Comment 735 on “If You Were a Dinosaur, My Love”

1. karen says:

   at 5:23 AM

   this is a 3.5 stars, because it balances out my two readings of it s a perfectly good story on the first reading it s engaging, it inspires emotions, it sets up an unusual situation and brings the reader trippingly along on the journey, hypnotized by its nursery rhyme cadence i finished it and i thought, huh i liked that just fine why all the low ratings on here so i put on my dora the explorer hat and oh of this old battle over awards and genre specificity and sad puppies if you re new to this [...]

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2. Lyn says:

   at 5:23 AM

   Thank you Althea Ann for introducing me to this short work and to Apex Magazine.Poignant, meditative, thought provoking Rachel Swirsky playfully draws the reader in and then opens the door to sorrow and regret The narrator is grasping for meaning in a situation that is senseless and without redemption Brief, poetic and powerful.

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3. Groot says:

   at 5:23 AM

   While it s true that it isn t SF, that s not why I give it 1 star It s simply a brutally racist hate piece Oh, it s racist against white rednecks who presumably marry their own sisters, so it s OK Not.

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4. Peter Wendt says:

   at 5:23 AM

   I just can t I have no words Best I can do is give it the award winning Nebula, Hugo nominated ONE STAR it deserves.

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5. Corey says:

   at 5:23 AM

   Well it was shorter than most blog posts Is it a story Is it poetry Is it a word picture Rambling thoughts Disappointingly, it doesn t strongly present as any of these It s too short to be a story, too ugly to be poetry, too disjointed to be a word picture, too deliberate to be stream of consciousness What exactly is it There was no pining for what was missed, no harkening to the beauty or love that was lost Only empty wishes and violence the very thing that took him away And for what reason is [...]

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6. Sam Julian says:

   at 5:23 AM

   Redefines the notion of speculative fiction as heroic hypothetical I wish there was story to it, and if we re being honest it s probably not 5 stars but I believe in affirmative action.

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7. Rankovich says:

   at 5:23 AM

   This is a pretty good exercise in Bathos, but it is clear that this was not the intent of the writing.There are good, unserious stories, where the writer winks from behind the page This is not one of them Indeed, it s not even a story, per se, much less Speculative Fiction it won an award for the latter If You Were A Dinosaur, My Love tries to be very, very, very serious and very, very, very emotional, but it s clumsy love song with murder fantasy tacked on.The first few paragraphs seem to meet [...]

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8. Jokoloyo says:

   at 5:23 AM

   I thank Althea Ann for her review that introduce me to this work.It is a poetic short story with poetic style that gripped me into the story And without long over flowery words, the story showed me a shattered happiness and wishful thinking.Despite the Hugo Nominee and Nebula Award, I suggest not to expect a science fiction or even a fantasy story It is a beautifully written story, but the fantasy elements are just metaphors in my opinion.

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9. Juan says:

   at 5:23 AM

   This is a remarkably disturbing work, seemingly patterned using the structure of the Preschooler s story If You Give a Mouse a Cookie Disturbing for it furthering a bigoted stereotype of the working class five blustering men soaked in gin and malice at a pool hall as people who readily inflict thoughtless violence against anybody different from them Disturbing for its attempt to paint revenge fantasy in a positive light But most of all, disturbing for relaying images that are, to put it bluntly, [...]

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10. Arcticus says:

    at 5:23 AM

    I read this story just after the 2014 Hugo awards because I d read the accusations being thrown around on both sides and wanted to make my own mind up about what was going on The SPs held it up as an example of a story that was only nominated for the Hugos and given a Nebula because of politics, whereas the anti SPs claimed it was an example of a brilliant story that the SPs hated for political reasons.My initial reaction was one of being completely underwhelmed The characterisation such as ther [...]

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11. Althea Ann says:

    at 5:23 AM

    A new Kyle Murchison Booth story Monette fans will be delighted to be granted another encounter with her archivist See The Bone Key for book show 2 Here, when called upon to catalog a rather disappointing collection of 19th century literature, Booth has an uncomfortable and unexpected encounter with family curses and the paranormal.Merged review A poetic, short piece utilizing a thought association format to gradually reveal a tragic scenario.This was a Hugo nominated piece we read several shor [...]

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12. Flange says:

    at 5:23 AM

    How did SF speculative fiction fall this low I read this because of the fuss it caused and I wish I hadn t The SF of my youth is long gone and been replaced with dreadful message fiction written by charlatans.I don t mind eccentric or different if it s done with talent and skill This isn t It s just poorly written fan fiction elevated to prominence by a political clique.

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13. Archit Ojha says:

    at 5:23 AM

    Read this one during a bus ride.Title was enough to make me laugh Without thinking much about its genre, I read and enjoyed it.Poetic and marvelous.

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14. Meghan says:

    at 5:23 AM

    You can read it, too, right here.

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15. VirtualReader says:

    at 5:23 AM

    You can read it here for free, but it isn t worth it apex magazine if you wI ve read some good short stories about Sci Fi or Fantasy But this isn t one It s not even Sci Fi or Fantasy The 3 Sci Fi Fantasy awards that it won are not a sign that it s a good story They re a sign that the Hugo awards et al have been taken over by people who understand nothing about Sci Fi and Fantasy, don t care about the readers, and are trying to push a political agenda.The story is like a picture book, without pi [...]

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16. Anya says:

    at 5:23 AM

    If You Were a Dinosaur, My Love sounds like something you might say to your lover when it s 2 am and you re feeling whimsical or half sleepy I tend to spew the soppiest shit when I m half asleep or high drunk It was sweet and emotive but I can see what the bashingapalooza was all about and while the story is lovely, it doesn t have a sci fi element Oh, well.

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17. Byron says:

    at 5:23 AM

    How did something without a story win the Nebula for best short story There s a reason the readership of SFF has been shrinking, and it s thinking that gives this work awards A needy, whiny work, there is nothing to comprehend here, nevermind see Please, move along for sanity s sake.

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18. Kestrel says:

    at 5:23 AM

    I m not going to rate this, because sometimes if you give a bad rating to the wrong person, they ll have you removed from I know they can t ban everyone who didn t like this poem, because that would be everyone, but still, I won t take the chance.Now, you might think I m some kind of cruel weirdo for posting a negative review about some little girl s poetry Not at all There are plenty of tweens who dream of growing up to be writers, and most of them end up doing something less productive, like m [...]

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19. Wrangler says:

    at 5:23 AM

    If this was supposed to be a whimsical rip off of Kipling s epic If, I didn t get it.Didn t like it, but I ll give it 2 stars since it only take a few minutes to digest And hey, it was free to read, so that s a plus.

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20. Salman Mehedy Titas says:

    at 5:23 AM

    This is my first story by the author, and I m at a loss here I m trying to search for adequate words that could explain how touched I was by this little piece of writing I feel like saying this is witty, funny, and has a level of emotional depth that can only be understood when you reach the end of the story I have already said these things in simple words, but I don t think it does justice to the story This review clearly fails to explain how I felt after reading the story I m grasping for the [...]

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21. Dan Duff says:

    at 5:23 AM

    Read this from the Hugo package Still can t believe that a publisher put this in print, let alone that it was award worthy Don t waste your time.

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22. Claude Rains says:

    at 5:23 AM

    Seriously The only people soaked in gin and malice these days are angry homosexuals, not knuckle dragging dudes in a pool hall.3 problems with this work 1 This is not speculative fiction Thus, it is inaccurate in the extreme for the story to be awarded a Nebula and nominated for a Hugo.2 The quality is what one would expect of a grade school student venturing into creative writing for the first time Think Ralphie s breathless essay on the Red Ryder air rifle in the movie A Christmas Story.3 This [...]

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23. Scholar-At-Arms says:

    at 5:23 AM

    This piece got a lot of attention after its Hugo and Nebula nominations Those awards are for the best science fiction fantasy stories in a given year, according to WorldCon and the WSFA, respectively The difficulty in this case is that IYWAD,ML is neither science fiction, nor fantasy, nor a story It s a brief prose poem about a woman whose fiancee was beaten to death by generic bigots who hurled out generic insults The emotion of grief carries through strongly, but everything else is gibberish A [...]

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24. Danielle T says:

    at 5:23 AM

    Hugo Awards were handed out last night, with the fandom community triumphing over politicking puppies This story was nominated for last year s and was cited by pups as why SF F is apparently in decline, so naturally it has to be a good one, right While it s on the border of being defined as speculative fiction, I do think it s a beautifully composed work, using science fiction as a medium for the narrator to work through a painful event.

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25. Nick says:

    at 5:23 AM

    A short work that was foolishly nominated for an award it did not qualify for as it is neither science nor fiction What is most odd is that the author ends up attacking the fictional fianc for the same reason the gin soaked straw men do Which makes it strangely self loathing.

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26. Mmaster says:

    at 5:23 AM

    I, uh What I didn t really get it, maybe I read it too fast.At the same time, I don t understand the utter hatred it gets I m so confused.

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27. Eric Franklin says:

    at 5:23 AM

    A super short story with a twist that pulls together some somber strings related to intolerence and violence against the other The story is tightly written, doesn t overstay it s welcome, and quickly insinuates its way into your conscience I suspect that s why all the reward committees picked up on it You can read this in several minutes, and for free, here apex magazine if you w

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28. Ariya says:

    at 5:23 AM

    Beautiful and very sad Swirsky just wrote 5 pages and won Nebula Award for short story That s totally something.

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29. Bryan says:

    at 5:23 AM

    Not science fiction, but very well written An interesting story, and a quick read It s not something I d like to see catch on , as this works partially because it s quite unique.

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30. Erika says:

    at 5:23 AM

    Gorgeous and heartbreaking and gorgeous Did I mention gorgeous

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