Lightspeed Magazine, Issue 111 (August 2019)

LIGHTSPEED is an online science fiction and fantasy magazine. In its pages, you will find science fiction: from near-future, sociological soft SF, to far-future, star-spanning hard SF--and fantasy: from epic fantasy, sword-and-sorcery, and contemporary urban tales, to magical realism, science-fantasy, and folktales.

If you've ever worked a terrible service job, you'll want to take a trip to Robot Country--the weird and sometimes hilarious world of Dominica Phetteplace's new SF short "One Thousand Beetles in a Jumpsuit." Kendra Fortmeyer brings us our second original science fiction short, "No Matter," which wrestles with time travel paradoxes. We also have terrific reprints from Sam J. Miller ("Calved") and Carlos Hernandez ("The Macrobe Conservation Project"). In our first fantasy short, "The Final Blow," Scott Sigler takes us onto the battlefield...and into the mind of one scared young witness. Cassandra Khaw spins a lovely fable about two dangerous lovers in "A Leash of Foxes, Their Stories Like Barter." Our fantasy reprints include "The Rock Eaters," by Brenda Peynado, and "Card Sharp," by Rajan Khanna. Besides fiction, we also have our usual assortment of author spotlights, along with our book and media review columns. Plus, we have a feature interview with Silvia Moreno-Garcia.