Asimov's Science Fiction Magazine - October/November 2015

In this issue

Aliette de Bodard’s October/November 2015 cover story is an enormous new novella that plunges us into a far future where various factions struggle to find the lost “Citadel of Weeping Pearls.” Success will require travel through time and space. The journey
could result in death, or it could give the empire the weapon it needs in a war against archenemies.

Our traditionally “slightly spooky” issue is full of outré stories of the macabre. A trio of tales makes use of English and Irish locales and lore. Alan Smale entices us to the West Midlands for a chilling look at “English Wildlife”; Ian Creasey draws us further north to York, and, then through hyperspace, to listen while a young girl spins a sinister yarn about “My Time on Earth”; and Rick Wilber takes us from the beaches of West Ireland to the coast of Massachusetts for one character’s just rewards in “Walking to Boston.” We remain in the U.S. for Sandra McDonald’s ghostly account of “The Adjunct Professor’s Guide to Life After Death”; venture to the old west for Ian McDowell’s uncanny legend of “The Hard Woman”; and voyage through time with Timons Esaias to find out what happened in “Hollywood After 10.” Daryl Gregory escorts us to another realm for a surprising twist on a familiar tale of witchcraft in “Begone”; and new author Brooks Peck lures us to a space station in Earth’s Orbit to view the consequences of living “With Folded RAM.”

Robert Silverberg’s Reflections column praises “Star (Psi Cassiopeia),” a great, yet little known, nineteenth-century interstellar space opera; Norman Spinrad’s On Books examines today’s hard SF in “The Real Deal”; James Patrick Kelly’s On the Net informs us that “We Have the Technology” to create the posthuman era; plus we’ll have an array of spooky poetry and other features you’re sure to enjoy.