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Convergence Problems by Wole Talabi

By John Folk-Williams

Convergence Problems

Wole Talabi, in his brilliant story collection Convergence Problems, offers an intriguing idea about how stories can be told. It contrasts sharply with the method made famous by James Joyce in Dubliners where characters reach a climactic moment of epiphany in which they grasp some great truth about themselves. That approach has been done to […]

Filed Under: International Speculative Fiction, Short Fiction Tagged With: Africanfuturism, artificial intelligence, capitalism, love, myth, purpose, story-telling, Wole Talabi

True Names by Vernor Vinge

By John Folk-Williams

True Names by Vernor Vinge

The passing of Vernor Vinge, author of the great A Deepness in the Sky and A Fire Upon the Deep, led me to go back to one of his earliest ground-breaking works, the novella True Names, first published in 1981. It’s regarded as the inspiration and first detailed working out of what William Gibson would […]

Filed Under: Cyberpunk, Short Fiction Tagged With: altered minds, cyberspace, information, knowledge, magic, power, true name, Vernor Vinge

Selected Stories by Theodore Sturgeon

By John Folk-Williams

Stories by Theodore Sturgeon

(Revised 3/31/2024) It’s a month since I came down with covid, and I’m still dealing with weird aftereffects. But an excellent way to get my brain going again came to hand in the form of The Selected Stories by Theodore Sturgeon. A lot of collections refer to their stories as “unforgettable” but this set of […]

Filed Under: Short Fiction, Vintage Science Fiction Tagged With: alien civilizations, hopeful future, human survival, identity, mind, post-apocalytic, self-worth, Theodore Sturgeon

Contingency Plans for the Apocalypse by S.B. Divya

By John Folk-Williams

Contingency Plans for the Apocalypse

Contingency Plans for the Apocalypse and other Possible Situations by S.B. Divya, author of Machinehood and Meru, is a deeply interesting collection of fourteen stories, many quite short, all of them posing life-changing choices for each central character. The prose is supple, ranging from lushly sensuous description to stripped down action. The author perfectly matches […]

Filed Under: Short Fiction Tagged With: choice, consciousness, cyborg, evolution, love, neurodiversity, pain, S.B. Divya, transhuman, uploaded minds

Robotic Ambitions Kickstarter from Apex

By John Folk-Williams

Robotic Ambitions Apex Book Company

Apex Book Company will begin a Kickstarter campaign on February 21st to raise funds for a new anthology, Robotic Ambitions. I don’t usually join in campaigns like this, but Apex is an important institution in the SFF world. I’d like to help make this book possible — I have to add that I have no […]

Filed Under: Short Fiction Tagged With: androids, Apex Books, artificial intelligence, consciousness, robots

Bliss Montage by Ling Ma

By John Folk-Williams

Bliss Montage

One of the things that makes Ling Ma’s stories in Bliss Montage so extraordinary is her ability to blend keen perceptions of human relationships with fantasy elements that somehow make the fantastic an intimate part of ordinary life. There is the house in “LA” the narrator shares with a hundred ex-boyfriends, the pickup date in […]

Filed Under: Parallel World Fantasy, Short Fiction Tagged With: fantasy, identity, Ling Ma, love, memory, rebirth, relationships, self-worth

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Something is struggling to be born in this damaged and inspiring world, and I believe science fiction and its speculative cousins are helping us figure out what it is. It’s pushing the imaginations of fiction writers to bend and twist familiar forms to try to capture the forces that are hurling us into a barely conceivable future. This blog is my small way of exploring the half-perceived … Read More about About

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