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    Apex Magazine: Issue 46
    Apex Magazine: Issue 46
    Apex Magazine: Issue 46
    Ebook135 pages1 hour

    Apex Magazine: Issue 46

    By Lynne M. Thomas

    ()

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    About this ebook

    Apex Magazine is a monthly science fiction, fantasy, and horror magazine featuring original, mind-bending short fiction from many of the top pros of the field. New issues are released on the first Tuesday of every month.

    We are a 2012 Hugo Award nominee for Best Semiprozine!

    Issue 46 features the following content:

    Table of Contents
    Fiction
    "Death Comes Sideways to the Mall" by William Alexander
    "Mermaid's Hook" by Liz Argall
    "If You Were a Dinosaur, My Love" by Rachel Swirsky
    "The Fairy Library" by Tim Pratt

    Nonfiction
    "Editorial: Blood on Vellum" by Lynne M. Thomas
    "I Married a Fake Geek Girl; A Defense of Casual Fandom" by Kelly McCullough
    "Interview with Tim Pratt" by Maggie Slater

    Cover art by Ken Wong

    Edited by multi-Hugo Award-winning editor Lynne M. Thomas.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherApex Book Company
    Release dateMar 5, 2013
    ISBN9781301320967
    Apex Magazine: Issue 46

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      Book preview

      Apex Magazine - Lynne M. Thomas

      APEX MAGAZINE

      ISSUE 46, March 2013

      EDITED BY LYNNE M. THOMAS

      Smashwords Edition

      Copyrights and Acknowledgments

      Blood on Vellum: Notes from the Editor–in–Chief Copyright © 2013 by Lynne M. Thomas

      Death Comes Sideways to the Mall Copyright © 2013 by William Alexander

      Mermaid’s Hook Copyright © 2013 by Liz Argall

      If You Were a Dinosaur, My Love Copyright © 2013 by Rachel Swirsky

      The Fairy Library Copyright © 2012 by Tim Pratt (Originally published in Antiquities and Tangibles, 2012)

      Interview with Tim Pratt Copyright © 2013 by Maggie Slater

      I Married A Fake Geek Girl; A Defense of Casual Fandom Copyright © 2013 by Kelly McCullough

      Publisher — Jason Sizemore

      Editor–in–Chief — Lynne M. Thomas

      Senior Editor — Gill Ainsworth

      Managing Editor — Michael Damian Thomas

      Slush Editors — Sigrid Ellis, Deanna Knippling, Kelly Lagor, Eileen Maksym, Michael Matheson, Maggie Slater, Fran Wilde, Jei D. Marcade

      Graphic Designer — Justin Stewart

      ISSN: 2157–1406

      Apex Publications

      PO Box 24323

      Lexington, KY 40524

      Please visit our website at http://www.apex–magazine.com.

      Each new issue of Apex Magazine is released the first Tuesday of the month. Single issues are available for $2.99. Subscriptions are available for twelve months and cost $19.95.

      About Our Cover Artist

      Ken Wong is a freelance artist and designer, hailing from Adelaide, Australia. His work spans from dark, surreal portraits of sad girls to quirky children’s book illustrations. He’s best known as the art director of video game Alice: Madness Returns and as the creator of Hackycat, for iPhone and iPad.

      Mistaken Identity

      Table of Contents

      Editorial

      Blood on Vellum: Notes from the Editor–in–Chief

      Lynne M. Thomas

      Fiction

      Death Comes Sideways to the Mall

      William Alexander

      Mermaid’s Hook

      Liz Argall

      If You Were a Dinosaur, My Love

      Rachel Swirsky

      The Fairy Library

      Tim Pratt

      Nonfiction

      Interview with Tim Pratt

      Maggie Slater

      I Married A Fake Geek Girl; A Defense of Casual Fandom

      Kelly McCullough

      Dark Faith: Invocations

      Edited by Maurice Broaddus and Jerry Gordon

      Featuring

      Jeffrey Ford, Max Allan Collins, Mike Resnick, Jay Lake, Nisi Shawl, Laird Barron, Tom Piccirilli, Jennifer Pelland, and more!

      Religion, science, magic, love, family — everyone believes in something, and that faith pulls us through the darkness and the light. The second coming of Dark Faith cries from the depths with 26 stories of sacrifice and redemption.

      "…rises to the expectations set by Maurice Broaddus and Jerry Gordon’s first (Dark Faith) anthology, if not surpassing them."

      — Dark Wolf Fantasy Reviews

      ISBN: 978–1–937009–07–6

      Available at ApexBookCompany.com or most major book vendors

      Blood on Vellum: Notes from the Editor–in–Chief

      Welcome to issue 46 of Apex Magazine!

      We have some stellar fiction for you this month. This issue features Death Comes Sideways to the Mall, a piece by Will Alexander about a really bad shopping day. Liz Argall’s Mermaid’s Hook is a tale of longing at the seaside. Rachel Swirsky’s If You Were a Dinosaur, My Love takes confessional storytelling Paleolithic.

      Our reprint this month comes from Tim Pratt’s collection Antiquities and Tangibles. The Fairy Library is a tale of what is either the worst or best library job ever, depending upon your perspective and employment prospects.

      In nonfiction, Maggie Slater interviewed Tim about his story, as well as Antiquities and Tangibles. Kelly McCullough discusses his marriage to a fake geek girl, and the importance of being welcoming towards casual SF/F fans.

      Our spectacular cover this month is by Ken Wong.

      I hope that you enjoy this issue of Apex Magazine. Thank you especially to our subscribers, for your ongoing support!

      The nomination period for the Hugo Awards ends on March 10: http://www.lonestarcon3.org/hugo–awards/index.shtml. Apex Magazine is eligible in the Best Semiprozine category. Here is a list of 2012 stories from Apex that are available in the short story category: http://www.apex–magazine.com/hugo–and–nebula–eligible–work–from–apex–magazine/.

      Lynne M. Thomas

      Editor–in–Chief

      Death Comes Sideways to the Mall

      William Alexander

      If you drink a tea brewed from the plastic shavings of his credit cards, then his fortunes will fall and yours will rise — but beware the price. Zoe leaned forward and lowered her voice. There is always a price. In this case, the carcinogenic effects of scalded plastic will exact that price.

      Sure, sure, the client said. I’m already paying a lot for this, though. She looked older than she was — a consequence of terrible bangs and a high forehead. How do I get his credit cards without him noticing?

      That is up to you. Zoe glanced around to make sure they were not overheard. The semi–public nature of this conversation bothered them both, though Zoe was better at hiding it. If she could afford an actual storefront, they would be conducting business in relative privacy. Instead, they sat on stools beside Zoe’s kiosk, surrounded by the endless currents of mall traffic. A foldable wall of rice paper offered some visual shelter, but it wasn’t much, and she needed to keep her shelf of tchotchkes visible and enticing.

      Zoe sold runes of good fortune, beauty, and potency, all carved into bright and shiny things. She sold necklaces guaranteed to improve standardized test scores, and others that would grant sure footing to a daughter’s soccer team, and more for preventing airline delays. She preferred to peddle positive and upbeat sorts of charms — but hers was a business of moving sideways, and this inevitably circled around to a certain amount of vengeance, backstabbing, and stealth.

      She ran one hand through her hair. It had passed through every single dyeable color on its way to the resigned brown of frozen dirt in late November.

      I can provide a charm which might make him careless, and your own fingers more nimble, she whispered. But, in the end, your success will be yours. The risks will be yours. The rewards will be yours. This was pep talk, legal disclaimer, and invocation of the secret, wealth–making forces of the universe that clients never failed to believe in, as though both physics and the music of the spheres answered the strum of the Invisible Hand — and here, at the mall, they probably did.

      The client narrowed her eyes at the tchotchkes on display, clearly trying to make out the numbers on price tags. A cheapskate. She didn’t want to pay any more than she had already forked over for the session. Zoe re–calibrated her approach.

      You may have the luck charm. My gift. Wear it around your neck, tucked under your clothes — it needs the heat from your skin for it to work. The tea leaves will be ten dollars, and they will help make the plastic taste better.

      The client still grumbled over the cost of the tea, but she paid for it. Then she took the necklace charm — without thanks, as though entitled to the gift, as though it were even possible to be entitled to a gift — and went on her way.

      Zoe gave no visible sign of her relief that the session was done, that the client was gone, and that a fraction of kiosk rent was now safely paid for. She adjusted the placement of her chairs and waited for the next mall–walker in need of witchcraft.

      Several monks went by, each one holding a disposable coffee mug. They made an elaborate show of avoiding Zoe’s kiosk, and crossed both themselves and the air in her direction. She responded by pretending to give them the evil eye, while carefully avoiding the possibility of actually giving them the evil eye. This was all for show — or at least it was mostly for show. The act would drop after standard business hours. Monks were decent guys, who brewed decent beer. They kept to their monastery most of the time, tucked out of sight behind the movie theater, but they also ran a more public storefront for selling the beer, tankards, and indulgences on the fourth floor.

      Then Alexander showed up. He sat on the stool she reserved for actual clients. He looked like he always did: pale, thin, younger than he actually was, and probably suffering from a wasting illness and consuming obsessions. He reached for the amulets on display and took down both kesk and ma’sik. He had not yet bothered to say hello.

      This is beautiful work, he said, running his thumb over the carved letters. The compliment actually sounded genuine.

      Thank you, said Zoe. Put them back.

      Can I buy these? he asked.

      No. Not those two. You can’t afford them.

      Can I borrow them?

      No. Make your own.

      You know I can’t possibly do that. My skills are elsewhere.

      You don’t have any skills, she told him. You have talent, great heaping amounts of fumbling talent, but you have never paid attention to anything long enough to develop skill. Put the amulets back.

      Zoe and Alexander were not lovers, in case you were wondering. Anything

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