Wireless
Charles Stross
Language: English
Pages: 368
ISBN: 0441017193
Format: PDF / Kindle (mobi) / ePub
It has been said that the natural state of science fiction is the short story. If that is so, you won't find a better exploration of that state than Charles Stross's new collection. Centred around an original and previously unpublished novella, 'Palimpsest', WIRELESS is a showcase of some of the best short SF of the 21st century. With an introduction from the author and containing hitherto uncollected works such as 'Missile Gap', 'Trunk and Disorderly' and 'Rogue Farm', and some gems previously available only in small press publications, such as 'A Colder War' and 'Antibodies', WIRELESS will illustrate perfectly why award-winning editor and anthologist, Gardner Dozois, once declared: 'Where Charles Stross goes today, the rest of science fiction will follow tomorrow.
new construction sites up and down the coast. When he is home they frequently argue into the small hours, picking at the scabs on their relationship with the sullen pinch-faced resentment of a couple fifty years gone in despair at the wrongness of their shared direction. So she escapes by visiting John and tells herself that she’s doing it to keep his spirits up as he learns to use his prostheses. “You shouldn’t blame yourself,” he tells her one afternoon when he notices her staring. “If you
structural-engineering assignments relating to nuclear installations in the Ukraine and Azerbaijan. This is the first time that any Dresden Agreement party openly demonstrated ownership of this technology: in this instance, the conclusion we are intended to draw is that the sixty-seventh Guard Engineering Brigade operates four units. Given existing figures for the Soviet ORBAT, we can then extrapolate a total task strength of 288 servitors, if this unit is representative. VIDEO CLIP: Five
superannuation files brought up to date, as a matter of some urgency.” Renfield sighs. “So someone had an accident with a shredder again. And no photocopies?” She looks at me sharply for a moment. “Well, I suppose that’s typical. We’re just another of those low-priority outposts nobody gives a damn about. I suppose I should be grateful they sent someone to look into it . . .” She takes a sip of tea. “We’ve got fourteen short-stay patients right now, Mr. How ard. Of those, I think the prognosis
the list. “It’s a’ just as bad whauriver ye go. At least here ye can still get pork scratchings.” “Aye, weel.” Tam raised his glass, just as a stranger appeared in the doorway. “An’ then there’s some that dinnae feel the cauld.” Davy glanced round to follow the direction of his gaze. The stranger was oddly attired in a lightweight suit and tie, as if he’d stepped out of the middle of the previous century, although his neat goatee and the two small brass horns implanted on his forehead were more
in every hundred stars had an Earth-like planet, this single structure could support the population of our entire home galaxy. As for the mass—this structure is as massive as fifty thousand suns. It is, quite bluntly, impossible: as-yet-unknown physical forces must be at work to keep it from rapidly collapsing in on itself and creating a black hole. The repulsive force, whatever it is, is strong enough to hold the weight of fifty thousand suns: think about that for a moment, gentlemen.” At that