杏吧原创

THERE is nothing like an anthology for taking the pulse of new science fiction. One of the latest and best is The New Voices of Science Fiction, which includes many new writers who have received or been shortlisted for the Nebula or Hugo awards.

Editors Hannu Rajaniemi and Jacob Weisman promise a 鈥渢onal freshness鈥�. So while the collection features mostly US authors, it does seem refreshingly diverse, with widely divergent glimpses of the future from the likes of Sam J. Miller, Rebecca Roanhorse, Kelly Robson and E. Lily Yu.

The short story is an ideal form for sci-fi: a premise can be tested, its ramifications developed and radical consequences presented. Such anthologies are important for providing a snapshot of the field and its future trajectory.

So where do the new writers鈥� concerns cohere? Time travel is a recurrent trope. Alice Sola Kim offers the tale of a scientist who rescues her 9-year-old self from bullying to change the harmful patterns of her older iteration. Likewise, in Amal El-Mohtar鈥檚 poignant 鈥淢adeleine鈥�, a young woman compares her drug-induced jaunts through time to her mother鈥檚 Alzheimer鈥檚.

Many stories are suffused with dystopian threads: fraying social bonds, environmental disruption and widening inequality. All have effects on the most vulnerable. Miller鈥檚 鈥淐alved鈥� follows a refugee from drowned Brooklyn living in a near-future, post-Arctic Sweden. A long-haul ice fisherman with few prospects, he struggles to connect with his adaptable son, who sees him as a relic.

鈥淪pace exploration is limited to resource extraction, with the greatest changes happening at home鈥�

Bucking the dystopian trend is Yu鈥檚 鈥淭he Doing and Undoing of Jacob E. Mwangi鈥�. It imagines how a scarcity-riven society might create 鈥渁 deep immune response in the human psyche鈥� to the onslaught of inequality and rage. A massive redistribution of wealth has strengthened global institutions. But the introduction of Dream Seeds 鈥� a universal basic income in Kenya 鈥� leads to a divide between Doers and Don鈥檛s, those who choose to make, build or learn and those who want only to be entertained.

The growth of entertainment platforms, whether in virtual reality or on social media, is a distinctive trend. 鈥淥penness鈥� by Alexander Weinstein explores relationships that fail to cope with the intimacy offered by new tech. One stand-out story, 鈥淯topia, LOL?鈥� by Jamie Wahls, is stylistically gutsy. Here, humanity鈥檚 future after the singularity looks strange, with consciousness shifting easily between trillions of realities, from a knock-off Middle Earth to FloTiSim 鈥� a floor-tile simulator.

Not surprisingly, the near-future tales stick closest to extrapolation, with new economies for counterfeit meat in Vina Jie-Min Prasad鈥檚 鈥淎 Series of Steaks鈥� and unusual cultural encounters in Roanhorse鈥檚 鈥淲elcome to Your Authentic Indian Experience^TM鈥�. These stories attend as much to world-building as to the lived experience of those brutalised by capitalism鈥檚 retrenchment.

In this superb collection, the radical freedom of the digital typically contrasts with resource-depleted physical landscapes. Space exploration is limited to resource extraction, with the greatest changes happening at home. Reinventions of the body meet backlashes and resistance as often as love. Ultimately, these new writers have very human stories to tell, necessarily complicated by compromises and failures as much as heroics.