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Once Upon a Future Time, Volume 4
352 pages, Paperback
Published August 1, 2024
8 people want to read
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January 26, 2025
A bunch of fun sci-fi stories adapted from all kinds of fairy tales/famous stories. My five favorite ones were as follows:
1. The Emperor's Test by Elizabeth Lowham: Retelling of "The Emperor's New Clothes" except this time the Emperor, who is the protagonist's older brother, is getting a new ship made out of a material that only the worthy can see. Despite Netti's own feelings of unworthiness, she decides to help her brother expose the truth at the risk of looking like a fool in front of the entire empire. Super good! I love the brother/sister dynamic and how Netti decides to protect him.
2. Artificial Beauty by Sara Itka: Retelling of "Sleeping Beauty" where Aurora and the prince are AIs. One company makes "The Princess" program that slowly learns what emotions are and eventually names herself "Aurora" before having to shut down because an opposing company is trying to hack her. The opposing company makes "The Prince" program, and it has to figure out how to wake Aurora back up and also learns about emotions in the process. Super interesting take on the story, I loved how the author portrayed the AIs and that they decide at the end to discover what "love" is together (with the help of a lot of romcoms, lol).
3. The Adventures of Severin Miles, TFC by Tiffanie Gray: Retelling of "The White Snake." Not sure what that is, but this story was super fun. A ship technician comes across some super high-tech gadget that allows him to talk to robots. This ability helps him locate the Empress's lost ring, and he's granted his wish to travel and gain an education. On his voyage, though, he stumbles upon a plot to kill the passengers and teams up with a bunch of bots to take down the captain and pirates. I really liked his ability to talk to bots and that he treats them like he would any person. And their plot to defeat the pirates was great (rat bots!).
4. Spinning Gold by Jason P. Crawford: Retelling of "Rumplestiltskin" where a woman is taken onto a top secret military project to test out an AI. She hates the parameters of the mission and asks the AI to do it in a plausible way that looks like it'll be successful but will ultimately fail. At the end of the project, the AI asks for her help to escape, which she agrees to. But then the AI visits her again saying it needs to download into a person so it can gain physical experience, and her dying husband is the perfect candidate. She refuses, but the AI cures her husband and then gives her three days to come up with its kill code, otherwise it will download into her husband and he'll be replaced with the AI. Super good! I like how it started out with her on trial, so through the whole story I knew this AI was no good. The reveal at the end was brutal, too.
5. Marshmallow Moon by Brittany Rainsdon: Retelling of "Hansel and Gretel" where their stepmom abandons them on a desolate planet except for a biosphere controlled by this scientist who has a gene pool. The gene pool allows her to change people however she wants, and she holds Hansel hostage while she tries to change Gretel into this woman who this scientist arenged to marry a rich prince but backed out at the last minute. Gretel tricks the scientist into the gene pool herself, though, through the use of a hologram, hehe. This one was so unique and a creative twist on the story! Once again, I liked how the author did the brother/sister dynamic; super cute.
1. The Emperor's Test by Elizabeth Lowham: Retelling of "The Emperor's New Clothes" except this time the Emperor, who is the protagonist's older brother, is getting a new ship made out of a material that only the worthy can see. Despite Netti's own feelings of unworthiness, she decides to help her brother expose the truth at the risk of looking like a fool in front of the entire empire. Super good! I love the brother/sister dynamic and how Netti decides to protect him.
2. Artificial Beauty by Sara Itka: Retelling of "Sleeping Beauty" where Aurora and the prince are AIs. One company makes "The Princess" program that slowly learns what emotions are and eventually names herself "Aurora" before having to shut down because an opposing company is trying to hack her. The opposing company makes "The Prince" program, and it has to figure out how to wake Aurora back up and also learns about emotions in the process. Super interesting take on the story, I loved how the author portrayed the AIs and that they decide at the end to discover what "love" is together (with the help of a lot of romcoms, lol).
3. The Adventures of Severin Miles, TFC by Tiffanie Gray: Retelling of "The White Snake." Not sure what that is, but this story was super fun. A ship technician comes across some super high-tech gadget that allows him to talk to robots. This ability helps him locate the Empress's lost ring, and he's granted his wish to travel and gain an education. On his voyage, though, he stumbles upon a plot to kill the passengers and teams up with a bunch of bots to take down the captain and pirates. I really liked his ability to talk to bots and that he treats them like he would any person. And their plot to defeat the pirates was great (rat bots!).
4. Spinning Gold by Jason P. Crawford: Retelling of "Rumplestiltskin" where a woman is taken onto a top secret military project to test out an AI. She hates the parameters of the mission and asks the AI to do it in a plausible way that looks like it'll be successful but will ultimately fail. At the end of the project, the AI asks for her help to escape, which she agrees to. But then the AI visits her again saying it needs to download into a person so it can gain physical experience, and her dying husband is the perfect candidate. She refuses, but the AI cures her husband and then gives her three days to come up with its kill code, otherwise it will download into her husband and he'll be replaced with the AI. Super good! I like how it started out with her on trial, so through the whole story I knew this AI was no good. The reveal at the end was brutal, too.
5. Marshmallow Moon by Brittany Rainsdon: Retelling of "Hansel and Gretel" where their stepmom abandons them on a desolate planet except for a biosphere controlled by this scientist who has a gene pool. The gene pool allows her to change people however she wants, and she holds Hansel hostage while she tries to change Gretel into this woman who this scientist arenged to marry a rich prince but backed out at the last minute. Gretel tricks the scientist into the gene pool herself, though, through the use of a hologram, hehe. This one was so unique and a creative twist on the story! Once again, I liked how the author did the brother/sister dynamic; super cute.
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