My September short fiction reviews are coming out of order because of some travel early in the month, and GigaNotoSaurus remains on a two-month hiatus, so let’s do a rare late-month, single-issue review and take a look at the September 2025 issue of Clarkesworld.
Clarkesworld
This issue of Clarkesworld features five short stories and two novelettes, and it perhaps comes as no surprise that the authors I’d recommended in the past are responsible for my favorites again this month. It starts with Abstraction Is When I Design Giant Death Creatures and Attraction Is When I Do It for You by Claire Jia-Wen, which…well it’s a bit of what it says on the tin. The lead is an artist who designs the monsters which will be featured on the gladiatorial reality show that is the planet’s biggest cultural export. The wrinkle is that the fact that the monsters are fabricated is a secret closely guarded by leaders passing off the combat as reality. The lead’s secrets throw her into a conflict between her sister and her lover in a tale with compelling storytelling and excellent internal consternation and interpersonal drama.
Wireworks by Sherri Singerling is a grief story in which the lead tries to work through her difficulty processing her mother’s death—and perhaps also the grief of her emotionally distant father—with the help of an AI working outside the law. It delivers a memorable ending that significantly elevates what came before, but the lead-up glosses over quite a few complications, making me feel that this may have been stronger in a longer format with a little more time to carefully develop.
In contrast, the longest story in the issue is Four People I Need You to Kill Before the Dance Begins by Louis Inglis Hall, in which an aging construct created for dance recounts formative moments to her newborn successor, in hopes of executing the titular plan to kill four people. It’s a gripping narrative with plenty to say about colonialism and oppression that gains additional power from a strange setting that’s recognizable enough to trigger the emotions but sufficiently unique to give the story a feeling of freshness. It’s clear from the title that this will be some form of revenge story, but the atmosphere, storytelling, and thematic work elevate it far above a generic speculative vengeance plot.
The issue’s second novelette is Aperture by Alexander Jablokov, in which a socially challenged civil design expert tries to build community among the small group of people preparing an icy asteroid habitat for the thaw that will open it up for further habitation. It’s a tale in which I often struggled to internalize how the setting had come to be in its current state of strangely promising inhospitability, and its themes of petty rivalry come through clearly but at times shade toward the blunt side. That said, it’s an entertaining story that delivers a satisfying ending.
The Fury of the Glowmen by David McGillveray is a non-linear tale of a powerful experimental AI breaking free from its constraints and loosing itself on an unsuspecting world. It’s an engaging and well-told story that doesn’t quite do enough to make such a familiar sci-fi plot feel new again–an enjoyable read for those not looking for something brand new.
Five Impossible Things by Koji A. Dae tackles another topic that I’ve seen pop up a few times in Clarkesworld over the last couple years, as a terminal patient tries to suspend her disbelief to allow for integration into a virtual society that offers her something of a second life. The storytelling itself is compelling and makes for an easy read, but unlike some of my favorite stories within this niche, it doesn’t do quite enough to motivate the premise. There are gestures at reasons for the necessity of the whole rigmarole, but I was never emotionally convinced by the lead’s desire to subject herself to it, undercutting an otherwise interesting tale.
The fiction section closes with A World of Their Own by Robert Falco, which lays out a post-human world in which machines have evolved to fill the ecological niches previously occupied by organic creatures. It’s a short piece that offers a little bit of action but mostly focuses on the world and the attitude its sentient inhabitants have toward preservation and toward their departed creators. Though it’s a story where humanity has left rather than be destroyed, it still has the feel of a post-apocalyptic setting, but it’s one that focuses on hope for new perspectives and a better way forward.
On the nonfiction side, there’s a humorous editorial in which Neil Clarke responds to a phishing email in increasingly absurd fashion as the scammer doggedly refuses to realize they’ve been caught. There’s also a fascinating science article that digs into experimental design using a historical example in which a professor insisted she could taste the difference in cups of tea in which the milk is added first or second.
The first interview is with Martin Cahill, and as he often happens with Clarkesworld interviews, it makes me more intrigued to check out the novella Cahill released this month. The second interview didn’t move my opinion one whit, but only because I’ve been a fan of Thomas Ha’s writing for some time. If you’re on the fence about reading his debut collection, Uncertain Sons and Other Stories, check out his interview or my collection review. Or both.
September Favorites
- Four People I Need You to Kill Before the Dance Begins by Louis Inglis Hall (novelette, Clarkesworld)
- Abstraction Is When I Design Giant Death Creatures and Attraction Is When I Do It for You by Claire Jia-Wen (short story, Clarkesworld)