Analog Jan/Feb 2009 coverThe grandaddy of American SF magazines gets the new year started in fine fashion with an enjoyable January/February 2009 issue. Reviews of the seven stories and one serial installment behind the cut—beware of minor spoilers (but I’ll try not to give away the endings).

John Allemand’s… ahem, vivid cover illustration is for the issue’s lead story, a Rajnar Vajra novella called “Doctor Alien” that gets things started on the right foot. A psychiatrist is dipatched by NASA to the moon-orbiting ship of eccentric alien traders called the Tsf, only to find that his decidedly odd hosts have, in their custody, three completely different alien species they want him to “treat.” Much like the last story by Vajra I read (”Emerald River, Pearl Sky,” Analog Jan/Feb 2007), this story was rich and inventive, with creatively imagined aliens and nifty ideas flying fast and furious. It’s also quite funny—I was especially fond of the hilariously eclectic speech patterns of the Tsf, indicative of the way Vajra seems to revel in the sounds and rhythm of language. The distinct personalities of the various aliens also contributed to the spirit of fun, and I finished it with a big grin on my face. Vajra seems to leave the option open for future stories in this setting, which could be fun in a psychotic psychological “Draco Tavern” kind of way.

Dave Creek’s novelette “Zheng He and the Dragon,” is the latest in the apparently growing subgenre of “alien encounters in history” (other examples include Ian Creasey’s “Silence in Florence,” Asimov’s September 2006, Michael F. Flynn’s mostly amazing novel Eifelheim, and S.P. Somtow’s “An Alien Heresy,” Asimov’s April/May 2008, among others). In this case the year is 1407, and the protagonist is Zheng He, a successful (and, thus, powerful) treasure fleet admiral in the employ of the Emperor of China. When a dragon-like being crashes into the ocean near his flagship, he sees an opportunity to present his Emperor with the most fabulous gift imaginable. Like other stories of this type, this story depends for its effect on dramatic irony, the difference between our modern, “enlightened” perspective and Zheng He’s limited worldview and cultural arrogance. Both Zhang He and his otherworldly visitor are sharply drawn by Creek, and the conflict between their personalities was believable and compelling. A most enjoyable story.

“To Leap the Highest Wall,” a novelette by Richard Foss, makes it three for three, taking us to an alternate 1970. The American space program has been hobbled by Congressional oversight following the destruction of Apollo 8 on re-entry (which didn’t happen in our “real” world), and the Soviets have just become the first to put a manned spacecraft into orbit around the Moon. Foss shows us how the men in Houston Mission Control respond, in the paranoid atmosphere of that Cold War era, when they receive an unexpected communication from the Soyuz orbiter. This was a thought-provoking story that evokes its time (alternate history though it might be) quite convincingly, a sort of sidestream cousin of Apollo 13.

Alas, I found the issue’s two short stories quite a bit less satisfying. John G. Hemry’s “Rocks” gives us an episodic overview of the history of human aggression, all the “progress” in that questionable area revolving around rocks. That idea was kind of interesting for a few pages, but it overstayed its welcome a little—by the end, the point felt a bit bludgeoney. Richard A. Lovett’s Mundane-as-Mundane-could-be “Excellence” tells the story of a former competitive runner in early middle age, offered an experimental procedure that could make him the best in the world, but will surely be followed by a very rapid decline. This is your basic “deal with the devil” tale, and Lovett presents it baldly as such right up front. His narrator/protagonist is a compelling character and we’re given an engaging insight into the morals, motivations and inner conflicts of such a person, but it didn’t really progress much past that initial set-up, and I was left kind of wondering what the point was. Ultimately both shorts remained relatively simple and obvious, and felt like filler.

Happily, the good returns with Edward M. Lerner’s novelette “Small Business,” which takes a setup we’ve seen before—a straightforward young man with a useful skill is lured by a pretty face into a resistance movement of dubious prospects—and drops it into a compelling and well-conceived framework involving a powerful organization methodically turning its technological advantage into an oppressively monopolistic domination of Earth’s burgeoning off-world economy. Solid execution makes the difference—this story is tightly plotted, with serviceable (albeit kind of generic) characters worked convincingly into the politically-charged setting. Also a plus is that Lerner makes a good point about imbalances of power in a capitalist market, without seeming preachy.

Next up is part 3 of Robert J. Sawyer’s serialized novel “Wake“—since I probably won’t be going back to review the previous two issues of Analog anytime soon, I’ll try to summarize the plot here. Caitlin Decter, a teenaged girl blind from birth, undergoes an experimental treatment to restore her sight, involving the use of computers to process the visual information between her eyes and her brain. Meanwhile, a dissident in China tries to overcome that country’s communication blackout following a horrifying government action, a group of researchers studying the intelligence and communicative skills of a very special chimpanzee make some startling discoveries, and an autonomous intelligence evolves inside the Internet. Trust me, it’s all related. I’ve really enjoyed this novel so far, and the third part is no let down. Sawyer’s prose style makes for quick and easy reading, and Caitlin is a most fetching protagonist. There are some flaws—Sawyer overdoes the “waking up” process of the Internet intelligence a bit, and Sawyer frequently resorts to infodumps that only just manage to avoid “As you know, Bob” level. Also, I can’t decide if the story’s saturation with real-world Internet phenomena and real-world scientific personalities is appropriate given the increasingly technological culture in which we live, or if it seems like the author’s a bit too desperate to prove how “in the loop” he is. Still these amount to only minor annoyances, and don’t detract all that much from a story which is rich in worthy ideas about intelligence, culture, and how some of the hugest-seeming differences aren’t really all that large. A thought-provoking story, and I’m looking forward to the conclusion.

The issue’s fiction finishes on a very strong note with an excellent novella by Kristine Kathryn Rusch called “The Recovery Man’s Bargain.” It follows Hadad Yu, a “Recovery Man” who finds objects for paying clients, and doesn’t worry himself too much about whether or not those clients ought to actually possess the objects he finds for them. When a large-scale recovery mission for a very wealthy and powerful client goes terribly wrong and that client promises to ruin Yu as a result, Yu realizes his only hope of salvaging any kind of career for himself is to accept a very dangerous, very troubling mission for the enigmatic aliens called Gyonnese. An interestingly shady main character, aliens and spaceships, and a created universe that has enough detail crowding in at the edges to feel believable and real. In other words, my kind of story. An exciting and most satsfying wrap-up to an issue full of mostly excellent science fiction.

The January/February issue of Analog should be available in bookstores and newsstands until around Christmas, so you have plenty of time to pick it up. I can highly recommend that you do.