Tuesday, March 18, 2014

Review: Diverse Energies

Title: Diverse Energies
Editors: Tobias S. Buckell and Joe Monti
Genre: short story, dystopia, sci-fi, romance, YA
Published: 20 November 2013
Pages: 368
Rating: 6 / 10
Challenges: NetGalley, Lucky No. 14

Synopsis: "In a world gone wrong, heroes and villains are not always easy to distinguish and every individual has the ability to contribute something powerful.

In this stunning collection of original and rediscovered stories of tragedy and hope, the stars are a diverse group of students, street kids, good girls, kidnappers, and child laborers pitted against their environments, their governments, differing cultures, and sometimes one another as they seek answers in their dystopian worlds. Take a journey through time from a nuclear nightmare of the past to society’s far future beyond Earth with these eleven stories by masters of speculative fiction. Includes stories by Paolo Bacigalupi, Ursula K. Le Guin, Malinda Lo, Cindy Pon, Daniel H. Wilson, and more." (from GoodReads)

My Review: I'm not usually a fan of short stories, but I requested this one from NetGalley because I like some of the authors mentioned and I love supporting books about diverse characters. The stories are all interesting, but there are definitely some that I enjoyed more than others. My favorites were "Uncertainty Principle" by K. Tempest Bradford (a girl discovers that she's the only person who can detect temporal anomalies), "Gods of the Dimming Light" by Greg van Eekhout (a modernization of Ragnarok - especially cool because I read it the day before Ragnarok was thought to occur!), and "Blue Skies" by Cindy Pon (not your typical kidnapping story). The others weren't bad, but these were the three that I found the most interesting and wish I had gotten more story for.

This collection is great because of the much-needed diversity it features. However, the downside is that so much of it is bleak. The worlds these authors have created are beautiful and fascinating, but also really terrible if I were to actually live in them. I would love to see a collection of stories (or novels) about these characters when they're happy and living normal lives.

Disclaimer: I received an electronic review copy from NetGalley in exchange for my review.

Other Reviews:

If you have reviewed this book as well, leave me a message in the comments and I'll link to your review.

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