Indigenous Fiction Issue 3 Edited by Sherry Decker I. F. Publishing, P. O. Box 2078, Redmond, WA 98073-2078, USA; $6 per issue or $11 for two issues Digest, 76 pp, colour cover ISSN 1521-2351
In issue 3 of Indigenous Fiction Sherry Decker makes it clear where she's aiming the magazine. Her editorial is a chunk of advice on starting to write a novel. Mainstream fiction predominates here, though there's genre work too, and poetry. The poetry is less consistent than the fiction, however my favourites being 'The Night-Hag's Embrace' by Douglas M. Stokes, in which a traditional demon is given a new twist, and 'Glass Holes' by Steve Dimeo, who uses subtle parallels to evoke the sorrow of disease-wrought changes in a loved one. A. Del Vento's 'Watching You' is a story about an obsessive observer who witnesses the comings and goings of a doctor he suspects of murder, and persuades his sister-in-law to consult him in order to find out more. Unfortunately she falls under the doctor's spell and our hero fears for her life. Despite the jarring second-person narration, this kept me guessing to the end. After an unpromising beginning, 'The Good Trip' by Mark Rich becomes a moving tale of transcendence. A curious malady is afflicting people, allowing them to read minds; the consensus view is that it's the result of an alien invasion. Then the main character finds he's caught the bug. | |
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