Rise Reviews

You will not find many publications that puts out as much material as Golden Vision Magazine. The magazine publishes two issues at a time. One is a print version and the other a free online publication. Each is distinctively different. This review is dedicated to the online version.
The online version boast part one of a serial, two previously published short stories, a new short story, and 21 works of flash fiction. The previously published and serial have not been read but that still left plenty of material to look over.

This month’s entry for the webzine Giganotosaurus is “Hero-Mother” by Vylar Kaftan. An unconventional tale to say the least, Kaftan does the work of crafting an entire race of creatures in order to explore the instinctual call to motherhood.

We are introduced to Keloc and Duv, a pair of creatures decended from treecats and living in some heretofore unknown society, as they attempt to mate. The act itself is described in loving and gruesome detail. The females of the species have no opening to their wombs and therefore the male member must literally drill its way into her body in order to “inspire” a cub. Kaftan turns the parental cycle on its ear, making the coupling a painful process that needs be endured and the actual child birth becomes the orgasmic moment. The result of this is selected breeding, as only females with a certain pain tolerance are able to give birth by council law.

Picking up where we left off with last week’s review, “Memories of Chalice” by Peter M. Ball is a tale of memory. Or more specifically a lack of it and the trade in it. The narrator describes his fall from prominence pushing exotic memories. The world suggested here would be an interesting one to see in a larger format. It deals with memories being traded on an open market, influenced by a mysterious machine called the Nexus.

“In the Dark” is the first in a series of poems by Ki Russell that suggest speculative topics. None of them display the opaqueness that is the bane of most fantasy poetry. “Infatuectomy” and “Drowning in Pearls” also appear in the issue.

Electric Velocipede is the type of magazine that could not exist without the internet. That is to say, it’s focus is so eclectic that it would have a hard time gathering a following without the wider exposure the internet allows. It’s fortunate for us, then, who live in the internet age that we get to experience the thing made real.

The latest double issue of the Hugo Award winning magazine is a monster. There are 32 stories, poems, shorts, and non-fiction pieces to uncover. Undoubtedly, there is something here for everyone.

My first impression of the Ideomancer mainpage is the one that stays with me – ooo, fancy!

Support the Little Guy is an e-zine devoted to promoting the Twitter campaign by the same name. It is published on a bi-monthly basis, and contains 3-6 stories, poetry at times, and reviews of short fiction that are published online. Episode #2, titled Jingle Bells, contains three short stories and five reviews. The stories are [...]

Basement Stories is a relatively new online speculative fiction magazine; its first issue was published in July of 2010. Issue #3 is the first issue I’ve read, but if this issue is indicative of the quality of the previous issues, I will be reading those as well.

The first tale, “Like Rain from Silver Skies,“ is by Nancy Fulda. Natalie, a teenage girl, is convinced she’s getting messages from a dead man through graffiti in the form of nonsensical letters on a wall. Her brother, Shane, doesn’t truly believe her, but tries to help her anyway. As Natalie tries to unravel the mystery of the dead man and the letters, Shane struggles with a secret he’s been keeping from Natalie. This is a well-written story with a satisfying ending.

“Rough Night” by Kate Marshall “Don’t Look” by H L. Fullerton “The Ballerina and the Priest” by Tina L. Pens “Today’s Fish is a Very Fine Fish” by Nancy Stebbins Brain Harvest is a magazine that specializes in very short fiction. It proudly proclaims itself to be An Almanac for Bad-Ass Speculative Fiction. The editors [...]

December brings us Albedo One issue #39, bringing with it six stories, one of which being from Mike Resnick. A quick glance shows that a few of them even have awards pinned on them. 2009 Aeon Award winning story “Frogs on my Doorstep” by Annette Reader starts us off with a tale about a girl [...]

Review of The Future Fire, Issue 2010.20 By Mark Burgh In her opening editorial, guest writer Natania Barron, writes, “The queer issue of The Future Fire resoundingly represents the goals of the Outer Alliance,” a support group of LGBTQ speculative fiction writers.  These goals are to combat bigotry and to raise the voices of writers [...]