For my April short speculative fiction spotlight, I decided to focus on new-to-me authors. Of course, there are a few longtime favorites here as well. But for the most part, the authors herein were ones who, for whatever reason, I have either never read before or who have never made it to my list. Sometimes you gotta break out of your usual reading habits and try something new.
“An Inheritance in Six Parts” by Nadine Aurora Tabing
This story is exactly what it says on the tin. Our narrator tells how she got various parts of her body. Her violet eyes were an inheritance passed down the matrilineal line and allow her to see ghosts. Her military-grade right arm came from her father but instead of killing people on the frontlines, she uses it to deep-fry figs and matsutake at her deadend job. And so on. Her family sacrificed parts of themselves, literally, to give the next generation a better chance than they had. (Worlds of Possibility—April 2024)
“Haus Lobo” by Malik Berry
I think this is the first time I’ve ever read a speculative short story about ballroom. Not balls like rich white people in poofy gowns doing the waltz but a drag ball where drag queens and kings and trans people from various Houses walk in categories (just look it up, and if you ever get the chance to go to one, drop everything and do it). This particular story involves Lula walking in the Realness category, except instead of trying to look like a cis person, Lula is trying to look like a wolf. I love stories that explore the monstrousness of queerness by turning the things that bigots hate about us into a source of power, as Malik Berry does wonderfully here. (Baffling Magazine—April 2024; issue 15)
“Headphone Boy” by Nana Afadua Ofori-Atta
Our narrator retells the story of how she met her children’s father. She calls him Headphone Boy, but she’s actually met over and over again over the course of many lifetimes. He has no memory of those past iterations, but she does. This world is full of magic and magical creatures, but for our narrator, the most miraculous thing is Headphone Boy. It’s a very short story, but crammed full of exciting worldbuilding and compelling characters. (Tales & Feathers—April 2024; issue 2)
“I Am Not the One Who Gets Left Behind” by Eric Smith
I am both a fan of Eric Smith’s and also someone who believes that I’m going to be the first to die when the zombie apocalypse hits, so of course this story was perfect for me. A father is trapped in his home with his young son. Outside, aliens hunt the city using scent to lure their human prey. The father always joked that in the end of times, he’d be the one the more survivalist people would leave behind, but here he is, holding on for the sake of his son. (Sunday Morning Transport—April 7, 2024)
“Katya Vasilievna and the Second Drowning of Baba Rechka” by Christine Hanolsy
One thing that always bothered me about the old school Grimm Brothers-esque fairy tales was how unfair they were toward women and children. A rusalka was typically a girl murdered by a cruel man or who drowned herself due to an unhappy marriage, then cursed to spend eternity haunting a river as a monstrous spirit (that’s the more recent version; historically, they may have been fertility spirits or river guardians). Marya, our rusalka protagonist, falls for Katya, a young noblewoman shipped off to marry some baron or another. A lovely story about loving yourself and being loved by another. The women here have agency and power and push back against tropes. (Beneath Ceaseless Skies—April 18, 2024; issue 405)
“The Last Great Repair Tech of the American Midwest” by Ellis Nye
I adored every single thing about this story! Written like an obituary, it remembers Wendy “Darling” Marszałek, a trans woman who died in her 80s in 2081. The obit is written by one of the last journalists for a local newspaper who Wendy helped keep employed by finding, repairing, and gifting them typewriters when their computers died. Wendy was always there, helping people suffering from technological obsolescence by finding old school hacks. And this is a good reminder that queerness isn’t just an identity, it’s a way of being, a political movement, a revolutionary ideology, and a community. (Reckoning—Spring 2024; issue 8)
“Memories Held Against a Hungry Mouth” by Ann LeBlanc
“Professor Iris believes there is nowhere better to eat a sandwich than a folding chair set ten meters across the border where the world dissolves into epistemological blankness.” There is a void in a sub-basement of a library. She tests the effects of it by pushing others—and herself—into it. Each time, she returns having lost more of herself, and sometimes those who enter it don’t return at all. Ann LeBlanc’s story is exactly what I expect from Three-Lobed Burning Eye: it starts off weird and ends leaving you feeling discomfited. (Three-Lobed Burning Eye—March 2024; issue 41)
“Mise en Abyme” by Mia Xuan
According to wikipedia, “mise en abime”, French for “put in the abyss”, is a literary device involving mirroring, repetition, and self-reference. Apparently it derives from heraldry where a larger shield would depict a smaller shield, aka the Droste effect, where a picture depicts itself in the picture. Here, Mia Xuan uses the technique in a very creative way by building an entire city, Droste, of Miss Missets. These women are created every time one Miss Misset passes her reflection, yet each one is slightly different. I don’t know about you, but sometimes I wonder what kind of person I’d be if I’d taken a different path in life. I’d be fundamentally the same person, but also unique. I love a story that gets me all pensive. (Speculative City—March 2024; issue 14)
“Selkie Among the Pines” by Sara Chisolm
Young Cecilia is at her father’s wake when she learns that he had a big secret. Not just him, but all the adult relatives in her life. Especially her mother. That secret holds the key to his true identity, one that others wanted to erase even if it cost him his life. The story of the selkie—a seal who can shed its coat and appear human, and if you capture its coat it belongs to you forever—is a great metaphor for being marginalized in a world that demands assimilation. How much of yourself are you willing to let go of? How much are you willing to let others take from you? (FIYAH—Spring 2024; issue 30)
“Sleeping Arrangements” by R.T. Ester
Omitorun, a secret agent for a powerful organization known as Monarch, turns down a spot on the space shuttle to leave the planet before it’s destroyed by an asteroid. Omitorun tries to get a rebellious granddaughter on the ship instead. Along the way, we learn about some of their deceptions and cruelties, all done in the name of enforcing “order.” It doesn’t end in the way I expected. Sometimes redemption and restitution aren’t on the table. Also, shoutout to Dante Luiz for the stunning accompanying artwork. (IZ Digital—April 2024)
