CBRIII Book 14: Wastelands: Stories of the Apocalypse edited by John Joseph Adams

As I was flipping through the book advertisements at the back of the last book in my CBR, the Brave New Worlds anthology, I found an ad for a book of apocalyptic fiction also edited by Adams. Naturally, I had to check it out. In Brave New Worlds, Adams demonstrated a knack for picking engrossing short stories, and in Wastelands, he didn't disappoint.

There were several stories that I thought stood out above the others. "The People of Sand and Slag" by Paulo Bacigalupi describes a future in which people have been bioengineered to the point of almost immortality. A group of mercenaries come across a dog, a species thought to be extinct, and try to figure out what to do with it. The story was rather moving, and made me wonder, if pain could be eliminated from our lives, would love and compassion go with it?

Another story that I loved was Jerry Oltion's "Judgement Passed." A group of astronauts returns to Earth to discover that the Rapture has occurred without them. They're left to wonder if they're better off in their newly emptied world or if perhaps God will come back for them... but one of them doesn't want to sit around and wait.

Dave Bailey's "The End of the World as We Know It" puts the phrase in a different context - it gives a look at how one specific individual's world comes to an end due to a personal tragedy... that happens during the apocalypse. It's incredibly touching, and I won't deny that it moved me to tears.

The anthology also included several stories I'd already read, like Cory Doctorow's "When Sysadmins Ruled the World," which I hated the first time I read it, and Octavia Butler's "Speech Sounds," which is one of my favorite short stories of all time from my favorite author. And, of course, there were a few stories I didn't really enjoy, like Gene Wolfe's "Mute," which is supposed to benefit from repeat readings, but I had to scour the internet for clues as to the meaning of the story.

It appears that Adams has several other anthologies out there, like one devoted entirely to zombie stories. I'll definitely have to look for that one, and I recommend this one as well as the previous anthology to anyone interested in some wonderful short stories.

Book 24: Cloud Atlas by David Mitchell

SPOILERS here for those who haven't read the book. I'd recommend skipping out after the second paragraph if you want to enjoy the book untainted.

Cloud Atlas is a novel that plays with the ideas of structure and narrative. It is six stories set in different time periods ranging from the 1800s to a postapocalyptic future. Each story begins and is interrupted halfway through by the next story until you reach the penultimate story which is told unbroken. After the finish of the last story, the others resume each after the completion of the previous story. It's rather like climbing a mountain - with each story, you progress higher until you reach the final story; then, as you come down the mountain, you pick up the end of each tale in reverse order that you started them.

The novel begins with the journal of Adam Ewing, an American notary who has sailed to the South Pacific for work and on his trip home finds himself the unlikely savior of a stowaway "savage" Maori. His journal is cutoff mid-sentence by the next story, which is a collection of letters sent from Robert Frobisher, a roguish musician in the 1930's who travels Europe and seduces a prominent composer into taking him on as an amanuensis [yeah, I had to look that up. It's basically a secretarial slave]. From Frobisher's journeys we then travel to California in the 1970s, where Luisa Rey, a journalist at a sleazy gossip rag has stumbled onto a conspiracy at a nuclear power plant. After Rey's story comes the "Ghastly Ordeal of Timothy Cavendish," which tells of how Cavendish, a publisher in London, ends up trapped against his will in a retirement home. The next story, my personal favorite, is an interview with Sonmi-451, a clone from the future corpocracy of Nea So Corpos, in the former region of Korea. From Sonmi's intriguing recollections we then move even further into the future, to what is left of Hawaii, as a "freakbirthed" Valleysman watches the last of humanity fight for survival. Each story represents a different style or genre of writing (for example, Rey's tale is a crime thriller), and Mitchell does a fine job of writing each style.

One of the interesting things about the structure of the novel is that each story (with the exception of the last) is being read or watched by the next. Frobisher finds Ewing's journal and comments on it in his letters; Rey reads Frobisher's letters; Cavendish is sent Rey's story as a manuscript; Sonmi-451 watches a movie version of Cavendish's ordeal; and Zachry (the Valleysman) views Sonmi's interview through a futuristic device that projects a hologram.

There is another way the author connects his stories. He mentions a comet-shaped birthmark that is shared by main protagonists of the story (save for the last - it's not the narrator but another character who bears the mark). The obvious interpretation of the mark here is reincarnation - that it's the same soul traveling through the ages. And just like how there's a sense of progression as you head deeper into the novel (or up the mountain, as I think of it), there's a progression of the soul from one lifetime to another - it evolves. It starts out as Ewing, a very proper man who sees how horribly humans treat one another (races enslaving others, for example) and chooses not to act; to Frobisher, who is driven by his own selfish impulses but strives to create something lasting through his music; to Rey, who sees an impending catastrophe and fights to prevent it; to Cavendish, who fights for his freedom; to Sonmi, who fights for the freedom of others, namely, her fellow clone slaves; and finally, to the character of Meronym, who fights with Zachry to prevent the loss of all humanity has achieved in the face of its most primal, base nature. The soul evolves from idle witness to proactive fighter - in every time period, the same problems are presented (the struggle for power and/or dominance between men, between races, between countries) and as the stories advance, the soul reaches its apex in the unbroken sixth story, and the ramifications are felt as the other stories come to their conclusions.

The more I reflect on the book, the more I find threads between the stories. And I wish that Mitchell would turn the chapter on Sonmi into a full novel; that story in particular is a very well fleshed out world that I would love to explore. The novel has been optioned by the Wachowski brothers (of Matrix fame), and it's interesting to ponder how they would take such a sprawling vision and turn it into a movie. But personally, I'd rather not see it get the Hollywood chop treatment.

Book 18: I Am Legend by Richard Matheson

Robert Neville is the last man on Earth. At least, that's his assumption. A plague has infected the world's population and turned everyone into vampires. Even the dead have returned to life and seek blood. As the last man, Neville is stalked every night by the undead. He has turned his home into a fortress, keeping himself safe behind boarded up windows and rings of garlic. By day, he leaves his home to hunt and kill the infected.

He follows this routine of hunting and hiding, day after day, for several years, until he questions his reasons for wanting to stay alive in a world full of the undead. Finally, he gives himself a purpose for living. He decides to figure out exactly what caused the vampiric infection and how to cure it. Along the way, he meets a woman, Ruth, who appears to also be alive like him. He brings her back to his house and as they talk about their lives before the plague and discuss his theories on the plague, he grows suspicious and begins to wonder if she is infected and simply hasn't changed yet. So he tests her blood and gets his answer, but it is not the one he wanted, and he never could have imagined what she has in store for him.

I've seen "The Omega Man" and "I Am Legend," two of the four different movies based on this novel. While both movies draw from the story, they both contain significant changes to the details of the book, like what causes the changes and how things end. It was interesting to see the differences, but it seems to me that both adaptations ignored the main theme of the story. In Neville's mind, the infected are monsters, deadly creatures who must be destroyed. But to those who are infected but not fully changed, Neville himself is the monster, killing those who were both undead and those who were alive when infected without bothering to determine the difference. He is the monster, and as such must be destroyed, and his deeds will pass into legend (hence the title).

This is the first of Matheson's work that I've read. A lot of his works have been adapted into movies and tv shows: "What Dreams May Come," "Stir of Echoes," "Nightmare at 20,000 Feet" from the Twilight Zone. I can see why his stuff's been optioned again and again - he has some fantastic ideas here. However, the fulfillment of said ideas sometimes falls a little flat. And there were interesting flashbacks that went nowhere - what happened to his daughter, Kathy? How close were he and Ben Cortman? What happened when his wife, Virginia, showed up at his door after he'd buried her? Overall, it's an enjoyable read, and a good addition to my apparently end-of-the-world/dystopian themed CR.

Book 16: One Second After by William R. Forstchen

William R. Forstchen, professor of history at Montreat College, has written many books and articles on military history and technology. In his latest book, he's used his extensive knowledge on the subjects as well as his knowledge of electromagnetic pulses (EMPs) to create a terrifying possible future for our country.

An EMP, according to Wikipedia, is "a burst of electromagnetic radiation that results from an explosion (especially a nuclear explosion) or a suddenly fluctuating magnetic field. The resulting electric and magnetic fields may couple with electrical/electronic systems to produce damaging current and voltage surges." Forstchen believes that EMPs pose a very real threat to the United States - one of our enemies could detonate a large nuclear weapon above the US and the resulting wave could potentially knock out all electrical devices and bring our country to a complete halt, throwing us back into the Dark Ages. We're not talking a minor power outage - these EMPs if powerful enough could do damage that takes months or years to fix.

In the novel, John Matherson, a professor of history at Montreat College in NC (like the author), is preparing for his daughter Jennifer's birthday when they experience a power outage. Only, this isn't like any normal power outage. Days pass and there's no sign of any electricity. Cars have completely stopped working, coming to dead stops in the middle of the streets. People begin to panic, raiding grocery stores and fighting at the pharmacy to get their prescription medications. John, a friend of the local law enforcement and a respected citizen due to his position at the college, his military background, and his vast knowledge of history, drops in to see the mayor and the chief of police. There's been no communication with any other cities, including Asheville, the nearest big town. John has a theory as to what's happening - he believes an EMP has destroyed all the electrical devices in the city, and in other cities as well, judging by the way the town has become cutoff from the outside world.

From there, the town begins to unravel. Martial law is established. Just try to imagine what life is like without electricity - no food can be processed and sold, and the few farms in town cannot sustain a population of 1000s. No medications can be made and distributed, so those who are dependent on insulin or beta blockers die within weeks of their last doses. No phones or computers can connect them to the outside world, so they have no idea what's happening - and there's no hope of help coming, because what they face is occuring in other cities around the country.

For those who survive the disease, hunger, and cold, a new threat looms. Refugees who pass through the town looking for help bring word of a gang called the Posse who have looted and ransacked their way through NC and are headed toward them. This gang has weapons and vehicles, and they burn, ransack, and kill their way through every city, taking all food and anything of value they find and leaving nothing behind. Matherson and the head of security at the college, also a military man, decide there's only one thing to be done. They organize a militia, mostly consisting of scared kids from the college, to stand and fight and protect their town from the Posse.

The book has a foreword by Newt Gingrich and an afterward by Captain Bill Sanders, U.S. Navy. Forstchen clearly believes that by writing this book, he's warning the public of a looming threat that could have devastating effects for our country. The book does its job - it's horrifying to imagine the things that he describes coming true - people being executed in the street for looting; cannibalism running rampant; our country dividing itself as brother fights brother for survival. But... there are no answers to be found in the book. There are no suggestions as to what we can do to protect ourselves from this threat. Even in his afterward, Sanders offers nothing more than the statement that "the solution 'is feasible and well within [our] means and resources to accomplish.'"

The Pollyanna in me likes to think that, should there be a major catastrophic attack on the US, we wouldn't devolve so quickly. But, given the reports of looting and insanity that occurred after the recent earthquakes in Chile, well... I suppose it's not so farfetched. And I did find myself thinking, "Oh my god, I need to stockpile food and water and medicine and I need a gun NOW." But as serious as this threat may be, I'm not 100% sold that it will happen, because even if a country fired nuclear weapons at us, wouldn't our overseas forces do the same to them? Does any country hate us enough to destroy themselves completely in the process? I truly hope we never have to find out.