mjmahoney
1/2/2019
Overall thoughts: A solid collection with some stand-outs and thought-provoking ideas. Some stories are definitely tied to the 90s in their themes and inspirations, though this still works for the most part. Only one story really failed for me. Just 5 of 24 authors were women (another indication of publication era, I suppose)
"Papa" - cool future world and some interesting issues raised, a little slow getting there,
"Sacred Cow" - clever premise for an alt-future tale.
"Dancing on Air" - I enjoyed this contemporary tale a lot, esp. liked the two narrative viewpoints.
"A visit to the Farside" - Cold War flavored tale, with a good twist.
"Alien Bootlegger"- What happens when an extraterrestrial tries to set up in the moonshine business? it gets pretty gonzo. Fun characters and I liked how the story was told from multiple points of view.
"Death on the Nile" a little gem by Connie Willis. When I finished I had to go back and reread parts and I'm still thinking about it today.
"Friendship Bridge" The sci-fi aspect was cool, I kind of wished that was explored more. The end pulled things together a bit clunkily (is that a word?). The story is set in a central Asian country in turmoil, so it both shows its age and is timely, alas.
"Into the Miranda Rift - Cavers on Uranus' moon Miranda. A cool, otherworldly setting, a grueling journey.
"Mwalimu in the Squared Circle"- meh, not for me.
"Guest of Honor" - Interesting future world how people might deal with immortality (resonated at bit with the earlier "Papa").
"Love Toys of the Gods" - Funny and maybe very true consideration of what we'd do if aliens really did visit us.
"Chaff" - I liked the concept, a neat consideration of future biotechnology and genetic tinkering but the ending didn't quite pull it all together.
"Georgia on My Mind - fun mystery merging sci-fi and history of science. I had a moment when they mentioned the brother of my post doc advisor as head of one of the computing organizations. That was cool.
"Cush" - definitely falls in the New Weird category. I liked it a lot, even though I'm not completely sure what happened at the end.
"On the Collection of Humans" - very short and nicely done.
"There and Then- Time travel to a gentler time, though it seems some problems are timeless. I liked he visit to the (distant) past and enjoyed the perspective of the narrator.
"The Night We Buried Road Dog" - this was more of a ghost story or paranormal mystery, bit I liked it and the narrator's voice.
"Feedback" Joe Haldeman - Creepy, effective story about future technology, unfortunately the misogyny is a feature, not a bug.
"Lieserl" - touching, even wonderful, story about how we might use human bioengineering to our benefit in the future, but there's still a human cost.
"Flashback" Dan Simmons - imaginative and depressing, but possibly realistic, dystopia about drugs and the decline of the USA. Digs at Reagan era policies did not go unappreciated.
"A child's Christmas in Florida" - not sure this is sci-fi, or how I'd categorize it, however it did leave me like o.O so that was good.
"Whispers" - this was a cool medical mystery about a future global plague, I liked the narrative POV, the ending didn't quite payoff though, needed a bit more something for me, maybe just more concrete resolution (ah well).
"Wall, Stone, Craft" - alt-history take on some well known writers of the 19th century and how they might have interacted. I think I might have enjoyed it more if I'd known more about the actual history and knew where this departed.