Uploaded May 1, 1996 -- Updated October 18, 1996
Here is the list of stories in this issue. If you have any comments or reviews, send them to jbailey@sff.net. Please indicate which issue and/or story you're referring to in the subject line, and try to keep comments for different stories separate in you letters so I can place them properly.
"Human History" by Lucius Shepard [10/17/96]
"Advance Notice" by Kathleen Ann Goonan [10/17/96]
"The Soul Selects Her Own Society: Invasion and
Repulsion: a Chronological Reinterpretation of Two of Emily Dickinson's Poems:
a Wellsian Perspective" by Connie Willis (Nominated for 1997
Hugo Award)
"Early, in the Evening" by Ian Watson
"Mortal Clay" by S.N. Dyer
"Popeye and Pops Watch the Evening World
Report" by Eliot Fintushel
Miscellaneous Comments (on the magazine as a whole, editorials, columns, etc.)
Rich Horton: 10/17/96
This is a long, involving, novella set in a far future Earth, where "ordinary" humans live in conditions resembling the US frontier at the turn of the century, under the domination of the Captains, who live in space stations. The narrator, Bob Hillyard, has a wife and a teenage son, and is tempted by a young woman new to their small town. His straying drives his wife to leave and journey into the forbidden wastelands at the edge of their town, apparently to die. Bob follows her, and finds that his world, the Captains, the wasteland, are a lot different than anyone in his town knew. The somewhat overheated resolution to the story is a little trite, in my opinion, but Shepard's writing is sound as always, and his careful, complex, characterization of Bob, his wife and the other woman, his son, and their interrelationships, make the story work, and represent the real human history to which the story's title refers.
Rich Horton: 10/17/96
Alex, an artist from Mars, comes to Earth, Thailand, in 2150 or so, as a tourist. Her clone-sister has emigrated to Thailand a long time ago, and now is a leader of sorts of resistance to the "Law of 2050", which mandates that no technology is allowed on Earth past 2050 levels, ostensibly to preserve Earth's cultures and ecology. Alex's sister has (Alex thinks) been forging her artworks, reducing the value of Alex's work. Alex finds her sister, and learns something about the meaning and value of art, and the relationship of life and art. A nice story, with a action, intrigue, and a little bit of mystery wrapped around a well-expressed theme.
(Nominated for 1997 Hugo Award, best Short Story)
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