#FandSF #FavoriteStories Summer 2025 #Fantasy #SF @shereereneethomas.bsky.social
That's it for this issue. I'll post a rollup of all my short reviews on Goodreads as soon as Amazon get around to listing it.
Hopefully we won't have to wait as long for the next issue.
Winter 2026...January maybe???

(2/2) #FandSF One of the many findings: over half the responders said that they featured a white protagonist in their earliest writing. Think about that; “Write what you known?”
I highly recommend reading Sorg's article. The results should be thought-provoking for all readers, writers and editors.

(1/2) #FandSF #FavoriteStories Summer 2025 #Fantasy #SF
By the Numbers 10: Why We Need to Count On Each Other by Arley Sorg @arleysorg.bsky.social
I don’t usually review the non-fiction pieces, but this one is important.
Sorg sent out surveys about writer’s experiences as authors of color.

#FandSF #FavoriteStories Summer 2025 #Fantasy #SF
Soul Rebel by @mauricebroaddus.bsky.social
Afrofuturistic steampunk tale about the political conflict between the Maroons, Assembly of First Nations, and United States of Albion.
Each chapter heading is an apropos title of a Bob Marley song.

#FandSF #FavoriteStories Summer 2025 #Fantasy #SF
And a Little Garlic by #WilliamMagieri
Angling with garlic; a different type of talking fish story.

#FandSF #FavoriteStories Summer 2025 #Fantasy #SF
The Red River Summers by Inda Lauryn @indalauryn.bsky.social
Black Hawk, Black Witch, and Galena, a tale about enslavement and colonization.
Living on the Illinois River, this story had special meaning to me.

#FandSF #FavoriteStories Summer 2025 #Fantasy #SF
The Seventy-Eight Spoons by Devan Barlow @devanbarlow.bsky.social
Attics can contain the most amazing things, especially for someone who is metaphorically “out of spoons” and doesn't realize it.

#FandSF #FavoriteStories Summer 2025 #Fantasy #SF
The Apology Tour by Nnedi Okorafor @nnedi.bsky.social
Software shackles A.I. Persons. An enslaved Person and the engineer who designed them face a reckoning in the desert.

#FandSF #FavoriteStories Summer 2025 #Fantasy #SF
The Corporate Souls by John Shirley @johnshirley2024.bsky.social
Corporations are claiming personhood. How about a mandatory Corporate Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory?

#FandSF #FavoriteStories Summer 2025 #Fantasy #SF
The Final Trial of Jalen, Oba of Uhuri by Justin C. Key @justinkey.bsky.social
A kōan for you: why, in chess, is the Queen most powerful, but the King most important?
A West African tale of atonement, redemption and belated justice.

#FandSF #FavoriteStories Summer 2025 #Fantasy #SF
Threat Assessment by Matthew Kressel & Mercurio D. Rivera @matthewkressel.net @mercuriodrivera.bsky.social
I tell you things, you tell me things...Quid pro quo. Yes or no?
—Hannibal Lecter
Psychoanalyzing a rogue AI on the moon. Who's the danger?

Cover art by John Jennings shows a man with dreadlocks holding a sword that he just unsheathed from a walking cane. There is a city skyline in the background. The color palette is orange, yellow, and green. Text: Nnedi Okorafor: The Apology Tour THE MAGAZINE OF Fantasy & Science Fiction VOLUME 1 Soul Rebel Maurice Broaddus Justin C. Key Matthew Kressel & Mercurio D. Rivera John Shirley Inda Lauryn

The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction just published their first issue in over a year. Sheree Renée Thomas continues at the helm, so we are in for some good stories.
Follow along as I post short reviews of my favorites.
@shereereneethomas.bsky.social #ScienceFiction #Fantasy #SF #FandSF

#FandSF #FavoriteStories Summer 2024
Slickerthin by Phoenix Alexander @dracopoullos.bsky.social
An awkward adolescent gets an unexpected and unwanted gift. An allegorical story that should feel familiar to anyone who has raised a child.

#FandSF #FavoriteStories Summer 2024
The Glass Apple by Ivy Grimes @ivygrimes.bsky.social
A wedding gift that entices, entraps, and finally engulfs. I would much rather have received a toaster oven.

#FandSF #FavoriteStories Summer 2024
Red Ochre, Ivory Bone by Deborah L. Davitt @deborahldavitt.bsky.social
Burial practices can connect people—and species!—down through the ages, eons and light-years.

#FandSF #FavoriteStories Summer 2024
Jacob Street by #LMarieWood
A deliciously disturbing story about getting from here to there. The GPS must be right.
Right?

#FandSF #FavoriteStories Summer 2024
Growth Rings of the Earth by #XinweiKong
Everyone has uploaded to VR Heaven and a trip to the stars. The last person left has a life-defining existential decision to make.
Earth>trees>growth rings>wood>paper>books…back to the Earth?

#FandSF #FavoriteStories Summer 2024
Another Such Victory by #AlbertChu @chubertwrites.bsky.social
“Life was a room with narrow walls.”
Menaces from outer space, mechs, and moral dilemmas—a Pilot with PTSD struggles with a spiritual crisis.

#FandSF #FavoriteStories Summer 2024
What You Leave Behind by #KenAltabef
The bomb explodes and people die. Those who survive carry pieces of that moment inside them for years afterwards and struggle to finally leave the rubble behind.

#FandSF #FavoriteStories Summer 2024
Dog People by #EstherFriesner
Who let the dogs out? And the cats? And all the happy grateful dead folk?
The Three Ladies of the Hereafter try to set things right.

#FandSF #FavoriteStories Summer 2024
Snowdrop by #RaulCanerCruz
An elderly childless couple is gifted with a snow girl. A poetic retelling of the 19th century Russian folk tale Snegurochka. With a special guest appearance by the All-Father.

#FandSF #FavoriteStories Summer 2024
She’s a Rescue by Marie Vibbert @reasie.bsky.social
Mother wants what she wants, but Daughter, Dad, and Doggie make a formidable team.
If you like Heinlein YA stories, you will love this one.

#FandSF #FavoriteStories Summer 2024
Metis in the Belly of the God by #NinaKirikiHoffman
The way to a god’s heart—and head, and loins—is through his stomach. A first person account of Metis’ journey through the metaphor-rich body of Zeus.

#FandSF #FavoriteStories Summer 2024
Water Baby by Tonya R. Moore @tonyarmoore.com
We came from the sea, and to the sea we shall return.
A surrealistic setting for a climate change horror story.

#FandSF #FavoriteStories Summer 2024
On My Way to Heaven by Alberto Chimal @albertochimal.bsky.social
So I throw the windows wide
And call to you across the sky
—Gilmour/Waters/Mason/Wright
A possible alien abduction, psychic pain & a prog rock soundtrack.
New bands for my playlist!

#FandSF #FavoriteStories Summer 2024
What It Means to Drift by #RajeevPrasad
Cyborg minds run the machinery of civilization, but require centering by the touch of human emotions.
A sad but sweet dance.

Magazine cover illustration of a ruined stone arch looking out onto a lake or inlet with mountains in the background. There are three "flying saucers" over the water.

#TheMagazineOfFantasyAndScienceFiction just released the digital version of their Summer 2024 issue. Their last came out in February and was labeled "Winter 2024."
It looks like their publication schedule with be intermittent or biannual.
#FandSF

#ScienceFiction #Fantasy #FandSF #FavoriteStories Winter 2024
That's it for the Winter 2024 issue of The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction. I'll roll up all my reviews on Goodreads when the issue is finally listed.
The big question is whether the next one will be March/April or May/June.

#ScienceFiction #Fantasy #FandSF #FavoriteStories Winter 2024
Do Not Hasten to Bid Me Adieu by #WillMcMahon
A great (x20) grandpa and his great (X20) granddaughter carry out a correspondence over space and time.
And Little Women remains as relevant as ever.

#ScienceFiction #Fantasy #FandSF #FavoriteStories Winter 2024
The Interspatial Accessibility Compact's Guidelines for Cross-Cultural Engagement by #DaneKuttler
In the Language of Flowers, what blossom says “Being with you is like being alone?”