Love, Loss and Life in Between, by Suzanne Rogerson (author), Sandie Keane (narrator)

Suzanne Rogerson, January 2023

This is a collection of short stories about love, loss, grief, and moving on, in a variety of forms.

"Spirit Song" is about an elderly woman playing her lute for dying residents in the...hospice?..old age home?...where she lives herself. (My uncertainty is due to having listened to the audio, not read the print edition, where I could more easily have checked little details.) She knows when a person is dying, and insists on "playing them out" even when the nurses are worried she's overexerting herself. And she wonders, what is really on the other side? It's a really sweet story.

Short Tails: Chet & Bernie Short Stories, by Spencer Quinn

Forge Books, ISBN 9781250886910, June 2022

Everyone's favorite canine narrator, Chet, is back with more stories of his adventures with private investigator Bernie Little.

This time we have three short stories, and an excerpt from the most recent novel, Bark to the Future, which was still forthcoming at the time this was published.

"Upper Story" features Chet during the time he was living with Rick Torres, while Bernie is hospitalized after being seriously injured. We get a lovely look at how well-known and generally liked both Chet and Bernie are--even among some of the perps. We also learn that Bernie's condition was more serious than Chet was able to understand at the time. It's sweet and heartwarming.

Tales from the Folly: A Rivers of London Short Story Collection (Rivers of London #1.5, 1.6, 2.5, 3.5, 4.6, 5.1). by Ben Aaronovitch

JABberwocky Literary Agency, July 2020

This is a collection of short stories, including some "moments," short pieces that Aaronovitch doesn't want to call stories, set in the Rivers of London world.Not all of these stories feature the major characters in the novels. Several feature side characters, and characters whose stories were intended to be one-offs, but perhaps won't be.

Well, in at least two cases, clearly won't be.Tobias Winter and Vanessa Sommer, two young German police officers, met in The October Man, In Tales From the Folly, Tobias has a Moment in which he first learned disturbing news about the UK's magical establishment. Vanessa has a short story in which, with her new knowledge, she returns home at Christmas time, intending to check out some of the peculiar features of her childhood community.

Dreams of Distant Shores, by Patricia A. McKillip (author), Tim Campbell (narrator), Amy Landon (narrator)

Tantor Media, ISBN 9781705205945, June 2020

This is a collection of short fiction by Patricia A. McKillip. I've always loved her novels, but I have to confess I wasn't aware she had any short fiction. In this book are five short stories, two novellas, a non-fiction essay by McKillip, and an afterword by Peter S. Beagle.

It is, of course, wonderful. It's McKillip.

A witch, already old, accepts the invitation to be the Moon Goddess's body for a century. A century later, in our modern day, she wakes up out of a more-than-life-size statue of a mermaid, returning to the world as a strong, powerful, beautiful woman. A group of young men are suspected of stealing the mermaid from the bridge (they really tried), one of them is in trouble with his girlfriend because they had promised to have it for friend's wedding. The witch herself is puzzled by parts of the modern world and delighted by others, and there's the problem of the fishermen who regard cormorants as intolerable competitors and are trying to wipe them out. No, I'm not doing justice to the story.

Bread Alone (Adventures in the Liaden Universe® Number 34), by Sharon Lee, Steve Miller

Pinbeam Books, November 2021

This is a collection of four stories set in Lee and Miller's Liaden Universe--space opera, values that make my heart sing, an appropriate appreciation of the excellence of tea and of cats, together with helpings of romance.

These aren't Korval stories, but rather stories centered around The Bakery. In "Degrees of Separation," Don Eyr is a young, unvalued member of one small and poorly run clan. His love of baking born in his delm's kitchen, where the servants, at least, have time for him. His cousin the nadelm persuades the delm to send him off to be educated--and young Don Eyr decides to attend a prestigious culinary school. When he returns to Liad, he's a different young man, with a partner, Serana, formerly a member of the City Guard where the school is located. On Liad, they find not all is well, and decide to fix their little piece of it. 

Bad Actors: (Adventures in the Liaden Universe® Number 33) by Sharon Lee (author), Steve Miller (author)

Pinbeam Books, July 2021

This is a collection of three shorter Liaden Universe adventures--and not featuring the usual type of Liaden Universe heroes. These are people who don't necessarily place the same value on honor

The first is "Excerpts From Two Lives," about a man and woman who are lovers, and part of a political entity that is hostile to Terrans, Liadens, and other political entities that might be more interested in trade and cooperation than in conquest and expansion. The man is a rising military officer; the woman is a scientist developing the means to rapidly terraform planets, enabling rapid expansion and growth for their civilization. The two are willing to cheaat, backstab, and undermine anyone who gets in their way, as they climb the political ladder by coordinating their military and scientific plans.

When something goes badly wrong with the first live test of the terraforming biotechnology, though, disaster strikes and they have a very big decision to make.

Uptown Local and Other Interventions, by Diane Duane

Badfort Press, February 2014 (original publication February 2011)

This is an absolutely delightful collection of Diane Duane's short stories. 

They cover a wide range of her work, and there's bound to be several here you haven't read before. Leprechauns coping with the challenges, and facing new dangers, of modern Ireland, in the 1990s "Celtic tiger" period. A man who seeks a clockmaker's help in getting back the truly valuable thing he lost when he was ten, in a house fire and burglary. (It's not what he thinks.) A queen is confronted by the twin challenges of a dragon angry that her prized treasure has been stolen, and the heroes that are, for sure, real soon now, going to go deal with the dragon. Some modern criminals/terrorists hire a Swiss computer hacker who has been around a little longer than they think, to help them steal Nazi gold from the major Swiss banks.

Ambient Conditions (Adventures in the Liaden Universe #31), by Sharon Lee & Steve Miller

Pinbeam Books, November 2020

This book includes two shorter Liaden stories, and a foreword by the authors, that explains the circumstances of the writing of the second story.

The first story is the previously published "A Visit to the Galaxy Ballroom." Korval's removal from Liad to Surebleak has, among its other consequences, let to a split in the Scouts. Scout Pilot Lina yo'Bingim has been somewhat aware of this, but, based on Liad, it hasn't seemed to affect her directly. An unexpected assignment, taking Administrator Chola as'Barta to Surebleak, lands her directly in the conflict. Loyalty, Scout ethics, and betrayal all play a role here, and yo'Bingim has some hard decisions to make.

Falling in Love With Hominids, by Nalo Hopkinson (author), Bahni Turpin (narrator)

Tantor Media, ISBN 9781515942634, September 2019 

This is a wonderful collection of short stories, and Nalo Hopkinson, as the writer, and Bahni Turpin, as the narrator, kept me listening to stories that were just straight up horror that I would ordinarily just skip right over. Along with the horror, there's dark fantasy, lighter, happier fantasy, and even a couple of stories that can fairly be called science fiction. There's a reworking of the story of Caliban, and a new Bordertown story. It's an impressive range.

Inside Jobs: Tales From a Time of Quarantine, by Ben H. Winters (author), Scott Aiello (narrator), Kevin T. Collins (narrator), Ellen Archer (narrator)

Audible Originals, April 2020

This is a collection of three short stories, set in the current pandemic shutdown.

A small but very professional criminal gang plans their next job via Zoom meetings. It seems it doesn't matter what your profession is; working from home has its own problems, of kids and spouse competing for space, of getting everyone on screen and audio at the same time, and those embarrassing moments when your coworkers see things you'd forgotten would be visible.
Two brothers who haven't spoken in years return to their childhood home, which their father never left and where he has now died. The two brothers each have their own plans for the house, and the plans are not compatible. Unfortunately, there's a hid with a GoPro.

The Egg, and Other Stories, by Andy Weir (author), R. C. Bray (narrator), Jonathan Davis (narrator), Christy Romano (narrator)

Audible Studios, June 2017

This is a varied collection of short stories from Andy Weir. They range from hard sf to much softer and fuzzier fantastic fiction. Not all of the narrators are reliable; one narrator isn't who we think they are. Some of these stories work much better for me than others, but overall this is an enjoyable and satisfying collection.

It's an enjoyable way to spend an hour or so of your time.

I bought this audiobook.

18 Wheels of Science Fiction: A Long Haul into the Fantastic, by Eric Miller (editor), Graydon Schlichter (narrator), Jennifer Knighton (narrator)

Big Time Books, January 2020

This is a very enjoyable collection of science fiction and trucking. Some trucks still traveling the roads of Earth, some "trucking" in space, and even some time-traveling trucking.

They all involve artificial intelligence in some form.

One uploaded, former flesh-and-blood, trucker is on a war of revenge against the AI takeover of his former profession. Another progresses from live trucker signing on as a driver for testing, and partnering with, AI-assisted trucking, through an increasingly mechanized body, in ways that may seem very disturbing to many readers. Yet he remains convinced the company has treated him very well, and kept the promises they made him.

Science Fiction Anthology V.1, by Ray Jay Perreault (author), Christopher M. Allport (narrator)

Audible Audio, July 2016

This is a collection of four short stories by Perreault. Two, "Progeny," and "Circle is Closed," got reworked a bit to become part of the fix-up novel, Progeny's Children. They're good short stories, and "Circle is Closed" has an extra kick at the end from being on its own as originally written. "The Greatest Host" is a fun little story for those of us who love dogs.

Jagannath, by Karin Tidbeck (author), Kirsten Potter (narrator)

HighBridge, ISBN 9781684410712, February 2018

Karin Tidbeck is a Swedish fiction writer who writes in both Swedish and English, and does her own translations in both directions. In her afterword, she talks about both the challenges and the benefits--the concepts that can't really be translated, the ones that can't quite be translated, but don't add anything but an extra stumble for the reader who doesn't speak that language, the insights you can get by coming at a language from the outside.

She also talks about the experience of reading all of H. P. Lovecraft's work, more or less nonstop.

Starlings, by Jo Walton (author), C.S.E. Cooney (narrator), Rudy Sanda (narrator)

Tantor Audio, January 2018

This is a collection of fantasy, science fiction, and poetry. There's a play. It's Jo Walton's first short fiction collection, and it's a delight.

There's a generation starship story, with a generation in the middle of the voyage forming new ideas about what the plan should be when their descendants reach their destination. Will they really all want to be farmers and builders and the scientists needed for colonization on the world? What about the unique arts that have developed in space? Can they avoid forcing their own decisions on those descendants?

An angel welcomes newcomers to Heaven, and explains why the angels meeting the newcomers are all of alien species--and the complexities of being an angel assigned to oversee an area on a planet that wasn't originally, your own.

Ayiti, by Roxane Gay (author, narrator)

Audible Studios, July 2018 (original publication October 2011)

This is a collection of short stories about Haitian women, in Haiti and in the US. It's read by the author, who has a wonderful voice--in both senses.

The background and experience behind these stories is unfamiliar to me and therefore sometimes confusing. Yet the more I listened, the more grounded I felt and more open to enjoying the next story. These are stories of life in a country and setting very different from my own, and stories of an immigrant experience both like and unlike my grandparents' immigrant experience in the first part of the 20th century. They're stories very well-told, and they drew me in.

Coffee & Cigarettes: Pulp-Noir-Short Stories, by Eric Leckey (author), Bill Nevitt (narrator)

Eric Leckey, May 2019

This is, as the subtitle suggests, a collection of short stories recalling the tone, style, and subject matter of film noir and the pulp hardboiled detective and crime fiction that it grew out of it.

These stories are competent and serviceable in their way, set in the same era and capturing the tone and attitude perhaps a little too well. The times, social setting, and social mores of the noir era are what one would expect of the stories and characters, but there's no apparent awareness that the readers, a century later, might not. That might be a deliberate choice. I think it's a weakness; there could have been greater depth to the stories if the distance between readers and characters were in some way acknowledged.

A Liaden Universe Constellation, Vol. 1, by Sharon Lee & Steve Miller

Baen Books, December 2013

This is a larger collection of Liaden Universe shorter fiction. Some of the stories here I've read and reviewed in the earlier chapbooks, but some were new to me. Daav is, as a result of his very courtesy to the young daughter of a clan allied with Korval, is backed into a corner where he can't avoid a duel with that clan's heir. He can't avoid it; he can't kill the other clan's heir. He finds his solution in a very clever choice of weapons.

We also get the story, which I've wondered about, of how Ren Zel came to be expelled from his clan.

Certain Symmetry (Adventures in the Liaden Universe #4), by Sharon Lee & Steve Miller

Smashwords, May 2011 (original publication 2000)

There are two more Liaden universe stories here. One advances the tale of Moonhawk and Lute, with a visit to an old friend of Lute's--whose husband has died, and who has shut up their inn out of her grief. She's determined to do nothing that would risk forgetting her husband, Rowan, by moving on in life.

Can Lute and Moonhawk help, in a way that she can accept?

The other story is of Pat Rin yos'Phelium, a few days after A Day at the Races, receiving a very welcome gift--and another package, the Balance book of a a friend who has killed himself. Several of the outstanding Balances are easy to resolve, but the last is different, and very tricky for Pat Rin to find a resolution for.

Duty Bound (Adventures in the Liaden Universe #3), by Sharon Lee & Steve Miller

Smashwords, May 2011 (original publication March 2001)

Again, two stories.

Pilot of Korval has the young Er Thom yos'Galan and Daav yos'Phelium, raised together, separated for the first time, as they each train as pilots and for their adult careers, Daav as a Scout, and Er Thom as a future ship's captain and Master Trader. For Er Thom, it leads to a test of both his commitment to his crewmates, and his judgment in pursuit of that. It's also a tricky test of his self-control, discipline, and relationship with his birth mother.