Uncanny Magazine Issue One Read online

  UNCANNY MAGAZINE

  Uncanny Magazine Issue One

  “Uncanny Magazine Editorial Staff” by Uncanny Magazine

  About Our Cover Artist: Galen Dara by Galen Dara

  “The Uncanny Valley” by Lynne M. Thomas and Michael Damian Thomas

  “If You Were a Tiger, I’d Have to Wear White” by Maria Dahvana Headley

  “Presence” by Ken Liu

  “Late Nights at the Cape and Cane” by Max Gladstone

  “Celia and the Conservation of Entropy” by Amelia Beamer

  “Migration” by Kat Howard

  “The Boy Who Grew Up” by Christopher Barzak

  “Her Fingers Like Whips, Her Eyes Like Razors” by Jay Lake

  “Mars (and Moon and Mercury and Jupiter and Venus) Attacks!” by Sarah Kuhn

  “Worldcon Roundtable Featuring Emma England, Michael Lee, Helen Montgomery, Steven H Silver, and Pablo Vazquez” by Uncanny Staff

  “Does Sex Make Science Fiction “Soft?”” by Tansy Rayner Roberts

  “The Short List: The Ten Best Science Fiction & Fantasy Shorts on the Web” by Christopher J Garcia

  “Kissing song” by Neil Gaiman

  “The New Ways” by Amal El-Mohtar

  “The Whalemaid, Singing” by Sonya Taaffe

  “Interview: Maria Davhana Headley” by Deborah Stanish

  “Interview: Beth Meacham on Jay Lake” by Lynne M. Thomas

  “Interview: Christopher Barzak” by Deborah Stanish

  “Thank You, Kickstarter Backers!” by Uncanny Staff

  Edited by Lynne M. Thomas, Michael Damian Thomas, and Michi Trota

  Ebook generated by Clockpunk Studios.

  Copyright © 2014 by Uncanny Magazine.

  www.uncannymagazine.com

  Uncanny Magazine Editorial Staff

  Publishers/Editors–in–Chief: Lynne M. Thomas & Michael Damian Thomas

  Managing Editor: Michi Trota

  Podcast Producers: Erika Ensign and Steven Schapansky

  Interviewer: Deborah Stanish

  Podcast Reader: Amal El–Mohtar

  Submissions Editors: Alex Kane, Andrea Berns, Arkady Martine, Ashley Gallagher, Cislyn Smith, Elizabeth Neering, Heather Clitheroe, Jen R. Albert, Jesse Lex, Jessica Wolf, K.E. Bergdoll, Kay Taylor Rea, Lesley Smith, Liam Meilleur, Mishell Baker, Piper Hale, Shannon Page, Vida Cruz

  Logo & Wordmark design: Katy Shuttleworth

  About Our Cover Artist: Galen Dara

  Galen Dara likes monsters, mystics, and dead things. She has created art for 47North publishing, Fireside Magazine, Lightpseed, Lackington’s, Resurrection House, and Ragnorok Publishing. She was nominated for the 2014 Hugo Award and 2014 World Fantasy Award. When Galen is not working on a project you can find her on the edge of the Sonoran Desert, climbing mountains and hanging out with a loving assortment of human and animal companions. Her website is www.galendara.com and you can follow her on Twitter @galendara

  The Uncanny Valley

  by Lynne M. Thomas and Michael Damian Thomas

  January 28, 2014 was the worst day of our lives: A parade of awful news culminating in our 11-year-old daughter Caitlin nearly dying during her spinal fusion surgery. Possibly due to some unusual quirk of her Aicardi syndrome, blood left her body faster than the doctors could replace it. In the end, she received 1 ½ times her own blood in transfusions and was resuscitated on the operating table.

  We had been made aware that this was a distinct possibility and were glad we’d had the ability to clear our schedules of all editorial projects during Caitlin’s surgery and recovery. As much as we loved working on a magazine and anthologies, our focus was squarely on Caitlin, and rightly so.

  Thanks to excellent doctors, nurses, therapists, and our amazing network of friends, Caitlin made it. She recovered from the surgery, sits much better now, and has a better quality of life. We are truly blessed to have so many wonderful people in our lives – many of whom have helped us on this next part of our professional journey.

  By the late spring of this year, we were ready to return to editing. We wanted to create a project that’s the culmination of everything we’ve done and learned — filled with passion, joy, family, friends, and beauty. After months of discussion and planning, we developed the magazine that you’re reading RIGHT NOW.

  We chose the name Uncanny because we wanted a publication that has the feel of a contemporary magazine with a history– one that evolved from a fantastic pulp. Uncanny will bring the excitement and possibilities of the past, and the sensibilities and experimentation that the best of the present offers. We even created a fake history of the magazine for Tor.com. It’s our goal that Uncanny’s pages will be filled with gorgeous prose, exciting ideas, provocative essays, and contributors from every possible background.

  When we chose to Kickstart Uncanny, we knew there would be massive risks and challenges. At every step, we were overwhelmed by the generosity of SF/F readers and professionals from around the world. Friends and colleagues pledged their work and backer rewards, helped us create the Kickstarter video, and spread the word throughout the SF/F community.

  An all-star team have now joined us to create each issue of Uncanny : Michi Trota- Managing Editor, Erika Ensign- Podcast Producer, Steven Schapansky- Podcast Producer, Deborah Stanish- Interviewer, Amal El-Mohtar- Podcast Reader, and Caitlin Rosemarie Thomas- Ombudsman. Jeremy Tolbert of Clockpunk Studios designed our phenomenal website.

  Katy Shuttleworth created our logo mascot and wordmark.

  When discussing our mascot, Katy asked what we wanted, we said… space unicorn? Sure, why not! And the Space Unicorn that Katy delivered became the rallying point for the Kickstarter, epitomizing everything we wanted for the magazine.

  We began to refer to our backers as the Space Unicorn Rangers Corps. And we grew.

  Not only did Uncanny fund, we reached every single stretch goal. We are still flabbergasted and deeply grateful.

  The best way to thank all of you for making this dream possible is this, our, first issue, which you now hold in your hands.

  Our first issue of Uncanny features six original stories. Ken Liu explores a near future story where a son in America cares for his dying mom in China in “Presence.” Amelia Beamer’s story features a girl who invents time travel to meet her grandfather in “Celia and the Conservation of Entropy.” Maria Dahvana Headley recounts the perhaps fictional last days of Jungleland in “If You Were a Tiger, I’d Have to Wear White.” Max Gladstone shares a story set in a supervillain bar revolving around a loser who crosses the line in “Late Nights at the Cape and Cane.” Christopher Barzak writes a tale of a teen boy meeting the real Peter Pan in “The Boy Who Grew Up.” Finally, Kat Howard weaves a mythic tale of immortality and a phoenix in “Migration.” Our reprint this month is “Her Fingers Like Whips, Her Eyes Like Razors” by the much missed Jay Lake.

  Uncanny’s first issue also features poetry by Neil Gaiman, Sonya Taaffe, and Amal El-Mohtar, interviews with Christopher Barzak, Maria Dahvana Headley, and a special interview with Tor editor Beth Meacham about Jay Lake’s life and career.

  In nonfiction this month, Sarah Kuhn discusses being a female comic book fan and building communities, Tansy Rayner Roberts explores the blending of romance and science fiction, Christopher J Garcia gives his picks for the ten best SF short films available on the Internet, and a roundtable of convention runners including Emma England, Michael Lee, Helen Montgomery, Steven H Silver, and Pablo Vazquez discuss Worldcon as a concept and how it should change or remain the same.

  Our November podcast features Maria Dahvana Headley’s “If You Were a Tiger, I’d Have to Wear White” and Amal El-Mohtar’s poem “The New Ways” (both read by Ama
l), and an interview with Maria conducted by Deborah Stanish. Our December podcast features Amelia Beamer reading her story “Celia and the Conservation of Entropy,” Sonya Taaffe’s poem “The Whalemaid, Singing” (as read by Amal El-Mohtar), and an interview with Amelia conducted by Deborah Stanish.

  And so it begins. Adventure! Excitement! Derring-do! SPACE UNICORNS!

  Welcome. We’re glad you’ve joined us.

  © 2014 Uncanny Magazine

  Lynne and Michael are the Publishers/Editors-in-Chief for Uncanny: A Magazine of Science Fiction & Fantasy.

  Three-time Hugo Award winner Lynne M. Thomas was the Editor-in-Chief of Apex Magazine (2011-2013). She co-edited the Hugo Award-winning Chicks Dig Time Lords, as well as Whedonistas and Chicks Dig Comics.

  Along with being a two-time Hugo Award nominee as the former Managing Editor of Apex Magazine (2012-2013) Michael Damian Thomas co-edited the Hugo-nominated Queers Dig Time Lords (Mad Norwegian Press, 2013) with Sigrid Ellis and Glitter & Mayhem (Apex Publications, 2013), with John Klima and Lynne M. Thomas.

  Together, they solve mysteries.

  If You Were a Tiger, I’d Have to Wear White

  by Maria Dahvana Headley

  The lion sat in a lounge chair, his cocktail coupe full of something redder than bourbon and darker than blood. He lapped at it unhappily, his eyes settling on nothing in particular. He was flanked by two aging blondes in tarnished spangles, their diamante balding, but still impressive, even in the unforgiving light of the California afternoon.

  Leo, the star of the opening sequence of every Metro–Goldwyn–Mayer Film since the 1920s, and I, a 28–year–old journalist on assignment for a men’s magazine, looked out at the half–full pool. A few of the pythons and boa constrictors drifted on their backs, their skins shedding into the chlorine. I’d gotten used to it. I’d been here six weeks and the Forever Roar refused to give me the time of day.

  He’d initially attempted to decline my interview altogether, but his contract required it. This didn’t mean he was planning to speak to me. I gathered he was miserable and disgusted. He’d come up in the glory days, the inheritor of the three–legged stool and the ring of fire, and now his paradise was tainted.

  Jungleland, by the time I drove through its rusting gates in ’68, was bankrupt and officially plotted to hit the block.

  Dr. Dolittle, cast with Jungleland’s residents, had been released the year before. It was the final humiliation, a generation of serious actors performing in a skin show, their dialogue spoken by human ventriloquists. The animals went on strike, of course, but there was no union.

  The compound’s pachyderms—who’d once elegantly congaed in a small ring before retiring to practice their Martha Graham–choreographed scarf dances—stood by the side of the road, shamefacedly trumpeting for traffic, but the cars stopped coming.

  The owners of Jungleland padlocked the gates.

  I typically covered hippies and communes in Northern California, but the magazine had sent me here to see if I could find ten thousand words of zoo scandal, crimes, or perversions, it didn’t matter to them. Species mixing, ligers and tigons, or maybe just a wading pool full of the sacrificial blood of giraffes. The magazine was looking for an article one part cult massacre, one part Barnum, but above all, they were looking to profile the Forever Roar, who’d remained mum for the past twenty years. It was their last chance. An ecology group had threatened to buy Leo at auction, take him to Africa and release him into the veldt.

  The lion, in his trademark velvet jacket, wasn’t veldt material. The world had gone seriously downhill if it thought sending an actor known for his portrayal of King Lear to a rural grassland was a good deed, but things were bad here and no one wanted to say just how bad. Lately, one of the panthers had escaped and prowled Thousand Oaks screaming for justice and trying to organize the housecats, but everyone had ignored him.

  Jungleland was no longer what it had been.

  Home in its heyday to two thousand animal actors and their human colleagues, the place had housed everyone from day players on Robin Hood to the rhesus monkeys who’d been sent off to cure polio. The lions of Jungleland had always been famous. They were all called Leo in public, though MGM had been through five lions before this one: Slats, Jackie, Coffee, Tanner, and George. Now there was Leo. No one knew his real name. I’d thought I might coax it from someone, but the residents of Jungleland were not as voluble as I’d imagined they’d be.

  The place was a Sunset Boulevard of drunken rages, drownings in the pools, and a herd of gazelles who refused to change out of their pajamas. The day I arrived, I glimpsed a fretful chimpanzee who’d played opposite both Tarzan and Jungle Jim and now spent all her time dressing up in old feathers. She swung naked into a plaster tree and was gone before I could ask for an interview.

  The leopards were using heroin and even the ostriches, traditionally abstemious, were drunk. A cancerous camel strutted the perimeter, spitting tobacco juice. The residents were lonely in their various sections of the park, all of them stretched on old recliners in their terrycloth robes, drinking forlornly from bottles and bent tin dishes.

  All the animals at Jungleland were actors. The few humans who still lived here were elephant fetishists from disbanded animal shows, seasonal workers who’d missed the impalas of their previous lives, costumers, cosmeticians, and the tiger trainer, who’d been fired, but who now lived amongst the big cats and had no interest in coming out. After her expulsion, she’d hidden herself with the felines. The erstwhile owner had warned me about her before I arrived.

  “Don’t mess with Stark,” he muttered. “She’s a living hell.”

  I was more interested in the Forever Roar than in the tiger lady, but I’d get the story any way I could.

  One of the blondes leaned in to look closely at Leo, examining a piece of mane that seemed out of place, though it was still groomed into its signature pompadour. It was well–known to everyone here that the lion relied on small falls and mane–pieces, as well that he felt no shame about it. The blonde lit the lion a Kent. Leo took it, inhaling with a sense of worldly weight. He was not always so calm. He was famed for his mercurial temperament, his tendency to fly into a rage from a standing start, but no one around him seemed to blame him for his volatility, though he’d actually bitten a reporter in ‘66.

  “He’s a lion, after all,” breathed one of the blondes, in what passed for a conversational whisper, dragging on her own cigarette. Her accent was New Jersey through and through, and it reminded me I hadn’t called my mother. “That’s not as bad as a tiger, but lions, Mike–”

  “Mitchell,” I corrected her. “Mitchell Travene. I’ve published stories in The New York Times, Harper’s Magazine and Playboy.”

  She laughed.

  “Big name then, I get ya, but I never heard of ya. Mitchy, you gotta know the big cats can’t be asked to behave domestically. Nobody falls for a big guy and gets away safe. He offer you a beer? You can have one from the Frigidaire, you want.”

  The lion turned and stared briefly at the blonde, who blushed and took the beer back. Lila was in possession of a slick red claw scar that stretched from just below her left earlobe to the inside of her right wrist. A rhinestone cuff covered it, but above the edge of the metal, the line was ragged. Her counterpart and twin, Lola, sported a similar mark from the corner of her mouth.

  Lola eyed me from behind her cat’s eye glasses.

  “We’ve had people write stories about us before,” Lola said, suspiciously. “And none of ‘em got it right, did they Leo, honey?”

  The lion took a thoughtful drag, but did not respond. It was that kind of day. It had been that kind of day for weeks now. Nobody was talking, and everyone was in a bad mood.

  In the room beside the pool, a movie projector was showing an MGM film and I cocked my ear to hear the familiar roar, perhaps the only sound I’d ever get out of him: Leo tossing his head against a screen of stars. That roar, of course, was an amputation. The live version (I�
��d been told) began with a moan, which grew into the credit–sequence section and ended in a series of short guttural shouts. The cut had long been a bone of contention between the lions and the studio.

  Even so, Leo had posed and roared for a generation’s worth of movie premieres and award events. To the great cats, that kind of work was the equivalent of pornography. He’d worked closely with every major starlet, almost always in the fur, but in truth, Leo preferred to stay dressed. His paws were tender, and so he wore slippers. His maroon silk dressing gown was open to the waist. He coughed delicately and one of the blondes ministered to him with a handkerchief, looking apologetically in my direction.

  The Forever Roar had a cold and was in foul humor. The tip of his tail flicked irritably and a little man in white came running, bearing a kit for tail shining. Polishing cloth, coconut oil, a comb made of bone. Leo waved him away.

  The lion wanted solitude, walks, and the occasional party; a bar corner with a chair built to accommodate his girth; an entourage of his makeup artist; someone to carry his wigs and hats; and a few of his girls to tend him, but that world was gone. When he performed for the microphones and the cameras, the lion had the charisma of a roadside revivalist. Twenty years back, he could’ve led a cult.

  Today, the lion was feeling his age. He’d been famous too long. He hadn’t been to Manhattan in years and Hollywood, formerly his stomping ground, was less friendly to lions than it had been. Animal shows were waning and the only place the lion truly felt himself these days was Vegas, where he strolled between the tables, pinching and purring, performing occasionally. Even Vegas was less than heaven for lions, and the new acts had his kind performing like trained bears. Leo had no desire to dance. He was the Forever Roar, not a meow sideshow.

  Though the lion was never alone, he was single and had been for as long as anyone could remember. My editors speculated that he had a secret situation on the side. His status was one of the things I’d been sent to discern.