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The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction, September/October 2010
NOVELLAS
Orfy – Richard Chwedyk
NOVELETTES
Eating at the End-of-the-World Café – Dale Bailey
The Door in the Earth – Alexandra Duncan
The Literomancer – Ken Liu
Uncle Moon in Raintree Hills – Fred Chappell
SHORT STORIES
The Window of Time – Richard Matheson
How Seosiris Lost the Favor of the King – James L. Cambias
Blind Spot – Rick Wilber and Nick DiChario
Steadfast Castle – Michael Swanwick
F&SF Mailbag – David Gerrold
About It – Terry Bisson
Orfy – Richard Chwedyk
NOVELETTES
Eating at the End-of-the-World Café – Dale Bailey
The Door in the Earth – Alexandra Duncan
The Literomancer – Ken Liu
Uncle Moon in Raintree Hills – Fred Chappell
SHORT STORIES
The Window of Time – Richard Matheson
How Seosiris Lost the Favor of the King – James L. Cambias
Blind Spot – Rick Wilber and Nick DiChario
Steadfast Castle – Michael Swanwick
F&SF Mailbag – David Gerrold
About It – Terry Bisson
258 pages
First published September 1, 2010
About the author
Gordon van Gelder
294 books25 followersGordon Van Gelder (born 1966) is an American science fiction editor. From 1997 until 2014, Van Gelder was editor and later publisher of The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction, for which he has twice won the Hugo Award for Best Editor Short Form. He was also a managing editor of The New York Review of Science Fiction from 1988 to 1993, for which he was nominated for the Hugo Award a number of times. As of January 2015, Van Gelder has stepped down as editor of Fantasy & Science Fiction in favour of Charles Coleman Finlay, but remains publisher of the magazine.
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Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews
March 12, 2017
1961 Taiwan and young American Lilly Dyer is taught life lessons by her so called friends from home, her new school mates, but mostly by the literomancer, old Mr Kan, and his nephew Teddy. A story build around the magic of the component parts of Chinese characters and the history of Taiwan from Japanese invasion, to the arrival of the Chinese Nationalists, and finally the American cold war suppport including and unbeknown to Lilly, her father, for all things anti-communist.
September 13, 2017
Emotional story about an American girl living in Taiwan during the time of the cold war. A short read and really makes you see how not black and white the cold war was. Very emotional and well written.
September 21, 2017
A beautiful idea, exploring the magic of words. Lilly Dyer is an American girl whose father has a mysterious job with the government. They are transferred to Taiwan where Lilly is bullied by some truly hideous children--then she makes friends with a baseball-loving boy her age and his grandfather, a man who can look into people's hearts with the words they pick for him to interpret.
I'd give this story a higher rating if not for the ending. No spoilers here, but the way the revelation was conveyed--the people describing the events like they were talking books instead of people--and the way the other characters reacted was the height of disbelief. I kept stopping, thinking "Nobody talks like this! Nobody would ever tell their wife in that much detail! Why is everybody so docile about this???!!!" Yes, the triple exclamation points were necessary.
Liu is a strong writer. This is still a good read. A difficult read, given the subject matter. But the climax was incredibly frustrating, and I found the lack of complicated aftermath at the end a tough sell. Liu makes up for this with some closure, but it still doesn't settle well. But that's just me.
I'd give this story a higher rating if not for the ending. No spoilers here, but the way the revelation was conveyed--the people describing the events like they were talking books instead of people--and the way the other characters reacted was the height of disbelief. I kept stopping, thinking "Nobody talks like this! Nobody would ever tell their wife in that much detail! Why is everybody so docile about this???!!!" Yes, the triple exclamation points were necessary.
Liu is a strong writer. This is still a good read. A difficult read, given the subject matter. But the climax was incredibly frustrating, and I found the lack of complicated aftermath at the end a tough sell. Liu makes up for this with some closure, but it still doesn't settle well. But that's just me.
February 22, 2018
The October anniversary issues of The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction were usually quite good and the September/October 2010 issue is one of the best. I don't think there are any poor stories and most of them are very good.
F&SF frequently published horror stories and this issue is no exception. Fred Chappell's "Uncle Moon in Raintree Hills" is (probably) a story of supernatural horror, but it is told from the viewpoint of children. Could they be misinterpreting what they see?
"The Door in the Earth" is another story about two children, older than the ones in "Uncle Moon." The two boys live with their divorced father. They come to visit their mother and her new husband, who live at the edge of a forest, not near any neighbors. There is a door built into cave rock...
Dale Bailey's "Eating at the End-of-the-World Cafe" and Ken Liu's "The Literomancer" both have strong horror elements as well, but in these the horror comes from the way people are treated by political opponents. "Eating" is a science fiction story set in a time of severe poverty under an autocratic regime. Eleanor has a very sick daughter. What will she be willing to do to protect her child?
"The Literomancer" takes place in Taiwan in 1961. The USA is committed to helping to stop the advance of communism. There is a small supernatural element in here but it is primarily about what people will do to further a political aim. Coincidentally, this story is also told from the viewpoint of a child.
In James L. Cambias's "How Seosiris Lost the Favor of the King," two wizards duel in ancient Egypt.
David Gerrold's "F&SF Mailbag" isn't really a story at all. It is a series of jokes about what might happen in the future of science fiction publishing.
"About It" by Terry Bisson is like most of Bisson's stories, in that it is unlike other stories. It concerns a man taking care of a laboratory-created Bigfoot.
"Blind Spot" is by Rick Wilber and Nick DiChario. It's about a man coming back for the funeral of his estranged father.
Richard Matheson's "The Window of Time" is about a man who gets a chance to go back in time and talk to his teenage self. This would have been a perfect Twilight Zone episode and Matheson would have been the one to write the script.
Michael Swanwick's "Steadfast Castle" could have been another horror story but it is much too funny to qualify. A police officer comes to the house of a missing, possibly murdered man. The house, which has artificial intelligence, has its own feelings about the situation.
The longest story is "Orfy" by Richard Chwedyk. It is part of a series about "saurs," miniature dinosaurs designed as intelligent toys. Years have gone by and many of the saurs, long abandoned, live together in a house with one very dedicated human. In this story, the saurs have to deal with the death of one of their number.
My favorites of these are the Chwedyk, the Liu, and the Swanwick.
There are also book reviews by Charles de Lint and Chris Moriarty and a film column by Kathi Maio. This issue's "Curiosities" entry is by F. Gwynplaine MacIntire. It ends with "almost nothing is known about [Lucian of Samosata] apart from his fragments of autobiography, and these appear to be a hoax." Much the same could be said about MacIntire, whose mysterious life came to an end when he committed suicide by setting his apartment on fire, earlier in the same year that this issue appeared. (If you're not familiar with MacIntire, you can find the little that is known about his fascinating life story on Google.)
The excellent cover, illustrating "Orfy," is by Bryn Barnard, who I believe did all the "saurs" covers.
F&SF frequently published horror stories and this issue is no exception. Fred Chappell's "Uncle Moon in Raintree Hills" is (probably) a story of supernatural horror, but it is told from the viewpoint of children. Could they be misinterpreting what they see?
"The Door in the Earth" is another story about two children, older than the ones in "Uncle Moon." The two boys live with their divorced father. They come to visit their mother and her new husband, who live at the edge of a forest, not near any neighbors. There is a door built into cave rock...
Dale Bailey's "Eating at the End-of-the-World Cafe" and Ken Liu's "The Literomancer" both have strong horror elements as well, but in these the horror comes from the way people are treated by political opponents. "Eating" is a science fiction story set in a time of severe poverty under an autocratic regime. Eleanor has a very sick daughter. What will she be willing to do to protect her child?
"The Literomancer" takes place in Taiwan in 1961. The USA is committed to helping to stop the advance of communism. There is a small supernatural element in here but it is primarily about what people will do to further a political aim. Coincidentally, this story is also told from the viewpoint of a child.
In James L. Cambias's "How Seosiris Lost the Favor of the King," two wizards duel in ancient Egypt.
David Gerrold's "F&SF Mailbag" isn't really a story at all. It is a series of jokes about what might happen in the future of science fiction publishing.
"About It" by Terry Bisson is like most of Bisson's stories, in that it is unlike other stories. It concerns a man taking care of a laboratory-created Bigfoot.
"Blind Spot" is by Rick Wilber and Nick DiChario. It's about a man coming back for the funeral of his estranged father.
Richard Matheson's "The Window of Time" is about a man who gets a chance to go back in time and talk to his teenage self. This would have been a perfect Twilight Zone episode and Matheson would have been the one to write the script.
Michael Swanwick's "Steadfast Castle" could have been another horror story but it is much too funny to qualify. A police officer comes to the house of a missing, possibly murdered man. The house, which has artificial intelligence, has its own feelings about the situation.
The longest story is "Orfy" by Richard Chwedyk. It is part of a series about "saurs," miniature dinosaurs designed as intelligent toys. Years have gone by and many of the saurs, long abandoned, live together in a house with one very dedicated human. In this story, the saurs have to deal with the death of one of their number.
My favorites of these are the Chwedyk, the Liu, and the Swanwick.
There are also book reviews by Charles de Lint and Chris Moriarty and a film column by Kathi Maio. This issue's "Curiosities" entry is by F. Gwynplaine MacIntire. It ends with "almost nothing is known about [Lucian of Samosata] apart from his fragments of autobiography, and these appear to be a hoax." Much the same could be said about MacIntire, whose mysterious life came to an end when he committed suicide by setting his apartment on fire, earlier in the same year that this issue appeared. (If you're not familiar with MacIntire, you can find the little that is known about his fascinating life story on Google.)
The excellent cover, illustrating "Orfy," is by Bryn Barnard, who I believe did all the "saurs" covers.
August 9, 2017
A heartbreaking historical short story in Taiwan right after the Chinese Communist Revolution.
September 13, 2011
I received this magazine in a goody-bag at a writer's convention and could not put it down. Great stories packed inside! I've read other issues before, and I must say, I dearly love most of the stories I've read so far.
June 4, 2013
The short story The Literomancer made me sick to my stomach. The rest of the stories were good.
April 14, 2017
I wanted to leave a comment on this one because of how deeply it touched me.
We experience this politically-charged story through young Lilly's eyes and really it was the only way to truly experience this story. The end of it left me on a plane with shocked and horrified tears in my eyes. Even more so because I know that if if read about this events in a history book o would've just shrugged my shoulders and moved on. Deeply moving and a must read.
We experience this politically-charged story through young Lilly's eyes and really it was the only way to truly experience this story. The end of it left me on a plane with shocked and horrified tears in my eyes. Even more so because I know that if if read about this events in a history book o would've just shrugged my shoulders and moved on. Deeply moving and a must read.
Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews