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boomt 's review for:
Stories of Your Life and Others
by Ted Chiang
There is no question Chiang is brilliant. Each story considers profound questions about science, religion, language, and other themes. At an intellectual level, this is some of the best science fiction I have read. However, his characters are often one-dimensional leaving many stories feeling lifeless. "The Story of Your Life" is the most compelling story in the collection, as it considers how the strange syntax of an alien language reflects a radically different world-view from our own. (I hope Arrival, the upcoming movie based on the story, does not twist it into a standard Hollywood alien invasion narrative.) "The Evolution of Human Science" considers a future in which artificial intelligence pursues scientific investigation beyond the limits of human understanding and the varying human responses to that future. Fascinating, but it is a three page sketch rather than a story. I recommend these stories if you like SciFi to tease your mind, but personally, I look for more.