MetaFilter posts tagged with scifi

Nicola Griffith on her writing, genre, kittens, ableism, and more

brainwane — Tue, 20 Apr 2021 04:30:05 -0800

"To me, honestly, genre is just a vehicle I use to cross the story terrain. So depending on what story I want to tell, I use the appropriate genre." Author Nicola Griffith, author of scifi, historical fiction, detective fiction, nonfiction, and more, discusses her books and writing journey in an interview from late 2020. She learned more about how her own fiction works while writing a PhD thesis a few years ago. Griffith's blog has tons of interesting musings, on topics including the phenomenon of marginalized readers feeling "momentarily flummoxed by fiction that doesn't push us down" and identity and science fiction. "Reading SF, the over-riding value of which is the new, keeps our reticular activating systems primed: we expect everything and anything."

The Universal Translator (Star Trek Explained)

Foci for Analysis — Thu, 15 Apr 2021 03:08:52 -0800

An true and accurate analysis of one of Star Trek's most important pieces of technology.

"'Is this everything you will be trading in?' I ask. "

brainwane — Sat, 10 Apr 2021 20:59:54 -0800

"Retriever" by Stephen Kearse is a short science fiction story about an employee of the United States Federal Gun Retrieval Agency: "I'm an agent of the 28th Amendment, the abolition of the 2nd." Published October 2020.

Grieving, loss, futility, diaspora, and broken connections

brainwane — Mon, 05 Apr 2021 23:06:06 -0800

Two melancholy short scifi and fantasy stories, new this year, about grieving the loss of parents. "Comments on Your Provisional Patent Application for an Eternal Spirit Core" is by Wole Talabi: "So you've been using the money they left us to develop this thing?" "All Worlds Left Behind" is by Iona Datt Sharma: "I, uh, used to come here with my dad? I don't speak the language as well as he did."

Story of Your Strife

adrianhon — Sat, 03 Apr 2021 04:22:51 -0800

Ted Chiang (previously) on why computers won't make themselves smarter (The New Yorker) and on why most fears about A.I. are best understood as fears about capitalism (NY Times/Archive.is)

Televised Worlds Part 4: The Children of Pynco

BiggerJ — Fri, 26 Mar 2021 19:05:22 -0800

Two orphans of unknown species, the sole survivors of a spaceship crash on an vast desert planet, meet two bumbling bounty hunters, and together, they discover abandoned technology, a distant world with more wonders - and hope - than it first appears to have... and each other. Oh, and did I mention it's a series of Australian stop-motion shorts from 1997? This is PLASMO. (Note: eps 3 & 4 are listed in reverse order. Also included: the earlier pre-reboot special Happy Hatchday to Plasmo.)

Televised Worlds, Part 1: Colonies of Color and Gloom

BiggerJ — Tue, 16 Mar 2021 21:34:57 -0800

ReBoot wasn't quite the first all-CGI half-hour animated series. Earlier that year, French studio Fantôme released Insektors, an epic soft sci-fi romp about the conflict between two civilizations of insect-people (Engadget article featuring insights from a co-creator and an animator). The series had two dramatically different English dubs, available on YouTube in their entirety: the more faithful if somewhat unsubtle American dub and the more comedic UK dub. The former playlist also includes some originally unlocalized extras: a Christmas special, a Making Of special and a short about a fictional VR game.

"Will my grandmother have, like, laser guns?"

sibilatorix — Thu, 04 Mar 2021 22:52:50 -0800

"So your grandmother is a starship now: a quick guide for the bewildered" by Marissa Lingen Other writing on nature.com by Marissa Lingen. Marissa Lingen's short fiction previously. And a more recent previously on Lingen's "Present Writers" blog posts.

Person of the Year 2031

simmering octagon — Sat, 20 Feb 2021 12:32:05 -0800

As the earliest viable brain scan, MMAcevedo is one of a very small number of brain scans to have been recorded before widespread understanding of the hazards of uploading and emulation. He is considered by some to be the "first immortal", and by others to be a profound warning of the horrors of immortality.

so who is there left to trust?

theodolite — Sun, 14 Feb 2021 14:27:56 -0800

Basilisk collection - From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia is a work of unfiction by Blackle Mori. According to the author, unfiction is "fiction that insists it's real."

Waking the Leviathan

kaibutsu — Wed, 03 Feb 2021 09:24:21 -0800

The story of how James S.A. Corey's The Expanse went from game concept to blockbuster TV series: From failed MMO pitch to play-by-email roleplaying game to novels to television.

...And an NCC-1701-D

adrianhon — Fri, 25 Dec 2020 10:09:45 -0800

Ryan's Edits (previously) shares The Twelve Days of Star Trek: a Sci-Fi Christmas Carol!

"baking stories are another of my go to story types"

brainwane — Mon, 21 Dec 2020 13:18:39 -0800

Two Ladybusiness contributors "explore their feels about 'soft' or low-stakes SFF short fiction, and rec a whole bunch of stories for you to enjoy." Links to twenty-two science fiction and fantasy stories that make the recommenders feel soft or hopeful, especially "domestic stories and stories that are good people doing their best".

China 2098: First Time Abroad

adrianhon — Sat, 19 Dec 2020 03:11:52 -0800

Fan Wennan's digital illustrations have caught fire on Chinese social media, depicting the world of 2098 where China is a high-tech superpower, with a humbled US that's embraced communism; Wall Street is draped with hammer-and-sickle flags celebrating the "30th anniversary of the People's Union of America". The illustrations come amid China's Communist Party claiming the pandemic has shown the superiority of its authoritarian model (NYT/Archive.is)

"Nothing Is Stranger To Man Than His Own Image"

Going To Maine — Wed, 25 Nov 2020 10:48:42 -0800

O Human Star is a 505-page, eight-chapter web comic melodrama by Blue Delliquanti about a roboticist who is mysteriously reincarnated (as a robot) many years after his death and must find out why. It's a story about gender and the self. It's a bad guide to how the academic funding process works or appropriate employer/employee relationships, but is otherwise an optimistic, speculative vision of how the future might be.
This is the first page.
Samantha Reidel's review in Polygon (August, 2020)
An interview with Delliquanti about their comic at Multiversity Comics (January, 2019)
Previously from 2014

Dune as a measure of our discontent

maskd — Sun, 22 Nov 2020 06:32:50 -0800

Daniel Immerwahr at the Los Angeles Review of Books writes about the renewed popularity of Dune, the influence of Native American cultures on Frank Herbert’s novels, his libertarianism and how his politics fit in the 21st century.

For [George] Lucas, the lords-and-ladies theme gave his space saga a romantic air — Camelot with spaceships. Dune's medievalism was darker, with loveless political marriages, blood feuds, oppressive tax farming, and a "rigidly guarded" class system. Rather than polishing off the rough edges as Lucas did, Herbert appeared to delight in the abrasive qualities of this stratified society. "Planetary feudalism," one of the Dune series's heroes explains, is the "best social form" for an interstellar civilization. Its success stems, another continues, from the "ancient human demand" for hierarchy, for a world "where every person knows his place." [...] Herbert read widely about desert cultures and worked deep-cut references to Islamic history into his portrait of the Fremen. Yet, beneath the Arabic facade, you can also glimpse the Indians of Washington, whom Herbert knew much better. The Fremen, living in the dangerous desert and harpooning enormous sandworms there, are not so far off from the Quileute and Hoh people who thrived in the forests of Western Washington and harpooned whales off the Pacific Coast.

Also from the LARB: Race Consciousness: Fascism and Frank Herbert’s “Dune”

"sentenced the petitioner to a life term, but how long is a life?"

brainwane — Thu, 29 Oct 2020 18:39:20 -0800

Sci Phi Journal is an online magazine that "wishes to provide a platform for idea-driven fiction, as opposed to the 'character-driven' mode that has come to predominate speculative fiction." A few short stories they've published: "Minutes of the Meeting of the Board of Directors of CYBIMPLANT INC held at 10:00 AM on 14 May 2036" by Rick Novy (October 2020), the futuristic legal what-if "Habeas Corpus Callosum" by Jay WerkHeiser (January 2017; content note for rape), a fictional FIFA ruling in "Red Card" by Madeline Barnicle (June 2020), and an academic investigation of the missing Pope "John XX" by Timons Esaias (March 2020).

Coincidence, backstabbing, obligation, tradition, and tech support

brainwane — Tue, 27 Oct 2020 18:37:09 -0800

Four scifi stories about jobs, loyalty, and navigating difficult politics and priorities. In the happiest of the four, "Happenstance" by Fran Wilde (2017), an engineer of serendipity has to subvert residents' expectations and a skeevy executive's plans. "Sweet Marrow" by Vajra Chandrasekera (2016) (audio) portrays the fraught relationship between a journalist and a government worker in a turbulent time. "Exile's End" by Carolyn Ives Gilman (August 2020) is "a complex, sometimes uncomfortable examination of artifact repatriation and cultural appropriation." And in "Thank You For Your Patience" by Rebecca Campbell (March 2020), Mark's stuck doing tech support while the world slow-motion falls apart outside.

Exploration, separatism, yearning, and hopeful stories

brainwane — Mon, 26 Oct 2020 18:35:44 -0800

Two short scifi stories about space programs run by brown and Black people: the optimistic "Heard, Half-Heard, in the Stillness" by Iona Datt Sharma (published August 2020) and the mostly optimistic "At the Village Vanguard (Ruminations on Blacktopia)" by Maurice Broaddus. Datt Sharma's story is also listed in Ladybusiness's recommendation list of eight short & sweet stories published in 2020: "I found all of these stories hopeful."

Fires, homemade pills, and gardens

brainwane — Sat, 24 Oct 2020 18:18:17 -0800

Stories about how we cope with disasters, in the short and the long term. "Ambient and Isolated Effects of Fine Particulate Matter" by Emery Robin (horror-y), published in April, and the more hopeful "Growing Resistance" by Juliet Kemp (audio and text at that link), first published in August 2019. Reckoning, "a nonprofit, annual journal of creative writing on environmental justice," published the (horror-y?) "Ambient and Isolated Effects of Fine Particulate Matter" by Emery Robin in April 2020:

On Thursday the sun rose red and stayed red, and stared at us red and red through the shifting candlewax layers of sky. We sealed the windows and cancelled gym, and forbade the children to leave until their mothers came for them, and through lunch period they pressed their noses to the glass and left smears of rainbow oils there. Before their faces and ours the bloody halo crept through the silhouettes of our buildings, picking its way down the foothills, stealing hot and infected towards the wide soft swathe of nothing that had once been San Francisco. In the early afternoon the children left in bunches and tangles, clusters of heaving minivans like lifeboats. We gathered in the teacher's lounge and stood with our hands wrapped round our one o'clock coffee mugs and said quietly to each other and ourselves the air quality numbers in the neighborhoods to which we would be driving through the greyness: Montclair and Emeryville, San Antonio and El Cerrito, one-eighty-five, two-seventeen, two-fifty, two seventy-one. Some of us had masks, and some did not. Some had the wrong masks—the flimsy kind, thin and cotton, with no wires at the top to mold over our noses and cheekbones—and we discarded these in the wastebasket, a growing pile of white leaves. Those who did have the right masks put them on and looked at the others with invisible mouths, invisible lips. There were no spares.

Cast of Wonders podcasted "Growing Resistance" by Juliet Kemp in March, noting: "This story comes with a pretty significant content warning. It's an incredibly hopeful story, but the setting and themes surround healthcare in a post-pandemic world. This may be just the story you need right now, or it might be the exact opposite. Please listen or read with that in mind."

The late-afternoon sun hovers above the wall as I kneel on the earth, weeding tomatoes. Beyond the wall, yellow-orange light reflects off the clean sharp lines of the apartment blocks. Boxes for safe people, people who are provided for. People who matter. People who I knew, once upon a time. People who could afford the vaccine before the gates closed. The plague's gone now, but the wall's still here.

"The words barely stick in her throat at all."

brainwane — Fri, 23 Oct 2020 18:11:29 -0800

"The Avengers' training regime will start soon; today is for her to relearn the world." "Pour Back The Ocean" by imperfectcircle (Katherine Fabian) is a sweet fanfiction story depicting Wanda Maximoff after the events of the Marvel Cinematic Universe film Age of Ultron. As the author puts it, "Wanda has to find a new place in the world. Contains team training exercises, expected grief and unexpected kindness." There are also cute dogs.

"Was it rude to tell your boss she was growing scales?"

brainwane — Wed, 21 Oct 2020 18:07:18 -0800

Since September 1, 2010, Daily Science Fiction has published a new short scifi/fantasy story each weekday. The easiest way to navigate the archives is probably by story topic, so you get titles, author names, and excerpts (example). Here are six very short stories you might like. A short, silly piece, published this year: "The Dragon Queen of the Suffix County Public Library" by Barbara A. Barnett. "Dara the Library Director sprouted the first scale during our weekly staff meeting, after I suggested a change to the Staff Favorites book display." "Apology Accepted" by Kathryn Felice Board is a short, sad, incisive piece that is probably in some way about emotional labor. "You have to save something to forgive yourself." "Measures and Countermeasures" by Beth Cato (content note: anorexia) portrays the lengths Colleen and her mother will go to pursue their (opposed?) goals, and has a melancholy-but-trending-happy ending. "She dug in a pouch and found her contact cases. The blue case held a prescription for her sight. The white one, she'd bought from another girl." And: three stories that particularly play on Internet writing styles: "Search History" by KT Bryski is a quick zombie story, "43 Responses to 'In Memory of Dr. Alexandra Nako'" by Barbara A. Barnett (previously) is reanimation-related horror in a blog comments section, and "Only g62 Kids Will Remember These Five Moments" by Leonard Richardson (disclaimer: my spouse) is clickbait set on a colony ship. (Also, speaking of found-document/epistolary sf/f: as previously mentioned on the blue, "Feature Development for Social Networking" by Benjamin Rosenbaum.)

"you got two options. Wallow in guilt like a hero, or do something."

brainwane — Tue, 20 Oct 2020 18:04:37 -0800

Two short speculative stories featuring computers with consciousness. "Batteries For Your Doombot5000 Are Not Included" by Merc Fenn Wolfmoor (published this year) is a light sf/f story about an ex-supervillain who gets a second chance at talking with a woman she had a crush on. "Applied Cenotaphics in the Long, Long Longitudes" by Vajra Chandrasekera (audio) is "an RFC 9481-compatible full personalytic profile recorded in Binara-Unduvap 2561 (Sep-Dec 2018 in the Christian calendar) at R. Satka's home and studio in the New City in the Autonomous Territory of Vilacem. The interview interprets itself in real time as each interviewer asks their questions...Since Satka's death, this interview is her primary being-in-the-world, and retains executive authority over her estate."

"All goes onward and outward, nothing collapses"

brainwane — Mon, 19 Oct 2020 18:02:44 -0800

Four sweet pieces of fan fiction in which characters watch election returns come in. The one for which you least need to know the underlying canon: "A Great and Gruesome Height" by Jae Gecko, a queer romance that pays homage to the Dar Williams song "Iowa" along with The West Wing. "It's 1998, Josiah Bartlet is the Democratic nominee battling sitting Republican President Lawrence Armstrong for the Oval Office, and back in Iowa, Republican campaign coordinator Megan Richter is about to fall from a great and gruesome height." (This is a Yuletide story, and you can sign up for this year's Yuletide exchange between now and 9am UTC on 26 October.) Another West Wing piece: "Election Days" by Raven (singlecrow), which puts the team in a Star Trek future, administering a Federation-wide election. "Someone on some godforsaken little moon out towards the Beta Quadrant is applying for certiorari because [the candidate] once took an undocumented transporter and thus is legally a clone." If you enjoyed Dykes to Watch Out For, take a look at "Five New Love Truths You Need To Know" by sprat (unfortunately missing the illustrations it had when first published), about a trans teen figuring out dating.

Anyway, it's all dark on the second floor because everybody's down in the living room, where the TV is, crowded in anxious and sweaty on the couches and the floor and wherever they can fit, eating vegan nachos and watching the results come in. Janis was there for a while and it felt like being in a rollercoaster during the climb to the top, when everybody's breathless and grabbing each other's arms and clinging on like that could save you, laughing and waiting and terrified. The polls say it's going to happen but what if the polls are wrong? So they're here to get the news together, no matter what...

And, if you enjoyed The Colbert Report and Jon Stewart's Daily Show, and you're comfortable with fanfiction about celebrity personas, check out "Silent" by Erin Ptah, an alternate reality piece in TDS-TCR FPF fandom. "In 1998, the staff of The Daily Show (including star correspondent Stephen Colbert) gets a new addition: deaf writer Jon Stewart."

Several of the writers had noticed the silent conversation by this point, and decided it was more interesting to look at than the show's fuming host or irate co-creator. Kilborn hadn't realized anything was going on until this moment. "What?" he demanded, snapping out of the argument to glare suspiciously at Jon. "What's so funny?" "Nothing to do with you!" said Stephen quickly. "He was laughing at something I said. I am the funniest person here, after all, so it's only natural." He fell without thinking about it into the habit of signing along as he spoke. It was the easiest thing to do at home, where the deaf people did best with ASL and the hearing people weren't necessarily looking at you. Even if you were as fabulous as Stephen. Kilborn's brow furrowed. "You can do sign language?" "Yes," said Stephen, though the sign he made along with it was Obviously. "If I make sure he always knows what's going on, will you quit worrying about him?"

"Three thousand bucks a blast. The council only bought one shot."

brainwane — Sat, 17 Oct 2020 17:59:07 -0800

Two short, exciting scifi stories in which underdogs fight battles. "The Hard Quarry" by Caleb Huitt, published this year, has a solo asteroid miner outwitting pirates: "The only statement the regs make on going extravehicular at speed is not to." "Corporate Robo Renegade Piston" by Nicholas Sugarman (2017) has an underfunded mecha pilot strapping in to fight a kaiju: "it hurt his pride knowing his face was plastered onto a waffle iron. He sighed, comforting himself with the knowledge that at least he wasn't on the kaiju cleanup team."