Reviews for Threads of time

The average rating for Threads of time based on 2 reviews is 3.5 stars.

Review # 1 was written on 2020-01-24 00:00:00 Chris Elliott A valuable resource, with three excellent stories, some so-so stories, but more importantly, valuable essays by the author of each story, regarding their creative processes and narrative decisions. This is a book -- if you can get your hot little hands on it -- that would be a godsend to a science fiction or creative writing class. First, the very good news -- this collection features three stories that I regard as excellent. Samuel R. Delany's "We, in Some Strange Power's Employ, Move on a Rigorous Line" is so bright and funny and readable, it would be a stand-out in any collection. Yes, the technology is dated (a mobile power cable-laying apparatus and its attendant roughnecks hook isolated communities up to a world-wide electrical grid -- whether they want to be hooked up or not), but the ethical questions are red-hot topical: does progress have the right to ride roughshod over those who want to live a simpler, possibly less "enlightened" life? All sorts of current concerns could be substituted for the very retro power grid, from social media to (dare I say it?) anti-vaxxers. Beautifully written, and very accessible Delany. I regularly used Ursula K. Le Guin's "Nine Lives" and Robert Silverberg's "Sundance" in my Science Fiction class at Ohio State -- and I never got tired of talking about them, and hearing what my students had to say about them. Le Guin's story is superficially simple, but it's a masterful, heartbreaking story about the importance of family, and the relationships we make in our lives -- however unconventional those connections might be. And Silverberg's story of how the preparation of an alien planet for human colonists might reasonably be "mistaken" for genocide is a treat, important thematically, but also interesting for the way that Silverberg uses Point of View to make his ... er, point ... (If you ever have to teach a class explaining POV to unenthusiastic readers ... use this story ...) Of the other stories, some are ok, but don't blow my socks off. (Sorry, I'm not a big fan of Harlan Ellison. You might be. You might like his story if that's the sort of thing you like. I like Joanna Russ's SF very much, but I'm not crazy about fantasy. My bad ...) Some are very dated, and (imho) don't survive their datedness as elegantly as the Delany story. However, in the "Got lemons, make lemonade" Dept., I would say that it would make an interesting discussion to ask why some stores can survive datedness, and others sink under the weight of clearly outdated attitudes, style, assumptions, technology ... One or two are very, very bad. (I couldn't get beyond the first page of the story by the editor of the volume -- and yes, it was very naughty of him to include it ...) But you can probably track down the stories in this volume in any number of places, even online, so the true gold here is, of course, the essays by the authors. The book is organized thematically -- which is a little artificial and sometimes arbitrary and even perverse. (Why is "Sundance" pigeon-holed under "Setting" and not "Point of View," which I think is much more interesting than the setting? And I would have paid hard cash money to hear Silverberg's reflections on why he wrote it the way he did.) So, flawed, but valuable.

Review # 2 was written on 2018-08-28 00:00:00 Laurent Lalonde Okay, so this book is probably better than the cursory read through I gave it. Most of my reading this book comes down to formatting issues which I understand is not the most pertinent to how it actually reads. I guess part of the issues is I don't really like a lot of science fiction. So, why did I pick this up? I love fantasy and speculative fiction and there's a lot of crossover. Sometimes things just get lumped in together. But, I'm picky with science fiction. If it seems too hokey, I stop reading. Most of those essays were of the variety where I abandon ship. So then my reading the essays was not as enlightening. I did not find the writing instruction to be any more useful than what people have written in other writing books. The world building examples were well done. I bought a used paper book and think that I will keep it around for just that reason. I may update the review later. I think that if someone were to be writing speculative fiction, this book would be a good resource to have if a situation came up or if people felt stumped. But, there are books on writing that explain the craft better. And, one could argue that a good novel, regardless of genre, all have the same elements.