Over in the newly-round Twitter timeline, there’s a thing called #FridayReads where you post (you guessed it) things you’ve read. On Fridays. (I don’t think you have to read the things on Fridays, though.)
So! Here are four fictive things and one essay I’ve read and enjoyed lately, arbitrarily ordered, and one thing I’m about to read:
THING ONE!
Naomi Kritzer’s “Paradox” in the May/June issue of Uncanny starts out looking like just another Time Travel Trope Takedown, but it’s so, so much more.
THING TWO!
“Baroness,” by E. Catherine Tobler, in the May edition of Clarkesworld. This haunting story of post-human explorers takes a subtle but convincing look at what exactly we mean by human anyway.
THING THREE!
Matt Dovey’s “To the Editors of The Matriarch, re. Allegations of Press-Ganging” in Daily Science Fiction is a clever, cutting satire of rape culture set in a steampunk-flavoured Napoleonic-War-era England.
THING FOUR!
K.M. Szpara’s “Small Changes Over Long Periods of Time” (also in Uncanny‘s May/June issue) follows the misadventures of a newly-turned gay transgender vampire. It’s all-around excellent, and you should read it!
ESSAY!
John Wiswell’s “Evil isn’t a Disability,” in Fireside looks at the intersection between mental illness, ableism, and evil in the movies and in critiques of Donald Trump.
What next?!
I’m about to read Spaceman of Bohemia by Jaroslav Kalfar, which sounds like a lot of fun if by fun you mean disturbing surrealist weirdness. I haven’t had much luck with the few newly-published novels I’ve read this year (excepting Kameron Hurley’s amazing The Stars are Legion, which I loved) so I hope this one aligns with my tastes a bit better.