And the anniversary year rolls on! We have a new novella from Adam-Troy Castro, the provocatively titled “Draiken Dies”—but you’ll actually find that anchoring the issue; our cover story is a bit shorter, but no less worthy—it’s a tale of a trio of tween girls with a knack for science and an eye for adventure, in the style of the best Heinlein Juveniles—it’s James Van Pelt’s “Minerva Girls.”
 
Derek Künsken’s House of Styx serial may have wrapped up, but we haven’t seen the last of the setting just yet, as Derek takes us behind the scenes to look at “The Science Behind The House of Styx,” our fact article for the issue.
 
We’ll also have the next in our series of retrospectives, this one from current Asimov’s editor and former Analog executive editor, Sheila Williams, plus something suitably seasonal yet lighthearted in Sarina Dorie’s “I, Bigfoot”; an SF-spin on a fairy tale in “The Chrysalis Pool” by Sean McMullen; the hunt for the future’s most valuable commodity in “The Treasure of The Lugar Morto” by Alan Dean Foster; the life and times of an enhanced boxer in “Home of the King” by Dan Reade; a city full of shifting timelines in “City” by Joel Richards; plus stories from Maggie Clark, Jay Werkheiser, Mary Soon Lee, James Sallis, Aimee Ogden, and more!

When an encounter with a ghost suggests to young Aleyara that there may be a world beyond the one told of in her species’ stories about their arboreal home, she and a band of friends set out to discover the truth, but their biggest challenge may yet be waiting for them even if they can make it home . . .

That’s next issue, in “Aleyara’s Descent,” by Christopher L. Bennett.

Then “The War Against the Bugs” has proven to be a popular story premise for a long time, but it’s turned on its head next issue, when the war leads to a fragile alliance with some of the “bugs.” And there’s something corrosive at the heart of the tenuous peace, which might just lead to a return of the old bloody days for both peoples. . . . Find out in “Poison,” by Frank Wu and Jay Werkheiser.

We also have a genuinely speculative fact article in “Astronautical Explanations for ’Oumuamua” by Duncan Lunan, plus much more from ML Clark, Mark W. Tiedemann, Allen M. Steele, Kelly Lagor, Sean McMullen, Jen Downes, and others, along with all our regular columns.


When a humble tinker’s apprentice in a failing colony has a chance at the adventure of a lifetime (or more), it may also mean leaving his home behind to face its fate; what choice can he make? Find out in our lead story next issue, “The Tinker and the Timestream,” by Carolyn Ives Gilman. 

Then we present a pair of fact articles for your enjoyment: a deep dive into planetary formation from Kevin Walsh, in “Why are the Keplerians so Different?” as well as a “Big Ideas” piece about extinc¬tions and the Fermi Paradox from Howard Hendrix, “The Passenger Pigeon and the Great Filter.” 

And of course we have a bunch of material thematically-appro¬priate for the April Fool’s Day season, including the answer to a classic SF question in “The House on Infinity Street,” by Allen M. Steele; the truth about “What Women Want,” from Katherine Tunning; a quest for lost love upended in “Incommunicado” by Andrej Kokoulin; the most caveating an emptor can do when considering “The Problem with Bargain Bodies” by Sarina Dorie; a failed health inspection that works out for everyone in Leonard Richardson’s “Meat”; and much more, from Robert R. Chase, Rajnar Vajra, Shane Tourtellotte, Stanley Schmidt, Aubry Kae Andersen, Adam-Troy Castro, and then some. 

You don’t want to miss it! 

Another January/February issue is nearly upon us, and once again, we close out the old year and ring in the new with some top-notch stories.

First among them is our lead novella: it’s not unusual for a killer to have a personal motivation for a series of slayings, but it is unusual when the killer in question is an elephant. What’s more, when a doctor thinks he may be able to curb the animal’s murderous rages, the implications go much further than anyone expects. How far? Find out in “The Elephant Maker,” by Alec Nevala-Lee.

Then our fact article, “Life, But Not Quite as We Know It,” on some very unusual sorts of potential life forms, comes to us from Christina De La Rocha.

And of course we have plenty of other stories, like “EDIE,” a tale with some of the aforementioned unusual life, by James Dick; a pleasantly hardboiled SF yarn in “Hothouse Orchids” by Harry Lang; a look at harmless vacation fun from the other side of the ledger, in “The Bends” by Rajan Khanna; and a clash of values in a quiet little (post-apocalyptic) town upstate, in “The Battle of Wanakena,” by Megan Hyland, as well as much more, including seasonal offerings like “Christmas at Albert’s” by Mark W. Tiedemann, and “A Real Snow Day” by M. Bennardo, and stories both sad and hopeful, as befits the end of one thing and the beginning of another, from authors including Marie Vibbert, Shane Tourtellotte, James Van Pelt, Victoria Navarra, Erik Johnson, Tom R. Pike, Matt McHugh, Lorraine Alden, and more.

We’re already wrapping up 2022, but we still have a few treats in store before we see the year off! Next issue, our cover story features the return of an iconic science-fiction character: when a genetically-modified animal is killed and the details don’t add up, ARM sends one of its top investigators—Gil Hamilton! Get the whole story in “Sacred Cow,” by Larry Niven and Steven Barnes.

Our fact article for the issue, from Christopher MacLeod, wonders if rather than the popular Alcubierre drive, a quantum mechanical star-drive might instead be “Another Way To the Stars.”

Then, of course, we also have a wide selection of other stories: 
Even a peace between humans and aliens can be fraught with hidden danger, as we see in “Jazz Age,” by Mark W. Tiedemann; the Nietzsche quote about staring into the abyss turns out to be far more literally true than anyone expected in Lisa Herbert’s “Seen”; a high-tech repo man stumbles into a far-reaching conspiracy in “Cryptonic,” by Aurelien Gayet; a robot struggles to find its better self in “In All Good Conscience,” by Meghan Hyland, and more, from Guy Stewart, Mark Laidlaw, Tom Jolly, Holly Schofield, Leonard Richardson, Deborah L. Davitt, and others, plus all our usual columns and features!

Our September/October issue arrives as summer begins to wind down and fall begins to creep in through the cracks, and we have stories to suit both moods.
 
Our lead piece is a bit of historical (science-) fiction that wouldn’t fit as well anywhere but Analog: in the early days of America’s entry into WWII, a former minor-league baseball player finds himself contributing to the war effort at an ordnance plant, but he also finds more secrets than he bargained for. What’s going on, and how do some familiar faces figure in? The answers lie in “Kingsbury 1944,” by Michael Cassutt.
 
We’re always happy when our fact article ties into a story, as it does next issue, thanks to Marianne Dyson’s novelette, “The Power of Apollo (16),” and the associated Science Behind the Story piece, both of which involve some fascinating information that only Marianne (one of NASA’s first female flight controllers) could bring us.
 
We’ll also have a timely bit of fiction about a potentially worrisome asteroid, from Jerry Oltion in “Shepherd Moons”; a chaotic romp through a multiversal arms bazaar, from Ian Creasey, in “Self-Regulation”; and many others, both a little scary and a lot silly, including stories from Tom Greene, James Sallis, Marie Vibbert, Rich Larson, Marissa Lingen, and much, much more!
 
You don’t want to miss it!

By the end of the events of “The Malady” by Shane Tourtellotte (November/December 2021), readers saw a huge mystery solved, but those answers also brought new questions to light: who was responsible and why? And perhaps most importantly: what next? Well, our lead novella for next issue, “Truta and Pilta,” can answer that last matter at least: a space race. 

Then our first fact article of the issue considers some of the more esoteric properties of black holes, in “Black Holes and the Human Future” by Howard V. Hendrix. We also have a fact “short” about the problems with fictional bio-scanners—you know: as in “Scanning the planet for life-forms, captain!”—from Valentin D. Ivanov, in “Biosignatures: the Second Biggest Blunder of SF.”

And of course we have plenty of other fiction pieces, such as one featuring a unique combination of time-travel and astronomy, in Jerry Oltion’s “The Dark Ages”; an all-too-accurate tale of technological turnover, in AT Sayer’s “Across the River”; plus a summer’s worth of blockbuster action, ranging from the meeting of a shape-shifter and an assassin in “Punctuated Equilibrium,” by Auston Habershaw; a tiny flaw leading to a nail-biting rescue, in “Single Point Failure,” by Sean Monaghan; and a pulse-pounding struggle for revenge or redemption in “Across the Sand Sea,” by TL Huchu, and many more, from Michèle Laframboise, Aimee Ogden, Steve Toase, Joe McDermott, Kelsey Hutton, Bruce McAllister, and then some!


Not every character strictly needs an origin story—life is rarely that simple. So while next issue’s Andrea Cort tale, “Burning the Ladder” by Adam-Troy Castro, isn’t one, it’s still a formative moment, earlier than any we’ve seen so far, that has big ramifications for the character we’ve come to know. New to the Diplomatic Corp, Andrea struggles to understand the abuse an alien child suffers at the hands of its own species, but she may just learn a painful and permanent lesson that no good deed goes unpunished instead.

Our fact article for the issue is from Raymund Eich, looking at some of the exact logistics of interplanetary colonization, in “The Believers Shall Inherit The Solar System.”

And we’ll have stories including a tale of an old man, his dog, and an environmental reclamation project, in Bud Sparhawk’s “Simple Pleasures”; a trippy (in multiple ways) Probability Zero from Louis Evans, “Gateway Drug”; an unusual pair of firefighters who are more than the sum of their parts in Alice Towey’s “Firebreak”; an orphan making his way in an alien world in Eric Del Carlo’s “A Boy in the Key of Forsaken”; the return of a cunning shape-shifter in Auston Habershaw’s “Proof of Concept”; all-out warfare in Timons Esias’s “Beachhead”; desperate times demand hard choices in A.C. Koch’s “Planetfall”; nearly-forgotten knowledge struggles to be preserved in Jessica Reisman’s “Aconie’s Bees”; and more, from Sean McMullen, Stanley Schimdt, Jerry Oltion, and others!

When an escapee from an interstellar cult looking for an old flame stumbles across an enigmatic structure on a distant planet that seems to be drawing alien creatures to it, his unique experiences may just be the thing that qualifies him to see more of the situation than anyone else. But he’s not the only one who seeks its meaning, and there are others who would do anything to get it. At what price, understanding? Discover the answer next issue, in “Exile’s Grace,” by Mark W. Tiedmann.

Our fact article for the issue. “Evolving Brainy Brains Takes More Than Living on a Lucky Planet,” by Christina De La Rocha, is part evolutionary biology and part planetary geology in an attempt to shine light on one of the more profound questions we have about human life.

We’ll also have a Journeyman story from Michael F. Flynn; a bit of “youth in revolt . . . on a starship” from J.T. Sharrah; stories from C. Stuart Hardwick, Michael Swanwick, Brenda Kalt, and more; plus a special feature on humor in Analog from Stanley Schmidt (as well as a couple of thematically-appropriate stories to accompany it); and of course, all our regular (and regularly excellent) columns.

New year, new issue! We start things off with a bang, in the form of a novella from a titanic team-up: in the aftermath of a disaster, the survivors have to discover a way to communicate with a most alien life form or die trying. My intentionally vague description doesn’t do it justice, as you’ll find out in “Communion,” by Frank Wu and Jay Werkheiser.

Our fact article for the issue also comes from Jay Werkheiser, in the form of a Science Behind the Story on Kepler’s Laws, concluding in this very issue, and we have a “speculative history” Special Feature, in
Brishti Guha’s “The Robots of Ancient India.”

We also, of course, have a wide array of stories, from androids fighting pirates in Tom Jolly’s “Cloudchaser” and a potentially other-worldy trap in Tony Ballantyne’s “The Lobster Pot” to a high-stakes heist in Raymund Eich’s “A Fistful of Monopoles” and some environmental justice in “Yellow Boots” from Stephen L. Burns, as well as plenty more, from Liz A. Vogel, Megan Hyland, and others.

Don’t miss it!

Next issue, we close out the year . . . and Kepler’s Laws, Jay Werkheiser’s serial begun in this very issue. You’ve read the beginning: now find out how it ends, when tensions come to a head and the quiet conflict explodes into the open. Stands are taken, mysteries are solved, and not everybody makes it out alive. Don’t miss the exciting conclusion!

Then Christina De la Rocha continues her informal series of fact articles on global warming, with “Will Nuclear Power Save Us From Global Warming?” The answer is, like many things, not entirely straightforward, but that’s what makes it interesting.

And of course we’ll have a myriad of shorter stories, including the return of a long-absent fan-favorite author, with “Malady,” by Shane Tourtellotte, as well as pieces from Dan Reade, Brenda Kalt, Barry Malzberg & Bill Pronzini, Robert Reed, Bill Frank, and more. 

This issue, we’re going to do something that’s a little unusual for a number of reasons: we’re experimenting with the serial format by bringing you a full-length novel in just two parts, and we’re revisiting the lethal world of Kepler from Jay Werkheiser’s original novelette, “Kepler’s Law,” much expanded, in Kepler’s Laws (note the plural). Folks who remember the original story and recall the desperate attempts of the colonists to settle on the chemically hostile world might think they have an inkling of what’s in store, but far from it—Kepler’s Laws is about 90,000 words beyond what you’ve seen. Hold on to your hats; survival is going to come at a cost.

Perhaps the primary objection to using nuclear power to wean ourselves off of fossil fuel is that terrestrial nuclear power plants are dangerous. If that’s the case, then might we skirt the issue by making them nonterrestrial? We take a look in our fact article for the issue, “Orbital Nuclear Power,” by Donald Wilkins.

Then we have a planet held in thrall by two feuding petty tyrants when contract killer Rage Laskin drops in to take a job, but naturally things rapidly go pear-shaped in “The Silence Before I Sleep,” by Adam-Troy Castro.

And of course we have a wide variety of other stories from familiar faces like J.T. Sharrah, John Vester, Marissa Lingen, Robert Scherrer, Marie Vibbert, Joel Richards, and Holly Schofield, plus new names like Marco Frasetto and Bianca Sayan, plus the next entry in all of our fine features and incredible columns. 

When a crew of pirates decides to rob a ring station, the last thing they’re expecting is a pair of rivals who’ll band together to save everyone . . . if they don’t kill each other first. All hope lies with . . . “The Unlikely Heroines of Calisto Station,” from Marie Vibbert. (That blurb works best if you read it in your best “Trailer Guy” voice.)

Our fact article for the issue is a look at Venus as it may have existed in the distant past (and the not-so-distant past of science fiction) in “Return to the Golden Age: Why Venus Might Actually Once Have Been Habitable,” by Richard A. Lovett, and we’ll have a special feature from Edward M. Wysocki, as well as an interview with theoretical cosmologist and author of The End of Everything (Astrophysically Speaking), Katie Mack.

And of course there will be plenty of fantastic fiction, including a Space Age alternate history, in “The Next Frontier” by Rosemary Claire Smith; orbital derring-do that takes on personal significance in C. Stuart Hardwick’s “Sample Return”; a check-in with a much older version of a familiar character, now retired and living in a dome on Mars when disaster strikes, in “Long Day Lake.” Don’t miss it!

When an orbital salvage team stumbles across something lurking among satellite debris, a rote recovery mission becomes a matter of life and death. And even if they manage to survive, can they also hope to safeguard the Earth? Find out in May/June’s lead story, “Dangerous Orbit,” by Analog newcomer M.T. Reiten.

Many headlines were made recently about the discovery of potential evidence of life on Venus, and our fact article for the issue comes from one of the very researchers who made that discovery, who’s also an author with a long history at Analog: David L. Clements writes about “Possible Signs of Life on Venus.”

Then we have a host of other stories and special features, from such authors as Lettie Prell, Neal Asher, Charles Q. Choi, Tom Jolly, Jay Werkheiser, Bond Elam, and more, plus all of our regular features, of course.

Something unknown to humans is killing squid in huge numbers off the coast of Monterrey, and Emilia, a marine biologist, is trying to unravel the mystery, but it may just put her and her daughter’s lives at risk if she can’t solve it, and quickly. Follow her, in our March/April cover story, “Flash Mob,” by Meg Pontecorvo.

Then when a woman goes missing on an alien planet and no one seems willing to help, one man must venture into terra incognita with a local guide to try to find her, no matter the cost, in Catherine Wells’ “Invasive Species.”

Climate change isn’t just about temperature, as we see in our fact article for the issue, “From Atmospheric Rivers to Super Typhoons: The Future Looks Bright for Weather Disaster Fans,” from Christina De La Rocha.

And of course we have plenty of other stories, from Sean McMullen, Tony Ballantyne, Sean Monaghan, Brenda Kalt, Ray Nayler, Tom Jolly, Marie Vibbert, James Van Pelt, Aimee Ogden, and more, plus all our regular and (regularly excellent) columns.

New year, new stories! We start 2021 with a look at an unusual living arrangement creating stresses on a relationship in “Mixed Marriage” by Dan Helms; then we have a hardboiled slice of fiction in which a protagonist with “a certain set of skills” sets out to discover who murdered a friend and mentor, even when doing so seems to run counter to “The Will of The Gods,” by Charles Q. Choi.
Our first fact article of the year gets into the nitty-gritty of one of the most ambitious projects humans can undertake: “Constructing a Habitable Planet” by Julie Novakova.
And of course we have an abundance of other stories, from the unequal relationship in Harry Turtledove’s “My Hypothetical Friend” to the complicated rebellion of Nick Wolven’s “The Liberator,” plus more from Norman Spinrad, Deborah L. Davitt, Raymund Eich, Jerry Oltion, Em Liu, and others, as well as all our regular columns.

It’s hard to believe we’re already wrapping up the anniversary year with the next issue, but you know we’re going to go out with a bang!

Our cover story marks the overdue return of an author and characters absent from Analog’s pages: what have the otter-like Cochee-coco been up to since we last saw them back in 2012? Find out in “Together We Can Be More” by Juliette Wade.

Then our fact article focuses on some famous SF concepts by some of the people who thought them up: we return to Dyson Spheres and Ring-Worlds in “Big Smart Objects” by Greg Benford and Larry Niven.

Next, our retrospective piece is a fine look at the weight of duty and the consequences of shirking it, in Gordon R. Dickson’s “Call Him Lord,” as well as a provocative accompanying essay from yours truly.

We also have a pair of special features diving deep into our history: “The Women We Can See in Analog” from Marie Vibbert, and “How Articles Came to Analog” by Edward M. Wysocki, as well as a range of fine fiction from the likes of George Zebrowski, Grey Rollins, Brenda Kalt, Gregor Hartmann, Eric Del Carlo, Marissa K. Lingen, M. Bennardo, and more!
You don’t want to miss it!

Imagine: a desperate crew finds a last ditch, unexpected lifeline, but to take advantage of it, they may have to cross a threshold they’re unprepared for. At what price, survival? Find out in our next issue’s cover story, “Sticks and Stones,” by Tom Jolly.

Then our retrospective also serves as a tribute to Vonda N. McIntyre, who passed away in 2019: we present her “Of Mist, and Grass, and Sand,” as well as a few words from former Analog editor, Ben Bova.

We’ll also have the finale to Derek Künsken’s “The House of Styx” and a sequel to Jay Werkheiser’s September/October 2018 fact article, “Alien Biochemistry: Embracing The Carbon Chauvinist,” in which he embodies the role of a critical thinker and outlines the opposite position, in “Alien Biochemistry: Rejecting the Carbon Chauvinist.”

And of course we’ll have plenty of other fiction, including a novella-length sequel to Stan Schmidt’s 2015 serial, Night Ride and Sunrise, as well as stories from Marie Vibbert, Robert R. Chase, Elisabeth R. Adams, Alec Nevala-Lee, Rich Larson, and more!

The celebration continues! Next issue, our cover story is one where alien physiology also leads to alien philosophy: it’s “Moral Biology,” by Neal Asher.

Then we have arguably the most famous piece in our retrospective series: Anne McCaffrey’s “Weyr Search,” with a poignant introduction from Analog’s majordomo, managing (and poetry) editor, the superlative Emily Hockaday.

Our fact article is the rather self-explanatorily titled “Space Dust: How an Asteroid Altered Life on Earth . . . Millions of Years Before the Dinosaurs,” by one of our most popular nonfiction authors, Richard A. Lovett.
Of course we also have part two of Derek Künsken’s serial, The House of Styx—no spoilers, but readers who enjoyed the nuanced characters, hard science, and imaginative world-building in The Quantum Magician and especially “Persephone Descending” will find much to love here.

We’ll also have scores of other stories, about dirty deeds in a mining colony in “A Breath of Air,” from Tom Jolly; an alien getting a wider look at its own culture in Ramona Louise Wheeler’s “The Calm Face of the Storm”; a father try to bond with his daughter in spite of changing technology in Eric Cline’s “It Was Tradition When You Turned 16.”

Our 90th anniversary kicks off with the magazine you hold in your hands, and it continues full swing throughout the year and next issue: 

We open March/April with the next anniversary retrospective, Raymond F. Jones’ 1952 gem, “Noise Level,” accompanied by an introduction from Alec Nevala-Lee.

Then we’ll have the first of three installments of Derek Künsken’s serial, The House of Styx. An unexpected discovery sets a family of hardworking prospectors on Venus down a dangerous path, with repercussions that could shape the entire planet and beyond.

We’ll also have a short story and tie-in fact article from Gregory Benford, a very Analog take on an old adage in C.C. Finlay’s “One Basket,” plus fiction from Jenn Reese, Andy Dudak, Catherine Wells, Richard A. Lovett, Edd Vick and Manny Frishberg, and more, on top of all of our ongoing columns and features.

Our next issue is really something special: it’s Analog’s 90th anniversary! We’ll be celebrating with treats and events throughout the whole year, but we kick off the anniversary issue proper with our lead story, “The Quest for the Great Grey Mossy,” by Harry Turtledove. It’s set in the same world as “Bonehunters” (May/June 2019) but you don’t need to have read that to appreciate this—most of you will recognize the famous tale it riffs on right away, but you’ll also quickly see it’s more than just homage.

Then we have something unusual for Analog: a retrospective of a classic Analog story from decades past, along with the story itself. Our initial offering is also the most recent (and just past the twentieth anniversary of its appearance in these pages): the Hugo—and Nebula-nominated “The Astronaut From Wyoming,” by Jerry Oltion and Adam-Troy Castro.

We’ll also have two fact articles, one from Alec Nevala-Lee and Ed Wysocki, looking at John W. Campbell’s various technological interests and inventions, “Making Waves”; and a Science Behind the Story feature from Eric Choi, based on “The Greatest Day,” his alternate-history tale in the same issue.

Then we have tons of top-shelf fiction, like “Wheel of Echoes,” by Sean McMullen, in which an undiscovered historical artifact changes how we see a major literary figure as well as what we think we know about historical technology, and plenty more terrific tales besides, from Jay Werkheiser, Doug Dluzen, C. Stuart Hardwick, Sarina Dorie, Ian Randal Strock, Joel Richards Fruchtman, Izzy Wasserstein, Matthew Claxton, Richard A. Lovett, Andrew Ward, Wendy Nikel, Rachel Rodman, and Gregor Hartmann, as well as plentiful poems and all our regular columns.

And be on the lookout over the rest of the year for more special features, including more retrospectives, a serial, and lots of especially great content that you don’t want to miss. 

The November/December issue opens with a story in the most classic Analog mold: a pair of explorers try to open line of communication with an alien species, but the process may involve a painful exchange for the humans. How many sly jokes can I make about this story? Find out in “An Eye for an Eye,” from Jerry Oltion.

The n we also have a novella about the kind of choices we might make if we really had a new lease on life, in “You Must Remember This,” from Jay O’Connell.

And of course, we’ll have plenty of other stories, from Julie Novakova, Gary Kloster, Aimee Ogden, Rajan Khanna, Eric Cline, Craig DeLancey, Michael Carroll, Guy Stewart, Marissa K. Lingen, and more (including a few seasonally-appropriate treats), as well as all our regular columns.

Another issue means another cache of cleverly curated chronicles for your indulgence! First, we check in on some old friends that we haven’t seen in some time—almost twenty years, in fact! When a prospector on the Moon sees people who couldn’t possibly be there, the only thing to do is check in with other people who couldn’t possibly be there. Get the rest of the story (though maybe not the whole story) in “The Gorilla in a Tutu Principle; or, Pecan Pie at Minnie and Earl’s,” by Adam-Troy Castro.

Then: we currently have two detectors searching for “ripples in space-time,” but what about making ourselves heard by any other civilizations that may be searching? Find out in “Building a Gravitational Wave Transmitter,” our fact article from Albert Jackson and Gregory Benford.

And as always, we have plenty of other stories, including an adult SF take on superheroes from Christopher L. Bennett, in “Conventional Powers”; a tale about paving the way for those who come after us, in “On Her Shoulders,” by Martin L. Shoemaker; a story that’s somehow exactly what it sounds like, in “Road Veterinarian,” by Guy Stewart, and more, from authors like Tony Ballantyne, Antha Ann Adkins, Norman Spinrad, Michael F. Flynn, Joe M. McDermott, Christian Monson, Julie Novakova, Marie Bilodeau, Mario Milosevic, Brenda Kalt, Brendan DuBois, Phoebe Barton, Sean Vivier, Edward M. Lerner, and Jennifer Povey, as well as all our regular departments (and maybe a bonus article or two).

When political tensions aboard an astronomical exploratory vessel run high, it’s a tense situation. But when that same vessel discovers a mysterious alien artifact and it’s revealed that not everyone on board is who they say they are, it becomes a powder keg. Find out what happens next, in our July/August lead story, “Vault,” from Robert R. Chase. 

Our fact article for the issue is a bit different: a little like a traditional fact piece and a little bit of an essay, C. Stuart Hardwick brings us “Do We Still Need NASA? The Agency and Its Future in the Era of Commercial Space.” 

Then we have a cosmic mystery on the largest possible scale in “The Slipway,” by Greg Egan, and you’ll also find a truckload of tricky time travel tales, such as “Monarch of the Feast,” by Paul Di Filippo; “All Tomorrow’s Parties” by Phoebe North; “The Babbage Tour,” by Leo Vladimirsky; and “A Wonderful Thing to Say” by Dan Reade, as well as a tale of Augmented Reality gone horribly wrong in Nick Wolven’s “The Eyes of Alton Arnhauser”; a science-fictional take on a fairy-tale in Freya Marske’s “What We Named the Needle”; and a crime with an impossible murder weapon in Tom Jolly’s “Shooting Stars,” plus stories from Catherine Wells, Robert Scherrer, Joe M. McDermott, Julie Novakova, Alison Wilgus, Eric James Stone, Steve Rasnic Tem, John Vester, Buzz Dixon, David L. Clements, and Leah Cypess, as well as all our regular ongoing (and outstanding) columns.

The story of a frontiersman and his ward, who must escort a scholarly expedition looking for fossils in hostile territory, may not sound like science fiction, but when you discover just who’s doing the escorting and precisely what they’re looking for, you’re going to change your tune. Find out more in our May/June issue lead story, “Bonehunters,” by Harry Turtledove.
 
Then our fact article comes to us from John Vester: living on one of the least-habitable planets is more possible than you might imagine, as you’ll see in “The Venus Sweet Spot: Floating Home.”
 
We’ll also have:
 
A curious automaton studies whale remains and learns something new “At the Fall” by Alec Nevala-Lee; astronauts must adapt to an alien world that’s unexpectedly close to home in J.T. Sharrah’s “Forgetfulness”; the last hope of a dying species in Dave Creek’s “The Dominant Heart Begins to Race”; a gonzo post-human pursuit (in multiple senses of the word) in “Leave Your Iron at The Door,” by Josh Pearce; an outsider who finds the common thread in different forms of fleeting beauty in “The Methuselah Generation,” by Stanley Schmidt; the profitable search for a historical artifact on the Moon, in “Mulligan” by Bud Sparhawk; a sequel to “Paradise Regained,” in Edward M. Lerner’s “Gates of Paradise”; as well as a plethora of pleasing plots from such fine fabricators of fiction as Bruce McAllister, Phoebe Barton, Joe McDermott, Wendy Nikel, Cynthia Ward, Marissa K. Lingen, Alex Shvartsman, Frank Smith, Liam Hogan, Guy Stewart, Antha Ann Adkins, Mary E. Lowd, Joshua Cole, and David Ebenbach, plus all our regular (and regularly excellent) columns.

We always like to do something a little seasonal when the opportunity arises, so next issue, you can expect something in the April spirit (either April 1 or April 15—take your pick), like “Hop and Hop with Gleepglopgeep! A Bedtime Reader,” from Tim McDaniel; “Parenting License” by Leah Cypess, and “The Little Sailboat,” by James Gunn, along with a selection of more serious (but still seriously good) hard SF, ranging from C. Stuart Hardwick’s “Open Source Space 2: Dangerous Company” and “Beneath a Red Sun” from James C. Glass, “Second Quarter and Counting” from James Van Pelt, and “The God of All Mountains,” by Joanna Miles, as well as “The End of Lunar Hens” by M.K. Hutchins, and “The New Martian Way,” an SF mystery from Brendan DuBois.
Then there’s a new fact article from Richard A. Lovett, plus stories from Matt Kressel and Mercurio Rivera; Sarina Dorie; Tom Greene; Bond Elam; Brad Presslar; Bruce McAllister; Bud Sparhawk; Eric Del Carlo; Jay Werkheiser; Vajra Chandrasekera; Jack McDevitt; Steve Rasnic Tem; Elizabeth R. Adams, as well as all our regular columns.

We open November/December with “Empress of Starlight” by G. David Nordley. When stars begin “disappearing,” a crew takes the long trip out to the Dyson sphere they suspect is causing it, but what they find is even bigger and more astounding than they imagined.

Our fact article then tackles the remote but very real possibility of a cataclysmic terrestrial asteroid impact, and what can be done to prevent it, in “Defending the Earth,” from Marianne J. Dyson.

And of course we have a wide array of other stories, including an epic space opera with a very big idea, from Christopher McKitterick, “Ashes of Exploding Suns, Monuments to Dust”; a look at how daunting a seemingly-simple skill can be to learn for the inexperienced, from Joyce and Stanley Schmidt, in “Mixipoxi Learns to Drive”; a most unusual reality show contestant in “Pandora’s Pantry,” from Stephen L. Burns; “Hubstitute Creatures,” a new Hub story from Christopher L. Bennett; and plenty more, from Jerry Oltion, Rich Larson, Marissa Lingen, Cynthia Ward, Tom Jolly, C. Stuart Hardwick, and others, plus all of our regular outstanding columns and features.

We open November/December with a story you may have been expecting in this issue: “Empress of Starlight” by G. David Nordley. When stars begin “disappearing,” a crew takes the long trip out to the Dyson sphere they suspect is causing it, but what they find is even bigger and more astounding than they imagined.

Our fact article then tackles the remote but very real possibility of a cataclysmic terrestrial asteroid impact, and what can be done to prevent it, in “Defending the Earth,” from Marianne J. Dyson.

And of course we’ll have a wide array of other stories, including an epic space opera with a very big idea, from Christopher McKitterick, “Ashes of Exploding Suns, Monuments to Dust”; a look at how daunting a seemingly-simple skill can be to learn for the inexperienced, from Joyce and Stanley Schmidt, in “Mixipoxi Learns to Drive”; a most unusual reality show contestant in “Pandora’s Pantry,” from Stephen L. Burns; “Hubstitute Creatures,” a new Hub story from Christopher L. Bennett; and plenty more, from Jerry Oltion, Rich Larson, Marissa Lingen, Cynthia Ward, Tom Jolly, C. Stuart Hardwick, and others, plus all of our regular outstanding columns and features.

Our lead story for September/October is “Empress of Starlight” by G. David Nordley. When stars begin “disappearing,” a crew takes the long trip out to the Dyson spheres they suspect are causing it, but what they find is even bigger and more astounding than they imagined.

Then our fact article examines the nitty-gritty realities of non-carbon-based life, in “Alien Biochemistry: Embracing the Carbon Chauvinist,” by Jay Werkheiser.

We follow that with a historical romp in “Harry and the Lewises,” from Edward M. Lerner; a comedy of tesseract errors in “And He Built a Crooked Hub,” from Christopher L. Bennett; some suitable bits of Halloween feeling in “The Unimportant Parts of the Story” from Adam-Troy Castro, “Black Shores” by Darren Speegle, and “It Came From the Coffeemaker,” by Martin L. Shoemaker; a look at the ways an AI’s programming might lead it down unexpected paths in “Optimizing the Unverified Good,” by Effie Sieberg; and many more, from the likes of Greg Benford, Sean McMullen, Ron Collins, Tony Ballantyne, and others.

Forget the Avengers meeting the Guardians of the Galaxy; the biggest crossover of the summer isn’t in theaters, it’s in next month’s issue—black-ops agent extraordinaire Draiken comes face to face with infamous lawyer/killer Andrea Cort, and when they go toe-to-toe, who will come out on top? Why, the readers, of course. Find out more next month in “A Stab of the Knife,” from Adam-Troy Castro.

Then our fact article is a Science Behind the Story piece that takes a look at all the genetics and quantum physics that went into Derek Künsken’s serial, The Quantum Magician, which wrapped up in this very issue.

Then we have a host of novelettes and short stories, including a look at some very alien yet suspiciously familiar creatures in “Until We Are Utterly Destroyed,” by Frank Wu; an adventure among the asteroids with lethal stakes in “Potosi” from Joe Pitkin; a unique take on exploration in “Open Source Space,” by C. Stuart Hardwick; a treasure hunter in the far future with a valuable relic of forgotten technology in Auston Habershaw’s “A Crystal Dipped in Dreams”; a tale of how sometimes our hypotheses don’t pan out, even when you’re an icon of SF, in “New Frontiers of the Mind,” by Andy Duncan; an unusual way of remembering those close to us, in “Eulogy for an Immortal,” by Robert James Herndon; and more, from Marissa Lingen, Evan Dicken, Mary Soon Lee, Alex Shvartsman & Alvaro Zimos-Amaro, Mary E. Lowd, Kris Dikeman, M. Bennardo, Stephen L. Burns, Jacob A. Boyd, Eduardo Vaquerizo, and Daniel Peterson, as well as all our regular columns . . . plus maybe even a special feature or two!

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November/December 2020

Published since 1930, Analog Science Fiction and Fact is one of the most enduring and popular science fiction magazines of all time. Starting with its January/February 2017 issue, Analog Science Fiction and Fact updated its annual subscription format to feature a total of 6 issues per year, all of them 208-page double issues. The new format allows for expanded articles and more special features, as well as greater editorial flexibility overall, and comes with no increase in the annual subscription price!

 

Analog’s editorial emphasis continues to be on realistic stories that reflect high standards of scientific accuracy and imagination, and on lively articles about current research at the frontiers of real science. A recurrent theme in both fiction and provocative opinion columns is the human impact of science and technology. Home to many bestselling authors, including Robert J. Sawyer, Michael F. Flynn, Stephen Baxter, Catherine Asaro, Harry Turtledove, Joe Haldeman, and Ben Bova, Analog has won numerous Nebula, Hugo, and other awards cementing its position as a leading SF periodical.

 

Analog Science Fiction and Fact features 6 double issues each year.

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Analog Science Fiction and Fact - September/October 2020

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