The Female Factory by Lisa Hannett and Angela Slatter

The Female Factory by Lisa Hannett and Angela Slatter is the eleventh volume in Twelfth Planet Press's collection of Twelve Planets. I read it as part of Aurealis Awards judging back in January (and refrained from reviewing until after the awards were announced) but I would have read it anyway, since I have a subscription to the Twelve Planets series. Also, although I was on the judging panel that awarded this book the Aurealis for Best Collection, this review represents my own opinions only and, in fact, is based on notes I made before even discussing the books with the other judges.

In The Female Factory, procreation is big business. Children are a commodity few women can afford.

Hopeful mothers-to-be try everything. Fertility clinics. Pills. Wombs for hire. Babies are no longer made in bedrooms, but engineered in boardrooms. A quirk of genetics allows lucky surrogates to carry multiple eggs, to control when they are fertilised, and by whom—but corporations market and sell the offspring. The souls of lost embryos are never wasted; captured in software, they give electronics their voice. Spirits born into the wrong bodies can brave the charged waters of a hidden billabong, and change their fate. Industrious orphans learn to manipulate scientific advances, creating mothers of their own choosing.

From Australia’s near-future all the way back in time to its convict past, these stories spin and sever the ties between parents and children.

The Female Factory mainly deals with different ideas of reproduction. There are stories about the meaning of motherhood, if you can or can't reproduce, and stories about what it means to be a woman. I really loved the first two stories, enjoyed the second two but not as much. The last story, which is a novella, was very interesting. My comments on each story are at the end, as per usual.

The Female Factory was my first Slatter + Hannett read and it certainly made me want to read more (which I haven't had the chance to do yet). If you've enjoyed one of both of these author's work in the past, then I would definitely recommend picking up this collection. (And you get that cool iUterus and Frankenstein stitching cover, what's not to like?) Overall, a thought-provoking read.

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Vox — A couple struggling to conceive in a world where the souls of aborted foetuses are recycled as voices (and souls) inhabiting electronic devices. Haunting. Moving.

Baggage — A surrogate mother who has no difficulty getting pregnant works for an agency that arranges babies for rich people. Having to sleep with a billionaire is the last straw.

All the Other Revivals — A very different story to the first two. A magic gender-bending billabong and a teen that doesn't fit in anywhere.

The Female Factory — A novella with a Victorian feel set in an Australian prison. Featuring orphans, the prison matron and strong Frankensteinian overtones. (There really was a place called The Female Factory, by the way.)

4.5 / 5 stars

First published: 2014, Twelfth Planet Press
Series: Sort of. Twelve Planets, volume 11 (but they are all 100% standalone) 
Format read: e-judging copy
Source: Aurealis judging originally, but I have a subscription and now also have the paperback.
Disclaimer: Tsana was a judge for the Aurealis Awards, on the panel which judged this book. This review is the personal opinion of the writer, and does not necessarily reflect the opinion of any judging panel, the judging coordinator or the Aurealis Awards management team.
Challenges: Australian Women Writers Challenge, Australian Science Fiction Reading Challenge

Cherry Crow Children by Deborah Kalin

Cherry Crow Children by Deborah Kalin is the twelfth and concluding (sort of) volume of Twelfth Planet Press's Twelve Planets series. I have reviewed almost all of them (my review of The Female Factory will come after the Aurealis Awards are announced), and you can browse reviews of the other volumes here.

Tulliæn spans a fractured mountaintop, where the locals lie and the tourists come to die. Try the honey.

Briskwater crouches deep in the shadow of a dam wall. Ignore the weight of the water hanging overhead, and the little dead girl wandering the streets. Off with you, while you still can.

In Haverny Wood the birds drink blood, the dogs trade their coughings for corpses, the lost children carve up their bodies to run with crows, and the townsfolk stitch silence into their spleens. You mustn’t talk so wild.

The desert-locked outpost of Boundary boasts the famed manufacturers of flawless timepieces; those who would learn the trade must offer up their eyes as starting materials. Look at your pride: it will eat you alive.

Sooner or later, in every community, fate demands its dues — and the currency is blood.

This collection is very strongly linked thematically. I think the stories are all set in the same world, but they needn’t be. What links them more clearly is the recurring idea of exclusion and of differences being consumed by a place or an idea or the ideal of a place. As usual, I've put my thoughts on individual stories at the end.

The writing in all of them is beautiful without weighing the story down with dense prose. When I read my first Deborah Kalin story, I knew this was a collection to look forward to. And I was right. Whether or not you've read any Kalin stories before, if you're at all a fan of fantasy or horror (especially the kind of horror I read, see: this blog you're reading), do yourself a favour and grab a copy of this book when it comes out (in a month).

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The Wages of Honey — A man comes to a town looking for his cousin. The locals creep him out a bit and are maybe a bit too enthusiastic about their local honey. A creepy but not overly scary tale. An enjoyable read.

The Briskwater Mare — It was a very sunny day when I read this book and this is not a sunny day story. With this story I’m starting to sense a theme of places that, metaphorically or literally, consume people.

The Miseducation of Mara Lys — Probably my favourite story. A girl goes to the school where elite watchmakers (loosely speaking) sacrifice everything to learn the craft. Of course there are secrets and Mara, rejected from the profession she yearns for, wastes little time discovering them. It’s less cliched than I think I've made it sound.

The Cherry Crow Children of Haverny Wood — Another enjoyable story. I felt like part of the landscape of this one had distinct Australian inspirations (although it was definitely not actually set in Australia). The story is about a mother and daughter who are different in a village with very strong beliefs and traditions.

4.5 / 5 stars

First published: April 2015, Twelfth Planet Press
Series: Twelve Planets, volume 12 (but they are all 100% standalone)
Format read: Proofs
Source: Well I have a subscription, but I actually read it while proof-reading for the publisher.
Disclaimer: See above.
Challenges: Australian Women Writers Challenge

Secret Lives of Books by Rosaleen Love

Secret Lives of Books by Rosaleen Love is the latest volume in Twelfth Planet Press's Twelve Planets series of collections. With this one, I wasn't sure what to expect going in — other than feminism — since I'm not familiar with any of Love's other work. And it was about feminism, although that was mainly the last story, which I suspect is the one to stick in people's minds.

Secret lives, replete with possibilities. Elsewhere exists as a better place, in a better time, for a better life. The trick is how to get there from here. These stories give the answers. Share in the secret lives of books. Fly to Mars, the first stage, perhaps, in the onward journey to elsewhere. Hear the music of the heavenly spheres and be forever changed, providing the bad guys don’t hear it first. Discover Gaia may not be quite what we think she is. Discover the universe is a rather big place. Embrace Utopia for women too, if only …

It's called Secret Lives of Books, but I think what it's really about is the secret lives of stories. All five stories within grapple with the story of stories on some level. "The Secret Lives of Books" is literally about the secret story of a particular collection of books, "Kiddofspeed" is about a story that developed around some photos, "Qasida" is about the mysteries of Mars and the plausibility of fantastical stories, "The slut and the universe" (which has a couple of long subtitles which I'll leave for you to discover yourselves) is about the stories of feminism and misogyny. Fitting least into this patter, "The Kairos Moment" is a story about music, muisic itself being a type of story, albeit not necessarily in the narrative sense. There is, of course, the expected feminism in this collection, but I found it mostly manifested through the existence of female characters, apart from in "The slut and the universe".

My favourite story was "Qasida", which I decided would probably be my favourite when I was still halfway through it and had two more stories left to go. It's sort of a surreal story about Mars and magic (for lack of a better term) travel and aliens, except it's not all that surreal. It's told rather sensibly, which I think is part of the appeal.

I highly recommend this collection to all SFF fans. The stories were all equally good and almost equally unusual. I'd tentatively say this is probably in my top four of the Twelve Planets. Which might not sound like much, but you have to remember there's some very stiff competition.

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Secret Lives of Books — This was a strange story that didn’t go the way it initially seemed it would. The main character is a recently deceased writer, trying desperately to get a living person’s attention. And then there’s his extensive book collection, which he has always been very attached to. I’d call this soft horror, as we incrementally — creeping — learn more about the books.

Kiddofspeed — Another unusual story, sort of chronicling the adventures of a girl taking photos of Pripyat (near Chernobyl, and based on real events) and sort of talking about the nature of story.

Qasida — Probably my favourite story so far. It’s another story of stories, this time about Mars and strange happenings. Visits to Mars, objects from Mars and the

The Kairos Moment — An odd story about the uplifting feeling people experience when listening to good music. And a researcher trying to study the phenomenon. And some strange happenings. I was entertained and quite amused. (And in case it isn't obvious, this story is certainly represented on the gorgeous cover.)

The slut and the universe — I seem to have noted that all the stories in this collection are unusual and this is no exception. It's a post-apocalyptic fairytale about feminism. Despite the post-apocalyptic setting not much seems to have changed and there is discussion (literally) on such feminist topics as the meaning of the word "slut" an why feminism is the root of all evil. It was also a rather entertaining read.

4.5 / 5 stars

First published: June 2014, Twelfth Planet Press
Series: Twelve Planets (but these are not connected volumes in any way; different stories by different authors which do not have to be read in any particular order)
Format read: Paper, shockingly
Source: Twelfth Planet Press stall at LonCon3
Disclaimer: The publisher is a friend but, as always, I have endeavoured to be impartial
Challenges: Australian Women Writers Challenge

CAUTION: Contains Small Parts by Kirstyn McDermott

CAUTION: Contains Small Parts by Kirstyn McDermott is the most recent (just, the next is due to come out soon) addition to the Twelve Planets collections being put out by Twelfth Planet Press. So far, this collection has been shortlisted for the Norma K Hemming Award, made the Ditmar ballot — both as a collection and the first and last stories individually — and was shortlisted for Aurealis Awards as a collection and for Best Horror Short Story for, again, the last story. As far as Ditmar voting goes, I'm going to have difficulty deciding how to rank the two stories — "What Amanda Wants" and "The Home for Broken Dolls" — against each other, let alone against the other stories (which I intend to read soon).

A creepy wooden dog that refuses to play dead.
A gifted crisis counsellor and the mysterious, melancholy girl she cannot seem to reach.
A once-successful fantasy author whose life has become a horror story - now with added unicorns.
An isolated woman whose obsession with sex dolls takes a harrowing, unexpected turn.

Four stories that will haunt you long after their final pages are turned.

CAUTION: Contains Small Parts contains three shorter (but not short!) stories and a novella. Aside from all dealing with the darker sides of human nature, there's not a huge amount of similarity between them. They fit together well in the collection, but beyond that, they're probably best treated individually. I'm not even sure which one I like best and I don't have a least favourite one. Looking below, it's clear I had the most to say about "Horn" but it wasn't the one I enjoyed reading the most. The only sensible conclusion is that CAUTION: Contains Small Parts is a very strong collection, which it is.

I highly recommend CAUTION: Contains Small Parts to fans of horror and contemporary fiction. For those scared of genre fiction, the stories could all be taken as magical realism, if that's what you prefer to think you read. All the stories, as I said, deal with the darker side of humanity and none of them are excessively gory (unless you count damaged and dismembered sex dolls as gory; it's kind of a grey area), though some parts might make you cringe. This is an excellent collection and one I wouldn't hesitate to recommend to most people.

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What Amanda Wants — a counsellor with the power to lessen her patients’ trauma. That is, until she meets Amanda, a girl whose problems she can’t figure out. A dark tale, but a satisfying one. Some of the stories within the story aren’t for the faint of heart but then the faint of heart probably shouldn’t’ve picked up this collection to begin with.

Horn — This story is a bit less straightforward. On the surface, it’s a story about a male fantasy writer whose success is overshadowed by personal loss (which he blames on himself and his writing). But when you look at the details, there's a lot more subtext there. For a start, the writer is named Dermott Mack, although, I'm not really sure what Kirstyn McDermott was saying with that detail (perhaps indicating the gender-flip in the story? There are several possible interpretations). The most interesting parts, to me, were the discussion of Dermott Mack masculinising the fantasy genre with his best selling series about violent unicorns. To me this is either a reference to Australia's "female-dominated" fantasy scene (y'know, for a given value of "dominated"), or to the sort of reception female fantasy writers are likely to receive on a more global (well, UK/US) level. And yet, even as we are treated to a scholarly analysis of Mack's masculine work in a feminine world —

“In his efforts to redress a very real gender imbalance, Mack imbues the genre with a fresh, masculine vitality that has been sorely missing from the output of mainstream publishing mills.”

— we're presented with a fan letter that makes mention of Lord of the Rings and Game of Thrones, hardly overly feminine works. Is this addressing the ongoing "discussion" of the masculine and violent nature of grimdark fantasy and whether women can write it (they can)? Or is it a grim gender-flipped parody of the kind of comments female fantasy authors can expect to have thrown their way? I also couldn't help but notice some ironic parallels between this story and another novella by the same name written by Peter M Ball and published by the same publishing house. "Horn" gives this reader much to ponder.

CAUTION: Contains Small Parts — a creepy story and a sad one. The protagonist is sent a toy dog-on-wheels one day for no apparent reason. As he soon learns, it’s not an ordinary toy dog and what he experiences is not a random haunting. It turned out to be less horrifying in the end than I expected to be.

The Home for Broken Dolls — This is probably the most talked-about story (well, novella) in the collection, or at least the one I'd heard most about before reading. At the book's launch — back in June 2013 at Continuum 9 — McDermott read an excerpt which was definitely creepy and horrifying. But it was an excerpt that squicked me out a lot more back then than it did yesterday when I read it in context. I think probably because I was prepared — and it only got a little bit worse than that — and because my mental voice doesn't have the same creepy tone as Kirstyn's did at the launch. Anyway, the story is about a woman who fell into collecting and repairing sex dolls. The kind of dolls that resemble real women (or at least pornstar women) and are as anatomically correct as silicone can be. The passage I mentioned above, describes in loving detail the severe damage a particular doll had suffered when Jane, the main character, first encounters her. There are two main stories here. There's Jane's, who is a “Girl to Whom a Very Bad Thing Happened Once”, and there's the dolls who turn out to have lives of their own (minor spoiler). It's all very sordid, especially the parts about what's been done to the dolls — and the implicit questions of why and what kind of people might do such things — but the main thing that squicked me out upon reading was part of an interaction Jane had with another person, rather than with a doll (details are spoilery, I think). This isn't the kind of horror to make you sleep with the light on or check under the table for errant toys. More the kind that reminds you how unsavoury some people can be.

4.5 / 5 stars

First published: 2013, Twelfth Planet Press
Series: Twelve Planets, the ninth collection in the series (all are by different authors about different things)
Format read: eBook
Source: Subscription to the series
Challenges: Australian Women Writers Challenge, Aussie Horror Reading Challenge

Asymmetry by Thoraiya Dyer

Asymmetry by Thoraiya Dyer is the latest in Twelfth Planet Press's Twelve Planets series of collections. You can read my reviews of the other collections at this link.

Asymmetry does not contain linked stories like some of the other Twelve Planets — in fact they're all very diverse. They fall in different places on the science fiction to fantasy spectrum, but one thing they have in common is sheer innovativeness. These are the first stories I've read of Dyer's and I was very impressed. I'll definitely be keeping an eye out for more of her work in the future.

"After Hours" is a story about a vet, some army dogs and a werewolf. I think it was my favourite in the collection. It's told from two different first person perspectives which have very distinct personalities. Although the formatting kindly lets us know which narrator is speaking, I think it would have been clear even without the typographic distinction. A mark of the strong writing. Also, I appreciated how Dyer's veterinary experience clearly came out in this story.

"Zadie, Scythe of the West" is a gender-flip story set in a fantasy world. To put it simplistically, it's a world where women are warriors and men are housekeepers but the worldbuilding is more complex than that. There are very clear ideological reasons for why the women go to war and also for the rules constraining their abilities to do so. I suspect it's the sort of story others might compare with Ursula Le Guin or Joanna Russ but I don't feel well-versed enough in those authors' works to do so.

"Wish Me Luck" is a science fiction story set in another solar system in a time when interstellar travel exists (but is rare and expensive). The science element is fairly esoteric (in the quantum mechanical sense) and, were it a longer piece, one might call it space opera. In a way, it's a story about a man who just wants to get home. There's more to it, of course.

"Seven Days in Paris" is hard to explain properly without spoilers. It's the sort of story where almost every aspect becomes apparently only gradually. I'll say it's about a disposable clone created somewhat illegally and ostensibly for the greater good. It's told from the clone's perspective, interesting because the clone does not (at first) have any idea what's going on.

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Overall the stories deal with themes of identity and belonging in different ways, a trend I noticed only now as I was writing the mini-reviews above. I like how the more I think about them, the more I'm finding things to think about in them. There is nothing simple here. An excellent collection.

Asymmetry is a quick read, with all four stories of the short variety rather than longer novelettes or novellas. It's also a highly enjoyable read which I recommend to anyone interested in modern Australian speculative fiction. Reading and thinking about Dyer's stories made me want to be able to write like that. Dyer is definitely a writer I will be keeping an eye on.

5 / 5 stars

First published: March 2013, Twelfth Planet Press
Series: Twelve Planets (a series of collections)
Format read: ebook on my iThings
Source: Subscription to ebook editions of the Twelve Planets
Challenges: Australian Women Writers Challenge

Through Splintered Walls by Kaaron Warren

Through Splintered Walls by Kaaron Warren is the sixth of the Twelve Planets series of collections out from Twelfth Planet Press. You can read my reviews of the other collections at this link.

Through Splintered Walls contains three short stories followed by one novella. They're titled "Mountain", "Creek", "Road" and "Sky", which I think is a great set of names for within a collection. To me, the collection can easily be split into two parts, the short stories on the one hand, and the novella on the other.

The Short Stories

"Mountain" is about a ghost-haunted mountain and a woman who often drives over it on the way to the coast. The mountain and its ghosts hold many secrets, which they don't always share with passers by. But the main character has seen some of them and the reader learns a few more.

"Creek" is about quaking women who drowned in creeks. They claw their way through Australia's shallow creekbeds and call out, demanding to know what happened to their loved-ones. Olivia, our protagonist, first encountered them when she was young and has been haunted by them ever since. I loved the ending of this one, but I shan't elaborate because spoilers.

"Road" is a tale about an older couple who live at a black spot on the road (as in, a place where there are many accidents). They're quite used to injured people running up to their house and asking to use their phone (it's a mobile phone black spot too), and they always lay out a wreath for the accident victims. But is that all there is to it? You'll have to read the story to find out.

The Novella

"Sky", unlike the short stories, is a somewhat less literal title. The story is named after the weird small country town, somewhere north of Sydney, in which much of the action takes place. The protagonist, Zed, is not very likeable at all (he is, in fact, a rapist — you've been warned). From when we first meet him as a child, seen through his school-teacher's eyes, to the main action when he finds himself in Sky, I didn't relate to Zed at all, but kept reading because I wanted to know what happened next. (Whereas with the short stories, I cared about the characters.)

Sky is a horror town in a classically dystopic way; everyone is employed because to get a job or to advance, they have to challenge the person currently holding that job and fight to the death. But Zed keeps being drawn there, for various reasons. I suspect his being a terrible person heightens the feelings of disgust the reader has towards Sky, since even he finds the place disgusting. The story is told in seemingly random parts which eventually come together in a coherent string of cause and effect.

I didn't enjoy "Sky" as much as the short stories. Not because it was bad, but because it made me uncomfortable in a less enjoyable way. If anything, it reminded me most strongly of Warren's Slights, but less horribly disturbing. Whereas the short stories are almost the kind of creepy tales you might tell around a camp fire at night.

I enjoyed Through Splintered Walls very much, despite reading the three short stories in the middle of the night during a bout of insomnia (I'm not sure why this seemed like a good idea at the time, but I suppose it could have been worse). I recommend the collection to fans of horror and creepy stories. There are a few dismembered body parts floating around in "Sky" but nothing overly gory on the page. Er, except for the bit with the cat food factory grinder. The collection is definitely in my top three of the Twelve Planets (along with Love and Romanpunk by Tansy Rayner Roberts and Bad Power by Deborah Biancotti).

4.5 / 5 stars

First published: 2012, Twelfth Planet Press
Series: Twelve Planets number 6 (but there's no reason to read them in any particular order)
Format read: ebook
Source: Twelve Planets ebook subscription
Challenges: Australian Women Writers Challenge 2013, Aussie Horror Reading Challenge

      

Cracklescape by Margo Lanagan

Cracklescape by Margo Lanagan is one of the more recent releases in the Twelve Planets series from Twelfth Planet Press. I have previously reviewed several collections in the series.

This is only the second Margo Lanagan book I've read and the first containing short stories (the other was Tender Morsels). Although there were only four stories in Cracklescape, I really felt like I got a feeling for the sort of stories Lanagan writes. The general feeling actually reminded me a bit of Ekaterina Sedia's stories, but with an Australian flavour rather than a Russian one (and a bit less depressing).

A few words on the stories in Cracklescape:

The Duchess Dresser is about a dresser (presumably the one on the front cover) with a mysteriously stuck drawer and the man who acquires it and puts it in his bedroom. Suffice to say the drawer isn't stuck here because the key cannot be found.

The Isles of the Sun was a strange story and perhaps my favourite in the collection. It's a somewhat modern world fairytale with a bit of a twist: as well as being told from the main child's point of view, it's also partly told from his mother's point of view. I appreciated the look at the other side of the coin. It's easy to write about the kids that go on an incredible, magical adventure, but what about the parents? Nice to see it addressed in a short story.

Bajazzle was strange. Oddly enough, the references the title evoked for me ended up having more relevance to the story that I expected. Other than that, it's an open-to-interpretation piece and I don't think I can say more about it without saying too much. That and I suspect my reaction to it says as much about me as about the story itself. Heh.

Significant Dust was two stories really. The foreground events in the main character's life — themselves told in two time lines — and the story with the dust and the possible aliens. I think I will need to reread this one when I'm less busy and stressed. I have a feeling there's a bit more to the background story than I picked up on the first time through.

All in all, this is a strong collection which fans of Lanagan will enjoy. For those who haven't encountered her work before, I recommend it to fans of magical realism, fairy tales sneaking into the real world and magic in everyday places. I'm not the biggest fan of short stories, particularly not in large doses (a definite upside of the slim Twelve Planets series), but Cracklescape has made me mentally bump White Time, another Lanagan collection waiting on one of my shelves, up my TBR.

4 / 5 stars

Showtime by Narrelle M Harris

Showtime by Narrelle M Harris is another of Twelfth Planet Press’s Twelve Planets collections. The stories in it are thematically linked — supernatural creatures such as vampires, zombies and ghosts feature — but there isn’t a linking setting or common characters as in Nightsiders, Bad Power or Love and Romanpunk.

The general theme throughout the four stories is of subverting some of the tropes associated with the aforementioned supernatural creatures. There’s either a bit of a twist or something upfront that’s a bit unusual in each of them. They’re also all ultimately about families in different ways. I really enjoyed all of the stories and I would highly recommend this collection to anyone with even a passing interest in vampires, zombies or ghosts. The fact that two of the stories were also set in Australia only added to my enjoyment (of the other two, if you’re wondering, one’s set in a kitchen which could be almost anywhere and the other is set in Hungary).

Stalemate

Stalemate is the story set in a kitchen. It’s a story about family and about family fights and how the same fight can feel never-ending.

Thrall

Thrall is the story set in Hungary. It’s about an ancient vampire that hasn’t quite gotten with the modern times (and has discovered that YouTube videos have no problem capturing his likeness, unlike good old silver nitrate film). A story about how the old isn’t always compatible with the new.

The Truth About Brains

The truth about brains is that one day your little brother can accidentally get turned into a zombie. And then you don’t necessarily want him around when he’s getting increasingly smelly in the Australian summer. That doesn’t stop your mum from making you take him with you every time you go out, though…

Showtime

The titular story is about a (human) librarian and a vampire going to the Melbourne Show. If you’ve read Narrelle M Harris’s The Opposite of Life (I haven’t yet), then you might recognise the two main characters.

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Overall, it’s hard to pick a favourite story as there are different nice things to recommend about each of them. As I said, I very much enjoyed this collection and I highly recommend it.

4.5 / 5 stars

Thief of Lives by Lucy Sussex

Thief of Lives, by Lucy Sussex is part of Twelfth Planet Press’s Twelve Planets collection. I have previously reviewed other Twelve Planets, Nightsiders by Sue Isles and Bad Power by Deborah Biaccotti.

Thief of Lives is a collection of four short stories without common setting. I have to admit, this collection was closer to literary realism than I usually read. Thematically, women are central to all the stories in a variety of different ways. Karen Joy Fowler eloquently explains what Sussex writes about in the introduction:

Fantasy, history, crime. The relationship of women to men. The relationship of women to women. The relationship of the writer to her subject.

Alchemy

The first story in this collection is set in ancient Babylon. It’s about the best perfumier in the city, one of the first chemists in the world. She is watched, throughout her life by an immortal who has singled her out the smartest person in Babylon and is fascinated by her mind.

The Fountain of Justice

This story can be most accurately described as crime. It’s set around underworld shootings in an Australian city (I would guess Melbourne, but I don’t think it ever said), and told from the point of view of a legal aid.

The Subject of O

This story is about the main character’s understanding of her sexual experiences, when she starts to see them in a new light.

Thief of Lives

The titular story was my favourite of the bunch. The main character is PA to a successful urban fantasy novelist who has been sent to Bristol to conduct some research. While there she discovers a psychic vampire preying on the town; a creature who sucks the life out of its victims before committing their lives to paper. It’s a fascinating exploration of writers drawing inspiration from their surroundings that interweaves reality and fantasy.

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Twelfth Planet Press has been putting out some really excellent collections with their Twelve Planet series and I suspect I may end up buying and reading all twelve as they come out. (Four down, one to go and seven more yet to be published…)

4 / 5 stars

Bad Power by Deborah Biancotti

This book is part of Twelfth Planet Press’s “Twelve Planets” series. It is a collection of five short stories all set in a common world. I bought the ebook version and it’s also available in paperback and for Kindle.

Bad Power is set (mostly) in modern Sydney in a world where some people have an inexplicable power: talking to dead people, seeing the future, immortality, and a few less common powers. And, although most of the protagonists have super powers, none of them are heroes (well, with one possible exception).

A few words about each of the stories:

Shades of Grey

The first thing that struck me about Biancotti’s writing when I started reading this story was the cinematic quality of the mental images it conjured up. The opening story grabbed me from the first paragraph and thrust me into the collection.

In “Shades of Grey” we meet Esser Grey, a wealthy businessman who recently discovered his power and is testing the limits (and not really finding any). We also meet detective Palmer, a recurring character throughout the collection who keeps being given the weird cases. (I enjoyed the continuity of seeing Palmer in later stories and also the mentions of Grey later on.) This story really sets the scene for the rest of the collection.

Palming the Lady

In this story, a young medical student, Matthew Webb, goes to the police and is directed to detective Palmer. He is being stalked by a homeless woman who knows where he’s going to be and gets there before he does. But his future isn’t he only future she sees.

Web of Lies

We meet Matthew again, this time just after his father’s death when he and his mother and discovering how to live again, free from the old man’s dictatorship. They both struggle with it in different ways and both learn there is more power in their family than they had realised.

As a side note, Matthew is mentioned in passing the last two stories. After the tumultuous stories in which he played a central role, it was nice to read that he had a slightly more stable future ahead of him. A neat way of letting us know that it was all OK in the end.

Bad Power

This is the only story not set in modern Sydney and also the only one written in first person. It also stood out for me as being the one story with a less thoroughly described setting — I was slightly confused about the time period it was set in, but turns out my first instinct was correct.

It’s a story about someone with a self-described “bad” power and about the horrible things people do to each other. This was easily the most horrific story in the collection and, for that reason, my least favourite. However, the link the previous and subsequent stories made it a relevant and integral part of the collection. I think without this story, the whole collection would have felt slightly more bland. (And it does make a good title for the collection as a whole.)

Cross That Bridge

This was the story that, when I heard a brief description on Galactic Suburbia, made me want to read the whole collection. Max works for the police. His power is the ability to find lost children, even when there is no discernible trail. As one might imagine, people find his talent creepy and he is constantly under suspicion.

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It’s hard to choose a favourite story in this collection. Aside from “Bad Power”, they read almost like chapters from the same book (except with resolutions and different protagonists). The idea of normal people discovering superpowers isn’t a new one (cf Heroes), nor is the idea of an organisation such as the Grey Institute hinted at in the background throughout the collection (cf X-Men, Union Dues, etc). However, Biancotti pulls the world off uniquely and fascinatingly.

I really enjoyed the exploration of human nature and the wildly different coping mechanisms the powered characters employ. My favourite take home message? Power is not always empowerment.

4.5 / 5 stars

Nightsiders by Sue Isle

Cross posted from here.

Nightsiders by Sue Isle is a collection of four short stories set in the same world. It is part of Twelfth Planet Press’s Twelve Planets series, twelve collections which are showcasing the work of twelve Australian female authors. I believe it’s the only one so far to be entirely science fictional (that said, the only other I’ve read is Love and Romanpunk by Tansy Rayner Roberts — an excellent blend of Roman mythology, the past and the future — and I’m not sure what’s planned for the rest of the series).

Nightsiders is set in Western Australia, in and around Perth. I want to say it’s post-apocalyptic, but that’s not quite true. It seems part local apocalypse, part generalised catastrophic climate change. The Australian climate has changed so that the west coast is no longer particularly habitable, with hints at the start that things are better in the east. The former city of Perth is now generally referred to as Nightside, because the people living there have turned nocturnal, seeking shelter during the heat of the day and going about their business in the marginally cooler nights.

A few words on each of the stories:


The Painted Girl

13 year old girl has been with walking with an older woman (who isn’t her mother) as long as she remembers. One day, her life abruptly changes and she learns there’s more to it than she’d realised.

The Nation of the Night

Ash, 17 year old a trans boy, goes east for an operation. The story is mostly about the stark differences between the parched west and the drowning east. He quickly learns that life is far from perfect in Melbourne, even if they still have hospitals and infrastructure. In Nightside (aka Perth), everyone helps their neighbours, in Melbourne, the infrastructure is overcrowded and they’re trying to keep out as many surplus people as they can manage.

Paper Dragons

Some of the kids in Nightside put on a play based on some old TV scripts they found in an abandoned home. Turns out it’s a soap about the trivialities of teenage life as in our time. Nightside’s entire population of old folk (who remember life before the bombings and the evacuation) turn out to watch.

The Schoolteacher’s Tale

This was my favourite story. Mostly, I think, because it filled in some of the gaps left by the other stories with teenage protagonists who didn’t know life before Nightside. The titular schoolteacher is a 70 year old woman who had been mentioned as a key figure in the lives of the characters in the previous two stories. We are exposed to some of her reminiscences of how much the world has changed and, through the story, we learn a bit of where Nightside is headed in the future.

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It sort of feels strange that I can summarise each of the stories in a few sentences but barely even touch on what the stories are really about. Partly this is avoiding spoilers, and partly because there are some themes and ideas that run through all four stories which are hard to pin down to just one of them.

An idea that runs through all the stories (though features the most in the first one) is that of the Drainers. They are a group of people with a genetic mutation that gives them a tolerance for the harsh sun and helps them go a bit longer between sips of water. They come out during the day when everyone else is sleeping, and hide in caves and drains (hence the name, I suppose) at night. There are stories of them eating people or draining their blood and, because they move about when everyone else is sleeping, they’re regarded almost as reverse vampires, a notion which appealed to me.

All the children protagonists have adapted better to life in Nightside than the adults. They have good night vision (and poor day vision) and, of course, they are used to the only life they have ever known. One theme that ran heavily through the first three stories is that of abandonment. In the two middle stories, the children were abandoned by parents who went east during the evacuation. There’s a heavy implication that this happened to almost all of the children of Nightside, with some of the remaining adults acting as foster parents to many of them. It sort of felt a bit much. Of course, the children that weren’t abandoned when their parents went east wouldn’t have still been around. But really, children are pretty much top of the list of things parents take with them when leaving a war zone. Where are the parents that stayed behind with children? Where are the children whose parents were killed rather than left? I appreciate that the theme of abandonment fits in with the greater theme of Nightside being abandoned by its former inhabitants and the rest of the country, but it felt a little bit lopsided by the time I got to the end.

On a happier note, this was a collection full of strong and well drawn female characters. With the exception of Ash (trans) in the second story, all the protagonists were female. There was also a good balance of male and female secondary/background characters, which is always nice to see.

To a small degree, the setting put me in mind of Daughters of Moab by Kim Westwood, but the writing style was very different and thematically the setting and the idea of adaptation to a hostile environment were the only things the two have in common.

Overall, I found Nightsiders an interesting read.

Rating 4 / 5 stars