One of the space program's pioneers gets one last chance to fly

“Dorothy lived in the midst of the great Kansas prairies, with Uncle Henry, who was a farmer, and Aunt Em, who was the farmer's wife.”

L Frank Baum used this line to start his most famous work, The Wizard of Oz. Now, Mary Robinette Kowal uses this same line to start a whole new story, 'The Lady Astronaut of Mars.'

Here, the space program played out a little bit differently. Instead of simply being content with reaching the Moon, humanity kept pushing out into space. While computers were still in the punch-card phase, man reached Mars and eventually colonized it, beneath bio-domes to keep in the air.

Elma York was the face of the Mars program. With the mind of a scientist, the heart of an explorer and the looks of a starlet, she was the perfect choice to be the face of the colonization program, along with her computer-science husband.

Fast-forward several decades and their lives have become the same as any couple in their later years. Elma keeps in shape for her NASA-compliance physicals, and also to help take care of her husband. While his mind is as sharp as ever, his body has begun to betray him. The tremors have gotten so bad, and his muscle mass has gotten so low, that he is transitioning into 'it's a matter of time' territory.

But how much time? Because NASA has a new project in the works. They need a person to make a one-way trip to the nearest star system, to set up an array to facilitate travel. Does Elma live out her marriage with her slowly dying husband, or take her last chance to fly among the stars?

Mary Robinette Kowal's talent lies in finding the humanity in her characters. Whether they be a clockwork toy, an IT girl on a generational ship, or a woman living on Mars, Kowal makes the reader wonder what they'd do in their place. This is the real joy of Kowal's stories, and what keeps readers coming back time and again.

Highs: It's a amazing what a little girl from the Kansas countryside remembers years later.

Lows: I might resent the narrator using her looks in this way, but then again it was the 1960s.

Verdict: Very much worth the read, for free, on Mary Robinette Kowal's site here.

Further Reading: 'Paper Tiger', Shades ofMilk and Honey

Sometimes it's best not to be so special after all

A room full of mechanical toys can become quite devious in Mary Robinette Kowal's short story 'Clockwork Chickadee.'

Somewhere, somewhen there's a magical room full of clockwork toys.  There's Clockwork Sparrow, flying around the ceiling on a string.  There's Clockwork Scarab, sitting with his lotus. And there's the Clockwork Chickadee, who flaps her wings and pecks at the shelf.


Clockwork Sparrow tends to think a lot of himself.  He is, of course, the only clockwork creature in the room who can actually fly.  It may not be the sparrow who is clockwork, though, only the device on the ceiling that makes the bird fly when the boy winds it.  Nevertheless, Clockwork Sparrow feels that he is special.


Being special can cause envy, though.


Clockwork Chickadee can't fly.  Her wings flap, her head moves, but she sits solidly on the shelf where she is kept.  Clockwork Chickadee does know a few things that Clockwork Sparrow doesn't, though.


Clockwork Chickadee knows Live Mouse.


Clockwork Chickadee knows that Live Mouse has the wind-up key.


And Clockwork Chickadee is very, very clever indeed.


Highs:  The story starts out seeming like a simple retelling of a parable, but by the end turns into something completely different.


Lows:  It's a very tight story, but it leaves me wanting more tales from this room.


Verdict:  A tale unlike the others I've read from this author, available for free here on her website.


Further Reading:  'For Want of a Nail', 'Tanglefoot'

Jane and Melody learn that men are never what the seem...for good and for ill.

With the rise in popularity of books like Pride and Prejudice and Zombies and Sense and Sensibility and Sea Monsters, as well as the growth of the Steampunk genre, there has been a renewed interest in the classical style of writing.  While Jane Austen hardly qualifies as fantasy, genre writers tend to be on the leading edge of trends in literature.  Mary Robinette Kowal, with Shades of Milk and Honey, has masterfully infused the gentle Regency romance with just a touch of magic to add to its beauty.

Along with other womanly arts, any woman of Quality also learns to manipulate the strands of ether that make up the universe.  Rather like working a personal glamour, these can be used to affect the senses.  On can project the warm glow of sunlight to a dark corner, add tinkling strains of harpsichord to a parlor, or perhaps hide an unfortunate set of teeth.  Of course, different women have different aptitudes for this skill, but most agree that a house isn't a home without these small comforts.


This is the one area in which Jane truly excels.  Creeping ever closer to being a spinster, Jane's looks have never been her strong point.  With overly strong features, Plain Jane is a particularly apt expression.  So it's only natural that she is overshadowed by her beautiful younger sister Melody.  Both are still on the look-out for possible suitors, and while they don't stand to inherit terribly much, their father has put aside enough for a decent dowry for each of them.


But one fateful summer, things begin to change.  Men can drive a wedge between even the closest of sisters, and just because one is of marriageable age doesn't mean that she has the wisdom to see men for what they are.  As the situation becomes more and more dangerous for the girls, help comes from the most unexpected of sources.  And sometimes the most affable and social have even more to hide than the quiet ones.


Shades of Milk and Honey is a solid period piece set in Regency England.  The only fantasy element, the 'glamour' that mostly women work, simply compliments the gentle story of the Ellsworth girls and the small social dramas of the area.  Details from the speech to the social mores to the styles of dress are meticulously researched and plotted so that the reader often forgets that she is reading a modern piece.  Kowal even goes so far as to have created a 'Jane Austen Dictionary' in her world processing program that flags any word that does not appear in a Jane Austen novel, so she can research it and see if the word or concept existed at the time.  It's this attention to detail that raises Shades of Milk and Honey far above the traditional period gimmick and makes it an excellent debut novel.


In all, this is a very quiet book.  Even when the story quickens and some of the plots come to light, there is still the dance of social niceties to be adhered to.  Fantasy fans who want to see the women throw off the constraints of society and charge into battle will be sorely disappointed. 


The only problem that I foresee is the book not finding many of the readers that would most appreciate it.  While in some ways a fantasy book, it is much slower paced than most on the shelves.  While a period piece, there is nary a dirigible nor vampire in sight.  In fact, many readers of mainstream fiction would quite enjoy the story, but may never know it exists simply because of the section of the bookstore or library in which it resides.  Perhaps the best way for this book to gain notice among people who wouldn't otherwise find it is word-of-mouth.  So if you end up enjoying this book, make sure that those who are less adventurous in their reading find this gem.


Highs:  Watching the speed at which Jane can analyze and replicate some of Mr. Vincent's most elaborate glamour tricks, and his consternation at it, is fun to watch.


Lows:  It'll be hard to find the people patient enough to enjoy this style of writing among those who typically scan the fantasy shelves, and those expecting High Fantasy of Urban Fantasy action will be sorely disappointed.

Verdict:  A delightful piece of period fiction with well-developed characters and prose meant to be savored.


Further Reading:  Glamour in Glass, A Discovery of Witches

A broken port turns into so much more

A hardware failure shows a deeper web of deception in Mary Robinette Kowal's 'For Want of a Nail.'

Of course Rava would be excited.  Appointed the wrangler for her generational ship's AI, and at such a young age, she's in charge of the ship's most valuable passenger.  Cordelia does more than just run communications and inventory and the like.  Contained in her memory banks is the entire history of the family.  Every birth, death, marriage and other event in the history of each passenger has been documented by Cordelia, through the VR glasses that every family wears.

So when Rava brings Cordelia's case to a party being held on the ship, and the case that Cordelia inhabits is dropped, a rather important port ends up being broken.  This port is what allows Cordelia to access her long-term storage, both for retrieval and storage of data.  She has about two weeks worth of storage onboard, before she would have to start deleting bits of herself.  So Rava, and her brother Ludoviko set off to find a new i/o port, or at least a new cable to hardwire her into ship's systems with.

In the process, though, Rava goes to her uncle Georgo for guidance.  Uncle Georgo was Cordelia's wrangler before Rava took over the job.  He's mostly been keeping in touch by commlink recently, and he seems very out-of-sorts now.  He demands to know where Cordelia is, and doesn't seem to remember that Rava took over his job months ago.  

Members of the family who are no longer productive members to the whole are recycled.  How as prominent a member of the community as Georgo could hide this for so long calls all sorts of people - and AIs - into question.  

While the main storyline revolves around Cordelia, Rava and Georgo, plenty of other ideas are hinted at as well.  Rava's brother Ludoviko is on the waiting list to be allowed to have a child, because in an enclosed environment such as this ship, resources for things such as child rearing would be limited.  This privilege would be reserved for the most worthy.  The idea that family members would be 'recycled' as soon as they are no longer productive is a plan that certainly wouldn't work in today's society either.  But both of these concessions would be necessary on a ship with limited resources and space such as this.

This, like many of Kowal's short stories is available from her website here.  It's quite a nice story, with more depth than might be expected from an AI housed in a Victorian writing desk.

Highs:  Every character acts as one would expect, from the jealous older sibling to the old man losing his faculties.

Lows:  Some of the lack of redundancies within Cordelia, as well as in the ship as a whole, are frustrating.

Verdict:  A masterfully crafted work in a small package.

Further Reading:  Shades of Milk and Honey, The Risen Empire