Couple of 2011 stories

Neither particularly impressive. None crappy either. Both dark.

Note that recent F&SF fiction tends to be online only for a couple of months. Save it locally if you want to read it later.

1. [ss] Chris Lawson's "Canterbury Hollow"; download; F&SF, January/February 2011: Love story of a "balloted" couple - in world with too much population & too few resources; so periodically, ballots are drawn to decide who is to be prematurely killed!
   
   Kurt Vonnegut's "2 B R 0 2 B" (download) is a much crisper variant on essentially the same theme.
2. [ff] JR Hume's "The Last Station"; download; Every Day Fiction, 18 January 2011: Humanity has achieved immortality by getting transformed in to androids. But some people remain the original organics ("folks"). This is the story of the last days of one of the last "folks".

JR Hume's "Self Promotion" (flash fiction, horror, free)

This society practices compulsory euthanasia for the old: you reach the age of 60, you're promptly put in gas chambers. Day has finally caught up with Simeon Selkirk, one of the professional executors. Good for him that he bothered learning another skill & that he still has his wits intact...

Fact sheet.

First published: Every Day Fiction, 8 July 2010.
Download full text from publisher's site.
Rating: B.