Finishing on a downstroke

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Of the four stories remaining in The Best of World SF, Volume 2, edited by Lavie Tidhar, I skipped one, which happens to be a novella. The other three are not up to the standard of the earlier stories in the volume, but are of moderate interest.

"Between the Firmanents" by Neon Yang (Singapore). I got a page or two into this novella, realized it was going into hellish territory, and skipped out. It is fantasy, with no hint of the "science" of SF. The "gods" portrayed are as wicked and lascivious as the old Greek and Roman deities, or perhaps more so.

"Whale Snows Down" by Kim Bo-Young, translated by Sophie Bowman. Told from the viewpoint of deep-sea dwellers such as anglerfish and siphonophores (as this image, from NOAA), it consists mainly of ruminations and conversations among those dwellers regarding the sudden increase, oceans-wide, of "marine snow" (organic detritus from things that die at the surface or in shallower water). The denizens conclude that the humans have finally done themselves in. It's odd: whales are depicted as having gills. Possibly the translator mistranslated a word for "baleen". This is the best of these three.

"The Gardens of Babylon" by Hassan Blasim, translated by Jonathan Wright. This story and the one that follows circle back on themselves, in different ways. Both are fantasy, although somewhat technological fantasy. This one is slightly better written than the other.

"The Farctory" by K.A. Teryna, translated by Alex Shvartsman. "Farctory" is but one of several words that get an inserted letter or two ("cola just to keep the reader off balance. The other imagery follows suit.

The volume ends with a letdown, although there are a couple of interesting ideas here also. Overall, Best, V2 is well worth reading.