The Caretaker by Ken Liu (Science Fiction)
I understand the aesthetics of its design, the efficient, functional skeleton softened by touches of cuteness and whimsy. Peggy and I once saw a show about caretaker robots for the elderly in Japan, and the show explained how the robots’ kawaii features were intended to entice old people into becoming emotionally invested in and attached to the lifeless algorithm-driven machines.
Miss Nobody Never Was by James Patrick Kelly (Science Fiction)
Except this couldn’t be Adele, because this girl was twenty-something and my ex was getting invites from AARP. I could tell she was young from the shoulders, which had never borne the weight of overdue bills or a curdled marriage.
Herman Melville: Space Opera Virtuoso by John Kessel (Science Fiction)
It was shortly after this period, in February 1938, that Astounding Science Fiction published the first installment of Melville’s immense five-part serial, Starry Deeps, or the Wail. This cosmos-encompassing novel, which I have shown in my book Plumbers of the Future to be the first real science fiction epic, met with mixed reactions at the time.
Laws of Survival by Nancy Kress (Science Fiction)
You could count on dogs for your kids. Almost, and for the first time, I could see the point of the Domes. The aliens found humans dangerous or repulsive or uncaring or whatever, but dogs...
What’s Up Tiger Lily? by Paul Di Filippo (Science Fiction)
In itself, this transformation of his newspaper boded no ill. Such things happened millions of times daily around the globe, thanks to proteopape. And since Bash himself was the much-lauded, much-rewarded inventor of proteopape, he was positively the last person in the world to be astounded by the medium’s capacity for change.
Gilgamesh in the Outback by Robert Silverberg (Fantasy)
He narrowed his eyes and stared into the distance, searching for this day’s prey. His bow of several fine woods, the bow that no man but he was strong enough to draw–no man but he and Enkidu his beloved thrice-lost friend–hung loosely from his hand. His body was poised and ready. Come now, you beasts! Come and be slain! It is Gilgamesh, king of Uruk, who would make his sport with you this day!
Shoppers by James Patrick Kelly (Science Fiction)
Evergreen is a vision of white teeth, dark polyskin and post-retro body design. It is happy to see them, or at least as happy as a bot can get.
The MSG Golem by Ken Liu (Science Fiction)
"Rebecca went on shaping the mud. She was not a great sculptor, but since God gave her dispensation to be “rough” and liberal in her interpretation, she finished quickly. “What do You think?” Rebecca asked. “It’s very modern,” God said, diplomatically.
In the Temple of Celestial Pleasures by Adam-Troy Castro (Horror)
The gate was an obscene bas-relief in which hundreds of miniature human forms coupled in combinations of two or three, or four, no two positions alike, all possible sexual combinations represented. It was the most intricate work of art Jin had ever seen with his own eyes, and it moved him not at all.
Under the Lunchbox Tree by John Kessel (Science Fiction)
Along the path she found a lunchbox tree. The boxes nearest the trunk were small and green, but the ones farthest out and high up, on the big limbs, were square, white, and ripe. Mira leaped up a couple of meters or more and managed to snatch one.
Little Animals by Nancy Kress (Science Fiction)
For decades, science has known that the material brain operates at a quantum level. For over a century, science has known that quantum equations run independent of time. Backward, forward, it makes no difference.
Everywhere is Now by Paul Di Filippo (Science Fiction)
In the middle of the circle, a foot or two above the grassy curb-girdled plot right where the Harkleys had planted a rosebush, someone had cut a large hole in the sky.
The Journal by Ken Liu (Science Fiction)
The letters on the page wriggled like the worms her husband strung on hooks the one time he took her fishing. Every time she tried to focus on a letter, it stretched, twisted, and rolled into a meaningless black squiggle.
(Now+n, Now-n) by Robert Silverberg (Science Fiction)
There was a mingling of traits in her that I found instantly irresistible: she seemed both shy and steel-strong, passionate and vulnerable, confident and ill at ease.