of a short story by Ursula K. Le Guin (and of another scifi classic), and comes with mocked-up old-school travel posters plus the essay "Thought-Experiments and Trains of Thought". (Via Crooked Timber.) Jed Hartman (disclaimer: a pal) has compiled a list of links to short stories responding to the Le Guin story, including stories by N. K. Jemisin and P.H. Lee.
loneliness, crows, prophecy, lost things, and courage
What if there's an ache you've been denying, and you've gone solitary to see to your own quiet needs, and someone tries to pull you back into the world? “The End of the World in Five Dates” by Claire Humphrey (previously) is a short fantasy story told in vignettes (text and audio available): “Happy Rapture,” she said, and kissed my cheek, although we had never met before. "Tell the Crows I’m Home" by Laurel Beckley, published this year and available in audio as well, is an atmospheric fantasy story: Nicole finds them all, save for the crows, who do not appear to be bound to the rules of the farm, and come and go as they please. Like Nicole, a crow is never lost. She used to have quite a few human visitors, back when the world was only half broken.
"I can help." "Maybe he expects that."
"Everybody knows about Thrull. Thrull like legend among us folk—biggest, greenest, meanest, nastiest, and dirtiest of all—with one big difference: legends false, Thrull true." "Big Thrull and the Askin’ Man" by Max Gladstone is a short fantasy story, told as a tall tale or fairy tale, in which a straightforward host learns to respond to manipulative questions from a seemingly weak guest.
"At work I am composed and civil and do not break anything"
Two short speculative stories about coping and related struggles. "Dragons" by Teresa Milbrodt (published this year) has a hard-to-quit video game: “I've thought about getting glasses,” the dragon said as we sat on rocks with mugs in our hands and the tin of butter cookies on another rock between us. The dragon even had cloth napkins, which hid the gaping wound in my abdomen. “How to Remember to Forget to Remember the Old War” by R.B. Lemberg (content note for self-harm): "I am luckier than most. Numbers come easy to me, and I look grave and presentable in my heavy jackets that are not armor." The Lemberg story is also available in audio.
"My best friend is a dolphin and sometimes it’s weird."
"In your first conversations with them, you’ll probably want to refer to all you’ve learned in the past year’s intensive study of dolphin history, culture, and ritual. Maybe you want to put them at ease, or maybe you kind of want to show off. I’m telling you not to do that, because you know nothing." The science fiction short story "Share Your Flavor" by Jenifer K. Leigh has a fun friendship between a human and a dolphin who commiserate about their relationship issues. [more inside]
"Sixteen Earth years. Not quite nine, Martian."
Wanna read action-y scifi about girls solving problems by hacking electronics? (Previously.) "Power to the People" by Kiera Lesley is shorter: “Sorry, print took longer than I expected.” Sarah said, fishing in her pockets for her offerings, all in white because that was the only colour filament she had. But "A Thousand Ways" by Beth McCabe takes place on Mars: Riley began moving the rows of panels from angled to vertical, a kluge Liam's team had fixed up to keep the sticky dust from accumulating during a storm. While she worked, her gaze travelled over the landscape of her childhood, littered with the debris of the Consortium's failures.
"The obvious target for any attempt at communication is one's peers."
"The Case for Human Intrusion into the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant" by Slant is a 4-part fanfic responding to "Expert judgment on markers to deter inadvertent human intrusion into the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant" (the "this place is not a place of honor" report). [more inside]
"with a red pen, she writes in the margins all the names she can recall"
In a short-story excerpt from his novel The Overstory, Richard Powers describes a scientist, her forestry research, and her vindication: "The Woman Redeemed by Trees". (Suzanne Simard, the real-life inspiration for the fictional character here, got a Ted Lasso shout-out.) For a fantastical tale about a woman battling conventional wisdom, "Makeisha in Time" by Rachael K. Jones (also available in Spanish) travels through time: "Each time she returns from the past, she carries another lifetime nestled within her like the shell of a matryoshka doll."
"But then her tiny nostrils flared, and I knew I was dead."
"The Woman With the Long Black Hair" by Zach Shephard -- "The string-dolls and paintings puzzled her. So much reverence . . ." -- and "We Love Deena" by Alice Sola Kim (previously) -- "I don't remember which attempt it was, how many people I had been so far." -- are odd, complicated fantasy stories in which people get the wrong idea about a woman who brings death.
"she is lonely, and skeptical of my ability to ease her loneliness"
"Unit Two Does Her Makeup" by Laura Duerr (published this year): "She is smiling, but I see and catalog and evaluate thousands of smiles every day. Hers is tentative." "Maslow's Howitzer" by Miriam Oudin (previously): "I shipped from the factory with several hundred variations of the offer I was about to make." Two fun scifi stories about robots figuring out how to fulfill their needs -- in caring for themselves and for others.
Mech suits, an aristocrat, talking dinosaurs who race motocross
Two science fiction stories that use over-the-top characters and situations, plus crankiness, to get laughs -- and both available in audio and in text. "Let Us Now Praise Awesome Dinosaurs" by Leonard Richardson (audio, illustrated): "Why would a dinosaur need a gun?" asked the shop owner. "Self-defense." "Texts from the Ghost War" by Alex Yuschik: While I realize driving that mech likely takes all of your limited resources, please take care not to step on the roses. (Audio uses a cool trick to sound right in stereo!) [more inside]
"observed the hunter’s nephew, with severely limited enthusiasm"
Light fantasy stories with some silly bits. "The Family Business" by Andrea Tang is a modern fairy tale about a Korean-American teen. "Janet and I Try to Get Frosted Strawberry Pop-Tarts at the Gilbert Rd Super Target. It's the One in Scottsdale. No, the Other One. The One on Gilbert." by Saul Lemerond basically never leaves the checkout lane.
Paper and ink, lemons and a bike
Small, kind, domestic scifi stories in a climate-changed US. "When she pressed the county seal into the page, embossing an eagle rampant and ivy wreath, the diploma-shaped ache in her chest eased almost to nothing. It should have been hers anyway." "The Notary of No Republic" by J. Byrd (published this year): a self-appointed public servant gets a complicated request. "'Hope is a habit, Dix.' A bad habit, yes, a dangerous one. Hope had shaped this foundering world into what it was." "A Luxury Like Hope" by Aimee Ogden, also published this year: despite everything, an aunt tries to use lemons.
bamboo, beetles, gardening, and power balances
"The first time I tried to regreen our town, I was sixteen. I got sentenced to 150 hours of community service..." "Choose Your Battleground" by Andrew Leon Hudson is a short, light, triumphant science fiction story about urban ecology. "A bee man came by a few months ago. I don’t like bees much, but I took some." "The Restoration" by Karen Heuler is a little longer and slower and more unsettling, as humans reckon with our discomfort with real ecological balance.
“They been talking to you too?” he asked in a whisper.
"The Bronx’s First Spiritual Hip Hop Party" by Sarah A. Macklin is a short, sweet fantasy story about a southern girl visiting New York City and making unexpected friends through the power of music.
scars, cracks, blood, and video games
"That Story Isn’t the Story" by John Wiswell (previously) is a fantasy story about escape and recovery from abuse (author interview). "Everything Anton owns goes in one black trash bag. His ratty yellow sketchpad, which he bought to draw the other familiars when he moved here, and only ever used three pages of. The few shirts and khakis that he paid for with his own money, before Mr. Bird took control of his finances." "The Breaks" by Scott King (also available in Spanish) is a fantasy story in which people help each other heal. "When the clerk at the convenience store takes my twenty for the frozen mac and cheese and the cheap wine, I barely notice the fractal pattern of cracks running across his face."
Consciousness simulacra and a dusty mirror
The science fiction story "Proof by
Induction" by José Pablo Iriarte and the fantasy story “Basilisk
and Sons” by Timothy Mudie both center men trying to deal with
complicated emotions while grieving and carrying on their fathers' work.
The former found via Aimee
Picchi's November short story readathon (aka #NaShoStoMo) on
Twitter, recommending one short sf/f story per day.
in which the reader learns horses' likelihood of colic in microgravity
"Love Unflinching, at Low- to Zero-G" by M. L. Clark is an engaging, reasonably happy sci-fi novelette starring a veterinarian on a space station who treats horses, dogs, and more while attempting to prevent a diplomatic crisis. Content note for mention of the accidental death of a dog.
"Hazelnuts were from before."
Vivid imagery about the future of our relationship with ecological surroundings in these three melancholy speculative stories. "The Wild Inside" by Angela Penrose: "We had to close up another building that day—bolt the doors shut, board over the windows, stop up the chimney and all the vents with concrete". "Packing" by T. Kingfisher (Ursula Vernon): "Today is not the day I wanted to do this, but we aren’t always given choices. It’s time to pack for the new seasons." And "The Last Ride of the Polaris" by Carmen Peters, in the Apocalpyse issue of Black Cat Magazine (download the PDF), has interiority, two guys, and a waterslide. [Content note: includes a homophobic slur.] "That’s how you needed to talk nowadays, in the past tense."
"And then tomorrow I’ll open my next manila folder and do it again."
Gods, demons, angels, etc. deal with bureaucracy and support groups in some short fantasy stories. "Magicians at Law" by Grace Seybold has arbitration and a kitty-cat: “Hm. I’m assuming, given the smell, this was a standard demonic service contract?” "Broken Idols, Guarded Hearts" by Elizabeth Loupe has an old, possibly obsolete rivalry: "We’d expected death, but they said we’d been punished enough. That was true." "Mr. Death" by Alix E. Harrow [content note: child death] has a lot of grief: "Every new reaper is shielded, at least a little."
"All that alchemy of tree and climate, genius and history."
Rebecca Campbell (previously) has won the Theodore Sturgeon Memorial Award for the best short science fiction of 2020 for "An Important Failure". It's a novelette "full of longing & fear for the woods" and "about creation in the face of climate change". Campbell's surveillance-focused "Such Thoughts are Unproductive" similarly resonates with fear and longing. Many of the other nominees are also available to read free online.
"She settles on a diner in a small human town"
Three speculative stories about the logistical and emotional side effects of time travel and related phenomena. "Paradox" by Naomi Kritzer is heavier: "If you need to know you matter, don’t ask history, ask the people you matter to." "Cyclical" by Tanya Breshears (previously) is bittersweet and domestic: "A human's life is a rushing river: a moment, once lived, is rendered forever inaccessible, except by the poor substitute of human memory." "The Theory and Practice of Time Travel: A Syllabus" by David DeGraff is humorous: "Students will devise and perform experiments to test the nature of reality as long as there is minimal chance the experiment will destroy the universe. And no one dies. 3 credits."
Escape, lineage, oppressed labor, and underdog revenge
Two scifi stories of underdog revenge in an unfair future. "The Last of the Redmond Billionaires" by Peter Watts is a very dark vignette in a climate refugee future. "The Stillness of the Stars" by Jessica Snell (formerly McAdams) is a happier space thriller on a generation ship, about escaping past the steerage-class wall.
"Your grandpa was a lot of things in the old days"
Two short speculative stories about growing up in a powerful family. "Horangi", fantasy by Thomas Ha (reminds me a little of Ursula Vernon's Grandma Harken stories): “I’m sorry to hear that,” my grandfather responded politely, and he gave a smile that I’d often seen him give to the customers in his shoe repair shop, respectful, but with a little firmness to it. “I’m not sure why you’re telling me this. My family doesn’t work for yours anymore, Mr. Yong.” "Urban Fanfare", science fiction by Jared Oliver Adams: It was a cool idea. One of Mom’s best, really. But the problem with it was the music the committee chose.
"The quiet of the aftermath pressed down on us"
Two scifi stories about people finding tendrils of human connection while confronting modern grief. "A Glut of Nothing, and Yet… Something" by Monte Lin: ""The Singularity had come, but not the one people wanted.... the Glut: a grayed-out area that evaded vision, comprehension, and perception..." "Love at the End" by Deborah Germaine Augustin: "I woke up hungover the day after Kuala Lumpur was supposed to end.... Eddie poured water from our last six-litre bottle into the kettle." Both published this year.
"None of this is going as planned."
"I hate Original Diana immediately, or at least I want to hate her." "The Failed Dianas" is a short, emotional science fiction story by Monique Laban (Clarkesworld, February 2021) in which our Asian-American protagonist struggles with whether it is possible to make her parents happy. It was P H Lee's favorite story of the month.
"Suhela is a constant, like the acceleration of gravity"
"In the capital, where our Queen lives, there are two universities." "Fifty Years in the Virtuous City" by Leo Mandel (originally published on Archive Of Our Own as part of a fanworks exchange) is a short story, told in glimpses over fifty years, about two women growing as scientists, administrators, and rivals in a utopian alternate-history South Asia. Audio version available; Seth Dickinson interviews the author. Mandel's fanfiction responds to "Sultana's Dream," a 1905 utopian feminist short story by Rokeya Sakhawat Hossain.
Apprenticeship, vulnerability, wigs, shipwreck, & watching wisdom grow
“I didn’t ask you to meet me here to reminisce,” said Suradanna. She turned the guest-cup upside down and placed it carefully on her desk, signaling that business negotiations were about to begin. “I want to hire you.” "Suradanna and the Sea" by Rebecca Fraimow (published 2016) is a fantasy novella that -- as the author puts it -- "features trade routes, magical fertilizer, and one girl's centuries-long effort to impress a woman who is already in a committed relationship with a boat."
"took out a sheaf of papers and shook them in the miners’ faces"
"'I am in desperate country,' she said, after swallowing, 'and I need all the bravery I can get. But I will have nothing of resignation.' She spat out a wad of wet pulp." "What I Assume You Shall Assume" by Ken Liu is a short fantasy story published in June, about 1890s Idaho, Chinese and Chinese-American experiences, violence, the magic of words, solidarity, and grit.
"Talitha is smiling at her, tentative, luminous."
"'It's like mathematics,' Cat says. 'Once it’s written, it can't not be true. See?' She takes the swan back and adds a descending stroke to the character on the neck. It takes flight and flutters around Toby’s head." "Flightcraft" is a short fantasy story which author Iona Datt Sharma describes: "A romance in its beginning, an ancient craft, and an aeroplane named for a traitor."
"I knew I was in over my head when Punzie's mother called"
"And you know if we both have to spend our time with dragons, at least yours is a cute one." "The Thing In the Walls Wants Your Small Change" by Virginia M. Mohlere (published 2018) is a short fantasy story about recovery from abuse, a tiny cute dragon, and how we protect each other. On a similar theme: "Four Things that Weren't Adequately Covered in Mulan's R.A. Training" by NaomiK, a short fan fiction piece published in 2013. "Mulan is a Resident Assistant on a dormitory floor at a college. Gosh, some of the students on her floor come from really screwed-up families."
"Cookie deeply aware this highly problematic."
"Exclusive Content" is a charming piece of fan fiction by ellen_fremedon about Sesame Street, tagged "backstage drama, issues of representation, muppet identity politics, literary adapations, kind of a lot of annotations". "In old days, Cookie think, just having monsters on television was spooky. Monsters doing classy drama was transgressive. Transgressive mean it a thing that people not expect you to do, and they think you strange when you do it. It special kind of surprise."
"No, chairs can be even worse," said Coco.
A short, kind fantasy story about ghosts: "起狮，行礼 (Rising Lion — The Lion Bows)" by Zen Cho: "Gwailo have no sense. They treat the past like it's just an old movie. Like it's not serious."
"Her branches creaked as she walked the outer gardens"
Four scifi/fantasy stories published this year about the strange and ordinary things (our) bodies (might) do or be: "AirBody" by Sameem Siddiqui, "The Bee Thing" by Maggie Damken, "The Longest Season in the Garden of the Tea-Fish" by Jo Miles, and "Badass Moms in the Zombie Apocalypse" by Rae Carson. All are also available as audio/podcasts. [more inside]
"Let me guess: fuel is sacred too."
InterGalactic Medicine Show was an online magazine publishing short science fiction and fantasy stories. After it ceased publication in 2019, it took down its paywall so now all its archives -- hundreds of original short stories and reprints, with original illustrations, and some also available as audio -- are free to read. Includes stories by Naomi Kritzer, Holli Mintzer, and Tim Pratt. Title is from the sweet, comic "For Sale: Veterinary Practice On Sigma 4; Certain Conditions Apply" by Jared Oliver Adams from the final issue.
"I decide that it is practical for me to find it attractive"
Silly, fun, or heartwarming scifi stories published this year about robots & AI include "A Guide for Working Breeds" by Vina Jie-Min Prasad (author of "Fandom for Robots" (2017), previously), "Custom Options Available" by Amy Griswold, and "Rager in Space" by Charlie Jane Anders. [more inside]
"I apologize for disturbing you, Ensign"
Eight tiny scifi/fantasy stories and what-if suggestions about aliens, monsters, etc. trying to understand humans, and vice versa. Including "I dunno, dude. This ‘light’ stuff sounds like a bunch of mumbo jumbo to me. I mean, how do we know it’s even real?" and "This is both relateable and aspirational in some fashion, for, alive humans SUCH AS OURSELVES… self-deprecating remark…" [more inside]
"spotted cool things their listing bots had mislabeled and underpriced"
"Mika was careful. But you heard stories." In the short, sweet scifi story "Legal Salvage" by Holli Mintzer, a vintage seller navigates a forgotten building of self-storage lockers, an unfamiliar sorting bot, Geoff the sentient traffic light, and a party. Part of Slate's Future Tense Fiction series, in partnership with Arizona State University's Center for Science and the Imagination. Thematically related to Mintzer's "Tomorrow Is Waiting" (previously; MeFi's Own!).
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