Mitigated Futures

I'm only one story in, but I'm already happy. This is what I fell in love with SF for. Concise stories that explore a What If, provide a Sense of Wonder, do some World-Building, and let me feel the punch, give me something to think about, and give me a reason, no, a need, to read the next story....

So, yeah, A Militant Peace, four stars.

Lonely Islands, too short, 3 stars. Neat idea, but I just needed Buckell to take it somewhere. I can keep going in my imagination after I turn the page, but not far enough without more from him. What does he envision to replace cars for moving heavier things, or elderly & disabled people?

The Rainy Season, perfect, 4 stars. Very plausible sort of dystopia, but, as we know, we're living in one now, show more according to older SF's predictions. People are still squabbling with family and having dreams of a better life, as we've been doing so since before Lucy.

Mirror, Mirror, I can't quite decode. What did Kiri do exactly, and what is the narrator saying to the person they're talking to? But even if I did understand it, I think I wouldn't like it. I'm just not into cosmetics, plastic surgery, celebrities.

Press Enter to Execute, can't rate. I have a personal, visceral antipathy to intrigue & assassination plots. But it seems quite clever. If you want revenge on spammers, read it.

Mitigation, 3.5 stars, great What If, the intrigue oversimplified.

A Game of Rats and Dragon, 3.5 again, reads like a mashup of cyberpunk and solarpunk, but is framed by the real... and no matter how wondrous the digital, we still need to eat, shit, love irl....

Resistance, barely 3*, more like an essay than a story, and several jarring typos too.

The Universe Reef, 0* because it's the seed of a story, that's all. I *think* it would make an interesting novella, or a setting for an interesting epic.

Placa del Fuego, can't rate, not for me, I'm so tired of street urchin caught up in interstellar intrigue, but it did seem very well done, with a Sense of Wonder about the aliens & wormholes.

Love Comes to Abyssal City, um, 4* fascinating sample of a what would be an excellent longer work about the Cities.

A Jar of Goodwill, 4* even though I don't know what is in the jar.

Overall, I found it most disturbing that there were *still* typos, even after the acknowledgements recognized ppl who had found some. But I guess we all found the stories so engrossing we overlooked them.... show less

Short story collection, often on the shorter side, with lots of climate futurism. Buckell is also interested in intellectual property, like the aliens who claim patent rights in the wheel and (separately) seed libraries, though he can’t always distinguish copyright from patent.

"So he lied to me." My voice remained flat.
"He left out truths that would have made you less willing to come."
"He lied."

from A Jar of Goodwill