Today I'm reviewing more 1985 science fiction short stories as they appear in the anthology The Year's Best Science Fiction, Third Annual Collection, as selected by editor Gardner Dozois. These anthologies are humungous books, in contrast to the Wollheim anthologies I had been reviewing...and the Asimov ones covering earlier years. Although I think the stories are worthy, by and large, a few of them really don't fit the genre of science fiction. It's kind of like the old Rod Serling TV series The Twilight Zone, which mixed science fiction tales with psychological dramas and alternative history stories. But that series didn't make the claim of being science fiction, and this anthology series does. Nevertheless, I'm plodding through it all, with my following reactions to the next four stories in this volume...
SIDE EFFECTS by Walter Jon Williams
This story is a brutally satirical indictment of the pharmaceutical industry and how money, not health, is the bottom line as a morally compromised physician tries to game the system by taking money from drug companies to test their products on financially vulnerable patients, sometimes simultaneously testing two different drugs on the same person. A New York City secretary and a grave robber have their stories here, too...and they all come to a crescendo at the end...
THE ONLY NEAT THING TO DO by James Tiptree, Jr.
In a star-faring future where humans are settling across the galaxy, there is one dark zone of space where a ship has recently disappeared. A precocious, spunky little girl takes her ship into that zone and gets more than she expected when a new, intelligent, and ostensibly benevolent life form establishes mental contact with her. There's the innocent way she thinks and speaks, and there are the very serious consequences of the predicament she finds herself in with her newfound alien friend. A pretty neat story...
DINNER IN AUDOGHAST by Bruce Sterling
Not in the least bit a science fiction story, Sterling nevertheless wrote a gem of a tale here about the real very prosperous and powerful western African city of a thousand years ago, expressing in detail its government, social structure (slavery runs rampant), the international situation, trade, architecture, cuisine, and fashion...in the framework of a rather brief, interesting story involving a poor, itinerant prophet whose words disturb those eating a sumptuous, extravagant meal. I get it: Gardner Dozois likes Bruce Sterling, but this is historical fiction, not sci-fi...
UNDER SIEGE by George R.R. Martin
This is a deftly told time travel story, where those in a bleak future suffering the consequences of nuclear holocaust between the Soviet Union and the West send the consciousness of one of their own specialized, talented mutants into the mind of a Finnish officer back in 1808 as he is on the Swedish side in a war against Russia. The narrative toggles back and forth between the horrible future and crucial moments in that past conflict concerning the unnecessary surrender to the Russians of a Swedish fortress, when certain decisions made differently could alter the course of history and steer it away from there ever being a Russian Revolution. Years before he began work on his A Song of Ice and Fire ("Game of Thrones") saga, I could see what a compelling, incisive writer Martin was and how he made his characters come to life as few can. I thought the ending was pretty cool, too...
Next week: more reviews of 1985 sci-fi short stories...
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