The Readers’ Guide

What’s in Issue 421

Novel	Jonas correctly guesses in which hospital he was born and obtains an official birth certificate. Will it be good enough for the Bureau of Personal Information Protection? Judging by the architecture of the building in which the Bureau is located, all bets are off: Ásgrímur Hartmannsson, Error, chapter 9
Serials	The real and fake Roxies square off for a shoot-out, but the Sheriff has a steady aim this time and comes to the rescue. Or so it seems, for a moment... Glenn Gray, A Day in the Cornfield, part 13 Mark Twain, Sam Saperstein and others pop back and forth through time in the mysterious subway tunnel: Rob Hunter, Mark Twain in Milan, part 3; part 4.
Short Stories	New contributor Berdine Jordan portrays the grief of a mother who loses her son to a very peculiar mental disorder: Missing Morgan, part 1; conclusion. New contributor Christopher Lee Kneram reports the diary of a spacefarer marooned on the Sun: The Wreck of the Perihelion Siren, part 1; conclusion. Does nature have a music all its own? Sometimes a mother and daughter do: Mary B. McArdle, Highway Orchestrations. Do not be quick to scorn an apparently narrow-minded old man if he insists on authenticity: P. F. White, How I Became an Electric Nun.
Flash Fiction	If an oracle warned you of danger, would you be superstitious to heed it? Gary Inbinder, Deviled Spam. New contributor Monica Valentinelli employs the well-known fact that messages come in containers. But what if the container itself is a message, one that the sender does not want to be received? The Message.
Poetry	Rebecca Lu Kiernan, Element
Short Poetry	Oonah V. Joslin, Stick Dressing

Departments

Translation	Carmen Ruggero, tr., El Arte poético — Bill Bowler, Ars poetica
Welcome	*Bewildering Stories* welcomes Berdine Jordan, Christopher Lee Kneram, Cheryl W. Ruggiero and Monica Valentinelli.
The Critics’ Corner	Cheryl W. Ruggiero and Don Webb, Naming Characters
Challenge	Challenge 421 channels The Raider of the Spanish Main.
Letters	Oonah V. Joslin, When Poets Meet
The Reading Room	Kenneth Weene, Widow’s Walk excerpt
The Art Gallery	Üzeyir Lokman Çaycı, Postmodern Conductor NASA: Picture of the Day Earth Observatory Picture of the Day Our Earth as Art *Sky and Telescope*, This Week’s Sky at a Glance

Randomly selected Bewildering motto:

Randomly selected classic rejection notice:

Bewildering Stories’ official mottoes:

“Poems are not made with ideas; they are made with words.” — Stéphane Mallarmé
Ars longa, vita brevis. Rough translation: “Proofreading never ends.”

To Bewildering Stories’ schedule: In Times to Come

Readers’ reactions are always welcome.
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