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On Spec: The Canadian Magazine Of The Fantastic vol 18 no. 3 # 66 Fall 2006
01/02/2007 . Source: Donna Jones 
magazine: Copper Pig Writers Society. Price: $ 6.95 (CAN). ISSN: 0843-476X. Distributed in Canada by CMPA and the UK by BAR. Buy On Spec: The Canadian Magazine Of The Fantastic in the USA - or Buy On Spec: The Canadian Magazine Of The Fantastic in the UK  check out website: www.onspec.ca
I couldn't start this review without mentioning the really quirky front cover. 'Rufus' by Richard Yot has a little boy with a light and a teddy bear in his hand. The shadow looming up behind him is of a clawed beast with big teeth and red eyes and horns on its head. Flying around his head is a strange mutant bird that looks equally intimidating!
Derryl Murphy, the fiction editor of 'On Spec', opens this edition with a contemplative editorial about the future of children's Science Fiction. Where has it gone? It seems to be a flood of fantasy, barraging our children into wizard academies and Pullman plot-lines, but where has the SF gone from our children's bookshelves? Understandably, it's an editorial like this that makes me think of my childhood. It wasn't so much Science Fiction that dominated my reading time but horror. Even from my perspective on my past though, I can see the horizon filling up with a children's section full to bursting point of fantasy.
'Sticky Wonder Tales' by Hugh A.D. Spencer is about two characters in constant contact through email. They talk about their lives changing through bacterial mutation and computer software made from alien technology and the consequent problems that befall them because of it. The whole story gets more surreal as the unwitting characters face the prospect that they are becoming less and less like human beings and more abnormal by the day. What ultimately ends this short story is that their mutations have rendered them no longer useful to their respective employers. Sadly, the final revelation that they are brothers only makes your heart break even more for them.
'Finish The Game' by Stephen Leclere was about a man returning to his home town to discover people who have been dead for years suddenly appearing to him in seemingly normal interactions. The story continues like this until he decides to look into his best friend's death at the end of a drawn out stabbing when they were young. At the local library, he finds out that all the people he has met so far, strange as they may have seemed but ultimately very alive, are all in fact dead and in suspicious circumstances. Eventually, he realises that one thing connects the mystery and it's the very cryptic note that has been sent to him drawing him back to the town. A good well-written short that resembles the writing style of two acclaimed authors still writing today in the supernatural-horror genre.
Overall, though, my favourite by far of this issue has to be 'Spiked!' by Saint James Harris Wood. Environmental activists have been all a flutter because of strange goings on at a logging site. While they spike the trees to deter the deforestation, people come out of there with strange tattoos covering them from neck to foot. It all seems a bit hippyish and a bad acid trip put into words until the main characters go into the woods and receive the same fate. In a matter of a few paragraphs, this story changes direction and brings a smile to your face and a question mark hanging over your head. Stumped would be an understatement of how I felt after the 'encounter' that one character has and the strange cryptic statement he is receives. But by the end, it's all totally clear and side-achingly funny. An excellent little read that I really loved.
I don't normally acknowledge those stories that don't really grab my attention or aren't really my taste but 'Silicon Singularity' by Ernie Reimer caught my attention for a more upsetting reason. One woman decides to leave North America to escape a growing culture of embedded neural implants that heighten the senses and give the user increased strength. The woman, a professor of history and anthropology believes that this is diluting humanity. The reason I am involving this one in my review is because it goes from being a really fabulous read to a string of words and moments that fail to emote much in the overall story. It was such a shame and I can't help but grieve that this one was on course to be a real attention grabbing tale, perfectly reflecting the times we could be living in should we let pressures and narrow-mindedness escalate.
Well, another edition draws to a close. One thing I will say is that the diversity of 'On Spec' never fails to impress me. I still love it and its unfailing ability to entertain me with the quirky contrast it involves. Thanks again, On Spec', for a great read!
Donna Jones
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