Yep, Curtis Ellet's Swords and Sorcery Magazine is on a roll. For several months in a row the quality of the stories he's published has been solid. This month, two more authors unknown to me, to more good stories.The first, "Odin's Mirror" by Andrew Knighton, is a good piece of alternate history with vikings and, well, read it and find out. Not much action but lots of stuff that's just very cool. As with a lot of alternate history, there's a single twist that doesn't bear a lot of scrutiny, but once you accept it the rest flows in its wake perfectly.
Even better is Rick Silva's "Soup". Donna, a mercenary comes upon a town being robbed by a band of out-of-work mercenaries. Almost at once, she's challenging the bandit's leader, Hoth, for leadership and quickly loses. Before he and his men leave town, Hoth lets her know he expects her to be better prepared for another encounter in a week. Instead of just fleeing, knowing he'll chase her down, Donna sticks around to work a little "magic" and ready herself for the gang's return. It's a fun twist on "stone soup" and Seven Samurai.
I'm really happy to see Swords and Sorcery Magazine maintain its new level of quality. It'll be interesting to see how the magazine evolves.
My pleasure
ReplyDeleteThanks for the positive review - really glad you enjoyed Odin's Mirror. You're right, almost any alternate history jumps off from something a little implausible, for me it's where you go from there that's interesting.
ReplyDeleteAndrew Knighton
You're quite welcome and of course, re: alternate history you're right. It's what the author does with that "twist" that can make it fun and exciting.
ReplyDeleteAlso, one of the things I liked about your story, is that while it could be part of a larger story it doesn't need to, standing quite admirably by itself. Reading so many short stories in the last year, especially by a lot of newer authors, that is more often not the case.