The Leading Edge, no. 26 (October 1992)
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Brigham Young University (Provo, Utah): October 1992. Paperback journal: 144 pages. Suggested retail price: $2.95 (US) Tags: Fantasy; Science Fiction; Short Stories Tactical strength: [5/10] |
This collection of short stories and nonfiction is better than usual for the Leading Edge, but still shows its student origins. Overall the editing is substandard, with many punctuation and consistency errors. This, the poor design of the magazine, and the poor reproduction quality all distract from the content.
This issue also leaned heavily on two factors: Jane Yolen and cyberpunk. Jane Yolen appeared at the BYU science fiction symposium, and her main address and an interview are included. The main address is interesting but often strays from her topic. The interview didn't add much beyond the main address. One Jane Yolen article would have sufficiently covered the event.
Two nonfiction articles try to educate the reader about the cyberpunk movement; both authors seemed to be looking through fog at something they knew was there but couldn't see well enough to describe. I know the authors wanted to tell me something, but I don't know what. The piece of cyberpunk fiction was good -- much better than the typical TLE short fiction, but it had more editing and consistency flaws than most. Again, these were very distracting.
The poetry is not even worth mentioning and should be avoided. Luckily all the poetry was short enough that you don't have to expend much energy to get through.
The TLE staff has an annoying habit of publishing themselves under pseudonyms and then writing some meaningless blurb about the author. In fact, all the blurbs are uninformative and detract from the stories. From the tone of the bylines, you never know if you can take the piece seriously.
My recommendation: if you have run out of professional anthologies of short fiction, read the short fiction in the Leading Edge, but don't read anything else; and then, don't pay to read it, go to the library.
