{"id":3613,"date":"2022-04-20T13:34:33","date_gmt":"2022-04-20T13:34:33","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/sfshortstories.com\/?p=3613"},"modified":"2022-04-27T19:55:36","modified_gmt":"2022-04-27T19:55:36","slug":"it-takes-a-village-by-priya-chand","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sfshortstories.com\/?p=3613","title":{"rendered":"It Takes a Village by Priya Chand"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

It Takes a Village<\/em><\/strong> by Priya Chand1<\/sup> (Clarkesworld<\/em> #186, March 2022) opens on a starship in orbit around a planet. An asteroid has hit the ship and the damage has affected the onboard facilities (the initial section takes place during a planned powercut). We later learn that the mothers have gone down to the planet to start a colony, and the fathers have stayed on board to take care of the children.
After a little more scene setting, the fathers decide to go down to the surface and join the mothers; then we find out (spoiler) that the \u201cmothers\u201d are actually men, and the \u201cfathers\u201d are actually women. The children are not what they seem either:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI\u2019m sorry,\u201d Aparla said, shaking her head. \u201cBut you know you\u2019ve been carrying around a frozen embryo, right?\u201d
I hugged Callo\u2019s ovoid, a hermetically sealed container full of clever tech that kept it at the same temperature as liquid nitrogen. \u201cSo?\u201d
\u201cSo? Servain, you\u2014none of you\u2014had to bring them here. They\u2019re frozen embryos! The comms aren\u2019t working, for all you knew we were dead, killed by something down here! They would\u2019ve been safer on the ship.\u201d
\u201cNo,\u201d I said, head shaking, holding Callo tighter. \u201cThe AI said we had to take care of the children. We\u2019re the fathers.\u201d
\u201cAnd we\u2019re the \u2018mothers\u2019?\u201d Disdain seethed on her tongue. \u201cGood Earth, Servain! That AI twisted some old-style naming convention and you\u2019ve been going with it? Did you also forget you used to be my wife?\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

Subsequently, the fathers start trying to settle into planetary life but, after an unhappy few days, they eventually decide to go back up to the ship (the fathers have a morbid concern about the safety of the embryos\u2014which they carry about with them at all times\u2014and a temporary generator problem is the final straw). The narrator and one other father are the only ones to stay on the planet.
This odd story never really convinces: why did only the men go to the planet; why has there been such a huge change in the father\u2019s attitude to risk in such a short period (they have only been separated three years)?; why do the fathers endlessly carry their frozen embryos around (arguably less safe than leaving them somewhere secure)?
Perhaps this story is a comment on the risk-averseness of modern mothers but, if so, that is buried under the story\u2019s odd and not particularly interesting events, and the piece doesn\u2019t seem to offer any particular commentary.
* (Mediocre). 6,350 words. Story link<\/a>.

1. The first line made my heart sink (\u201cmisery memoir\u201d, I thought):<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A generation of traumatized fathers was raising a generation of children with trauma in their bones.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

It Takes a Village by Priya Chand1 (Clarkesworld #186, March 2022) opens on a starship in orbit around a planet. An asteroid has hit the ship and the damage has affected the onboard facilities (the initial section takes place during a planned powercut). We later learn that the mothers have gone down to the planet […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[860],"tags":[21,539,622,863,861,12,862],"class_list":["post-3613","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-priya-chand","tag-21","tag-539","tag-clarkesworld","tag-gender-reversal","tag-priya-chand","tag-short-story","tag-starship-colonisation"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sfshortstories.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3613","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sfshortstories.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sfshortstories.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sfshortstories.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sfshortstories.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=3613"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/sfshortstories.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3613\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3725,"href":"https:\/\/sfshortstories.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3613\/revisions\/3725"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sfshortstories.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=3613"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sfshortstories.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=3613"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sfshortstories.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=3613"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}