Everand Logo

Welcome to Everand!

  • Discover millions of ebooks, audiobooks, and so much more with a free trial

    Only $11.99/month after trial. Cancel anytime.

    Aurealis #91
    Aurealis #91
    Aurealis #91
    Ebook126 pages1 hour

    Aurealis #91

    By Stephen Higgins (Editor)

    ()

    Read preview

    About this ebook

    Aurealis #91 The June 2016 issue of the award winning speculative fiction magazine is now available. This latest issue has all of the fiction, non fiction, news and reviews that our readers love and expect. Aurealis has been publishing quality fiction for over 25 years and has discovered many well known authors and illustrators. Find out why so many people rely on Aurealis for their hit of quality Speculative Fiction. Each issue also features up to date reviews and even a dash of humour.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherChimaera Publications
    Release dateJun 7, 2016
    ISBN9781922031471
    Aurealis #91

    Read more from Stephen Higgins (Editor)

    Related to Aurealis #91

    Related ebooks

    Science Fiction For You

    View More
    View More

    Related podcast episodes

    Related articles

    • Article

      Goodbye Gordon

      Jan 21, 2022

      Goodbye Gordon
      7 min read

    • Article

      At a Grandfather’s Knee

      Mar 18, 2022

      At a Grandfather’s Knee
      6 min read

    • Article

      Protected

      Aug 26, 2022

      Protected
      2 min read

    • Article

      Stalking Diary

      Aug 31, 2022

      Stalking Diary
      2 min read

    • Article

      Four Things You Hear

      Jan 1, 2023

      THE HOLLOW OF the oak tree wasn’t dark enough. Zoia squeezed her head between her knees, letting her wool dress mute the sunlight, the sounds of the forest, and the angry knife of grief that found her heart every time she thought about last night. Zo

      7 min read

    • Article

      Ira & the Whale

      Jun 14, 2022

      It is dark in the whale and hot. The air is difficult to breathe. Ira is coated in gunk, sweating in his black Speedo. The whale’s heartbeat booms and echoes like a giant drum. It’s intimidating. It sounds tribal, ritualistic, as Ira wades through th

      15 min read

    • Article

      Dog Days

      Jan 23, 2022

      Dog Days
      8 min read

    • Article

      Three Poems

      May 1, 2019

      Our treasure is to be together. We used to be filthy rich. We had it as good as a ball of worms. We squirmed happily together in caves. We had it so good. We had our old curved nails tearing into pomelos. It was almost too much. One day a cluster wan

      2 min read

    • Article

      Taking Sides

      Apr 1, 2022

      Taking Sides
      7 min read

    • Article

      “Really?”

      Jun 2, 2022

      “Really?”
      6 min read

    • Article

      Hunting For Hokumpoke

      Aug 3, 2021

      Hunting For Hokumpoke
      7 min read

    • Article

      The Kindness of Strangers

      Apr 27, 2020

      The Kindness of Strangers
      5 min read

    • Article

      His Brilliant Career

      Mar 19, 2023

      His Brilliant Career
      9 min read

    • Article

      The Wind Feels Loss

      Aug 8, 2019

      The Wind Feels Loss
      7 min read

    • Article

      Deer Man By Geoffroy Delorme Review – Life In The Wilderness

      Apr 13, 2022

      There’s a dreamy moment halfway through Geoffroy Delorme’s brief, sensuous book in which one of the young deer he gets to know curls up beside him, its head resting on his leg. The image is both touchingly familiar and surreal. A couple of walkers no

      4 min read

    • Article

      Watership Down

      Nov 6, 2017

      Watership Down
      6 min read

    • Article

      To Ring A Nightingale

      May 18, 2022

      To Ring A Nightingale
      5 min read

    • Article

      A Kind of Deep Companionship: The Millions Interviews Jo Ann Beard

      Jun 3, 2021

      When you’re slogging through your day, imagining what else is to come, and you remember that the minute all else is done you can sink down into your book like warm water, and be absorbed while you’re absorbing, is priceless, as they say in capitalism

      6 min read

    • Article

      The Letter box

      Jan 1, 2020

      Dear Cricket, I have read your magazine many times and I love it! It makes me happy when it comes in the mail. I am legally blind and cannot see as well as others, but that’s OK, because I am still very smart. My type of blindness is caused by albini

      7 min read

    • Article

      Closure

      Jan 20, 2020

      Closure
      8 min read

    • Article

      The Right Time

      Oct 14, 2019

      The Right Time
      5 min read

    • Article

      Ricko’s Not-so-modern Life

      Dec 11, 2018

      Ricko DeWilde steps off of a small wooden boat on the Nenana River and onto dry land. The steep, muddy ridge he must ascend to continue our goose hunt is too tall for him to see over the top, but it’s not too tall to climb. He eyes it warily. “I don’

      8 min read

    • Article

      ‘I’m Just Going Outside …’

      Dec 20, 2020

      I plan to spend this summer reading in a hammock in the pear orchard here at Lush Places. So if anyone is looking for me for any reason, other than offering to deliver a boutique gin and elderflower tonic (you can take the girl out of Auckland …) to

      2 min read

    • Article

      On Loss

      Apr 17, 2023

      On Loss
      3 min read

    • Article

      How the Lark Got Her Crest

      May 30, 2023

      How the Lark Got Her Crest
      15 min read

    • Article

      Happy birthday, Darling

      Dec 30, 2020

      DARLING, our English pointer, turns 127 (in dog years) this week. I am proud to report that she can still manage a definite, if slightly shaky, point. Moreover, my response, as I don’t shoot, still annoys her. She will stand, one paw raised, nose dir

      2 min read

    Related categories

    Reviews for Aurealis #91

    0 ratings

    0 ratings0 reviews

    What did you think?

    Tap to rate

    Review must be at least 10 words

      Book preview

      Aurealis #91 - Stephen Higgins (Editor)

      AUREALIS #91

      Australian Fantasy & Science Fiction

      Edited by Stephen Higgins

      Published by Chimaera Publications at Smashwords

      Copyright of this compilation Chimaera Publications 2016

      Copyright on each story remains with the contributor.

      EPUB version ISBN 978-1-922031-47-1

      ISSN 2200-307X (electronic)

      CHIMAERA PUBLICATIONS

      Smashwords Edition License Notes

      This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you're reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to Smashwords.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of the authors, editors and artists.

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

      Contents

      From the Cloud—Stephen Higgins

      Skin Deep—Ika Koeck

      Stern Daughters—Imogen Cassidy

      Why I Hate Tuesday—Carl Purcell

      Dark Fantasy Versus Horror—Claire Fitzpatrick

      Death Rides a Pale Horse Called Binky (but not in my books): An Interview with Jennifer Fallon (Part 2)—Chris Large

      Secret History of Australia—Edward ‘Crispy’ McPherson—Researched by Stephen Higgins

      Next Issue

      Credits

      From the Cloud

      Stephen Higgins

      I’m reading the greats. Michael Pryor gave me a few Robert Silverberg novels and I am ploughing through them. The great shame about the decline in the numbers of bookshops has meant that there is a steep decline in the visibility of the SF backlist. As more and more people access ebooks, the problem gets worse. Unless an old… sorry, established author has just had an old novel become the subject of a major release film, they just don’t appear on iBooks. You really need to search hard to get a hold of the significant works from way back then. Unless you happen upon reviews of various authors and you feel inclined to read reviews of ‘old’ novels, you miss out.

      Take Robert Silverberg. Many of his most significant and highly regarded works were first published in the 70s. Of course he has produced some wonderful and valuable work since then, but that was when he really hit his straps. Silverberg is not just prolific; he is immensely talented. The only reason Michael gave me his books was that we had a discussion about well-known authors we had not read, and he was my contribution. Both Michael and Dirk Strasser thought I should read him, and I value their opinions. After a couple of short novels, I did wonder why Silverberg had escaped my attention. Oh I know about him and his reputation, but I had not read a single word of his. My loss, belatedly rectified. I can heartily recommend him. Try The Book of Skulls or Downward to the Earth. There are many others, in both fantasy and science fiction, but these are the ones that have impressed me so far.

      Why not investigate some authors for yourselves? We all know the names Asimov, Clarke, Dick, Aldiss, etc etc. Find out why we all know them.

      All the best from the cloud.

      Stephen Higgins

      Back to Contents

      Skin Deep

      Ika Koeck

      The wolf pup twisted and squirmed, yelping, his whimper growing louder as he tried to pry his leg free. The metal teeth of the trap bit deep into his bone; the chain attached to it anchored in the ground so he could not dig himself free. Thrashing on the ground the pup growled, howled, and in his agony knew that he would die that day. His young packmates, the ones left behind while the adults went out to hunt, fled the moment they saw his predicament. They knew better than to tempt their fate, as he had. They knew, as he did, that their survival depended on secrecy and on steering clear of the game trail the two-legged skin wearers frequented in their hunts. What a fool he was, to think he could slip past the traps when others had failed. The pup howled again. Desperate to free himself, he began to chew his mangled leg.

      Twigs snapped. Birds scattered from the trees. Between the sounds of their panicked flight and screeches that spoke of death, a shadow crept into view. So quickly and so near now that he could hear its breath and see its teeth gleaming in the sunlight. Frightened into utter stillness, the pup with half of his leg still caught in the trap, only stared as the skin-wearer approached. He locked eyes with his hunter, saw the terror reflected behind the two-legged beast’s equally wide eyes. His attempt at a fierce growl died in a whimper while the skin-wearer, hands trembling, brought its spear up for a lethal thrust.

      Steel flashed and the pain that stabbed his side drowned his sight of the world. The dark grew and grew, stilled his breath and ended his pain. He drifted away into nothingness, and heard the distant howls of his kin shattering the forest’s peace.

      His father always said he was too brave for his own good.

      * * *

      You’re a coward, boy. Houndstooth is no place for cowards.

      Rod tried to shake that thought away but it was no use. He could still hear his father’s voice through the wolf’s dying whimpers. Could almost see the snarl on the great hunter’s lips when he spoke those words, a look now reflected on the wolf’s face as it convulsed. It pervaded his thoughts with such intensity that for a moment the boy once again felt the weight of his father’s disappointment, crushing him.

      When the twitching animal stilled, Rod blinked and stared, half in shock and half in despair at what he had just done. He tossed his spear aside in disgust. Rod couldn’t decide which was worse: the sound of the wolf pup’s final breath wheezing or the sight of the thick, black blood that was now pooling at his feet. It was his nose that decided for him in the end. The smell of blood and piss was too much for the boy to bear. Rod stumbled to the nearest tree and retched.

      ‘Uncle Stian, he’s over here.’ His brother’s voice was a whisper in the shadows.

      Shit. How did they find me so quickly?

      Rod wiped his mouth and straightened himself as he prepared to face his uncle and brother. They were little more than blurred black shapes in the distance at first, lurking in the bushes with a silence more predatory than the animals they hunted for sport.

      The hunters looked like animals themselves, his uncle wearing a beautiful white leopard’s hide with its head covering the top of his skull. His brother was clad in a black wolf’s fur, a beast he had hunted down on his tenth birthday. But it wasn’t the men that troubled him. It was the phantom of each animal, skulking not three feet away, watching them. If Rod hadn’t already emptied his stomach he would have heaved at the sight of the phantom beasts, following them like shadows.

      ‘By the Gods, Rodgild. You’ve actually done it! And on the last month before you turn fifteen. What is it? A wolf? Let us see.’ He clapped the boy’s shoulder and knelt next to the trap. Rod looked away and shuddered as the spirit of the leopard, a female, sidled up to them and rubbed her cheek against him. The phantom’s touch was like a breath of frost to his skin. The leopard nudged her head against Stian’s side too but the gesture passed unnoticed, as it always did. How Rod wished his uncle could feel that touch.

      It was not the prolonged silence that followed that troubled him. It was the way his uncle’s jaws moved, as though he was biting down a curse. Stian’s face had settled into the same expression he would wear when he sighted a storm in the distance or

      Enjoying the preview?
      Page 1 of 1