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A Tower for the Coming World
Who said restorative justice would be easy?
In these 18 speculative stories, novelettes, and novellas, M L Clark explores near and far-flung futures where the struggle to do better is messy, incomplete, and no less urgent than our own today.
Some of these pieces were first published in Analog, Clarkesworld, and F&SF, among other SF magazines. All have been refined, and are paired with reflections on the author's growth over more than a decade of publication, along with questions about how speculative fiction can help us to imagine better worlds.
In these 18 speculative stories, novelettes, and novellas, M L Clark explores near and far-flung futures where the struggle to do better is messy, incomplete, and no less urgent than our own today.
Some of these pieces were first published in Analog, Clarkesworld, and F&SF, among other SF magazines. All have been refined, and are paired with reflections on the author's growth over more than a decade of publication, along with questions about how speculative fiction can help us to imagine better worlds.
726 pages, Kindle Edition
Published July 4, 2023
1 person is currently reading
5 people want to read
About the author
M.L. Clark
42 books30 followersM L Clark is a writer of speculative fiction, along with book reviews, humanist essays, and news analysis at OnlySky.Media. Canadian by birth, Clark now calls Colombia home, and is an eager translator of classic Colombian lit as well.
In 2023, Clark will be launching six books from Sí, Hay Futuros Ediciones, an indie press that represents the persistence and necessity of hope amid setbacks.
Thanks for following along, if you do.
And thank you for pursuing your own, better dreams, either way.
In 2023, Clark will be launching six books from Sí, Hay Futuros Ediciones, an indie press that represents the persistence and necessity of hope amid setbacks.
Thanks for following along, if you do.
And thank you for pursuing your own, better dreams, either way.
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Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews
July 23, 2023
I have waited for a collection like this to come from Clark for several years. I have obtained copies of most of the volumes she contributed to, but to have all the works in one place, is truly a blessing. This collection contains pieces that have all been published in more traditional magazines and collections. Which is a pity for a few stories I am aware of, I consider missing from this collection, particularly Fat of the Land. It was amazing to finally read these stories as a collection.
The description of this volume is:
“Who said restorative justice would be easy?
In these 18 speculative stories, novelettes, and novellas, M L Clark explores near and far-flung futures where the struggle to do better is messy, incomplete, and no less urgent than our own today.
Some of these pieces were first published in Analog, Clarkesworld, and F&SF, among other SF magazines. All have been refined, and are paired with reflections on the author's growth over more than a decade of publication, along with questions about how speculative fiction can help us to imagine better worlds.”
The sections and the stories in the volume are:
Introduction
Family
Saying The Names
A Plague Of Zhe
Hydroponics 101
Seven Ways Of Looking At The Sun-Worshippers Of Yul-Katan
Belly Up
Society
We Who Are About To Watch You Die Salute You
The Stars, Their Faces Uplifted In Song
Mercy And The Mollusc
Love Unflinching, At Low- To Zero-G
Partnership
To Catch All Sorts Of Flying Things
Leave-Taking
Nine Words For Loneliness In The Language Of The Uma’u
Lost And Found
Community
And You Will Know Us By Our Monsters
Seeding The Mountain
The Pool Noodle Alien Posse
Aspiration
A Tower For The Coming World
Proximity Games
Prior to each story is a piece by Clark on the context of that story. These pieces are well worth reading and I encourage you not to skip over them. I greatly enjoyed reading these stories. I had only read about half of them prior to reading this collection. Some were still very familiar and others less so. Seeding The Mountain brought to mind Frank Herbert’s The Green Brain. A few of the stories brought to mind Alfred Bester’s works. There is not a story in the collection I did not appreciate. I plan to go back and reread the stories but this time in chronological order, to read them and see the progress in Clark’s writing. That order is:
Saying The Names
Lightspeed Magazine, March 2011
A Plague Of Zhe
Lightspeed Magazine, June 2012
Hydroponics 101
Analog Science Fiction & Fact Magazine, June 2013
We Who Are About To Watch You Die Salute You
Analog Science Fiction & Fact Magazine, March 2014
The Stars, Their Faces Uplifted In Song
GigaNotoSaurus, November 2015
Seven Ways Of Looking At The Sun-Worshippers Of Yul-Katan
Analog Science Fiction & Fact Magazine, February 2016
A Tower For The Coming World
Clarkesworld Magazine, December 2016
Belly Up
Analog Science Fiction & Fact Magazine, July/August 2017
To Catch All Sorts Of Flying Things
Clarkesworld Magazine, September 2019
And You Will Know Us By Our Monsters
The Future Fire, 2019
Leave-Taking
Clarkesworld Magazine, March 2020
Nine Words For Loneliness In The Language Of The Uma’u
Clarkesworld Magazine, June 2020
Seeding The Mountain
Analog Science Fiction & Fact Magazine, September 2020
Mercy And The Mollusc
Clarkesworld Magazine, February 2021
Love Unflinching, At Low- To Zero-G
Clarkesworld Magazine, October 2021
Lost And Found
Clarkesworld Magazine, October 2022
Proximity Games
Fantasy & Science Fiction Magazine, Jan/Feb 2023
The Pool Noodle Alien Posse
The Future Fire, April 2023
In the introduction Clark states:
“My stories also routinely involve a mystery of some sort: a puzzle that the protagonist must work out, even if the solution gives rise to a whole new set of much more difficult problems. (Open-ended closers, inviting the meatier work of social change beyond the page, are common.)
And these tales consistently reflect my own struggle, too: to find a way through personal setback and insufficient agency, towards a vocabulary that at the very least speaks to what keeps so many of us from dreaming better worlds.”
Those elements of mystery and of struggle are clear through these stories. And sometimes the mystery is the character understanding themselves. Further in the introduction, in fact, the concluding words of it, she states:
“They’re the ones that highlight how much we need each other—to keep from losing ourselves, our time, and our ever-fleeting agency to self-recrimination, shame, and fear.
On and off the page, the path to a healed world is never easy. We will mess up. We will always make mistakes.
And if we’re lucky, we will also grow: into a better understanding of our worlds—and also, of ourselves.
That’s where the real activism begins.”
These are stories of grappling with who we are, and finding our place. They are stories with mystery, and strife, and yet a continued will to push on. They are stories that will entertain, and also challenge the reader. And as the end words of the title story states:
“And from those roots the rest of us move up, somehow, and on.”
And so these stories and the stories or context behind them will inspire us to do so. So Ml Clark, we who have read your stories salute you, and look forward to future offerings from your pen in both short and long form fiction.
The description of this volume is:
“Who said restorative justice would be easy?
In these 18 speculative stories, novelettes, and novellas, M L Clark explores near and far-flung futures where the struggle to do better is messy, incomplete, and no less urgent than our own today.
Some of these pieces were first published in Analog, Clarkesworld, and F&SF, among other SF magazines. All have been refined, and are paired with reflections on the author's growth over more than a decade of publication, along with questions about how speculative fiction can help us to imagine better worlds.”
The sections and the stories in the volume are:
Introduction
Family
Saying The Names
A Plague Of Zhe
Hydroponics 101
Seven Ways Of Looking At The Sun-Worshippers Of Yul-Katan
Belly Up
Society
We Who Are About To Watch You Die Salute You
The Stars, Their Faces Uplifted In Song
Mercy And The Mollusc
Love Unflinching, At Low- To Zero-G
Partnership
To Catch All Sorts Of Flying Things
Leave-Taking
Nine Words For Loneliness In The Language Of The Uma’u
Lost And Found
Community
And You Will Know Us By Our Monsters
Seeding The Mountain
The Pool Noodle Alien Posse
Aspiration
A Tower For The Coming World
Proximity Games
Prior to each story is a piece by Clark on the context of that story. These pieces are well worth reading and I encourage you not to skip over them. I greatly enjoyed reading these stories. I had only read about half of them prior to reading this collection. Some were still very familiar and others less so. Seeding The Mountain brought to mind Frank Herbert’s The Green Brain. A few of the stories brought to mind Alfred Bester’s works. There is not a story in the collection I did not appreciate. I plan to go back and reread the stories but this time in chronological order, to read them and see the progress in Clark’s writing. That order is:
Saying The Names
Lightspeed Magazine, March 2011
A Plague Of Zhe
Lightspeed Magazine, June 2012
Hydroponics 101
Analog Science Fiction & Fact Magazine, June 2013
We Who Are About To Watch You Die Salute You
Analog Science Fiction & Fact Magazine, March 2014
The Stars, Their Faces Uplifted In Song
GigaNotoSaurus, November 2015
Seven Ways Of Looking At The Sun-Worshippers Of Yul-Katan
Analog Science Fiction & Fact Magazine, February 2016
A Tower For The Coming World
Clarkesworld Magazine, December 2016
Belly Up
Analog Science Fiction & Fact Magazine, July/August 2017
To Catch All Sorts Of Flying Things
Clarkesworld Magazine, September 2019
And You Will Know Us By Our Monsters
The Future Fire, 2019
Leave-Taking
Clarkesworld Magazine, March 2020
Nine Words For Loneliness In The Language Of The Uma’u
Clarkesworld Magazine, June 2020
Seeding The Mountain
Analog Science Fiction & Fact Magazine, September 2020
Mercy And The Mollusc
Clarkesworld Magazine, February 2021
Love Unflinching, At Low- To Zero-G
Clarkesworld Magazine, October 2021
Lost And Found
Clarkesworld Magazine, October 2022
Proximity Games
Fantasy & Science Fiction Magazine, Jan/Feb 2023
The Pool Noodle Alien Posse
The Future Fire, April 2023
In the introduction Clark states:
“My stories also routinely involve a mystery of some sort: a puzzle that the protagonist must work out, even if the solution gives rise to a whole new set of much more difficult problems. (Open-ended closers, inviting the meatier work of social change beyond the page, are common.)
And these tales consistently reflect my own struggle, too: to find a way through personal setback and insufficient agency, towards a vocabulary that at the very least speaks to what keeps so many of us from dreaming better worlds.”
Those elements of mystery and of struggle are clear through these stories. And sometimes the mystery is the character understanding themselves. Further in the introduction, in fact, the concluding words of it, she states:
“They’re the ones that highlight how much we need each other—to keep from losing ourselves, our time, and our ever-fleeting agency to self-recrimination, shame, and fear.
On and off the page, the path to a healed world is never easy. We will mess up. We will always make mistakes.
And if we’re lucky, we will also grow: into a better understanding of our worlds—and also, of ourselves.
That’s where the real activism begins.”
These are stories of grappling with who we are, and finding our place. They are stories with mystery, and strife, and yet a continued will to push on. They are stories that will entertain, and also challenge the reader. And as the end words of the title story states:
“And from those roots the rest of us move up, somehow, and on.”
And so these stories and the stories or context behind them will inspire us to do so. So Ml Clark, we who have read your stories salute you, and look forward to future offerings from your pen in both short and long form fiction.
October 5, 2023
I have been following M L Clark's work for years through their work that has appeared in Clarkesworld, especially, but also Analog and other magazines, and they are one of my favorite authors, so it was wonderful to find this collection of all (over 700 pages!) of their published short fiction.
These are remarkable, evocative, and beautiful tales that speak to political, personal, and philosophical issues with great imagination and empathy. It is particularly impressive that these stories -- even several that take place in the same universe -- are so varied in style and narrative approach. And while many explore the same themes, the breadth and depth of those explorations is so rich that, despite having read almost half of these stories before, I found new layers while re-reading them in this collection.
What makes this book even richer, though, are Clark's introductions: honest, critical observations of the contexts surrounding the creation and publication of each story. As a fellow writer *and* as a reader, I found these really illuminating and found that the stories became even more interesting because of them.
I cannot recommend this collection enough: it stands shoulder-to-shoulder with the work of today's best and most famous SF short fiction writers (Ted Chiang, Sarah Pinsker, Nancy Kress, etc.).
These are remarkable, evocative, and beautiful tales that speak to political, personal, and philosophical issues with great imagination and empathy. It is particularly impressive that these stories -- even several that take place in the same universe -- are so varied in style and narrative approach. And while many explore the same themes, the breadth and depth of those explorations is so rich that, despite having read almost half of these stories before, I found new layers while re-reading them in this collection.
What makes this book even richer, though, are Clark's introductions: honest, critical observations of the contexts surrounding the creation and publication of each story. As a fellow writer *and* as a reader, I found these really illuminating and found that the stories became even more interesting because of them.
I cannot recommend this collection enough: it stands shoulder-to-shoulder with the work of today's best and most famous SF short fiction writers (Ted Chiang, Sarah Pinsker, Nancy Kress, etc.).
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews