The Boy Who Sang for Others: 02/07/09

Here it is February and I'm still working my way through the January issue of The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction. I'm taking the issue slow knowing that after the March issue the magazine is going bimonthly.

"The Boy Who Sang for Others" by Michael Meddor is a tale of possession. It's tone is similar to "Rising Waters" (the classic reprint for this issue) and it's written in a mountain dialect. As I'm not a fan of dialect and the repeated misuse of "were" got old really quickly.

Things only get interesting this very short story in the last page and a half. The boy struck dumb by a horse hoof to the head begins to sing in church except that it's not his voice. He sings in the voices of the long dead. That is why he needs to be exorcised.

Grandma manages to give an interesting explanation of events in the last paragraph but it didn't seem worth the effort of reading the entire story just for a quip from her at the end. At least the story is short.

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