Posts Tagged ‘Pluto’
Miniatures by John Scalzi
Posted on: December 23, 2016
Miniatures: The Very Short Fiction of John Scalzi
published Dec 31, 2016
where I got it: received review copy from the publisher (Thanks Subterranean!)
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Wanna know the balm for doorstopper books and series that don’t have an end in sight? Super short stories that are super satisfying. Stories that get in, make a point and maybe make you laugh, and get out. It’s like those delicious bite-sized Milky Way mini candy bars that (the best) people give out at Halloween.
Miniatures is John Scalzi’s new collection of very short stories. Inspired by everything from travel boredom, the bureaucracy of superhero management, overly intelligent yogurt, a very bitter Pluto, the design limitations of twitter, people being idiots, how to be polite to aliens, having some fun at Wil Wheaton’s expense and more, these mostly humorous and mostly ultra short stories are the bite sized milky way minis of spec fiction. Covering 25 years of Scalzi’s long career in journalism, review writing, and fiction, this collection is a must-have for Scalzi fans. Oh, you’re not familiar with John Scalzi, but you like to laugh? You’ll like this too!
A handful of the stories deal with interactions with aliens, but these aren’t “first contact” stories, not by a long shot. These are millionth contact stories, when interactions with aliens have become as commonplace as seeing a stick-figure family sticker on the back of a mini-van. Two of my favorite stories in the collection are of this variety – “New Directives for Employee-Manxtse Interactions” and “Important Holidays on Gronghu”. Both are presented as company wide memos, and both of these companies are about to be holding massive open interviews. I’ve read “Important Holidays on Gronghu” probably four times and it gets funnier every time.
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