Volume 47, Issue 2
Spring 2024

Star*Line 47.2 cover
Cover: Necromancer
© Sebastian Timpe

Wyrms & Wormholes

Predict / Prevent

Sometimes I'm blown away by how prescient science fiction can be. We don't always get it right, but sometime stories and poems can come startling close to the truth of the future. Recently I read J. G. Ballard's “Studio 5, the Stars,” a story about the editor of a poetry magazine that is exclusively made up of computer generated works. In the story, the magazine gets infiltrated by a human poet and all runs amok. Editors today find ourselves in the exact inverse of this situation. How did Ballard know in 1961, when the story was written? It reminds me of how often the human race ignores the warnings that we feel uncomfortable with, and fail to act soon enough to create meaningful change. Similarly, Ballard wrote ample warnings about impending climate change. These stories are an example of why reading and writing can be so important, beyond their ability to entertain us.

The poetry that fills these pages is filled with similar warnings, the dreams of our poets, our emotional history, coming together to form a global conversation about how we would like the future to look, and our grave concerns for how it might materialize if we don't heed the warnings. SFF is a visionary field, and it's always a joy to read your visions of what might be. Some of us might even accurately predict what is to come, which ones of us, only time will tell. I'm keeping my fingers crossed that it will be some of the more positive outcomes that come fruition, and that we don't have to find ourselves down the line saying I told you so...

—Jean-Paul L. Garnier, Star*Line Editor


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Star*Line Staff:

Editor: Jean-Paul L. Garnier
Layout: F. J. Bergmann
Production Manager: F. J. Bergmann
Mailing: Brian U. Garrison

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Table of Contents

Departments

  • Wyrms & Wormholes * Jean-Paul Garnier
  • SFPA Announcements
  • President's Message * Colleen Anderson
  • From the Small Press * Herb Kauderer, John Reinhart, Lisa Timpf
  • Stealth SF * “The Way the Past Will Be” * Denise Dumars
  • SpecPo Publishing * Interview with Emily Hockaday * Jean-Paul Garnier

Art

  • Necromancer * Sebastian Timpe
  • Shredder Mouth * Denny E. Marshall
  • Globe Strider * Denny E. Marshall
  • Tunguska Viewport 6 * Arpy
  • Unlocked Jaw * Denny E. Marshall

Poetry

  • Ecosmonomics * Jason P. Burnham
  • The Days of Abundant Internet * Ian Willey
  • Parabolic Arc * Alessio Zanelli
  • Misjudged * Lauren McBride
  • Silver Linings * Mary Soon Lee
  • Negligence Standard * Howard V. Hendrix
  • Xenomorph * Ellen Harrold
  • My Yesterdays Haven’t All Happened Yet * Robert Frazier
  • [first contact—] * Chris Langer
  • Conspiratorial * Sujith Surendranathan
  • [time stops] * LeRoy Gorman
  • Numbers on Doors: 011 * Yuliia Vereta
  • Forgets His Place * John H. Dromey
  • Interstellar Message Reaches Earth * Alan Ira Gordon
  • [the path away] * Anna Cates
  • Black Unicorn * Addison, Flores, Goyan, King & Wong
  • [Spotting aliens in a crowd] * Yuliia Vereta
  • Sibling Rivalry * Jenny Thompson
  • The City Insists * Devan Barlow
  • Synesthesia, Violet and Indigo * Lora Gray
  • [flying saucer] * Gary W. Davis
  • [My new tattoo] * Barbara Candiotti
  • [synthetic human] * Anna Cates
  • The System of Crimson Octopus: OctoParadis * Yuliia Vereta
  • [Morning sun so warm] * Denise Dumars
  • Abandoned Station * Mariel Herbert
  • among the immortals * Lee Clark Zumpe
  • Circle of Dark * Jason P. Burnham
  • Crash Landing * Greg Schwartz
  • To Dust * Richard Magahiz
  • Message in a Cosmic Bottle * Anna Cates
  • Medusa with Cancer * Pixie Bruner
  • On an ark pilot * Richard Magahiz
  • Binary musings over squeezing affection * Eva Papasoulioti
  • [this planet] * LeRoy Gorman
  • [the new AI juries...] * Karl Lykken
  • [Y marks the spot] * Debby Feo
  • Complaint of a Mad Mage’s Girlfriend * Sarah Cannavo
  • He-Whose-Words-Strike-Fear * Juan M. Perez
  • [Opening night] * Sarah Cannavo
  • The Variants Line * Garrett Carroll
  • Mysterious Artifact Story * Howard V. Hendrix
  • What the Hero Didn’t Do * Mary Soon Lee
  • [multiverse lottery] * Francis W. Alexander
  • Rewilding the Axolotl * Angela Acosta
  • at the zoo * D.A. Xiaolin Spires
  • Hanged Men * Jennifer Crow
  • Dead End * Jean-Marie Romana
  • Trapped Tourists * John H. Dromey
  • We Shall Always Live in the Afterlife * Robert Frazier
  • [drunk] * M. R. Defibaugh
  • Aboriginals’ Revenge * Richard Magahiz
  • [the Dark Forest] * David C. Kopaska-Merkel Drought
  • Season * Silvatiicus Riddle
  • Tapputi Belatekallim (ca. 1200 BCE) * Jessy Randall
  • The Glass World * Josh Pearce
  • Tiny Aliens ... * Lauren McBride
  • Perspective Shift * Jason P. Burnham
  • [Blartigon-9] * Greg Schwartz
  • How to Survive ... * Matthew Roy
  • Fatherhood * Cletus Crow
  • An alien in the headlights * Kendall Evans
  • [he pushed up ...] * David C. Kopaska-Merkel
  • The Sound, The Sound, The Sound * Beth Cato & Rhonda Parrish
  • Beings * Bruce Boston
  • Number 134 * Michael Lisieski
  • Occam’s razor shaves society * Richard Magahiz
  • post-apocalypse * Herb Kauderer
  • binary system * Marisca Pichette
  • [white Christmas] * Ann K. Schwader
  • Life in the New Ice Age * Goran Lowie
  • Shapes Ever-Shifting * Avra Margariti
  • [old junkyard] * Ngo Binh Anh Khoa
  • humanorigami * John Reinhart
  • [anistrophy in] * James Hall
  • Death Will Not Free You from Labor * H. V. Patterson
  • On the Way Here * Corinne Hughes
  • Tiny Bubbles * Adele Gardner
  • Just Static * DJ Tyrer
  • Quantum ferrets make great pets * Miguel O. Mitchell
  • A Regular Guy * Lisa Timpf
  • Death of the Sun * Matthew Wilson
  • [Childish antics lead] * Debby Feo
  • It’s the end of the world again * John C. Mannone
  • The Nekra * A J Dalton
  • [cannibal café] * Randall Andrews
  • Final Fitting * John H. Dromey
  • back Make me a sandwich * Marisca Pichette
  • iRobbie * RK Rugg
  • [perhaps] * Joshua St. Claire

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