Clarkesworld #88 contains, among works by Ken Liu, Cheng Jingbo, Yoo Ha Lee, and Robert Charles Wilson (and doesn't that line-up just make you want to buy it), a story by Aliette de Bodard called Ship's Brother.
What's more, all of those are accessible for you to read online (thanks!), and you can find them either via the links below, or by moving on from Aliette's story once you have read it (yes, I have to insist).
The story plays in a society which has FTL ships - which require a human, or human-born post-human at their centre; and it's the duty of a women to birth one of those after their 'normal' child. And it can be the end of the mother, at lest mentally. (any flashbacks to Sucharitkul's Inquestor series are entirely mine, I know). We witness the birth of such a shipmind, and the impact this has on her family, and especially her brother. On the one hand a classic family tale; and on the other heart-wrenchingly heavy and sad, but also full of beauty.
But enough hyping already - go and ready it. And I guess, having birth and family relations on her mind a while back would have been rather close to home for Aliette, which might explain some of the emotional impact in the story...
Ian McDonald is the author of a long (and growing) list of books and collections; with Philip K. Dick and BSFA Awards to his Name. His current output is the Everness trilogy; whilst The Broken Land is a classic story of his, originally published in 1992, and now re-published in eBook format by Open Road Integrated Media (who specialise in doing exactly that) in July 2013.
The story follows the tribulations and depredation of a girl called Mathembe, born to Confessor parents in Chepsenyt Township in the Transfluvial Province. Mathembe, who has never spoken a work (despite having the physical means to do so) lives in a fascinating, organical world, where food, house elements, glass and ceramic cobbles, conveyances (trux, jeppeneys, traix – I leave it to the reader to imagine how these look!), as well as weapons are grown, or shaped from organic 'plasma' by people who have to skill to shape it.
On death, as recently happened to her grandfather, the head of the dead person is removed, and added to a tree in the grove of ancestors, where the join the Dreaming (which comes across somewhere between a massive, organic parallel computer consisting of all dead Confessors, and some kind of afterlife MMORPG). But the heads can also be kept alive in a pot of organicals and thus moved and carried along (as Mathembe does with her grandfather for most of the story), or added as an Oracle and back-up driver on a bus...
This is a re-publication of this story written by Neil Gaiman and illustrated by Dave McKean, with a long and slightly convoluted history leading to the form you can now (re)purchase for your enjoyment.
Signal to Noise was originally published in serialised form in The Face, the UK 'style' magazine (I remember some of it from those days, although it passed me by... I must have been too young and superficial at the time, I suspect) in 1989, and then collected into a Graphic Novel in 1992. Neil then re-wrote it into a Radio play, with music by Dave McKean, in 1996 (and released on CD in 2000). There is a stage adaptation by Marc Rosenbush and Robert Toombs from 1999, and Dave McKean has been writing about work to turn it into a film, which, to my knowledge, is currently on ice, but which I look forward to, should it ever materialise.
The story, for those who are not familiar with any of the above, concerns a director who, whilst planning for his biggest, best film, learns that he has cancer, and only a short time to live. The film he meant to make concerns the end of the World, exemplified by the populace of a small village, as the first Millennium is about to end.
And, instead of throwing himself into treatment and attempts to extend his life, he keeps working out the film, in his head (because that's how he works). Do I need to point out the obvious parallels re. the end of the world, but also the differences in outcome for the village and the director? But there is so much more going on here, on ever so many levels. And, even if you don't feel like you want to (over-)analyse Neil Gaiman's writing, there is the actual film we are shown, and which we can play in our heads, and generally the rather gorgeous and evocative graphics by Dave McKean.
If you feel like reading something during the Holiday Season to intersperse the relentless celebrating, eating, drinking, and opening of presents with some culture then I have a suggestion for you...
You might consider The Ghosts of Christmas, a short story with a rather Dickensian title by Paul Cornell, which has been made available on Tor. com for all our enjoyment, with an illustration by Scott Bakal.
Although I'm sure that you can also read this after Christmas, it just won't be as topical/timely anymore, I guess...
Either way - enjoy the story, enjoy your Christmas (or you days off should you not celebrate), and thanks for reading along!
Peter Watts is a Canadian hard SF author and “reformed marine biologist” (his own words), with 5 published Novels (one of them published in two volumes for ‘commercial considerations’) and 2 collections of short stories to his name; Beyond the Rift, the topic of this review, being the latest of those. He was recently labelled a “sociological futurist Lovecraft” in a discussion on Charlie Stross’ blog – very fitting I find, in relation to at least some of this book!
He has a brand-new novel, titled Echopraxia, scheduled for 2014 - now there's something to look forward to!
All stories in the collection have been previously published between 1994 and 2010 in a variety of locations and formats, and one of them (The Island) has won the Hugo Award for best Novelette He is himself not completely convinced by some of his old work when re-reading the stories:
“I’m revisiting some of them for the first time in almost a quarter century. Some stand up. Others, not so much. […] Anyone interested in tracking my development as a writer through the years might find it valuable as a kind of Wattsian proto-story, containing the crudeiments of themes later explored with greater sophistication”
Personally speaking I didn't think things were all that dire, I thoroughly enjoyed nearly everything in the collection (and yes, some of them were re-reads. And worth re-reading).
There is one original and never before published piece in the book – an essay by the author titled “Outro: En Route to Dystopia with the Angry Optimist”, where he expounds and reflects on his themes, the reception thereof (what people read frequently does not match what the writer feels he has written, of course!), and “the lack of villains in my fiction, and the abundance of villains in reality” – no prize for guessing that his arrest and beating at the hand of American border guards on trumped up charges features…
Definitely a recommended read, maybe even as an introduction to the author, although I’d strongly recommend his Rifters series (Starfish, Maelstrom, Behemoth) and the claustrophobic (and Hugo nominated) Blindsight, too.
Below is a list of stories in the books, and a few words each on topic and/or my impressions. If you think this might spoil your enjoyment of the book then stop now…
In keeping with the topic of the previous review, here is a short story by Douglas Lain (a 'postmodernist' writer, whatever that is), titled The Last Apollo Mission, and originally published in 2011 in Rudy Rucker's magnificent (and magnificently weird) Flurb Magazine.
What does it deal with, you ask? A failed writer working as a bookseller, hired by Stanley Kubrik to write the script to a film, in a way which was never done before; and ending up on the moon together with her boyfriend. Or is it a stage set in the basement of the collapsed World Trade Centre? I guess, in many way, the story deals with the permeability of reality, to rather startling effect. Ah, just go read it already, ok?
The picture is a photoshop from a moon-landing-denier website, which I shall not link...
