Clarkesworld Magazine, Issue 224

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Issue can be read on-line: https://clarkesworldmagazine.com/issue_224/

Rating: 4/5.

A better than average issue, with an interesting novella-length story by Wole Talabi, and other interesting stories by Rati Mehrotra and Alex T. Singer.

• “Brainstem Disco, 2191” by Angela Liu: on music and dancing that apparently takes place in the head of a person.
• “The Library of the Apocalypse” by Rati Mehrotra: survivors of a war rummage through a ruined city, waiting for the time when a strange library gives them access to imaginary other worlds. Only some survivors return from the visit. And when only one is left, he has to find another purpose to staying in the city.
• “We, the Fleet” by Alex T. Singer: a fascinating story of a machine intelligence ‘mother’ that is terraforming and mining a solar system to make more versions of itself. But it gets interrupted when an unknown ship, bearing an organic being, crashes. The rest of the story tells of the being’s recovery, and the two of them coming to an understanding of what it means to be a mother that wants the best for their children.
• “Descent” by Wole Talabi: a fascinating tale set in a world where people live on mountains, high above the air that gets thicker and thicker at lower latitudes. Nothing is known about what is below, not even if there is a solid surface. But one man wants to know, and he gets a chance to find out, even if it may end up killing him.
• “Oh Time Thy Pyramids” by Ann LeBlanc: a strange story of a ‘sculpture’ who has spent ages motionless; until one day it decides to move. That would lead to a journey through time and space, and perhaps the multiple lifetime of universes.
• “Proxima One” by Caryanna Reuven, translated by Sue Burke: various automated space probes, each known as Proxima One, explore space looking for signs of life. Many never see them; but others, by reprogramming themselves, see it in many different ways.
• “Yarn Theory” by Marie Vibbert: a mathematician who knits listens to an alien message and starts knitting out the message. What she learns may, or may not, be able to decode the message.

Magazine read from 2025/05/04 to 2025/05/11.