Marie Hodgkinson (Ed)
Paper Road Press
Otago Daily Times, March 18th 2022
2020 was a challenging year, and its tortuous nature is perfectly captured in the whirlpool in Rebekah Tisch’s beautiful painting that graces the cover of this anthology. It was, however, a productive time for the imagination, as its contents prove. These stories represent a broad cross-section of NZ speculative fiction ranging from dystopian cli-fi to fable, and several that defy ready classification, including AJ Fitzwater’s blood-soaked recipe for building unicorns and ‘How to Get a Girlfriend (When You’re a Terrifying Monster)’, a delightful inter-dimensional adventure/romance reminiscent of Lily Inglegheart’s creations in Sex Education without the explicit content. A number also have a distinctly local flavour, such as Anna Kirtlan’s homage to the Wellington wind, T Te Tau’s ‘Kōhuia, which intertwines a vision of genetic engineering informed by mātauranga Māori with involuntary time travel, and my favourite, ‘The Moamancer,’ which posits the survival of Moa in the Manawatū gorge courtesy of the protective spells of generations of musical magicians.
Some of the stories are more accessible than others, but the diversity of offerings ensures that there will be something here for readers of most persuasions, and for those unfamiliar with our homegrown talent, it provides a good starting point for future reading.
Leave a Reply