A review by brokenrecord
Uncanny Magazine Issue 15: March/April 2017 by Julia Rios, Michael Damian Thomas, Lynne M. Thomas, Michi Trota

3.0

I looooved the premise of this — a conference where versions of the same person from different alternate realities meet up and hold panels and so on. It's just such a fun idea (although I have to say there's basically no way I would ever want to attend a conference like that if I were invited. I don't think I could handle comparing myself to other versions of me that I perceived as better or worse off!). And the plot of one of the Sarahs being killed and the only semi-investigator Sarah trying to figure out who it was and what had happened had a lot of promise. But the mystery ended up falling a bit flat to me. Since this is a novella, there just wasn't enough time to build up suspects and throw in red herrings and all that.

Spoiler

It was obvious to me that the DJ that Sarah interviewed was not the same DJ she had met at the beginning and that the host Sarah was not the true host Sarah. I didn't have all the details worked out before it was all revealed, but the reveal wasn't interesting enough to make up for those aspects being so heavily telegraphed.

So I ended up feeling like it was a really wonderful premise that was squandered a bit. If the story had been longer and there had been more time to really build the mystery, I think it would've worked better for me. But I still adored the premise and had an enjoyable enough time reading this.