From 2007
to 2009, George Mann edited a series of science fiction anthologies called The Solaris Book of New Science Fiction. Unthemed, the anthologies captured a wide
variety of perspectives on the field, hard to soft sf, entertaining to
literary—the majority of which were British writers. After a break of two years, Solaris decided
to revitalize the series and commissioned Ian Whates to bring together a new
selection of stories. The mission
statement the same, Solaris Rising: The
New Book of Solaris (2011) continues the small albeit quality start made by Mann, and Solaris’ desire not
to “highlight one flavour of SF but
rather reflect its boundless variety, the energy and imagination that can carry
science fiction in so many fascinating and entertaining directions.”
And the
variety shows from the opening salvo to closing; Solaris Rising begins and ends on opposite ends of the
pulp/literary spectrum. Ian McDonald’s
“A Smart Well-Mannered Uprising of the Dead” starts things off with a
mid-future look at Africa. Not a zombie
story, international commerce and resource competition have combined to bring
about a revolution in one corner of the continent—by the virtual dead. Fully a
work of humanism, McDonald spins a more subtle but no less interesting story
than he is known for in portraying a land trying to retake the reins of control
from foreign interests. Sharp description
defining realistic characters, the content of “The Incredible Exploding Man” by
Dave Hutchinson more literally reflects its title than
figuratively—thankfully. Not a standard
comic book story, Hutchinson sends a shout out to Alfred Bester’s The Stars My Destination in this
well-written tale of an accident at a particle collider in the US. A strong
relationship built between two characters, we don’t find out until the end why
precisely the story is titled as such, but it fits. A YA offering, “Sweet Spots” by Paul Di Filippo is perhaps the ultimate high
school boy’s dream. It begins when Arp
discovers he can see the precise places in time that trigger desirable
events—like knowing which pair of butterfly wings in Brazil will bring about a
blizzard in Chicago. Taking full
advantage of these sweet spots, he proceeds to tweak and twist his life into
better and better shape. Trouble is, the
girl he loves still eludes him. Filled
with Di Filippo’s trademark style and humor, this is YA worth reading as an adult.
The lack
of a colon (no, not that colon) making all the difference, “The Best Science
Fiction of the Year Three” by Ken MacLeod is not the story of the early days of
sci-fi, rather a British writer who is approached by an American anthology
editor to produce a piece for an unbelievable sum—political situations at
stake. Their differences settled by a
science experiment, Macleod adds a subtle layer of humor that only genre
readers—informed genre readers—will get.
“The One that Got Away” by Tricia Sullivan is a Weird story about beach
scavengers that Sullivan admits in the intro she herself was not entirely sure
where it was going, or went. Switching
to hard sf, “Rock Day” by Stephen Baxter is a classic story about a man who
wakes up to discover the world is not as it was when he went to sleep. A rather empty story (like a Clifford Simak
one-off of old), Baxter has written better.
Self-replicating machines, neologisms galore, seeds guarded by
holograms, and a whole lot more happens in the brief pages of “Eluna” by
Stephen Palmer. Perhaps this should have
been unpacked into a novella or novel, but my guess is one has to have read
other of Palmer’s work to appreciate. At first flush, little coheres.
“Time is not space. You can’t wander around in
it like a landscape” admonishes
a professor in Adam Roberts’ “Shall I Tell You the Problem with Time
Travel?” And Roberts sets out to prove
it in a humorous tale of a group of competing academics who see all sides of
the coin—and there are more than two. H.G.
Wells’ The Time Machine (indirectly)
brought into the mix, so too is WWII atom bomb testing, development, and,
unfortunately, production. The best
story in the anthology, “The Lives and Deaths of Che Guevara” by Lavie Tidhar
wonderfully deconstructs the idea of revolution that Che Guevara is tied to on
t-shirts, posters, and other paraphernalia worldwide. Inspired by the documentary The Hands of Che Guevara, Tidhar clones
the famous revolutionary and sends him out in the world to confront and
adjudicate the revolutions of his lifetime and beyond—Cambodia, South Africa,
Northern Ireland, and Lebanon. “Steel
Lake” by Jack Skillingstead is the understated story of a father trying to come
to terms with his drug-addicted son.
Accidentally ingesting an experimental drug himself, he is soon on his
way to confronting issues in his own past—psychedelically and otherwise. A well delivered, surprisingly poignant
story.
I’ve never
been much impressed by Mike Resnick’s work.
While he has struck a few nice chords in his career, quantity seems to
far outshine quality. His collaboration
with Laurie Tom for Solaris Rising
does not change my mind. “Mooncakes” is
the story of a young woman about to embark on a generation starship, and
leaving behind her family, culture, history et
al proves more difficult than she’d imagined. The associated topics dealt
with in perfunctory fashion, a subtler writer would have endowed this story
with more humanity and poignancy. (See,
for example, “Amicae Aeternum” by Ellen Klages in Reach for Infinity.) “At
Play in the Fields” by Steve Rasnic Tem is a standard science fiction story
with a standard moral. About a man who
wakes up in the far future on alien ship, Tem nevertheless delivers the
genre-familiar in a clear, readable voice.
“How We Came Back From Mars (A Story That Cannot Be Told)” by Ian Watson
is a fun (in the intellectual sense) story about a group of astronauts stranded
on Mars. With only days of rations left,
they are picked up by aliens in a flying saucer. Landing in a bizarro version
of Earth, they don’t know whether they’ve arrived in a Texas Hollywood studio
shooting a science fiction flick, or an alternate future, the world’s political
alliances shifted radically. “You Never Know” by Pat Cadigan is a beautifully sublime
story of a curio shop worker in NYC before 9-11, and were it not for Tidhar’s
story, would be the best in this anthology.
A security camera system installed in man’s shop one day, he
contemplates the images on screen of himself, the shop, customers, and
occurrences. Some things happening
everyday, and some only once in a lifetime, you never know.
An idea
just for the sake of an idea, “Yestermorrow” by Richard Salter is a one-off
about a world where every night at midnight people are sent forward and
backward in time. Moreover, everyone
knows the date, time, and location of their death. Topping it all off, a serial killer is going
around murdering people just before their appointed moment of death. Something for a cheap late-night production
on the sci-fi channel, the story possesses nothing of merit. Another retro sf offering, “Dreaming Towers,
Silent Mansions” by Jaine Fenn is the story of a group of explorers who pass
through a one-way portal to a planet that superficially seems to have once been
inhabited by humans. But as members of
the team begin disappearing, something more seems at stake than just
discovery. A rather obvious homage to
Lovecraft, it only improves his style.
“Eternity's Children” by Eric Brown and Keith Brooke is a broad mix of
science fiction tropes. But as they are
presented via character, it is a nice little story of an aged politician
returning one last time to the planet which is the source of the rejuvenation
medicine which has given him such a good, extended life. A bearer of bad news to the planet’s
inhabitants, he finds solace in delivering his message in the last place he
would have thought. All in all, a nicely
executed story with some strong questions and emotions churning below the
surface. “The Return of the Mutant
Worms” by Peter F. Hamilton, the story closing the anthology, is a
self-indulgent, self-pitying piece that is really more of an afterword than story. Surely there must be better ways to raise sf
awareness than just stabs of spite.
In the
end, in Solaris Rising Ian Whates
continues the work of George Mann from the original trilogy of Solaris science fiction
anthologies. From time travel to
imminent asteroids, alien encounters to planetary horror, political commentary
to hard and soft sf, there is indeed no theme to the selection save the genre
itself. Able to avoid the monotony of
many themed anthologies, it’s much easier for a potential reader to take a risk
on to see how the stories stack up.
The
following is the table of contents for the anthology:
“A Smart
Well-Mannered Uprising of the Dead” by Ian McDonald
“The
Incredible Exploding Man” by Dave Hutchinson
“Sweet
Spots” by Paul Di Filippo
“The Best
Science Fiction of the Year Three” by Ken MacLeod
“The One
that Got Away” by Tricia Sullivan
“Rock Day”
by Stephen Baxter
“Eluna” by
Stephen Palmer
“Shall I
Tell You the Problem with Time Travel?” by Adam Roberts
“The Lives
and Deaths of Che Guevara” by Lavie Tidhar
“Steel
Lake” by Jack Skillingstead
“Mooncakes”
by Mike Resnick and Laurie Tom
“At Play
in the Fields” by Steve Rasnic Tem
“How We
Came Back From Mars (A Story That Cannot Be Told)” by Ian Watson
“You Never
Know” by Pat Cadigan
“Yestermorrow”
by Richard Salter
“Dreaming
Towers, Silent Mansions” by Jaine Fenn
“Eternity's
Children” by Eric Brown and Keith Brooke
“For the
Ages” by Alastair Reynolds
“The
Return of the Mutant Worms” by Peter F. Hamilton
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