Entanglements: Tomorrow's Lovers, Families, and Friends. edited by Sheila Williams. 2020

ENTANGLEMENTS: TOMORROW’S LOVERS, FAMILIES, AND FRIENDS

RATED 70% POSITIVE. STORY SCORE: 3.4 OF 5

10 STORIES : 0 GREAT / 5 GOOD / 4 AVERAGE / 1 POOR / 0 DNF

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This really isn’t a bad anthology although it is one of the very few books to not contain a single Great story. There are some good ideas and some competent writing. Which is exactly why I’m incredibly frustrated. Every one of these story had potential and none of them lived up to it.

Modern Science Fiction has intentionally leaned towards characterization and prose style, with the scientific speculation taking a back seat. This is especially true when compared to the great SF writers of past generations who overwhelmed mediocre writing ability with legendary thinking ability. Perhaps, this is why many of the authors seemed to be unwilling to wrestle with their own premises.

“Entanglements” stated purpose is to examine the relationships of the future in many permutations, but many of these stories seemed very stuck into the political and social biases of today. There is very little here that would challenge the received wisdom of the Present.

Examples of underused ideas are:

• the Coven of shared motherhood from “Sparklybits” with the class divide between the power-Mom’s and the stay-at-home Mom

• the horror of “Your Boyfriend Experience” and the way sextoy corporation could use robots to infiltrate your relationships

• Service animal robots and their interlinked role in people’s lives - “A Little Wisdom”

• “Don’t Mind Me”’s Minder that allows parents to control was their children see and hear. * this one particularly bothered me, because Palmer chose to ignore the complicated social, economic, and political battle-of-ideas that would surround this technology. Instead, the focus is on bland characters and a lack of nuance or interest. I really want to feed this story into an AI that has been trained on the writing of Isaac Asimov.

It would be wrong of my to not mention the nice biography of and interview with Nancy Kress in this volume. Although, I’m not sure why it was there.

The artwork by Tatiana Plakhova is exquisite. Easily the best thing about the book.

ENTANGLEMENTS IS RATED 70% POSITIVE

10 STORIES : 0 GREAT / 5 GOOD / 4 AVERAGE / 1 POOR / 0 DNF

How do I arrive at a rating?

1. Invisible People • novelette by Nancy Kress

   Good. Lesser Kress, but that still makes this good, smart, and human. A family’s adopted daughter is shown to have been trafficked and experimented on, resulting is strange behavior that may be the future of humanity.

2. Echo the Echo • short story by Rich Larson

   Good. When I read Rich Larson, I think “That is exactly what the future is going to be like.” This is a story of recorded memories of the elderly and a one-night-stand inspired by AI dating app.

3. Sparklybits • novelette by Nick Wolven

   Good. A group of powerful women share motherhood of a young boy who has started a relationship with a escaped AI.

4. A Little Wisdom • short story by Mary Robinette Kowal

   Average. A good idea in an eDawg that cares for an elderly woman with Parkinson’s. But the execution gets muddled with tornadoes, office politics, and a bit of heavy-handed moralizing.

5. Your Boyfriend Experience • novelette by James Patrick Kelly

   Average. Another interesting concept without an appropriate amount of thoughtfulness. A same-sex couple tests out sexbot prototype on a dinner date.

6. Meditation • short story by Cadwell Turnbull

   Good. Simple story of a AI assisted grieving.

7. The Nation of the Sick • short story by Sam J. Miller

   Good. On the date that a man is trying to visit his drug-addicted brother, he meets a woman who will transform the world with her products and ideology.

8. Don't Mind Me • short story by Suzanne Palmer

   Average. Great idea - school children have devices that prevent them from hearing or seeing anything at school that goes against their parents’ beliefs. Lacking in nuance, but also in story and characters. So much wasted potential here.

9. The Monogamy Hormone • short story by Annalee Newitz

   Poor. Propaganda for Polyamory with very minimal Sci-Fi elements.

10. The Monk of Lingyin Temple • novelette by Xia Jia

    Average. A Buddhist monastery is also a science laboratory which has invented a way for people to truly experience each other’s suffering. I feel like there were elements of Buddhism imbedded here, but not fulling explained.

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