Uneven but thought-provoking. ( )

http://yet.org/2008/12/axiomatique.ht... ( )

+ is hit, - is miss:

+ The Infinite Assassin (1991)
+ The Hundred Light-Year Diary (1992)
Eugene (1990)
+ The Caress (1990)
+ Blood Sisters (1991)
+ Axiomatic (1990)
+ The Safe-Deposit Box (1990)
Seeing (1995)
+ A Kidnapping (1995)
+ Learning to Be Me (1990)
+ The Moat (1991)
The Walk (1992)
+ The Cutie (1989)
Into Darkness (1992)
Appropriate Love (1991)
+ The Moral Virologist (1990)
+ Closer (1992)
+ Unstable Orbits in the Space of Lies (1992) ( )

Egan's first collection of great mind bending and mind melting stories. Really high quality at a 3.94 average, and a major talent of the form.

Axiomatic : The Infinite Assassin - Greg Egan
Axiomatic : The Hundred Light-Year Diary - Greg Egan
Axiomatic : Eugene - Greg Egan
Axiomatic : The Caress - Greg Egan
Axiomatic : Blood Sisters - Greg Egan
Axiomatic : Axiomatic - Greg Egan
Axiomatic : The Safe-Deposit Box - Greg Egan
Axiomatic : Seeing - Greg Egan
Axiomatic : A Kidnapping - Greg Egan
Axiomatic : Learning to Be Me - Greg Egan
Axiomatic : The Moat - Greg Egan
Axiomatic : The Walk - Greg Egan
Axiomatic : The Cutie - Greg Egan
Axiomatic : Into Darkness - Greg Egan
Axiomatic : Appropriate Love - Greg Egan
Axiomatic : The Moral Virologist - Greg Egan
Axiomatic : Closer - Greg Egan
Axiomatic : Unstable Orbits in the Space of Lies - Greg Egan

Multiversal murder tango, at a Cantor.

4.5 out of 5

Foreknowledge failure.

3.5 out of 5

Micromanaged kid just a tad nihilistic.

4 out of 5

An enhanced policeman gets entangled in a billionaire's bizarre Dr Moreau creations as art and save the child schemes.

4 out of 5

Placebo death override.

4 out of 5

A man who lost his wife in an armed robbery shooting, and is a complete believer in the sanctity of life wants to get a brain implant so he can do something about his wife's killer, now released from jail.

4.5 out of 5

Jumper, no wild card or evil lawyers, but crappy base situation.

4 out of 5

Bullet in body, bullet out of body, seat of consciousness partially likewise.

3.5 out of 5

Copy deception reality frozen.

4.5 out of 5

A man learns to come to terms with the Jewel or Ndoli device - which is also mentioned in Border Guards, and has a bit of a different reaction with a glitch to others.

3 out of 5

Immigrantproofing the wealthy.

4.5 out of 5

Assassin death religion victim choice.

4 out of 5

Paternal pang kit cure destruction.

4 out of 5

Hyperspace saviour run record.

4.5 out of 5

Brain baby.

4 out of 5

A crazed religious not and expert biologist creates a virus that will ensure non-monogamous sex will kill you. He fails to account for pregnancy correctly.

3.5 out of 5

Another 'jewel' story, this time, two people meet at work, and one of them has a fetish that he wants to know what it is like to be someone else, so they do some body swapping, and use identical clones as well, to experiment.

3.5 out of 5

Strange society not attractive.

3.5 out of 5

http://notfreesf.blogspot.com/2007/08... ( )

The hardest of hard sf. I have a couple years of college physics, and Egan's stories were a challenge for me to follow.

'bluetyson' here on LT characterizes this sort of thing as "mind melting". That's exactly what I got from it, too: this is so good that I found that I needed to take a rest between stories.

(So good that it forever destroyed any illusions I ever harbored of writing the stuff: the state of the art is now Too High for me.) Hell, this is so good that it put me off reading the stuff for a while: nothing else measured up. ( )