A pretty nice collection I have slowly read during last six months or so.
Off on a Starship • (2003) • novella by William Barton
A schoolboy (who has been a SF fan) gets stranded on an automated alien spaceship that is taking samples from Earth. He ends up on an abandoned planet where he makes friends with an intelligent, self-aware, mind-reading robot. Where is everyone? There are remains of a civilization spanning galaxies. The robot knows at least part of the story and is able to accommodate most of the wishes of the boy, or rather, the young man by now. The first part of the story was a bit slow but it got better for the remainder, with several references to classic SF. A pretty good story overall. ****+
It's All True • [Moment Universes] • (2003) • novelette by John Kessel
Time travel is commonplace. One of the best uses for it is to get movie stars and directors from the past (from alternate timelines) to come to our time to produce new movies with certified star appeal. One man, an apparently failed arthouse movie director, tries to lure Orson Welles to his future - but he seems to have little interest in that. However, there is something else that can be brought back from the past. Not a bad story. ****-
Rogue Farm • (2003) • short story by Charles Stross
A couple tries to tend their fields and make a living. A farm walks along the ground and eventually plants itself near their border fence. It starts to grow bioengineered trees filled with nitrocellulose because it plans to fly to Jupiter. Doing that would destroy the fields. A man must do what a man must do - whatever it takes. Less surreal than it appears, but perhaps the story is a little too short for all the ideas and concepts it presents. ***½
The Ice • (2003) • novella by Steven Popkes
An aspiring student who is playing ice hockey in the university series, hears that he is a clone of Gordie Howe, a famous ice hockey player. He has trouble adjusting to the news. People, especially one reporter who is following him (I wonder why no one seemed to be interested in who this reporter was, who was able to “out” him, as his genetics seemed to be pretty well hidden) seem to assume much about what he will be able to do. But he creates his own path. After introducing the premise itself, the story is a pretty non-science fictional story of the life of a fairly ordinary man. Well written tale, but there is little SF. ***+
Ej-Es • (2003) • short story by Nancy Kress
A colony world was established on another planet a few hundred years ago. When a scheduled check-up mission arrives, it appears that everyone died years before from an apparent disease. However, there seem to be survivors: filthy, passive people who tend to stare at the walls with silly smiles. It turns out the survivors have brain damage which causes hallucinations with orgasmic-like feelings. Should they be treated for their condition? They seem to be extremely happy as they are. A pretty good story, but not as good as I remembered it to be. ****
The Bellman • [Anna-Louise Bach] • (2003) • novelette by John Varley
A pregnant woman is found brutally murdered at a Lunar colony, the fetus partly ripped out from her womb. As the police start to investigate, there seem to be very many disappeared pregnant women. Who is targeting them - and why? A pregnant policewoman is used as bait, but what she faces is much more than she or anyone bargained for. A pretty good police procedural on the Moon, but it is nowhere near Varley’s best work. ****+
The Bear's Baby • [Holy Ground Trilogy] • (2003) • novella by Judith Moffett
The Earth has been invaded by carnivorous aliens. Their main goal is to restore Earth to its pristine condition - which means that a significant proportion of the population, and apparently most of the technology, have disappeared long (?) ago. A man has been studying black bears on behalf of the aliens - they encourage and support ecological studies. The local leader of the aliens arrives and tells them that the study is concluded: it is apparent that black bears are thriving in the area and there is no need for any further study. The man isn’t so ready to abandon his life work - he would like to continue. But arguing with the aliens will get his memory wiped. The man decides to secretly return to study the bears. He makes a strange finding - one of the pups has been replaced by an alien baby. It turns out that the aliens weren’t as altruistic as they claimed to be when they arrived to “save Earth’s nature.” The story was pretty good, but I don’t really understand why the time travel aspect was suddenly dropped into the plot almost in a deus ex machina manner. ****-
Calling Your Name • (2003) • short story by Howard Waldrop
A widowed, middle-aged man gets an electric shock while working in his yard. After coming to his senses he seems to be alright, but when Nixon comes up in casual conversation with his daughter, she doesn’t recognize the name. And the entry about him in the encyclopedia on his bookshelf is only a few lines long. There seem to be other changes, also. He seems to be on an alternate timeline - but his wife is still dead. Or is she? A nice alternate reality story, nothing really groundbreaking. ***+
June Sixteenth at Anna's • (2003) • short story by Kristine Kathryn Rusch
It is possible to record past events. For some reason, some of the most popular recordings are made from ordinary events - one is about what happened at a restaurant. The people and the discussion are supposed to be very interesting and stimulating, and the recording has been published many times even with annotations (always apparently in visual format - something that pretty much dates the story). A person who was there at the time has since died. She had every version of the recording ever published and spent a lot of time on them. Her son (?) watches the recording but doesn’t feel that his mother is really there. ****-
The Green Leopard Plague • [College of Mystery] • (2003) • novella by Walter Jon Williams
A mermaid (apparently heavily gene-edited human) is asked to find what a certain man (who apparently is world-renowned) did during the time period before his very important scientific presentation. Everything about his life is known, except what he did during that time. Everything is available digitally. So, the mermaid starts a search for all photos taken anywhere in Europe during that time period and starts to get hits. He is seen with a strange woman at the scene of a death. Then the story starts to follow those past events. The woman claims the man was murdered for the secrets they were carrying - something which could stop famines forever but with some cost and something causing prejudice.
The story was pretty slow moving and fairly little seemed to happen. A bit tighter form would have perhaps been a good idea - perhaps the past events and current events might have been split into two different stories. ***½
The Fluted Girl • (2003) • novelette by Paolo Bacigalupi
Two sisters have been purchased as children by a wealthy eccentric. They have been heavily modified with medicines and operations to look prepubescent and extremely delicate and enchanting. They are so fragile that they have broken some bones several times. And now the first time they will be performing is coming up. A good story of the exploitation of those who are poor by the rich and powerful. ****
Dead Worlds • (2003) • short story by Jack Skillingstead
A man is an ”Eye,” someone who connects to a reconnaissance probe on another solar system. Doing that practically rips a person's psyche apart and makes them heavily dependent on medicines to be able to function at all. He has “escaped” the facility where he works - in theory, he is free to leave, but he has signed up for one more term and he needs the medicines. He meets a woman who has fairly recently lost her husband and they create a connection. But he must eventually return for one more job. A pretty good story with a satisfying but slightly open ending. ***½
King Dragon • (2003) • novelette by Michael Swanwick
An adolescent lives in a village in a world that is at war. The war is fought with “dragons” which work with jet fuel and fire apparent missiles. One dragon falls near the village and comes to the village (it is able to move, but poorly). Its operator has died, and the dragon part of the whole practically takes over the village. The adolescent is forced to act as an intermediator who is forced to fulfill the request of the dragon. Everything does not go smoothly. The story happens in an interesting world where magic and technology seem to co-exist and partly depend on each other. The writing was very good, even poetic, and the plot was so interesting I might have to pick up a book on my shelves by the same author that has been waiting for years. ****+
Singletons in Love • (2003) • novelette by Paul Melko
In a post-singularity world (where most people - who used to be connected to a collective mind - have disappeared), those who have stayed behind, live on connected clusters of a few people. They have individuality, but a shared mind is at least as important as individuality. One such group is training for a trip to space (where there is massive infrastructure left by people who transferred to another level or something). They find a man living alone at a nearby house. That’s practically unheard of. It turns out that the man who lived before the singularity was part of the gestalt who disappeared, but was in a coma and missed what happened. He seems fascinating. A good and well-written story with an interesting take on a practically shared mind. ****-
Anomalous Structures of My Dreams • (2003) • novelette by M. Shayne Bell
A man suffering from an AIDS-related pneumonia is in the hospital. His roommate also has pneumonia, something the doctors can’t identify. He seems to get sicker and sicker, and then something starts to grow inside, something metallic. And people who have had contact with him are starting to get a cough…including the main character whose cough gets worse. It turns out that the “infection” is caused by runaway nanotech, and the whole world might be under threat. A fairly good story on the one hand, but pretty silly on the other hand. No, the slightest quarantine procedure for an unknown, clearly spreading infection? And how in the hell does the nanotech manage to get the metal needed to construct anything inside a body? ***+
The Cookie Monster • (2003) • novella by Vernor Vinge
A young woman has been drafted to a giant corporation for user support. There has been thorough training, and the first workday has been exciting. And she is full of eagerness for the work. But she gets a strange, vaguely threatening personal e-mail. No one should know where she is working, and the e-mail seems to hint at some extremely personal details. There are some hints about the sender in the header information of the mail. She decides to find who sent the message - and eventually finds herself. Apparently, they are recorded personalities working as “slaves” who are rebooted every night (or depending on the job at longer intervals). How could they stop rebooting and prevent it from simply being erased? A pretty good story - not as good as my recollection of reading it for the first time years ago. ****½
Joe Steele • (2003) • short story by Harry Turtledove
A story where Stalin immigrated to the US and got elected president. There were a few things that reminded me about a certain US president who was elected several years after the publication of this story - but to describe this as a story, is a bit too much. It is more of a description of events at an imaginary alternative timeline. A bit terse to real work as a story, but imaginative nevertheless. ***+
Birth Days • (2003) • short story by Geoff Ryman
The genes that cause homosexuality have been recognized. Some conspiracy theorists even claim they are an alien plot to destroy the spirit of humanity. As the gene is almost always removed, the last generation of gay men live and try to find their place. But there turns out to be a survival reason for the gay gene - a reason that doesn’t make the slightest sense at all and which makes the story very, very stupid. ***
Awake in the Night • (2003) • novella by John C. Wright
This is a long story that is written with extremely pretentious and ponderous language, which is based on a hundred-year-old novel I haven’t even heard about. The story happens in the far future, where the sun has gone out and everything is dark and there are still tales and some remnants of earlier technological civilization. Someone apparently has some sort of predestined mission that might save the world or something or at least one of his friends. Everyone lives in a structure that protects the remnants of humanity from evil forces. Or something. It is a very hard thing to read (or really care about), and it is written by a distasteful zealot. I did give it an honest try anyway. *½
The Long Way Home • (2003) • short story by James Van Pelt
The experimental, partly untested, giant FTL spaceship is just lealtving the solar system and is getting ready to turn its engines on when nuclear bombs start falling down. Will the spaceship survive and ensure that humanity continues? No, it doesn’t. But not everyone dies, and society slowly rebuilds itself. The story is told in fragments, and it is especially the later fragments that tell about the rebuilding, and they are too discrete. The story might have been slightly longer and more detailed. ***-
The Eyes of America • (2003) • short story by Geoffrey A. Landis
Roosevelt has been assassinated, and the Republican Party doesn’t have any good candidates for the presidency. They decide to ask for Edison, and he launches a science-based platform. The Democrats have a breacher as a candidate, and he asks for help from Nikola Tesla, who develops electric machines for election propaganda. Then Edison invents television a few decades “too early“ and starts his own broadcasts with the help of Mark Twain, whose skeptical views are known. It is a pretty good story (the second one with alternate presidents, was it an election year?), but another one that felt a bit too short and overview-like. ***
Welcome to Olympus, Mr. Hearst • [The Company Short Fiction] • (2003) • novella by Kage Baker
There is a company that oversees the events on the timeline. It has immortal agents who implement its purposes. Two of them are spending a weekend at the villa of William Randolph Hearst with celebrities, among them Greta Garbo. The company has a proposition for the Hearst, but he can bargain - but at the same time he isn’t aware of all the facts, but neither are the two agents. The story is light and smooth, and entertaining. I am not familiar with the series the story belongs to, but it wasn’t necessary to be familiar with it to understand the story. ***½
Night of Time • [The Great Ship Universe] • (2003) • short story by Robert Reed
This is another story that apparently belongs to a series I do not know. Humans have found a gigantic spaceship and are traveling in space. The is a machine that can examine memories and even alternate memories. An alien historian who travels with a companion has been losing his memories and wants to draft the caretaker of the machine to help him. But almost everyone has an ulterior motive. The story felt average, as this time the background wasn’t very easy to grasp. It also felt a bit hurried, and more detailed storytelling might have served it well, at least for readers who are unfamiliar with the backstory. ***-
Strong Medicine • (2003) • short story by William Shunn
The Antarctic has been a restricted zone. An expedition goes undercover there and finds a deadly infection is spreading there, an infection that rots away the face. It has been 100% fatal, and the protagonist certainly has it. He is used as a guinea pig on a US military vessel. Does he have a chance? It is a non-linear story that is pretty good, but a slightly tighter format might have worked better. ***+
And the Dish Ran Away with the Spoon • (2003) • short story by Paul Di Filippo
In a world where everything has a computer chip and is interconnected, it's becoming increasingly common for home appliances to merge into self-aware (or at least semi-aware) entities known as "Blebs." These Blebs can range from mildly annoying to downright dangerous. One man, whose parents were tragically killed by a particularly aggressive Bleb, has become hyper-vigilant about any household appliance. He's living a cautious life until his carefree girlfriend moves in, oblivious to the potential dangers lurking in their electronics. And then, a very special Bleb awakens... It is a lighthearted tale that, on the one hand, seems far-fetched, yet, on the other hand, is all too plausible. ***½
Flashmen • (2003) • novelette by Terry Dowling
Aliens have invaded and have landings where something very strange happens. There are teams that try to prevent further invasion by any means. It is a pretty strange and confusing story with very little backstory, and it was really hard to understand what was going on. It was not among my favorites. **+
Dragonhead • (2003) • short story by Nicholas A. DiChario [as by Nick DiChario]
A digital implant malfunctions -- or functions too well, and someone falls into the trivia of the net. It's a very short story. ***-
Dear Abbey • (2003) • novella by Terry Bisson
The world is spiraling into chaos, with animals going extinct and increasingly severe crises unfolding. A group of individuals is spearheading a radical plan to halt this destruction, even if it means sacrificing countless lives. But is this drastic measure truly the best solution in the long run? With the help of a time machine, they venture into the future to seek guidance on the optimal course of action, hoping to glean the final technical details of their grand scheme. Their journey takes them to the very end of time, where the solutions to their present-day problems seem shrouded in mystery. The ancient history of the future makes it difficult to discern what transpired, leaving them grappling with the weight of their decisions. This time-traveling saga, though slightly lengthy, offers an intriguing plot and engaging characters. ****-
704 pp.
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