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Reviews
Future Tense Fiction: Stories of Tomorrow by Kirsten Berg, Madeline Ashby, Charlie Jane Anders
amykidd's review
5.0
A really good selection of short stories exploring potential future tech and realities, and the implications for humanity.
wealhtheow's review
4.0
Mason, Jolene, and all their other friends in the hyper-modern city of New Lincoln spend their days fine tuning apps and their free time hanging out in virtual reality spaces. But then the food supply chain to the city breaks down and everything starts to get messed up. Anders is so great at crafting characters and relationships that feel real and relatable, putting them in situations that are just a step more sf or magical than our own, and seeing what naturally develops from there.
adelas's review
3.0
Some really good stories, some decent ones. The intro talks about how each short story was originally accompanied by an article about the science portrayed in the story. I wish they had published those essays in the book. The one I did read online (having paused the book to do so) really added value and interest to the story it went with.
tepachon's review
4.0
Decided to read this collection after listening to LeVar Burton's podcast episode featuring "Mother of Invention". Overall, I really liked a lot of these stories and honestly I would love to read longer versions of them (especially "A Brief and Fearful Star", "Mr. Thursday" and "No Me Dejes")
Mother of Invention 5/5
No Me Dejes 5/5
When Robot and Crow Saved East St. Louis 3/5
When We Were Patched 2/5
Domestic Violence 3/5
Mr. Thursday 5/5
A Brief and Fearful Star 5/5
Overvalued 4/5
Safe Surrender 3/5
Lions and Gazelles 4/5
Burned-Over Territory 4/5
Mika Model 3/5
The Starfish Girl 3/5
The Minnesota Diet 4/5
Mother of Invention 5/5
No Me Dejes 5/5
When Robot and Crow Saved East St. Louis 3/5
When We Were Patched 2/5
Domestic Violence 3/5
Mr. Thursday 5/5
A Brief and Fearful Star 5/5
Overvalued 4/5
Safe Surrender 3/5
Lions and Gazelles 4/5
Burned-Over Territory 4/5
Mika Model 3/5
The Starfish Girl 3/5
The Minnesota Diet 4/5
cyborgforty's review
adventurous
emotional
hopeful
inspiring
lighthearted
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
4.5
cosmicllama's review
4.0
Read this review, and other Sci Fi/Fantasy reviews at The Quill to Live :
After reading Broken Stars earlier this year, I became somewhat enamored by the idea of short story collections. I love that they can be incredibly focused while allowing the reader some room to explore outside the story. So when offered the chance to read Future Tense Fiction, a collection of works from well known contemporary authors from Slate’s column of the same name, I jumped at the opportunity. I’m not going to talk about the collection as a whole, mostly because it didn’t have the single guiding hand feel to it that Broken Stars did. Overall I came away fairly satisfied, with only a couple of the stories not leaving much of an impact. Mostly I wanted to take the time to highlight a few of the stories that touched me in different ways in the hopes of piquing your interest in the form and its strengths.
First up: Domestic Violence by Madeline Ashby. The story follows Kristin as she tries to determine why a co-worker is running late. Janae, the woman in question, mentions that the smart home she lives in won’t let her out without solving riddles that her husband has devised. It’s a very simple premise, but the horror behind it stuck with me. Ashby’s prose is dripping with the small infractions men put women through on a daily basis that are easily exacerbated by technology. While I consider myself fairly cognizant of these attitudes, Ashby exposed a few other ways in which technologies that are touted as convenient may only be convenient for some. It was an enlightening read that will stick with me for a while, and will push me to continue considering the unexamined implications of convenience technology.
Burned over Territory by Lee Konstantinou was my second favorite story from the batch. It takes place in a post-Universal Basic Income United States, in which everyone receives a monthly check from the government to support themselves. The story follows Viola, a former heroin addict, who is running for Chairperson of the Federation. The Federation is an organization that members give their basic income to, and in return receive housing, food and other basic necessities, allowing them to pursue what interests they may. I particularly enjoyed Konstantinou’s ability to explore a system of government and the trials it faces within a limited page count through the fairly realized character of Viola. Often a lot of the more “political” science fiction I’ve read pushes politics to the side, waving away issues with the creation of a new system, but Konstantinou places it front and center. Although the system itself is different, the same societal problems we experience in our society linger, making the election stakes feel incredibly real and giving the Federation a vitality I was not expecting. It felt like an honest attempt at an exploration of a more left-wing ideal of politics, highlighting that revolution is ongoing and will always have to deal with the same systemic problems we face today.
Mika Model by Paolo Bacigalupi was another of the more horrifying stories in the collection. It has a neo-noir setting and follows Detective Rivera as he is dragged into a murder case where the perpetrator is a sex robot. I know it sounds a little ludicrous, and Bacigalupi seems to give a wink to the reader by using the trappings and structure of a noir detective thriller. What makes the story so much more compelling, however, is Bacigalupi’s use of language and how specific characters interact with Mika, the robot involved in the murder. On the surface it is plainly a story about determining the humanity of a robot designed to be, effectively, a mechanical sex worker. Bacigalupi does not stop there and consistently urges the reader to pull on the thread to unravel something deeper. Ultimately, I came away with my stomach in knots, unable to cope with the extrapolation of this story to any sort of “other” people may encounter on a daily basis.
I’ll end with my favorite story of the bunch, Lions and Gazelles by Hannu Rajaniemi. The main gist of the story is that ultra-venture capitalists host a yearly competition in which startups compete with each other for funds. The novelty comes from contest being a race in which the entrepreneurs competing for cash enhance their bodies biologically. In the competition, mechanical modifications are forbidden, and the competitors, in a sense, become their own experiment while they attempt to hunt down a mechanical gazelle and win the prize. Having recently read Born to Run by Christopher McDougall, along with taking up running, Rajaniemi’s story cut immediately to the heart of the sport. The main character’s arc was so thoroughly satisfying, and Rajaniemi perfectly captured the thrill of the chase with his prose. It was incredibly streamlined and had such purpose driving the story I was engrossed from beginning to end. If you’re a runner, this story is magical.
All in all, this collection makes me want to pay closer attention to short stories. There is a purpose to them, and when done well, it can get a reader to feel or think differently in only a few pages. There are a few other stories I would like to highlight here, but I feel like I would just come off as gushing. Future Tense Fiction is a delightful collection that captured my imagination in fourteen different ways. So if you’re at all interested in short stories and the power they can wield, I highly recommend picking up Future Tense.
Rating: Future Tense Fiction – A Highly Recommended Cornucopia of Stories for your Fall Reading/10
-Alex
P.S. If you can’t get enough of talking crows, this collection has a story for you.
After reading Broken Stars earlier this year, I became somewhat enamored by the idea of short story collections. I love that they can be incredibly focused while allowing the reader some room to explore outside the story. So when offered the chance to read Future Tense Fiction, a collection of works from well known contemporary authors from Slate’s column of the same name, I jumped at the opportunity. I’m not going to talk about the collection as a whole, mostly because it didn’t have the single guiding hand feel to it that Broken Stars did. Overall I came away fairly satisfied, with only a couple of the stories not leaving much of an impact. Mostly I wanted to take the time to highlight a few of the stories that touched me in different ways in the hopes of piquing your interest in the form and its strengths.
First up: Domestic Violence by Madeline Ashby. The story follows Kristin as she tries to determine why a co-worker is running late. Janae, the woman in question, mentions that the smart home she lives in won’t let her out without solving riddles that her husband has devised. It’s a very simple premise, but the horror behind it stuck with me. Ashby’s prose is dripping with the small infractions men put women through on a daily basis that are easily exacerbated by technology. While I consider myself fairly cognizant of these attitudes, Ashby exposed a few other ways in which technologies that are touted as convenient may only be convenient for some. It was an enlightening read that will stick with me for a while, and will push me to continue considering the unexamined implications of convenience technology.
Burned over Territory by Lee Konstantinou was my second favorite story from the batch. It takes place in a post-Universal Basic Income United States, in which everyone receives a monthly check from the government to support themselves. The story follows Viola, a former heroin addict, who is running for Chairperson of the Federation. The Federation is an organization that members give their basic income to, and in return receive housing, food and other basic necessities, allowing them to pursue what interests they may. I particularly enjoyed Konstantinou’s ability to explore a system of government and the trials it faces within a limited page count through the fairly realized character of Viola. Often a lot of the more “political” science fiction I’ve read pushes politics to the side, waving away issues with the creation of a new system, but Konstantinou places it front and center. Although the system itself is different, the same societal problems we experience in our society linger, making the election stakes feel incredibly real and giving the Federation a vitality I was not expecting. It felt like an honest attempt at an exploration of a more left-wing ideal of politics, highlighting that revolution is ongoing and will always have to deal with the same systemic problems we face today.
Mika Model by Paolo Bacigalupi was another of the more horrifying stories in the collection. It has a neo-noir setting and follows Detective Rivera as he is dragged into a murder case where the perpetrator is a sex robot. I know it sounds a little ludicrous, and Bacigalupi seems to give a wink to the reader by using the trappings and structure of a noir detective thriller. What makes the story so much more compelling, however, is Bacigalupi’s use of language and how specific characters interact with Mika, the robot involved in the murder. On the surface it is plainly a story about determining the humanity of a robot designed to be, effectively, a mechanical sex worker. Bacigalupi does not stop there and consistently urges the reader to pull on the thread to unravel something deeper. Ultimately, I came away with my stomach in knots, unable to cope with the extrapolation of this story to any sort of “other” people may encounter on a daily basis.
I’ll end with my favorite story of the bunch, Lions and Gazelles by Hannu Rajaniemi. The main gist of the story is that ultra-venture capitalists host a yearly competition in which startups compete with each other for funds. The novelty comes from contest being a race in which the entrepreneurs competing for cash enhance their bodies biologically. In the competition, mechanical modifications are forbidden, and the competitors, in a sense, become their own experiment while they attempt to hunt down a mechanical gazelle and win the prize. Having recently read Born to Run by Christopher McDougall, along with taking up running, Rajaniemi’s story cut immediately to the heart of the sport. The main character’s arc was so thoroughly satisfying, and Rajaniemi perfectly captured the thrill of the chase with his prose. It was incredibly streamlined and had such purpose driving the story I was engrossed from beginning to end. If you’re a runner, this story is magical.
All in all, this collection makes me want to pay closer attention to short stories. There is a purpose to them, and when done well, it can get a reader to feel or think differently in only a few pages. There are a few other stories I would like to highlight here, but I feel like I would just come off as gushing. Future Tense Fiction is a delightful collection that captured my imagination in fourteen different ways. So if you’re at all interested in short stories and the power they can wield, I highly recommend picking up Future Tense.
Rating: Future Tense Fiction – A Highly Recommended Cornucopia of Stories for your Fall Reading/10
-Alex
P.S. If you can’t get enough of talking crows, this collection has a story for you.
knightreader1988's review
4.0
I am always delighted when something I read rekindles my love for a genre. Future Tense Fiction: Stories of Tomorrow reminded me why I will always be SFF/Spec Fiction girl. Curated by Future Tense (a partnership between Slate, New America and Arizona State University), the book is collection of short stories depicting the author’s view of a possible future given modern trends. With names like Okorafor, Machado, Ashby and Rajaniemi amongst others, I knew I was in for an epic ride. These GENIUSES (because there is no other descriptor) brought me into their futures and I loved it.
Mother of Invention x Nnedi Okorafor. An instant love, where we meet a single mother giving birth to her firstborn with the help of her robot home during a climate nightmare that threatens her life and her unborn child’s life. Highlighting the concept that “the more things change they more they stay the same” the story demonstrates many of the prejudices pervasive in today’s society that continue to plague humanity in the not too distant future.
When Robot and Crow Saved East St. Louis x Annalee Newitz. Switch that one up to the story of a robot gathering data for the CDC. Robot gets let go and finds friendship with a young outcast girl and a feisty. Together they prevent a catastrophic outbreak and it absolutely warmed my doctorish heart. Again, the imagination is stretched with a robot who has learned human emotion so well, but that human element that is so relatable is still there, along with our everyday problems of immigration and prejudice.
Those were two of my favorites but there are 12 more that will shake up every reader. These stories touched every aspect of my heart. Some borderline ominous speaking to a future that doesn’t bode well for humanity while others warmed my heart making me long to see these fantastic innovations in my time like disabilities being cured by starfish DNA and super humans that have the ability to chase herds and keep up. It was such a wonderful amalgam of stories that stretched the possibility of my imagination just enough that I felt at a loss when I was done. The authors collectively infused the fantastical with just enough humanity that I saw these pages coming to life in the near future.
With equal parts Future Tense and unbelievable, these stories all had one common thread. No matter how advanced we become, human problems, victories and emotions will always be there. This collection is a one of possibility and hope that will make you afraid yet hopelessly optimistic that through it all humans are the most incredible things living in a more incredible time. The authors are also literary wizards that made me imagine with them, and through it all I was grateful to look at the world through their beautiful minds.
------------------------------------------
A few of the stories are available on Slate.com for your (free) perusal. Below are the individual stories, graded on a scale of 1-10. If you feel even remotely curious, I encourage you to look up some of the stories on Slate and go from there.
Individual Short Story Grades:
10/10
1. Mother of Invention x Nnedi Okorafor
2. When Robot & Crow Saved East St. Louis x Annalee Newitz
3. Mika Model x Paola Bacigalupi
4. The Starfish Girl x Maureen McHugh
9/10
1. No Me Dejas x Mark Oshiro
2. Overvalued x Mark Stasenko
3. Lions & Gazelles x Hannu Rajaniemi
4. The Minnesota Diet x Charlie Jane Anders
5. Domestic Violence x Madeline Ashby
8/10
1. Mr. Thursday x Emily St. John Mandel
2. Safe Surrender x Meg Elison
7/10
1. Burned Over Territory x Lee Konstantinou
2. A Brief and Fearful Star x Carmen Maria Machado
3. When We Were Patched x Deji Bryce Olukontun
--------------------------------------------
My thanks are extended to Unnamed Press. They provided me with an ARC in exchange for my unbiased review.
Mother of Invention x Nnedi Okorafor. An instant love, where we meet a single mother giving birth to her firstborn with the help of her robot home during a climate nightmare that threatens her life and her unborn child’s life. Highlighting the concept that “the more things change they more they stay the same” the story demonstrates many of the prejudices pervasive in today’s society that continue to plague humanity in the not too distant future.
When Robot and Crow Saved East St. Louis x Annalee Newitz. Switch that one up to the story of a robot gathering data for the CDC. Robot gets let go and finds friendship with a young outcast girl and a feisty. Together they prevent a catastrophic outbreak and it absolutely warmed my doctorish heart. Again, the imagination is stretched with a robot who has learned human emotion so well, but that human element that is so relatable is still there, along with our everyday problems of immigration and prejudice.
Those were two of my favorites but there are 12 more that will shake up every reader. These stories touched every aspect of my heart. Some borderline ominous speaking to a future that doesn’t bode well for humanity while others warmed my heart making me long to see these fantastic innovations in my time like disabilities being cured by starfish DNA and super humans that have the ability to chase herds and keep up. It was such a wonderful amalgam of stories that stretched the possibility of my imagination just enough that I felt at a loss when I was done. The authors collectively infused the fantastical with just enough humanity that I saw these pages coming to life in the near future.
With equal parts Future Tense and unbelievable, these stories all had one common thread. No matter how advanced we become, human problems, victories and emotions will always be there. This collection is a one of possibility and hope that will make you afraid yet hopelessly optimistic that through it all humans are the most incredible things living in a more incredible time. The authors are also literary wizards that made me imagine with them, and through it all I was grateful to look at the world through their beautiful minds.
------------------------------------------
A few of the stories are available on Slate.com for your (free) perusal. Below are the individual stories, graded on a scale of 1-10. If you feel even remotely curious, I encourage you to look up some of the stories on Slate and go from there.
Individual Short Story Grades:
10/10
1. Mother of Invention x Nnedi Okorafor
2. When Robot & Crow Saved East St. Louis x Annalee Newitz
3. Mika Model x Paola Bacigalupi
4. The Starfish Girl x Maureen McHugh
9/10
1. No Me Dejas x Mark Oshiro
2. Overvalued x Mark Stasenko
3. Lions & Gazelles x Hannu Rajaniemi
4. The Minnesota Diet x Charlie Jane Anders
5. Domestic Violence x Madeline Ashby
8/10
1. Mr. Thursday x Emily St. John Mandel
2. Safe Surrender x Meg Elison
7/10
1. Burned Over Territory x Lee Konstantinou
2. A Brief and Fearful Star x Carmen Maria Machado
3. When We Were Patched x Deji Bryce Olukontun
--------------------------------------------
My thanks are extended to Unnamed Press. They provided me with an ARC in exchange for my unbiased review.