A review by oleksandr
Uncanny Magazine Issue 16: May/June 2017, by Ursula Vernon, Betsy Aoki, Chinelo Onwualu, Javier Grillo-Marxuach, John Chu, K.M. Szpara, Roshani Chokshi, Kelly McCullough, Theodora Goss, Carlos Hernandez, Michael Damian Thomas, Hiromi Goto, Naomi Kritzer, Lynne M. Thomas, Sonya Taaffe
4.0
Update: this text contains two reviews of Hugo and Nebula nominates works in this issue, not the whole issue.
Sun, Moon, Dust
This short story is short listed for Hugo Awards. For me, it is good, but not the best in the list. This is fantasy with a twist: a farmer inherits a magic sword to which the mightiest warriors of the past are bound. However, unlike the cliche start of a quest, the protagonist has no desire for sword&sorcery adventure
Small Changes Over Long Periods of Time
This novelette was nominated for Nebula in 2018
This is a vampire story with a twist: the victim is a transgender gay person, which, I guess is based on actual experience (the transgender part, not vampire bite part) of the author. While it could have been an interesting story, with vampires legalized and allowed to live among humans (this was already done in [b:Blindsight|48484|Blindsight (Firefall, #1)|Peter Watts|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1386924412s/48484.jpg|47428] as well as in scores of YA vampire romances), but it is unknown how turning into vampire affects transgenders. Add some sex scenes and that’s it. The story is not very interesting for me and I doubt it is because of the transgender stuff – in my mind I can replay the story with a cis person and it doesn’t either improves or worsens it for me.
Sun, Moon, Dust
This short story is short listed for Hugo Awards. For me, it is good, but not the best in the list. This is fantasy with a twist: a farmer inherits a magic sword to which the mightiest warriors of the past are bound. However, unlike the cliche start of a quest, the protagonist has no desire for sword&sorcery adventure
Small Changes Over Long Periods of Time
This novelette was nominated for Nebula in 2018
This is a vampire story with a twist: the victim is a transgender gay person, which, I guess is based on actual experience (the transgender part, not vampire bite part) of the author. While it could have been an interesting story, with vampires legalized and allowed to live among humans (this was already done in [b:Blindsight|48484|Blindsight (Firefall, #1)|Peter Watts|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1386924412s/48484.jpg|47428] as well as in scores of YA vampire romances), but it is unknown how turning into vampire affects transgenders. Add some sex scenes and that’s it. The story is not very interesting for me and I doubt it is because of the transgender stuff – in my mind I can replay the story with a cis person and it doesn’t either improves or worsens it for me.