Aeon #13

Issue #13 of Aeon is the third issue of this now pro-zine that I’ve reviewed. Call it this reviewer’s perception, editorial preference, luck of the submissions for this quarter, or triskaidekaphobia, but I didn’t find this issue nearly as strong as the last two. Still, three of the stories in here are noteworthy and offer superior entertainment.

Jeffe Kennedy’s “Pearl” is a far-future SF piece taking place in the prison colony of Obidion. Pearl is a descendant of long-dead convicts who are encoded for one another, she with Tomas. But when a handsome uncoded man named Schnell finds his way into their world, Pearl falls in love with him and wishes to be unencoded so she may return to the free world with him. But not before the Guards return after a long disappearance to wreak havoc on their world, and the Guard General wants Pearl as his concubine. Kennedy brings this complex world to life with dialogue and narrative that doesn’t lean on infodump or excessive exposition; the world unfolds before the reader’s eyes as the drama ensues. The plot is a little typical, especially with the Guard General’s “bad guy” appearance, but this is a fast-moving story containing characters with authentic passion.

Humor makes an appearance in “One Avatar, Hold the Anchovies” by S. Hutson Blount. Middle-aged pizza delivery guy Brian Murphy narrates this light tale in the setting of North Dallas. Delivering a pie to an aged man in a one-bedroom crackerbox in Lake Highlands, Brian’s customer turns out to be Ra, the Egyptian sun god, who wants to make him a priest. A short piece, the narrative is brisk and the dialogue snappy. Not overly funny, but I enjoyed it.

Four towns are submerged beneath a reservoir in Daniel Marcus’s “The Dam.” A man who keeps track of the water level narrates this horror tale and dreams of the people who “live” beneath the water, while telling of the odd people who live around the reservoir. While I call this one a horror story, I’m not sure if that’s exactly correct. While many of the descriptions are horrific, the narrative lacks the gripping suspense typical of horror and is somewhat SF in that readers are asked to figure out what makes this world tick. Interspersed with the first person narrative are brief chemistry instructions. It’s not until the end that these make sense, and throughout the story, I wondered why they were there and where “The Dam” was heading. Up until the dénouement, I was unconvinced of the story’s merit and purpose, but the ending saves a piece that until then, only made me shrug.

Bruce McAllister has a different take on a “deal with the Devil” in “Hit.” Anthony is a hit man in Los Angeles when an angel convinces him to take an assignment to travel to Rome and kill the oldest vampire at the Vatican. He’s given a crossbow and three arrows made from the wood of the cross at the crucifixion. The world’s oldest vampire is none other than the son of Lucifer, and though he wants to convert to the side of good, that would disturb the balance of the universe. Or so Anthony is told. Can’t give away the twist at the end, but it’s a clever one that takes the story away from one of cosmic proportions and to one of romance and the human heart. A wry tale with much charm that plays with morality loosely in a refreshing way.

At the outset in David Dumitru’s “Little Moon, Too, Goes Round,” sixteen-year-old KC Moss finds a skull in the ground that she shows to her grandmother. She names it Yorkwick, a misnomer from Hamlet—the fellow Hamlet knew well. KC pines after Eddie Johnson, who had the lead in the school play, and upon going to the local doctor’s home, she finds Eddie mutating into a prime, a post-reproductive post-hominid. This is a bizarre little tale, but at the end, I was left wondering what had happened to these people and why there were two moons in the sky. KC is an appealing character and saves this story from what could have left me scratching my head even more. I know exposition is out of fashion, but in an SF piece such as this one, I could have used a bit more. Still, it has a quirky appeal.

Marissa K. Lingen’s “Swimming Back From Hell by Moonlight” is a revisionist fantasy of the myth of Orpheus traveling to the underworld to bring back Eurydice, where he can’t look back as he leads her to the upperworld. Here, a young woman who has recently lost her husband enters a cave on the Oregon coast and meets the same mythological figures. Unlike Orpheus, who softens the hearts of Hades and Persephone with his music, the woman is a graphic artist, but uses her talent to accomplish the same. The story here, though nothing original, is satisfactory, but the author’s handling leaves much to be desired. Perhaps it’s the first-person narrative of the woman telling her tale, but I found the treatment humdrum. There is suitable pathos in the beginning with the loss of the woman’s husband, but when the fantastical elements are employed, they seemed too pat, as though the author were merely going through the motions. All the elements are there, but Lingen failed to make me believe it. And the ending seemed forced as well, a convenience tacked on so the story would have an emotional conclusion. Mildly entertaining but disappointing.

The iconic personification of emotions peoples Craig D. B. Patton’s “Misery Loves.” After her roof caves in from a storm, Misery, a recluse, must leave her musty, dilapidated home to find someone to repair it. First she goes to Honesty, as Humor, Joy, and the twins, Pain and Suffering, will be of no help. Honesty suggests she ask Love, a charming, beautiful man who lives in an exalted mansion, for assistance. Love is everything one might expect of a gracious gentleman and caters to Misery’s desire to be miserable in his customary, ingratiating manner. “Misery Loves” is a character-driven tale, mostly dialogue, and quite refreshing. Patton makes his fantasy world glimmer with amazingly little narrative description, with a subtle yet reasonable ending where our miserable heroine learns a bit about herself while staying true to her nature. A well-told, unaffected tale that I found delightful.

My three favorites, the best of this issue, were “Pearl” by Jeffe Kennedy, “Hit” by Bruce McAllister, and “Misery Loves” by Craig D. B. Patton. “Pearl” for its adroit combination of worldbuilding and character, “Hit” for its cleverness and breezy narrative from this well-established pro, and “Misery Loves” for its effortless charm.