From rec.arts.sf.reviews Wed Jun 30 14:01:30 1999 Path: news.ifm.liu.se!news.lth.se!feed2.news.luth.se!luth.se!cyclone.news.idirect.com!island.idirect.com!netnews.com!eecs-usenet-02.mit.edu!bloom-beacon.mit.edu!senator-bedfellow.mit.edu!usenet From: tillman@aztec.asu.edu (P.D. TILLMAN) Newsgroups: rec.arts.sf.reviews Subject: Review: "Emperor Penguins," Joseph Manzione (Jul-Aug ANALOG) Followup-To: rec.arts.sf.written Date: 26 Jun 1999 00:34:26 -0400 Organization: none Lines: 56 Sender: wex@tinbergen.media.mit.edu Approved: wex@media.mit.edu Message-ID: Reply-To: tillman@aztec.asu.edu NNTP-Posting-Host: tinbergen.media.mit.edu X-Newsreader: Gnus v5.3/Emacs 19.34 Xref: news.ifm.liu.se rec.arts.sf.reviews:2386 "Emperor Penguins" by Joseph Manzione Review Copyright 1999 Peter D. Tillman Rating: strong "A" -- Manzione's first world-class story, a legal- political examination of human-alien cultural contact. Don't miss it. Law professor John Renko is going through a bad divorce. His ex-wife has accused him of child abuse. He can't see his kids; they have to sneak behind their mother's back even to call him. So he's not paying much attention to the Aurigean visitors, until one hires him as a legal consultant. Sefira, an Aurigean diplomat, is being divorced back home, and "he" wants help with winning visitation rights for his children, unheard-of in the matrilocal Aurigean culture.... Yes, Emperor penguins are involved. Manzione's world-building is remarkably good. Both human and alien characters are sympathetic and well-drawn. Exposition is a little rough, forgiveable since he's got a lot of background to slip across -- even our best writers have trouble doing this well. The story-line has some unexpected, but logical and thought-provoking, twists. I hope this is the start of many stories of human-Aurigean relations; in any case, you shouldn't miss this one. Easily the best story I've read in Analog this year, and highly recommended. It's paired with an interesting Joseph H. Delaney article on how to write an sfnal law-story. This is Analog's annual double-issue. If you buy only three SF magazines a year, you should pick up this one, plus the Asimov's and F&SF doubles -- all three magazines showcase their best stories in inventory there -- I've never seen a double that wasn't worthwhile. So -- get thee to the newstand! Manzione has just two stories listed in the ISFDB < www.sfsite.com/isfdb/ >, both also published in Analog. "Candle in a Cosmic Wind" (1987, reprinted Dozois Year's Best #5), concerns "a Russian national, fleeing west across the U.S. after a nuclear exchange, runs into an alien landing party on the Utah border." -- from Brian Davies' useful SF Synopses < http://www.ils.nwu.edu/~davies/ > ISTR one or two more recent stories, but, if they exist, they're not indexed on the web (at least not where I looked). I know nothing about the author, although there is a "Joseph Manzione" who teaches at a college in Maine. If you know him, please forward this, to encourage him to write more (more!). Or will Analog forward email to authors? One way to find out: analogsf@erols.com < www.analogsf.com > %T Emperor Penguins %A Joseph Manzione %O Novelette %P 24 pp %J Analog %D Jul-Aug 99 %O $5.50 Read more of my reviews: http://www.silcom.com/~manatee/reviewer.html#tillman