An absolute treasure if you’re even remotely interested in science fiction. The stated objective of the book is diversity, and it does justice to it on many fronts – non-English writings, the setting in terms of geography, gender, sub-genres – dystopian, alien encounters, space operas, post-apocalypse, and even satire. 105 stories spanning 1160 pages, this book definitely needs to be on your shelf!
Imagine AI as a phenomenon with a singular memory that traces its origins to its current state – Speak is almost that. Through various, very interesting narrators across time – from Mary Bradford, who is making her way across the ocean to Massachusetts in the 17th century to Alan Turing to Stephen Chinn, tech whizkid and the inventor of the babybot, and a few more – we follow the evolution of thoughts which continue to reside inside the AI. The narrative may not throw light on causality, but is poignant and ironic because it conveys what it means to be human through an AI and the flawed humans who worked on it.
Greg Egan I have always been amazed at Neal Stephenson for being able to write Snowcrash and The Diamond Age in 1992 and 1995 respectively. I am now equally amazed that Greg Egan wrote this in 1995. In fact, even more, because while the first two books were novels and dealt with a smaller number […]
‘1984’ is a subject that has appeared in many conversations, no, not Indira Gandhi’s assassination, George Orwell’s book. And every time it did, I have smiled politely and pleaded ignorance except for ‘Big Brother’, nothing to do with Shilpa Shetty’s adventures or Sunny Deol’s movie, in spite of my Bollywood fixation. I read the book […]
Isaac Asimov Forget science fiction, if you are the kind who is affected by story telling and the imagination involved therein, this is a must-read. Its amazing that even after half a century has passed, and humanity has advanced quite a bit, Asimov’s work, even in terms of human relationships, raises questions we haven’t even […]