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A review by realalexmartin
Stories of Your Life and Others by Ted Chiang
challenging
dark
informative
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.0
For the most part, this was a disappointing read. I've heard incredible things about both Chiang as an author and this particular collection of short stories, but truthfully, I found many of them weak in character and with plots bordering on contrived. I did consider going through each of the stories one-by-one, but really, many of my issues were the same across the board, bar maybe two of the stories. These stories were "Tower of Babylon" and "Story of Your Life". These two stories were incredibly different yet they both achieved something that I think is necessary for short story writing, and that's understanding and successfully executing the scope of the story.
The short story only has a limited amount of pages it can use, so it needs to be in control of its scope to account for radical variables that can undo the logic of a story world as it interacts with the logic of the reader. This is especially true for speculative fiction. In novels, the author has the space and time to 'settle' the reader, ensure they are immersed into the world - this new world - using every new and old generic indicator. This is so much harder to do when you are ultimately only writing 40-60 pages within these worlds, which is why it's impressive when it's done successfully.
Admittedly, "Tower" had a bit of a head start when it comes to its world building and control of its scope as it was based on the original biblical myth. In the adaptation process, however, Chiang hyper-focuses on one persons perspective and outlines their journey and goalposts from the beginning. This allows the reader to build the necessary narrative expectations that is needed for Chiang to actively immerse the reader as they read. I thought the exploration of myth and the literal interpretations of the original mythological world to be fascinating, and the story never felt like it dragged, nor did it feel cut short. Again, this was a highlight for me.
For "Story", Chiang shows quite a bit of restraint in his scope, opting to limit the reader to a first-person perspective. This allows for the story to remain tight, focusing less on how the plot is affecting the world at large and more on how it affects the main character. With this, Chiang creates an incredibly strong emotional-backbone for the story that perfectly harmonises with the more technical and scientific aspects of the plot. I came out of this story with a profound understanding of how communication and interpretation interact with each other, something that I feel would've been lost if the story only focused on the arrival and extended stay of the Aliens. This story was my favourite of the bunch.
As for the rest of the stories, I found many of their premises or characters to be lacking. "Understand" started off okay, but devolved into what I can only describe as a 'battle of the nerds', with a plot that just spiralled out of control and a highly disappointing ending. "The Evolution of Human Science" was, quite frankly, a waste of paper. It was a three-page preamble to nothing, highly disappointing. "Hell is the Absence of God" was okay, but the premise felt a bit too contrived for my personal taste. "Liking What You See" was probably the worst of the bunch. It felt like a bad Black Mirror episode (I don't like Black Mirror) devised by a reddit user who was scorned one too many times by a woman wearing make-up. It completely undercuts its own premise by it simply not understanding that every person has a completely different understanding of what baseline beauty is. Its scope, which seems to be 'beauty' in general, is too large, meaning it can be easily contradicted by the readers own logic and interpretation of the issue. This is what I meant by large and uncontrolled scopes inviting "radical variables"; there's too much space for contradictory questioning by the reader to ensure clarity of meaning by the author. This story frustrated me on so many levels, and it did not help that it overstays its welcome by about 25 pages and the plot fizzles out to nothing. Rather than finishing the collection off with a bang, Chiang finishes it with a cloud of dirt hanging lowly in the air.
I've separated out two final stories: "Division by Zero" and "Seventy-Two Letters". Both of these had some technical merit I appreciated, the writing was mostly clean and their premises were mostly interesting. My issues largely stemmed from the fact that they were both buckling under the weight of their own technical and scientific exposition. "Division" set itself the impossible task of explaining the philosophy of mathematics to a general readership while also using it to actively tell its story. "Letters" spent pages and pages setting up its particular branch of nomenclature, with one scene in particular involving two characters explaining (at an academic-level) the intricacies of this (fantastical) version of nomenclature. My problem does not stem from me not understanding what they were saying - my problem is that the scope of both of these 'fields of study' were far larger than the story could handle, thus, it was far too large for the reader to be expected to handle. Both of these attempts at exposition served to further the plot, but failed to further the story.
I wanted to love this book, I really did, but I couldn't help but feel let down. I am no less curious to see what Chiang does when he writes in a longer form. Maybe his skills and imagination flourishes when he gives himself more pages to 'settle' us into.
The short story only has a limited amount of pages it can use, so it needs to be in control of its scope to account for radical variables that can undo the logic of a story world as it interacts with the logic of the reader. This is especially true for speculative fiction. In novels, the author has the space and time to 'settle' the reader, ensure they are immersed into the world - this new world - using every new and old generic indicator. This is so much harder to do when you are ultimately only writing 40-60 pages within these worlds, which is why it's impressive when it's done successfully.
Admittedly, "Tower" had a bit of a head start when it comes to its world building and control of its scope as it was based on the original biblical myth. In the adaptation process, however, Chiang hyper-focuses on one persons perspective and outlines their journey and goalposts from the beginning. This allows the reader to build the necessary narrative expectations that is needed for Chiang to actively immerse the reader as they read. I thought the exploration of myth and the literal interpretations of the original mythological world to be fascinating, and the story never felt like it dragged, nor did it feel cut short. Again, this was a highlight for me.
For "Story", Chiang shows quite a bit of restraint in his scope, opting to limit the reader to a first-person perspective. This allows for the story to remain tight, focusing less on how the plot is affecting the world at large and more on how it affects the main character. With this, Chiang creates an incredibly strong emotional-backbone for the story that perfectly harmonises with the more technical and scientific aspects of the plot. I came out of this story with a profound understanding of how communication and interpretation interact with each other, something that I feel would've been lost if the story only focused on the arrival and extended stay of the Aliens. This story was my favourite of the bunch.
As for the rest of the stories, I found many of their premises or characters to be lacking. "Understand" started off okay, but devolved into what I can only describe as a 'battle of the nerds', with a plot that just spiralled out of control and a highly disappointing ending. "The Evolution of Human Science" was, quite frankly, a waste of paper. It was a three-page preamble to nothing, highly disappointing. "Hell is the Absence of God" was okay, but the premise felt a bit too contrived for my personal taste. "Liking What You See" was probably the worst of the bunch. It felt like a bad Black Mirror episode (I don't like Black Mirror) devised by a reddit user who was scorned one too many times by a woman wearing make-up. It completely undercuts its own premise by it simply not understanding that every person has a completely different understanding of what baseline beauty is. Its scope, which seems to be 'beauty' in general, is too large, meaning it can be easily contradicted by the readers own logic and interpretation of the issue. This is what I meant by large and uncontrolled scopes inviting "radical variables"; there's too much space for contradictory questioning by the reader to ensure clarity of meaning by the author. This story frustrated me on so many levels, and it did not help that it overstays its welcome by about 25 pages and the plot fizzles out to nothing. Rather than finishing the collection off with a bang, Chiang finishes it with a cloud of dirt hanging lowly in the air.
I've separated out two final stories: "Division by Zero" and "Seventy-Two Letters". Both of these had some technical merit I appreciated, the writing was mostly clean and their premises were mostly interesting. My issues largely stemmed from the fact that they were both buckling under the weight of their own technical and scientific exposition. "Division" set itself the impossible task of explaining the philosophy of mathematics to a general readership while also using it to actively tell its story. "Letters" spent pages and pages setting up its particular branch of nomenclature, with one scene in particular involving two characters explaining (at an academic-level) the intricacies of this (fantastical) version of nomenclature. My problem does not stem from me not understanding what they were saying - my problem is that the scope of both of these 'fields of study' were far larger than the story could handle, thus, it was far too large for the reader to be expected to handle. Both of these attempts at exposition served to further the plot, but failed to further the story.
I wanted to love this book, I really did, but I couldn't help but feel let down. I am no less curious to see what Chiang does when he writes in a longer form. Maybe his skills and imagination flourishes when he gives himself more pages to 'settle' us into.