New story: “The Booby-Trapped Boy” by Colin P. Davies

I just finished reading “The Booby-Trapped Boy”, a new science fiction short story by British writer Colin P. Davies that was published in M-Brane SF #20 ( September 2010). Interesting piece about a hard-drinking former investigative reporter named Nick Ferrari, who scours the settlement of Marineris Ribbon on Mars for Shona, a robot and the love of his life. With the aid of his vat-born friend Joannie and “the Booby-Trapped Boy”, Nick discovers what it means to be part of the “unholy trinity.” Here are the opening lines:

 For Nick Ferrari the revelation started on a Friday night blitz, when Joannie was an irritating burr in his ear and he was still looking to wipe Shona from his memory. Five shots of Tequilapop had numbed his face and he sank back into the heaped coats on the bench. Joannie’s teeth flashed in the glitterball spray. She was trying hard — he had to grant her that — but he was determined not to be cheered up...

Colin P. Davies is a Building Surveyor from Liverpool, England, and is the author of three other short stories about Mars: “A Touch of Earth” (1995) and “The Girl with the Four-Dimensional Head” (2004), both of which were published in his collection Tall Tales on the Iron Horse (2008); and “The Certainty Principle", which was published in the February 2009 issue of Asimov's Science Fiction magazine.