MEMORIES AND VISIONS: Women's Fantasy and Science Fiction

Fifteen recent tales of feminist f & sf, from authors who have little or no reputation in the field, and sometimes no experience either. So what do we have here? Caro Clarke's intriguing tale of how psi-powered sex drives spaceships beyond the speed of light: a solid, well-wrought tale of ghostly vengeance for Klan murder (Charlotte Watson Sherman); a galactic Hamlet variant (L. Timmel Duchamp): an absorbing evocation of Alexander the Great (R.M. Meluch); Barbara Krasnoff's longer. clever tale of far-future spaceship pilots, drag addiction, and deafness; Laurell K. Hamiltows unpolished yet promising sword and sorcery; a weird Second Coming variant (Nona M. Caspars); clones (Mary Ellen Mathews); smart chimps and literary satire (Kiel Stuart); and networking (Adrienne Lauby). And there's the usual sprinkling of all-but-incomprehensible radical-feminist/separatist/lesbian writings. Uneven in quality but broad in scope and occasionally stimulating: worth a try, even for the uncommitted.