A review by lizanneyoung
You Have Arrived at Your Destination by Amor Towles

3.0

 

⭐⭐⭐

This is in a collection of Amazon Originals I’ve been working my way through as a way to try new authors and genres. This short story is from the Forward collection, which features different science fiction stories. 

The idea of genetic manipulation is interesting for sure, mostly because of the ethical dilemmas behind it. This story does a great job of taking the main narrator and showing him walk through those dilemmas, especially as he considers what he’s really doing by becoming involved in the “genetic nudging” the company advertises. It’s more than simple fertility treatments: it’s choosing the life your child could have based on a series of factors that were compared to how the bureaus calculate credit scores.

Where this story fell flat for me was the implications that the company doing these treatments is actually connected to a defense company, and that in reality, the work they are doing is to build a superior population in the name of national defense. It was a passing mention that deserved a bit more focus to leave a more lasting impression or create questions.