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Issue 129 Volume 13 February 2009

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Archives Editorial Serials and Long Fiction Poetry and Filk Music Short Stories Features Series

Editorial

Dan L. Hollifield

The Senior Editor's usual rants about whatever…


Serials and Novellas

Sweet Strings and the 2:55 A.M. Train
Matt Spencer
A modern day fantasy about a traveling musician whose guitar possesses supernatural powers over life and death.

Radiation Hotel
(When Insects Conquered the World, Almost)
Timothy Potter
If you get creeped out itsy bitsy critters no bigger than your fingernail, you may think that this is a horror tale, but actually it is a science fiction-heroic adventure about the planet's most successful inhabitants. Just don't go stepping on… their shoes.

Best Serials and Novellas of 2008

(As selected McCamy Taylor)

Half a Dream
Elena Clark
Four years later, royal bodyguard Giacomo is having flashbacks to the supernatural events which he witnessed the first time his charge, Prince Lucas was kidnapped. Now, the Prince is in danger again. Is Giacomo up to the challenge?
Sequel to "The Shadowy Man".

The End of the Matter
Robert Moriyama
Al Majius and his allies face the undead superwizard Aaron Morgenstern in open combat. Lion-men and vampires and werewolves, oh my…

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Short Stories

A Saturday Night Mutiny
J. Keegan
The planet was beautiful, a prime candidate for colonization. But then they found proof that it was inhabited intelligent creatures, and they had to decide: should they stay, and tell the universe what they had found, or leave the natives to be exterminated?

First Contact
E. S. Strout
The Mars lander found something that didn't belong — an object that looked artificial among the worn and irregular Martian rocks.

The Furthest Adventures of Count Bakula
Michael Ray Laemmle
He said he was a nobleman from the future. But he was often naked, or nearly so, and insisted on using a needle concealed in a hand puppet to puncture the flesh of us kids. Naturally, we all loved him.

The Glass Cage
James Lecky
Ulphia's beauty was legendary. No man could resist it. To preserve it, she would pay any price…

The Octopus Curse
Anna Caro
The young woman who brought four beautiful children to the food court looked both sad and exhausted (even moreso than caring for so many young ones would explain). But she had good reason for her sadness.

Best Short Stories of 2008

(As selected Robert Moriyama — in order of appearance)

The Twelfth of Never
T. Richard Williams
When the asteroid struck, Theo was as ready as it was possible to be — ready enough to survive the initial blast and the storms that devastated the surface. Now came the hard part: figuring out what to do next.

An Echo of Strings
L. J. Geoffrion
On November 10, 1975, the S.S. Edmund Fitzgerald was lost to Lake Superior, with all hands. No one knows what happened that stormy night. This is the story of The Lady of the Lake, the Finnish Snow "God", Heikke Lunta and the Mighty Fitz…

Bug
Coffee Anderson
PeeWee was only two years old, and unlikely to make it to three unless an odd assortment of people scattered around the globe could cure the artificial disease in his blood.

The Battle for Castle Greystone -or- Beanie and the Floaters
Michael J. Flanagan
Only the old and the young who had nowhere else to go lived in the flooded coastal cities. Satch, Beanie, and What's-her-name had made a home for themselves in one old building, and were content with their makeshift castle — until outsiders tried to claim it for themselves.

Mystic Canyon
T. Richard Williams
The mission to search for life on Titan was a One-Way — reserved for terminally-ill volunteers like Jake Youngblood. Some people opposed One-Ways because they thought they treated people like Jake as expendable… but Jake didn't care.

Forty Pieces of Lead
Joel Doonan
Three Feathers knew that Fancy Town was no place for an Indian. In fact, during the day, it was barely a place at all. But at night, its neon-lit streets were home to Cowboys — and Hollow Men…

The Season Without Sun
James Lecky
In a world of endless winter, the Amjak people had to fight to survive. Their enemies: the cold, the scarcity of game — and the brutally warlike Dajzyn.


A Dragon's Tale
Ty Johnston
The dragon and the knight should have been enemies — after all, the first time they met, the knight had done his best to kill the beast. But time and circumstance can change a lot.

Sideshow
Georgy A. Kolotove
Ashan the assassin was an honorable man. He always lived up to the letter of his contracts, although those contracts were never written down. Working for both parties in a marital dispute was an interesting challenge…

The Keeper
Joshua L. Hamilton
The Keeper had waited patiently for eons while the world Above evolved and changed. But the time for him to fulfill his purpose was fast approaching as another Cycle neared its end.

Mars's Gift
Jonathan Schlosser
The marines returning from Mars looked like they'd lost a firefight — but it was a plague, not bullets, that had mortally wounded them.

December 2008 Forum Challenge

Congratulations to J. Davidson Hero, author of the favorite entry in the December 2008 Forum Flash Fiction Challenge. Check out Forever the Day and six more tales of holiday woe (after reading our new stories, novellas, and poetry, reviewing our "Best of 2008" selections, and checking to see if there's anything good on TV (there isn't much, since they cancelled most of the GOOD shows). But wait! There's more:

January 2009 Forum Challenge

Congratulations to J. Davidson Hero (again??), author of the favorite entry in the January 2009 Forum Flash Fiction Challenge. Check out Salviati's Siren and four more solitary sojourns in lonely places. (Note that Nate Kailhofer has provided a quick and easy index that allows direct access to any of the previous months' challenge entries here, for those hungry for more snack-sized stories...)

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Poetry and Filk Music

Rod Stroked Survival with a Deadly Hammer
Michael Lee Johnson

The Clone
J. Davidson Hero

The Cosmist Worm
James Dye

The Patient Suitor
A. K. Sykora

The Tattoo
Kelly Haisan

Two Dimensional Visitors
Richard H. Fay

Valentine Conundrum
Richard Tornello

The Best Poetry and Filk Music of 2008

Dead Heading
Richard Tornello

Mary's Little Alien
Stuart Sharp

The Nameless Squire's Tale
James Matthew Byers

The Outer Inner Limits
Mark Edgemon

Beauty And The Rose
Megan Arkenberg

Contact
Thomas D Reynolds

The Study Of Man's Past
Holly Day

Numb
Tracy Hantke

Shasta Among The Tombs
Jonathan Stefanovic

A Cacophany Of Horror
Steven Vaughn

Echolocation
Casey Callaghan

Here
John Grey

Horrorku
Aurelio Rico Lopez III

Osiris Rising
J. Davidson Hero

Bearshirt
Richard H Fay

Swirling Grey Storm Clouds
Heather Kuehl

Industrial Action
Stuart Sharp

Plasma
Don Coonrod

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Articles and features

Thoughts on Writing #6: Kill Your Darlings
Seanan McGuire
Seanan McGuire takes apart the engine of writing to find out how it works, and offers her insights into how to put it back together again.

20th Century Boys: A manga review
McCamy Taylor
Our Serials and Novellas Editor reviews another classic Japanese manga (graphic novel) by Urasawa Naoki: 20th Century Boys, available in a new edition from publisher Viz.

Best of Features 2008

Thoughts on Writing
#1: You're Going To Suck
#3: You May Not Be A Novelist (And That's OK)
#4: People Are Going To Be Mean To You

Seanan McGuire
In an ongoing series, Seanan McGuire takes apart the engine of writing to find out how it works, and offers her insights into how to put it back together again.

Reader's Corner: Myth Adventures, Volumes 1 & 2
TaoPhoenix
TaoPhoenix dives into Meisha Merlin's new ominbus reprintings of Robert Asprin's classic fantasy humour series.

Conventional Wisdom: Atlanta Steampunk Meetup
Dan Hollifield
Dan heads to Oakland Park cemetary in Atlanta to participate in a gathering of steampunk fans, and files this report.

Off the Shelf
Larissa March
Larissa March shares her thoughts on what she's been reading lately, with book reviews this month featuring John Scalzi and a collaboration between Spider Robinson and the late Robert Heinlein.

Urasawa Naoki's Pluto Comes to America: Film Noir Meets Astro Boy
McCamy Taylor
Our Serials and Novellas Editor reviews the classic Japanese manga (graphic novel) Pluto, soon to be available in a new edition from publisher Viz.

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