Eric Choi

In a world where Science Fiction has been rather watered down, I was really excited to stumble upon Carbide Tipped Pens. This anthology promised hard SF which, if you're not familiar with it, is the purest form of this genre. Essentially the science or technology portion of the story is the story. Without it, everything else around it falls apart. I love reading stories like these. They are full of potential ideas, full of things that could someday be, and I was thrilled to be given a whole show more series of them.

The anthology started out strong! The first story, "The Blue Afternoon that Lasted Forever" was one of my favorites. The perfect length to draw me in, this scientific tale of the end of the world was chilling. Stories that plausible always are. "Thunderwell" was another of my favorites. This brilliant story shared the possibility of travel to Mars, and so much more. Followed by "The Circle", a story of ancient mathematics, and "Old Timer's Game", a story that highlights what artificially enhanced sports players may someday become, the first half of the anthology was brilliant. I was lost in a new world. One full of well thought out possibilities, and I couldn't have been happier.

Towards the middle, however, I was no longer as invested. A lot of the stories from the mid-point on were just too concentrated on the science/technology aspect. It made the characters shells of themselves, and therefore made it hard for me to focus. I absolutely understand that the basis of these stories is, in fact, science and technology. When too much jargon is being thrown about though it's tough to stay on track. Readers like myself, who take pleasure in reading these but aren't formally trained, are locked out of appreciating the story. If I had been a scientist in a former life, perhaps they would have been more enjoyable. I just felt lost.

The one notable exception was "SIREN of Titan" which was what kept me reading on to the end of this anthology. Dealing with Artificial Intelligence, it was absolutely fascinating and extremely well written. So, don't fret. If you choose to read this anthology I can assure you there are some definite gems in here! If you're a fan of SF, specifically of hard SF, this is a compilation you need to add to your reading list. Overall, I'm rather impressed. I hope there's more around the corner. show less

Before I start this review, I want to note something that’s more than a little important to the understanding of this book. This is an anthology written solely by ethnic Chinese writers who live outside of China proper. In her introduction Tess Gerritsen explores the fact that growing up, she was immersed in the Chinese culture–its superstitions, cultural beliefs, etc., but as she grew up she felt less “Chinese” and more “American”: “I believed in science, not superstition. As show more my memories of childhood receded…I forgot just how Chinese I am” (pg 1, Tess Gerritsen). Every story in the anthology (all 18, which is a lucky number in Chinese numerology) is centered around the writers’ growing up Chinese, “…an identity that none of us ever truly escapes, though we may grow up far from the shores of China” (pg. 2, Gerritsen).

I’m thrilled by this notion and was eager and excited for this collection. I have a not-so-trivial complaint, however. The cover art. It’s pretty, to be sure, but that is a Western dragon depicted on the cover, not an Eastern dragon. Doesn’t matter, a dragon is a dragon, you say? Think again. Unlike their Western counterparts, Eastern Dragons were considered to be good luck symbols, wise advisers and revered as sacred because of their ties with the Emperor. For me this is rather disruptive and irritating.

Onto the stories, however, which in theory, should have made up for the cover art’s lack.

“The Character of the Hound” by Tony Pi
I have never read nor heard of this writer before, but now I want to read more of his writings. Part cautionary tale for traitors, part murder mystery and learning when to compromise, this story was engaging from the first page. Wu Fan is an engineer for the Song Dynasty and is called upon to perform a special service for his country; he is to house a shen (spirit) to help solve a murder and theft. The story moves at an even pace, with Lu Fan and then Lu Fan/Quan Shen (Hound Spirit)’s narratives being distinct, but familiar. Its an interesting concept and one I hope the author explores in another short story or even a longer novel.

And that, my friend, ends what I enjoyed best about this anthology. The very first story in the collection is the only story I truly wanted to read again. The other seventeen stories failed to impress me, but more importantly they failed to entertain me. In William F. Wu’s “Going’ Down to Anglotown” I felt distinctly uncomfortable with the author’s depiction of what would have happened if Asia had more dominance over America than Europe. By the time I reached “Bargains” by Gabriela Lee (an author I’ve read before in the short story collection By Blood We Live) I was wondering if I had read the back cover correctly.

I have no doubt that the authors included are talented, and I’m likely to even enjoy a couple of them outside of this anthology, but I could not enjoy them this time around. I know better than to fully trust the backcover blurb on a book–they are rarely ever truly indicative of the book within–but the forward filled me with hope. I just wish the book had fulfilled that hope better. show less

My only interest in this anthology was to read A Slow Unfurling of Truth by Aliette de Bodard, so please read the following review with that in mind.

As far as i'm aware this is only currently available in the anthology Carbide Tipped Pens, which, for some reason unbeknownst to me, isn't available on Kindle: yes folks, it appears that the Luddites are at it again attempting their very worse to ruin life for us technologically advanced hominyds who read ebooks and love trees.   But, not to be show more outdone, i suggest that maybe you could get imaginative with your technologically advanced minds and dream up ways of how you may wish to obtain a copy to read.

And that was my first usage of "unbeknownst" on this website.   A lovely old word.   Some words are just too good to let fade away.

Oh yeah, it's supposed to be a review of the story, i know, i'm getting to it, but you can't get to the story until you actually have a copy to read so that had to be dealt with first.

So once again we're back with the Galactics and the Rongs and now instead of downloading/uploading dead people into V-Space they now seem to be able to take dead people and upload/download/re-sleeve them into new bodies.   Think Altered Carbon kind of thing but i've no idea how it's being done in Aliette's universe as that bit's not explained.

The problem with re-sleeving people is that after a period of time, especially if you lost touch with them, you may not be able to tell who a person was or wasn't.   This whole thing would obviously lead to whole new areas of crime with re-sleeved people claiming to be people who they aren't and claiming things to which they aren't entitled.   This then leads to a whole new occupation, that of people who ascertain the validity of re-sleeved people.

And so, that's where we are with A Slow Unfurling of Truth.   A Galactic has turned up claiming to be someone and it's very important that the Rong know if it's true or not, enter the Authenticators, a human and mindship pair working together to unfurl the truth.

I really enjoyed the re-sleeving and V-Space aspects of the Altered Carbon books, and it's great to re-encounter this kind of thing being written by other writers, especially writers as good as Aliette is.   So yeah, would love to read a whole lot more of this re-sleeving V-Space stuff from Aliette in the future -- she's certainly created a big enough universe to shove a ton more stories into.

So onwards, onwards we read, and next up will be The Frost on Jade Buds. show less

Overall, I really liked this collection of stories. Even the stories I didn't love really started to grow on me after I finished and thought about them a bit. The authors tend to skew white American, but it's still pretty representative of the non-white non-male sci-fi writer. And, something that surprised me, how many queer characters there were considering that being queer was not a plot point in any of the stories! Good job, hard sci-fi.

It started and ended on really strong notes. The show more first story, The Blue Afternoon That Lasted Forever by [a:Daniel H. Wilson|33773|Daniel H. Wilson|https://d.gr-assets.com/authors/1298332667p2/33773.jpg], made me so sad. It's really good. And the same author as [b:Robopocalypse|9634967|Robopocalypse (Robopocalypse, #1)|Daniel H. Wilson|https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1327885891s/9634967.jpg|14247828] which has been on my radar forever so I should probably just read it already.
The final story, Recollection by [a:Nancy Fulda|4037363|Nancy Fulda|https://d.gr-assets.com/authors/1297962807p2/4037363.jpg], is also pretty sad. It's about the downsides of being one of the first to be cured of Alzheimers. It ends hopeful though. These two stories are among the most human in the collection and both hit me right in the feels.

A Slow Unfurling of Truth by [a:Aliette de Bodard|2918731|Aliette de Bodard|https://d.gr-assets.com/authors/1261567215p2/2918731.jpg] reminded me of Alastair Reynolds in that the reader is flung into a completely different world and made to understand it just through reading more. In a good way.

The Circle by [a:Liu Cixin|5780686|Liu Cixin|https://d.gr-assets.com/authors/1339387737p2/5780686.jpg] was awesome, though a lot of reviewers have said that it's taken almost directly from his book The Three Body Problem, which I haven't read, so I still liked the story.

I liked the concepts explored in Every Hill Ends with Sky by [a:Robert Reed|57814|Robert Reed|https://s.gr-assets.com/assets/nophoto/user/m_50x66-3fbaf32fc1fc48e6ffaf3f63a026f0ff.png].

There weren't any stories I really hated. Lady With Fox ([a:Gregory Benford|22645|Gregory Benford|https://d.gr-assets.com/authors/1224059011p2/22645.jpg]) was too weird for me. Habilis ([a:Howard Hendrix|6673101|Howard Hendrix|https://s.gr-assets.com/assets/nophoto/user/u_50x66-ccc56e79bcc2db9e6cdcd450a4940d46.png]) had an ok concept but the structure of the story was confusing. It kept jumping back and forth in time from one conversation between two people to a different conversation between the same two people, and the paragraph breaks didn't necessarily indicate that we had shifted from one to the other.

Short stories are the best, and these were good. And I like the cover! show less