Originally published at The Mossy Skull. Please leave any comments there.

“Queen of the Butterfly Kingdom”
Holly Phillips

I really wish I didn’t have to resort back to grumpy ranting for this, the next-to-last of my reviews of the stories in the Interfictions anthology. Unfortunately, I’m afraid “Queen of the Butterfly Kingdom” rubs me every way but ( Read more... )

Originally published at The Mossy Skull. Please leave any comments there.

“When It Rains, You’d Better Get Out of Ulga”
Adrián Ferrero
translated from the Spanish by Edo Mor

At some point in the early history of the Interfictions anthology, apparently, it came down to Adrián Ferrero or me. Though it eventually turned out that there was room in the ( Read more... )

Originally published at The Mossy Skull. Please leave any comments there.

“Emblemata”
Léa Sihol
translated from the French by Sarah Smith

This story goes way the hell over my head. Like “Rats” and “Pallas at Noon”, “Emblemata” makes me wonder what a ho hum writer like me is doing in this anthology at all. It isn’t just that I have only the most ( Read more... )

Originally published at The Mossy Skull. Please leave any comments there.

“A Map of the Everywhere”
Matthew Cheney

I have been seeing Matthew Cheney’s name all over the place of late, but had yet to figure out who he was-so I was glad of this chance to read his work and see what he’s all about. This story is hands-down the weirdest one I’ve seen in ( Read more... )

Originally published at The Mossy Skull. Please leave any comments there.

“Hunger”
Vandana Singh

“Hunger” is the first story I’ve encountered here that strikes me as showing a modernist, rather than a postmodernist, sensibility. Which is a pretty rare thing on the speculative side of the publishing aisle, though I get the impression it is still much ( Read more... )

Originally published at The Mossy Skull. Please leave any comments there.

“Timothy”
Colin Greenland

I very much appreciate Mr. Greenland’s prose and descriptive skills; the world of this story is quiet and poised, with nothing superfluous. The premise, I’m afraid, annoys me a bit. A housewife has a brief affair with her cat. Are there really stay-at ( Read more... )

Originally published at The Mossy Skull. Please leave any comments there.

“Climbing Redemption Mountain”
Mikal Trimm

A simple, powerful premise, well thought out and cleanly executed. In his author comment Mikal Trimm calls this (or at least his original version of this) fantasy. But there’s only the one real speculative element, and even that is ( Read more... )

Originally published at The Mossy Skull. Please leave any comments there.

“Rats”
Veronica Schanoes

This story opens with several paragraphs of criticism on the pacific nature of fairytale-the opiate effects of allowing oneself the escape of long ago and far away, where all the rules are clearly defined, and good people live happily ever after as ( Read more... )

Originally published at The Mossy Skull. Please leave any comments there.

“Burning Beard: the Dreams and Visions of Joseph Ben Jacob, Viceroy of Egypt”
Rachel Pollack

“Burning Beard” mashes together the biblical legend of Joseph, the ancient Egyptian book of dreams, and a modern sensibility, and spins them up into a humanist retelling of the life of ( Read more... )

Originally published at The Mossy Skull. Please leave any comments there.

“The Utter Proximity of God”
Michael J. DeLuca

Nobody should be allowed to throw stones at glass houses unless they’re prepared to throw stones at their own.

I read this and I notice flaws. Bumps in the prose I wish I’d fixed. Points where the silliness comes off as wooden and ( Read more... )