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ISFDB links: #218<\/a>, #219<\/a><\/p>\n Editor-in-Chief, Scott H. Andrews<\/p>\n Other Reviews: Fiction: Non-fiction: These two issues actually have different covers for a change (a panoramic work has been split in two) but I\u2019ve covered them together; even so it makes for a short \u2018issue.\u2019<\/p>\n Out of the Woods<\/em><\/strong> by Marissa Lingen is a story about a small group of rebels who wait for the return of their King, and the pardon they hope he will grant them. When he does arrive back in his kingdom it is on his pyre, and his despised brother continues to rule. He would come. Not for the sacrifice\u2014what\u2019s a deer to the god of all rivers and roots and everything on the ground and beneath it\u2014but for the hunters. Hulokk would come when summoned by His people. As like as not, He\u2019d take someone with Him.<\/em> The story then flashes forward to the end of Sal\u2019s life, when she is in her seventies. In the intervening time she has conducted fifteen sacrifices, and lost nine people, a better performance than any other collective has managed. However, when a horseman arrives requesting her to perform another, she refuses: she has lost enough people . . . . Later, she changes her mind, and attempts the summoning herself. Gravity\u2019s Exile<\/em><\/strong> by Grace Seybold gets off to a pretty good start with its protagonist fighting a lizard on the wall of rock that is her world:<\/p>\n Woman and monster hung motionless against the rockface for an endless moment, eyes locked together. Then, abruptly, the lizard clacked its teeth shut, spun on two feet, and skittered away. Despite its dragging rear leg it was unnervingly fast, and in a few heartbeats it had disappeared around a knob of rock and was gone.<\/em> Later she makes her way downwards and comes upon a village. A sentry meets her and she is taken into their cave system. Here she discovers that there are no men, something that unsettles her. After two of the villagers feed and question her she is told to stay where she is while they go to a meeting. Needless to say she follows them, and sees the villagers and nine huge birds, larger than humans and stinking of carrion, watch a pregnant woman give birth to a partly formed human-bird hybrid. She is discovered and captured by the birds, who fly her to what appears to be a series of tunnels and cells in a flying rock. The rest of the story tells of\u00a0her attempt to escape. Source <\/em><\/strong>is the cover by Florent Llamas. There doesn\u2019t seem to much going on here apart from the bird flying away from the rock and the two figures, but if you look closely there are giant circles carved into the rock and there are two flocks of birds in the distance. An atmospheric landscape piece.<\/p>\n The story by Margaret Killjoy is the best of these four. As for the rest, in media res<\/em>1<\/sup> sums it up I think.<\/p>\n This magazine is still being published!<\/b> Subscribe here<\/a>.<\/p>\n ISFDB links: #218, #219 Editor-in-Chief, Scott H. Andrews Other Reviews: Greg Hullender\u00a0and Eric Wong, Rocket Stack Rank Dave Truesdale, Anne Crookshanks,\u00a0Tangent Online (#218, #219) Charles Payseur, Quick Sip Reviews (#218, 219) Various, Goodreads (#218, #219) Fiction: #218 Out of the Woods \u2022 short story by Marissa Lingen \u2217 Men of the Ashen Morrow \u2022 short […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[27],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3469","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-beneath-ceaseless-skies"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p6Pcj7-TX","jetpack-related-posts":[],"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sfmagazines.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3469","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sfmagazines.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sfmagazines.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sfmagazines.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sfmagazines.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=3469"}],"version-history":[{"count":12,"href":"https:\/\/sfmagazines.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3469\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3495,"href":"https:\/\/sfmagazines.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3469\/revisions\/3495"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sfmagazines.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=3469"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sfmagazines.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=3469"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sfmagazines.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=3469"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\nGreg Hullender\u00a0and Eric Wong, Rocket Stack Rank<\/a><\/em>
\nDave Truesdale, Anne Crookshanks,\u00a0Tangent Online<\/em> (#218<\/a>, #219<\/a>)
\nCharles Payseur, Quick Sip Reviews<\/em> (#218<\/a>, 219<\/a>)
\nVarious, Goodreads<\/em> (#218<\/a>, #219<\/a>)<\/p>\n
\n#218
\nOut of the Woods<\/em><\/strong> \u2022 short story by Marissa Lingen \u2217<\/strong>
\nMen of the Ashen Morrow<\/em><\/strong> \u2022 short story by Margaret Killjoy \u2217<\/strong>\u2217<\/strong>\u2217<\/strong>
\n#219
\nGravity\u2019s Exile<\/em><\/strong> \u2022 novelette by Grace Seybold \u2217<\/strong>\u2217<\/strong>
\nThe Last Dinosaur Rider of Benessa County<\/em><\/strong> \u2022 short story by Jeremy Sim \u2217<\/strong>\u2217<\/strong><\/p>\n
\nSource<\/em><\/strong> \u2022 cover by Florent Llamas<\/p>\n
\nAfter watching four of their number hanged, the central character, Lovis, comes up with a ruse that gets her near to\u00a0the brother. Then (spoiler) she kills him with a finger-snap spell, a minor fantasy device used earlier in the text. This rather arbitrary event brings to end a tale that consists mostly of talk between the rebels. While this is occasionally interesting, it doesn\u2019t add up what I would call a story.
\nMen of the Ashen Morrow<\/em><\/strong> by Margaret Killjoy has a group of hunters sacrifice a deer to the God Hulokk. The hunters want to bring summer to an end, to prevent the \u2018bright monsters\u2019 flooding into the valley:<\/p>\n
\nSal didn\u2019t want to die, and she assumed none of her companions did either. But Hulokk must freeze the earth to end the summer, and winter must come for the snows to settle onto the hills, and the snows must come to keep the creatures from the West at bay. Risk was necessary to life, always. <\/em>
\n[. . .]<\/em>
\nThe doe\u2019s blood melted and burned the earth. The smell of old rot poured into the forest. The ground collapsed, pulling the saplings and ferns down into the underworld, and Sal and her company stepped back.<\/em>
\nA single segmented leg, infinitely thin and long, crept out from the hole. First one, then another. Then another, another, another. Slower than the setting of the summer sun, His fat, round worm body of flesh and stone rose into the air. His belly was awash with eyes. He looked at Sal, and Sal borrowed the breath of the other hunters. She spoke, in the tongue of the gods:<\/em>
\n\u201cI ask you, Hulokk, to bring an end to summer.\u201d<\/em>
\n\u201cI will not.\u201d Hulokk\u2019s voice was a thousand voices, across and below the audible.<\/em>
\n\u201cI ask you, Hulokk, to bring an end to summer.\u201d<\/em>
\n\u201cI will not.\u201d Ancient trees trembled and fell, and Sal felt her heart quiver in her chest from the physical force of the voice.<\/em>
\n\u201cI ask you, Hulokk, to bring an end to summer.\u201d<\/em>
\n\u201cI will.\u201d<\/em>
\nFour legs shot out and wrapped around Lelein, and she screamed, hoarse and angry.<\/em>
\n\u201cI ask you, Hulokk,\u201d Sal started, but it took more magic than she could summon to keep her voice in the tongue of the gods. She finished her sentence meekly, in a human language.<\/em>
\n\u201cTo spare our lives.\u201d<\/em>
\nThe god dragged Sal\u2019s lover into the depths of the earth. At the last moment, the eldest among the hunters put a quarrel through Lelein\u2019s throat, silencing her forever. As the world grew silent, Sal collapsed at the edge of the of sinkhole and clawed at the dirt in lieu of weeping. <\/em>
\nHulokk froze the earth, and autumn came, then winter.<\/em> p. 21-23<\/p>\n
\nA good traditional fantasy.<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/sfmagazines.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/09\/BCS219x600.jpg?resize=450%2C600&ssl=1\")
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\nJeone let out a long, shuddering breath, the exhilaration of the fight draining away all at once. With exaggerated care, she tucked the sandal into her belt and pulled herself into a more secure two-handed hold, resting her cheek against the cool stone. Her skin was beaded with sweat. The sun was coming up\u00a0<\/em>out of the downclouds now, the day well started. She should get moving, retrieve her pitons and hammock and whatever of her worldly goods the lizard\u2019s sudden attack hadn\u2019t scattered into the cloudy void. Jeone smiled bitterly, picturing some far-down kingdom surprised by a sudden rain of camping equipment. It was the sort of thing that just happened every so often, no matter where on the worldwall you lived: rains of tools, fish, bodies, stranger things. One day Jeone herself would no doubt run out of luck, and her falling body would startle someone far below\u2014<\/em> p. 4-5<\/p>\n
\nThe main problem this story has is its unconvincing world setting. The wallworld is fine, but when it goes beyond this to the monstrous birds and their flying rock it starts reading like a modern and well-written version of some 1930s weird pulp story. Also, as with a lot of the stories in Beneath Ceaseless Skies<\/em>, there is a lot that remains unexplained, and so it reads like an extract from a longer work.
\nThe Last Dinosaur Rider of Benessa County<\/em><\/strong> by Jeremy Sim should have been titled The Last Dinosaur-Riding Gunslinger of Benessa County<\/em>, and then I wouldn\u2019t have to add much more. This one has Black Jonas returning to a town twenty years after he killed a number of people. The thing that is unusual about this western is that he rides in via the canal system on a pleesaur (plesiosaur presumably). Apart from the strange background of ocean prospecting, pleiosaur riding cowboys, it is a fairly standard story. He goes looking for a man named Doone to get his money (why he waited all this time isn\u2019t explained), and trouble from the past comes looking for him; eventually he leaves town. An vivid piece but, again, it has the feel of a middle story in a long series, or novel extract.<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/sfmagazines.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/09\/BSC218219.jpg?resize=625%2C313&ssl=1\")
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