Review – Exhalation
Lately, I’ve been loving short stories and anthologies. Basically, every short story that I’ve read I either loved outright, or it was good enough to be worthy of a read.
Well, the stories in Exhalation are definitely challenging this. Not that they’re all bad, it’s just that they are such a mixed bag, that they kind of sour the whole anthology.
It starts off strong with The Merchant and the Alchemist’s Gate. A time travel story in the style of 1,001 Arabian nights, a tale within a tale, which lends itself well to the paradoxes of time travel.
Then, Exhalation which is interesting enough. And then, What’s Expected of Us, which honestly, I have a hard time remembering at all.
And then, The Lifecycle of Software Objects. Oh my god! It was soooo looong… way too long. Honestly, I think it’s the size of a novella. But worse, it could have been edited down to half its length and would have lost nothing.
The following stories were better. Dacey’s Patent Automatic Nanny is a fun take on the early 20th century child rearing ideas and The Truth of Fact, the Truth of Feeling is a philosophical exploration through an experiential story on the idea of having a prefect memory and its implications.
There are other stories in this anthology, but really, they’re all just ok.
I think part of the problem for this anthology is that, although all of these short stories were written by the same author, they are written in different styles, about different ideas, and are of an uneven quality. All this means is that they don’t go well together. They don’t pair favourably. It’s like having a pickle with warm milk and a steak. There is nothing inherently wrong with either one of those things, just not when they are put together.
Overall, I would skip it! Maybe just seek out the individual stories. I would recommend The Merchant and the Alchemist’s Gate.
