jamiereadthis
Written on Apr 13, 2020
- ISBN10 1481442546
- ISBN13 9781481442541
- Publish Date 8 March 2016
- Publish Status Out of Stock
- Imprint Gallery / Saga Press
- Format Hardcover
- Pages 464
- Language English
Reviews
ross91
Written on Dec 22, 2019
Some of the stories were ok, some were great, some a little boring and some AMAZING, especially the one that gives this collection its title.
I'm happy to have finally read something by this author, I'm patiently waiting for his Dandelion Series to be over, so I can start reading it as well
empressbrooke
Written on Jul 12, 2019
Then many of the rest of the stories followed a pattern that I did not enjoy at all - nested stories that flipped back and forth between a main plotline and unrelated bits that were meant to thematically tie in to the main plot. "An Advanced Readers' Picture Book of Comparative Cognition" felt almost identical to "The Bookmaking Habits of Select Species" except that the main plot is interspersed with explanations of how various made up alien species store their memories. "The Waves" intersperses various cultures' creation myths into the main plotline, which is annoying because the main plot was actually quite interesting and I wanted to stay with it. "Mono No Aware" flips back and forth between present and past, which I normally wouldn't mind, except I was feeling fatigued by bits taking my attention from the main story. "All The Flavors" likewise flips between the main story and tales of a Chinese god.
The final three stories are fine, but never really soared to the heights of the run of stories that left me so delighted (though "The Man Who Ended History: A Documentary" came close).
The ones I loved fully deserved more than three stars, so I gave the entire volume four. The ones I did not like as much could certainly be loved by someone who isn't as annoyed by the story-within-a-story device that I thought was much overused.
dokie80
Written on Feb 7, 2017
Definitely will read other book by this author.
Metaphorosis Reviews
Written on Mar 29, 2016
A collection of some of Ken Liu's short stories.
I first ran across Ken Liu's work through short stories in one magazine or another. His name stuck in my mind, because the stories were astoundingly good. I kept finding more, and they just kept getting better. Plus, he was translating a lot of Chinese SF, which was great.
My view of Liu as a masterful, all-capable writer was dented somewhat with his long, mainly dull debut novel, The Grace of Kings. I took advantage of this anthology to see if the bloom was off the rose entirely, or just for long fiction. I'm happy to say it's the latter. Liu's short stories in this anthology aren't all excellent, but they're all good, and some of them are truly astounding.
In his anthology Insistence of Vision, David Brin posits that speculative writers are all interested in history. I don't find that true, but it certainly is for Liu. Many of the stories here draw on historical episodes, practices, or mythology, even when envisioning an alternate reality. The result vary between interestingly illuminating, and top-heavy slow-going. "The Man Who Ended History: A Documentary" illustrates both tracks. Many of the rest are straightforwardly philosophical, with new technology thrown in. A fair number give a sense of having been carefully, consciously constructed.
What surprised me was how many of the stories focused on questions of identity - usually the meaning of Chinese, American, or Japanese identities, or a contrast between them. It's an interesting issue, and one that Liu deals with even-handedly - no one identity is suggested as necessarily better than another. At the same time, it becomes a bit wearing. Perhaps for this reason, many of the characters feel self-centered. By the time I neared the end of the book, I was thinking, "Please write something about elves or dragons or aliens. Anything but more Asian/American identity crises." The next story was "A Brief History of the Trans-pacific Tunnel". You can guess what it was about.
Despite their sometimes rather monomaniacal focus, the stories in this collection are usually effective, and almost always beautifully written. For short fiction, at least, Ken Liu's name is one that will last - and he's only just starting.
The best stories in the collection:
- The Bookmaking Habits of Select Species - just what it sounds like, and without a clear storyline, but brilliant and effective nonetheless.
- State Change - how we'd act if we had concrete, tangible, finite souls. Another beautifully written story, though with a slightly fumbled ending.
- The Literomancer - magic with words, and betrayal with love. The story goes off into fairly lengthy historical asides, but it works well despite them.
- The Regular - an intelligent crime story.
- The Paper Menagerie - living origami. A beautiful, moving story.
- Mono No Aware - how to repair a solar sail. Another moving, effective story.
- A Brief History of the Trans-pacific Tunnel - another way history might have gone. Much as I longed, by this point, for a story not about history and identity, this story did a nice job with both.
Michael @ Knowledge Lost
Written on Jan 10, 2013