Analog Science Fiction and Fact, January/February 2010

Reviewed date: 2010 Jul 13
192 pages
cover art

I actually didn't like most of this issue--a fact I didn't realize until I was looking back at it after having finished it.

  • Novella: Neptune's Treasure, by Richard A. Lovett - Floyd and Brittney--his suit AI--find a crashed alien spaceship on Triton.
  • Novella: Thus Spake the Aliens, by H. G. Stratmann - Katerina and Martin run the gauntlet of alien artifacts on terraformed Mars, unsure what sort of test they must pass to prove humanity's worth before the aliens will save Earth from imminent destruction.
  • Novella: The Possession of Paavo Deshin, by Kristine Kathryn Rusch - Seven-year-old Paavo has seen the Ghosts all his life; now the Ghosts show up in the flesh and claim to be his real parents, who had been Disappeared for six and a half years.
  • Novelette: Simple Gifts, by Maya Kaathryn Bohnhoff - Professor Llewellyn tries to prevent a mining company from exploiting a planet's native intelligent species, but the native villagers turn the tables and exploit the company.
  • Short story: Shame, by Mike Resnick & Lezli Robyn - Townsfolk lynch a local alien who they think turned one of their own over to the evil Skeletons.
  • Short story: On Rickety Thistlewaite, by Michael F. Flynn - Stupid, unintelligible story about an emperor who tries to escape his tiresome duty.
  • Short story: Rejiggering the Thingamajig, by Eric James Stone - Bokeerk, a Tyrannosaurus Sapiens, is the only one who can fix the transmat system that has ceased working and stranded the whole galaxy of travelers.
  • Short story: A War of Stars, by David L. Clements - A meatspace copy of a human fighter pilot is about to deliver the deathblow to their bitter rivals, when he discovers that it may be humanity that is the aggressor in this war.
  • Science Fact: Twins: Never Identical, by Victor Raggio, MD - Monozygotic twins are not genetically identical because 1) mutations, 2) X-pair inactivation, and 3) different mitochondrial DNA.
  • Science Fact: Take Off Your Hat: You're In the Presence of Culture, by Stephen R. Balzac - What is culture and how does it work?
  • Special Feature: Making Unreality Ring True: Writer's Tricks For Bringing Stories To Life, by Richard A. Lovett - Lovett shares a few tricks about how to write convincingly.
  • Special Feature: Across my Life, by Ben Bova - Ben Bova recounts his experience with Analog: from reader, to writer, to editor, then back to writer again and then reader.


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