This week I began another year of short science fiction as I move on to another book in the Gardner Dozois anthology series The Year's Best Science Fiction, this one titled Fourteenth Annual Collection and covering 1996. His first selection for this volume, as is his apparent preference, is yet another long novella...
IMMERSION by Gregory Bensford
In the not-so-distant future, a scientist has published an academic paper putting him at odds with a European crime organization...he now seems to be a hit target of theirs. Going with his girlfriend to Africa for relief and escape, they find themselves caught up in "immersion", in which their essences are temporarily installed in the bodies of certain selected and modified chimpanzees. Enjoying the sometimes disturbing experiences, they repeat the immersions until one day they find themselves stuck in the chimps, unable to return. This story may sound too familiar when considering the Matrix movie that came out only three years later. But consciousness transfer to other places has long been a recurring feature in science fiction...it figured prominently in Clifford Simak's City novel nearly fifty years earlier. This story by Bensford was written clearly and easy to follow, building up the kind of suspense that I expect from good sci-fi tales...
Next week I'll see if I can't come up with more, hopefully shorter, stories from 1996...
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