Asimov's SF September 2009, Reviewed
Science Fiction from Dell Magazines with Cover Art by John Picacio
Aug 23, 2009
The September Asimov's is the 404th issue of this most award-laden of magazines, and editor Sheila Williams' editorial lauds the Dell Magazine award winner, regular columnist Robert Silverberg offers an insightful piece on worldbuilding, with a list of useful references, and Paul di Filippo provides book reviews on Christopher Anvil, Michael Marshall Smith, Charles Stross, and others.
Lisa Goldstein
Returning for the first time since her Nebula Award nominated short story "Dark Rooms," Lisa Goldstein's "Away from Here" offers a short story of a teenager whose parents run a small hotel. It's a bleak, sad tale enlivened -entirely appropriately-- by a sprinkling of magic from their other-worldly guests, made bearable by a glimmer of hope at the end as Liz considers her future.
Ferrett Steinmetz makes a memorable debut with "Camera Obscured." Victor 'Yo-Yo' Pino is socially maladroit, but determined to keep his ineptitude hidden from his classmates. Unfortunately for Victor, our future is even more socially networked, and prying eyes are everywhere. In his desperation to climb the Worldwork rankings he decides become a great lover, but unsurprisingly his plan is doomed. By turns funny and poignant, Victor and Rosalie are memorable and likeable.
Mike Resnick
Mike Resnick has – according to the story's introduction – won more awards than any other writer of short fiction. In "Soulmates," written in collaboration with Lezli Robyn, an alcaholic widower close to losing his job as a night-watchman encounters a trouble-shooting robot. Resnick and his collaborator provide an unfussy, deceptively simple story that provokes thought with almost every question the robot asks. It will probably feature on the 2010 Hugo ballot, and that wouldn't be an injustice. Highly Recommended.
Brenda Cooper's "In Their Garden" takes another familar setting, that of climate change, but for all that, and the fact that it's a short-short story, it's surprisingly effective.
Steve Rasnic Tem
As is Steve Rasnic Tem's "The Day Before the Day Before," in which a stranded time-traveller tells of the pointlessness of his mission, and how it went wrong. Very few stories in SF history have dealt with the physiological and psychological effects of temporal displacement, and that alone would make it worth the read. However, there are many other fine touches as Tem pours meaning after meaning into the smallest little details. Wonderful.
Benjamin Crowell's "Tear-Down" is another debut, and another story that – like the Resnick/Robyn – looks at how we define intelligence, as a family move into a house fitted with artificial intelligence. It's intelligent and thought-provoking, and Highly Recommended.
Jerry Oltion is the third and last debutant, and his "Her Heart’s Desire" uses another well-worn trope as shorthand (because most regular readers are familiar with the SF-nal classics, writers can assume as much and skip unnecessary exposition), in this case the magic shop that vanishes as soon as its purpose is fulfilled. When Patrick collides with Michelle, he inadvertantly knocks a jar containing her heart's desire out of her hand. How they resolve her dilemma is eminantly satisfying.
Kristine Kathryn Rusch
Hugo Award-winner Kristine Kathryn Rusch returns for her third appearance in five months, and her second in consecutive issues with her novella "Broken Windchimes." SF stories about music are comparatively rare, and those featuring aliens rarer still. The narrator is a castrati, a soprano made into a eunuch to perfect the purity of his voice for the alien Djane, who have considerable influence over their sector of space. When his voice 'fails' – and the Djane offer no second chances for for singers who deviate in the slightest from what their rigid musical code classifies as perfection – he travels to The Last Outpost, a human-run space station. Rusch provides an original and powerful story of a man reconciling himself to his new condition. A terrific story.
Despite reducing its page count by almost a quarter, Asimovs still offers almost unparalleled value for money, and the September issue has a half dozen front rank stories, and two or three that will deservedly feature in Year's Best and Award lists.
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