Reviews and Comments

An interesting book looking at the Earth at night from space.

It first looks at natural night images of the Earth, as illuminated by natural phenomenon like forest or bush fires, volcanoes, the moon, clouds and lightning, snow and ice, the auroras and atmospheric air glow.

The second section looks at artificial night images, illuminated by urban constructions (cities blocks, factories, refineries) and urban living. Another section looks at before and after images of night views after disasters like hurricanes, wars.

All in all, the book shows a different view of world: how it looks like illuminated at night. It is quite different from normal daylight views of the world as the sources of lighting isn't only the sun, but may be several sources that may or may not follow the contours of the land that can mislead the eye.

There are explanations provided with each image that help explain what the reader is seeing and how to interpret the images, as well as pointing out certain points of interest in each image.

A better than average issue, with interesting stories by Kristina Ten, DaVaun Sanders, Nick Thomas, Jennifer Hudak, and two standout stories by Peter S. Beagle and Aimee Ogden.

• "Approved Methods of Love Divination in the First-Rate City of Dushagorod" by Kristina Ten: an amusing but chilling tale of a country where the family of a girl resorts to 'approved' divination methods to find a partner for their eldest daughter. But repeated divination failures force the daughter to use an unapproved method, which may provide an unlikely end to her quest.

• "Vanishing Point" by RJ Taylor: two explorers on a surface of a planet encounter difficulties approaching what appears to be a gigantic alien. It never appears to get any closer despite their journey towards it. Then, one of the explorers sees a change in perspective that changes everything.

• "The Very Nasty Aquarium" by Peter S. Beagle: an old lady is gifted an aquarium which she then proceeds to decorate with a castle, a mermaid and a diver, along with some fish. But then she makes the unwise decision to add a pirate to it, which sets off a chain of events that may lead to her possession by a very nasty pirate.

• "The Pet of Olodumare" by Joshua Uchenna Omenga and Oghenechovwe Donald Ekpeki: a possibly African version of a creation myth of the universe involving a lonely supreme being who creates a loving pet, lesser beings and then humans. The humans and lesser beings would mess up, and end up creating the world we know.

• "Serenity Prayer" by Faith Merino: a short, mildly horror tale of boys preparing for a hunt.

• "We Go on Faith Alone" by K. S. Walker: a house strangely attracts bird collisions, which may be related to the work a person is doing on green energy that may well cause other kinds of attractions.

• "Little Bird" by Jill McMillan: the story of a girl who used to live alone with her father, and the unsettling outcome of a church gathering that may reveal a secret about what happened to the father.

• "Gather Me a Treasure" by Jordan Chase-Young: a person gathers gifts for an offer to bring back a loved one. But the end result may well be a cycle of gift giving.

• "NPC (or Eight Haxploits to Maximize Your Endgame Farming: A Player’s Guide)" by DaVaun Sanders: people are getting hooked on playing a computer game and doing tasks set by the game in the real world to get more rewards. But it would take one big gathering of material to show who gets the final reward.

• "A Half-Remembered World" by Aimee Ogden: a fantastic story of a city on the back of a giant crab wandering the oceans of the world. But the crab appears to be dying, and so might the city. We learn the lives of the people living on the crab through the eyes of a woman who has already lost much (her child and her companion) but in the end may gain much as the reality of the situation becomes serious.

• "A Meal for Fredrick" by Nick Thomas: a family puts together a paper dragon for fun, but it becomes a permanent fixture in their house. Things take a turn for the fantastic when the father begins 'feeding' the dragon to ward off illness in the family. But it would take one serious illness to break the fantasy of the situation: or does it begin a more fantastic one?

• "The Day of the Sea" by Jennifer Hudak: the Sea, in the form of an old woman, approaches a village and is invited in by one family. Others are not so happy to see the Sea, for in her wake, the seawater steadily encroaches on to their village. But the Sea has lessons on how to survive on the ocean that the villagers eventually accept. The question is whether they learned the right lessons from the sea.

• "What to Do When a Protagonist Visits Your Generic Village" by Dan Peacock: a story of the various possible actions a generic villager can do when a warrior protagonist comes for a visit.

• "Pedestals, Proclivities, and Perpetuities" by Celeste Rita Baker: a lady get tossed on to the roof of a house. Turns out, she enjoys it up there and refuses to come down, eventually setting up a business from up there.

• "A Time to Sing" by Eddie D. Moore: dwarfs warriors face off against giants. The winners will sing of the victory.

• "The Giant’s Dream" by Beth Goder: an artist living inside the body of a giant senses changes and starts to talk to the giant in her dreams; or perhaps she is now appearing in the giant's dreams.

The third book of the Ballad of Halo Jones, this one initially finds her down and out. Out of funds and options, she is now stuck on a nowhere planet and drinking to forget her sorrows. But change would come when the opportunity for a job comes along.

But the job offer would actually be enlistment (via the shipmate she met in the previous book) into the military conflict between Earth and the worlds of the Tarantula Nebula. She gets basic training and is assigned to patrol duty. She then gets to see first hand the conflict that is happening and wonders whether it is worth it.

When she gets sent to the planet Moab, a heavy gravity world that plays havoc with time, she begins to question the futility of war but gets involved in a relationship with the general in charge of the war. When the war winds down, questions begin to be asked about the general's methods, especially one that Halo discovers, to her horror, that she was involved with on the cruise ship in the previous book. At the end, she makes a decision about her relationship with the general and decides to make her own path in the galaxy again.

A book that is darker than the previous two, this one shows a Halo that now world-weary and disappointed with her life. Whatever happens to her from now on is not yet known as future planned episodes of Halo Jones' story were not written, but if there were, they would surely explore yet more fascinating aspects of her life.

The second book in the Ballad of Halo Jones, this one looks at Halo Jones' adventures about a space liner as it makes its one-year journey towards a planned rendezvous with one of her friends.

The stories range from the curious, like her ability to talk to the ship's navigator (which happens to be a dolphin), her job as a waitress, being held hostage by people considered as terrorist by Earth, meeting one of the richest men on the ship and so on.

But it is the stories about her relationships with her fellow shipmates that stand out. One is a larger than life character who constantly struggles to find a machine that can take her on in arm wresting. The other is an unusual person who is constantly ignored by everybody else due to him / her (we're never sure of the gender) efforts to fit it.

Both of them would play key parts in the story when Halo discovers the awful truth about the tragedy that happened in the first book that lead her to go travelling on the ship. Another key part of the story (although not revealed in this book) is her discovery of who is actually staying in a private suite and how her actions now would have repercussions in the future.

When she finally gets to the rendezvous point, she also learns the truth about her friend who was supposed to be there. Now alone, Halo will have to consider her future options.

In this book, Halo Jones is portrayed as a more mature person, who discovers freedom and joy but also sadness and betrayal, just like the rest of us. We'll have to see how she will deal with her life in the next book.

The first book that collects the initial stories in the Ballad of Halo Jones. It starts off by throwing readers straight into the world inhabited by Halo Jones with little introduction, which may confuse readers at first until they get their heads around the slang and mannerisms and way of dressing of the people of The Hoop, the place where the story takes place.

Into this world steps Halo Jones, a down-and-out inhabitant of The Hoop who lives with her friends and a robot dog that belongs to a friend. Halo lives out her life, yearning to get away from the Hoop and hoping that one of her friends, who is a member of a band, may also have a chance to live a life away from The Hoop.

Then, disaster strikes when they run out of food and have to make a 'terrible' shopping trip to get new supplies. Their best plans go awry, and they have to brave a journey outside The Hoop (one of Halo's friends has severe agoraphobia, or fear of open places). But they survive the shopping expedition.

But they return to discover that tragedy struck while they were away. Now, with their lives turned upside down, Halo decides that enough is enough and leaves The Hoop by joining a space liner that is leaving.

Unlike many other comics and graphic novels, Halo Jones is 'just' an ordinary person without special abilities or superpowers, trying to live the life she wants while surviving in a world that does not really care for people like her. An interesting start to the Halo Jones stories.

A better than average issue, with interesting stories by Marie Vibbert, Bo Balder, Brenda W. Clough and Davian Aw.

• "Cheaper to Replace" by Marie Vibbert: an old robot is in need of repairs. And one graduate student, who has developed a fondness for the robot, is desperate to keep it after the university administration wants to get rid of it. Her last hope may be a professor who has a liking for old cars and, perhaps, an understanding for why she wants to keep the robot around.

• "Death and Redemption, Somewhere Near Tuba City" by Lou J Berger: in the future, a woman hunts down the last of the AI cars still roaming the country. But their rivalry turns into grudging accommodation at the end when their encounter does not go well for either of them.

• "Estivation Troubles" by Bo Balder: an interesting story of a couple who pay a visit to their home world, where its inhabitants are separated into people who are active in either summer or winter and aestivate in the other season. But the short visit turns into a crisis when one of them makes a choice the other doesn't agree with, but is finally resolved with a change of heart in the other partner.

• "Clio's Scroll" by Brenda W. Clough: an interesting story involving Dante Alighieri, who picks up an unusual alien acquaintance that requires his help to find a place to stay safe.

• "Tigers for Sale" by Risa Wolf: a space station has the ability to send ships to other universes. But it requires a human on board to decide who gets to travel. At the beginning of the story, the station encounters strange memory lapses and 'nightmares' about its real purpose. But after one encounter with a ship, its human companion gives it an unexpected command that would change the nature of the station, perhaps for the better.

• "Timelock" by Davian Aw: a man is 'trapped' in a timelock, a bubble of frozen time, by a group of party goers. When he goes to ask them to unlock the bubble, so he could go to work, he unexpectedly goes on a journey deep into the world, and deep into the depths of time, while hardly using any time at all.

• "What Remains, the Echoes of a Flute Song" by Alexandra Seidel: on an unknown world, a person wanders about the remains of places, playing a flute as a means of communication. One day, the flautist rescues a talking traveller, who appears to know more about the world, and now despairs at the condition of it. The flautist tries to make them happier, but it might not work.

• "The Orchard of Tomorrow" by Kelsea Yu: in a future where food and knowledge is being hoarded by the elite, one person makes a choice that has some similarities (and differences) to that done in the story of the Monkey King and the Peaches of Immortality.