K. Tempest Bradford, Author at Gizmodo

io9 Newsstand’s Attic Is Full of Dead and Dying Aliens

This week’s stories are about things that can’t last: people, relationships, or alien flesh. And they’re about longing for connection: with one’s offspring, with a dead poet, and with… aliens. Again. I Just Think It Will Happen, Soon by Rebecca Campbell | Interfictions Online Nela’s Dad started the thought. “So they’re calling you Twens? I…

io9 K. Tempest Bradford

Some Great Science Fiction and Fantasy Books To Keep You Sane on that Long Ride Home

Thanksgiving weekend is almost upon us! Many Americans will be making the long or short trek to family gatherings, or maybe a short vacation. Whether you’re flying, driving, or train-ing, you’ll want some good fiction to read or listen to on the way. Here are a few suggestions. Long Reads Many people reach for novels…

io9 K. Tempest Bradford

io9 Newsstand: Tyrants Need To Learn That “Leaving, Too, Is Resistance”

This week’s stories are about the necessity of resistance. Resisting the pull of depression, government control, or temptation by an apple. Liminal Grid By Jaymee Goh | Strange Horizons On the side of the hill at the edge of the town, Bander Ayer Puteh, is a failed housing development project, formerly called Falim Heights. Four…

io9 K. Tempest Bradford

io9 Newsstand: Is It Cold In Here, Or Did You Just Suck Out My Soul?

This week’s stories are about daughters who don’t want to be like their mothers, mothers who want impossible things for their daughters, and trees that resent being thrown out in the cold and snow. Hungry Daughters of Starving Mothers by Alyssa Wong | Nightmare Magazine: Queers Destroy Horror! As my date—Harvey? Harvard?—brags about his alma…

io9 K. Tempest Bradford

io9 Newsstand: Here’s a Great, Mind-Bending Story for Time-Travel Geeks

This week’s stories are about the perils of time travel, resisting and embracing change, and coming of age on a distant planet. And they all come from the December issue of Analog Science Fiction and Fact. If you remember, last week I talked about how all of the “Big Three” digest magazines have changed editors…

Books & Comics K. Tempest Bradford

io9 Newsstand: The Latest Issue of Asimov’s Science Fiction Is Well Worth Picking Up

This week’s stories mesh weighty elements—ghosts, drug trafficking, emergent AI, death—with lighthearted or humorous skeins that lift them up just enough, without being trivial. And they’re all in one great magazine: Asimov’s Science Fiction. Online magazines get a lot of attention in this column, which is a function of the taste of the columnist. I…

io9 K. Tempest Bradford

io9 Newsstand: This Ken Liu Story Will Make You Call Your Grandmother Right Now

This week’s stories are a mixture of hope, sadness, cynicism, and cute animals. There’s a lot of heartstring-tugging. I regret none of it. Crystal by Ken Liu | Daily Science Fiction The night before my departure, I trembled in the bed that Nainai and I shared, the darkness outside the window as frightening and unknown…

io9 K. Tempest Bradford

io9 Newsstand is Excited To Go Paragliding on the Moon

This week’s story is about pushing the limits of endurance, about finding one’s fearlessness once more, about staying true to one’s self and one’s beliefs—even when a night lasts for months, and the sun’s light provides no warmth or meaning. The 1st Annual Lunar Biathalon by Rachael K. Jones | Crossed Genres The First Video…

io9 K. Tempest Bradford

What Are the Best Stories of the Year So Far? (September 2015 Edition)

What were the summer’s best short stories? The ones you read and couldn’t stop thinking about, long after you closed the tab or turned the page? I have a few ideas about that… Every week, I boost my favorites in the io9 Newsstand column, but I am just one humble reader and reviewer. So once…

io9 K. Tempest Bradford

io9 Newstand Thinks Werewolves and Mermaids Should Hook Up More Often

This week’s stories are about falling in love during a full moon, going back in time to fix your biggest mistakes, and deciding whether or not existing is honestly worth it. Werewolf Loves Mermaid by Heather Lindsley | Lightspeed Magazine They met at a wedding. He was in the wedding party. She was serving canapés…

io9 K. Tempest Bradford

io9 Newsstand is Not As Obsessed With Serial Killers As You Are

This week’s featured story is about two kinds of disturbing people. One is a type that we, as a culture, are fascinated by to the point of reverence. And the other, we turn from uncomfortably and don’t talk about. I’m talking about serial killers, and creepy as f—- children. The World in Evening By Jei…

io9 K. Tempest Bradford

This Week’s io9 Newsstand Is Not Just About 9/11

This morning, The New Yorker heralded the arrival of Speculative 9/11 Fiction with trepidation, calling the trend “unsettling.” The article is partly a commentary on how fiction of any kind deals with traumatic, culture-shaping events, and partly a review of the new anthology In the Shadow of the Towers: Speculative Fiction in a Post-9/11 World…

io9 K. Tempest Bradford

io9 Newsstand Has One Last Thing To Say About The Hugo Awards

This week’s stories are about what happens to humans when they reach out to the stars, and what happens when the stars come crashing into us. But before we get into the stories… Earlier this week in her final roundup of Puppy-related Hugo Awards thoughts, Charlie Jane said: …if there’s one thing I would love…

io9 K. Tempest Bradford

io9 Newsstand: Speculative Fiction Is All About Keeping It Real (and Sometimes Surreal)

This week’s stories are about the housing crisis. They’re about ruthless politicians screwing everyone over in service of their own power games. And how making people safe means stripping them of everything that makes them real and worthwhile. And yes, these stories are speculative fiction and not articles from Reason Magazine. Ghosts of Home by…

io9 K. Tempest Bradford

io9 Newsstand: Read Some of the Creepiest, Darkest Horror Stories on the Internet

This week’s stories are about transformations born out of joy, fear, loneliness, pain, and the fierce fire of retribution. Fabulous Beasts by Priya Sharma | Tor.com Trigger Warnings: child abuse, incest, and rape “Eliza, tell me your secret.” Sometimes I’m cornered at parties by someone who’s been watching me from across the room as they…

io9 K. Tempest Bradford

io9 Newsstand: What Would You Do If The Government Was Monitoring Your Thoughts?

This week’s stories are about the things people will and won’t do for love, the monsters embedded in our skin and under the crust of the Earth, and the even worse horror waiting out there in the void. Duller’s Peace by Jason Sanford | Asimov’s Science Fiction Magazine September 2015 Serija knows what happens when…

io9 K. Tempest Bradford

io9 Newsstand: More Proof That Andrea Hairston is a Fantastic Author

This week’s stories are about dying languages, about the stuff of dreams crossing on over—and about how the world can come to an end more than once. Saltwater Railroad by Andrea Hairston [Part 1 | Part 2] | Lightspeed Magazine Miz Delia’s Island was protected by deadly reefs on the Georgia/Florida side and nine hundred…

io9 K. Tempest Bradford

io9 Newsstand: Are the little men with knives real?

This week’s stories are about what happens to women who aren’t seen by the world around them as fully realized human beings. The Reluctant Author by Megan Patton | Luna Station Quarterly Alma died in her tidy New York home shortly after 5pm on October 17th, before the news came on but after the daytime…

io9 K. Tempest Bradford

io9 Newsstand: Why Do Aliens Love The Number 8?

This week’s stories feature some brave, brilliant women who aren’t afraid to communicate with aliens—or face their own mortality. By the Numbers by Lynn Kilmore | Crossed Genres Magazine Mel liked it that the new mathematics building on campus had three steps up to the main doors. She liked how it squatted rectangular under the…

io9 K. Tempest Bradford

io9 Newsstand: Do All The Needs of The Many Outweigh Those of The Few?

This week’s stories are about the push-pull between honoring tradition and celebrating the new, about how hard it is to make peace with your past, and about how good it feels to make men pay for being pigs. This week’s stories also all come from the same source: Uncanny Magazine. I know I just encouraged…

io9 K. Tempest Bradford

K. Tempest Bradford

io9 Newsstand’s Attic Is Full of Dead and Dying Aliens

Some Great Science Fiction and Fantasy Books To Keep You Sane on that Long Ride Home

io9 Newsstand: Tyrants Need To Learn That “Leaving, Too, Is Resistance”

io9 Newsstand: Is It Cold In Here, Or Did You Just Suck Out My Soul?

io9 Newsstand: Here’s a Great, Mind-Bending Story for Time-Travel Geeks

io9 Newsstand: The Latest Issue of Asimov’s Science Fiction Is Well Worth Picking Up

io9 Newsstand: This Ken Liu Story Will Make You Call Your Grandmother Right Now

io9 Newsstand is Excited To Go Paragliding on the Moon

What Are the Best Stories of the Year So Far? (September 2015 Edition)

io9 Newstand Thinks Werewolves and Mermaids Should Hook Up More Often

io9 Newsstand is Not As Obsessed With Serial Killers As You Are

This Week’s io9 Newsstand Is Not Just About 9/11

io9 Newsstand Has One Last Thing To Say About The Hugo Awards

io9 Newsstand: Speculative Fiction Is All About Keeping It Real (and Sometimes Surreal)

io9 Newsstand: Read Some of the Creepiest, Darkest Horror Stories on the Internet

io9 Newsstand: What Would You Do If The Government Was Monitoring Your Thoughts?

io9 Newsstand: More Proof That Andrea Hairston is a Fantastic Author

io9 Newsstand: Are the little men with knives real?

io9 Newsstand: Why Do Aliens Love The Number 8?

io9 Newsstand: Do All The Needs of The Many Outweigh Those of The Few?

California Regulator Says Tesla’s ‘Robotaxis’ Are More Like a Limo in the Eyes of the Law

Dyson Airwrap Falls to an All-Time Low in Amazon’s Spring Sale, Lowering the Barrier for This Premium Multi-Styler

The ‘Tales from ’85’ Trailer Wants You Back in ‘Stranger Things’ Already

Forget Ray-Ban Meta, XREAL 1S AR/XR Virtual Screen Smart Glasses Drop to Record Low on Amazon

Pixel Buds Pro 2 Hit Record Low as Google Continues Its Clearance-Like Price Cuts Following Smartphone Deals

DJI Now Has a Cheaper 360 Drone Than Insta360, but the U.S. Won’t Get It

Amazon Clears Out Apple Watch Series 9 With Silver Stainless Steel Case at 48% Off During Spring Sale

What Do You Mean Fox McCloud Is in the ‘Super Mario Galaxy’ Movie

Apple iPad With A16 Chip Is Now as Cheap as It Gets, With Stock Moving Quickly in Amazon’s Tablet Deals

Amazon Echo Spot Is Running at Its All-Time Low, Likely the Last Chance Before Prime Day Arrives in a Few Months

Sonos Play Review: Call It a Comeback

Sonos Era 100 SL Review: The Cheapest Way Into Wired Sonos Sound

Asus ROG’s Massive Swift OLED Gaming Monitor Epitomizes Excess in the Best Way

The Ikea Varmblixt Smart Lamp Fills a Donut Hole in My Life

Nothing Headphone A vs. Headphone 1: Which Pair of ANC Wireless Headphones Wins?

Asus ROG’s Cetra Open Wireless Gaming Earbuds Might Be Better Than Wearing a Headset

Nintendo’s Talking Flower Is Annoying as Hell. I Love It

Level Lock Pro Review: As Good as a Secret Smart Lock Gets

Apple Studio Display XDR Review: It Looks So Good, I Wish It Were an iMac

RayNeo Air 4 Pro Review: My Eyes Love These Video Glasses, but My Nose Disagrees