Reviews

12-30-2003: Rich Horton on sff.discuss.short-fiction:

M. C. A. Hogarth continued to impress with her series, somewhat reminiscent of Ursula Le Guin, about aliens who have three sexes and can change sexes during their lives. There were two this year, both nice: "Unspeakable" and "Freedom, Spiced and Drunk".

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5-23-2002: Daniel E. Blackston in a SFReader.com column:

Speaking of affordable... our link to free fiction this bi-week is a real gem! "Freedom, Spiced and Drunk", by M.C.A. Hogarth is a stunning story available absolutely free from STRANGE HORIZONS. This story, posted May 27th 2002, packs in more originality in the short story form than we've encountered in ages. Hogarth's ingenious conceits harmonize like the inspired melodies of a jazz virtuoso and his penetrating parodies on gender mutation, social hierarchy, and the nature of mysticism are mesmerizing. You can count on a more detailed review of the fiction at STRANGE HORIZONS in a future column. While you're waiting, click over and read this piece, an unqualified triumph of creativity and a thought-provoking SF you're sure to remember after you shut your computer down.

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6-7-3003: Michael J. Jasper in Tangent Online:

M.C.A. Hogarth's "Freedom, Spiced and Drunk" tells the story of Kediil, a young alien struggling with the changes happening both inside his/her/its body and those occurring to his/her/its fellow aliens. It's a fascinating story of mutable genders, in which members of a race can become either female anadi, male emodo, or the powerful neuter gender, the eperu. Both anadi and emodo run the risk of "the slavery of the mind-free," a premature senility that can come as a result of childbirth in a female, or extreme exertion in a male. When a solution to this senility is raised, Kediil fights against her mentor to share this solution, despite its side effects. There are no easy moral answers in this imaginative tale strongly reminiscent of the work of Ursula LeGuin, and Hogarth is to be commended for that. There are a few missteps (at one point the emodo are described as having clever hands, then at another point they are described as clumsy; also, the ending felt a bit predictable, and the protagonist is passive at the very end), but overall this tale of a unique culture is fascinating and – as a story such as this should – a source of enlightenment upon our own world and cultures.

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5-1-2002: Javier Romero in TaleWarez (Spanish):

This is the story of a unique culture whose members can change their sex between the three they have, but in two of them can run the risk of premature senility. This is a story reminiscent of the work of Le Guin, with a fascinating ending. (Translation)

Go to the TaleWarez archive.