Sex in the System: Stories of Erotic Futures, Technological Stimulation, and the Sensual Life of Machines Book

Interesting but somewhat uneven collection. "The Book Collector" by Sarah Micklem, a story of a depressed game designer who falls in love with her own creation, was my favorite in the book. The pieces by Elspeth Potter and Lynne Jamneck were also strong. And I was pleasantly surprised to see a (mostly) hetero story by the versatile M. Christian in here, too.

There were some disappointments, though. The longest story, "Pinocchia" by Paul Di Filippo, had some innovative elements but the plot was as hackneyed as any Penthouse Forum letter. And several of the other stories suffered from the erotica vs. everything else problem. I define erotica as a story which has a double purpose: to be a good story, and to be sexually provocative or compelling. When the actual sexual content of a story is marginal, that's no longer erotica -- it's just a regular old short story that mentions sex. In plain terms, if I can't imagine anyone wanting to whack off to it, it's not really erotica.

The two Joe Haldeman pieces bracketing the book did manage to convince me that I need never read one of his books, so in that sense it was quite educational.