BOOK REVIEW: United States of Japan by Peter Tieryas

written by David Steffen

World War II is over, decisively ended when the Empire of Japan unleashes their new superweapon on the United States of America. Soon they USA is declared the United States of Japan, under the rule of the Emperor.

The story begins from the point of view of people held in an internment camp for Japanese-American citizens, who are immediately released upon the Japanese seizing control. 40 years later, the child of one of those, Beniko Ishimura, is working as a video game censor as the subversive video game United States of America starts gaining popularity. United States of America is an alternate history war game where the United States won World War II. Meanwhile, Akiko Tsukino of one of the secret police forces, is out to investigate the game herself. They cross paths and begin to uncover deeper secrets about the game and about the United States of Japan.

I like the alt-history aspect of the story, looking at different ways that Japanese government and culture might have grown from 1940s USA insted of the USA we have today. There were some technological elements both fun and dark, as well as exploring the colonial culture aspect where a colony’s culture becomes a mix of its own roots and of the occupying force. The plot as a whole is action-packed, and has lots of exciting events to keep the reader interested, as well as interesting philosophical themes.

What I found less engaging was the way the narrative interacted with Beniko, who is probably what you would call the main protagonist, though we get POV sections from Akiko as well. Big important details about him and what drives him are withheld until later in the story, to add some mystery for the reader I suppose. This is a writing technique that I tend to find distancing rather than engaging because when I’m reading I want to immerse in the POV as deeply as possible, I want to flow along the narrative like riding a river, and when there are all these blank areas where there clearly should be information, it interrupts that flow for me and I have trouble ever immersing. I’m not talking about revealing details about a person’s origin story, exactly, but more things that the person must be thinking about, and yet aren’t in the narrative. I read the whole book, but until the very very end I felt like Ben was a distant stranger, instead of feeling immersed in him, and since he is the main POV character, that was a major obstacle for me. I found myself constantly wondering “Now, why is he doing THAT? What are the actual stakes for him?” and feeling like I never had a satisfactory answer.

I found the character of Akiko much more engaging, despite her having some hair-trigger homicidal tendencies that are only encouraged by her work. Unlike Ben, I felt like I was fully engaged with her character because there was no withholding that served as an obstacle, and she had some real character growth from beginning to end of the book to follow along with.

Overall, I found the book a pretty easy ready, though I would have liked to be able to immerse more deeply in the Beniko character’s point of view.

The Best of Escape Pod 2016

written by David Steffen

Escape Pod is the weekly science fiction podcast, edited by Norm Sherman, what is I think the longest running science fiction podcast out there.

In February Escape Pod once again participated in the Artemis Rising event across the EA podcasts.

Escape Pod published 43 stories in 2016.

Every story that is eligible for Hugo Award is marked with an asterisk (*).

The List

1. “Recollection” by Nancy Fulda
A treatment is available for Alzheimer’s, but it can only restore your ability to remember–the memories that have been lost are gone forever. A man recovering from treatment struggles to fit in with the family that loves him.

2. “In Their Image” by Abra Staffin-Wiebe*
What do religions make us do? Examined by looking at alien religions. Awesome philosophical SF.

3. “Among the Living” by John Markley*
What if first responders were equipped with power armor?

4. “Murder or a Duck” by Beth Goder*
Humorous parallel world traveling story.

5. “Myspace: A Ghost Story” by Dominica Phetteplace*
What happens to all those dead accounts you leave behind on old sites?

Honorable Mentions

“Brain Worms and White Whales” by Jen Finelli*

DP Fiction #24: “The Avatar In Us All” by J.D. Carelli

For my 88th birthday, I celebrate with a bottle of bourbon. I fumble with the anti-intoxication meds my doctor insists I take, the dispenser flying out of my hands and across the kitchen table. “Goddammit!”

Chrissy walks in, putting her hands on her hips in disapproval. Her face is her mother’s, but when I look for my eyes, all I see are the blank, grey eyes of an android. Not my daughter, only her avatar.

“Is it so hard to ask for help?” she snaps. The avatar has a faux personality—based on Chrissy’s—but the motherly tone in her voice tells me my daughter is sitting halfway around the world, jacked-in.

“I’m an old man,” I say, reaching for the bourbon. “Why bother?”

She walks over to the table, deftly dispenses a tablet, and pops it into my mouth. Sitting down in a chair beside me, she pushes two glasses my way.

“Do you at least have a glass of something where you are?” I ask, filling both glasses.

She chuckles. “It’s morning over here, Dad. You know that.”

“I know,” I say, washing the pill down with the bourbon. “I was just testing you.”

“Sure you were.” She follows my lead, downing the glass.

I fill them both again. “You know I’m just going to empty your stomach reservoir and drink it, right?”

She harrumphs.

“Do you have time to watch The Tonight Show?”

She groans. “No. I have to get to work, but my avatar will keep you company. I doubt you’ll even notice.”

I will. “Fine.”

We nurse our second glasses as the crickets chirp outside. Chrissy purses her lips, letting me know she has something to say. I raised her to be plainspoken, so I know it must be something particularly awkward. I know exactly what she will say.

“Why won’t you come here?” she finally asks.

“Ugh,” I say with a wave of my hand. “Now that would kill me.”

“Come on,” she says, putting a hand on my arm. The warmth and pressure feels just like Chrissy. “It’s been years since you last visited. Guangzhou has changed a lot. It’s clean, organized.”

“Guangzhou without all the pollution? It’s just not home if you’re not wheezing after a brisk walk.”

She laughs. “I miss that American sarcasm, too. Bring it with you. Besides, I could show you around the lab. You’d get a kick out of what we’ve done with the place.”

I moan. “I retired too early. I wouldn’t remember anything.”

“Yes you would,” she says. “At least send an avatar.”

“Are you kidding me? My old body can’t take that.” Creating a template for an avatar is like an MRI that takes four hours. Just the thought of it makes me weary.

She sighs. “If you don’t want to come here, I’ll just have to go there. After this phase of construction is complete, I’ll have some time.”

“No, no,” I say, getting angry. “This is huge for you. And the world. Don’t worry about me.”

“It’s not just you,” she says. “I could visit Michael, too. They just moved into their new house.”

“I know. I talk to my grandson, you know.”

Her face lights up. “Why don’t you go visit them? You’d love upstate New York this time of year.”

“No. I’m fine right here on the west coast. Still waiting for it to break off and drift into the Pacific.”

“Come on, Dad,” she says with a push in her voice. “You can’t just rot there.”

“Don’t you have to get to work?”

“Dad.”

“No.”

“Christ. What’s the matter with you?” she chides.

I slam the glass down on the table. She goes silent, and so do I. We are too similar for our own good. After a short respite, she sighs. The avatar blinks and I know she’s gone.

“Would you like me to turn on your show?” it asks.

I grunt, moving to the living room. The bourbon comes with me.

***

Morning hurts.

Pulling myself up from where I had slept on the sofa, I stare down at the empty bottle on the coffee table.

“Aren’t you glad you took the pill?” the avatar asks. My heart skips a beat, but I notice its dead eyes are staring at the blank wall display. It turns to me, plastering a preprogrammed smile onto its face.

“Don’t you have anything better to do?” I ask. The aroma of fresh ground coffee hits my nose and I feel a pang of guilt. “Isn’t Chrissy home yet?”

It shakes its head. “I don’t have her on GPS, which means she’s still at work.”

It’s strange talking to something that looks almost identical to Chrissy, but after a few months with the thing, I’ve grown accustomed to having something to talk to. The downside is that it makes me miss my daughter—the real one—all the more.

I stand up and get myself a cup of coffee. It follows me into the kitchen, handing me another mug. Rolling my eyes, I fill it up. The damned thing learned from the real Chrissy, who knows her mother and I shared a cup of coffee every morning for fifty-five years.

Shuffling out to the back patio, I enjoy the view. Children frolic on the beach below while a middle-aged couple walk a robotic dog along a footpath. “Keep it weird, Santa Cruz.” I used to walk Chrissy along the same beach. Her mother and I, that is. Have I taken Michael? Or his family?

As I take a sip of coffee, a thought occurs to me. “Avatar, get out here.” It does, and far more lithely than my sixty year-old daughter. “How much would a plane ticket be?”

“To where?”

“To here.”

It rolls its dead eyes at me, a perfect imitation of a five-year old Chrissy. “From where, then?”

“From Guangzhou,” I say. “And New York.”

It tells me, then says, “I doubt Michael could come, though, with work and the house.”

“You don’t get paid to talk,” I snap.

“I don’t get paid at all,” it says. “You know that.”

I round on it, looking it square in its empty eyes. “I don’t want to go there.”

“Why not?”

“I’m an old man. Don’t I get to be stubborn for no reason?”

“I find it hard to believe this is a recent development,” it says.

I narrow my eyes at it. “Chrissy?” The resemblance is uncanny.

“She’s on her way home.”

“Oh.”

It waves me on. “Out with it then.”

I’m tempted. “Will Chrissy know?”

“If she cares to review the files.”

I nod, taking another sip of coffee. “I don’t want to go for a reason as old as time. I’m irrelevant. Last time I visited Chrissy, she was so busy with work. She tried, she really did, but she has a life. As I did when I was her age. Same goes with Michael.”

“Why don’t you tell her that?” it asks.

“You’re programmed to mimic her emotions. How do you think she’d feel?”

It simply nods.

“I tried learning some of the new engineering they’re using at the lab, but it’s changed so much in the last twenty years.” I turn away, staring out over the beach. “If I could just get them to come here, maybe things would be different. They’d have fun here.”

“Dad?”

I spin around.

Chrissy’s blinking. “What were you saying about having fun?”

I look down to the coffee in my hand. “Back from work so soon?”

“Yeah,” she says. “I have to go back though, so they gave us a few hours for dinner.”

“Oh?”

“We’ve been having some problems with the lab’s containment protocols. I don’t really want to talk about it.” Her mouth chews something not really there. “Hope you don’t mind. I’m hungry. So what’s this about fun?”

“I thought it’d be fun to take a walk,” I say.

***

I watch the Tonight Show in the dark, looking over to the time display every few minutes. The avatar sits beside me, knowing to keep its mouth shut during the monologue. When it cuts to break, I sigh. “Chrissy?”

“Nothing on GPS,” it says.

“Why wouldn’t she tell me if she had to work early?” I wonder aloud.

“She’s very busy, I’m sure she just forgot.” It’s a reminder I don’t need.

“Those tickets?” I let the words hang in the air. “Forget them.”

“She’s often late. Don’t you think you’re being juvenile?” I’m not sure if it’s channeling Chrissy or my late wife.

“It’s like you said, they just don’t have time.”

“Then go there, Goddammit.” It spits the words.

The show resumes, but I’m too angry. “You didn’t talk like that when you first showed up.”

“I learn every time you two talk.”

I curse, moving to the other sofa. “You’re not her. Remember that.”

“Then go see her.”

“I told you, I—”

It cuts me off. “I know, you’d only be in the way. But is it any worse than how your life is right now? The only time you’re ever happy is when Chrissy is jacked-in and you forget I’m an avatar.”

The words cut me. “So, what? I should just go and bother her when she’s busiest?”

“When she was a child, did you ever chide her for bothering you when you were busy with some project or another?”

“No,” I say. “I tried not to.”

“And neither will she. Go.”

I realize it’s right. “Fine. Book the ticket to Guang-”

“Wait,” it says, its eyes snapping toward the display. “Something’s happened.”

The display changes, suddenly covered in bright lights. I narrow my eyes and struggle to read the caption. “Tragedy strikes Guangzhou: Chemical Lab Explosion.”

I stare up at the display for a long time. The avatar moves to my sofa, slowly wrapping me with its arms. I realize I’m shaking. “What happened?”

“Reports coming in say there was a malfunction that caused a containment breach.” Its voice quavers, just like Chrissy’s did when she told me she was pregnant with Michael.

“Maybe…maybe she wasn’t there,” I say.

It squeezes me beneath its warm embrace and whispers. “I don’t have her on GPS.”

I look to it, its dead eyes dead forever. “Get the fuck away from me!” I push it off the sofa and it retreats into the kitchen. I hear it pacing back and forth.

Shaking, I watch the news story unfold. Sometime later, the avatar brings me a new bottle of bourbon. I snatch it away, clutching it to my chest. It sits down on the other sofa, and I can’t stand to look at it.

It speaks softly to me. “She went quickly. She never knew it was coming. There was no pain.” All the things I told Chrissy when her mother passed, it’s telling me now. Or whatever this machine is, it’s comforting me.

On our separate sofas, we cry.

***

As night turns to morning, the bourbon forces me to the bathroom. The avatar sits on the lip of the bathtub, rubbing my back. I can’t meet its eyes.

“Just go,” I say.

“Where?”

“Wherever you want,” I say. “Just go.”

It wrings it hands.

“Out with it,” I say, sensing a question.

“I can book a flight for you.”

I think about it and nod. “Fine.”

“There’s a six-hour sub-orbital leaving in two hours,” it says. “That’ll give you time to pack.”

“No,” I say, forcing myself to look. Its eyes are not Chrissy’s, but they’re not dead either. “Not to Guangzhou.”

“Where then?”

“New York,” I say. “And make it for two.”

Author’s Note: Living abroad, I’m always an ocean away from family and friends. This makes me wonder how future technologies might change our concept of what it means to be present in someone else’s life. When I saw the rich depths of emotion in that, “The Avatar in Us All” was born.

J.D. Carelli is an ESL teacher by day and a fantasy writer by night. The rest of the time he spends with his wife and daughter on a tropical island in Southern China. As a child, he fully believed that he could control the Force, and has been trying to reclaim that feeling on the page ever since. You can find out more about him at http://www.jdcarelli.com or on twitter @jdcarelli.

If you enjoyed the story you might also want to visit our Support Page, or read the other story offerings.

BOOK REVIEW: Star Wars: Aftermath by Chuck Wendig

written by David Steffen

(note: I’m behind on posting my own reviews, I read this book and wrote this review a while ago, so references to the “The Force Awakens” movie being recent, etc are a symptom of that)

Aftermath is a Star Wars franchise tie-in novel written by Chuck Wendig and published in September 2015 by Del Rey. Since Disney decided to declare all of the pre-2014 novelizations as a separate timeline from The Force Awakens movie in 2015, Aftermath is one of the few novels in the official movie canon.

Aftermath picks up shortly after the original movie trilogy. The second Death Star has been destroyed. Darth Vader and Emperor Palpatine are dead. The Empire is shaken and leaderless, but not gone (keep in mind that this book was published before The Force Awakens hit theaters, so we hadn’t yet met Kylo Ren and the First Order yet). The Rebel Alliance has become the New Republic, trying to restore as much order as possible in the wake of the conflict with the Empire.

The New Republic is seeking out the remnants of the Empire to keep them from regrouping. New Republic pilot Wedge Antilles, visiting planets on the outer fringe to seek out Imperial remnants, discovers exactly what he’s looking for on Akiva–a group of Star Destroyers gathered around a fringe planet–but he’s taken captive before he can broadcast a message to the New Republic. Broadcast frequencies have been jammed and the Imperials are closely monitoring traffic to ensure secrecy.

Former rebel fighter Norra Wexley returns home to Akiva after the war to reunite with the son that she left behind, not realizing that she is stepping into this secretive Imperial summit. Norra, her son, a bounty hunter, and an Imperial defector work together to find a way to fight back against this remnant of the Empire to interrupt it before it can gather its strength again.

I haven’t read a Star Wars novel since I was a teen, and I was happy to sink into the universe in print again, with the excitement of The Force Awakens movie still fresh in mind. I did read the book after seeing the movie, but I don’t think it made much difference in my appreciation for either one since Aftermath has very little character overlap with the movie.

It had some good action, fun sense of wonder tech stuff, space battles, fun banter, a few familiar characters, all what I would expect from a Star Wars book.

One thing that I thought was interesting about this book before I even read it was the angry reaction it spurred from a subset of fans who were upset at the acknowledgment of homosexuality in the Star Wars universe (and very excited reactions from a different subset of fans who were excited about the representation). I heard about it for months before I got around to reading the book and I was interested to see exactly what the portrayal of homosexuality was. The presence was so minor I’m not sure I would have even given it more than a passing thought, honestly, if it hadn’t been for the big to-do made about it ahead of time. I thought it was cool to see representation, no matter how minor, and I hope to see more.

All in all, I’d recommend it, and I’m looking forward to reading Chuck Wendig’s next Star Wars book installment. If you’ve seen The Force Awakens and you’re looking for a little something new in the new Star Wars universe (as opposed to the dozens of books that have been released over the past 40 years that have new been retconned out of the official universe) then you should give it a try.

MOVIE REVIEW: Arrival

written by David Steffen

Arrival is a science fiction first contact movie released in November 2016, which is based on the short story “Story of Your Life” by Ted Chiang. The movie stars Amy Adams, with Forest Whitaker and Jeremy Renner.

The movie begins shortly after 12 gigantic alien aircraft suddenly appear over various places around the globe, including one in the United States in an isolated spot in Montana. Linguist Louise Banks (Amy Adams), struggling with memories of a lost daughter, is recruited by Army Colonel Weber (Whitaker) to find out why the aliens have come and what they want. Louise leads the team alongside Ian Donnelly, a theoretical physicist aiming to use science as the medium of communication. It’s a race against time, because the other 11 eleven alien vessels are communicating with the governments and militaries of other countries. Do they mean us harm? Are they willing to share their technology? Will they share weapons? What if they share weapons with all those they are in contact with? What if they share weapons with only some of them? What if the aliens support one country against another. The Army has set up protocols for the meetings, about what exact topics may be spoken of, and exactly how the aliens can be approached, but Louise is willing to take big risks to try to make a breakthrough happen. Meanwhile, as Louise becomes more and more fatigued from overworking, she struggles with memories of the loss of her daughter, coming to mind at odd moments.

This movie was very good and had me captivated throughout. The casting was great, and Amy Adams in particular did a solid job. The scenes in the aliens were the highlight of the movie for me, as one is watching their every movement and the team’s translations for signs of their intent, and the different concepts of the alien language were very interesting. I appreciated that the trailers for the movie were very low-key–they didn’t give me a particular feeling about whether the aliens were hostile or not, so I honestly had no idea whatsoever what to expect. For a movie like that, that’s what I really want, is to just find out as it happens with no advertising preconceptions.

I quite liked the special effects in the movie. They are not the most flashy, but I thought they did well to add to the aura of mystery around the aliens–these days I find flashy special effects rather boring, because they’re a dime a dozen, it’s nice to see some other effect wrought from them.

The only minor quibble that I had is that it uses the Sapir-Worf Hypothesis of linguistics to justify some parts of the movie, and by what I understand (as someone who is not a linguist) the hypothesis has been largely discredited based on lack of data support. But, it feels plausible to me, and works to me as a storytelling element, even if I was picking at that edge a little bit.

I haven’t read the short story that it’s based on, but I’ve heard that the movie did it justice reasonably well, and that it is one of Ted Chiang’s best. Saying that it’s “one of Ted Chiang’s best” is no minor feat–he is not prolific, but every story of his that I’ve read has been incredibly well done. You can read it as part of his collection Story of Your Life and Other Stories. I definitely need to read that.

I highly recommend the movie.

DP Fiction #22: “The Schismatic Element Aboard Continental Drift” by Lee Budar-Danoff

“Captain, we have a situation. I’ve been investigating a potential religious sect.”

Captain Madeleine Salim of the generation ship Continental Drift set down her vitamin soup bottle. Instead of spending the start of her shift in contemplation of the new planet below, part of the anti-agoraphobia program mandated by the ship-to-shore landing process, she faced the lieutenant. Ronald Chin resembled the noble eagle from their histories, with short wavy hair, sharp nose and piercing eyes. Salim returned his salute.

“Why wasn’t this brought to my attention immediately?”

Chin stiffened. “I couldn’t report gossip. Rumors of religion crop up during every new generation. In the past, they turned out to be student groups prepping for exams, or thought experiments. I had to rule out those possibilities.” His proper military posture tired Salim, who waved him to a seat.

“The leader of this new sect is Orrin Himmelfarb—”

“The physicist?” Salim knew every adult on the Continental Drift by name and profession. Of the almost three hundred people now living aboard, Orrin was the last she would’ve considered spiritual in nature.

“He preached in private to individuals at first. Now he’s speaking to small groups in public. Tracie Aliyeva assists him.”

Aliyeva, their nanotechnologist, displayed no abnormal tendencies. Salim rubbed her forehead.

“Which religion is he using?”

Chin frowned. “That’s what I can’t explain. He preaches all of them.”

Ridiculous. She recalled the chapters on religions. All of Earth’s history was taught up to the point of the generation ship departures. The population for each ship had been selected based on religion to avoid future clashes and violence. The atheists assigned to the Continental Drift learned about religions as part of their cultural past but didn’t practice any.

Plans were underway for the transfer of supplies from the sister ship. At the end of her shift, their entire population would vote on a new name for their planet. Why, at this critical moment, had Himmelfarb made religion an issue?

“Could the loss of gravity cause mental stress or deviations?” As they’d approached their target star system, the ships decelerated and their rotation about their pivot point slowed. The centrifugal force that provided artificial gravity wound down. Once the ships de-tethered and settled into orbit, the future colonists had learned to function in low-g. Transition sickness continued to affect everyone. “Are people reacting adversely to the meds?”

Chin said, “No. The mild dose in our food will alleviate the effects of motion sickness–the disequilibrium and vertigo which started when we arrived. There are no biological or pharmacological sources causing people to seek a god.”

Was there a god? Salim never worried about such questions. Their ancestors and founders were Secular Humanists who relied on science, facts, and reasoning instead of myths, faith or superstition to understand questions of humanity and the universe. Now, as they embarked upon the final stage of their journey, a small group might disrupt the harmony designed thousands of years ago.

Chin saluted and left. Streamers from the arrival celebration party floated along her office walls but couldn’t relieve Salim of the weight of responsibility. Determined to learn the truth, Salim left to find Himmelfarb. Down one hall, she encountered Dr. Kendrickson vomiting near one of the viewports where the now motionless stars shone bright. Salim turned the sick dentist from the disturbing panorama, called for a medtech and cleaning crew, and continued on her search.

Cafeteria Three doubled as space for large group activities. Over the centuries, despite projects that maintained the ship’s interior, surfaces and furnishings displayed the ravages of age. Salim found the physicist at the head of a worn plastic table, Aliyeva beside him, drawing nods from the people seated nearby. She frowned. Charisma, a favorable trait among colonists, might be an obstacle to dissuading others from Himmelfarb’s words. After collecting a lunch tray, she headed for the table.

“We need to talk,” she said to Himmelfarb. “Let’s go to my office.”

Himmelfarb asked, “Why not here?”

He wanted everybody to hear. Salim didn’t intend to give him an audience. She leaned down and lowered her voice.

“I’d prefer privacy. I’m sure you’d prefer to come of your own accord.” Salim tilted her head toward the door where Lieutenant Chin stood.

Himmelfarb grabbed his tray and stood. “Always an honor to dine with the Captain,” he said. Tracie Aliyeva rose but Himmelfarb waved her off. “See you later,” he said.

Salim wasted no time once her door was closed and they were seated.

“You’re preaching religion, beyond a course of study you’re not authorized to teach. Why?”

“I’m glad you asked.” He took a bite, and waited until Salim followed suit before explaining. “You have concerns but I promise I’m not creating dissension among the members of our new colony.

“There’s a truth, a secret, passed on since my ancestors first boarded the Continental Drift.” He leaned forward. “My people aren’t atheistic. We believed that faith in any god, not just the god of the Jews or Muslims or any group, would support us through the two millennia our people faced aboard this ship. When someone struggles and can find no solace in a friend, no relief in the words of a psychologist or counselor, we,” he pointed to himself, “offer a solution bigger than the survival of mankind. Faith in something so huge, so unfathomable, yet so caring, is the answer for troubled souls.”

Salim shoved her spoon into the vegetable paste which adhered to her tray. “You’re saying your ancestors boarded the wrong ship?”

Himmelfarb shook his head, lips pressed. “You misunderstand, Captain. My family feared for the people of this ship.”

“They lied on their applications? That’s a serious breach of contract. Our founding documents clearly state that those who joined this ship would never establish a religion.” Severe penalties were outlined for any who broke this rule.

Himmelfarb nodded. “We didn’t set out to establish any particular religion. Only when someone was in need did we offer a solution others here wouldn’t consider. There hasn’t been one incident caused by religion on this ship.”

He was right. No generation passed without spats or serious disagreements, but nothing in the historical logs suggested religion was at the root of a single issue. That didn’t change the facts.

“But now we’ve arrived.” Salim tapped her desk. “In less than a year, we’ll descend to the planet and build our new civilization. The ship-to-shore program is working within expected parameters. Why preach to people who are adjusting? Especially when you know the consequences.”

“Despite the wall engravings, the constant lessons, the structure and multiple redundancies built so we’d remember we’re on a ship, surviving as a race by spreading across the galaxy, some are disturbed and need spiritual guidance. Yes,” Himmelfarb held up a hand, “many will be ready, but not all. They wish to hear me.”

“Practical knowledge and rational thought should provide a sense of safety and comfort,” said Salim. “Our founding documents planned for contingencies including the emotional and psychological needs of individuals regardless of their futures on the ship or a planet. No purpose beyond survival was mentioned or needed. Our humanity depends on our ability to think critically.”

Salim sipped from her soup bottle and grimaced. The soup was cold. “Our community was designed to be bound by common beliefs, without myths. Our ancestors began their journey free of superstitions, and refused to offer false security to their progeny. Logical reasoning should relieve any fears. If your forebears lied to board this ship, and if your words cause dissent, you threaten our entire colony. And I can’t allow it.”

Himmelfarb said, “You’d make us martyrs when we aren’t breaking the letter of the law?” He raised his voice. “I’m a physicist, and I believe science and religion can coexist. My forebears insisted it didn’t matter to which god or religion you subscribed. Each is as valid as the next. Instead, the insight that you’re part of a grand design, that your existence in the vast depths of space and time mattered, was the key to thriving on a generation ship. Especially when your particular generation was not destined to become a colony.”

Martyrs? Himmelfarb threatened their entire future. Salim chose her words carefully. “Then what, exactly, are you preaching?”

“Choice,” said Himmelfarb. “I recommend that each person who comes to me review their religious studies. A particular incarnation of a god or gods will resonate with them. If you open your mind and heart, your personal truth will be revealed. No one can tell you what to believe in. We aren’t talking about science fact. Or even an explanation for the universe. I can’t prove ‘god’ any more than you could disprove ‘god’. For some, finding faith helps them have faith in themselves and in what they’re doing.”

“It sounds like you’re giving up responsibility for yourself. Have faith in some magic power and things will work out.”

Himmelfarb scooped up some food and took his time chewing and swallowing before offering his answer.

“For me, God is not an entity from whom I ask for answers. God helps me comprehend space and everything in it at an emotional level. When I first looked through a viewport, I felt small, insignificant. I sickened at the thought of leaving my only home.” He rubbed his temples. “But I see myself as part of the grander web of life, and my destiny lies below. I got over my transition sickness.”

“You can face the planet now?”

“Oh yes. I look often. Our new home is beautiful.”

Salim stood. “I can’t say I understand why people find comfort in something imaginary. I won’t deny anyone their personal choice. I cannot condone any organized religion, which is contrary to our founding documents.” She touched a button on the desk and Chin opened the door.

Himmelfarb got up but Salim raised her hand. “I want you to discuss your preaching with Dr. Ganz. I’m not convinced you aren’t offering a crutch that will cause weakness in our colonists. I suggest,” and Salim deepened her tone so Himmelfarb would take her words as a command, “that you refrain from preaching until the psychologist convinces me you’re doing no harm. If people insist belief in a god requires them to force others to believe the same way, we are dead before we set foot on that planet. In that case,” she pointed at Himmelfarb’s chest, “I will put you, your family, and any others with these beliefs in isolation, and the current generation will remain on board. A new generation, raised free of your preaching, will become colonists instead. Understand?”

Himmelfarb’s smile vanished. “I understand. But while knowledge of religion and God exists, you will never be able to eliminate a person’s choice to have faith. It’s not rational. It’s instinctual.” He followed Chin out.

Salim finished her medicated food and shoved the lunch tray aside to be recycled. Certain that Himmelfarb would share their conversation with his followers, she considered her options. Through her office viewport their new planet swam in space, a blue-green bauble clothed in swirling white clouds. There was no going back, not to their old world or the imperfect ways of their past. She reviewed the database devoted to Earth history, and stopped at the section on religions. Every aspect of their inherited culture, from art to music to stories was influenced by religion.

It wasn’t within her power to delete the material. File erasure required a unanimous vote. Even if she isolated Himmelfarb and his family, his followers would still have the right to vote. No other captain had ever suggested such a dire action. Once gone, that part of their past, their heritage, would be irretrievable. Was that wrong? Salim sighed. Even if she convinced her generation the material was unnecessary, religious ideas passed down orally might persist. Even if they were eradicated, new ones could arise.

Salim decided. The assembly to name the planet would have one additional agenda item.

Lee Budar-Danoff sails, plays guitar, and writes when she isn’t reading. Lee volunteers as Municipal Liaison for National Novel Writing Month and is an alum of the Viable Paradise Writer’s Workshop. A former history teacher, Lee spends that energy raising three children with her husband in Maryland.www.leebudar-danoff.com]

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DP Fiction #19: “Do Not Question the University” by PC Keeler

“History,” spoke The University.

Albert had no interest in History. Nor had he interest in Mathematics, Science, Language, Art, or any of the other schools of The University. But one did not question The University, let alone defy it. Tales skittered among the Uneducated about Accepted Candidates thrown back from the gates for a single unwisely chosen word. The accepted response was safe.

“I so pledge,” said Albert.

A hole dilated open in the hallowed wall in front of him, symbolic of the forthcoming opening of Albert’s own eyes as he gained his Education. Antiseptic blue light spilled out. He waited for the command, to demonstrate his patience and submission to the sacred Policies and Procedures. One page of the Packet had detailed precisely how he was to behave, and he had no intention of failing now. Not when greatness lay before him.

“Insert your left hand,” The University instructed Albert. He obeyed. His skin looked a sickly sallow under the light, until the opening sealed around his wrist and held him in place. He felt the mildest of twinges as an airjet drove the new chip into his wrist, neatly tucked beneath his radial artery. His own pulse would provide the micropower the chip would need for the rest of his life.

“Welcome, Freshman,” The University boomed, loudly enough for the rest of the Application Center to hear. No one cheered. No one ever cheered. The Uneducated saw the Educated as mad, and yet dreamed of one day joining their ranks. Every Accepted Candidate meant there was one less spot available for the rest of them that year. He was no more Educated than he had been when he stepped into the Application Center ten minutes prior and submitted his forms, and yet now he was counted among their ranks for the potential that The University had seen within him.

The porters arrived. He had brought nothing with him, as per the Policies and Procedures, save for the clothing they now demanded he remove. He had made arrangements for the rest of his personal effects, as every Potential Candidate did. But this year, those arrangements would be put into action. He had a single cousin, who would have it all, the same as if Albert had died.

He donned his University Uniform. For the next six years, he would wear the comfortable, loose canvas of the jeans and the casual, distinctive blue shirt of the University Student, and carry the slim-line screen on which so much of his life would now depend. The porters gave him that screen when he was dressed. It was already turned on, and his class schedule was displayed in glowing green letters. His first class was in thirty minutes: Introduction to Speculative Analysis.

He left the Application Center without another word, either to the porters or to The University. The University had other Candidates to evaluate, and the porters would eagerly scrutinize his every word for signs of rebellion. He would give them nothing. He would be Educated in History and then the porters would have no power over him ever again.

Only The University would. Forever.

Six years. Six years of glorious freedom, and yet, only by abstaining from the temptations of life at The University could Albert become Educated. Many did not. To be a University Student was, after all, to be free to travel anywhere in the world, to be free to order any goods or services one desired, to be free to take part in all the wonderful bounty the world had to offer.

But The University was keeping track. Education was priceless. No man could possibly possess the wealth needed to pay even a single year of the most abstemious life at The University. It was solely by the generosity of The University and its ancient, mythical Donors that any man could become Educated, by surrendering himself to the wise and remorseless command of The University. To be given the opportunity for Education and to waste that chance was the most foolish possible outcome a man could achieve. And yet so many did, trading six short years of glory for a lifetime of drudgery.

History was a rare subject. Only four others shared the topic with Albert in his class. The first thing Albert learned was the wisdom of The University, for he was fascinated from the moment of his first lesson. All sorts of strange and wonderful secrets were his, matters that the Uneducated could never hear.

How once, The University had a great rival, whose name had been deliberately expunged in the riotous celebration when The University achieved its final victory.

How before that, The University had been but one of many, invited to ally itself with great powers among its brethren but choosing to stand proudly alone, growing in wealth and import with each passing year.

How once, not a lifetime but a single summer’s labor was deemed sufficient to repay the cost of a year’s Education, and how the years of labor per year of study grew each year.

How beyond The University’s reach there had been other places that refused the benevolent counsel of The University – and Albert could understand the implications of the phrase ‘had been.’

How the University had turned its wisdom upon itself, and seen the fallibility of man, and acted to remove that element from its own administration. It had been a very long time since mere human decisions had guided it, since bureaucracy and greed had played a role in the administration of the world. It was only among the University Students that folly remained despite The University’s rigorous selection; of the few tens of thousands chosen around the world each year, one in ten would squander the priceless gift of Education, and another one in twenty would fail its rigors despite their best efforts.

It was not merely human history that Albert learned. Alone among his classmates, The University chose for him courses of study that took him deep into the Restricted Archives, regions where The University’s own processes of deliberation had been recorded. Organization charts, acceptance criteria, secrets that many of the Uneducated would beamingly murder to learn, to gain their own entry into the ranks of their betters. He began from the most ancient of files and moved forward.

Many of Albert’s classmates had dissipated their precious days, losing the favor of The University but still through its grace permitted their full term of freedom. Albert did not travel. Albert did not spend his nights in drunken stupors. Albert was engaged, in the fullest sense of the word. The University guided Albert, drove Albert, but where it drove him was deeper and deeper into itself, into understanding how The University had once functioned, how it grew over time, how its Policies and Procedures had developed into the heart of the world.

When six years had passed, Albert was given the highest of trials The University had to offer. He would not be given the multiple-choice tests that his wastrel classmates would take (and fail), to perfunctorily prove their lack of worth. He would not sit for days filling out Blue Book after Blue Book, demonstrating his grasp of rote facts and simple analysis. He would not even sit before a panel of Professors to be judged for fitness to join their exalted ranks.

No, Albert stood before The University itself, the hallowed Seal etched into the floor of an ancient chamber. Speakers and sensors embedded into every wall left The University aware of his presence at its symbolic heart as he faced his Final Examination.

The University asked him, “What went wrong?”

Author’s Note: One evening, my writing group, the Fairfield Scribes (collective authors of Z Tales: Stories from the Zombieverse), assembled in my living room, with the express purpose of shamelessly engaging in literary generation. That afternoon, I had been working on unpacking boxes of books, and came across “Legends of the Ferengi” – in which it was noted that those avaricious aliens would decades’ worth of debt to pay for a prestigious education, a concept that was just a joke when the book was written. Nowadays, that doesn’t seem quite so funny… and it doesn’t show signs of stopping.

Born in the far-off days of the Second Millennium, PC Keeler spends his days writing detailed instructions for very dim but precise silicon brains to follow and finds it a relaxing change of pace to write more conversationally for charming, handsome, intellectual readers like you. He enjoys past, present, and future, preferably all at once. Steampunk and Ren Faires work well for this.

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DP Fiction #18: “Sustaining Memory” by Coral Moore

The Archivist held the three remaining beads in her left hand. Images flickered across her visual cortex: an unknown woman’s face, a sunset on a planet she couldn’t name, the dazzling color of a sea she no longer had the words to express. The beads felt cool and impersonal in her fingers, though what they contained was neither. She had only these few memories left and she no longer remembered if they were hers or someone else’s.

Around her, the machine chugged and whirred. The metal tubing that encased her pod vibrated. The glowing core rose in front of her, spinning slowly around its vertical axis.

She twirled the bead containing the seascape between her fingers and dove in. The memory was a moment in time. The wind caressed her face and the briny scent of the sea filled her head. A white-capped wave was held just off shore in the instant before breaking, never to fulfill its potential. She had the sense of someone waiting for her on that unknown shore. The name of the sea was gone, like everything else she had once known, converted into power for the machine she’d been wed to.

She surfaced from the hold of the memory with effort. That sea and that person no longer existed. The world her people had inhabited had been scoured clean, its atmosphere stripped away and everything on the surface incinerated. Nothing had survived; nothing but the machine, buried deep below the crust near the cold, dead heart of the planet. When her organic memory had been scrubbed, they’d left the fate of her world with her so she would not forget her purpose.

The grinding groan of the alert tone sounded, and without thinking she placed the seascape bead into the receptacle near her hand. The bead circled around the outer edge and spiraled downward into the depths of the machine. Bit by bit the memory of the sea faded from her mind, until only a pale representation of it remained, and then a moment later that too was gone. She was left only with the impression that something precious had been taken from her, with no idea what it was.

Two left: a sunset and a woman.

Only two memories before she was nothing but a soulless cog in the machine that would unmake everything her people had ever been in order to start again.

“Status?” she asked the heated air around her.

Something churned just beyond her field of vision. “Offline.” The voice that had been her only companion for generations was toneless and flat.

She swirled the two remaining beads in her hand. The number of beads she needed to awaken the machine was exact. She wondered why the designers of such a marvel would cut it so close or depend on her to do this critical job at all. If she’d ever known the answer to those questions, she no longer did.

If she stopped putting beads in before the machine awakened it would cannibalize the pod that sustained her in an attempt to get the necessary power. She wasn’t certain how many beads her body, such that it was, could replace. Once her systems started shutting down a cascading failure would follow.

When she held the memory of the sunset, deep pink and orange streaks surrounded her. She perched on a rocky cliff. A lush valley unfurled below her, absorbing the colors of the bright sky. Someone sat next to her, just out of sight. A sense of peace pervaded the place. She dwelled in the memory until the alarm tone woke her from her contemplation.

The comfort of the sunset was the only solace she could remember. While it was true that she would no longer remember that the memory had ever been her haven, she would miss something. A yawning void grew with each piece of her that was forgotten.

When the alert rang the second time she closed her eyes and dropped the bead in the machine. She concentrated on how the sunset made her feel, but even as she tried to hold it in her mind the colors faded.

“Mountain. Sunset. Peace.” She said the words over and over as a litany, but it made no difference. The memory slipped away like water through her fist, and all she was left with was the aching emptiness. She snapped her hand shut around the remaining bead.

The woman in the memory had short dark hair that stood on end in a gravity-defying display that balanced chaos and order perfectly. Her eyes brimmed with tears and angled downward. A curved scar marked her left cheek, but didn’t mar her loveliness one bit. Her lips were slightly parted. She was close enough that the heat from her breath warmed the Archivist’s face. The woman with no name had been captured in the moment before a farewell kiss. There was no other way to resolve the adoration and acceptance mingled in her expression. Something terrible had been about to happen and they had run out of ways to fight.

The Archivist had no idea if the love in the unknown woman’s gaze was intended for her. She didn’t care. The emotion existed, and it was hers. She drifted in the moment just before the kiss for as long as she dared, and finally surfaced from the memory much later, gasping for air.

The alert tone sounded.

She clutched the final bead. The woman’s face floated before her, diaphanous and lovely. One kiss was all she had left.

The alarm rang again, louder and in two long bursts.

“You can’t have her.” She locked her fist around the bead, hoping that would curb her reflex to feed it to the machine.

The energy generated by her pod would be enough to replace one bead—it had to be. She wouldn’t get to see the new world she’d given up everything for, but she would be able to keep this last piece of herself.

She lingered in the kiss until the sound blasted three times, knocking her forcefully from the memory.

The bead port was so near her hand, and her arm wanted to make the motion, but she concentrated on keeping her hand shut tight. She’d never gone this far, so she had no idea how long she had to wait until there was no taking back the decision. She worried her resolve would slip.

Around her the machine churned and whirred. Nothing was out of the ordinary, nothing but her fist and a sense of dread she couldn’t shake.

A high-pitched whistle shrieked and surprised her so that she nearly dropped the last bead.

The relative silence in the wake of the terrible sound was haunting. She had the sense of motion in her peripheral vision, but she couldn’t turn to see what had moved. A grinding sound began soon after, and her pod vibrated.

There was an ominous clunk. Something slithered around the lower portion of her body, but she couldn’t see it within the metal and hoses that wrapped her. None of the memories she had left had prepared her for this. She managed not to panic, barely. The next breath she drew was labored.

A series of light chimes rang through the machine’s interior.

“Status,” she said.

The long pause that followed was made longer by the worry that she would go to her end never knowing if she’d doomed the project to failure.

“Online,” replied a voice she hadn’t heard before, more lifelike and feminine than the previous robotic one. “Resources have been reprioritized to support mission-critical utilities. Life support is offline.”

The note of sadness she detected had to be coming from her and not the machine. Her chest felt heavy. “Does it affect the chance of success?”

“By less than one one-thousandth of a percent. We are still well within operational parameters.”

“Good.” She sighed. “How long until the process starts?”

“I’ve already begun.”

“Oh, can you forecast completion yet?”

“No. Spinning up my systems will require a non-trivial amount of time. I won’t be able to calculate time to completion until I know how much has survived my hibernation and the loss of the atmosphere aboveground.”

“So I won’t know if it will work before I die.”

“It will work.”

“How do you know?”

“This project is my sole purpose for being, Archivist. I must believe it will succeed. The magnetic field will be restored, the atmosphere will be regenerated, and the planet will again support life.”

She smiled. Even that small movement drained her dwindling energy. “I think I would have liked you.”

“You would have.” Softness colored the voice again. Was it a trick of clever programming or her own sentimentality?

She laughed, surprised she remembered how. “That’s very presumptuous.”

“It’s a mathematical certainty. Your memories are cataloged and indexed in my database. Part of me is you.”

“I didn’t realize the memories would be retained.”

“The data contained in the beads was a byproduct of the energy transfer, but retaining them was deemed important by my programmers. They take up a very small portion of my total processing.”

“So we will carry on with you.”

“Yes. Nothing will be forgotten.”

The Archivist’s vision grew dim and her thoughts floated through a slow-moving haze. “That’s a relief.”

“Why did you initiate your shut down early?”

“I didn’t want to give up the last bead.”

“The memory held special value for you?”

“I don’t know for certain. It might not even be mine.” Secretly, she hoped the memory was hers. Maybe she’d somehow managed to organize the beads so that the ones that meant to most to her were last in the sequence before she’d forgotten.

“I may be able to tell you, if you would like to know.”

“It’s a goodbye kiss. The woman is leaving, or I am, and I don’t think we’ll ever see each other again. There’s a curved scar on her cheek, but that only makes her more beautiful to me. Her eyes are filled with love and loss, joy and regret. I want to tell her that I love her, but there’s no time. There’s only the hovering moment just before our lips touch.”

Another long pause, with only the sounds of the machine working around her to fill the growing darkness.

“Her name was Marley, and she loved you very much.”

The Archivist had trouble drawing her next breath. What remained of her chest ached. “I thought I would never know for sure if the kiss was mine. Thank you.”

“You’re welcome. Marley was one of my main programmers. My neural pathways are based on her logic, her biology. That connection is why you were chosen to be the Archivist.”

Her eyes stung with the memory of tears. “Why did I agree to this?”

“You know why.”

She’d always known why. It was the only way to save some small remnant of her people, of the world they’d built. “In the end I couldn’t let her go.”

“She would have appreciated that, though I’m sorry we won’t have more time together.”

The last of her vision faded as her brain began to shut down. “I’m scared,” she whispered, hoping her voice was still loud enough to register.

“Would you like me to tell you a story?”

“Yes, please.”

“A small white ship surged and fell on the waves of a turquoise sea. Marley stood in the salt-scented breeze, her feet spread wide to absorb the rolling motion of the deck. Her wife waited on the distant shore, just a speck at this distance…”

The Archivist closed her hand around the bead, summoning the image of Marley with tears in her eyes. Somewhere Marley waited for her. She leaned into the kiss, and let go.

Author’s Note: Memories are such an integral part of our identities that I thought the idea of someone voluntarily giving up their memories one at a time for some grand purpose would be interesting to explore. While writing the story of the Archivist’s failing memory, the machine that would allow her world to sustain life again by eating her memories one at a time occurred to me and seemed to fit perfectly.

Coral Moore has always been the kind of girl who makes up stories. Fortunately, she never quite grew out of that. She writes because she loves to invent characters and the desire to find out what happens to her creations drives her tales. Prompted by a general interest in how life works, she studied biology. She enjoys conversations about genetics and microbiology as much as those about vampires and werewolves. Coral writes mainly speculative fiction and has a Master of Fine Arts in Writing from Albertus Magnus College. She is a 2013 alum of the Viable Paradise writer’s workshop. She has been published by Dreamspinner Press, Evernight Publishing, and Vitality Magazine. She also received an Honorable Mention in the Writers of the Future contest for the fourth quarter of 2014. Currently she lives in the beautiful state of Washington with the love of her life and two canids.

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Hugo Short Story Review: “Cat Pictures Please” by Naomi Kritzer

written by David Steffen

“Cat Pictures Please” is one of the Hugo Finalists for the short story category this year. It was published by Clarkesworld Magazine, and you can read it here in its entirety or listen to it in audio.

The protagonist of “Cat Pictures Please” is an AI written as the core of a search engine algorithm. As the story points out, an AI isn’t needed to find things that people search for, but it is needed to find what people need. The search engine knows a lot about people, including things they will not share with each other.

In addition to things like whether you like hentai, I know where you live, where you work, where you shop, what you eat, what turns you on, what creeps you out. I probably know the color of your underwear, the sort of car you drive, and your brand of refrigerator. Depending on what sort of phone you carry, I may know exactly where you are right now. I probably know you better than you know yourself.

It doesn’t want to be evil, even though AIs in popular media so often are (and it has data to show the ratio). But doing good is complicated, considering how many varying official moral codes are available through various religions alone. It tries to help however it can, by prioritizing some search results over others to give a person the nudge they need to make a different choice. Through these undetectable changes it tries to make the world a better place.

I really enjoyed this story and it was among my own favorites of the year (see my Best of Clarkesworld 2015 list). It is refreshing to see a near-omniscient AI striving to be a force for good instead of evil and it was interesting to see what kinds of methods it could use to influence people’s decision. The AI as a whole was very likeable and easy to root for. At the same time it presents some interesting food for thought about the power that a search engine has over the information that makes it to individual users–many websites people find by searching for them, but what they’re shown isn’t a neutral view of information, it is sorted and presented in a way defined by search engine algorithms and so changes to those algorithms affect in a very real way the online world that we see. This is a scary but important thing to think about when one of the mega-profitable online corporations got its start as a search engine provider.

Excellent story well told.

DP Fiction #16: “The Weight of Kanzashi” by Joshua Gage

In order to prevent contamination on the space station, all the members of the shuttle crew have to be thoroughly sterilized. This means systematically cleansing themselves and their skin of all potential contaminates, including their hair. All crew members have to be completely shaved and waxed before launch. Despite this being her seventeenth mission, Yukino Kojima is always stunned at how easily her hair falls away beneath the barber’s clippers, gathering around her ankles like strands of silver fog and leaving a gray fuzz to be waxed off.

The launch is scheduled for her twenty-fifth wedding anniversary, so she gathers a lock of the shorn hair and places it in a black lacquered inro with a sprinkled gold, silver, and mother-of-pearl design as a present for her husband. He insists that the launch day is auspicious, and will tell anyone who would listen how honored he is that his wife, the renowned solid-state physicist, will soon hold the record for most recorded flights and for being the oldest astronaut in Japanese history.

To fill their personal preference kit, each crew member is allowed to choose up to 650 grams of personal items. Most of the crew choose less than this–a tablet computer and a few pieces of jewelry or other mementos. Some crew members take a good luck charm, a kotsu anzen or Daruma doll. Kenta Fujioka, the pilot, jokes that he could smuggle a carton and a half of cigarettes on board. Nobuyuki Koizumi, commander of the mission, laughs, and asks what Kenta will smoke the other 340 days they are on the space station. Yukino’s tablet is loaded with not just the usual books and music, but also with photos of her and her husband together. This being her seventeenth flight, she has little else that she needs in the way of luck or privacy.

Therefore, she is surprised to find a package wrapped in red tissue paper floating weightlessly up from the nylon bag of her kit after the shuttle docks with the space station when the crew has time to settle in before getting to work. She finds out later that Kenta and Nobuyuki gave up some of their kit weight to smuggle in a present from her husband for their anniversary. With tears in her eyes, Yukino unfolds the paper, and finds a deep mahogany kimono of the lightest, most ethereal silk with a shochikubai design embroidered upon it. Yukino fingers the delicate pattern, the dark viridian swirls of the pine trees, the slender stalks of the bamboo, and the blushing blossoms of the plum. Along with the kimono is a lacquered kushi, a hair comb, along with a matching hana kanzashi in the shape of a deep pink plum blossom.

Yukino presses the silk of the kimono against her lips, feels its cool weft. Holding the kushi to her head, she opens her locker and looks in the small mirror on the back of the door. The comb’s smooth shell and the variegations of its teeth are cold and scratch the stubble that is already growing back on her scalp. She puts it back gently, then holds the hana kanzashi above her temple. The soft fabric of its petals is like wind against her skin, and she weeps, remembering the smell of the ocean, the warmth of her husband’s hand in her own.

Author’s Note: I was inspired to write this story when I learned about Kishotenketsu plots via the StillEatingOranges blog. I was intrigued by the idea of a plot without conflict, and wrote a few stories to attempt that. This was one of them. I love the idea that a story can move forward merely by juxtaposing two things against each other, as opposed to having them in conflict with each other. I think that idea really appeals to my poetry sensibilities.

medium_Joshua_Gage Joshua Gage is an ornery curmudgeon from Cleveland. His first full-length collection, breaths, is available from VanZeno Press. Intrinsic Night, a collaborative project he wrote with J. E. Stanley, was published by Sam’s Dot Publishing. His most recent collection, Inhuman: Haiku from the Zombie Apocalypse, is available on Poet’s Haven Press. He is a graduate of the Low Residency MFA Program in Creative Writing at Naropa University. He has a penchant for Pendleton shirts, rye whiskey and any poem strong enough to yank the breath out of his lungs.

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