Little Faces

by Vonda N. McIntyre

How will people deal with the immense distances and times of interstellar space?

First published in SciFiction, “Little Faces” was nominated for a Nebula Award.

Genres: Science Fiction, Short Stories, Fiction

36 pages, ebook

First published January 1, 2005

About the author

Vonda Neel McIntyre was a U.S. science fiction author. She was one of the first successful graduates of the Clarion Science fiction writers workshop. She attended the workshop in 1970. By 1973 she had won her first Nebula Award, for the novelette "Of Mist, and Grass and Sand." This later became part of the novel Dreamsnake, which won both the Hugo and Nebula Awards. The novelette and novel both concern a female healer in a desolate primitivized venue. McIntyre's debut novel was The Exile Waiting which was published in 1975. Her novel Dreamsnake won the Nebula Award and Hugo Award for best novel in 1978 and her novel The Moon and the Sun won the Nebula in 1997. She has also written a number of Star Trek and Star Wars novels, including Enterprise: The First Adventure and The Entropy Effect. She wrote the novelizations of the films Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan, Star Trek III: The Search for Spock, and Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home.

Reviews

[Anna Hepworth · Rating 5 out of 5]

Weirdly creepy, verging on body horror, particularly with the opening scene. A far future very alien setting, although I read this as the way humans had evolved themselves away from the current standard, not as a truly alien species, and I am not entirely sure that that is warranted.

[Lin · Rating 5 out of 5]

Can't believe Vonda N McIntyre wrote this and little sisters when she was like 60... I love that an older woman writer is out there being horny about reproduction and body modification in a really stressful and compelling way. This rules

[Jamie · Rating 4 out of 5]

Holy fuck this was wild. Normally any kind of body horror squicks me out, but this was just such a weird and fascinating take on gender, biology, reproduction, space travel, etc etc that I didn’t even care about the squick factor. So good.

[BBFlyer · Rating 3 out of 5]

Strange story.

[James · Rating 3 out of 5]

Really weird.

[Jennifer · Rating 5 out of 5]

This was very strange and beautiful. I didn’t fully understand it, but I’ll be thinking about it for a long time.

[Sami Sundell · Rating 4 out of 5]

Little Faces starts with a murder, but not exactly the kind you're used to. The story is set in a world of women; men are parasites, little faces feeding on their host and providing means for reproduction.

It's an interesting premise, and an interesting story. There's murder and betrayal, but also deep friendship, love, a community passsing judgment, and, finally, a bright future. A harsh beginning morphs into a hopeful ending.

[Spiegel · Rating 3 out of 5]

I liked this, so weirdly alien and fascinating exploration of gender dynamics, although the writing felt a little stilted.

[Amanda · Rating 2 out of 5]

This is not really my type of story. For what it was I think it was good, but I don't love this sort of thing.