Restricted Fantasies (Restricted Fantasies, #1)

by Kevin Kneupper

[layawaydragon]

Content Warning: One whole story is rescuing kids from a Nazi VR. It's very descriptive and disturbing. Another story is all about a prisoner who killed his girlfriend and daughter and his time in a futuristic torture prison. Immediately after that is a story about an abused woman who gets raped.

I'm really conflicted about this book and rating. It's def. the terrifying dystopian spectrum of sci-fi. It's inventive and well written. But there's some red flags that ruin the credibility. After finishing and looking back, I'm glad I stuck with it. Can't say I'd recommend it though unless it's undoubtedly your kind of thing.

FYI: I haven't watched Black Mirror. I picked this up because I like sci-fi and haven't read any lately.

1st short story - Seven Minutes in Heaven.
>>Yeah okay, clever. Extrapolating from the app games and Facebook. Fine so far.

2nd - Restricted Fantasies:
>>Someone living in a VR with 1,000 genders and the punishment for misgendering is death? PAH LEESE. This isn't slippery slope to show how rediculous a position is. That's just bullshit. Red flag.
>>Paragraph proclaiming Nazi's are cowards, which again is BS. Red Flag.
>>Quote: "Right and left, and at the far end, they're just the same lunatics wearing symbols. I'd pulled kids out of a few sims run by "anti-fascists" and there wasn't a whole lot of different between them and Hienrich [who is a Nazi]. " Really?
>>If I was just reading for pleasure, like borrowing from the library rather than a review copy, I might have quit here.

3rd - Panopticon:
>>Okay, this was terrifying. But I'm a lefty against torture, holes, and the death penalty. I don't know how 'tough on crime' conservatives will take it. I liked researching panopticon afterwards. That was something new I appreciated learning.

4th - Second Honeymoon:
>>CW for domestic abuse and rape. Terrible, depressing, and appalling. Honest to gods nightmare fuel. More so than the last story and more probable, IMHO.

5th - Irish Grudge:
>>That's certainly a take on reliving memories. As someone with traumatic experiences and anxiety, I actually...liked this one? Was not expecting that.

6th - First Contact:
>>This story felt like it took forever but worth it. Unique. Interesting, felt like a whole new real world. Of course it ends on a gross hedonistic note.

7th - The Only Way Out is Down:
>>Yeah, you can really tell the author is a man with this one. Ughhhhh. Gross. Like boys who draw penises on everything and think they're the only people that count.

8th - Cheat Code:
>>Well, one dumb fuck man got way more than he was worth and not what he deserved. Makes me laugh given all the people that think they can unlock shit like this with The Secret, etc. So many of these stories just screw everyone else over. I keep thinking how much it has to suck for everyone else.

9th - Rumspringa:
>>This was amazing. Almost makes up for the titled-piece. If this was featured in an anthology of authors, and lead me to read the rest of the author's stories, I would feel mislead. It's so different and more...(I kinda want to say better, but that's not exactly right)...what I want than the others aside from Pleasuredome.

10th - Smartest Guy in the Room:
>>Elitist pricks. Don't we all know one douche like this though? Ugh. I do like how douche got put down a peg unlike in Cheat Code.

11th - Pleasuredome:
>> I love this. Much more like the sci-fi I know and love. My only nitpick is the world was set up as "we don't have enough information to live through different periods" but then dude gets so wrapped up in Roman gladiator times? Fishy. But otherwise great.