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Quidditch
Hear ye, hear ye, lords and ladies. Come with me now to the year 2004, where apparently sci-fi writers decided to write about colonialism a lot. Or at least, those stories that made it into ‘The Year’s Best Science Fiction: Twenty Second Annual Collection’. I will talk briefly about the collection in general, select a couple stories, and crown one of them Best Sci-Fi Short Story. Oh, and next time I shall write notes after reading each short story.
Since I can hardly afford to subscriptions to sci-fi fantasy, I love short story collections; at least sci-fi fantasy ones. For some odd reason, plain old fiction short stories don’t intrigue me. The only stories I truly liked: a story about a magician who mysteriously disappears, (“Eisenheim the Illusionist”), and s story about a voice that is piped into a building to scream truth (“The Reverse Bug”). Anyway. Maybe I should give it another go; this time with an author I like picking the stories, like Barbara Kingsolver (should’ve done that when I was still at my old library, which actually had the book). Also, I enjoyed the old Clue books; maybe the Year’s Best Mystery stories would be good. Anyway. The bad thing about them, though, is that I have different tastes from the author. This was proven many years ago when I read the We Name Drop A Guy Who Went Batshit Nuts Sci-Fi Writers of the Future Collection (L Ron Hubbard, he gave money to it), which had some contests for new writers and put the medalists and honorable mentions in the book. I enjoyed basically all of them, but the ones that were honorable mentions I would have given first place and the ones that were first place I would have given an honorable mention to.
The best stories, to my mind, were the first ones. Maybe my perspective was altered by the fact that I read those when the grandparents had just arrived for the summer, and then decided to read The Series I Am Trying To Forget About for my sanity, but I doubt it. As I mentioned, colonialism is touched upon, mostly briefly, by quite a few of them. Of course, all of them are about human nature. Sadly, most of the writers are male, but this collection does not lack for female MCs. I’m not sure why most of them are male, when there seem to be plenty of women in the List of the People Who Almost Made It In that all these Year’s Best have. >_<
Inappropriate Behavior by Pat Murphy
A charming story, albeit somewhat jerky. It is about an autistic young girl who is in this program wherein she gets control a metal ‘crab’ and finds rocks on a beach, then talk with the maker of the experiment. One day, she finds something that is definitely not a rock.
Start the Clock by Benjamin Rosenbluam
Not so far into the future, people can decide to be the age they want to be for life. When a group of “kids” (really adults in children’s bodies) go to buy a house, they also investigate what is going on with one of their number.
The Third Party by David Moles
O hai thar, colonialism, nice to see you get kicked in the teeth! The natives of a planet are faced with two threats: one the government of another planet, the other a corporation. They play their two nemeses off each other, brilliantly-much to the surprise and relief of our narrator, who landed himself in a spot of trouble.
The Voluntary State by Christopher Rowe
Much to the dismay of our protagonist, a car breakdown leads to him being captured by people who aren’t part of the system. MAN! (Sorry, been watching too much On The Ground). They lead a successful revolt against GLADOS (well, some kind of brainwashing AI, anyway. Though not funny, like GLADOS). Also, can I begin with ‘much to the dismay of our protagonist’ every story? Actually, yes-but I will refrain.
Shiva in Shadow by Nancy Kress
People’s dark sides cause tragedy on a space ship, though the lady in charge of keeping the peace does her level best to stop it. But, in the thems that get sent to get data (they couldn’t go psychically or they’d die), everything turns out fine. Sad, and probably one of the best-written stories here.
The People of Sand and Slag by Paolo Bacigalupi
Oh my heart, this story. In the future, we’ve junked earth and become robots to survive. But, somehow, a dog survives. They are tempted to kill this creature of blood and bone, but one of them gets attached. It gets hurt and they kill it and eat it. I’m just glad the animal wasn’t a cat. It was hard enough with a dog. Honestly? This makes Caprica look cheerful.
The Clapping Hands of God by Michael F. Flynn
A visit to a new planet goes awry, because some of them (not our protagonist) think they know more than actually do. It feels a lot like Shiva in Shadow in some ways, probably in that it is influenced by Eastern religion. God opens gates to worlds, and the metaphor of clapping hands is present throughout the story.
Tourism by M. John Harrison
A guide leads people crazy enough to want to to a dark maze.
Scout’s Honor by Terry Bisson
Letters from himself bring a man to his fate with Neanderthals He can never go home. It reminds me of Connie Willis time travel stories, with talk of being picked up, only not as good.
Men Are Trouble by James Patrick Kelly
Or, lack of men leads to Issues. Years ago, alien beings came and took away men and made human woman have, well, someone’s babies. (Nobody really understands). When a woman dies, our hero investigates, and we find out plenty of things. It’s confusing, though, in that there seems to be some, I don’t know, time slipping or something.
Mother Aegypt by Kage Baker
A pretty cool story about a con-man who meets up with a woman who cons her evil employer. Funny, but with hidden darkness It’s happier than her first Company novel.
Synthetic Seredipity by Vernor Vinge
Being insanely quick on technologically is crucially important in this period in history and adults are being left behind. A student sent on a mission from a teacher whom rumour had it that she was fired from her former job on account of not being able to keep up realizes that she is perfectly capable of keeping up-and is teaching those that have fallen behind. A fun story.
Skin Deep by Mary Rosenblaum
A man badly disfigured in an accident agrees to a new kind of plastic surgery by a doctor-and finds himself being turned into the man’s dead son. So he quits, and finds that not freaking out is good enough. Poignant.
Delhi by Vandanda Singh
A man tries to find the person he is supposed to find and discovers a future underground slum. Very haunting.
The Tribes of Bela by Albert E. Cowdrey
A detective come to find out who is killing people on board the island finding out that the human born on the island is working to bring the island back to the natives. A bloody battle for survival breaks out, some do manage to survive-and the planet goes back to the natives. I told you there were lots of colonialism stories here. Pretty good.
Sitka by William Sanders
A group of time-travelers spy Jack London plotting with some guy plotting to blow up a ship. The time-travelers discuss that no matter how many different time-streams they visited, WW1 always happened somehow. Interesting.
Leviathan Wept by Daniel Abraham
The planet is sick, so people start fighting amongst themselves, like someone who’s own blood cells are attacking them. Sad.
The Defenders by Colin P. Davis
A too-short story about a grandfather teaching his granddaughter how to use a creature to defend themselves-and she is upset when her one, the one who was already good and better then the others, dies.
Mayflower II by Stephan Baxter
After a successful war with aliens, Earth’s government decides to take care of those humans with too-close ties to the alien invaders. So these groups of people have to escape Our protagonist wasn’t supposed to go, but the person who was turned out to have to be sick, so he was chosen instead, leaving his beloved behind. So he volunteers to be one of the long-lived people to get everyone where they are supposed to go. The story is about survival’s guilt, but also about change. Let’s just say that no one is the same as they are at the end of the story.
Riding the White Bull by Caitlin R. Kiernan
A stealth zombie story, with an anti-hero who wishes he had more courage and a government who never lets go of people, not even when they die, in order to take care of an alien thing that takes over people.
Falling Star by Brendan DuBois
After technology collapses, people live 19th century style while one of them mourns for what is lost. He gets kicked out, of course, but not before he may have had an effect on one of the boys.
The Dragons of Summer Gulch by Robert Reed
In a world more awesome than ours, instead of dinosaurs they had dragons. While two people tussle over still-alive dragon eggs and ignore the woman bitter about her people being conquered, she manages to get hold of the eggs to take the land back for her people. Dragons are awesome, and attract people who want to use their powers like they are flowers and the others bees. Considering I love using Bahamut, the dragon summon in the Final Fantasy video game series (well, he’s a summon in most FFs, sadly he doesn’t seem to be in the latest ones, nooooooo), in my darkest heart I almost understand.
The Ocean of the Blind by James Cambias
A man who wishes his boss dead, and, like everyone else, has thought of tons of ways to kill him, is unfortunate enough to be present when said boss gets sliced alive by the underwater people they were studying because said people thought he was like the rest of the prey. Made all the more effective by getting to know one of those people. They are more like us than they will know. After all, we killed dogs for experiment and pretended that their screams did not mean they were in pain. Aside: I was disturbed and impressed by how many ways they thought of killing their unfortunate boss. I never thought of a 100th as much of ways to kill a certain character in The Series That I’m Trying To Forget)
The Garden: A Hwarhath Science Fiction Romance by Eleanor Arnason
A man who wishes to stay at home and garden gets involved with a scientist on the ship. Upon discovering that it may be destroyed by a black hole, he does a runner and hides at home. Not realizing that the war between his people and the humans was over he is startled by a visit by two people, one human, one Hwarhath. There are explanatory notes, and it turns out it was written by an Hwarhath woman to argue that woman should be allowed to go into space.
Footvote by Peter F. Hamilton
A British politician decides to open a hole to another place to create a utopia. A divorced man and woman and their children get caught up in it. It was surprising how much of it sounded appealing to me. Maybe I am British at heart.
Sisypus and the Stranger by Paul Di Filippo
The French get technology that allows them to create a seemingly unstoppable empire. A man named Albert Camus gets an offer that he seriously considers that may make him more like the Camus we know.
Ten Sigmas
A man who is aware of all his alternate selves manages to rescue a young woman in some universes and decides that is enough. It was unique; I liked it. Would you take advantage of the knowledge alterna-yous have and what would you use it for?
Investments by Walter Jon Williams
Corruption nearly leads to a planet’s death, but a colonel and a man who recently rose through the ranks in the last war save the day. Too long, but good.
And the nominees are:
Inappropriate Behavior: A fascinating young heroine and a satisfying ending
The People of Sand and Slag Unforgettable and tragic
Mother Aegypt Humer and darkness intertwined
Delhi Past, present and future affect each other, at the same time, to great result
Sitka One of the more effective time travel stories
And the winner is:
Man, it was hard to chose. Inappropriate Behavior wins, probably because it was happy. I admit it, I love happy stories.
Since I can hardly afford to subscriptions to sci-fi fantasy, I love short story collections; at least sci-fi fantasy ones. For some odd reason, plain old fiction short stories don’t intrigue me. The only stories I truly liked: a story about a magician who mysteriously disappears, (“Eisenheim the Illusionist”), and s story about a voice that is piped into a building to scream truth (“The Reverse Bug”). Anyway. Maybe I should give it another go; this time with an author I like picking the stories, like Barbara Kingsolver (should’ve done that when I was still at my old library, which actually had the book). Also, I enjoyed the old Clue books; maybe the Year’s Best Mystery stories would be good. Anyway. The bad thing about them, though, is that I have different tastes from the author. This was proven many years ago when I read the We Name Drop A Guy Who Went Batshit Nuts Sci-Fi Writers of the Future Collection (L Ron Hubbard, he gave money to it), which had some contests for new writers and put the medalists and honorable mentions in the book. I enjoyed basically all of them, but the ones that were honorable mentions I would have given first place and the ones that were first place I would have given an honorable mention to.
The best stories, to my mind, were the first ones. Maybe my perspective was altered by the fact that I read those when the grandparents had just arrived for the summer, and then decided to read The Series I Am Trying To Forget About for my sanity, but I doubt it. As I mentioned, colonialism is touched upon, mostly briefly, by quite a few of them. Of course, all of them are about human nature. Sadly, most of the writers are male, but this collection does not lack for female MCs. I’m not sure why most of them are male, when there seem to be plenty of women in the List of the People Who Almost Made It In that all these Year’s Best have. >_<
Inappropriate Behavior by Pat Murphy
A charming story, albeit somewhat jerky. It is about an autistic young girl who is in this program wherein she gets control a metal ‘crab’ and finds rocks on a beach, then talk with the maker of the experiment. One day, she finds something that is definitely not a rock.
Start the Clock by Benjamin Rosenbluam
Not so far into the future, people can decide to be the age they want to be for life. When a group of “kids” (really adults in children’s bodies) go to buy a house, they also investigate what is going on with one of their number.
The Third Party by David Moles
O hai thar, colonialism, nice to see you get kicked in the teeth! The natives of a planet are faced with two threats: one the government of another planet, the other a corporation. They play their two nemeses off each other, brilliantly-much to the surprise and relief of our narrator, who landed himself in a spot of trouble.
The Voluntary State by Christopher Rowe
Much to the dismay of our protagonist, a car breakdown leads to him being captured by people who aren’t part of the system. MAN! (Sorry, been watching too much On The Ground). They lead a successful revolt against GLADOS (well, some kind of brainwashing AI, anyway. Though not funny, like GLADOS). Also, can I begin with ‘much to the dismay of our protagonist’ every story? Actually, yes-but I will refrain.
Shiva in Shadow by Nancy Kress
People’s dark sides cause tragedy on a space ship, though the lady in charge of keeping the peace does her level best to stop it. But, in the thems that get sent to get data (they couldn’t go psychically or they’d die), everything turns out fine. Sad, and probably one of the best-written stories here.
The People of Sand and Slag by Paolo Bacigalupi
Oh my heart, this story. In the future, we’ve junked earth and become robots to survive. But, somehow, a dog survives. They are tempted to kill this creature of blood and bone, but one of them gets attached. It gets hurt and they kill it and eat it. I’m just glad the animal wasn’t a cat. It was hard enough with a dog. Honestly? This makes Caprica look cheerful.
The Clapping Hands of God by Michael F. Flynn
A visit to a new planet goes awry, because some of them (not our protagonist) think they know more than actually do. It feels a lot like Shiva in Shadow in some ways, probably in that it is influenced by Eastern religion. God opens gates to worlds, and the metaphor of clapping hands is present throughout the story.
Tourism by M. John Harrison
A guide leads people crazy enough to want to to a dark maze.
Scout’s Honor by Terry Bisson
Letters from himself bring a man to his fate with Neanderthals He can never go home. It reminds me of Connie Willis time travel stories, with talk of being picked up, only not as good.
Men Are Trouble by James Patrick Kelly
Or, lack of men leads to Issues. Years ago, alien beings came and took away men and made human woman have, well, someone’s babies. (Nobody really understands). When a woman dies, our hero investigates, and we find out plenty of things. It’s confusing, though, in that there seems to be some, I don’t know, time slipping or something.
Mother Aegypt by Kage Baker
A pretty cool story about a con-man who meets up with a woman who cons her evil employer. Funny, but with hidden darkness It’s happier than her first Company novel.
Synthetic Seredipity by Vernor Vinge
Being insanely quick on technologically is crucially important in this period in history and adults are being left behind. A student sent on a mission from a teacher whom rumour had it that she was fired from her former job on account of not being able to keep up realizes that she is perfectly capable of keeping up-and is teaching those that have fallen behind. A fun story.
Skin Deep by Mary Rosenblaum
A man badly disfigured in an accident agrees to a new kind of plastic surgery by a doctor-and finds himself being turned into the man’s dead son. So he quits, and finds that not freaking out is good enough. Poignant.
Delhi by Vandanda Singh
A man tries to find the person he is supposed to find and discovers a future underground slum. Very haunting.
The Tribes of Bela by Albert E. Cowdrey
A detective come to find out who is killing people on board the island finding out that the human born on the island is working to bring the island back to the natives. A bloody battle for survival breaks out, some do manage to survive-and the planet goes back to the natives. I told you there were lots of colonialism stories here. Pretty good.
Sitka by William Sanders
A group of time-travelers spy Jack London plotting with some guy plotting to blow up a ship. The time-travelers discuss that no matter how many different time-streams they visited, WW1 always happened somehow. Interesting.
Leviathan Wept by Daniel Abraham
The planet is sick, so people start fighting amongst themselves, like someone who’s own blood cells are attacking them. Sad.
The Defenders by Colin P. Davis
A too-short story about a grandfather teaching his granddaughter how to use a creature to defend themselves-and she is upset when her one, the one who was already good and better then the others, dies.
Mayflower II by Stephan Baxter
After a successful war with aliens, Earth’s government decides to take care of those humans with too-close ties to the alien invaders. So these groups of people have to escape Our protagonist wasn’t supposed to go, but the person who was turned out to have to be sick, so he was chosen instead, leaving his beloved behind. So he volunteers to be one of the long-lived people to get everyone where they are supposed to go. The story is about survival’s guilt, but also about change. Let’s just say that no one is the same as they are at the end of the story.
Riding the White Bull by Caitlin R. Kiernan
A stealth zombie story, with an anti-hero who wishes he had more courage and a government who never lets go of people, not even when they die, in order to take care of an alien thing that takes over people.
Falling Star by Brendan DuBois
After technology collapses, people live 19th century style while one of them mourns for what is lost. He gets kicked out, of course, but not before he may have had an effect on one of the boys.
The Dragons of Summer Gulch by Robert Reed
In a world more awesome than ours, instead of dinosaurs they had dragons. While two people tussle over still-alive dragon eggs and ignore the woman bitter about her people being conquered, she manages to get hold of the eggs to take the land back for her people. Dragons are awesome, and attract people who want to use their powers like they are flowers and the others bees. Considering I love using Bahamut, the dragon summon in the Final Fantasy video game series (well, he’s a summon in most FFs, sadly he doesn’t seem to be in the latest ones, nooooooo), in my darkest heart I almost understand.
The Ocean of the Blind by James Cambias
A man who wishes his boss dead, and, like everyone else, has thought of tons of ways to kill him, is unfortunate enough to be present when said boss gets sliced alive by the underwater people they were studying because said people thought he was like the rest of the prey. Made all the more effective by getting to know one of those people. They are more like us than they will know. After all, we killed dogs for experiment and pretended that their screams did not mean they were in pain. Aside: I was disturbed and impressed by how many ways they thought of killing their unfortunate boss. I never thought of a 100th as much of ways to kill a certain character in The Series That I’m Trying To Forget)
The Garden: A Hwarhath Science Fiction Romance by Eleanor Arnason
A man who wishes to stay at home and garden gets involved with a scientist on the ship. Upon discovering that it may be destroyed by a black hole, he does a runner and hides at home. Not realizing that the war between his people and the humans was over he is startled by a visit by two people, one human, one Hwarhath. There are explanatory notes, and it turns out it was written by an Hwarhath woman to argue that woman should be allowed to go into space.
Footvote by Peter F. Hamilton
A British politician decides to open a hole to another place to create a utopia. A divorced man and woman and their children get caught up in it. It was surprising how much of it sounded appealing to me. Maybe I am British at heart.
Sisypus and the Stranger by Paul Di Filippo
The French get technology that allows them to create a seemingly unstoppable empire. A man named Albert Camus gets an offer that he seriously considers that may make him more like the Camus we know.
Ten Sigmas
A man who is aware of all his alternate selves manages to rescue a young woman in some universes and decides that is enough. It was unique; I liked it. Would you take advantage of the knowledge alterna-yous have and what would you use it for?
Investments by Walter Jon Williams
Corruption nearly leads to a planet’s death, but a colonel and a man who recently rose through the ranks in the last war save the day. Too long, but good.
And the nominees are:
Inappropriate Behavior: A fascinating young heroine and a satisfying ending
The People of Sand and Slag Unforgettable and tragic
Mother Aegypt Humer and darkness intertwined
Delhi Past, present and future affect each other, at the same time, to great result
Sitka One of the more effective time travel stories
And the winner is:
Man, it was hard to chose. Inappropriate Behavior wins, probably because it was happy. I admit it, I love happy stories.