On Spec #69

On Spec is a Canadian magazine publishing speculative fiction of all stripes (SF, fantasy, magical realism, horror, and anything in-between). Because it receives public grants—a concept we here south of the border should consider—from the Canadian government, 80% of the fiction published within its covers must be by Canadian authors. Although I have little doubt this limits the content On Spec produces, I can’t say I found the quality of the stories in issue #69 to have suffered for it.

“The Laws of Motion” by Catherine MacLeod is an odd horror tale reminiscent of the Night of the Living Dead movie. Except the trigger creating the shambling monsters is industrial pollution, and the “dead” are super intelligent mutant raccoons bent on bloody murder. While well written, the central idea is way overdone, making “The Laws of Motion” unmemorable.

“Manna” by Leslie Brown is another unfocused horror piece. Here, primitive desert nomads are cursed when they eat the dead flesh of the leviathan and are transformed—all but Rahal. She escapes, but readers are left wondering whether she’s carrying an even worse curse in her womb. Unfortunately, the tale ends without revealing the significance of this evil miracle or the outcome for Rahal.

“The Boatman” by Joanne Merriam is one of the gems of this issue. We visit Charon, boatman of the dead, in Purgatory, ferrying his charges to the gates of hell as he mourns the loss of his lady love. Vivian was one of his charges until he swept her off her feet, but now she has chosen to cross to the other side of the River Styx, leaving him. And he misses her more than he can say as he collects the coins fallen from the eyes of the dead.

“Hollywood Roadkill” by Cat Sparks is another gem, a dark vision of the near future where the homeless live off the garbage of the rest of society as they connive to lie their way back into the city. But there are plots within plots among the desperately poor, and life is the cheapest commodity available. A nicely dark tale with a real twist at the end.

“Perfect Violet” by Will McIntosh is an overlong tale built around the premise of a heartless trade, that of peddling happy memories. Once extracted, Kiko’s memories of the joyous moments in an otherwise miserable life are gone forever. But she is forced to lose them, again and again, in order to pay the rent, until she can remember nothing worth living for. McIntosh then takes us on a long excursion as Kiko courts Joseph, an old boyfriend, who has returned even though Kiko sold her happy memories of him and their time together long ago.

In “The Baby Blues” by Julia Campbell-Such, readers watch in horror as a new mother of nine babies slips from exhaustion through postpartum depression and straight into full-blown, delusional madness. Her nine bambinos morph from babies into sadistic monsters who plan her downfall, and we are helpless observers, knowing nothing good will come of this for any of them.

“Quiet Empire” by Michael Vance is a rambling tale about the end of the world in Victorian England. Our protagonists, gentlemen all, debate the disaster over port and a good cigar as society splinters apart around them. They each march off with a stiff upper lip, quite deranged and unable to wrap their minds around the world’s end. The difficulty with this piece is that readers are asked and expected to care about these men, but there is little about them to like.

“Living Under the Conditions” by James Moran is the final story and the best offering in this issue. In it, the world has been transformed by quantum magic, and a wormhole in near orbit creates random changes in basic laws of physics like time and gravity. Michael tries to maintain normalcy, but his life is anything but normal, and his attempts fail until he realizes that change must be embraced in order to be survived. It’s a wonderful tale and a strong finale for this issue.

Overall, I found On Spec #69 well worth my attention. I commend it to you.