Stable Strategies and Others

With rare exceptions I haven't read single-author collections of short stories in one shot for decades now, because there's usually too much of a same-ness to the tales that eventually makes what could be a great story read in another context into a same-old, same-old hack; but Eileen Gunn's 2004 collection, Stable Strategies and Others, turned into one of those rare exceptions as I found I couldn't - didn't want to - put the book down before reading the next story. She's that rare writer who can tell convincing stories about alternate-history never-quite Presidents turned smarmy "Lie Detector" television hosts called Tricky Dick ("Fellow Americans"); an ultra-corporate world where changing into insects to get ahead is seen as a sign of show more ambition ("Stable Strategies for Middle Management"); the loss of a sock in a laundramat dryer results in the leg associated with the sock going haywire much to the discomfort of the person attached ("The Sock Story"); and Kurt Cobain lives as the namesake of "Nirvana High" (co-written with Leslie What), where suicidal norms and psychic "special ed" teenagers try to survive those excruciating years. And that's only a third of this volume of 12 stories, written between 1978 and 2004, each one thoroughly realized, engaging and enchanting. Usually in any anthology a reader will like one story more than others, or will dislike a few here and there, but honestly speaking, I loved every single one of these 12 stories, and found myself diving into each from the very first sentence. My only quibble has nothing to do with the writing or the stories per se; it's only that I'm reading them in 2011, and some of what was science-fictional in 1978 is ordinary or even passe now; this is a risk for all sf writers and because Eileen Gunn publishes so infrequently, in some stories the real world has caught up (almost) to her visions. But that's not a reason to not find this book and read it for yourselves; these stories are marvellous! Highly recommended. show less

Gunn's short stories are varied, wildly imaginative, funny, scary, and a bit profound. Whether it is an alternate career for Richard Nixon, mankind's first meeting with an alien species, or people deliberately turning themselves into insects, there's something here for every taste. Don't miss it.

It's a good collection, with a bit of a range of weirdness to it. I particularly liked the lead story, "Stable Strategies for Middle Management," but that's me. YMMV, etc.