Every Version of You

Every Version of You by Grace Chan

The physical world has gone to pot. People spend most of their time living in a virtual reality world, Gaia. Their physical body is often in a basic lift-support pod while they spend time in the virtual world. Through a technological breakthrough, people can now "clone" themselves so that they can live full time virtually and dispose of their physical bodies. The book centers around Navin and Tao-Yi. Navin is done with the poor condition of his physical body and is eager to enter the virtual world permanently. Tao-Yi has doubts. She also endures the death of her mother, a real-world hold out. The book explores transhumanism and what it means to be "alive". Hidden beneath the surface is how we can be controlled and willingly surrender rights and abilities.

The Undertaking of Hart and Mercy

The Undertaking of Hart and Mercy by Megan Bannen

A fantasy world has demigods and "undead". People must take out funeral insurance policy when they enter, just in case. An arrow through the appendix of the undead is needed to eliminate them. Rather than create a dark fantasy tale, the author writes with a light tone filled with humor. It worked very well.

The story centers on Hart, a demigod marshall who hunts the undead and Mercy the daughter of an undertaker. They seem to hate each other, but there is some attraction. Hart starts spilling out his heart in anonymous letters. These are received by Mercy. They have a You've Got Mail relationship. They fall in love by mail, yet continue to dislike each other.  He discovers that she is the letter girl, and even tells her, but she doesn't believe him. Later he ends up saving her life from zombies and they fall in love. End, right? Nope. Still a lot more of the novel left. They seem to have a good relationship, but they freak out over him knowing about the letters and her not. Seems a bit contrived. He later discovers that he has the ability to stop the zombies by "going home". He saves the world, and then they live happily ever after.

The last part of the book seemed needlessly tacked on. The first part was really good. A light, humorous romantic fantasy is so much better than the dark droll that fills the shelves today.

The Echo Wife

The Echo Wife by Sarah Gailey

In this near-future world, cloning is fairly common. Famous figures are cloned to help protect them. The clones are specifically made inferior and cannot reproduce. The lead character, Dr. Evelyn Caldwell is a cloning researcher who has broken up with her husband Nathan. Her ex had wanted a child and the perfect wife. He had been creating clones of Evelyn with the characteristics he desired. After a dozen failures, he had created Martine who seemed to be the perfect wife. She was able to become pregnant with his child. However, they got into a big fight and Martine killed Nathan. Evelyn and Martine used their knowledge to dispose of the original body and create a Nathan clone. Martine later became unhinged when she found the remains of the other failed clones. They decide the best thing to do would to fake Martine's suicide (using another clone) and then have Martine escape to live with Evelyn, unbeknownst to Nathan. Evelyn offers to take care of Martine's baby (by secretly bringing it to its mom). How do ethics work in the world of cloning? Is a cloned being human or a biological product? 

Stories of Your Life and Others

Stories of Your Life and Others by Ted Chiang

This thought provoking science fiction collection deals more with philosophy than hard science. (Though mathematicians and linguists may beg to differ.) The story notes were rather short and placed at the end rather than after each story.

Story List (titles rom Wikipedia entry):

"Tower of Babylon" (originally published in Omni, November 1990) (Nebula Award winner)

This is an exploration of the Tower of Babel with a "literal" cosmology like the bible. It is fun, but not super insightful.

"Understand" (originally published in Asimov's, August 1991)

A man receives a medical treatment that gives him super-human intellect. The scientists are trying to study this, but he is always one step ahead of them due to his abilities. He later secretly obtains more of the treatment, making him even more intelligent. He eventually connects with another super-human. They fight with their capabilities, leading to one surviving. Could we have any control over "super-capabilities"? Part of super-smartness would be an understanding of what people are trying to test, making it difficult to measure. 

"Division by Zero" (originally published in Full Spectrum 3, June 1991)

What if math were not fixed and division by zero were possible? The woman who discovers this struggles with sanity and causes issues with her marriage. Her husband is both her support and falling out of love with her.

"Story of Your Life" (originally published in Starlight 2, November 1998) (Nebula Award and Theodore Sturgeon Memorial Award winner)

How would we learn to communicate with aliens? A scientist is tasked with understanding the language of heptapods that have visited earth. Their language is structured different from ours, with a non-linear structure closely related to how they are. They also find some math "simple" that we find more advanced. It is an intriguing look at the challenges of communication when there are large differences. It also comes to an abrupt end when they decide it is time to leave.

"Seventy-Two Letters" (originally published in Vanishing Acts, June 2000) (Sidewise Award winner)

Names have power. While this was one of the reasons I read this collection, I was a bit lost in the story.

"The Evolution of Human Science" (originally published as "Catching Crumbs from the Table" in Nature, June 2000)

What would the role of humans be if we had "metahumans" with greater capacity?

"Hell Is the Absence of God" (originally published in Starlight 3, July 2001) (Hugo Award, Locus Award and Nebula Award winner)

In this world angelic visitations are common, but not worry free. Sometimes people are healed, while others may be injured by flying shrapnel. People may end up in heaven or hell depending on their behavior and everyone knows where they go. The story focuses on people with different faith journeys. It is portrayed as pure fantasy which allows it to better explore relationships between faith and knowledge. It has an interesting structure nearer to a documentary of intertwined people.

"Liking What You See: A Documentary"

People can get a special treatment that causes them to not notice people's looks. Thus they will not be lead astray by common concepts of beauty. Many parents would have their kids undergo this process. The central focus is a college where the students are voting to have this treatment mandatory so as not cause harm to people without good looks. It is an interesting exploration of equality gone to extremes, while also exploring how we often make bad decisions based on appearance. How would life be if we could have this treatment?

The Girl With All the Gifts

The Girl with All the Gifts by M. R. Carey

A fungus wiped out most of the population and turned those in contact with it into zombies. A few other "off the grid" humans managed to survive, but would fight against other groups. There were also some military groups that survived and are studying it in a lab. They are studying some kids that have been exposed to the fungi, yet still function as normal humans. The lead researcher is portrayed in a negative light throughout the book. This sets up the conclusion where they realize the best course of action is to let the funga do a massage spore release that will wipe out the current state of humanity and lead to a future human/fungi symbiosis. The narrative flows very well and stays interesting, even as it presents a non-standard conclusion to the post-apocalyptic zombie tale.

The Forest on the Edge of Time

The Forest on the Edge of Time by Jasmin Kirkbride

Some time travelers are sent to different points in time to save the world from ecological destruction. Unfortunately, once of them damages the time machine. One is back in ancient Greek. There she struggles with the culture that includes slavery, but also realizes there are advantages to being back here. The book also explores some time travel paradoxes. Can you really complete your mission if you know all about the past and future? It reminded me a bit of Brandon Sanderson's time travel novella.

Automatic Noodle

Automatic Noodle by Annalee Newitz

In the San Francisco of the future, robots and humans live together in a not-quite peaceable manner. Many things, such as owning a restaurant, are reserved for humans. Some robots have been working at a restaurant when the owner disappears. They decide they would like to run the restaurant themselves. They manage to work through some technicalities to get "authentic noodle" set up. They rely on a review site to help customers find them. However, they are dependent on good ratings. Somebody later tries to review-bomb them to bring them down. This person is part of the anti-robot group. Eventually, they find them and restore their reputation. However, in the process they learn that they do not depend on the service and take pride in the "automatic noodle" name they have been given by their detractors. The book has a lighthearted approach to working together even with differences.

Tailored Realities

Tailored Realities by Brandon Sanderson

I've preferred Sanderson's science fiction work to his Cosmere mainstream. This collection does not disappoint. It contains many "short" works outside his typical universe. Many have been published in other areas. (After getting into the first one, I realized I had already read "Snapshot" before.) The length ranges from super-short flash fiction to long novella. The final work, "Moment Zero" is a new work that has Christopher Nolan vibes. A mad scientist has created a wormhole that has created a zombie apocalypse. The people that were at the scene of the wormhole creation were sent backwards and forwards in time. A couple detectives involved can somehow communicate across the timeline. They figure out what went wrong and work to push the "real" timeline to a peaceful ending.

Sanderson also includes notes for each story, often describing the genesis of the story and other important aspects. We learn that some of these stories were written as a pre-published starving author, while others were written well into his career. The "notes" are always one of my favorite parts of short story collections.

The collection includes:

1. Snapshot
2. Brain Dump
3. I Hate Dragons
4. Dreamer
5. Perfect State
6. Probability Approaching Zero
7. Defending Elysium
8. Firstborn
9. Mitosis
10. Moment Zero

Isles of the Emberdark: A Cosmere Novel Secret Projects, Book 5

Isles of the Emberdark: A Cosmere Novel Secret Projects, Book 5 by Brandon Sanderson

A young dragon leads a crew of misfits. She works to help encourage her crew to work together and be happy. She slowly learns how to be a good leader. There are significant areas of trust that need to be overcome. They have struggles as they encounter various other beings in space. The book is a bit long (but shorter than many other Cosmere books.) It stands along well and has some interesting stories that relies more on science fiction than fantasy.

The Constant Rabbit: A Novel

The Constant Rabbit: A Novel by Jasper Fforde

In an alternate Britain, animals have anthropomorphized and been given rights similar to humans. Things are complicated. Rabbits are treated poorly. They are criticized as indistinguishable sex-crazed beings that rapidly reproduce. The protagonist has a genetic variation that allows him to identify individual rabbits. He works as a "spotter". However, he also had a past friendship with a rabbit. If this were known he would be in trouble with his job (due to the anti-rabbit politics.) Foxes have key roles in government and are part of the force pushing to move rabbits out to an isolated colony. The protagonist rekindles the friendship with the bunny and discovers more about the bunny underground. He sees a fox attempt to kill a rabbit and kills the fox. He is brought to trial. His use of self-defense as rationale is rebuffed because the fox was allowed to act like and animal (rather than a human) when attempting to kill a rabbit. He was able to get off when his attorney said he was justified as being on a fox hunt. 

The book has obvious parallels to race and immigration. The animals are somewhat integrated into the new society, but still treated different from humans. They live split lives as animals and "people". Some organizations want to have nothing to do with some of these animals that are so different.

In the end, the rabbits feel they have had enough. They stop being anthropomorphized and go back to just being animals. The protagonist still sees his rabbit friend as a regular yard bunny.  Does this advocate immigrants going back home? Or just living with their old culture? Or is it just an interesting story?

Reawakening: The Side Step Trilogy, Book 2

Reawakening: The Side Step Trilogy, Book 2 by Orson Scott Card

A couple (Laz and Ivy) wake up and try to find their purpose. They are clones of an elite scientist and his assistant. They have their past memories and try to discover their purpose of being revived as clones. The scientist has the ability to "sidestep" to different time streams. The assistant has the ability to identify time portals. In their life as clones they have developed a romantic relationship. (However, it is not until the end that the original join together. They had connected, but felt reluctant due to age and business relationship.) 

In the story, they try to figure out their purpose. They meet with some of their other clones. There is also a mysterious message from a portal. One of their attempts to open a portal leads to some people going in and destroying a school. They send an army back in the portal to crush these people.. They also run into their children. They have some bizarre powers to appear and disappear. The son has a habbit of showing up naked and intimidating. Laz punches him as he is materializing which results in all sorts of internal damage. They then find an appropriate time stream that allows him to be healed, but still remember his bad behavior so that he reforms. In the end they discover the original Laz has traveled in time and feels "stuck". He eventually connects with the real Ivy and they can live happily ever after. 

The book has a number of streams that seem only tangentially connected. The premise is a bit like Mickey7, but explores some different areas of time travel and multiverse.

Earth Revisited

Earth Revisited by Byron Alden Brooks

A man from the 19th century wakes up in 1992. He is in a different body with a different woman (Helen) that reminds him of his early love, Theresa. Helen tries to nurse him back to health, thinking he is delirious. The world he lives in is a spiritualist socialist Utopia. There is no war. People live by Christian virtues, but there are no churches. There are interesting new technologies like a "tone telegraph". The book got more modern technologies wrong than it got right. It also spent a long time exploring the spirituality of the Utopian world. 

Gravity's Rainbow

Gravity's Rainbow by Thomas Pynchon

I started this after reading a quote from here about burned out light bulbs. It is a long book. After spending a few hours, I was not impressed and getting sick of the vulgarity, so I put it down. That's about it. (From November 18, 2016)

I am not a fan George Guidall narrations. His voice screams out "boring" and there are too many "empty spaces" as he reads. It doesn't help that the book is long and rambling. The Pulitzer Advisory Board was offended by its content, some of which was described as "'unreadable', 'turgid', 'overwritten', and in parts 'obscene'. That feels accurate.

While it is not being vulgar and scattalogical, there is a bit of World War II science fiction going on. There is some super device that some people want. Nazis and various other people come into play. Perhaps that would be an interesting novella, rather than an afterthought in 37 hours of blather.

The Languages of Pao

The Languages of Pao by Jack Vance

This is the 2004 "Vance Integral Edition" of the book. It had reviewed various versions to produce an "authoritative" version of the book that as reviewed by Vance. It was not easy to find, and ended up coming from on library loan from New Hampshire. 

Pao is a peaceful planet with billions of inhabitants. The language stresses a strong sense of community and togetherness. People are content having their basic needs fulfilled. However, this also leaves them susceptible to outside interference. The leader is killed and a pretender takes over. He is required to pay regular tribute to a warrior planet. The man with a real claim to the throne is taken under the wing of another leader. This leader trains him in the language and culture of the planet. It is part of a long scheme to get power. As part of this scheme a number of other people are sent off Pao to study linguistics in order to become future leaders. Different regions of Pao are also set up for certain groups (such as a warrior class) with their own languages. The true inheritor of the throne returns and is able to assume power. He helps the planet to grow and kick out their oppressors. However, he discovers that the planet is losing its identity. The grops have their own languages and thought processes. He hatches a plan to unify the country under a common language to maintain the identity. 

The book has some interesting takes on languages and their influence on culture. The neighboring planet has a "selfish" society that has great power over others. The planet is almost entirely men. They import women as concubines. The healthy sons remain while the daughters return with their mothers after the concubine period is over. This allows the group to rapidly reproduce, but does make them highly dependent on having a continual stream of foreigners. Could a society like this really function for a length of time? However, even more concerning is the unity of the original Pao language. Could a simple agricultural planet really maintain a single language across 15 billion people? Would the society stay similar across this planet?

Antibodies

Antibodies by Charles Stross

This short story was first published in 2000, and later published in the compilation Toast: And Other Rusted Futures. A mathematician publishes a paper that solves the traveling salesman problem and transforms NP-complete problems to easily solvable ones. This seemingly breaks all cryptography. The story them picots to AIs gone amok. The AI has grown and taken on an identity of its own. It has started to consume all electronic resources and then goes on to inhabit the real world. A couple is trying to reach an "extraction point" where they can escape from this world. Alas, they are caught a little before escaping. Luckily, they appear to have "anitbodies" and are able to escape. There are a few interesting concepts in this story, but they don't quite come together.

Wireless

Wireless by Charles Stross

This science fiction collection includes a variety of works spanning different time periods. I enjoyed the commentaries that were associated with the stories. The author praises the short story as a medium that allows earning money and receiving quick feedback. Alas, this was written before the influx of AI has caused issues in the field.

Stories included:

Missile Gap

Rogue Farm

A Colder War

MAXOS

Down on the Farm

Unwirer

Snowball's Chance

Trunk and Disorderly

Palimpeset

The Truth Machine: A Speculative Novel

The Truth Machine: A Speculative Novel by James L. Halperin

The novel is also available for free download from the author's company website. This starts from the period it was written in the 1990s and gradually moves forward in history. It primarily follows some college friends. One goes to be billionaire business leader. Another becomes president of the United States. There are various international conflicts and technological advances. Things didn't pan out exactly as the novel projects, but it did seem to get general vibes pretty well. 

The eponymous "Truth Machine" is the technological goal of the novel. Crime had become bad in society. Strict "two-strikes" laws were implemented to execute repeat offenders. This helped reduce crime, but it also led to execution of innocent victims. This was justified because this saved lives that would be lost due to violent crime. However, people wanted something better. Thus the truth machine. If there could be a technology that could identify the truth with 100% accuracy, we could reduce crime and false incarcerations. The genius strives to do it. Investors end up combining his company with another one that includes an unscrupulous guy.  They make plenty of money with other "big data" products as they are working on the truth machine. Unscrupulous guy shows him code that could help accelerate development of truth machine. Techie guy has photographic memory and can't not remember it. He is stuck because he would need to certify nothing bad happened in development of truth machine. He struggles to work on alternate approaches. After somebody that he thinks is innocent is put to death, he decides he must release the truth machine. He incorporates code similar to what he viewed. He also adds a special override just for him so that machine can be certified. However, unscrupulous guy knows he has used it and makes him sign off half of revenue from product and give him an override also. Eventually techie kills unscrupulous so he won't get killed. This haunts him internally. However, truth machine helps lead to world peace and a future world government. Decades later, he finally fesses up and goes to trial. He eventually is allowed to be free - if he agrees to treatment that takes away his super-intelligence. 

The novel reminds me of Fountainhead. It is trying to expose a worldview and contains climatic trial where the protagonist fights against the system. It poses some interesting exploration of how the world could be if everyone told what they believe to be the truth. It also explores the challenge of relying on technology. Can we ever be sure that it is totally accurate?

The Blazing World

The Blazing World by Margaret Cavendish

A royal from the normal world travels to the "blazing world". There she learns about the society and culture, along with scientific explanations for natural phenomena. Many of these explanations seem very wrong today, but it was a nice experiment at the time. This is a great forerunner of science fiction works and is a very entertaining read today.

A Voyage to the Moon

A Voyage to the Moon by Cyrano de Bergerac, translated by Archibald Lovell

This is alternatively titled Comical History of the States and Empires of the Moon. A Frenchman travels to the moon and has interesting experiences there. Similar to other "voyage" books, he identifies differences between their world and his world. They find it odd he treats their world as a "moon" of earth. The translation is somewhat difficult to follow. It was an early forerunner to modern science books.

Dragon and Thief (The Dragonback Series Book 1)

Dragon and Thief (The Dragonback Series Book 1) by Timothy Zahn

A dragon and kid raised as a thief are partners. They survived a spaceship crash. They pretend to be magicians and put on a show - earning a lot of money doing "legitimately" what the kid has done illicitly before. There is more plot and story, but I didn't really catch it.