Excellent worldbuilding as always, Claudia. I enjoy these standalone pieces a lot. Great detail within a short story. Impressive that this came from a dream.
The part where the main character eats the soup with tears streaming down her face stays with me. Also the part where she saved water. The inequality depicted in the story feels very present day, or could be many different times, past, present, or future.
This is a good story, dystopian sci-fi based on current reality. Tech used to create fear and control. I noticed the absence of animals in the story. Just a thought; a bird like a raven or a crow might be a nice touch, linking the mythlogical past long forgotten to an antiseptic future devoid of any real life.
Really enjoyed the pace, tension and world building in this short story. The fi- part works even outside the sci- part, and that's the mark of good fiction.
Many congratulations, Claudia. This short story is a very well-deserved Lunar Awards winner. When reading it, I kept thinking of current and historical examples of human beings separated by security gates, checkpoints, paperwork and bureaucracy because of political, economic and religious ideologies. I'm sure there will be many more in the future. Humanity will only survive the difficult times ahead through acts of community and generosity.
I totally agree that it's about who controls the technology and the design and how it's implemented and so on. My take on all this is that the way to solve all the world's problems is to simply replace the evil decision makers with benevolent decision makers - then they make good decisions and we have a utopia (that's the premise of my parallel world Katrina series). In other words the technology is 'neutral', it's the personality and intentions of the users/controllers that determines whether it's used for good or ill, and what effects it has on people, the environment and so on. It's kind of obvious when one thinks about it.
In my setting, all the ETIs have long-since understood and acted upon this, so now they have a 'prime directive' which is monitoring all pre-spacefaring civs and intervening at an early stage to prevent them becoming a threat. The Star Trek idea of not intervening is a really, really stupid thing to do. Like 'oh look, that evil fascist species has just developed warp drive and black hole bombs right under our observation satellites and now we have an interstellar war going on in which trillions are going to suffer and die - how silly of us; well, we'll not be making that mistake again, eh!' In the early years of life in the galaxy there weren't enough lifeforms to intervene, so you do get evil empires and an ancient war, but then the good guys win (we'd know by now if they hadn't), then you have a lasting peace because of the interventionist policy (that's the variable they missed out on the Drake equation, of course).
Anyhow, morning ramble over (I always have at least three coffees). Have a good day!
Adding my comment now that I can ;)
Excellent worldbuilding as always, Claudia. I enjoy these standalone pieces a lot. Great detail within a short story. Impressive that this came from a dream.
This is a really great vignette! Also, it makes you want to know what happens next (and before, for that matter).
One of the best aspects for me was the fast-paced narrative. That really worked!
The part where the main character eats the soup with tears streaming down her face stays with me. Also the part where she saved water. The inequality depicted in the story feels very present day, or could be many different times, past, present, or future.
This is a good story, dystopian sci-fi based on current reality. Tech used to create fear and control. I noticed the absence of animals in the story. Just a thought; a bird like a raven or a crow might be a nice touch, linking the mythlogical past long forgotten to an antiseptic future devoid of any real life.
Really enjoyed the pace, tension and world building in this short story. The fi- part works even outside the sci- part, and that's the mark of good fiction.
This is a fantastic stand alone short story. The tension is so well done. I can't wait to read more!
Many congratulations, Claudia. This short story is a very well-deserved Lunar Awards winner. When reading it, I kept thinking of current and historical examples of human beings separated by security gates, checkpoints, paperwork and bureaucracy because of political, economic and religious ideologies. I'm sure there will be many more in the future. Humanity will only survive the difficult times ahead through acts of community and generosity.
Beautiful descriptions and very realistic. It would not surprise me if this becomes the reality in places like Neom in the future.
I read Tesla City and it somehow reminded me of that Sky Dome 2123 trailer. Nice one, Claudia!
Thoroughly enjoyed this!
"The train hovers over the magnetic tracks..." This is the future I envision, a world connected by fast, clean, safe trains.
I totally agree that it's about who controls the technology and the design and how it's implemented and so on. My take on all this is that the way to solve all the world's problems is to simply replace the evil decision makers with benevolent decision makers - then they make good decisions and we have a utopia (that's the premise of my parallel world Katrina series). In other words the technology is 'neutral', it's the personality and intentions of the users/controllers that determines whether it's used for good or ill, and what effects it has on people, the environment and so on. It's kind of obvious when one thinks about it.
In my setting, all the ETIs have long-since understood and acted upon this, so now they have a 'prime directive' which is monitoring all pre-spacefaring civs and intervening at an early stage to prevent them becoming a threat. The Star Trek idea of not intervening is a really, really stupid thing to do. Like 'oh look, that evil fascist species has just developed warp drive and black hole bombs right under our observation satellites and now we have an interstellar war going on in which trillions are going to suffer and die - how silly of us; well, we'll not be making that mistake again, eh!' In the early years of life in the galaxy there weren't enough lifeforms to intervene, so you do get evil empires and an ancient war, but then the good guys win (we'd know by now if they hadn't), then you have a lasting peace because of the interventionist policy (that's the variable they missed out on the Drake equation, of course).
Anyhow, morning ramble over (I always have at least three coffees). Have a good day!