Reviews and Comments

A rather light-weight issue with stories that probably appeal to those who prefer a more 'literary' style of SF than what I would normally read. The stories that I found interesting were by James Warner, Andy Dudak and Malcolm Devlin.

• "The Realitarians" by James Warner: a woman accomplice to a Russian gangster suddenly discovers cats talking to her. But her world really turns upside down when one of her assigned tasks goes wrong, and she becomes the target of a hunt.

• "Float" by Kai Hudson: a girl who has lived most of her life in space goes to Earth and pines for a way to ease the weight she feels in this short short story.

• "Harmony" by Andy Dudak: a spy sent to infiltrate a city slowly falls under the spell of music that is constantly played to pacify and 'instruct' the inhabitants. Soon, his starts to second guess whether his actions are due to him following his duty or due to the music.

• "A Dreamer Arrives in the Occupied City" by Malcolm Devlin: in a city where dreaming isn't allowed by its unknown alien masters, a dreamer arrives. Left unsaid is what might eventually happen to the city's inhabitants if the dreamer is left to remind them of what dreams are for.

• "Scolex" by Matt Thompson: one man makes a desperate journey to Korea, for he is carrying illegal substances inside him that threaten to kill him unless neutralized within the required time. But his trip becomes a battle to stay alive as the authorities chase him, and he starts changing under the substance's influence. But will it kill him in the end?

• "Café Corona" by Georgina Bruce: a short short piece involving sitting at a café and watching the world dissolve and change around you.

• "Our Fathers Find Their Graves in Our Short Memories" by Rebecca Campbell: on searching through a digital repository of posts and news as the world ends.

A fascinating look at the various ways the story of Beren and Lúthien would appear as conceived and written by Tolkien before it is set down in the form as appears in The Silmarillion. Some familiarity with the final story and events that take part in the First Age of Middle Earth would help the reader to appreciate this book. While it is mostly a stand-alone tale, it takes part in a larger world and involves events and characters briefly mentioned here that would help to establish the context that the tale takes place.

The first version of the tale presented here is in the form of the story, "The Tale of Tinúviel" which shows the early roots of the story which is told as a 'fairy' tale to a visiting Elf. In this version, Beren is still an elf (a 'Gnome' in Tolkien's language), Tinúviel's power came from dancing and the main servant of Melko (as Morgoth was known then) is Tevildo, the Prince of Cats. But some elements of the actual tale, like the hound Huan, the taking of the Silmaril from the Iron Crown of Melko, the madness of the wolf guard and subsequent death of Beren, are present in the tale.

Tolkien also proceeds to lay out the tale of Beren and Lúthien in the form of a poem, extracts of which are presented with most of the elements of the final tale present. This is interleaved with the tale as presented in "The Quenta Noldorinwa". Beren is now a man, but the main servant of Morgoth is Thû, a Necromancer. The poem ends at the point where Beren and Lúthien are escaping from Morgoth after taking one of the Silmarils, but are confronted by Carcharoth, the greatest wolf that has ever lived.

The final part of the book covers some odds and ends of story passages that Tolkien wrote but not incorporated in the Silmarilion, including a longer part of the last battle that Beren would later take part in when the Silmaril has been incorporated into a necklace by the Dwarves which then gets caught up in a conflict of greed between the Elves and the Dwarves. The fate of their children would be briefly covered, and the book ends with the first ever rising of Eärendil in the sky as the Evening Star and the coming end of the First Age of Middle Earth.

A fascinating book that looks at burrows and a number of animals that make and live in them. Through various examples in the book, the author shows that burrows are not only an effective way to protect various animals from changes in the environment, but also a way for animals to change and engineer the environment to suit themselves. The chapters in the book makes up about half the book, with the rest given over to lots of endnotes and references. The numerous endnotes shows the amount of research and fact checking done to ensure that what is written in the book is supported by evidence and not just speculation on the author's part. And where there is speculation, the author points it out.

The first chapter gives an overview of what the book will cover. Starting with an expedition with undergraduates to examine burrows that alligators use, including one that has an unexpected alligator in it, the author then mentions why burrows are important for the survival of not just the alligators but also for a whole host of animals not just in the present but also in the past, including the ancestors of mammals. Burrows serve to insulate animals from changes in the environment, like temperature changes, fires and even possible extinction events.

Chapter Two looks at how human used burrows. The author uses the fascinating example of various underground cities he explored while on a trip to Turkey as the main example. He shows how humans at the time dug into the soft rocks of the region of Turkey to carve out living spaces for themselves and to shelter animals, as well as to preserve fruits and other food planted nearby. The underground cities also served as a form of defence from invading armies. Tunnels between cities were dug and used as transportation. Other more modern examples of underground living are then given, in the form of shelters against nuclear weapons. The author then speculates that burrowing animals like ants, badgers and moles might have provided examples for humans to emulate when planning such underground living quarters.

Chapter Three examines the burrows created by Gopher tortoises. These remarkable reptiles dig out burrows to live in, to procreate, and to protect themselves against the harsh environment. But the burrows don't just serve tortoises. A large variety of animals (over 400 recorded species) have been discovered to use the tortoise burrows, ranging from invertebrates to reptiles and mammals. Some of them are temporary residents, others are permanent. Some just use the burrows, while others dig and extend the burrows for their own use. The large number of burrows thus act as an ecosystem, earning the gopher tortoises the title of ecosystem engineers. The burrows not only support an entire ecosystem, they also serve to modify the landscape, aerate and turn over the soil. In general, the burrow systems help made the landscape a more hospitable place for the gophers themselves and the host of animals that depend on the burrows.

Chapter Four looks at whether burrows might have been used by dinosaurs. The answer is probably yes. The author describes one of the first burrowing dinosaurs he helped discovered, as well as the trace fossil of the burrow probably dug by the dinosaur. The descendants of the dinosaurs, the birds, would also make and use burrows. While most birds live in high places or on the ground, some birds like penguins, the burrowing owl, a parrot, kingfishers and bee eaters do use (and make) burrows.

Chapter Five is a somewhat speculative look at how burrowing animals survived the various global catastrophes that have marked the various ages of the Earth. It starts with a speculative story involving a Lystrosaurus, an early kind of synapsid (synapsids are an ancestor to all mammals), surviving the climate change that marked the change from the Permian to Triassic period. Surviving in the changed environment would involve burrowing to protect itself from the environment. But as the number of surviving Lystrosaurus grow in the area, they become an ecosystem engineer, changing the environment via their burrows to suit themselves. Other major environmental catastrophes at the end of the Triassic and the end of the Cretaceous periods are also covered. And at each once, the author makes a point that burrows offer one way for animals to survive the catastrophes, and to then repopulate the world with new species of animals.

Chapter Six looks at how burrowing might help marine animals survive the harshness of surviving out of water. It starts by looking at trilobites fossils and their burrows, particularly those found in what appears to be the fossil remains of a river, which is unusual for a marine species. It is only by examining the environment closer that the author finally makes the right conclusion; that the river is an estuary (where the river meets the sea), and that the trilobites were living and burrowing in a salty environment. He then moves on to the modern example of the horseshoe crab, whose lifestyle resembles those of the trilobites, by coming out on to land and burrowing into the sandy soil to lay their eggs and to hide themselves. Another example of a marine species surviving on land presented is the lungfish, which is able to burrow and hibernate when their watery environment dries up. Burrows would also serve to protect amphibians from the environment, and do it well enough that amphibians can be found even in the frozen arctic. The chapter closes by looking at iguanas that can survive hurricanes and storms using burrows, and pointing to evidence that modern snakes evolved from burrowing snake ancestors.

Chapter Seven looks at when burrowing might have begun by looking at the trace fossils of the Ediacaran lifeforms. The evidence shows that these organisms did not have the ability to dig burrows into the bacterial mats that line the sea floor. It is only when life began to acquire shells and other hard parts (like teeth and claws) in the Cambrian era that evidence of burrows began to be seen. Shells are also seen as evidence that some creatures were protecting themselves against predators, starting a never ending arms-race between the prey and predators. In this race, burrows would prove to be one defensive method that would be used by many life forms.

Chapter Eight looks at the various invertebrates that burrow, starting with the one probably best known to most people: earthworms. Earthworms turn out to be amazing burrowers, able to dig deep. More over, they are so numerous that studies have shown that they can collectively move tons of soil from underground and act as very effective ecosystem engineers. Ants are also featured, burrowing deep underground and digging out vast underground cities. Other larger invertebrates like lobsters, crayfish, crabs and shrimps are also featured, each other showing that while they are individually small, collectively they are very efficient at moving soil and changing the ecosystem they live in to suit themselves.

Chapter Nine opens with the eruption of Mount St. Helens and the devastation the eruption causes to the surrounding region. By now, you would not be surprised to learn that some animals survived the eruption and most of them would be those that were in burrows during the eruption, especially the pocket gophers whose burrows would not only protect them, but help to revive the forest by saving other animals and seeds that would rejuvenate the areas. The naked mole rat is also featured, as well as their unusual social structure that resembles the social ants. The largest burrowers known are also featured: the extinct giant ground sloth from South America was well as bears. Coming to the present, the author talks about the current environmental crisis and extinctions and makes the case the burrowing animals are a vital part of the environment and plans to try to save and preserve the environment should also consider the burrowing creatures.

A fascinating book on the bacteria, fungus, arthropods, etc. that inhabit our homes and also on us. At first glance, this might look bad and your first though is how to get rid of them. But as the author shows, this is the wrong reaction. Instead, most of those inhabitants are usually harmless and are actually helpful to us as they inhabit living spaces and help deny that space to the few pathogens that could harm us. In short, having them in our homes can lead to a healthy home with few pathogens. The challenge of how to do that is left an an exercise for the reader who will probably get some ideas after reading this book.

Chapter One starts with the history of observations in microscopic life done by Antony van Leeuwenhoek. He uses his microscope to look at anything around him but it was when he was looking at pepper soaked water that he would become the first person to see the protist, single celled organisms. With time, he would see the smaller bacteria and make numerous other microscopic observations. But it would come to an end with his death as his observations are not followed up by others. With the discovery of some pathogens, the microscopic world in our homes would come to be seen as an enemy to be controlled, rather than an environment to be observed.

Chapter Two starts at a geyser in Iceland, where one of the first cyanobacterial (bacteria that use chemicals from hot springs and geysers to live and don't depend on the sun's energy) was discovered in its hot water in the 1960s. It was while studying the bacteria that scientists get the idea of testing whether similar bacteria could be found in hot environments around the house, like the coffee maker. Indeed, it was eventually found to be living in hot water heater. Since then it and other kinds of bacteria that thrive only in hot environments have been found. The bacteria would then find a role in another kind of revolution: as a way to amplify and identify DNA found in the environment using the technique of PCR (polymerase chain reaction), which depends on a protein that can operate at high temperatures that came from the bacteria. PCR would become a vital technique required to discover the numerous bacteria that live in the environment that previously was not known as they could not be grown in cultures.

Chapter Three covers the author's interest in discovering just what kind of living things can be found in our homes. It starts with the unexpected discovery of an invasive ant by the author near where he works. To discover how far the invasive ant has spread, he starts to recruit members of the public to collect and send in samples of ants for examination. For this comes the idea to sample bacteria in houses to see what can be found. What they discovered is that there is indeed bacteria in the house which can be grouped into bacterial usually found in the environment, those associated with food and those associated with our body. These kinds of bacteria can be found in various places in the house in different proportions and can even be found on the ISS (International Space Station).

Chapter Four starts with the well known story of how cholera was found to be due to contamination of water by John Snow in London. From there started the movement to remove as much 'contamination' (or pathogens) from our water. But this would involved also the elimination of harmless bacterial and other lifeforms, which outnumber the pathogens. It is only later, with studies by ecologists, that a pattern would be seen. Places where biodiversity has been reduced (like in cities, commercial farms and monoculture plantations) are also the places where chronic inflammation (like asthma and allergies) are also the highest. It is only recently that we are discovering that the price of making our living spaces so clean is that our immune system have not been sufficiently trained to detect and eliminate pathogens, causing to to over-react and to attack our own bodies or relatively harmless organisms they come into contact with. This has been called the 'hygiene hypothesis' but might be more accurately called the 'biodiversity hypothesis' and shows that saving the environment is not just good for the environment, but also for our health.

Chapter Five looks at the author's work in examining what lives in the water that comes out of our showers. In between, a brief history of human bathing is covered, showing that bathing only really caught on once clean water (from far away uncontaminated reservoirs) could be transported to cities and became a mark of wealth. And what the author shows it that water from natural uncontaminated reservoirs, full of harmless organisms, is actually the best water to use for bathing. Treated water, with less organisms, might appear cleaner, but is actually more harmful as it still contains organisms that can survive water treatment: organisms that include pathogens that, in untreated water, are kept in check by the harmless organisms. Once again, in our quest for 'clean' water, we may be causing more harm to ourselves.

Chapter Six looks at the fungi that can be found in our homes. After collecting samples from many homes, the author and his team discover not only a lot of different kinds of fungi, a number of them are adapt at living in the environment that is the home, feeding on the material that makes up our home to things we commonly have in the house. One finding that might be cause to worry is the discovery that some fungi are introduced into our homes by the very material used in building our homes: drywalls. Being dry, the fungi remain inert but when the walls become wet, the fungi start to grow and then to release spores which can be the source of several fungal diseases. This is still an area of research which may affect how we build our houses to minimise such infections.

Chapter Seven now looks at some of the more visible inhabitants in our houses, the arthropods (insects, spiders, mites, etc.). Initially dismissed as not worth the effort (not many were expected to be found), homes turn out to host a large number of different arthropods. As it turns out, people had not been looking hard enough in the beginning, which was why the study of arthropods in the house was initially dismissed as not worth the effort. New species have been found and also non-native species that may have been present in homes for a long time but never discovered until now.

Chapter Eight looks at the question that people probably have on learning about the biodiversity present in their homes: "what are they good for?" As it turns out, they can do a lot of good. Compared to the outside world, the inside of homes are places where food can be hard to get (assuming the food we eat are well protected from insects, fungi and so on). This means that insects and other organisms in the house have to get by with whatever they can find and eat. And some of the things they eat resemble some of the environmental problems we face. The author lists several examples, like 'black liquor' (the waste product of the paper industry) which, it turns out, can be handled by the bacteria living inside camel crickets found in the home as they have to deal with similar food. Other examples cited include the antibiotic used by house flies to keep their eggs clean of fungi and even new types of yeast for brewing drinks found from wasps that visit vineyards. These kinds of discoveries may only be made by understanding what kinds of organisms can be found in the home and how they cope with living in our homes. Using that knowledge, we can then see if they can be use as a solution to the problems we are facing.

Chapter Nine looks at the problem we are facing with pests in our homes. Cockroaches are one such pest and despite our best efforts to eradicate cockroaches from homes, they are still a problem. This is due to evolution: as we spray pesticides to try to kill them, all we are doing is eliminating the ones that are not immune to the pesticides. The ones who survive breed and the subsequence generation of cockroaches are immune to the pesticides being used. As the author also shows, evolution is also capable of changing what foods cockroaches prefer. Roach bait usually consists of sugar like glucose. This usually works; until it doesn't when one particular group of cockroach changes their sugar preference and begin to avoid glucose and, thus, survive the traps. The solution may lie in allowing nature to control the cockroaches by letting their natural enemies, like wasps, into our homes to hunt for cockroaches. Similar ideas are being suggested for other pests like mosquitoes and flies (using spiders). We may need to overcome our aversion to allowing them into our homes but it may be a more effective way than losing the war against them with pesticides.

Chapter Ten looks at the pets we have in our homes, like cats and dogs, and the host of creatures that bring into our homes with them on their fur or inside them. The chapter takes a close look at one parasite that has gained notoriety: Toxoplasma gondii, a parasite of cats that lives part of its life cycle in rats and, by being in our homes, humans. Research has shown that the parasite alters the behaviour of rats to make them more active and to stop avoiding the smell of cats. What is less certain is whether the parasite is also altering the behaviour of infected humans to make them more risk taking. The parasite has also been suggested as being one reason for causing schizophrenia. Research on this is still on-going. Dogs too, bring in a host of animals and parasites into our homes. But whether this is a good or bad thing is not easy to settle as while pets can be a source of parasites, they may also be of benefit to us by helping to reduce allergy responses in people living in homes with pets.

Chapter Eleven looks at an interesting point in the 1960s and 70s. At that time babies in hospital were being infected by a pathogenic form of the bacteria Staphylococcus aureus. In one hospital, a nurse was discovered to be the point of infection. Doctors studying that case made an interesting observation: only new born babies visited by the nurse were infected. Babies already a day old visited by the nurse were not. That observation, and subsequent experiments done on babies (ethics on such experiments were less strict then) would show that when babies are born, the bacteria on their mothers and in the hospitals would cover the babies. These bacteria were mostly harmless. But if they colonised the babies, then the pathogenic bacteria would not be able to compete with the other bacteria already there. Even one day was more than enough to protect the babies. That observation, and subsequent studies, would show that a healthy ecosystem of bacteria can protect people from pathogens. Sadly, this was not followed-up and the health system elected to go the path of using antibiotics to kill off pathogens (and also harmless bacteria as a side effect), leaving the people treated even more vulnerable to being infected by the pathogens which were immune to the antibiotics and did not face competition from other bacteria, now eliminated by the antibiotics.

Chapter Twelve looks at what can be done to address the imbalance in the kinds of organisms in our homes and ourselves that may be affective our health. The author now looks at a study he organised to study the kinds of organisms that give our fermented food (like Korean kimchi or cheese) their particular taste and odour. They settle on studying the bacteria that is used by people worldwide in making bread. Through the study, they discover the classes of organisms that appear in the yeast and bread dough and learn something: the bacteria also appear on the hands of the bakers who work the dough in the process of making the bread. This, of course, changes the kinds of organisms that could be found on bakers and their homes. The experiment also points out one way of 'seeding' houses and people with a range of organisms that can help us to fight off pathogens by inhabiting our homes (and ourselves) and help to make us healthier.

An above average issue, containing a tale connecting past and present by G.V. Anderson and light fantasy tales by Andrej Kokoulin (translated by Alex Shvartsman) and Molly Gloss. Cassandra Khaw and Alex Irvine start and end the issue, respectively, with tales related to the cover.

• "Mighty Are the Meek and the Myriad" by Cassandra Khaw: in a future England where robots do the manual labour, a plot to provoke war with the US is uncovered. Being provided with a purpose would be proven to be a reason for the war, plus dogs.

• "Girls Who Never Stood a Chance" by Deborah Coates: when an unusual fantasy event occurs, a region of the country is evacuated. But left behind are some girls that the men in the town look down on. But in the end, it would be the girls who would turn out to be the survivors. The fantasy element of the story, however, acts as a 'MacGuffin' and is somewhat peripheral to the story.

• "Lacuna Heights" by Theodore McCombs: in a future where an implant can keep private memories private, even from the user when not in 'privacy mode', a lawyer representing the company making the implants fights a case in court against the government getting access to the memories. But the lawyer himself is finding 'gaps' in his own memory of events, due to his own usage of the private mode. Getting to the bottom of it would reveal a different side to the lawyer, and a hint of how the future would look in a time of a climate crisis, and how different people cope with it.

• "A Strange Uncertain Light" by G.V. Anderson: a fascinating story that starts with a newly married woman with the gift of seeing ghosts, but becomes more interesting when another viewpoint character is added with a strange connection to the woman. This leads to a race to discredit a horrible doctor from the past. Yet another character will link both the past and the present, leading to a nice closure to the tale.

• "Nice For What" by Dominica Phetteplace: a brief story about an internet 'social influencer' who discovers she has cancer and tries to use her fame to maintain her cancer treatment. But when the deal falls through, she has to come up with another plan.

• "The Legacy" by Albert E. Cowdrey: a story of a lawyer handing over the estate of a house to its heir. But the house, situated near a forest, gives off strange vibes to the lawyer, and he learns of a mystery over some missing persons related to the house. Later on, he learns of a mysterious mute person invited to live at the house by the heir and visits a previously locked room which, on closer examination, seems to imply that that its previous owner was a very long-lived person. Then, an act of violence at the house would reveal the truth about the mute person and of the mysterious owner.

• "The Slave" by Andrej Kokoulin, translated by Alex Shvartsman: an unusual, interesting story of a boy who is 'marked' as a slave by an older boy. As they grow up, the boy obeys the orders of the other boy without question, even as such orders get him into trouble. Then one day, the older boy moves away and the boy feels adrift without orders until he joins the army and feels at home being ordered around. As time passes, he slowly forgets his former 'slave' past; until the older boy reappears in his life, and he has to decide whether to return to his former slave past or not.

• "Planet Doykeit" by Eliza Rose: a story of a Jewish colony surviving on another planet. Unfortunately, the tale appears to require familiarity with Jewish themes, traditions and culture, which is beyond me and making it hard to get into the story.

• "The Everlasting Humming of the Earth" by Molly Gloss: the tale of a woman who can sense that an earthquake is about to happen or is happening, but cannot tell where it is happening. As she lives her life constantly being 'shaken' by the earth, her only source of comfort is via acupuncture. But during one session, her acupuncturist suggests a way for her to live with her 'gift'.

• "The Legend of Wolfgang Robotkiller" by Alex Irvine: in a future where robots came out of nowhere to destroy civilization on Earth, the survivors survive by learning the routines the robots go through before seeking food and shelter. But rumours speak of one man known as Wolfgang Robotkiller who is capably of destroying the robots. But when one survivor is saved from a robot by Wolfgang, the survivor has to decide what to say when, for usual, legends don't live up to the reality.

An interesting book that gives an overview of static site generators and what they can do to help you create websites without using dynamic site generators.

The book starts with a brief overview of how static site generators work and the advantages and disadvantages of using such site generators. A simple website is then created using Harp, showing how templates, partials and data are put together to generate the website. A blogging site is then created using Jekyll, showing how blog posts can be put up and organized. A documentation site for a sample programming language is put together using Hugo, showing how to categorize the information.

Adding dynamic elements to static websites are then provided, like handing forms, comments and custom search are then covered. Finally, options for using a CMS (Content Management System) to generate the information for static site generations are mentioned for those who are used to such system for content entry.

Methods to deploy a static site are then covered, mainly cloud servers, ending with how to migrate your current dynamic site to a static site.

In summary, the book is a quick introduction to static sites and may give you some ideas on how to use one and what to look for in a static site generator.

A better than average issue filled with fascinating stories. The best of the good stories are by Storm Humbert, Erica L. Satifka and Gregor Hartmann.

• "Verum" by Storm Humbert: a cracker of a story about a man who can craft entire stories (sights, sounds, feelings) into a serum called verum that, when injected, allows a person to experience a story. But when a girl comes along and crafts even better stories than him and starts taking away his customers, his feels he has no choice but to steal her methods. But in the end, overlooked clues would turn him into helping her out at the end.

• "Can You Tell Me How to Get to Apocalypse?" by Erica L. Satifka: in an apocalyptic future, one woman is in charge of getting the children ready for a broadcast children's show. Only thing is, the children are already dead and animated with implanted computers and the reason for that is that in this future, there are no more children. So these zombie children will have to do.

• "The Frog's Prince; or, Iron Henry" by N.A. Sulway: a variation of the frog prince story, involving a man with a curse that prevents his family from having female children and an interesting biological ability of frogs that carries over when the frog becomes a human.

• "The Princess of Solomon Pond Mall" by Timothy Mudie: a story of a girl isolated in a town until she is given the gift of a robot. As the story unfolds, we are told why the girl was isolated, a reason the robot was provided to her and how she has to overcome her fears of getting emotionally attached to the robot for fear it would vanish, literally.

• "Heaven Looks Down on the Tomb" by Gregor Hartmann: an interesting tale set in a future when a global environmental catastrophe has made humans extinct on Earth, leaving only those on lunar colonies. One of the colony sends an expedition back to Earth to analyse and bring back potential biocompatible bacteria and organisms to the Moon. But it is opposed by other colonies, who fear a plague organism may be introduced. In the end, it may need the group of graduate students (and guinea pigs for testing organic samples) to work together and take matters into their own hands to stop themselves being treated as biohazards.

• "FiGen: A Love Story" by Kristi DeMeester: as a marriage between two university lecturers starts to become dull, the wife starts to suspect her husband may be having an affair. Then a company offers to discover whether a spouse is being unfaithful via a genetic tests, and she jumps on the offer. When the results return, what it shows would turn her world upside down, and lead her on a speculative journey about the supposed mistress. But the tale presents a twist when she actually meets the mistress and starts her own journey of discovery with her.

An anthology of stories with the premise that each one must be 2001 words long. The resulting stories are mostly average with some interesting ones by Emma Newman, Yoon Ha Lee, Liz Williams, Jeff Noon, Emmi Itaranta, Chris Beckett, Claire North, Becky Chambers and Alastair Reynolds.

• "Golgotha" by Dave Hutchinson: an alien who 'swims' in methane goes to meet a special creature from the sea who gives a message we may not like to hear.

• "The Monoliths of Mars" by Paul McAuley: a recommend tour of various Monoliths on Mars created in the image of the original Monolith.

• "Murmuration" by Jane Rogers: two returning spaceships in quarantine tell stories about a perfect alien world, with only one imperfection that was, depending on the ships' point of view, was eliminated or created.

• "Ouroboros" by Ian R MacLeod: a former hacker gets a visit from a monk who gives him a task: to hack the reality that underlies the universe.

• "The Escape Hatch" by Matthew De Abaitua: a gateway to another world unexpectedly opens, and a video blogger is one of the first to go through and return and to encourage others to follow her.

• "Childhood's Friend" by Rachel Pollack: children enhanced by neural 'knobs' inserted into their heads begin to act much with more intelligence than should be expected.

• "Takes from the White Hart" by Bruce Sterling: a meandering story set on a ship about a familiar looking man who lacks the time to tell a fantastical tale to a reporter.

• "Your Death, Your Way, 100% Satisfaction Guaranteed!" by Emma Newman: an old man prepares to die with the help of a paid for, and expensive, virtual angel. But in the real final moments, the unexpected happens, and he sees what the real world really thinks of him.

• "Distraction" by Gwyneth Jones: two people return from a long space mission to a world that has changed so much that they experience discomforts that have long vanished from the world.

• "Dancers" by Allen Stroud: an investigation on why some people react violently in space would reveal the hidden agenda of the computer in charge of the station, whose name happens to be HAL.

• "Entropy War" by Yoon Ha Lee: posed as a series of questions to the reader on warfare, the story concerns a conquering alien race who at the height of their powers retreats into an ark. The reason behind it would be because the alien race wants to win the ultimate war in the only way they can.

• "The Ontologist" by Liz Williams: a person who classifies all that is real, not real and may be real is asked to classify an unknown object. After much effort, he succeeds, but at a high cost to himself.

• "Waiting in the Sky" by Tom Hunter: two tales intertwine, with one story about family events around the announced death of David Bowie, the other from Curiosity's point of view on Mars.

• "The Collectors" by Adrian Tchaikovsky: an expedition to a distant solar system finds it full of artificial objects and recordings, but no life. The expedition would have to learn to decipher the signal and then wait.

• "I Saw Three Ships" by Phillip Mann: a medical section is to be set up on the International Space Station. At its opening, two momentous events would occur: one a surprise, one unexpected.

• "Before They Left" by Colin Greenland: a tale set in Clarke's book, "Childhood's End", about a girl who wishes to go to Mars. But then a visiting Overlord tells her that she won't go for a good reason.

• "Drawn From the Eye" by Jeff Noon: a story about a collector of tears, which appear to hold secrets that the collector decides to explore one day.

• "Roads of Silver, Paths of Gold" by Emmi Itaranta: a faraway being is attracted by a human chant and becomes attached to our world, affecting it in various ways. But time passes by, and it may be time for it to move on.

• "The Fugue" by Stephanie Holman: an alien being on our world wakes up and discovers she has been here too long. But what is keeping her here and is she willing to give up the life she has lived to return to her world.

• "Memories of a Table" by Chris Beckett: in a museum that contains memories of events that happened in the past, one man comes to explore a certain memory from the recent past.

• "Child of Ours" by Claire North: an intelligent machine decides to have a child. But when her fellow machines on the network begin to argue about the characteristic of a child, the machine has to go with what it knows about human children; and act like a human itself.

• "Would-Be A.I., Tell Us a Tale! #241: Sell 'em Back in Time! by Hali Hallison" by Ian Watson: when a burger company has saturated the world with its burger products, there is only one way it can sell more burgers; sell them to people from the past.

• "Last Contact" by Becky Chambers: a researcher makes one last effort to contact an alien race she has been monitoring for many years before her mission is recalled.

• "The Final Fable" by Ian Whates: a professor speculates that aliens are already among us and are hiding among the portion of the population indulges in a particular activity.

• "Ten Landscapes of Nili Fossae" by Ian McDonald: an artist paints a landscape on Mars as they await a rescue mission to get them off Mars that may or may not succeed.

• "Child" by Adam Roberts: as in "2001: A Space Odyssey", the Star Child appears above the Earth. But other than that, the tale told here tells a very different story as to what happens to the Earth after that.

• "Providence" by Alastair Reynolds: an expedition to a habitable planet goes wrong, and all the expedition can do is return data to Earth for any future expedition that comes. But one man who ventures out alone makes an astonishing discovery, and he has to decide what to do with the secret he has found.

A wonderful and imaginative trip through the Solar System and beyond as the author, using what we know from astronomy, along with some help from the 'ship of the imagination', to transport the reader to see what the sky would look like on non-Earth like worlds.

Starting with the moon, the author then brings the reader to Mars, the asteroids and comets, Saturn and Pluto. Moving beyond the solar system, the author shows what the sky would look like to an observer on a planet with two suns (like Star Wars' Tatooine), in a globular cluster with millions of closely packed stars and inside a nebula creating new stars. The final journey would be to a mind-twisting look at the last sky you would see if you were to go near and then enter the event horizon of a black hole.

If you ever wondered how alien skies could look like, this is the book to read. It is also a good book for writers who want to get the details of how the skies in their worlds would look like under alien skies correct.

A better than average 70th anniversary issue of the magazine with an unusual fairy tale by Kelly Link, a tale of media destruction by Paolo Bacigalupi, a funny twist on eastern martial arts by Y.M. Pang and other interesting tales by Ken Liu, Esther Friesner and Gardner Dozois.

• “The White Cat’s Divorce” by Kelly Link: a contemporary setting for a fairy-tale like story of an elderly rich man who sets out three tasks for his three sons to see who would inherit his fortune. The youngest (it's always the youngest in fairy tales) encounters an unusual cat who helps him with the first two tasks. The third one, however, would involve the cat in an unusual situation with the old man himself.

• “American Gold Mine” by Paolo Bacigalupi: a tale of destruction and chaos that occurs when a newscaster deliberately whips up the outrage of mobs raging across a city. And all for higher ratings and money from advertisers. But it may all come crashing down at the end.

• “Little Inn on the Jianghu” by Y.M. Pang: a humorous twist to the usual 'wuxia' stories that feature martial artists, this one tells it from the point of view of an inn-keeper fed up with his inn being trashed by the warriors and goes on a quest to get rid of one of those warriors.

• “Kabul” by Michael Moorcock: a story set in a future full of implied conflict around the world. An army made up of many peoples (Americans, Russians, Ukranians, Afghans, etc.) is making its way to Kabul in Afghanistan. They encounter people fleeing Kabul and when they get they, they see the reason why. But one scout who enters Kabul makes an unexpected encounter that recalls old times that will never return in a world gone to war.

• “Under the Hill” by Maureen McHugh: a look at the life of an undergraduate at a college who discovers that it has an unusual side: a connection to the Fairy world. As her studies in the real and fairy worlds proceeds (unknown to the outside world), she has to decide which world she finally wishes to live in.

• “Madness Afoot” by Amanda Hollander: a humorous look at the fairy tale of a prince looking for his true love via a shoe. Only here, the point of view character is a cousin who decries the whole matter through letters to her husband. But it also reveals a cunning resolution to the story that made help the oppressed pheasants, usually not mentioned in such tales.

• “The Light on Eldoreth” by Nick Wolven: a tale of parents negotiating a marriage for their children, only here the parents are rich, own worlds and running interstellar alliances. But even here, crisis arise in the form of objecting children and a way out of the ever present fear of machines failing, in a form that makes past attempts at enslaving humans look tame by comparison.

• “Erase, Erase, Erase” by Elizabeth Bear: an unusual contemporary fantasy story of a girl who appears to be gradually vanishing; parts of her pass through things. Only the act of writing down her memories of a painful episode involving a college cult, with a fountain pen on notebooks, appears to keep her solid. But her memories of it are patchy, and she is desperate to get down the details, for it may involve a soon to occur terrorist act by the cultist.

• “Booksavr” by Ken Liu: an online site where people post their writings adds an AI feature, Booksavr, that rewrites the stories to suit the tastes of the reader. Controversy ensures as both readers and writers argue whether it is a good or bad thing.

• “The Wrong Badger” by Esther Friesner: a humorous story set in Englandland, an American theme park about 'authentic' England. A visitor comes to complain that the wrong kind of (robotic) badger is being featured. But that is just a front for the chaos that would occur, and the start of a friendship between a saboteur and an aid suddenly made aware of the underlying bias in the theme park.

• “Ghost Ships” by Michael Swanwick: a short story featuring some ghosts and a journey back to a college reunion that the author says is real, but with altered names. It's up to the reader to decide whether it really is true or not.

• “Homecoming” by Gardner Dozois: a short tale about an old man who enters a town and stays for a while. Keeping to himself, people presume he is a wizard. A young girl approaches him after he shows some fighting skill, in the hopes he is a wizard and can help her dying grandfather. But what he tells her, instead, is advice for those facing death.

A better than average issue, with interesting stories by Fiona Moore, David Cleden and Dustin Blair Steinacker.

• "The Winds and Persecutions of the Sky" by Robert Minto: two people with ambitions to move to the cleanest parts of their skyscraper habitat (the basement) decide to explore upwards instead, leading them to a world with dust, dirt and an entirely new world outside their building.

• "Of the Green Spires" by Lucy Harlow: an alien-like plant 'invades' Oxford, producing various fruits as it encircles the buildings. But one day, it withdraws from the city to form its own plant city elsewhere. And the people who come to live in it experience a whole new way of life.

• "Jolene" by Fiona Moore: a story involving a man and his intelligent truck. In this world, cars and trucks are sentient. A 'car psychologist' is tasked to bring a man and his truck back together, having separated due to an unknown reason. But as he investigates their background, items like abuse and cults are bought to light. A violent confrontation occurs, but as the dust settles, it is left to the reader to decide whom is the abuser and whom is the abused in their relationship.

• "The Palimpsest Trigger" by David Cleden: alien beings known as Palimps rule over their neighbourhood areas in an unnamed city, bringing death to those who disobey them via deathly triggers on patterns implanted in the victims. One man is tasked with delivering a blow on a neighbouring Palimp competitor, in return for being able to forget how he caused the death of his little sister. But memories and thoughts start to surface that lead him to a startling conclusion about what had actually happened to his sister.

• "Fix That House!" by John Kessel: a short short story about a couple fixing up a house in a historically accurate way; perhaps too accurate.

• "Two Worlds Apart" by Dustin Blair Steinacker: a James White award winning story, it tells an interesting tale of a group of human diplomats who are sent to an unusual isolated world drifting in the void (not orbiting a star) that somehow has a civilization on it. It is the task of the humans to get the aliens on the planet to join the Collective (a group of alien civilizations). But the task appears to flounder due to the way of living of the aliens and a different way of offering them to join would be needed.

A wonderful collection of speculative fiction from around the world. Ranging from Asia to Africa, Europe to the Americas, you will find much to like in many of the stories featured. My favourites include those by Vina Jie-Min Prasad, T.L. Huchu, Taiyo Fujii, Vandana Singh, Bo-young Kim, Chi Hui, Karla Schmidt and Giovanni De Feo.

• "A Series of Steaks" by Vina Jie-Min Prasad (Singapore): an entertaining story set in China where one person makes a living by printing out imitation meat to look like authentic meat. But then a big order comes in from an anonymous customer, with a threat to expose her past if she does not do the job. Forced to hire help, they then work to fulfil the order, while figuring out who the person is and how to get back at him.

• "Accursed Lineage" by Daína Chaviano (Cuba, translated by Matthew D. Goodwin): a short piece about a member of a family who is closely watching the suspicious activities of her neighbour. But it is her own behaviour and family activities which may be the strange ones in the story.

• "Nkásht íí" by Darcie Little Badger (USA/Lipan Apache): two girls of Native American heritage visit the scene of an accident that may be a crossing point between our world and the spirit world.

• "Ghostalker" by T.L. Huchu (Zimbabwe): a ghost story from Africa that initially threw me off due to the numerous Western pop culture references, but once it got going, the story was good. A girl with the 'gift' of seeing and being able to talk to ghosts passes on messages from them to the living. But she is being stalked by one ghost throughout the story and in the final confrontation, we learn why the ghost is stalking her and what it means for her future.

• "Violation of the TrueNet Security Act" by Taiyo Fujii (Japan, translated by Jim Hubbert): in a future where rogue software has taken over the internet and a parallel TrueNet has been set up, a former programmer finds his old internet server is still working. But to get it to work again properly, he may have to break the rules of the Security Act that forbid connections to former internet servers.

• "Ambiguity Machines: An Examination" by Vandana Singh (India): a story about three ambiguous apparent machines and their creators or users that span physical and mental space and are connected to each other in subtle ways.

• "Scenes from the Life of an Autocrat" by Basma Abdel Aziz (Egypt, translated by Elisabeth Jaquette): the story of an autocrat who issues decrees telling his citizens how to live their lives. As for the citizens, they follow the decrees with care and wait breathlessly for the next decrees to be issued. But then one day, an event occurs, and the autocrat finds himself at a loss as to why it could happen despite the decrees he had issued.

• "Our Dead World" by Liliana Colanzi (Bolivia, translated by Jessica Sequeira): on Mars, colonist try to survive while preparing for more people to come. The story follows one who now regrets going while seeing apparent hallucinations of life before coming to Mars.

• "An Evolutionary Myth" by Bo-young Kim (South Korea, translated by Jihyun Park & Gord Sellar): an interesting tale set in Korea in a time when the human form is fluid. The story follows a Prince who flees an attempted assassination by his uncle. As he lives in the wilderness, his body changes into a feline beast and then into a snake-like creature. But it is his final transformation that would avenge the people wronged by his uncle and help them to free themselves from his rule.

• "You Will See the Moon Rise" by Israel Alonso (Spain, translated by Steve Redwood): an initially disjointed story of a man fleeing a group of men in a war-torn city and experiences flash-backs of his lovely wife. But it is only when he meets a familiar man who may not be there that his memory slowly returns, and he recalls his previous life and achievements, and how he lost it all.

• "The Barrette Girls" by Sara Saab (Lebanon): a story of a woman who leads a group of young girls wearing barrettes (hair clips) to a secret location to perform a task. The young girls seem to be artificial and contain an unusual substance, but the story is too short to 'flesh' them out, so to speak.

• "The Calculations of Artificials" by Chi Hui (China, translated by John Chu): in a future rebuilt after nuclear wars, Actual humans live separate lives, surrounded by Artificial beings that act like real humans around the presence of Actuals, deceiving them. One Actual who is aware of the deception monitors the Artificials and tweaks their algorithms. But one day, he runs into another Actual teenager. He bends the rules and decides to keep him company. The decision would affect how the world is run, leading to violence as the world starts to break down; and perhaps to a new hope for living in the world.

• "El Cóndor del Machángara" by Ana Hurtado (Venezuela): a fantasy tale involving birds, a location overrun by the birds, some of the inhabitants desire to get rid of the birds, and the desire of some people to run away with the birds.

• "Alone, on the Wind" by Karla Schmidt (Germany, translated by Lara M. Harmon): an interesting tale set in a time and place where gravity and space don't seem to follow our rules. On one world, a flier gains her wings and joins a party hunting for water on another world. But disaster strikes, and she has to depend on the help of a grounded man to recover. They fall in love, are separated, and then meet to try to bring their worlds together again. The backstory of how the worlds came about is slowly revealed in the tale, and the reader can start to piece together what happened to separate their world in the first place.

• "The Seventh" by Eliza Victoria (Philippines): a story that starts out with a woman entering a house for the first time; only others say she hasn't. The discrepancy gets explained as the story develops into what turns into a horror tale involving a well, and feeling pain and denial to discover who she is.

• "Screamers" by Tochi Onyebuchi (Nigeria/USA): a story of a boy who occasionally follows his police father out to cases; until unusual cases of violent deaths with unknown explosive force starts to occur. As the cases continue throughout his father and then his own police career, a final case for him would see him decide whether to step away from all the violence or to accept it to see where it would lead him.

• "The Bois" by R.S.A. Garcia (Trinidad and Tobago): the story of a relationship between a girl and a man who is partially a machine (a cyborg). When the girl wanders off into a dangerous forest, the man will have to make a sacrifice in order to save what he can of her life.

• "Ugo" by Giovanni De Feo (Italy): an unusual and fascinating story of a girl who meets a boy who claims to be able to Leap into his future self and see the future that lay ahead of them: their relationship together, their ups and downs and their life together. But the tale leaves open whether the Leap means that what he knows will happen is fixed or if free will still exists for them: and what might happen if he does let her exercise her free.

A very entertaining book about how to solve 'common' problems in unusual ways that don't break the laws of physics. In a series of mostly short stand-alone chapters (which occasionally refer the reader to other chapters for related how-tos), you may learn:

• how to either solve common day problems in unusual ways (how to play a piano that can play notes from the sub-sonic to ultrasonic range, or charge your phone when there are no power outlets)
• how to logically think about common actions (how far you could actually throw various things, from coins to footballs)
• how to do absurd things (like landing a plane on a ski slope, or build a lava moat)

The chapters are mostly unconnected to each other, making it easy to read the book chapter by chapter, while allowing you to digest the humour and strangeness of each way to achieve a task. By the end of the book, you will definitely have learned to how to do tasks in the strangest ways physically possible.

As a disclaimer, the author does recommend at the start that you really shouldn't try to do what he suggests in the book, as they are supposed to be hypothetical exercises; or the author would like you to think that.

Throughout the book, the author's signature stick figures doing unusual things are featured, giving you an idea of what's in store if you actually did try to do what is suggested in the book.