Issue 48

This newest collection of Canadian fantastic fiction looks at the novella (17,500 to 40,000 words), the hardest-to-sell length of fiction.

In a small town in Alberta, an intact baby woolly mammoth is found buried in the snow. When Samuel, the town’s "smart person," touches the carcass, the mammoth’s life force is transferred to him, and he begins to have weird visions about being chased by beings on two legs. During a town-wide party, with mammoth stew as the main course (over Samuel’s strong objections), strange things start happening, and several of the townspeople turn into cavemen, and chase Samuel as if he is the baby mammoth.

A young warrior, in feudal Japan, is sent to a small town to find out why they haven’t sent in their annual amount of rice. Taking along his concubine and his brother, the mayor of the town says that it is not their fault; the land is somehow cursed. Solving the mystery, the warrior is shocked to find that his concubine and his brother are not exactly what they seem. They are mythological beings in human form.

Superheroes in present-day Korea deal with maniacal villains, inter-Korean politics, corporate downsizing (and overbearing mothers). As the world faces environmental catastrophe, reality-TV adventurers battle giant squids in the very deep ocean. Another small town in Alberta conducts pagan rituals during the year as if it was totally normal (though not everyone agrees). A pair of average women with the power of life and death travel the streets of present-day Montreal.

Here is another strong bunch of stories from north of the border. They are very easy to read, and very weird. It’s recommended.

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Jethrik is a land of rigidly defined gender roles; among them is the absolute prohibition on women wielding steel. Tarius leads several successful campaigns against the Amalites. Persius gets the Amalites to leave Jethrik land, and agree to a peace treaty (over Tarius’ strong objections). Beings like the Amalites, with a philosophy of Convert or Die, will not be bound by a piece of paper; they will be back.

Eventually, Tarius’ secret is revealed, and, as expected, Persius, Darian and Jena hit the roof. Tarius is to be immediately executed, by being dragged throughout the kingdom, tied to the back of a horse. She is helped by friends, nursed back to health, and heads home back to Kartik. Jena is forced to marry Tragon, a man she despises. After her repeated refusal to let him into her bed, Tragon unintentionally kills her unborn child, and Jena kills Tragon. For a wife to kill her husband is a major offense, so Jena is convinced that fleeing to Kartik, to see if Tarius will take her back, is a really good idea.

This is an excellent piece of writing. It’s a sword and sorcery novel with an emphasis more on the "sword" than the "sorcery." The reader will not be disappointed.

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He has no idea who his God is (which is totally unheard of), and has come into possession of a staff of great power. No matter how much he tries to get rid of it, the staff always returns to him. In his present mission, Sanct has this vague feeling to travel in a certain direction, but agrees to go in the opposite direction to help Pander, who he met on a previous mission. They travel to the castle of Seighn, where Pander’s mission is to prevent an assassination, but he doesn’t know who or how or when. While there, the castle is destroyed by a magically-created earthquake, and the King and Queen are killed. Pander and Sanct get their daughter, and heiress to the throne, Eiry, out of the area, fast. Whoever caused the earthquake will be looking for Eiry.

Along with several others, a young man named Claren joins the group. He was subject of some high-level magic, which scrambled his neural circuits, causing him to talk in gibberish. After his brain is unscrambled, he and Eiry instantly fall for each other. Alaris, a mage of great power who seems to know everyone and everything, finds an isolated farming community where all of them, especially Eiry, can hide. The urgency is because the amount of time allotted to the world is quickly running out, so there is the great danger of everything just ceasing to exist.

This is a fine piece of storytelling, and of world-building. It may seem a little slow, and will take some work on the part of the reader, but it is very much worth the time.

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Having been away from Atlantis for twenty years, Deucalion is disgusted by the conditions in its capital. Everywhere is filth, and poverty of record-setting levels. Unburied dead bodies litter the streets. Outside the city walls are thousands of destitute people clamoring to get in. Phorenice’s attitude is: the rich (mainly Phorenice) get richer, and everyone else fends for themselves. Phorenice makes it known to all that she is the daughter of a god, and expects to be treated as such, even though she is actually the daughter of a swineherd. Anyone who says no to Phorenice, about anything, can expect to die very unpleasantly, so Deucalion and the people of Atlantis are forced to go along.

Deucalion saves a woman named Nais from being eaten by tigers. He is betrothed to Phorenice, and does not dare to say no, but he falls for Nais. The Empress gets very jealous toward Nais, and has her buried alive between two huge blocks of stone. Deucalion slips her a drug, known only to the Priests Clan, of which Deucalion is a senior member, that puts Nais into suspended animation.

Deucalion has seen enough, and gets a ride with a boatful of people planning to start over on a faraway island, away from Phorenice. He suddenly has second thoughts, and asks to be let off on the other side of Atlantis, a land of deep swamps, impassable forests and hideous beasts. It takes months, but Deucalion makes it back to the capital. Phorenice, who is now to be worshipped as a god, has learned that Nais is not really dead, and is not happy. Then comes the final battle between Phorenice and the Priests Clan, just before the "real" gods make it clear that their patience is gone.

This is a gem of a story. Atlantis is certainly a popular setting for fantasy stories; this is one of the better stories ever written. It has just a little bit of weird in it, and is very much worth reading.

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Watson was severely injured, and should have died, while serving with the British Army in Afghanistan. He was saved by a blue djinn who exacts a price from Watson for his help. Years later, while solving a case of what looks like suicide by crossbow, Watson suddenly stabs Holmes with an arrow. In his death throes, "Holmes" turns into the blue djinn who saved Watson’s life years before.

During World War II, Holmes is in a California nursing home. The damage to British morale would be too severe if he should be killed by the Nazis. Holmes helps a local detective discover how a man can be shot three times, twice in the chest and once in the head, and walk away. It has to do with the importation of fifty pine boxes from Romania, filled with vampires willing to work for the Allies.

In other stories, Holmes and Watson meet up with two famous literary occult detectives, Flaxman Low and Thomas Carnacki. Holmes is very much of a realist; no matter how weird and occult things may seem, there is usually a rational explanation. But he does not totally dismiss un-rational explanations.

I really enjoyed these stories. They are well done, and they are nice and weird without being too weird. Holmes fans will love this book, and so will occult fiction fans.

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He spends most of his time dealing with idiot customers who don’t bother to read the instruction manual, or are upset because they can’t travel to some major event in history, and change things. The Department of Time and Space (DOTAS) has rules about such things, and the ability to enforce them. His boss is a thoroughly dislikable person who everyone calls Dickhead, right to his face.

Things get interesting when, one day, a time machine arrives with another time machine inside it. In that second time machine is a female murder victim. DOTAS comes and slaps a Top Secret sign on everything. Things get even more interesting when Spider finds a future version of himself, brutally murdered. Iris Street, the local police Inspector, is called in. She and Spider had a brief, but torrid, affair while he was a cop. It was part of the reason for his abrupt departure.

Spider meets several other future versions of himself, including a ninja type at the end of time. There is one spaceship of "good guys" holding out against the "bad guys," led by Spider’s boss, Dickhead. There are also alien beings called vores, who are literally eating the universe from the outside. Back in the present, Spider, Iris and another future version of Spider deal with the aftermath of a woman who, six years previously, uploaded a video to the internet of her suicide by self-immolation. It was in retaliation for her husband having an affair with Clea Fassbinder (the dead woman in the time machine).

This will certainly give the reader a mental workout. The plot may get a little gory, and convoluted, but it is a really good story, and is very much worth reading.

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This is a time of fear and uncertainty in Shavron. The neighboring lands are being menaced by the black leopards of Chetz. The only way to prevent a Chetzian attack on Shavron is to appoint a king, or other ruler, of Shavron; then, the Chetzians will leave them alone. Gideon, a rabbit, is totally against the idea, because it would mean abandoning the Holy One. He, and Deborah, a cheetah, try to convince Samson, a wolf, to join them before the Council to change their minds. Samson refuses, not convinced of the seriousness of the situation.

Gideon and Deborah return to Eldos, the capital, to find that a queen has already been chosen by the Council, a red fox named Jezerah. Along with Iya, the power behind the throne, she turns Shavron into a dictatorship. High taxes are imposed, repression is increased; the usual. The Holy One knows what’s going on; He tells Gideon that He will never abandon Shavron, and that things will get worse before they get better.

Gideon spends the next couple of years in an impregnable mountain top prison; Samson and Deborah are similarly mistreated. Under such circumstances, it would be easy for anyone to lose their faith, but that does not happen to Gideon.

I was very prepared to not like this book (religion and talking animals usually do not bode well), but it’s pretty good. It’s not just a good religion story, it’s also a good fantasy story.

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Alcor is a religiously rigid sort of world, where everyone worships The Keelong. It’s a vague, unknowable thing in the universe that has kept Alcor together, and peaceful, for the past thousand years. An important part of the crew is the Ama (priest), an elderly, inflexible type named Toreg. He expects total obedience to the proper rituals; if he doesn’t like what he sees, he has the authority to exile members of the crew to whatever planet they are on at that moment. He can even order the ship turned around and headed back to Alcor. Privately, Toreg knows that The Keelong’s "days" are numbered; questioning The Keelong, or even outright unbelief, is growing among the people.

They approach a desolate planet that shows obvious signs of having been through a major planet-wide war, with ruins and blackened landscape everywhere. A few meters above the planet, explosions occur all over the ship. It lands safely, but it is not soon going anywhere, maybe permanently. As they prepare for a long-term stay on this planet, the crew finds a stone building that is not too badly damaged. It’s a large room, with rows of benches facing a raised area at one end. Digging through the rubble, Toreg finds a large figure of a hideous being nailed to a cross and in great pain (the people of Alcor look like green-scaled lizards with tails who walk upright). This was obviously a war building, to spread information (and propaganda) among the people. The figure is kept as a constant reminder of The Enemy; any beings who can inflict that sort of pain on another being...

The linguists work to translate a book found in a nearby strongbox. Each night, the crew gathers to hear that day’s translation of the life of Jesus of Nazareth. Toreg urges the crew to return to The Keelong, and ignore this false deity, but it’s not working. The crew is listening to Jesus. Meantime, winter has come to their mountain valley. In a desperate attempt to destroy the cross, Toreg drags it up the mountain to throw it into a large canyon. Holed up in a cave, and exhausted, Toreg starts to read the rest of the book (which he also intends to destroy), while the face on the cross seems to be watching him.

It’s a pretty good book that does not overdo the religious aspect. This is worth reading for those who are religious, and not so religious.

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The Project has spent the previous 50 years listening to the stars, using the "Little Ear" radiotelescope at Arecibo, Puerto Rico. The rest of the world does not share the interest of the scientists on duty, so The Project is on the bureaucratic chopping block. Everything changes the day that a message is received.

It isn’t so much a message as it is early human radio broadcasts beamed back to Earth, with the message inside, as a series of something like dots and dashes. It is analyzed, and turned into a very stylized picture of the sender (specifically, from the star Capella). An interpretation of the message says that Capella’s binary star system is becoming very unstable. Perhaps one of the stars is about to go supernova, and the message is an attempt, before their race perishes, to learn that they are not alone in the universe.

There is much discussion in The Project as to whether or not Earth should answer the Message. An answer is sent, consisting of a similar stylized picture of humans, knowing that it will take 90 years for the message to reach Capella, and for them to send a response. The Day of The Reply is a worldwide holiday on Earth. Billions of people are tuned in to see The Reply, but it’s not what they were hoping for.

This is a really good and plausible novel. It shows how one moment of "Oh, my God!" (receipt of a message from space) can make up for many years of nothing. It’s recommended.

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One day, Makheb calls Veris, a senior member of the Senate, into his private chambers. He tells Veris, that he, Veris, has been relieved of his Senate duties, and must undertake a difficult journey to Aronia in the north, starting now. Veris is told that, in a few hours, his Senate colleagues are going to come looking for him, ready to execute him for killing Emperor Makheb. Veris is totally loyal to Makheb, so he is shocked, to put it mildly. An attempt on Makheb’s life, in his chambers, convinces Veris. At the same time, Makheb is going, alone, to the desolate Endlands, in the west, to confront Ramunak, the cause of all this.

Veris stops at his home in the city of Cosh, to grab a few things, and to try to convince his Senate colleagues that this is all a misunderstanding. Veris barely escapes with his life; Ramunak has been very busy, controlling people’s minds. His journey is extra difficult because he has to go through the Denok Forest. It used to be a nice place to visit, until it was taken over by some sort of evil. Now, it is a dark and sinister place, to be avoided at all costs.

First of a series, this is intended for younger readers, but the three authors do a very good job with it. It’s very much worth reading.

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Earth promises a benevolent leadership; the Fifty Suns will generally be able to rule themselves. But Earth makes it very clear: Join Us or Be Destroyed. Long ago, Earth decided to not allow any other star empires to exist. The Fifty Suns decide on silence, and let the Earth ship try to find them among the Cloud’s millions of stars.

A minority among the population of the Fifty Suns is the Mixed Men. Possessing a sort of double brain (not two separate brains, but more like pairs of molecules where there is only supposed to be on molecule), they have been subject to prejudice also, and have had to resort to extreme secrecy to hide their cities. Maltby, hereditary leader of the Mixed Men, finds himself on board the Earthship, the Star Cruiser, ordered to pilot it to the capital of the Fifty Suns. His secret orders, from the leaders of the Fifty Suns, are to pilot the ship right into a space storm, powerful enough to destroy even a hundred-deck behemoth like the Star Cruiser.

It’s obvious to the people that, even if the Star Cruiser is destroyed, which does not happen, it won’t be long, in cosmic terms, before Earth sends thousands of ships looking for the Fifty Suns empire. Many psychological methods are used to get Maltby to talk, including conditioning him to fall in love with Gloria Cecily, Grand Captain of the Star Cruiser.

This is an excellent far-future space opera in the grand tradition. Few writers can do it quite like A.E. van Vogt. This one is very much worth reading.

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He kills Fialan, leader of the lochvaur, hoping to tip the balance of power in his favor. Sehduk does not take into account that he has created a powerful enemy in Lachlei, queen of the lochvaur. Vowing vengeance against the rival clan led by Sehduk, Lachlei leads her people into a fight against demons and the undead.

Rhyn’athel, another of the three gods, is the only being powerful enough to defeat Sehduk. He takes human form, and joins Lachlei’s warriors, in order to stop Sehduk, once and for all. He doesn’t reveal his identity to Lachlei, but his abilities are not those of the average mortal. Rhyn’athel also falls in love with Lachlei.

Meantime, Fialan is not exactly dead. He finds himself on Tarentor, another of the Nine Worlds, part of an army of the dead. It’s controlled by Sehduk, so the warriors have no free will, and are forced to fight against their own people. Once on Elren, where this takes place, they must eat real food, and they have corporeal form. Every minute they are there, they become more of Elren, and less of Tarentor.

This is an excellent sword and sorcery novel that is pretty heavy on the sorcery part. It’s got good characters, led by a very strong female warrior, it’s got an exciting story, and it is very much recommended.

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While Makheb travels to the desolate Endlands, to confront Ramunak, the cause of all this, several other members of the Senate, who can best be described as "power-hungry," consolidate their power. The word is spread throughout the empire that Veris is an outlaw; Wanted: Dead or Alive.

Meantime, Veris, who is really a famous warrior from the Barbarian Wars named Gromulus, stops in a small town on the edge of the Denok Forest to visit Fayorn, an old war buddy, and to return his sword (it’s not as simple as it sounds). Even though Fayorn lives on Nadorian land, he thinks of himself as citizen of Aronia, a very self-sufficient and independent people. Fayorn has no love for Emperor Makheb, or Nador, so he does not join Gromulus on his journey.

After a long time in self-imposed exile, Tornach, another war hero, returns home to a town that is unrecognizable. He is Ungoran, and they were the cause of a lot of bloodshed during the Barbarian Wars; memories of those days are slow to fade. In town after town, he is treated as if he, personally, is the reason that a loved one never came home.

Here is another well-done piece of writing. The plot may be a little simple, intended for younger readers, but it is very much worth the reader’s time.

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