Back in June of 2023, ![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
ambyr and I started a book club because we had both purchased Library of America's "The Future is Female" 2 volume short story collection, and, at least for my part, I figured I would be more likely to get down to reading it if there was some structure around my plans to do so. We invited mrissa and some other folks from the scintillation discord to join us (apologies for not tagging everyone, I don't remember everyone's DW tags offhand), and found a time that seemed to work, and for the most part have met every other week since then.
Early on, we wound up settling on reading 4 stories per meeting (mostly based around how many would be good to discuss per meeting, rather than how much people could read between meetings, though I am sure some folks appreciate only having a smallish batch to read each session).
We have now read NINE short story anthologies (though some of the anthologies are sometimes a little bit confused about what qualifies as a short story), and have renamed the group "Sci-Fi Outside the Spotlight" (rather than the original uninspired name "The Future is Female" chosen simply because that was the first two books we were reading).
The anthologies we have read so far are:
pauraque has been sharing notes and thoughts on the stories and meetings.
Prior to this book club, I think my exposure to short stories was Ted Chiang's Stories of Your Life and Others, Vonnegut's Welcome to the Monkey House, and the book Characters in Conflict (this can't be the version we had in my class, because it doesn't contain To Build a Fire, but it does have the same cover image as the version we had).
One thing I forever associate with this book is that there are four conflicts. Man vs. Man, Man vs. Nature, Man vs. Self, and the one I can never remember. Maybe man vs. machine? Man vs. Society? Let's say man vs. Protein.
So you could say that I was fairly new to the genre of short stories, when we started. And it's not like I'm an expert now or anything. But I am a fan! And I know to be insulted when people put book chapters in my short story anthologies! DON'T DO THIS. IT IS RUDE!
What I want to do is look back over the Table of Contents from these volumes and highlight some stories and authors that stuck with me. Some of them may be "oh, of course, Lewis, everyone knows that story/author is good" type mentions, but that's just something that you all have to deal with due to my being a relative newbie.
The Future is Female Volume 1
Space Episode, Lesli Perri (1941) — This story sticks with me as one that benefitted from being read in a book club setting. I read it and thought "okay, it's a pretty simple space adventure they're on a ship a thing goes wrong, they snap to action, etc.", and it was only due to the group discussion that I saw how it was undermining some gender stereotypes without being flagrant or in your face about it. My understanding of the story really shifted from pre-discussion to post-discussion, even though, ultimately, it is not the deepest or most innovative story we read.
Created He Them, Alice Eleanor Jones (1955) — This is a very effective bit of horror that I have written about a couple of times before, I won't belabor it now.
The Barbarian, Joanna Russ (1968) — Joanna Russ can write. Not a surprise to anyone, I am sure. This collection also contained a CL Moore story "The Black God's Kiss" which was absolutely riveting until a very deflating ending, and it was very puzzling why that story was in a sci fi collection, but it did sort of make sense given how much Jirel of Jory seems to be an influence on Russ's Alyx stories.
The Future is Female Volume 2
Frog Pond, Chelsea Quinn Yarbro (1971) — This story of ecological degradation and conflict between urban and rural outlook was unsettling in a good way. It made me want to read more by Yarbro (though, to my chagrin, most of what Yarbro is known for in her other writing is a very long vampire series, and not this kind of subtle eco-horror)
When It Changed, Joanna Russ (1972) — I guess I am going to play favorites a bit, here: if I learned one thing from these volumes it is that I needed to be reading more Joanna Russ. I have begun to remedy this.
The Screwfly Solution, Racoona Sheldon (1977) — I don't think of myself as one for horror, but the ones that stick with me seem to be disproportionately horror-heavy. There is a not so great but not terrible Masters of Horror episode that adapts this story, but i think the story does a better job at the tone than a movie/tv episode can do.
There are some really good stories that I've note mentioned, and some stories that were really interesting to discuss but not very good as stories which I've not mentioned here, but that's about all the time/space I have for these volumes now.
Rediscovery Volume 2
Why did we only do volume 2 of Rediscovery, I hear you ask. Well, it is the fault of the series, since volume one covers 1958-1963, volume 2 covers 1953-1957, and volume 3 covers 1964-1968. Does that make any sense, organizationally? No. It does not. Anyway, we started with the chronologically earliest volume.
The overarching takeaway from this volume is that there is a danger in having third parties write afterwards to the stories in an anthology which seek to both provide author bios and story context. Often those afterwards will include frustrating, inaccurate takes on the stories, and the wrong ratio of author bio to story discussion. So, just as we say "don't put chapters of books in your short story anthology", you really only have three sensible choices for who provides commentary on the stories: 1) the authors themselves, 2) translators, if there has been translation, or 3) the editor of the anthology, as the person who has the bird's eye view on the whole anthology.
Captive Audience, Anne Warren Griffith (1953) — This was an interesting story that dealt with ubiquitous advertising, and had a gendered take on roles and resistance in a corporate consumer dystopia.
The Piece Thing, Carol Emshwiller (1956) — This story is about an alien infant reaching out to humans it encounters. Emshwiller had a piece in the first Future is Female volume that I had also liked (and which featured a POV dog, iirc), but this one I think showcases her ability to capture alien POV. I wouldn't say this is the most innovative piece (though I guess I don't know how well worn this territory was in 1956) but it does what it is doing well.
The Queer Ones, Leigh Brackett (1957) — One which definitely stuck with me. The story is about aliens getting noticed in a rural-ish setting, who, if I remember correctly, are identifiable for being redheads, maybe? But also have like the wrong number of ribs or some such. The story is playing off of communist scare tropes and has a sort of detective story vibe, but is mostly about this journalist tracking down the father of these mutant kids and then eventually helping the aliens escape persecution.
Okay, this has taken longer to type up this much than I anticipated, so maybe I'll break it into three parts, and do three anthologies at each go.
Remember kids: if you are making a short story anthology: the contents of your anthology should be short stories!
ambyr and I started a book club because we had both purchased Library of America's "The Future is Female" 2 volume short story collection, and, at least for my part, I figured I would be more likely to get down to reading it if there was some structure around my plans to do so. We invited mrissa and some other folks from the scintillation discord to join us (apologies for not tagging everyone, I don't remember everyone's DW tags offhand), and found a time that seemed to work, and for the most part have met every other week since then. Early on, we wound up settling on reading 4 stories per meeting (mostly based around how many would be good to discuss per meeting, rather than how much people could read between meetings, though I am sure some folks appreciate only having a smallish batch to read each session).
We have now read NINE short story anthologies (though some of the anthologies are sometimes a little bit confused about what qualifies as a short story), and have renamed the group "Sci-Fi Outside the Spotlight" (rather than the original uninspired name "The Future is Female" chosen simply because that was the first two books we were reading).
The anthologies we have read so far are:
- The Future is Female: Classic Science Fiction Stories by Women v. 1
- The Future is Female: Classic Science Fiction Stories by Women v. 2
- Rediscovery: Science Fiction By Women v. 2 (1953-1957)
- Dark Matter: A Century of Speculative Fiction from the African Diaspora
- Dark Matter v. 2: Reading the Bones
- Wandering Stars: An Anthology of Jewish Fantasy and Science Fiction
- The Way Spring Arrives and Other Stories: A Collection of Chinese Science Fiction and Fantasy in Translation from a Visionary Team of Female and Nonbinary Creators
- Latinx Rising: An Anthology of Latinx Science Fiction and Fantasy
- A Thousand Beginnings and Endings: 16 Retellings of Asian Myths and Legends
pauraque has been sharing notes and thoughts on the stories and meetings.Prior to this book club, I think my exposure to short stories was Ted Chiang's Stories of Your Life and Others, Vonnegut's Welcome to the Monkey House, and the book Characters in Conflict (this can't be the version we had in my class, because it doesn't contain To Build a Fire, but it does have the same cover image as the version we had).
One thing I forever associate with this book is that there are four conflicts. Man vs. Man, Man vs. Nature, Man vs. Self, and the one I can never remember. Maybe man vs. machine? Man vs. Society? Let's say man vs. Protein.
So you could say that I was fairly new to the genre of short stories, when we started. And it's not like I'm an expert now or anything. But I am a fan! And I know to be insulted when people put book chapters in my short story anthologies! DON'T DO THIS. IT IS RUDE!
What I want to do is look back over the Table of Contents from these volumes and highlight some stories and authors that stuck with me. Some of them may be "oh, of course, Lewis, everyone knows that story/author is good" type mentions, but that's just something that you all have to deal with due to my being a relative newbie.
The Future is Female Volume 1
Space Episode, Lesli Perri (1941) — This story sticks with me as one that benefitted from being read in a book club setting. I read it and thought "okay, it's a pretty simple space adventure they're on a ship a thing goes wrong, they snap to action, etc.", and it was only due to the group discussion that I saw how it was undermining some gender stereotypes without being flagrant or in your face about it. My understanding of the story really shifted from pre-discussion to post-discussion, even though, ultimately, it is not the deepest or most innovative story we read.
Created He Them, Alice Eleanor Jones (1955) — This is a very effective bit of horror that I have written about a couple of times before, I won't belabor it now.
The Barbarian, Joanna Russ (1968) — Joanna Russ can write. Not a surprise to anyone, I am sure. This collection also contained a CL Moore story "The Black God's Kiss" which was absolutely riveting until a very deflating ending, and it was very puzzling why that story was in a sci fi collection, but it did sort of make sense given how much Jirel of Jory seems to be an influence on Russ's Alyx stories.
The Future is Female Volume 2
Frog Pond, Chelsea Quinn Yarbro (1971) — This story of ecological degradation and conflict between urban and rural outlook was unsettling in a good way. It made me want to read more by Yarbro (though, to my chagrin, most of what Yarbro is known for in her other writing is a very long vampire series, and not this kind of subtle eco-horror)
When It Changed, Joanna Russ (1972) — I guess I am going to play favorites a bit, here: if I learned one thing from these volumes it is that I needed to be reading more Joanna Russ. I have begun to remedy this.
The Screwfly Solution, Racoona Sheldon (1977) — I don't think of myself as one for horror, but the ones that stick with me seem to be disproportionately horror-heavy. There is a not so great but not terrible Masters of Horror episode that adapts this story, but i think the story does a better job at the tone than a movie/tv episode can do.
There are some really good stories that I've note mentioned, and some stories that were really interesting to discuss but not very good as stories which I've not mentioned here, but that's about all the time/space I have for these volumes now.
Rediscovery Volume 2
Why did we only do volume 2 of Rediscovery, I hear you ask. Well, it is the fault of the series, since volume one covers 1958-1963, volume 2 covers 1953-1957, and volume 3 covers 1964-1968. Does that make any sense, organizationally? No. It does not. Anyway, we started with the chronologically earliest volume.
The overarching takeaway from this volume is that there is a danger in having third parties write afterwards to the stories in an anthology which seek to both provide author bios and story context. Often those afterwards will include frustrating, inaccurate takes on the stories, and the wrong ratio of author bio to story discussion. So, just as we say "don't put chapters of books in your short story anthology", you really only have three sensible choices for who provides commentary on the stories: 1) the authors themselves, 2) translators, if there has been translation, or 3) the editor of the anthology, as the person who has the bird's eye view on the whole anthology.
Captive Audience, Anne Warren Griffith (1953) — This was an interesting story that dealt with ubiquitous advertising, and had a gendered take on roles and resistance in a corporate consumer dystopia.
The Piece Thing, Carol Emshwiller (1956) — This story is about an alien infant reaching out to humans it encounters. Emshwiller had a piece in the first Future is Female volume that I had also liked (and which featured a POV dog, iirc), but this one I think showcases her ability to capture alien POV. I wouldn't say this is the most innovative piece (though I guess I don't know how well worn this territory was in 1956) but it does what it is doing well.
The Queer Ones, Leigh Brackett (1957) — One which definitely stuck with me. The story is about aliens getting noticed in a rural-ish setting, who, if I remember correctly, are identifiable for being redheads, maybe? But also have like the wrong number of ribs or some such. The story is playing off of communist scare tropes and has a sort of detective story vibe, but is mostly about this journalist tracking down the father of these mutant kids and then eventually helping the aliens escape persecution.
Okay, this has taken longer to type up this much than I anticipated, so maybe I'll break it into three parts, and do three anthologies at each go.
Remember kids: if you are making a short story anthology: the contents of your anthology should be short stories!
