Cat in Glass by Nancy Etchemendy
This is the best story in the magazine. The narrator's sister and daughter have both strange deaths while in the presence of a priceless statue of a glass cat. (The death's have been explained naturally, however, she knows they have been caused by the cat. The artist even states that he put his anger in the cat.) Others have promised to sell the statue, but nobody has yet to do it. The narrator has lived much of her adult life in a mental hospital, and only comes out at the end due to her daughters' family attempting to save money. She finally decides to take matters into her own hands. We are still left to wonder whether the narrator is truly insane or if the cat really does have some powers.
The Happy Frog by Elizabeth Moon
Princesses try to kiss frogs to find a prince, but all they end up doing is murdering frogs. In the end, the frog kisses a girl and ends up with a beautiful she-frog. It is moderately well written.
The Husband of Puma St. Louis Desire by W. Warren Wagar
meh. A shy guy goes back a few hundred years to live in the body of a pop star's husband. The bulk of the story is set in the 1990s, and it just doesn't age well. There is also too much name-dropped far-future technology, not to mention a fairly disgusting premise. This is the epitome of bad science fiction.
The Consequences of Buying Maria Montez for Dad • shortstory by Ron Goulart
ok. This is set in 2020, which seemed a long way off when it was written, but now seems to be totally inaccurate. The story is about two heavily indebted playboy sons who want their zillion-are father to die so they can inherit all the money. One suggests using an android nurse to clandestinely hurry up the process. The other feels moral pangs about doing that. In the end, the father dies and the nurse android shows up at the house of one of sons. This could have been a decent story if the science fiction elements were taken out. However, the technology name dropping gets things really wrong and is quite distracting.
The Importance of Pitch essay by Isaac Asimov
He really comes off as conceited. It seemed like ok science.
Termin'ator by Michael Armstrong
Purpose [Pteros] by P. E. Cunningham
This is a collection of foreign affairs essays with an "intellectual conservative" bent. The essays look at conflicts from a long term perspective. To somebody like Kissinger, the cold war was a continuation of World War 2. However, the new generation does not have that influence, and thus comes to different conclusions. Korea is viewed as a challenging situation. None of the major players (China, US, South Korea) are ready for the dictatorship in North Korea to fall. It is easy to criticise foreign policy decisions. However, we don't know what would have happened otherwise. Would a bad outcome have been replaced by an even worse one? There are many interesting points to ponder in the essays even if you don't agree with the conclusions.
