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Electric Velocipede is one of several current very low budget SF 'zines. These typically consist of a number of sheets of legal-sized paper folded in half and stapled, with a card stock cover and a selection of essays, poetry, and fiction. The latter generally consists of fairly short stories, and, in the typical SF-oriented 'zine of today, these are often experimental or cross-genre in nature. I've seen all three issues of Electric Velocipede to date, and it fits that template pretty well.

This issue includes 7 stories and 6 poems. Authors featured include Neal Barrett, Jr., Catherine Dybiec Holm, Kevin Donihe, Christina Sng, and several more. There are reviews of albums by the progressive rock band Dream Theater, and of Jeff VanderMeer's book City of Saints and Madmen. I have to say the overall quality this time around wasn't up to that of the previous issues. A couple of the stories are relatively straight-forward SF -- normally a pleasant enough thing to see, but these seemed clumsily executed, implausible in both the speculative elements and the plot. Best of the fiction is probably Vincent Sakowski's rather surrealistic "Television Shoes," about a man replacing his eyes with the title shoes. Sandra McDonald's "Opening Night" makes use of a familiar gimmick, but fairly effectively. Dybiec Holm's "The Last Great Chance" features a fairly affecting loser main character, a drunk who encounters aliens when a UFO lands in his backyard. Of the poems, I preferred Lucy Cohen Schneider's "The Copernicker Rebbe".

In sum this issue is a bit of a letdown, but I'm always glad to see someone trying to bring more SF into our lives. I'll keep an eye on editor John Klima's future efforts -- for now this remains a promising but not wholly effective venue.

Rich Horton is an eclectic reader in and out of the SF and fantasy genres. He's been reading SF since before the Golden Age (that is, since before he was 13). Born in Naperville, IL, he lives and works (as a Software Engineer for the proverbial Major Aerospace Company) in St. Louis area. He writes a monthly short fiction review column for Locus. Stop by his website at http://www.sff.net/people/richard.horton.