1. “The Fifty-Minute Nietzsche,” Windhover, May 1996.2. “Siding the House,” Obsidian II, November 1997.3. “Fences,” Honorable Mention story, O. Henry Festival Stories, March 1998.
- “Jasper’s writing is full of vivid descriptions of the struggle of digging fenceposts, the chain-smoking neighbor with emphysema, and Canton’s own internal struggles.”
— Greensboro News and Record
4. “Waiting for Joey,” PIF Magazine, November 1999.
5. “Unplugged,” SpaceWays Weekly, January 2000.
- Reprinted at ShadowKeep, September 2000.
- Reprinted in Gunning for the Buddha.
- “The details are sharp and unsentimental: we see the ex-cowboys jerking and twitching, hear their mumbled, brain-fried conversations, but the view is compassionate, not scornful, and the inward battle is viscerally real.”
— Sherwood Smith, SF Site
- “Kesey meets Cronenberg.”
— E. Sedia, Tangent Online
6. “A Simple Way to Pass the Time,” New Works Review, March 2000.
7. “Wrecked,” (long version) ShallowEND, March 2000.
8. “Wrecked,” (short version) The Raleigh News & Observer’s Sunday Reader, March 2000.
9. “Peterson & Son Automotive,” 3 AM Publishing, June 2000.
10. “Mud and Salt,” Writers of the Future 16, September 2000.
- Reprinted in Why I Hate Aliens, January 2004.
- Reprinted in Gunning for the Buddha.
- “The author clearly understands Wittgenstein’s famous observation about speaking lions, as the alien remains just that—alien. The hunters are all too familiar stand-ins for the reader and the values of our culture as a whole. Take your time with this one.”
— Jay Lake, Tangent Online
- “Several sharp turns, including to the emotions, make the story a satisfying read.”
— Sherwood Smith, SF Site
- “Jasper’s aliens are believable—they are neither monsters bent on world domination nor flawlessly wise and adorable aliens that dominate science fiction.”
— E. Sedia, Tangent Online
11. “Winter Hunt,” The Stirring, July 2000.
- Reprinted at Climate Controlled, October 2002.
12. “Breathing Trouble,” The Pedestal Magazine, December 2000.
13. “Crossing the Camp,” Strange Horizons, January 2001.
- Honorable Mention, Year’s Best Science Fiction vol. 19.
- Reprinted in Gunning for the Buddha.
- “I thought the writing was powerful, the men and aliens sympathetic as they wrestle with their own emotions, and examine grim moral dilemmas while trying to do good work. A fine story.”
— Sherwood Smith, SF Site
14. “One Night in Rosecroft,” The Witching Hour, February 2001.
- “Jasper’s characters are recognizable without descending into stereotype. This is one of the more successful stories in the volume.
— Deborah Layne, Tangent Online
15. “Scotty’s Song,” Strange New Worlds IV, May 2001.
- “‘Scotty’s Song’ starts in a classic story fashion as well. Character, with a problem (no sleep) in a setting. And as the first short section is done, we know the problem isn’t just Scott’s lack of sleep, but the reason why he isn’t sleeping, and the reader is hooked. Clear writing, done to the point, makes the opening of this story work perfectly.”
—Dean Wesley Smith, series editor
16. “Explosions,” Strange Horizons, July 2001.
- Reprinted in The Best of Strange Horizons, October 2004.
- Reprinted in Gunning for the Buddha.
- “Jasper veers between the inexplicable and realistic human reactions to the inexplicable in a tight, involving story.”
— Sherwood Smith, SF Site
- “If expanded, this sequence of four stories about the aliens known as Wannoshay or Wantas—near-humanoids marooned on a near-future Earth, rather than bug-eyed invaders—could form an excellent ‘mosaic novel’; even as a ‘mini-mosaic’ it’s intense.”
— Faren Miller, Locus
17. “What Was Left Standing,” The Pedestal Magazine, August 2001.
18. “After the Storm,” The Raleigh News & Observer’s Sunday Reader, November 2001.
19. “A Feast at the Manor,” NeverWorlds, February 2002.
- Honorable Mention, Year’s Best Fantasy and Horror vol. 16.
- Reprinted in Gunning for the Buddha.
- Reprinted in The Fat Man at the End of the World, November 2008.
- “I really liked this story; Jasper handles the subjects of food, friendship, attraction, and marriage with grace, compassion, and a touch of humor, leading us unexpected places.”
— Sherwood Smith, SF Site
- “Jasper’s skill of sympathetic observation shines in this tale—it is impossible not to love his overweight protagonists, far as they may be from the current ideal of a human body.”
— E. Sedia, Tangent Online
20. “Working the Game,” Future Orbits, April 2002.
- Honorable Mention, Year’s Best Science Fiction vol. 20.
- Reprinted in Gunning for the Buddha.
- Translated to Russian and reprinted in Russian magazine Esli.
- “Michael J. Jasper’s ‘Working the Game’ left me in awe of his creative prowess… Twined against this dystopian background are a touching love story and a vision of futility that rivals Hardy’s. A spectacular success.”
— Daniel E. Blackston, SFReader
21. “Natural Order,” Asimov’s Science Fiction Magazine, June 2002.
- Honorable Mention, Year’s Best Science Fiction vol. 20.
- Reprinted in Gunning for the Buddha.
- Reprinted and recorded as an audio podcast from Escape Pod, April 2006.
- Reprinted in Polish magazine Nowa Fantastyka, 2006.
- Reprinted in the Relief Anthology The Fleas They Carried, May 2009.
- “This intensely moving story asks some profound questions—what is the place of human beings in the natural order? Is life more valuable than duty? Are even the worst of us deserving of forgiveness?”
— E. Sedia, Tangent Online
- “The last four entries are the most memorable, the standout being the evocative and vivid ‘Natural Order,’ which Jasper calls in his afterword ‘the best story I’ve ever written in ten hours.’”
— Publishers Weekly
22. “Visions of Suburban Bliss,” Gothic.Net, June 2002.
- Honorable Mention, Year’s Best Fantasy and Horror vol. 16.
- Reprinted in Gunning for the Buddha.
- “Yes, his whole life seems wrapped up in the artificial niceness of the suburban good life… It’s weird, just how easily suburban bliss can turn seriously weird.”
— Sherwood Smith, SF Site
23. “Mother of the Bride,” HorrorFind, July 2002.
24. “Wantaviewer,” Strange Horizons, September 2002.
- Honorable Mention, Year’s Best Science Fiction vol. 20.
- Reprinted in Gunning for the Buddha.
- “Everyone seems to be expecting some kind of interstellar war, and while waiting for the fewmets to hit the fan, take out their apprehensions on the Wannoshay still trying to comprehend this bewildering world they are refugees on. The choices here are realistic, the consequences logical, and the story heartbreaking.”
— Sherwood Smith, SF Site
25. “Goddamn Redneck Surfer Zombies,” The Book of More Flesh, October 2002.
- Honorable Mention, Year’s Best Fantasy and Horror vol. 16.
- Reprinted in Gunning for the Buddha.
- Reprinted in The Best of All Flesh, December 2009.
- “In less skilled hands, that would be an interesting gimmick but not much of a story. Jasper throws in a narrator—a man who likes to fish and surf, and who is getting old. The end result is a bittersweet meditation on mortality and afterlife, and a strong message of hope.”
— E. Sedia, Tangent Online
- “The notion of zombies taking up surfing as a beloved preoccupation is weirdly satisfying enough; the rest of Jasper’s story is frosting on the cake.”
— Edward Bryant, Locus
- “With a title like that, how could a story miss? Well, actually, it could easily have been one of those one-joke groaners. Jasper shows here how finding just the right voice makes a story work.”
— Sherwood Smith, SF Site
26. “Comfort and Joy,” The Raleigh News & Observer’s Sunday Reader, December 2002.
27. “Gunning for the Buddha,” S1ngularity, March 2003.
- Honorable Mention, Year’s Best Fantasy and Horror vol. 17.
- Reprinted in Gunning for the Buddha.
- Reprinted at Farrago’s Wainscot, 2007.
- “The story races at headlong pace, shifting around in time just as the characters do… the story’s got velocity.”
— Sherwood Smith, SF Site
- “You don’t have to be young and fiery to feel that kind of anger these days, but finding a way past it can be a tortuous journey. Jasper crams that into a few short pages — then reality turns inside-out.”
— Faren Miller, Locus
28. “The Deck,” Windhover, May 2003.
29. “Riverrun Alley,” MarsDust, July 2003.
30. “The Disillusionist,” Would That It Were, August 2003.
- Honorable Mention, Year’s Best Fantasy and Horror vol. 17.
- Reprinted in Gunning for the Buddha.
- “A very thoughtful exploration of the place of illusion and truth, with nice special effects.”
— E. Sedia, Tangent Online
- “About three quarters of the way along I realized I was picking up hints about the identity of the deputy, which caused my interest in an already creepy, thoughtful, sensorily complex story to zing. My favorite of the collection.”
— Sherwood Smith, SF Site
31. “Never, Incorporated,” Flytrap, October 2003.
- “Michael J. Jasper’s “Never, Incorporated” takes a familiar idea, that of dark creatures (in this case, goblins) offering one’s heart’s desire at too great a price, and gives it an original spin, making the ending at once inevitable and surprising.”
— Greg Beatty, SF Reader
- “A sly depiction of a demon hoisted with his own petard.”
— Nick Gevers, Locus
32. “Helljack,” with Tim Pratt, H.P. Lovecraft’s Horror Magazine, November 2003.
- Honorable Mention, Year’s Best Science Fiction(!) vol. 22.
- “I enjoyed this story quite a bit, mostly because it manages to be gruesome and entertaining, yet never takes itself too seriously.”
- — E. Sedia, Tangent Online
33. “Coal Ash and Sparrows,” Asimov’s Science Fiction Magazine, January 2004.
- Honorable Mention, Year’s Best Science Fiction vol. 22.
- Honorable Mention, Year’s Best Fantasy and Horror vol. 18.
- Reprinted in Gunning for the Buddha.
- Reprinted in Cornstalk Gypsies, October 2008.
- “Jasper does more of his structural magic with this strange tale of a boy, a book, and the girl who discovers that book. What happens to each as time slides along, what the book means, makes for a fascinating story, impossible to predict.”
— Sherwood Smith, SF Site
- “A powerful work which ’started as an outtake’ from a YA fantasy novel-in-progress and makes me eager to see the final product.”
— Faren Miller, Locus
34. “Remainders,” second prize-winner in the SF Reader annual contest, February 2004.
35. “Repeat Performance,” Fishnet, July 2004.
36. “Redemption, Drawing Near,” Interzone, August 2004.
- Honorable Mention, Year’s Best Science Fiction vol. 22.
- “Also quite impressive is ‘Redemption, Drawing Near,’ in which the US military calls in a Catholic priest to help interrogate aliens who have landed on Earth, apparently seeking refuge, but who remain dangerously inscrutable, expressing a cultural complex requiring deep moral scrutiny.”
— Nick Gevers, Locus
- “As with the other stories in this issue of Interzone, ‘Redemption, Drawing Near’ effectively cast me into a science-fiction reading haze… I felt like I was reading genuine, gosh-wow science-damn fiction and enjoying it.”
— Rick Kleffel, The Agony Column
37. “An Outrider’s Tale,” Gunning for the Buddha, January 2005.
- Honorable Mention, The Year’s Best Fantasy & Horror, volume 19
- “A new look at a very old fairy tale. Most of it is narrated in the past tense over a campsite, but Jasper makes it work, because the story telling is not simply a frame; the strange narrator must then take that tale and use it. This last aspect was what brought it all together to a transcendent close. Best use of that tale I’ve seen in a while.”
— Sherwood Smith, SF Site
- “This type of story is the main reason I read fantasy.”
— E. Sedia, Tangent Online
38. “Black Angels,” Gunning for the Buddha, January 2005.
- Honorable Mention, The Year’s Best Fantasy & Horror, volume 19
- “Here’s a story with all kinds of nifty elements: angels, demonics, a fight, a cemetery… the action is full of pizzazz, making a fast, engaging read.”
— Sherwood Smith, SF Site
39. “California King,” with Greg van Eekhout, Asimov’s Science Fiction Magazine, April/May 2005.
- Honorable Mention, Year’s Best Science Fiction vol. 23.
- Honorable Mention, The Year’s Best Fantasy & Horror, volume 19
- “It is always a delight to experience the nova-imaginations of the best new writers at their creative heights, and Jasper and Van Eekhout may well lay claim to their places in that minor pantheon.”
— Patrick Samphire, Tangent Online
- “The resulting clashes are vividly portrayed, the dynamics of a broken family intersecting keenly with larger cultural and environmental concerns; but the succession is handled with unexpected dignity, a basis for optimism in the wider world.”
— Nick Gevers, Locus
- “The interactions between the imperfect King and his imperfect family are delightful, but it really is the casual lines of humor that keep this tale on track. That and a touching conclusion that the authors handle just right.”
— Bluejack, April 2005 Internet Review of Short Fiction
40. “Gillian Underground,” with Tim Pratt and Greg van Eekhout, Polyphony 5, November 2005.
- Honorable Mention, The Year’s Best Fantasy & Horror, volume 19
41. “The Brotherhood of Trees,” Aeon Speculative Fiction, February 2006.
- Honorable Mention, The Year’s Best Fantasy & Horror, volume 24
- “The protagonist and his partner are depicted with compassion and pathos, and not the over-the-top camp behavior many other authors use to depict gay characters. This, coupled with the neat backstory and polished prose, makes this a tale worth reading.”
—Jason Fischer, Tangent Online
42. “This Divided Land,” Jigsaw Nation, May 2006.
- “Of all the stories in Jigsaw Nation, this was the one that felt the realest, and maybe that’s why it had such a strong impact on this reader. Well recommended.”
— Paul Abbamondi, SFReader
- “Michael Jasper turns a story of unrequited gay love in “This Divided Land” into a fairy tale (no pun intended) through a carefully measured Fairy Godmother narrative voice.”
—Mark Teppo, Strange Horizons
43. “Meet the Madfeet,” Fantasy Gone Wrong, DAW Books, September 2006.
44. “A Miracle in Shreveport,” Electric Velocipede, May 2007.
- Honorable Mention, Year’s Best Science Fiction vol. 25
- “…There’s something slightly off-kilter about Jasper’s story. The looming war is neatly dealt with, but the author doesn’t really follow through on this theme. The racism—we discover about halfway through that a black man was lynched in the town where the team are playing the night before they arrive—is ominously traced out.”
—Martin McGrath, The Fix
45. “Drinker,” Heroes in Training, DAW Books, September 2007.
- Listed on the 2007 SF & Fantasy Recommended Reading List.
- “‘Drinker’ by Michael Jasper provides a model for enveloping readers in a nonhuman, alien culture… In the Drinker’s case, he struggles against the suspicious conservatism of his fellow creatures as he finds a way to preserve his environment and his species. Mournful in tone, but ending with a bit of hope, Jasper’s understated prose provides food for thought about our own adaptation [or lack thereof] to planetary changes.”
—Elizabeth A. Allen, The Fix
46. “Tiny Disaster, The Raleigh News & Observer’s Book Pages, September 2007.
- Finalist, 2004 Brenda L. Smart Award for Short Fiction.
47. “Painting Haiti,” Paper Cities, April 2008.
- “Surreal in a lucid way, this story captures the nightmare that Claudia suffers through. A well-told tale with a visual arts sensibility.”
—Marshall Payne, The Fix
- “The story was well-written, and I appreciated the painting & voodoo elements.”
— Fantasy Book Critic
- “Other excellent stories are Steve Berman’s offbeat but fascinating “Tearjerker,” a veritable feast of imagination and creativity and the colourful ‘Painting Haiti’ by Michael Jasper, portraying the nightmares and the difficulties to survive experienced by an artist from Haiti emigrated to the USA.”
— SF Site
- “The story is about being a foreigner and recovering your roots, culture-wise. Very interesting magic system and quite nice portraya of Haitian myth. The end is a delight.”
— Post-Weird Thoughts
48. “A Game of Contact,” The Exquisite Corpuscle, Fairwood Press, October 2008.
49. “Devil on the Wind,” with Jay Lake, Black Gate 14, 2009. |
   
 
 
   
           
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Gunning for the Buddha collects 13 previously-published stories and two unpublished stories, from Prime Books, January 2005.
