Del Sol SFF Review

Griffin Jackson sat in a metal chair, at a metal table, in a metal room. That was the limit of his knowledge on the subject of location. A metal door opened and a short man in a dark suit entered. “Good morning, Mr. Jackson. I’m Smith, with the UN agency for Cygnoid affairs. How are you today?” “I’m apparently incarcerated today, Mr. Smith. How are you?” “Funny. They told me you were funny.” “Who told you?” “The Cygnoids. We’re in one of their ships, in orbit.” “Really? Is there a window?” “This is a serious situation, Mr. Jackson, there are diplomatic issues.”  “Call me Griff, everyone calls me Griff. Now, how about getting me out of here.” “That is not going to happen right now, Griff. I’m here to take your statement.” “Regarding?” “Regarding the events that led to your detention.” “You’re going to have to help me out, Mr. Smith. I don’t know why I’m here.” “I’ll start then,” said Smith. “You are the manager of the Pennock Farmers Market?” “Yes, for the past eight years.” “Tell me ab

I tell myself that I've tried to be patient, and, in my defense, I've waited a full ten minutes before grabbing the remote. That's ten minutes of hearing howling, growling, and things getting knocked over in the alley while I'm just trying to unwind with some Stranger Things. The problem is that if I jack up the volume too much in the talking scenes, then as soon as the action scenes start, the neighbor on my left is going to start pounding on our shared wall. Never mind that there's two werewolves screwing in the alley behind our building, somehow my TV is the problem in his eyes. Or ears, I guess.        We all have to live with the werewolves when it's just a couple. If it was a pack of five or more then we could call the patrol, but with the cost of silver bullets and the volume of paperwork, they won't come out for just a pair of werewolves, even if the pair has been screwing loudly in a residential area. And the cops won't come because of jurisdict

INVITE JOY TO ENTER YOU . There's a town in your mind and you can see it clearly. It has a general store seemingly cobbled from lumberyard scraps that sells old clocks and porcelain dolls alongside cooking essentials. A candle shop fills its surrounding street with sweet scents of every nature and preference. A cafe nearby has had the same reliable menu since the day it opened, although the owner is constantly being replaced with a new one. There are homes there, many of them increasingly empty, all slowly cradling into one another, and a few new condos spattered about as realty companies remotely envision glitzy ghost towns of the near tomorrow. Taken as a whole, the town feels displaced from another era, perfectly suited for the lost to find themselves. The people there are happy.      My brain is an oil spill of wooziness. A room with poor lighting fights to enter my awareness. I must force myself to shackle together some sort of linear timeline if I want this feeling to stop. I

      by Arthur Plotnik       I DOUBT if physicists envision black holes the size of pearls, much less black holes contained in small silver boxes. I'd certainly have dismissed such ideas as nonsense, or maybe some conceptual artist's fantasy. But then I hadn't yet found myself entering the Witches' Market of La Paz, Bolivia, after wandering through South America in a state of dread.      In  El Mercado de Las Brujas , science, reason, and reality gave way to magical beliefs. Crowding the sidewalks of this old quarter, the vendors—most of them leathery Indian women—hawked supernatural powers to be gained through potions, dolls, rocks, herbs, silver bracelets, woven crosses, and dried animal parts.      I'd been traveling through South America not for pleasure, but because I'd needed to get at least a continent away from my husband Patrick and what I'd learned about him some weeks earlier: A secret club. School children. Filmings. Not only that, but to suppor

"There'll be a slight delay. Technical difficulties."  I turn to look at the mauve-haired technician. Normally, I suppose, she'd use the intercom but after all the customer criticism posted on social media about the impersonality exhibited by the TimeRafters franchise, she's making the gesture of sticking her head into the room to speak with us in person. Judging from her manner, it's not something she's had much practice with, but I appreciate the intention anyway. Technical difficulties.  My mouth twists into a grimace as I ponder the two words that you least want to hear at certain times. When you're undergoing robo-surgery, for example. When you're on a booster-jet headed for the moon. Or when, as in my case, you're waiting to make the time-jump into the current of an alternate history. The technician glances back over her shoulder, then turns to us again. "It'll take about fifteen minutes," she says. "You can cancel, if