Jupiter # 37: XXXVII Kale.
‘Jupiter’ continues on its way with another stupendous collection of stories. A really enjoyable edition displaying plenty of variety, great quality and intriguing subject matter. Definitely one to read for all Science Fiction fans out there.
Six stories on offer this time. We start with Krishan Coupland’s ‘Apples’. In a post-apocalypse world, two children make separate journeys, each with a very odd companion. The boy travels with an emotionless and harsh master, a man of skin and bone and rotten flesh. The girl’s care provider is a strange mannequin woman. A very hard situation to fathom but it is evident that the boy and girl are destined for each other. This isn’t exactly an Adam and Eve story as you might think, it’s stranger and certainly darker than you can imagine and leaves you wondering what sort of world they left behind and what type of future awaits them.
‘Midnight Midnight’ by Aliya Whitely was very well written. Mystifying and atmospheric, it told the story of aliens running a corner shop on Earth. It doesn’t explain what aliens are doing on our planet or why they are selling a controlled substance called Chaka to which lots of people seem to be addicted. Characterisation very believable with sinister undertones! A great story!
Douglas Thompson’s ‘Centauri’ took us to a planet orbiting one of our nearest stellar companions. On ostensibly a barren rock, astronaut Hillary Fording was about to give up the search for extra-terrestrial biology when a group of creatures emerged from the sand. She was even more amazed when they began to construct buildings from out of nothing. Was this reality or imagination or even a combination of the two? A carefully constructed story, just like the alien city, it took us away from our planet to a believable scenario four light-years away.
‘Avert’ by Chris Bailey was set in the not too distant future, when humans were beginning to venture beyond the solar system. However, something seemed to be preventing them from going beyond the heliopause, the boundary between the sun’s influence and interstellar space. Not only were strange duplicates of astronauts produced, Voyager spacecraft seemed to be coming back from whence they came.
It became even stranger when even the stars themselves began to move in the heavens, producing an unequivocal signal to humans. A well thought out story, full of interesting speculation. You never know, this could happen!
‘The Blog Of Revelations’ by Jack Ford in many respects reminded me of HG Wells and ‘The Man Who Could Work Miracles’. A superb story, witty and gloriously funny with black undertones, it sent the message that you should be careful what you write because you never know who will be reading your text. A rambunctious man called Chris had been writing a series of blogs on all matters political, economical, sociological and theological. In fact, on everything under the sun! Unknown to the unfortunate chap, little aliens had been listening in and had built their perfect world based on his dogma. While this was okay in many respects, when aliens decided to implement the same philosophy on Earth, the results were not exactly beneficial. Definitely a story to read!
Coming from the other side of the planet from myself, the well-known author Simon Petrie is also a part of the ‘Andromeda Spaceways’ community. He has a story in this issue called ‘Sky Pie’. Now, if you were walking about in Australia and there was snow on the ground and children were skating on the lake, you’d think something funny was going on and you would be right. The problem was, some bright spark decided that the runaway greenhouse effect was going a bit too far but after doing something about it, he got a frosty reception. As you would expect from Simon, an excellent story well worth reading but, unfortunately, one which could possibly turn out to be true in the future.
There we have it, another notable addition to the Jovian satellites with this magazine. I read ‘Jupiter’ on Kindle. Actually, the Kindle version is very easy to read and manipulate and with Jupiter coming in this format, I think it’s a good avenue to explore. You don’t need the Kindle device because the software is free to download from Amazon on your PC or laptop. You can indeed experience and enjoy all the benefits of Kindle format books and magazines without having the device. It’s also cheaper to read the magazine this way and you are also helping the environment to cut down on paper.
Rod MacDonald
August 2012
(pub: Ian Redman, 19 Bedford Road, Yeovil, Somerset BA21 5UG, UK. 52 A5 magazine. ISSN: 1740-2069. Price: £ 2.75 plus postage (UK). £4.99 PDF £10.00 for 4 issues (requires 1.5mb in mailbox). Also available as download for PDF and Kindle)
check out website: www.jupitersf.co.uk
