Plot: For months, Jon has been tracking down the game identities of the boys who have been bullying him in school. He promises them cheatware, which is supposed to enhance the prizes they win. In exchange, they lock him out so their paths with never cross, either in Brutal Assault or any other portals inContinue reading “Review of “Bullies” by Damien Krsteski”
Category Archives: Theme of Absence
Review of “Reflections” by Lamont Turner
Plot: Two men, one dressed in black and the other dressed in white, sit on silver chairs at a silver table. The whole room is silver, in fact. Other than the table and chairs, however, there are no furnishings in the room. The man wearing black types on a tablet, looking up occasionally at theContinue reading “Review of “Reflections” by Lamont Turner”
Review of “Bookstore” by Jeremiah Minihan
Plot: The unnamed narrator of this story likes to browse the small independent used bookstore near his work. He’s been there many times before, chatted with the short, gray guy at the front desk. He’s sure Bill—that’s the name of the guy at the counter—has been here for years. He’s always wearing the same fadedContinue reading “Review of “Bookstore” by Jeremiah Minihan”
Review of “Elevators and Aliens” by Eddie D. Moore
Plot: Marty is looking over blueprints and sipping bourbon at the bar of the Bayside Hotel on Proxmia b. Most people visit the Bayside for the salty air and a walk on the beach. Humans have been living on Proxmia b for a little less than five hundred years. Communication with earth ceased off afterContinue reading “Review of “Elevators and Aliens” by Eddie D. Moore”
Review of “Dust to Dust” by Tom Howard
Plot: Spy novelist Alex Poe has returned to his home town of Bidderville. He first left Bidderville thirty years earlier when he was eighteen. His last trip back was twenty years before now for his mother’s funeral. Today he’s returned for another funeral and a favor. He’s come to visit his great-aunt Phaedra. Her trailerContinue reading “Review of “Dust to Dust” by Tom Howard”
Review of “Fresh Air and Ice Cream” by Rick McQuiston
Plot: Bobby has spent so much time in front of the television playing video games, his face has grown gaunt. He finally talked his mom into buying him the game Extinguish the Light. A brilliant flash of light nearly blinds him. It’s only his mom, pulling back the curtain. She tells him she wants himContinue reading “Review of “Fresh Air and Ice Cream” by Rick McQuiston”
Review of “The Red Expansion” by Matt Nagel
Plot: LM081018 is a non-sentient robot tasked with highway maintenance, a job it has been performing faithfully for millennia. This morning, as the growing sun rises over the horizon and recharges its batteries, LM081018’s temperature gauge registers 75 degrees Celsius. The robot once had rain gages, but since all earth’s water has long boiled away,Continue reading “Review of “The Red Expansion” by Matt Nagel”
Review of “The Hole” by K. N. George
Plot: James has been having recurring dreams involving six-eyed monsters and his death. These freak him out. He doesn’t know why. Dreams can’t kill, and six-eyed monsters don’t exist. He attributes the nightmares and their effect on him to childhood memories of bullies beating him nearly to death. He tells himself he needs to seeContinue reading “Review of “The Hole” by K. N. George”
Review of “The Unicorn Keeper” by Mary E. Lowd
There is no plot in this short work, only a portrait of a put-upon unicorn keeper. Amilioona, the unicorn, has dainty gleaming, tufted—perfect— hooves which gleam “the same sparkling shade of white as a hillside of snow in the sun.” Those dainty hooves manage to kick the slop bucket over regardless of where the keeperContinue reading “Review of “The Unicorn Keeper” by Mary E. Lowd”
Review of “A Matter of Fax” by Susan Rooke
Plot: The house is perfect with its acreage, gatehouse, and large conservancy. After all her years of recording and concert work, and all the travel, this is the place for her. Never mind the silly rumors about the place being haunted. Then the relatives she hadn’t seen for years descend on her. When polite hintsContinue reading “Review of “A Matter of Fax” by Susan Rooke”
Reviews of Old and New Stories. Mostly Old 