With Stories of Your Life and Others,his masterful first collection,multiple-award-winning author Ted Chiang deftly blends human emotion and scientific rationalism in eight remarkably diverse stories,all told in his trademark precise and evocative prose. From a soaring Babylonian tower that connects a flat Earth with the firmament above,to a world where angelic visitations are a wondrous and terrifying part of everyday life; from a neural modification that eliminates the appeal of physical beauty,to an alien language that challenges our very perception of time and reality,Chiang's rigorously imagined fantasias invite us to question our understanding of the universe and our place in it.
Publisher: Pan MacmillanISBN: 9781529039436Number of pages: 352Weight: 251 gDimensions: 196 x 130 x 24 mm
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United by a humane intelligence that speaks very directly to the reader,and makes us experience each story with immediacy and Chiang's calm passion.Ted is a national treasure... each of those stories is a goddamned jewel.Meticulously pieced together,utterly thought through,Chiang's stories emerge slowly...but with the perfection of slow-growing crystal.Chiang writes seldom,but his almost unfathomably wonderful stories tick away with the precision of a Swiss watch - and explode in your awareness with shocking,devastating force.He puts the science back in science fiction - brilliantly.(Chiang) confirms that blending science and fine art at this length can produce touching works, tales as intimate as our own blood cells,with the structural strength of just-discovered industrial alloys.Essential. You won't know SF if you don't read Ted Chiang.Chiang is the real deal. His debut collection,Stories of Your Life and Others is one of the finest collections of short fiction I have read in the last decade. These tales possess the imaginative frisson that is a trademark of the best conceptual fiction,but,also bespeak a confident prose style and a willingness to take chances in tone and narrative structure.His stories mirror the process of scientific discovery: complex ideas emerge from the measured,methodical accumulation of information until epiphany strikes....The best science fiction inspires awe for the natural properties of the universe...Mr Chiang's writing manages all of this.Chiang derides lazy thinking,weasels it out of its hiding place,and leaves it cowering.The stories range widely in time,subject and style but are united by a patient but ruthless fascination with the limits of knowledge.Ted Chiang's stories are lean,relentless and incandescent.A science fiction genius...Ted Chiang is a superstar.
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