Aurealis #144

By Dirk Strasser (Editor)

Aurealis 144 is bursting at the seams with speculative fiction wonders, from the mysterious encounters in Devil-May-Care by Michael Gardner, the quirky and ingenious Ask Bernard by Greg Foyster to the subtle and well-crafted worldbuilding of Pygmalion by J D Moyer. Our compelling non-fiction includes an interview with writer G R Matthews plus Lachlan Walter’s timely investigation of Indigenous Australian Science Fiction. Of course, we always have a huge Reviews section and our internal artwork is second to none. Aurealis—a gift from the gods.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Chimaera Publications
• Release date: Sep 5, 2021
• ISBN: 9781922471093

Dirk Strasser (Editor)

Dirk Strasser has written over 30 books for major publishers in Australia and has been editing magazines and anthologies since 1990. He won a Ditmar for Best Professional Achievement and has been short-listed for the Aurealis and Ditmar Awards a number of times. His fantasy novels – including Zenith and Equinox – were originally published by Pan Macmillan in Australia and Heyne Verlag in Germany. His children’s horror/fantasy novel, Graffiti, was published by Scholastic. His short fiction has been translated into a number of languages, and his most recent publications are “The Jesus Particle” in Cosmos magazine, “Stories of the Sand” in Realms of Fantasy and “The Vigilant” in Fantasy magazine. He founded the Aurealis Awards and has co-published Aurealis magazine for over 20 years.

Book preview

AUREALIS #144

Edited by Dirk Strasser

Published by Chimaera Publications at Smashwords

Copyright of this compilation Chimaera Publications 2021

Copyright on each story remains with the contributor

EPUB version ISBN 978-1-922471-09-3

ISSN 2200-307X (electronic)

CHIMAERA PUBLICATIONS

Smashwords Edition License Notes

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Hard copy back issues of Aurealis can be obtained from the Aurealis website: www.aurealis.com.au

Contents

From the Cloud—Dirk Strasser

Devil-May-Care—Michael Gardner

Ask Bernard—Greg Foyster

Pygmalion—J. D. Moyer

Indigenous Futurism and Indigenous Australian Approaches—Lachlan Walter

Dying for Answers with G R Matthews—Chris Foster

Reviews

Next Issue

Submissions to Aurealis

Credits

From the Cloud

Dirk Strasser

Have you ever had one of those conversations? Where the person finds out you’re into fantasy and science fiction and they say that, although they love the Game of Thrones series, they would never read a fantasy book.

I’ve had that conversation recently.

What do you say to that?

I asked her why.

Her response was revealing. She was obviously well-read, mentioning that she usually read the Booker prize winner after it’s announced. She waffled a bit about the reason for not reading fantasy, but it ultimately came down to that it’s not literature. She obviously wanted people to know she read Booker prize winners, but never fantasy.

I read because I enjoy it. It’s fairly simple. If I like something I’ll continue with it and seek out other books by the same author. If I don’t like it, I stop reading. I haven’t read a lot of Booker prize winners as a result.

I’ve come to the conclusion that a lot of people read for a different reason. They read to impress others. They read to be able to tell other people what they’ve read. They read to boast.

Outside the speculative fiction community, you usually don’t get any brownie points for saying you read fantasy. It often gets dismissed, trivialised, even mocked.

And yet Game of Thrones was the most watched series of all time. (Stranger Things and The Walking Dead were two and three.)

So there are a lot of people who are happy to say they watch speculative fiction, but not read it.

Which brings me to a quote from the writer, producer and creator of another series that makes it into the top 15 most watched series of all time—and one of my other favourites: Vikings.

I’ll quote him in full. Michael Hirst says,

‘People hate me for it in a way, but I do draw this distinction between Game of Thrones and Vikings. Because Game of Thrones is a fantasy, anything can happen, so people can come back to life and dragons can fly. I’m not saying it’s bad, it’s great, very accomplished. Because anything can happen, it’s actually meaningless. It doesn’t obey any of the laws of geography or biology or anything, and I’m very proud of the fact that Vikings is real, at least it’s based on real people and real events. We make it as real as we can. We don’t use much greenscreen. Our actors actually drag boats up hills, row and fight, so it’s a very real undertaking.’

Don’t get me started on the naivety of what he’s saying here!

Okay… I can’t help it. I’m going to get started.

Michael Hirst should be proud of his series, but he should be ashamed of his boastful lack of understanding about fantasy. The ‘anything can happen in fantasy’ bit is gob-smackingly ignorant of what it takes to build a consistent fantasy world, create characters and structure a plotline within it. How easy is it in comparison to base it on existing geography, biology or historical figures! What’s more meaningless: retelling a story that already exists, or creating something new?

And he doesn’t even realise that, with its merging of Norse mythology and mysticism with historic facts, Vikings is a classic fantasy. The fantasy elements are a key to its success. Well done, Michael Hirst. You’re one of us, and you don’t even know it.

All the best from the cloud!

Dirk Strasser

Editor: Dirk Strasser

Dirk Strasser has won several Australian Publisher Association Awards and a Ditmar for Best Professional Achievement. His short story, ‘The Doppelgänger Effect’, appeared in the World Fantasy Award-winning anthology, Dreaming Down Under (Tor). Dirk’s fantasy trilogy The Books of Ascension (Pan Macmillan) and short stories have been translated into several languages. The short story version of Conquist was published in Dreaming Again (HarperCollins). His screenplay of Conquist was a Finalist at the 2019 Cinequest Film & Creativity Festival, Richmond International Film Festival, the Fresh Voices Original Screenplay Competition and the Byron Bay Film Festival. He has co-edited Australia’s premiere speculative fiction magazine Aurealis for over 120 issues and founded the Aurealis Awards. www.dirkstrasser.com.

Associate Editor: Scott Vandervalk

Scott Vandervalk has been a freelance editor for over eight years, with projects ranging across the globe, from educational textbooks to novels, short stories, roleplaying games and boardgames, amongst other types of text. Scott has previously worked in science and education support, both of which have led to editing projects related to those fields. When not editing, Scott can also be found dabbling in gardening, cooking, writing or designing and playing games. Scott currently serves as president of the Bendigo Writers’ Council. Website: scottvandervalk.com.

Back to Contents

Devil-May-Care

Michael Gardner

It wasn’t easy being friends with Harrick Asmodeus. It was harder working for him. His best years were behind him—and I mean well behind him—but there was no convincing Harrick he was finished. More than talent, more than the connections he’d made, the thing that had taken him to the top was a laser sharp sense of entitlement and self-belief. It was his superpower.

‘So, what do you reckon? A winner, yes?’ he said, grinning that cosmetically whitened grin. He was practically hopping on the spot, which, with his greying hair, bags under the eyes, and sagging skin around the neck and jowls, made him look like a vulture walking through a hot desert. He smelled of stale cigarette smoke, and leather.

I sat at my oak desk, the only nice piece of furniture in my cheap, rented office, and sighed deeply. I glanced out the window, taking in the shitty view of the red brick wall of the next building over. On the street below, two cats were hissing at each other, fighting over scraps from a bin.

I technically hadn’t been Harrick’s agent for five years. He sacked me when I finally confronted him about his overdue bill. He’d responded with a deluge of horrible comments about my mother. Indicated that he wished he’d never taken pity on me in high school. Reminded me that he’d made me who I was today. And then reluctantly offered me copyright to his first album—Destructor—which at least streamed moderately well, unlike the recent car crashes that had sent his career into a death spiral. After he’d signed it over to me, he’d stormed out of my office, and had sworn he’d never return again.

But he had come back. Often. We now worked on a contract by-contract basis.

‘I don’t know, Harry,’ I said, turning back to regard him. He was still moving from leg to leg, leather jacket squeaking, the chain around his waist jangling. I wondered if he was back on the gear. But that was unfair. He’d always been twitchy, energetic, pumping all of his focus into one thing until karma or the universe or some goddamned thing told him it was time to toss his baby aside and move onto the next.

‘Come on, gov,’ he said. Somewhere along the line he’d affected a subtle cockney accent, even though he was as Australian as me. ‘Reality shows are big. And if fucking Dave Navarro can host Ink Master, I sure as fuck can host this.’

‘I’m not