I found Allegory E-zine in my Novel & Short Story Writers Market guide. I was looking for science fiction and fantasy fiction magazines to help me with writing my fiction. The issue that I stumbled upon was Volume 19/46 – Fall 2012, which is now in their Archives. To read “Job Hunting” by Diana Parparita and “The Man of Many Tongues” by Jake Waters you’ll need to purchase the issue, but it’s well worth the money. Each story stood out in my mind for different reasons.
Job hunting, who likes it? No really, who? It’s a grueling process of putting on your best and being on your best behavior and despite your best efforts you’re forced to leave still wondering. Parparita really has fun with this idea. In this story, it’s an older dragon that is being interviewed for the job of dragon. Immediately this makes you laugh. The interviewer is snotty, mean and attempts to use ageism to prevent the dragon from getting the job, but during a mock battle(spoiler, sorry) the dragon eats the interviewer and takes her job. The story moved along at an amazing pace, with lively dialogue, and interesting characters. This is a must read for after a bad interview.
The other story that I found enjoyable but creepy was “The Man of Many Tongues”. I was originally attracted to the story by the authors bio in which it said he was a Peace Corps Volunteer(PCV). This was intriguing to me, because I too was a PCV and I’m always fascinated by other Peace Corps writers. The use of language really resonated with me, as I could sympathize with the characters language frustrations during service training. The pace of the story at one point made me feel it was long, but in hindsight I feel the story moved along at the right pace to really immerse the reader in the story and amp up the creepy factor. The main characters are not people who I would want to cross in a dark ally, but thankfully I don’t have any language skills that they would envy. It’s a great story and I’m looking forward to reading more of Jake’s writing.
In this current issue there are two stories that I’m fascinated with “The Boy” by Norm Hendricks and “Brownie Bites” by Melinda Moore. “Brownie Bites” attracted my attention because well it says brownie. I like brownies, I didn’t think I could go wrong. Add in a little magic and I was right. This is a really cute story about a woman who wants to make a better life for her unborn child. The characters drive and her persistence are admiral qualities and make her a charming heroine. “The Boy” is a powerful story heavy in science fiction. I would need a whole blog post to talk about this story. In a sentence though: This story has great pace, true characters, good concept and execution a must read.
Hellar Reviews 