Alytha

Still haven't finished this collection. With the stupid audit going on, it even took me almost a week to finish a single short story...

But as the quality of the stories is generally very high here, they deserve some more detailed reviews, and splitting the reviews into 2 avoids a monster post that nobody's going to read anyway... :P

• I, Row-Boat, by Cory Doctorow. Probably the first science fiction story about scuba-diving that I've read. The pun in the title is to be taken literally too. In the far future, Earth is a protected nature reserve. Humans have long ago uploaded their consciousnesses to the internet, and all kinds of things have become conscious and sentient. Robbie the row-boat is just taking people who have downloaded into human-shells to go diving on a reef, as usual, when it becomes apparent that the reef has achieved sentience, and started to communicate with the internet. And it is not happy about having people poke around on it. A really interesting story. I guess the subject matter arises from itself once you come up with the titular pun, but still...also contains lots of philosophical discussion on Asimovism, a religion of AIs.  8/10
• Julian, A Christmas Story, by Robert Charles Wilson: In a different and not that far future, mankind has regressed to a vaguely 19th century lifestyle du to fossile sources of energy running out. The knowledge of these times is regarded as myth, and society is ruled by the church. Two young men from very different sociological backgrounds try to find their way in life, in politically troubled times. An OK story, but not terribly interesting or groundbreaking. 6/10
• Tin Marsh, by Michael Swanwick: Mr Swanwick is one of my absolutely favourite authors, and deserves much more attention than he seems to get. In this story, two prospectors on Venus looking for valuable metals get very bad cabin fever (or space-suit fever?) being stuck out there, with only themselves for company, for months. They find out that you can get to know somebody too well, and that that somebody then probably will try to kill you. a nice little psychological thriller set in the desolate landscape of Venus. 8.5/10
• The Djinn's Wife, by Ian McDonald: Set in the same world as his novel River of Gods, ie, India in the near future, populated by all kinds of aeai's (AIs). A young dancer falls in love with a suave AI diplomat, and in a fit of entitlement issues, decides to marry him in order to get some attention. At first, they have a really good time as the superstars of the moment, but soon she notices that her world is shrinking inwards towards a not quite real husband, and her art, while he, as an AI, can be everywhere at the same time...it gets worse from there. The story is told by the dancer's daughter, who may or may not be the daughter of the AI. Considering all the other things he can do, stimulating an egg to divide shouldn't be that far out. And there are some clues...I really like the rich world of River of Gods, and this is a good story about being careful what you wish for. 9/10
• The House Beyond Your Sky, by Benjamin Rosenbaum: I honestly have no idea what this story is supposed to be about. Nor what the author smoked while writing it. 5/10
• Where the Golden Apples Grow by Kage Baker: unfortunately I only discovered Kage Baker's work after her death. Her two fantasy novels, The Anvil of the World, and House of the Stag are really good and should definetely by read. The story here is about two boys born on Mars, one as the son of a trucker, the other into a family of farmers. Both find that the grass is greener on the other side, and that their life as it is sucks quite badly. When fate throws them together, they both get to know the other side, and prepare to make some major changes in their life. A good story, which looks at both sides pretty realistically. On the other hand, how often does the grass actually remain greener on the other side once you get there? Maybe you'd have to be an idealistic teenager. And maybe that wouldn't be all that bad...7.5/10
• Kin by Bruce McAllister. In yet another far future, Earth has made contact with various alien species, one of which specialises in assassinations. And then there is a corrupt government, and a young boy who is not going to take that without a fight. And despite being physically as different as they could possibly be, the boy and the alien assassin find out that they're not that different in mind after all. Pretty solid but not overly spectacular story. 6.5/10
• Signal to Noise by Alastair Reynolds: A couple of scientists have established contact with a parallel and identical dimension, when the estranged wife of one of them dies in a freak accident. It turns out that at that moment, the dimensions start diverging, as in the other one, Andrea didn't die. In a last desperate attempt to seek redemption for himself and the mistakes he made in his relationship, Mick travels to the other universe, or rather, takes over the body of the other Mick for a week. The whole thing is morally a bit awkward. The Andrea on the other side is not his wife, technically, and in no way has a duty towards him, especially as their counterparts were getting a divorce anyway. It's basically just something Mick does in order to make himself feel better, and as Andrea is a really nice person, she plays along, although she feels pretty miserable about it. might be a bit of a waste, using the first contact to another dimension for that kind of thing. Also, the description of the decay of the signal between the dimensions, and the ensuing gradual loss of senses; touch, hearing, vision, is one of the creepiest things I've ever read. 8/10
• The Big Ice by Jay Lake and Ruth Nestvold: Unfortunately not set in the "Flowers" universe, but still really good. A young woman is just trying to life her own life as a scientist on a distant planet when her past as a highly bio-engineered pawn of a noble house catches up with her. Fighting for her life, she finds support from an unforeseen source, deep beneath a glacier. Good story about dealing with your inheritance, whether you want to or not, and how to escape it in a rather interesting manner. 9/10
• Bow Shock by Gregory Benford: An astronomer finds a weird asteroid and travks it for awhile, until he finds something even weirder. This is what happens when physicists try to write fiction...up to the last couple of pages, this is not science fiction, but just astronomy with a bit of the glamorous life of an astronomer with literary aspirations thrown in. Once it gets interesting, it's over. Even though it has illustrations. It should have started about two thirds in, and dealt with what happened after. Good idea, but extremely dry and pretty boring execution for the most part. 4.5/10
• In the River by Justin Stanchfield: A scientist is biologically modified in order to be able to communicate with a species of water-dwelling aliens, and travel with them for a while to find out more about their maths and science. After a short time, she goes native, and when she has to be taken out of the River again because her implants are starting to break up, she finds coming home very hard. A good story about the meaning of home and the people you belong to, and that you sometimes find them in unforeseen places. 8.5/10
• Incarnation Day by Walter Jon Williams. Out on the moons of the gas giants, resources are scarce, so children are brought up in cyberspace, and only incarnated after they've grown up and got the skills to get a job and be a useful member of society. Until then, they are the property of their parents, who can send the Blue Lady (not to be confused with the Blue Fairy, who does the opposite), to terminate their programm if they're not satisfactory. This way of growing up of course leads to various mental illnesses being very common out there, but pretty much ignored, until one young programm child dares to take on the system, enttailing the risk of getting herself terminated as her actions are very much against the ideas of her frustrated and very technologically-oriented mother. Really interesting premise, and good execution. 8.5/10
• Far As You Can Go by Greg Van Eekhout: a young boy and his robot friend leave a post-apocalyptic city to look for a better life at the beach, and have some adventures on the way. Solid story about friendship and growing up, coupled with a bit of post-apocalypse. Solid but not terribly exciting. 7/10
• Good Mountain by Robert Reed: The world is made of living island, which travel around the ocean, until they eventually hit the Continent, and stick to it. Thus, the Continent gets ever bigger. Public transport is done by worm (as in, inside the living worm, which even has windows), and everybody has mockmen slaves, who seem to be like humans but bred to be barely intelligent enough to perform tasks. Now, as the Continent gets bigger and bigger, it traps rising bubbles of methane gas rising from the ocean under it, which leads to explosive blow-outs, which can devastate whole islands at a time, as they're basically made of living wood. Currently, these blow-outs get progressively worse, and the whole Continent is going up in flames. On the last worm, a group of travellers is racing ahead of the flames, trying to reach the coast and a ship to outlying islands. However, a young woman on the worm claims to be a scientist exploring a crashed alien space ship near a station nor far ahead. She claims to have discovered that the passengers of that ship seeded life on the planet, and were themselves the ancestors of the worms, and technologically extremely advanced. She proposes to lead the other travellers to the ship to sit out the blaze. However, the worm driver claims that she is very often on his route, and takes a young man along every time to have a look at the spaceship. And they're never seen again...A really really bizarre world, with references to Dan Simmons' Hyperion cycle, and Dune. The end of the story is not really clear on the woman's claim. It all depends on how you see the worm driver. On the one hand, he does have a long experience about what's happening, or rather not happening, near the stations. And he has no reason to lie about her and the other men. However, he seems very preoccupied by his worm, and getting away from the place is very much in his own interest. And the girl's story is really plausible...9/10