Review of The Melancholy of Mechagirl by Catherynne M. Valente

Is there anything she can't do? Catherynne Valente's oeuvre not only covers a swathe of genres and sub-genres, but does so in a variety of styles and approaches that make putting her fiction in a box impossible. Ensuring that task is truly out of reach is the Japan, Japan-adjacent, Japan-inspired, and Japan touched short story collection: The Melancholy of Mechagirl (2013).

The Melancholy of Mechagirl kicks off with the eponymous poem. The zig-zag of the title becomes inherent as Valente takes the reader on a mini-journey through the soul of a Japanese teen girl. “Ink, Water, Milk” is a 3x3 grid, columns and rows the same names, or as Valente describes it, like three cells from a film roll, one laid on top of the other on a light box. More stories than story, it is a short but brilliant interplay of color, history, emotion, myth, procreation, all bleeding one into the other, separate yet part of the same whole. One of the best of the collection.

TCG Resource Systems (aka, How I Met Your Mother)

Captain Obvious says, economy is one of the three pillars supporting every TCG. Lieutenant Apparent adds, economy must be considered in every decision made and every card played. And Private Plain squeaks: economy is to blame for not being able to splash all my hardest hitting cards in one turn! (Umm, Private, that game is Yu-Gi-Oh...) Invisible yet influential, economies can make some TCGs stand tall, and others hang noodle limp. At the risk of hyperbole, it is the spine of every TCG.

As such, I thought it would be fun to look at some of the economies—resource systems—that have developed since Magic: the Gathering appeared 35+ years ago (and cursed us with the shittiest resource system known this universe—and all the universes beyond).

And there have been a number. From simple to complex, static to dynamic, inherent to abstract—the ability to pay and play those sweet-sweet cards has appeared in many iterations in TCG and TCG-esque games. (If you consider yourself a purist of the definition of “TCG”, run the other way. I will discuss TCGs, CCGs, LCGs, ECGS, UCGs, etc., etc. without a fig given to taxonomy.) A variety of systems will be discussed here, and in the closing paragraph I will draw some conclusions—objective conclusions, naturally.

Review of Colossus by D.F. Jones

It's an understatement to say AI has undergone significant shifts in perspective. Undoubtedly cavemen would have furrowed their foreheads at the idea, industrialists of the 19th century, also. But when machines entered everyday life in the mid 20th, it was allowed as a possibility. And when computers appeared, it became an inevitability. The interesting perspective to that perspective is: the context was always 'the future'. AI is in the future. Guess what, it's 2026 and the future is here. AI, or something resembling AI, is in our homes and in our pockets. Beyond inevitable, how could we not have seen it come when it did? Why was it a far future thing? That's what people ask in hindsight. Looking back to the era between 'possibility' and 'inevitability' is a novel portraying a Cold War AI, Colossus by D.F. Jones (1966).

Charles Forbin is the US government project head, leading the team of people designing and building the world's first artificial intelligence. In the opening pages, Forbin has put the finishing touches on the massive project and enters the president's office to inform him of the green light. A gregarious, determined man, the president praises the project and the next day holds a press conference to announce to the world that the US would be downsizing its military by 70% and turning over control of the armed forces to Colossus, the AI. Almost simultaneously, the Soviet Union announces its own AI, an entity they call Guardian. What happens next turns the world upside down and puts humanity on the back foot for the first time in history.

Cardboard Corner: Review of Endeavor: Deep Sea

Surprise, there are critical views of the modern liberal education system. It doesn't push students. It doesn't set realistic expectations. It doesn't prepare them for the real world. It doesn't recognize differences. It's not like school when I was a kid... I will let reality speak for the legitimacy of those concerns. What I want to do here is demonstrate how the system has appeared in board games—at least one board game: Endeavor Deep Sea (2024).

Endeavor: Deep Sea is an action-selection game for 1-4 players. Each player is the leader of a team of marine biologists, technicians, engineers, etc. exploring the sea. Anything the player does—gets another submersible, discovers a new place, explores a new location, conserves a species, collects journals, fills a board with tokens (ahem)—will get them victory points. The player with the most victory points after six rounds, wins.

Review of The Wilding by Ian McDonald

Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child's 1995 novel The Relic tells of an Amazonian creature accidentally transported to NYC's Museum of Natural History. It proceeds to wreak havoc on the museum, brutally killing staff and visitors. The story is brainless escapism of the purist variety. Ian McDonald's 2024 The Wilding is an Irish peat bog take on the same.

Lisa Donnan is a tour guide working at Ireland's largest environmental reclamation project—a 400 sq. km. bog that was nearly wiped out by peat extraction and is now being allowed to regrow. She and her coworkers oversee the re-wilding of what is now a nature park by tracking wildlife, monitoring biosystems, and leading tours and hikes. Trouble starts when one of the farmers allowed to use the land discovers an eviscerated cow. The discovery coincides with the first day of hiking for a group of middle-schoolers, and Lisa soon finds her hands full with more than just teen angst.

Review of Beluthahatchie and Other Stories by Andy Duncan

Ahhh, Andy Duncan. What to say? The definition of quality over quantity, the man writes only a couple short stories per year. Each is hand-crafted, polished to chrome shine, and will certainly feature an organic premise speaking to some measure of humanity at large. And authorial voice, amazing. Each story drips with flavor yet is told in a way that fits the story being told. But I gush. Duncan’s first collection, Beluthahatchie and Other Stories (2000), is well worth seeking out by connoisseurs of speculative fiction in short form.

A Robert Johnson crossroads story with an agenda, the title story “Beluthahatchie” tells of a vice-ridden blues musician from the early 20th century who meets an untimely end and finds himself on the train to hell. But it's when encountering the devil and learning about his new living conditions that the reader really gets to thinking. Written in fabulous prose, Duncan sets the tone for the collection by drawing the reader in with rich character and dialogue, and leaves them pondering over the substance.

Cardboard Corner: Ranking Arkham Horror: The Card Game Opening Scenarios

Arkham Horror: The Card Game campaigns have a definitive arc. They ebb and flow through six, eight, nine scenarios, giving players a variety of ways to test decks and test skill, and culminating in a boss battle. That boss should be, and most often is, the ultimate test. Knowledge of the campaign's mechanisms and upgraded decks go a long way toward success. Opening scenarios are the opposite, and the focus of this post.

In some ways, the opening scenario is the best point of any campaign. The mystery of what is happening, the excitement of what is to come, and the simple joy of getting into another campaign combine to give them a little extra zest. They are also a challenge. Players have the weakest decks they will have all campaign and no knowledge of the new mechanisms. First impressions, as they say, mean everything. In previous posts, Speculiction has ranked the Arkham Horror releases and bosses. As such, I thought it would be fun to rank all the opening scenarios, as well.

From worst to first, here they are. Enjoy!

Review of Hard Light by Elizabeth Hand

Elizabeth Hand's Cass Neary series, at the structural level, doesn't poke its nose above ordinary. It's slow burn murder mystery through and through, a saturated genre if ever there were. Where the series gouges its mark is in Neary. Like boiling a frog, the reader slowly realizes they are bound to her vices almost as much as her virtues, and by default bound to the dubious circumstances spiraling around her. Not an archetype, she lives and breathes inner demons, her antagonism serving character and plot. It's that level of credibility which makes the series worthwhile and worth mention whenever the best neo-noir books are discussed. Let's see how third book in the series, Hard Light (2016), continues digging into Neary.

Generation Loss was set on the coast of Maine and Available Dark in Iceland. In the direct aftermath, Hard Light takes readers to London Penniless, Neary finds herself in a dive bar, looking for a means get home to the US. She runs into a goth singer, who takes her to a coke house, which gets her into an art party, which puts her in contact with strange prehistoric artifacts, which... takes the reader on yet another subtly evolving murder mystery that has both feet in a dark, personal reality. No spoiler, the manner in which Hand integrates the physics and chemistry of photography into murder mystery continues to astound.

Review of Moon Dogs by Michael Swanwick

Whether you know it or not, Michael Swanwick has been producing some of the best off-center fantasy fiction since 1980; he plays in the sandbox but uses his toes. What some people also may not know is that Swanwick has also been one of the best voices in non-fiction over that time. He has produced 100+ published essays, and likely just as much content if not more on his blog, in interviews, etc. Swanwick's 2000 collection Moon Dogs features the best of his short fiction between 1991 and 2000 as well as the most relevant of his non-fiction during the same time frame.

Moon Dogs kicks off with the title story. It tells of a young man who goes to a near-drowning clinic in the hopes of purging his thoughts of mortality. After, he rests in the woods and meets a strange woman with a pack of mechanical dogs. Her backstory relevant, the man's sense of mortality takes a dramatic swing in the aftermath of their meeting. This story is the lone, previously unpublished piece in the collection and is an oddly successful combination of gothic and science fiction. It delivers on mood, and, if anything else, is a well written bit of cheap revenge.

A True Phoenixborn: Breaking Down the Ashes: Rise of the Phoenixborn Product Line

In a way, this is a spurious post. Like baby spiders emerging from the egg sac, it's inevitable Ashes: Rise of the Phoenixborn will find its own way in the world, the words below unnecessary. But the game has evolved a couple of times the past ten years, and therefore for people interested, here is a quick and dirty breakdown of Ashes products. Skip to the summary if you just want to know where to start.

Ashes: Rise of the Phoenixborn

The first Ashes product release was the 2015 master set Ashes: Rise of the Phoenixborn. It was popular and spawned expansions: nineteen standard hero packs, three deluxe hero packs (new dice types), tournament play, deckbuilding websites, forum chatter, and all the jazz one associates with a popular collectible card game. Anti-Magic: the Gathering in several ways, the master set offered players a complete, out-of-the-box TCG-esque play experience without the need to chase cards, worry about rarity, etc. The game's design is better for it. All the cover art for the products released during this cycle has a white background.