Short SF Marathon Day 15: Yoon Ha Lee, Rose Lemberg

Yoon Ha Lee, “The Contemporary Foxwife.” Clarkesworld, July 2014.

With three stories in this list, Yoon Ha Lee is the most successfull author on it. It’s well earned for me, as I enjoyed each of the three stories. All three are of a similar kind, science fictional reimaginations of folklore and mythology. In this case the foxwife, from the Japanese (and earlier Chinese) traditions of foxes taking human shape to trick or help; the distinction isn’t always clear. Here, sometime in the far future, a male foxwife appears in the space station flat of a hapless grad student asking her to allow him to do her chores.

This is a rather quiet, domestic story where the sfnal and fantastic elements are there mainly as props to help the protagonist resolve her mundane dillemas. What makes it interesting is that it undercuts the traditional fairytale by having a happy ending by not having the human fuck up their relationship with the foxwife. What’s also interesting and which has echoes in the next story, is the matter of fact use of trans/genderqueer characters here, both arguably the foxwife as well as the roommate.

Yoon Ha Lee, “Wine.” Clarkesworld, January 2014.

In “Wine” it’s the protagonist who’s trans. As the story put it, Loi Ruharn was a gifted but low ranked officer who “came to the Falcon Councilor’s attention as a minor novelty, as a womanform soldier who lived as a man” and was taken as her lover. When their planet is invaded the Council of Five take drastic measures to ensure they will be able to fight off their attackers; Loi disagrees with the methods their mercenaries employ and takes steps to amend them.

This story didn’t need Loi Ruharn to be a trans man; another reason could’ve been found to let him catch the eye of the Falcon Councilor, nor does the story dwell on it other beyond what’s quoted above. With trans characters, as with most other characters not fitting the straigh cis white male template, there’s always the perceived need to have a reason for them to be in a story, rather than just existing. In this case Yoon Ha Lee has it matter in a way that feels natural but then doesn’t make Loi Ruharn into a token. He just is who he is.

Rose Lemberg, “A City on Its Tentacles.” Lackington’s, Winter 2014.

Another sort of fairytale, by somebody I’ve know by name for a year or so now, as somebody both involved in fandom and being spoken off highly by people I trust as a poet and writer. Certainly there is a poetic gleam to this story, of a mother who sells her most precious belongings to help her daughter become better for a few months, at the cost of her own health. It’s clear she has done this before and will need to do this again; as Lemberg makes clear through an encounter in the middle of the story, she also can’t afford to take chances on finding a more permanent solution.

This is a story about the importance of stories and imagination grounded in a reality of life for people without the resources or privilege to make use of it in the way we’re conditioned to see as right by those very same stories. It chimes in well with a blogpost Lemberg just posted on the privilege and necessity of writing and it speaks to a larger debate going through science fiction and fantasy about marginalised voices and the circumstances that make it difficult for so many to get themselves heard.