Review Summaries

• The story is valued for presenting its strange premise with restraint, as an intimate family narrative rather than an elaborate explanation. Its blend of speculative imagination and nostalgia gives the short work a lingering force.

Reviews

• 熊が火と見つける

  私がSFマガジンで邦訳されたものを読んで以来、ずっと気になっていたテッド・ビッスンの短編集の原作になります。 私がこれを購入しようとしたのは、無論、表題である『熊が火を見つける』の原作で楽しみたいと思ったからですが、それ以上にもういまでは邦訳ではSFマガジンのバックナンバーでしか見かけられない、ジョージに接したからでした。 丘の上にあるステキな家に住む男と女に初の子どもが授かりました。 ごく普通の家庭で、ごく普通に生まれた子どもにはすこし変わったところがありました。 彼には翼がはえていたのです。 この子どもの翼に悩み、苦しむ夫の姿には個性とはなにか？偏見とは何かを考えさせられるでしょう。 ですが最後にはハッピーエンドで迎えるなんとも優しいSFです。 英語の練習にもきっと役立ちます。どうか読んでみてください。 SFはメカだけではないことを、あなた方は見つけるでしょう。

• Imaginative and heartfelt

  Highly imaginative storytelling, no word wasted, simple powerful dialogue when needed

• Great writer

  This guy is full of imagination. One story where bears start using fire, England drifts across the Atlantic and crashes into New York. Crazy, great stuff.

• Bears are usually a good idea

  'Bears Discover Fire' is an unusually interesting SF short. I can't remember a D___ thing about the other stories. TWENTY.

• Prepare to enjoy! (Assuming you like short stories and don't hate science fiction)

  I like short stories. Especially, I like the classical form that ends with a meaning or outcome we didn't see coming, usually a kind of revelation. And I like science fiction: When it works, we're carried along in a fun but out-of-normality experience, seeing mundane reality in a different light. Again, a kind of revelation. This collection does those things pretty successfully, although a couple of the stories left me feeling like I must have missed something. I'll have to reread and/or think more about them. But I might not get to it, because the stories didn't lay quite such a strong claim on my attention that I feel challenged to figure them out. I'm kind of on the cusp. That said, these stories are really something. They're not on the level of, say, a John Updike collection of stories, but they do stay with you. And "They're Made out of Meat," short-short though it is, is worth buying the book just for itself!

• I can't believe I've waited this long to read Terry ...

  I can't believe I've waited this long to read Terry Bisson. A truly unique voice. The stories hover tantalizingly between reality and fantasy, never allowing the reader to settle down in either world. Mesmerizing.

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